“Yodogima?” commanded he, after a while.

“Yes, father.”

“What were you just now thinking about?”

“Amida, most honorable father.”

“Your own, or some other fair one’s goddess of mercy; you are so considerate, my daughter?”

“Mine, dear father,” replied she, without any change of expression or an apparent heart-beat.

“Humph!” ejaculated Shibata, thoughtfully; “it is strange how affinities get mixed; I myself possessed somewhat a consciousness—of Amaterasu, though, the goddess of love. I wonder what is the time; the hour must draw nigh: the barons will soon be gathering; it is really getting dark. You may retire now, to make ready; Katsutoya shall be present, and your maid must grow impatient—though, I promise, nature has left really little to be done, and you need not blush; a father is privileged, you know.”

In the great hall, at another side of the high-walled inclosure—with its ponderous gate and turreted angles, surrounding a network of tile-covered, wood-lacquered buildings or grained-post colonnades, with here and there a shrine or a bell or a row of lanterns or a fretwork of gold—sat Sakuma and Gonroku, the one Shibata’s chief captain and the other his natural son.

Sakuma had just returned with added laurels; a new fief or more had been wrested from Uesugi (to the eastward) his master’s old-time foe and a daimyo of undoubted rank. To beat him in battle was no mean feat, and this, Sakuma’s latest triumph, had once more demonstrated the power and efficiency of Kitanoshi, Shibata’s stronghold, in whose castle all the great barons formerly subject to Nobunaga were then about to assemble. Shibata, the lord daimyo of all Echizen, had issued the invitations, ostensibly to cement friendships and perpetuate in authority the house of their late master, Nobunaga. Gonroku, too, felt the force of his father’s growing ascendency, but may have been just now a little jealous; duties elsewhere, to the westward, escorting Katsutoya to Nagahama castle—lately surrendered to them by Hideyoshi—had disappointed and kept him personally from the latest battle field.

The perfume of azalea freshened the room; lanterns suspended everywhere cast a subdued light into the farthest corners; soft, velvety matting set in oblongs edged round with black-lacquered frames covered the floor and a huge vase of old Satsuma ware, with a single scroll hung at the back, constituted the only decoration. Sakuma and Gonroku had come in early, and seating themselves at one side spoke in low anxious tones or whacked cautiously their pipes, as convenience required, against the one hibachi (brazier) shared between them.