“It is not so easy as it looks,” I say in excuse; and Kotmasu, with recollections of far worse performances than mine, agrees with me.
Our little dinner of toy-like viands7, served by the soft-footed little mousmé, is gone through with fitting ceremoniousness, but at last it is finished, and Kotmasu is so pleased with the repast, that he is in no hurry for the long walk back to the town.
“There are generally pretty geishas here,” he said to me, when we had lighted the ridiculous little pipes—mere tubes of[25] silver, with a pigmy bowl at the end—which the mousmé had now brought us.
The jars placed before each of us, filled with sweet-scented tobacco of the colour of tow, and so “mild” that a baby might have inhaled8 its smoke; the spittoons and the porcelain9 stove containing the glowing embers at which we lit our pipes; always made me smile—they were so toy-like and minute—and long for my briar and honey-dew.
“Yes?” I replied interrogatively between the puffs10. “Shall I tell Gazelle” (for such was the mousmé’s poetic11 name) “to summon one?” he continued.
Why not? I had seen them many times before, it was true; but we were in no hurry, and they were always graceful12, dainty, pretty and amusing—at least the best of them were, and no one troubled about those who were not.
“Is there dancing?” Kotmasu asked[26] Gazelle, who had stood regarding us with a friendly look during our colloquy13.
“Yes. Some of the best geishas from the town are here in the house. There is a party below, the most noble young Sen” (we had never heard of him, but no matter—it was but the mousmé’s way of describing a good customer, who had probably kissed her pretty Dresden-china face and given her half a yen14 for the privilege) “is here with his most noble companions from the big ship. They have brought the geishas with them. They are dancing now. Listen! But doubtless I can get one to come for the pleasure of Mr. the English sir.”
We nodded assent15, and with a smile Gazelle vanished.
We heard the sound of the pad, pad of her footsteps retreating along the passage, then a sudden cessation of the noises in the room below, as we could imagine her opening[27] the door. The zing, zing of the samisen suddenly ceased, and the girls’ voices stopped their monotonous16, chant-like song. Then came the sound of other voices seemingly in argument; then a recommencement of the previous noises as before our mousmé had interrupted the proceedings17.
Then we hear Gazelle returning.
“Alone?” I suggest to my companion, who merely shakes his head and laughs, replying, “No. The geisha is light of foot—a butterfly, coming without sound, the heavy circling flutter of her fan like the beatings of the wings of the great grey moths18 outside there in the garden.”
The footsteps of Gazelle came on, and then halted outside. There was no knocking at the door. How can one beat upon fragile paper panels with one’s fist? And the usual little knocker of brass19, a grotesque20 lizard21, or miniature lion-head[28] with bristling22 whiskers indicated and large white-balled eyes, was missing. The door-panel, with its flight of storks23, and stiff but wonderfully realistic bed of rushes from which the storks had risen, was slid aside, and through the narrow opening the little dancing-girl fluttered softly in, like some gay-hued butterfly or large-winged night-moth.
“It is Snowflake!” exclaimed Kotmasu, and ere the dainty little figure bowed low before us, I caught a fleeting24 glance of recognition shot to him from beneath her drooped25 eyelids26.
What a droll27 doll she is! Childish, with an assumption of innocence28 which is as charming as it must be unreal. An elegant, slender little figure, full of dainty grace. Her face painted—till it looked positively29 funny—its whiteness hiding the native transparency of her warm-hued skin, all damask rose and nut-brown[29] tinted30. And the two little dabs31 of rouge—oh! with what inartistic exactness they are placed, one on either cheek. The little rosebud32 of a mouth, with childishly pouting33 lips, is reddened brilliantly. And the delicate nostrils34 of her charming little nose—so piquant35, so retroussé—are coloured just the same. Her jetty hair—somewhat coarse, I admit, but so glossy—is taken back from off her whitened brow, and lies in smooth, heavy coils on the shapely little head. A silver pin or two, and one of mother-of-pearl, with some charming baby-curls in rebellion on the nape of her slender neck, soften36 any severity.
And her dress. Plum-coloured brocade, with long pendent sleeves and a double tunic37, the under one of a different stuff and very light, opening to disclose garments, such as her Western sisters are struggling for, of canary-coloured satin,[30] vanishing into the curious tabi of white cotton, shoes and stockings all in one, with separated toes.
She was such a fairy-like little being, and her fan-play and posturing38, which passes for dancing, so charming and graceful, that I could have watched her, as I have other geishas—soothed by the slumbrous pad, pad of her gliding39 steps upon the matting which covers the floor—almost all night. But at last she gracefully40 bowed, asked for her yen, and withdrew with the elegant fluttering motions of her class.
With the exit of Snowflake one became aware of the existence of time. Even Kotmasu was becoming drowsy41. I could see through the open panels that the lanterns in the garden outside were going out one by one, beginning to give it a deserted42 look. The moon was on the wane43, the white-faced moon in an indigo44 sky, and the[31] walk home was a rather long one to which to look forward.
We rose, my companion very reluctant to go. The noise of the samisen still continued in the room beneath us, and the pad, pad of the dancers had begun again to the accompanying falsetto of the musicians’ voices, in a strange monotonous chant.
We had paid the bill, mysterious items done in red ink upon a narrow strip of satin-like rice-paper; and so we went out by way of the verandah down the funny little steps which led from it to the garden path a dozen feet or less below.
We went down into the “garden of a thousand lights,” and I idly counted those whose hearts were cold, whilst Kotmasu spoke45 to a friend.
“We are here!” said the friend, and in a little pagoda46 near a willow47 I caught a glimpse of others, a gay blot48 of colour in the half-shadow denoting the presence of ladies.
[32]
And thus was it that I found Mousmé and fell in love with her at first sight.
She, it appears, is the sister of Kotmasu’s friend. In the subdued49 light of the little pagoda, where all the lanterns swinging to and fro in slight draught50 of air are yellow or red, I am introduced with marvellous ceremony to this radiant, childish being who is destined51 at once to captivate the heart and senses of the “English sir,” as Kotmasu grandiloquently52 describes me.
She is clad in silks of extreme richness, and brocades which glitter with gold thread (for her family is a wealthy one), and her obi of turquoise-blue silk swathes her supple53 waist, and makes her look still more slender by reason of its exaggerated bow.
Her coiffure is pyramidical, the ebon-hued hair dressed à la butterfly. And the fantasy suits her; even the long, large-headed[33] pins, which serve as mock antenn?, seem appropriate to the queer grace of my mousmé. Her brilliant complexion54 is softened55 by the subdued light. Only her eyes sparkle innocently with interest.
Why had not Kotmasu presented me before? Was he about to relinquish56 his bachelor and somewhat erratic57 and amorous58 habits? The thought gave me quite a new sensation. Upon analysis I was forced to admit that it was jealousy59. Miss Hyacinth (for that was Mousmé’s name, I soon discovered), so fresh and delicate, a little figure off a tea-caddy, quaint60 and charming withal, had no doubt ensnared his vagrant61 affections, as she had my own admiration62 already.
Miss Hyacinth was addressing me in soft tones from behind her paper fan, which had pagodas63, willows64, and dainty little women like herself painted upon it.
Yes! I had been in Nagasaki a long[34] time. I was English. No: England was not like Japan. Everything was larger, people ate more. There were no gardens like these, except sometimes when there was some grand feast taking place. This is but a tithe65 of the replies I made.
“Are the women pretty, and do they all wear rich clothing?” my mousmé inquired.
And I said “Some” in answer to the former, and earned a petulant66 moue. And “Not often” in reply to the latter, gaining thereby67 a smile of evident satisfaction as my reward; adding that “an ugly climate enforces ugly clothes.” But I felt sorry almost on the instant, because she seemed not to understand.
“No paper lanterns at night! Is there then a moon?” with a look of wondering astonishment68 and apprehension69.
“Yes!”
She seemed relieved.
[35]
“I have been to school,” she explained, with a delicate assumption of dignity. “I have seen the map”—the Japanese maps are marvellous things, some of them—“I know where the mail-boats go. But there are so many countries in the way. How do they get there?”
All this in Japanese, of course, whilst Kotmasu talked to her brother in an undertone of the latest addition to the ranks of the Nagasaki geishas, a girl trained in Yeddo. And the other ladies sipped70 their tea and talked to the other men, who were nonentities71 to me.
Kotmasu had finished his jokes about the geishas, and became, perhaps, aware of my monopoly of Miss Hyacinth—whose name indicated a far less voyant flower than Western minds would associate with it—so he said, somewhat abruptly72, “We must go.”
For a moment Mousmé’s small, shapely[36] hand, with its cool, white fingers, rested in mine.
“I shake the hand English way,” she explained, with a ripple73 of laughter. And then, with low bows to the other ladies, Kotmasu and I leave the merry party in the pagoda, and go away down the steep path bordered with the staring sunflowers.
I had read a few days before—and laughed at the idea—a line in a verse of a decadent74 poet that,
“Woman gone,
The darkness wraps us round in sable75 pall76.”
But now I did not laugh; I felt it, and understood.
I could have sworn that all the lanterns were extinguished, that the stars had gone down. And why? Because Kotmasu and I had turned our backs upon a pair of sparkling eyes, and I had put a hundred feet or so between me and Miss Hyacinth’s beguiling77, coquettish personality.
[37]
We don’t talk much, and I switch absent-mindedly at the flowers with my toy cane78 of bamboo, as we pass along the narrow path towards the spectral79 gateway80, now just visible at the bottom, a gaunt, white skeleton. Not till I send a big sunflower’s head spinning off and up against my companion’s legs, who starts as if something had bitten him, do I become aware that we have not spoken since we started down the hill.
Kotmasu pulls out his watch, a relic81 of his college days in England, and I waste a whole wax vesta—a luxury almost priceless in Japan, which I cling to—in enabling him to see the time.
Then we hurry out through the ghostly gateway on to the rough road, and thence onward82 down towards my house at as quick a rate as the obstruction83 of loose stones, sticks and ruts will let us.
Kotmasu shakes hands at my gateway.[38] No, he wouldn’t come in and have anything. Whisky saké would not tempt84 him, and “brantwein” was too much for his head, with still a good way down-hill yet to go.
My house had never seemed so lonely.
I fancied, strange though it may appear, that something—which after all had never existed—was missing. The tiny rooms seemed vast, the matting floor almost unfamiliar85 in its deadly silence.
The servants are at rest, of course. I think all I have to do is to push aside a panel and enter. There are no locks; and if there were, they would be but toy ones, ingenious, but useless all the same. I have a cash-box, a European one of tin, but I have given it a rice-paper jacket, because it looked so terribly substantial amid all my other frail86 belongings87.
How lonely it is! Even Oka the cook’s snoring down in the basement does not prove so companionable as usual.
[39]
As I cross the floor of my bedroom, and light the absurd little lamp near my apology for a couch, the dry boards of the thin flooring creak noisily and drearily89 beneath my tread. Some of the youthful fear of darkness is revived within me by the awful silence and the fitful flicker90 of my lamp. The little red-and-blue tortoises painted on the paper panels near the window seem to be coming to life and crawling about.
A glance out of the window as I throw off the last of my garments does not reassure91 me. Quite the reverse. It is so black outside. So I close the casement92, and turn in sadly.
I lie thinking for some time in the dark, and almost insensibly my thoughts revert93 to our supper at the chaya of “A Thousand Lights” and to Kotmasu’s friend.[40]
A bright idea presents itself, solving my longing88 and loneliness.
It is Miss Hyacinth I want, and such a thing should not be impossible—in Japan.
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1
chrysanthemums
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| n.菊花( chrysanthemum的名词复数 ) | |
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adorning
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| 修饰，装饰物 | |
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impaled
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| 钉在尖桩上( impale的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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morsels
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| n.一口( morsel的名词复数 )；（尤指食物）小块，碎屑 | |
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prawns
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| n.对虾，明虾( prawn的名词复数 ) | |
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implements
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| n.工具( implement的名词复数 )；家具；手段；[法律]履行（契约等）v.实现( implement的第三人称单数 )；执行；贯彻；使生效 | |
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viands
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| n.食品，食物 | |
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inhaled
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| v.吸入( inhale的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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porcelain
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| n.瓷；adj.瓷的，瓷制的 | |
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10
puffs
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| n.吸( puff的名词复数 )；（烟斗或香烟的）一吸；一缕（烟、蒸汽等）；（呼吸或风的）呼v.使喷出( puff的第三人称单数 )；喷着汽（或烟）移动；吹嘘；吹捧 | |
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11
poetic
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| adj.富有诗意的，有诗人气质的，善于抒情的 | |
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12
graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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13
colloquy
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| n.谈话，自由讨论 | |
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14
yen
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| n. 日元；热望 | |
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15
assent
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| v.批准，认可；n.批准，认可 | |
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monotonous
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| adj.单调的，一成不变的，使人厌倦的 | |
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proceedings
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| n.进程，过程，议程；诉讼(程序)；公报 | |
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moths
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| n.蛾( moth的名词复数 ) | |
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brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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lizard
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| n.蜥蜴，壁虎 | |
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bristling
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| a.竖立的 | |
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storks
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fleeting
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| adj.短暂的，飞逝的 | |
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drooped
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| 弯曲或下垂，发蔫( droop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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eyelids
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| n.眼睑( eyelid的名词复数 )；眼睛也不眨一下；不露声色；面不改色 | |
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droll
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| adj.古怪的，好笑的 | |
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innocence
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| n.无罪；天真；无害 | |
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positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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tinted
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| adj. 带色彩的 动词tint的过去式和过去分词 | |
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31
dabs
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| 少许( dab的名词复数 )； 是…能手； 做某事很在行； 在某方面技术熟练 | |
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rosebud
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| n.蔷薇花蕾，妙龄少女 | |
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pouting
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| v.撅（嘴）( pout的现在分词 ) | |
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nostrils
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| 鼻孔( nostril的名词复数 ) | |
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piquant
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| adj.辛辣的，开胃的，令人兴奋的 | |
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soften
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| v.(使)变柔软；(使)变柔和 | |
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tunic
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| n.束腰外衣 | |
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posturing
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| 做出某种姿势( posture的现在分词 ) | |
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gliding
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| v. 滑翔 adj. 滑动的 | |
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40
gracefully
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| ad.大大方方地；优美地 | |
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41
drowsy
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| adj.昏昏欲睡的，令人发困的 | |
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deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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wane
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| n.衰微，亏缺，变弱；v.变小，亏缺，呈下弦 | |
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indigo
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| n.靛青，靛蓝 | |
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45
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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pagoda
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| n.宝塔（尤指印度和远东的多层宝塔），（印度教或佛教的）塔式庙宇 | |
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47
willow
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| n.柳树 | |
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48
blot
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| vt.弄脏（用吸墨纸）吸干；n.污点，污渍 | |
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49
subdued
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| adj. 屈服的，柔和的，减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
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50
draught
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| n.拉，牵引，拖；一网（饮，吸，阵)；顿服药量，通风；v.起草，设计 | |
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51
destined
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| adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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52
grandiloquently
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53
supple
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| adj.柔软的，易弯的，逢迎的，顺从的，灵活的；vt.使柔软，使柔顺，使顺从；vi.变柔软，变柔顺 | |
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54
complexion
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| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
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55
softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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56
relinquish
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| v.放弃，撤回，让与，放手 | |
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57
erratic
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| adj.古怪的，反复无常的，不稳定的 | |
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amorous
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| adj.多情的；有关爱情的 | |
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jealousy
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| n.妒忌，嫉妒，猜忌 | |
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60
quaint
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| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
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vagrant
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| n.流浪者，游民；adj.流浪的，漂泊不定的 | |
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admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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63
pagodas
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| 塔，宝塔( pagoda的名词复数 ) | |
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64
willows
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| n.柳树( willow的名词复数 )；柳木 | |
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65
tithe
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| n.十分之一税；v.课什一税，缴什一税 | |
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66
petulant
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| adj.性急的，暴躁的 | |
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67
thereby
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| adv.因此，从而 | |
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68
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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69
apprehension
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| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
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70
sipped
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| v.小口喝，呷，抿( sip的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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71
nonentities
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| n.无足轻重的人( nonentity的名词复数 )；蝼蚁 | |
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72
abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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73
ripple
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| n.涟波，涟漪，波纹，粗钢梳；vt.使...起涟漪，使起波纹； vi.呈波浪状，起伏前进 | |
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74
decadent
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| adj.颓废的，衰落的，堕落的 | |
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75
sable
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| n.黑貂；adj.黑色的 | |
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pall
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| v.覆盖，使平淡无味；n.柩衣，棺罩；棺材；帷幕 | |
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beguiling
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| adj.欺骗的，诱人的v.欺骗( beguile的现在分词 )；使陶醉；使高兴；消磨（时间等） | |
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78
cane
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| n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的 | |
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spectral
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| adj.幽灵的，鬼魂的 | |
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80
gateway
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| n.大门口，出入口，途径，方法 | |
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81
relic
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| n.神圣的遗物，遗迹，纪念物 | |
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82
onward
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| adj.向前的，前进的；adv.向前，前进，在先 | |
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obstruction
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| n.阻塞，堵塞；障碍物 | |
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84
tempt
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| vt.引诱，勾引，吸引，引起…的兴趣 | |
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85
unfamiliar
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| adj.陌生的，不熟悉的 | |
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86
frail
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| adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的 | |
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87
belongings
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| n.私人物品，私人财物 | |
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longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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drearily
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| 沉寂地，厌倦地，可怕地 | |
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90
flicker
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| vi./n.闪烁，摇曳，闪现 | |
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reassure
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| v.使放心，使消除疑虑 | |
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casement
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| n.竖铰链窗；窗扉 | |
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93
revert
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| v.恢复，复归，回到 | |
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