“Quite democratic, Yodogima, and—perchance justly so; were men without some wholesome check the world should sooner reach its final doom.”

“But we live, Ieyasu, and—is not life worth the while? Does it not portend something more than merely living?”

“It would were it not for the price—but trust me, Yodogima; I live only for you.”

“I do.”

“Then you are mine, and the world can take care of itself.”

They bowed low, and Ieyasu, strengthened, as only a wholesome appreciation can strengthen, took his leave, fully determined to remove every obstacle to the consummation of a love that had grown and ripened from childhood associations, that germinated with an earliest contact and sent its roots deep down into the fertile soil of a consciously overpowering affinity.

Yodogima stood still at first, fairly puzzled at the daring of Ieyasu’s conception.

All that time or task had taught her seemed crushed underneath a possible truth. Were man but a stretch between something and nothingness, then generation must be a curse and love only a consequence. And if it were not true and marriage were a thing in which a parent, the state, or society at large rightly had an interest, then her answer had been a crime; she had transgressed, and therein must lie the sin.

Then she remembered that the sages had sung in all lands and at all times of man’s strength and woman’s worse than weakness.

“I will trust him and he shall prove the truth.”