The treadmill creaked again, and registered the notch of another empty revolution. Now Todd shook himself and raised his eyes to see how far he had come. Not a hundred yards ahead of him began the slope of Azabu. Blackening swiftly against the copper sky loomed the great Japanese entrance to his Legation. Evidently he must decide swiftly what to tell or not to tell his daughter. He thought of Dodge. Dodge knew the Japanese better than he; maybe he knew girls better. In the breaking of the news to Gwendolen he might be of great help. Then the tiny flicker of comfort died. Dodge and Gwendolen were playing at being enemies. They scarcely spoke. It was a lover's quarrel, Todd supposed, for Dodge certainly loved her; and the sudden friendship, on the girl's part, of a successful rival betrayed clearly her sentiments. Lovers' quarrels were well enough in their way; but why should this have come just now when Dodge could be of use?
He drew a sigh that racked the meagre frame, and started up the slope. "Kuruma, Dan-na San! Rick-shaw,—Dan-na San?" cried a group of coolies who had a little station at the base of the hill. Their accents were persuasive, even plaintive. They moved forward in a body, the empty black vehicles (inseparable from them as shells from snails) rattling behind them. They clamored like crows.
"No, I don't want you. No, I say, I-I-yè! Go back," he cried, and waved them off, with some irritation at their persistence.
The smooth gravelled driveway of the hill might have been a trough of viscid red clay, to judge from the slow and dragging steps of the one who now ascended it. The rejected coolies, staring up from the street level, assured one another that the tall foreigner was both sick and stingy. For the latter fault they hoped he would fall down before reaching the top of the hill. Then they would run to him, and charge a yen apiece for picking him up. They began to ascend, stealthily, like human vultures.
The dark spot of his ascending head could scarcely have been seen through the opened gate, when, in a whirl of rustling skirts, Gwendolen came down upon him. "I cannot tell her," he muttered between clenched teeth, as she came. "I shall die. She must not know what I believe!"
Gwendolen did not reproach him for being late, though he had thought her first words would be a playful chiding. She did not speak at all, only took his arm, pressed it lovingly with her own, and with cheek sometimes laid for an instant against his shoulder made the rest of the ascent with him. The tenderness, the consideration of her manner, touched him profoundly. He looked down into her face, white and fair even in the dying light. She smiled up at him. He saw a new beauty, a hint of new strength in her. For a moment his harassed sense clutched the impossible. Maybe good news of Yuki had come to her!
"What is it, child? You look different? What has happened?"
She gave a low little laugh, and did not answer. They had nearly reached the gate. In the great shadow a smaller shadow stepped out to join them. Gwendolen put out a white hand and drew it near. "This is what has happened, father—" she whispered. "We are—friends again."
"Friends?" echoed Todd; "you and Mr. Dodge,—thank God!"
"Friends!" came Dodge's pleasant voice; "well I rather guess not!"