As she looked at the beautiful, sleeping child the sudden thought of parting with it seized horribly upon her. Her face twitched like some hideous piece of parchment suddenly animated with life. Nothing, she told herself fiercely—neither the clamoring voice of the wild mother, nor the sulky jealousy of Ohano—should cause her now to relinquish her hold upon the descendant of the illustrious ancestors. Let the Spider do her worst! Let the vindictive jealousy of Ohano betray to the world the truth! She, the Lady Saito Ichigo, would defy them all. The gates of Saito should be sealed and guarded as rigorously as if these were feudal days. As for Ohano! She looked at the girl with a new expression. Between her and the little one resting upon her bosom there could be but one choice.
“My girl,” she said to Ohano, finally, “dry your face, if you please. It is unseemly for one of gentle birth to abandon one’s self to passion. Come, come, there is a limit to my patience!”
Ohano sat up sullenly, drying her eyes with the ends of her sleeve. The Lady Saito was choosing her words carefully, and her stern glance never wavered as she bent it upon Ohano’s quivering face.
“Without my lord’s child, Ohano, you are but a cipher in the house of the ancestors. It would become necessary to serve you as once we served an innocent one before you!”
Ohano’s hand clutched at her bosom. She appeared to be suffocating, and could hardly speak the words:
“You do not mean—you dare not mean—that you would divorce me!”
“The law is clear in your case, as in that of your predecessor,” said her mother, coldly.
“I will speak to my uncle Takedo Isami. I will address all of my honorable relatives. I will tell them with what you have threatened me, the daughter of samourai! You have compared me with a geisha—a Spider! It is intolerable—not to be borne!”
“Nay,” vigorously defended her mother-in-law. “You speak not now of a geisha, Ohano, but—of—the mother of the last descendant of the illustrious ancestors.”
A silence fell between them, broken only by the breathing of Ohano—short, gasping, indrawn sobs which she seemed no longer able to control.