CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Into the wide, white streets of modern Yedo, Pierre stumbled alone. There had been no definite thought in his hurried flight, only a craving to flee from the polluting face and soft, compelling voice of his compatriot. How was it possible for a man with the intelligence of Ronsard to harbor such ideas of Japanese character? Yuki's very presence breathed purity; yet that old man had said—had dared to hint— Pierre broke away from the recollection, hid his eyes, and groaned. As a consequence he was nearly hurled to earth by a passing kuruma-man, whose warning cry of "Hek! Hek!" had been ignored.
Pierre recovered himself with difficulty. The occupant of the vehicle, a stout burgher of the middle class with sulphur-colored socks and a gaudy watch-chain, essayed some laughing excuse; but the wiry human steed, deliberately putting his shafts to the ground, squared himself before the offending "Seiyo-jin" to deliver a volley of heterogeneous oaths, selected at random from the stores of other nations. Pierre, unmoved by these comic insults, apologized to the burgher in three languages, and hurried on.
Now for the first time he noticed that flags were being hung at every door. Flags fluttered from the backs of jinrikishas and were stuck on top of pull-cart loads. Past him hurried newsboys with printed hand-bills held eagerly upward. Small bells jangled at their hips.
"Nan desu ka?" (What is it?) he asked politely of a passer-by.
"Ikusa," was the brief response, accompanied, as Pierre could not help seeing, by a disdainful, yet triumphant scowl. "Ikusa" was a word not included in the Frenchman's short vocabulary.
Four University students, with the exaggeratedly short skirts, and the brawny, bare legs of the Satsuma faction, came lurching toward him. All grinned at sight of the alien, and shouted with one voice, "Banzai Nippon!"
Pierre understood this phrase at least. "An excellent sentiment," he remarked gravely in English; "but now will you kindly inform me why it seems appropriate to the present moment?"