CHAPTER VI
THE PRINCESS SADO-KO
CHAPTER VI
THE PRINCESS SADO-KO
WHILE the ladies of the household of the Princess Sado-ko, and guests of her cousin the Prince Komatzu, were gossiping over their noonday tea, Kamura Junzo, alone, was wandering aimlessly about the palace gardens. He was melancholy and restless. Instead of being satisfied with his success, Junzo was disappointed. He could not have explained why this was so. His patron had been pleased with his work, he had received marked attention and favor from those in power at court, and finally was actually being petted by the ladies. Perhaps it was this latter enervating thing that rendered the young man disappointed and disgusted.
Court life had not proved, after all, what he had fancied and pictured. Nobility, such as he had anticipated, was there only in name. Here in this small court of the noblest prince of the blood, gossip and scandal buzzed like the swarming of bees.
Junzo did not wonder that the Princess Sado-ko kept herself in seclusion in her private wing of the palace. In spite of the curious tales he had heard of her eccentricities, he felt a glow of sympathy for her. Plainly she disapproved of the life about her.
As he strolled about the castle gardens, Junzo’s memory carried him back into the days of his childhood. A picture grew up in his mind of a great stone wall and a cherry tree which drooped above it, and underneath the cherry tree a small, bewitching creature in a miniature kimono and the royal kanzashi in her hair.