Momentarily, at the mention of Ieyasu’s love, Yodogima brightened; something moved her to a kindlier remembrance of the man who had so often defeated his own intended purpose, seemingly with the sheerest kind of stupid neglect. That he had once loved her there could be no doubt, but the possibility of his having reencouraged that love now grew the remoter, in her estimation, with each attempted move on his part to set aside, as presumable, an established, developing progression.

A regime, however, that invited, till fixed and consolidated, every upstart in the empire to try for individual ascendency—a privilege the taiko would not have denied any; he loved too well the pleasure of crushing them. Yodogima would have so marshaled her forces that none could disturb, but all might rise in one united, orderly and elastic trend toward a goal commonly beckoning back for the best that God had given man. She had tested this Ieyasu from a standpoint none other had been privileged, had found out long ago Oyea’s temper, if not her purpose, and could not now, in face of the circumstances, bring herself to believe that she, a mother; Hideyori, her kind; the nation, at large; or an ideal, that she had conceived, could endure the vagaries of a man so attuned and advised as Ieyasu had proven himself, whatever the sentiment.

“Ishida,” she surmised, “will do only his part; every man is born unto some righteous purpose.”

The messenger awaited her pleasure.

“Comfort Maeda with the intelligence that I shall come forthwith,” replied the princess.

Ishida met her at the door:

“You are too late, Yodogima! Maeda is dead.”

Ieyasu stood by, and with Ishida’s addressing the princess so familiarly a flush at first reddened his face, then a cold pallor revealed the blow finding lodgement in his heart.

Nor had Ishida’s words roused in her lesser feelings; more certainly of contempt. She had, perhaps, at a fatal moment, unduly sacrificed her bearing toward him, but she had judged him not manly, yet wiser than to endanger himself by resolving a license granted, into an indiscretion, possibly fatal to both alike.

“You apparently take an undue advantage, Ishida; please explain yourself,” commanded the princess.