She blushed all rosy red, even her little ears and neck tingling with pink, as they paused before her. Half unconsciously she bent her head and made a timid little motion of greeting to them.
The younger man, the one with the huge stick, said, in an undertone, “I’m going to speak to her,” and he went a pace nearer.
“Can you tell me where the Dewdrop Tavern is?” he asked, in atrocious Japanese.
For a moment she hesitated. Then the faintest smile lurked at the corners of her mouth and a dimple peeped out in her chin. Her voice was sweet and low.
“The humble one cannot understand such language,” she said, pretending ignorance of his words, and secretly hoping that she might provoke further speech from these strange men.
Before the stranger could frame his question in plainer language, Aoi appeared in the path, hastening down anxiously to the gate. She was overwhelmed with distress, she declared, that the august ones were followed so rudely by the children of the community. Would not the excellencies condescend to pardon the little ones? They must appreciate how strange they appeared to them. But as for her, Madame Aoi, she was well acquainted with their people, since her own lord had been English also.
The two men looked at each other and then at the young girl, as though understanding now her strange beauty.
“What,” asked Aoi, “is it the excellencies desire that they have deigned to halt before our insignificant abode?”
“We wish to be directed to some tavern—some place where we can secure accommodation.”
“Ah, yes, exactly. In the village on the shore of Matsushima there is the Dewdrop Tavern, but that is some distance away. If the excellencies will follow the street for a little while longer they will come to the Snowdrop Hostelry. There the honorable ones would be welcomed with august hospitality.”