"Here, Ishii." Kikuchi took charge. "There should be a doctor at the American Embassy on a day like this. Get out through the entrance on the other side, across the tennis court and through Sannencho Lane. If any one stops you, show them this Foreign Office seal on the envelope. Here," he turned to Kent. "Sign this. I'm asking them to send a doctor over here."
Apparently all the Foreign Office people had gathered in the main building. In this wing it was quiet, but with a roaring background of sound, as of surf pounding on rocks, the clamor of the mob outside. The girl stirred, opened her eyes. "Hugh-san," her hand faltered towards him. "It's good you're here, Hugh-san."
"What's that; so she's a friend of yours, Kent." But Kikuchi received no answer. He looked at the other, who had thrown himself in front of the couch, leaning over the girl; then he tiptoed out of the room.
The girl had fallen into a stupor again. From outside a roaring crackle became louder and louder. The windows crimsoned with vitreous red glitter.
"Hugh-san," she was trying to raise her head, the voice faint, dreamy. "See, sunrise over the mountains again; but I want to sleep some more, I'm tired." Poor little girl, evidently her mind was back in Hakone. "Hugh-san, sing some more," her hand falteringly sought his. "Sing the 'rock-a-by baby' song again."
"Yes, yes, go to sleep, dear. You'll be all right presently; but now you must just sleep." He smoothed her hair.
"Yes, I'll sleep; but you must sing to me, Hugh-san." The weak voice was insistent.
Sing! Must this damned grotesque inspiration pursue him even into the shadow of death! It was monstrous, impossible, this necessity of drooling nursery nonsense in the very shadow of racking tragedy. He cleared his voice, contrived a croaking sound, choked, tried again, managed it. Leaning forward over her, he intoned his miserable ditty. "Rock-a-by, baby——" he began even to find a sort of comfort in it, the monotonous repetition of the meaningless stanzas; kept droning them mechanically, endlessly,—"when the wind blows the cradle will rock——" The impression of a large, white hand on the girl's breast just before him took form in his mind. He looked up. It was the new doctor from St. Luke's.
"Unless you are singing for your own edification, Mr. Kent, you might as well stop." The voice was cold, registered the young man's intense disapproval. "This girl is dead, stone dead."
He stared. It was, of course, what he had expected; still the announcement, the definite irrevocableness thereof stunned him. A new figure, a woman's, came into the field of his vision. Sylvia. He stretched out his hand to her.