“But, my lord, thou speakest of thy worldly tasks. Wilt thou, then—?”
“Nay, Jiro, I will not take my life, I promise thee, before I have seen thee. To-morrow.”
“To-morrow,” repeated Jiro, and was gone.
Near the iris field in the Emperor’s garden there is a slight hill, set upon whose sides are a number of fanciful shelters. Under one of these, upon a bench that night long sat Prince Mori Keiki. Above him the bare trees supporting the structure twined their naked boughs together into what in the leaftime was a natural roof. This night, bare of leaf, they were as open to the cold as the structure’s side, yet Mori seemed unaware of the season. There was no chill upon his limbs. A strange smile flitted across the features of the solitary Prince.
With a shrug of the shoulders he glanced at the slight structure under which he sat.
“It is a summer-house,” he muttered, “and it is now winter. Fitting—fitting.”
Farther up the hill above him, within the shadow of another similar structure, a slight form crouched, while burning eyes were fastened upon Mori. With chilled and shivering being, the youth watched.
“He must not depart this life,” said the little watcher on the hill; “he must live—and believe. Oh! all the gods, lend me the strength and power to convince him!”
