Page:The Tale of Genji.pdf/101

Rh a hand to my upbringing, it was to you only, dear nurse, that I was deeply and tenderly attached. When I grew up I could not any longer be often in your company. I have not even been able to come here and see you as often as I wanted to. But in all the long time which has passed since I was last here, I have thought a great deal about you and wished that life did not force so many bitter partings upon us.’

So he spoke tenderly. The princely scent of the sleeve which he had raised to brush away his tears filled the low and narrow room, and even the young people, who had till now been irritated by their mother’s obvious pride at having been the nurse of so splendid a prince, found themselves in tears.

Having arranged for continual masses to be said on the sick woman’s behalf, he took his leave, ordering Koremitsu to light him with a candle. As they left the house he looked at the fan upon which the white flowers had been laid. He now saw that there was writing on it, a poem carelessly but elegantly scribbled: ‘The flower that puzzled you was but the Yūgao, strange beyond knowing in its dress of shining dew.’ It was written with a deliberate negligence which seemed to aim at concealing the writer’s status and identity. But for all that the hand showed a breeding and distinction which agreeably surprised him. ‘Who lives in the house on the left?’ he asked. Koremitsu, who did not at all want to act as a go-between, replied that he had only been at his mother’s for five or six days and had been so much occupied by her illness that he had not asked any questions about the neighbours. ‘I want to know for a quite harmless reason’ said Gengi. ‘There is something about this fan which raises a rather important point. I positively must settle it. You would oblige me by making enquiries from someone who knows the neighbourhood.’ Koremitsu