Page:Zodiac stories by Blanche Mary Channing.pdf/63

46 Cherry-Bloom gave a gasp, but her politeness rose to the occasion; she must answer.

"The honorable dress of the August One is not what we are accustomed to seeing," she stammered.

The August One looked down at himself.

"A striped blazer and white ducks—I suppose it does strike the native mind as odd," he said to himself in English.

Cherry-Bloom was afraid that she had offended him, and threw herself at his feet afresh.

"The clothes of the Serene Sake-Demon are all-magnificent!" she said, "They dazzle my miserable eyes!"

The young man burst into a fit of laughter.

"What in the world do you take me for?" he asked as soon as he could speak.

"Did you call me a sake-demon?"

Cherry-Bloom knocked on the ground