“You love her still?” she asked. Now a note of fear was in her voice. She could not bear that he should speak or think unkindly of the Princess Sado-ko, yet the very thought that he should love one who was no longer herself, rendered this paradox of women distracted.
“You love her still?” she asked, catching his arm and shaking it with her childish jealousy.
“No, no,” he said, as though the very thought was loathsome, “’tis you alone I love, my own Masago.”
Her tone was sharply tart.
“You do not love Sado-ko?”
“I love Masago,” he said.
She sighed.
“I would not have it otherwise,” she said, and laughed happily.
“Masago,” he said earnestly, “ask the consent of your honored parent that I may come indoors. We will spend a portion of the night together. I will then tell you all you wish to know concerning that passion of the heart I once have felt, which you have suspected. It is better you should know.”