She lived near Kanda-bashi, she said. They passed along the crowded streets, crossed the Ginza and turned down the broad street along the palace moat. Here there was no one. He took her hand, and, hand-in-hand, child-like, as do young Japanese couples, they walked on. But she was in no mood for personal talk. The moon; see how the light refracted on the green-oxidized copper roofs of the palace buildings, and the black reflections of the gnarled pines in the silvery water! She was thoughtful, a little serious. He walked on with her, wholly happy at the sense of her nearness, the softness of the small hand in his, languorously content.
At the Kanda bridge she stopped. "Here I leave you. I live over there." She indicated a dark mass of houses on the other side of the bridge. "And thank you, Kent-san, you have been so good to me."
But he held on to her hand. "But, Adachi-san, first you must tell me when I may see you again. I must see you, often, like this."
She smiled a little. "Why?"
"Of course. We shall be friends, good friends, shan't we?"
"But I am always so busy, really. I have so little time."
"Of course, you have time. Say Wednesday." She shook her head. "Well, then, Saturday afternoon; then I know you have time. I shall wait for you in Hibiya, at the fountain by the wistaria arbor, at noon, please."
But again she shook her head. He clung to her hand, insisting. Suddenly she pulled it free, laughed. "All right then, next Saturday." She moved away a few steps, then abruptly, impulsively, she plucked from her hair a rose, held it over to him. "For you, Kent-san. Good-night, o-yasumi nasai."
He stood holding the flower, watching her as she moved swiftly over the bridge and disappeared in a narrow lane between the dark buildings. He found a rickshaw. Despite subconscious realization that the day had, after all, been drab, commonplace, disappointing, he felt in an exalted mood. The trotting figure of the rickshaw coolie faded from his consciousness; it was as if he were alone, with his thoughts, dreams. What a wonderfully complicated little beauty she was, entirely different from any girl he had known, had ever imagined; mysterious with her passionate devotion to the new things, art, the political flux and ferment, her peculiarly insistent abhorrence at the luxuries of the rich, and then, finally, that inconsistent flash of coquetry. Now he must carry on, get the explanation of all this, learn her thoughts, attain intimacy. She piqued him with her elusiveness, but it added to his zest. But what did he wish, after all? He enjoyed the sense of being surrounded, enveloped in her beauty; yet he was not in love with her—no, he was not—there was no desire of conquest, to embrace her, to clasp her in his arms in possession. And still he had realized distinct enjoyment at holding her hand. It was intensely interesting, her evident acquaintance with the manipulation of the hidden strings which actuated the secret workings of the government behind the scenes. Yes, that also caused attraction; yet he had been drawn to her, irresistibly, with the direct certainty which compels steel to a magnet, even before he had heard a word from her, by the sheer compulsion of her beauty. Hang it, it was all very puzzling, this not being able to define what was really stirring within one's own mind. Still, he was no psychoanalyst. He gave it up. He would let the thing take its course, let fate work it out according to its own inscrutable arrangement.
He held the rose to his face; yes, he was certain; of all the incongruous, clashing incidents of the day, this was the one he liked best.