“We cannot count upon so unlikely a contingency, my girl. We Japanese women, when we sacrifice our men to the Emperor’s service, pray that they may not return! It is a pious, patriotic prayer, Ohano. Be worthy of it, my girl. Duty and honor to the ancestors are the watchwords of our language.”
“Duty—and honor!” repeated Ohano, slowly.
A long silence fell between them, during which Ohano’s eyes never left the face of her mother-in-law. A sick terror assailed her, so that she could not move, but sat there rigidly, nursing her lame arm. What dreadful project, she asked herself, did the stern mother-in-law now meditate, that she should look at the unhappy Ohano with such a peculiar, commanding expression?
Finally the older woman said, with quiet force:
“Ohano, you come of illustrious stock. There have been women of your race who have found a solution to problems more tragic than yours. I pray you reflect upon the text of the samourai, which, as you know, was as binding upon the women as the men: ‘To die with honor, when one can no longer live with honor!’”
She stood up, and leaned heavily upon her staff.
“Let me recommend,” she added, softly, “that you study and emulate—and emulate”—she repeated the last word with deadly emphasis—“the lives of your ancestors!”
Ohano’s mouth had dropped wide open. She came to her feet mechanically, and mechanically she backed from her mother-in-law until she came to the farthest screen; and against this she leaned like one about to faint.
Her mother-in-law’s voice seemed to reach her as from very far away, and also it seemed to Ohano that a smile, jeering and cruel, was on the aged woman’s face, marking it like a livid scar. It was as if she cried to Ohano:
“I challenge you, as the daughter of a samourai, to do your duty!”