The voice of the Spring was speaking clearly.
"And you really want to go to Japan, sweetheart? It's the first time
I've heard you say you want to go."
"Uncle and Aunt Murata in Paris used always to say about now, 'If we go back to Japan we shall be in time to see the cherry-blossoms.'"
"Why," asked Geoffrey, "do the Japanese make such a fuss about their cherry-blossoms?"
"They must be very pretty," answered his wife, "like great clouds of snow. Besides, the cherry-flowers are supposed to be like the Japanese spirit."
"So you are my little cherry-blossom—is that right?"
"Oh no, not the women," she replied, "the men are the cherry-blossoms."
Geoffrey laughed. It seemed absurd to him to compare a man to the frail and transient beauty of a flower.
"Then what about the Japanese ladies," he asked, "if the men are blossoms?"
Asako did not think they had any special flower to symbolise their charms. She suggested,—