Aoi’s father was vexed by Genji’s seeming fickleness, but so soon as he was with him he forgot all his grievances and was always extremely nice to him. When Genji was leaving next day his father-in-law came to his room and helped him to dress, bringing in his own hands a belt which was an heirloom famous far and wide. He pulled straight the back of Genji’s robe which had become a little crumpled, and indeed short of bringing him his shoes performed in the friendliest way every possible small service. ‘This,’ said Genji handing back the belt, ‘is for Imperial banquets or other great occasions of that kind.’ ‘I have others much more valuable,’ said the Minister, ‘which I will give you for the Imperial banquets. This one is not of much account save that the workmanship of it is rather unusual,’ and despite Genji’s protests he insisted upon buckling it round him. The performance of such services was his principal interest in life. What did it matter if Genji was rather irregular in his visits? To have so agreeable a young man going in and out of one’s house at all was the greatest pleasure he could imagine.
Genji did not pay many New Year’s visits. First he went to the Emperor, then the Heir Apparent and the Ex-Emperor, and after that to Princess Fujitsubo’s house in the Third Ward. As they saw him enter the servants of the house noticed how much he had grown and altered in the last year. ‘Look how he has filled out,’ they said, ‘even since his last visit!’ Of the Princess herself he was only allowed a distant glimpse. It gave him many forebodings. Her child had been expected in the twelfth month and her condition was now causing some anxiety. That it would at any rate be born some time during the first weeks of the New Year was confidently assumed by her own people and had been stated at Court. But the first month went by and still nothing happened. It began to be rumoured that she was suffering from some kind of possession or delusion. She herself grew very depressed; she felt certain that when the event at last happened she would not survive it and she worried so much about herself that she became seriously ill. The delay made Genji more certain than ever of his own responsibility and he arranged secretly for prayers on her behalf to be said in all the great temples. He had already become firmly convinced that whatever might happen concerning the child Fujitsubo was herself utterly doomed when he heard that about the tenth day of the second month she had successfully given birth to a boy. The news brought great satisfaction both to the Emperor and the whole court.
The Emperor’s fervent prayers for her life and for that of a child which she knew was not his, distressed and embarrassed her; whereas, when the maliciously gloomy prognostications of Kōkiden and the rest were brought to her notice, she was at once filled with a perverse desire to disappoint their hopes and make them look ridiculous in the eyes of those to whom they had confided their forebodings. By a great effort of will she threw off the despair which had been weighing down upon her and began little by little to recover her usual vigour.
The Emperor was impatient to see Fujitsubo’s child and so too (though he was forced to conceal his interest in the matter) was Genji himself. Accordingly he went to her palace when there were not many people about and sent in a note offering as the Emperor was in such a state of impatience to see the child and etiquette forbade him to do so for several weeks, to look at the child himself and report upon its appearance to the Emperor. She replied that she would rather he saw it on a day when it was less peevish; but in reality her refusal had nothing to do with the state of the child’s temper; she could not bear the idea of his seeing it at all. Already it bore an astonishing resemblance to him; of that she was convinced. Always there lurked in her heart the torturing demon of fear. Soon others would see the child and instantly know with absolute certainty the secret of her swift transgression. What charity towards such a crime as this would a world have that gossips if a single hair is awry? Such thoughts continually tormented her and she again became weary of her life.
From time to time he saw Ōmyōbu, but though he still implored her to arrange a meeting none of his many arguments availed him. He also pestered her with so many questions about the child that she exclaimed at last: ‘Why do you go on plaguing me like this? You will be seeing him for yourself soon, when he is shown at Court.’ But though she spoke impatiently she knew quite well what he was suffering and felt for him deeply. The matter was not one which he could discuss except with Fujitsubo herself, and it was impossible to see her. Would he indeed ever again see her alone or communicate with her save through notes and messengers? And half-weeping with despair he recited the verse: ‘What guilty intercourse must ours have been in some life long ago, that now so cruel a barrier should be set between us?’ Ōmyōbu seeing that it cost her mistress a great struggle to do without him was at pains not to dismiss him too unkindly and answered with the verse: ‘Should you see the child my lady would be in torment; and because you have not seen it you are full of lamentations. Truly have children been called a black darkness that leads the parents’ heart astray!’ And coming closer she whispered to him ‘Poor souls, it is a hard fate that has overtaken you both.’ Thus many times and again he returned to his house desperate. Fujitsubo meanwhile, fearing lest Genji’s continual visits should attract notice, began to suspect that Ōmyōbu was secretly encouraging him and no longer felt the same affection for her. She did not want this to be noticed and tried to treat her just as usual; but her irritation was bound sometimes to betray itself and Ōmyōbu, feeling that her mistress was estranged from her and at a loss to find any reason for it, was very miserable.
It was not till its fourth month that the child was brought to the Palace. It was large for its age and had already begun to take a great interest in what went on around it. Its extraordinary resemblance to Genji was not remarked upon by the Emperor who had an idea that handsome children were all very much alike at that age. He became intensely devoted to the child and lavished every kind of care and attention upon it. For Genji himself he had always had so great a partiality that, had it not been for popular opposition, he would certainly have installed him as Heir Apparent. That he had not been able to do so constantly distressed him. To have produced so magnificent a son and be obliged to watch him growing up a mere nobleman had always been galling to him. Now in his old age a son had been born to him who promised to be equally handsome and had not the tiresome disadvantage of a plebeian mother, and upon this flawless pearl he expended his whole affection. The mother saw little chance of this rapture continuing and was all this while in a state of agonized apprehension.
One day, when as he had been wont to do before, Genji was making music for her at the Emperor’s command, His Majesty took the child in his arms saying to Genji: ‘I have had many children, but you were the only other one that I ever behaved about in this fashion. It may be my fancy, but it seems to me this child is exactly like what you were at the same age. However, I suppose all babies are very much alike while they are as small as this,’ and he looked at the fine child with admiration. A succession of violent emotions—terror, shame, pride and love—passed through Genji’s breast while these words were being spoken, and were reflected in his rapidly changing colour. He was almost in tears. The child looked so exquisitely beautiful as it lay crowing to itself and smiling that, hideous as the situation was, Genji could not help feeling glad it was thought to be like him. Fujitsubo meanwhile was in a state of embarrassment and agitation so painful that a cold sweat broke out upon her while she sat by. For Genji this jarring of opposite emotions was too much to be borne and he went home. Here he lay tossing on his bed and, unable to distract himself, he determined after a while to go to the Great Hall. As he passed by the flower-beds in front of his house he noticed that a faint tinge of green was already filming the bushes and under them the tokonatsu[9] were already in bloom. He plucked one and sent it to Ōmyōbu with a long letter and an acrostic poem in which he said that he was touched by the likeness of this flower to the child, but also hinted that he was perturbed by the child’s likeness to himself. ‘In this flower,’ he continued despondently, ‘I had hoped to see your beauty enshrined. But now I know that being mine yet not mine it can bring me no comfort to look upon it.’ After waiting a little while till a favourable moment should arise Ōmyōbu showed her mistress the letter, saying with a sigh ‘I fear that your answer will be but dust to the petals of this thirsting flower.’ But Fujitsubo, in whose heart also the new spring was awakening a host of tender thoughts, wrote in answer the poem: ‘Though it alone be the cause that these poor sleeves are wet with dew, yet goes my heart still with it, this child-flower of Yamato Land.’ This was all and it was roughly scribbled in a faint hand, but it was a comfort to Ōmyōbu to have even such a message as this to bring back. Genji knew quite well that it could lead to nothing. How many times had she sent him such messages before! Yet as he lay dejectedly gazing at the note, the mere sight of her handwriting soon stirred in him a frenzy of unreasoning excitement and delight. For a while he lay restlessly tossing on his bed. At last unable to remain any longer inactive he sprang up and went, as he had so often done before, to the western wing to seek distraction from the agitated thoughts which pursued him. He came towards the women’s apartments with his hair loose upon his shoulders, wearing a queer dressing-gown and, in order to amuse Murasaki, playing a tune on his flute as he walked. He peeped in at the door. She looked as she lay there for all the world like the fresh dewy flower that he had so recently plucked. She was growing a little bit spoilt and having heard some while ago that he had returned from Court she was rather cross with him for not coming to see her at once. She did not run to meet him as she usually did, but lay with her head turned away. He called to her from the far side of the room to get up and come to him, but she did not stir. Suddenly he heard that she was murmuring to herself the lines ‘Like a sea-flower that the waters have covered when a great tide mounts the shore.’ They were from an old poem[10] that he had taught her, in which a lady complains that she is neglected by her lover. She looked bewitching as she lay with her face half-sullenly, half-coquettishly buried in her sleeve. ‘How naughty,’ he cried. ‘Really you are becoming too witty. But if you saw me more often perhaps you would grow tired of me.’ Then he sent for his zithern and asked her to play to him. But it was a big Chinese instrument[11] with thirteen strings; the five slender strings in the middle embarrassed her and she could not get the full sound out of them. Taking it from her he shifted the bridge, and tuning it to a lower pitch played a few chords upon it and bade her try again. Her sullen mood was over. She began to play very prettily; sometimes, when there was a gap too long for one small hand to stretch, helping herself out so adroitly with the other hand that Genji was completely captivated and taking up his flute taught her a number of new tunes. She was very quick and grasped the most complicated rhythms at a single hearing. She had indeed in music as in all else just those talents with which it most delighted him that she should be endowed. When he played the Hosoroguseri (which in spite of its absurd name is an excellent tune) she accompanied him though with a childish touch, yet in perfect time.
The great lamp was brought in and they began looking at pictures together. But Genji was going out that night. Already his attendants were assembled in the courtyard outside. One of them was saying that a storm was coming on. He ought not to wait any longer. Again Murasaki was unhappy. She was not looking at the pictures, but sat with her head on her hands staring despondently at the floor. Stroking the lovely hair that had fallen forward across her lap Genji asked her if she missed him when he was away. She nodded. ‘I am just the same,’ he said. ‘If I miss seeing you for a single day I am terribly unhappy. But you are only a little girl and I know that whatever I do you will not think harsh thoughts about me; while the lady that I go to see is very jealous and angry so that it would break her heart if I were to stay with you too long. But I do not at all like being there and that is why I just go for a little while like this. When you are grown up of course I shall never go away at all. I only go now because if I did not she would be so terribly angry with me that I might very likely die[12] and then there would be no one to love you and take care of you at all.’ He had told her all he could, but still she was offended and would not answer a word. At last he took her on his knee and here to his great embarrassment she fell asleep. ‘It is too late to go out now,’ he said after a while, turning to the gentlewomen who were in attendance. They rose and went to fetch his supper. He roused the child. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I did not go out after all.’ She was happy once more and they went to supper together. She liked the queer, irregular meal, but when it was over she began again to watch him uneasily. ‘If you are really not going out,’ she said, ‘why do you not go to sleep at once?’ Leaving her at such a moment to go back to his room he felt all the reluctance of one who is setting out upon a long and perilous journey.
It constantly happened that at the last minute he thus decided to stay with her. It was natural that some report of his new pre-occupation should leak out into the world and be passed on to the Great Hall. ‘Who can it be?’ said one of Aoi’s ladies. ‘It is really the most inexplicable business. How can he have suddenly become entirely wrapped up in someone whom we had never heard the existence of before? It cannot in any case be a person of much breeding or self-respect. It is probably some girl employed at the Palace whom he has taken to live with him in order that the affair may be hushed up. No doubt he is circulating the story that she is a child merely in order to put us off the scent.’ And this opinion was shared by the rest.
The Emperor too had heard that there was someone living with Genji and thought it a great pity. ‘You are treating the Minister very badly,’ he said. ‘He has shown the greatest possible devotion to you ever since you were a mere baby and now that you are old enough to know better you behave like this towards him and his family! It is really most ungrateful.’