I had come out on my unhuman tour to do some painting. But what with my thinking and musing, what with being made to listen to old tales, I knew there would be no picture, no matter how many days I might be at it. This very day I was at the pond with my colour-box and tripod, and I thought I owed it to myself to make a picture of the place, somehow or other. I sat on my tripod and began to make a visual survey of the pool and its surroundings, to make up my mind, on how much of the scenery I should take into my picture. I knew my materials were pine trees, giant-leaved creeping bamboos, rocks and a mirror-like pool of water.
The question was, how much of them should be covered in my canvas. The creeping bamboos were growing quite close to the edge of the water, and some of the rocks were ten feet high, while the pine trees were scraping the sky and cast their shadows into the water far and long, so much so that I could not see how I might take them all on my canvas. I had half made up my mind that I should paint only the reflections of the waters in the pond, feeling almost certain that the novel idea would astonish the people. But then the astonishment must be one arising from the sense of admiration and appreciation for the substantial artistic value of the production. How to solve this part of the problem occupied my attention next. Naturally, my eyes directed themselves, to the reflections in the pond.
Strangely enough no definite picture would come from the study of shadows only, and it was irresistible that I should try to make something by following the watery reflections back to their originals on land. My eyes were closely studying the ten foot rock, from its lowest point in the water to its body above, when I felt myself under the spell of a fairy’s wand, just as they had travelled to the summit of the cliff. I saw there a face in the struggling rays of setting sun that stole through the leafy screen and were faintly falling on the darkish top of the rock, the face of the woman, who had surprised me as a midnight shadow, or a vision, who had surprised me in her wedding gown, and had surprised me outside the bath-room! My eyes refused to turn elsewhere, as if rooted to the centre of the pale face of the woman who was standing fixedly on the rock, gently straightening herself up to her full height. Oh! that instant! I jumped on my feet. But the apparition had vanished, nimbly hopping down the other side of the rock and as she did so, I thought I perceived something red which resembled the camellia in her sash. The declining sun, slanting closely over tree tops, was faintly dyeing the trunks of the great pines, and below the creeping bamboos looked greener than ever. I was once more taken by surprise.
CHAPTER XI.
That night I gave myself up to renewing my acquaintance with the priest, Daitetsu, by calling on him at Kaikanji temple, at the top of the stone steps. The old priest received me, not effusively but with a most cordial welcome.
“I am glad you have come. You must find life very tedious in these parts?”
“The beautiful moon lured me out for a walk, and my feet brought me here, to be plain, Osho-san.”
“Yes, the moon is beautiful to-night.”
The priest said this as he slid open the front shoji of his chamber. The garden outside had nothing in it but two stepping stones and a single pine tree; but beyond extended a stretch of sea, dimly visible in the moonlight, with fishermen’s lights innumerably dotting the watery surface as far as the horizon, where they seemed to change into stars.
“What a beautiful view, Osho-san. Isn’t it a pity that you should keep it shut out?”