"No harm can be done. I am from the American Legation, and was sent to accompany Miss Todd," said he, in Japanese, pitying the old dame's nervousness.
"Hai! hai! Sayo de gozaimasuka?" mumbled she, greatly relieved. She loved and was proud of Yuki; she adored her mistress; but there was a single voice in that house, and it belonged to Tetsujo.
Dodge went alone into the house, guiding himself by the voices. They had reached the guest-room. All fusuma and shoji had been closed. Without knocking Dodge pushed aside a silver panel painted with birds. At the same moment Iriya entered by the opposite wall of the room, a mere white ghost of propriety.
Yuki, almost in Gwendolen's arms, was pouring out rapid, disjointed, incorrect phrases of English,—sometimes with a whole sentence in her own tongue,—so that the listener could catch the meaning only in fragments.
Dodge, after a bow to Mrs. Onda, walked straight to Yuki, took a seat near her, and by his quiet eyes compelled her attention. He began to speak in slow, deliberate Japanese that the mother also might understand. Whether interpreting through his careful pronouncing or divining from his emphasis, Gwendolen, too, seemed to follow him.
"In allowing Miss Todd to call this morning, Miss Onda, her father, Minister Todd, has commissioned me to say to you—"
"Don't you believe him!" cried Gwendolen, flinging herself bodily before Yuki. She turned flashing eyes upon the speaker. "The poor child has enough to bear already, without your giving more!"
"I must deliver your father's message, Miss Todd. And I shall do so, though I have to wait until Miss Onda's father comes."
At sound of that dreaded name Gwendolen's courage for the moment fell. Dodge quietly resumed, in Japanese, "While Mr. and Mrs. Todd have only the most affectionate feelings toward Miss Onda, they beg to recall the very delicate international questions raised by the present war. America being neutral—er—Miss Todd's official position—"
"Miss Todd's official fiddlestrings," interrupted Gwendolen. "There, Yuki! He's through! That's all he had to say! Now can't we go into your bedroom, or out to the garden, and finish our conversation in peace?"