XIII
Two strangers to Sendai, tall and uncouth-appearing foreigners, came down the main street, walking in the swift, swinging fashion peculiar to the Westerner, so totally unlike the shuffling slide of the native.
They seemed both amused and irritated at the sensation they were creating, for a veritable little procession followed at their heels. Small, solemn, and mystified Japanese boys they were for the most part, who regarded them with the same awesome curiosity they would have bestowed on a wild beast. A round-eyed, startled little boy of twelve had followed them all the way from the station, through which they had entered the city. Others had quickly joined him, until gradually the following had increased uncomfortably for the foreigners, since these astonished and curious Japanese ran sometimes ahead of them, to stand in their track and gaze up at their faces.
Annoyed, the strangers quickened their speed to a rapid gait, which forced the sandal-wearers into a run in order to keep pace with them.
It was noonday and very warm. No jinrikishas were in sight. The strangers would have welcomed the piping cries of the numerous jinrikisha men of Tokyo, who had pestered and swarmed about them there like flies. Here in the City of Sendai there appeared to be no public jinrikisha stand as yet, and the “tavern” to which they had been directed had not as yet dawned upon their vision.
“We seem to be on the chief street,” said one of them. “Better turn here.”
They turned swiftly down a cross-street which seemed rather a long road, on the sides of which tall bamboos sprang upward to a great height, bending at the top into an arch which cast its shade below. The houses were set back some distance from the road, though garden walls, in which were small bamboo gates, isolated each dwelling.