A man and a woman were whispering to each other by a shaded lamp in a quiet detached room which was partly hedged by unohana whose snow-white flowers gleamed in the moonlight. Only the frogs croaking in the neighbouring paddy-field broke the stillness of the night.
The man was Sakuma Shichiroyemon, a councillor of Oda Nobuyuki, the lord of the castle of Iwakura, in the province, of Owari. About fifty-two years old, he was a fierce-looking man with powerful muscles and bristling gray whiskers. Haughty, quick-tempered and very jealous he tyrannized over his subordinates and was accordingly an object of hatred throughout the clan. The person with whom he was now talking was a woman close upon his own age—the supervisor of Lord Oda’s maids-of-honour, by name O-Tora-no-Kata. Being a cross, cunning, and avaricious hag, she was regarded by the maids with terror and detestation. “Birds of a feather flock together.” She had wormed her way into the good graces of Shichiroyemon in order to make her position secure; whilst the latter, on his part, had set her to spy on the actions of his lord, as well as of his colleagues and inferiors.
“What’s that, Madame Tora?” asked Shichiroyemon, his face reddening with anger. “Do you mean to tell me that our lord is going to set that green boy of a Hachiya over me as Prime Councillor?”
“I repeat what I hear;—all the maids say so....”
“Pshaw! How I do hate that Hachiya—that peasant’s son born in obscurity. Who knows where he comes from? A pale, smooth-faced womanish sprig! How glibly he flatters our lord! He has never been in battle; what use is such a bookworm in these warlike days? And yet this inexperienced stripling is going to be appointed Prime Councillor! Humph, what infatuation! Ha, ha, ha!”
“It will not boil yet. The fire is not strong enough.”
“Eh! The fire?”
“Ha, ha!” said O-Tora with a disagreeable smile. “Here I have good fuel to make you burn!”
“Don’t try to annoy me like that,” said he impatiently. “Tell me quickly.”
“It is the secret of secrets. I can’t readily ... w-e-l-l ... sell it.” She spoke slowly, with an emphasis on the word ‘sell.’