He took her hands and stroked them very gently.
“If you were a Japanese woman—” he began, when she interrupted:
“It ought to make no difference what I am. I am your wife. Do not treat me as an alien—a stranger.”
He drew her warmly to him at that.
“No, I will not,” he said. “I will tell you everything—all my thoughts. You know, Ellen, I am of samurai ancestry, and as a young man I was brought up in that school. When I became old enough I served for a time in the army. I hold a commission. Later, my father, who was one of the most enlightened of the men of old Japan, was imbued with the new thought. He put aside old traditions and pride. I was forced, so to speak, into a commercial life. Conditions changed for the samurai then. We were desperately poor for a time. They looked to me to redeem the family fortunes. And to do it I had to be taken from one school of thought and put into another—from samurai to tradesman. It was a strange transformation for a Japanese of such ancestry as mine. But I learned to like the work. I succeeded. You know of my long sojourn in America, till I could almost believe that I thought as your people think, and saw things as you in America see them. I seemed to be a living example of the evolution of an Oriental mind long swayed by Occidental environment. I called myself American many times, as you know. We came back here. The war, with all it meant to Japan, and the old patriotic feeling aroused, began a struggle with my acquired Occidental sense. Now I know that I never can be other than what I am by every inherent instinct—a true Japanese! I loved you, so I feared to tell you. You married me thinking possibly I was other than I am, Japanese only by birth, but of thought the same as you. That is why I have not confided in you.”
“But I knew it all the time,” she said. “I never thought you other than you were. Because you wore our dress, it did not make you of our country, nor did I love you for that, Kiyo. I did not require that you should become like my people. I, as your wife, was willing to become one of you, if you would let me.”
For a long time he was silent. Then with a sudden impulse he held the light before her face.
“Let me see your face then,” he said, “when I tell you of my resolve.”
“Tell me,” she whispered; “I am not afraid.”
“I must give you up for one who has a larger claim upon me—for beloved Ten-shi-sama!”