ON a day in late March, 1907, Miss Betty Doane sat in the quaintly airy dining-room of the Hotel Miyaka, at Kioto, demurely sketching a man's profile on the back of a menu card.
The man, her unconscious model, lounged comfortably alone by one of the swinging windows. He had finished his luncheon, pushed away his coffee cup, lighted a cigarette, and settled back to gaze out at the hillside where young green grasses and gay shrubs and diminutive trees bore pleasant evidence that the early Japanese springtime was at hand.
Betty could even see, looking out past the man, a row of cherry trees, all afoam with blossoms. They brought a thrill that was almost poignant. It was curious, at home—or, rather, back in the States—there was no particular thrill in cherry blossoms. They were merely pleasing. But so much more was said about them here in Japan.
The man's head was long and well modeled, with a rugged long face, reflective eyes, somewhat bony nose, and a wide mouth that was, on the whole, attractive. Both upper lip and chin were dean shaven. The eyebrows were rather heavy; the hair was thick and straight, slanting down across a broad forehead. She decided, as she sketched it in with easy sure strokes of a stubby pencil, that he must have quite a time every morning brushing that hair down into place.
He had appeared, a few days back, at the Grand Hotel, Yokohama, coming in from somewhere north of Tokio. At the hotel he had walked and eaten alone, austerely. And, not unnaturally, had been whispered about. He was, Betty knew, a journalist of some reputation. The name was Jonathan Brachey. He wore an outing suit, with knickerbockers; he was, in bearing, as in costume, severely conspicuous. You thought of him as a man of odd attainment. He had been in many interesting corners of the world; had known danger and privation. Two of his books were in the ship's library. One of these she had already taken out and secreted in her cabin. It was called To-morrow in India, and proved rather hard to read, with charts, diagrams and pages of figures.
The sketch was about done; all but the nose. When you studied that nose in detail it seemed a little too long and strong, and—well, knobby—to be as attractive as it actually was. There would be a trick in drawing it; a shadow or two, a suggestive touch of the pencil; not so many real knobs. In the ship's diningroom she had his profile across an aisle. There would be chances to study it.
Behind her, in the wide doorway, appeared a stout, short woman of fifty or more, in an ample and wrinkled traveling suit of black and a black straw hat ornamented only with a bow of ribbon. Her face wore an anxious expression that had settled, years back, into permanency. The mouth drooped a little. And the brows were lifted and the forehead grooved with wrinkles suggesting some long habitual straining of the eyes that recent bifocal spectacles were powerless to correct.
“Betty!” called the older woman guardedly. “Would you mind, dear... one moment...?”
Her quick, nervous eyes had caught something of the situation. There was Betty and—within easy earshot—a man. The child was unquestionably sketching him.
Betty's eagerly alert young face fell at the sound. She stopped drawing; for a brief instant chewed the stubby pencil; then, quite meekly, rose and walked toward the door.