“It is an evil omen on this night,” she whispered pitifully. “Do not, pray you, do not seek to find the cause.”
“Your fear is most incomprehensible. Let us go to another room, then. We will join your honorable parents.”
She clung to him fearfully as they made their way across the room together. The shadow on the shoji moved upward from its crouching position, and through the thin walls the lovers saw an arm, with the long sleeve of a woman falling from it, extended to push aside the doors.
Upon a sudden impulse Junzo strode toward the doors and opened them. The figure on the balcony stood still, silhouetted in the silvered light of the night. Between the parted shoji she stood like one uncertain. Then suddenly she swayed, as if about to faint. She grasped the door for support.
“Between the parted shoji she stood like one uncertain.”
The lovers watched her in silence as eloquent as though they gazed upon a spirit. Then suddenly the man broke the spell of tense silence, and stooping to the andon raised it up and swung its light upon the woman’s face.
A cry escaped his lips—a cry simultaneously echoed by the stranger. She stepped into the room, and with her hands behind her drew the sliding doors closed. Now against them she stood, looking about her with vague eyes.
“Who are you?” hoarsely sounded the voice of Junzo.
“Ask—her!” was the reply she made, indicating Sado-ko. Junzo slowly turned toward his fiancée. He saw her hands fall from her face, which in the dull light seemed now white as marble. She turned it toward the woman. Her voice was strange.