A few hours of brilliant sunshine and all the dampness had been sucked up from the earth; the air was warmed and dried and the mists rolled back from the garden, revealing a fairy-land too exquisite to be real.
Something especially wonderful had happened that morning. The faces of the little maids had been filled with a joyous expectancy as they hurried from room to room on their household duties. A mysterious smile hovered on the lips of Komatsu when he appeared to receive his orders. Even old O'Haru was secretly immensely pleased about something, but they all had evidently agreed among themselves to keep the great news secret until the psychological moment had arrived when the ladies of the house and Mr. Campbell had assembled on the piazza just before breakfast.
When this occurred word was swiftly and silently conveyed over the household and all persons belonging to the domestic staff instantly gathered in the hall and doorway.
"Why, what on earth is the matter with them?" Miss Campbell asked uneasily. "Will you please look: the entire household collected in the front hall."
Mr. Campbell was as much at a loss as his cousin.
"They look as if they were going to play a joke on us," observed Billie,
"Did you ever see anything so guileless and simple-hearted as they are?"
"Oh, I know what it is," cried Mary, clasping her hands with delight. "There," she said, pointing to the old gardener, who was approaching by way of one of the paths. There was an inimitable smile on his face, and he carried tenderly and gingerly a double handful of brown branches on which clustered delicate pink blossoms.
"It's the cherry blossoms! They are in bloom!" Mary shouted in her enthusiasm. "That's why they are all so delighted. The dears! They are just like a lot of children."
The crown of the year for the Japanese had indeed arrived, the season when every cherry tree becomes a magnificent nosegay which has caught the sunset's glow, and all the world goes forth to view the splendid sight.
The love of these people, young and old and of all classes, for flowers, and particularly for cherry blossoms, is touching in its simplicity and sincerity.