Yone Santo: A Child of Japan
XV.
FAIR PROMISE.
SEATED on my veranda, overlooking the broad bay of Yedo, I waited to learn the motive of this new demonstration.
“ I will say once more,” Milton began, “ and say it for the last time, that, so far as I can judge myself, your threats of abusive treatment have no weight with me. But there are arguments at work in my own mind which do indeed affect me. Until this night, although I ought to have known, I did not fully know in what direction I was tending, nor with what insane speed. Now I do know. No harm, fortunately, has yet been done, and within a week I shall quit Japan, without again seeing Yone Santo.”
He was a strange compound of weakness and impulsive vigor, of honorable and ignoble propensities. Listening to him now, marking the fervor, the apparent frankness, and the unmistakable feeling with which he spoke, no unprepared hearer could have distrusted him. For myself, I do not doubt that at the moment he was thoroughly sincere. But it would have been a lamentable folly, knowing his utter instability, to leave him in a condition of such merely superficial and probably transitory regret. His impressions might change entirely in a day ; and I had — or believed I had — ample evidence, of the worthlessness of his pledges.
“ Much harm has been done, sir,” I said, in reply to one part of his observation.
“ None whatever,” he responded, “ thanks to Yone’s innocence, — not to my honesty. When I reached home, after leaving you this afternoon, I found a note from her, written at Santo’s dictation, and asking for instruction about a detail of the boat. I first thought of going there to-morrow. But the evening was so bright that I determined upon an after-dinner walk to the building-yard. If you had asked me, I should have said it was mainly, if not solely, with a view to answering Santo’s inquiries.”
“ And it would not have been true.”
“ It would have been true then, for, as I remember, that was certainly my conviction. Now, of course, I recognize that it was little better than a pretest, imposed by myself upon myself. But I had no foreshadowing of what would occur. The opportunity was unusual, and the temptation was great. Havingsettled the business question, old Santo himself proposed going into the garden; and after seeing Yone and myself seated on the bench, he straightway dropped asleep. I think we might have been there half an hour when you appeared. How much you heard I do not know. It was the first time I had ever addressed her in a way — in a way likely to do harm. I had been friendly, and, I admit, affectionate before, — too much so, perhaps, — but I had never tried to pervert her notions of right and wrong. As you probably know, I failed completely, — and I thank God for it. I was surprised in the beginning, then vexed, at her total lack of comprehension. I could not help wondering if it was genuine, but I soon saw I might as well have endeavored to make her understand a new language as tried to sully her thoughts with a suspicion of evil.”
“ Why do you tell me this ? ” I demanded.
“ Because, whether I succeed or not, I wish to try and repair some of the damage I have done, — the only damage, I may say, — which is the uneasiness I have caused you.”
“ That may rest. But it is not the only damage. The unfamiliar words and ideas you have planted in Yone’s mind will not pass out of her recollection, as if she were a girl of mean intelligence. You have laid a foundation upon which her imagination will build, until she becomes acquainted with the existence of many things yet unknown to her. It was against such a risk that I would have guarded her, at any cost.”
“ But surely, Dr. Charwell, I may say — Heaven knows, without a thought of offense — that a girl of her peculiar beauty would be sure, sooner or later, to be enlightened.”
“ You know little of this country, sir. She might live to old age, and never hear a whisper of such venomous stuff as you have attempted to pour into her ears to-night. That does not happen to be the style of ill-treatment which the Japanese apply to women of a decent class. It was reserved for foreigners to institute the pastime of woman-hunting in this part of the world. And a noble revelry they make of it! They remind me of that princely Nimrod, the Count de Chambord, who used to have his deer driven so close that he could look into their eyes, and then, as he slaughtered them right and left, he called it sport. The pursuit of Japanese women by foreigners is the same sort of manly diversion. They bring down their game, not because they are expert or daring, but because them victims are all unconscious of the danger that threatens them. You and others fall in with a pretty and attractive girl, and ply her with seductive words she has never heard before, — words which she did not know could be spoken to her, and the sound of which awakens emotions she had never dreamed of. She becomes alive to possibilities far outside of her accustomed sphere, and to the possession of faculties as strange to her as sunlight to the blind. Think how narrow are the limits of a Japanese woman’s happiness ! Maternity is the single deep and absorbing joy she can know. If she gets a husband who treats her with reasonable kindness, she may become moderately attached to him ; but conjugal love is a sentiment she never feels, and never dares to feel. If she finds it stealing upon her, she knows her sole hope is to crush it out, lest she suffer the more keenly when the inevitable day of neglect and cruelty comes. As for the proud delight of courtship, the little span of bliss when the weaker becomes the stronger, when the expectant bride is the ruler and her lover the willing slave, no glimpse of such ecstasy ever dawns upon girlhood in Japan. Of all the women in the land, not one knows what it means. But you are not to suppose them any more destitute of tender sensibilities than our own daughters and sisters. The loving instincts of their sex are not called into life here, — that is all. But what is to happen when one of them listens to professions, against the danger of which our young women are guarded by parental vigilance or conventional education ? Why should the untaught Japanese doubt the sincerity of what she hears ? She knows no reason why any man alive — least of all, any foreigner — should take pains to flatter or delude her by false avowals. What is she, to assume that it is worth any man’s while to beguile her with deceitful protestations ? Who would so foolishly waste time on her ? Strange as it seems, it must be real and true. She has never before been told she possessed beauty, or grace, or other charms ; certainly not as she is now told. Her thoughts have never been turned into those channels. In the ordinary course of her life they never would be. But now she is confronted by a foreigner, a being upon whom she looks as a moral and intellectual superior, who flutters her little soul with caresses which she does not know how to reject, and which open to her a rare new world of poetry and romance. Then comes her dream of happy love, which lasts a month, two months, more commonly a week, and from which she awakes with her poor fond heart broken,—broken as ruthlessly as the tie which she believed, because she had been told, would endure forever. That’s the proud game of the woman-hunter in Japan. That is the game which you, Mr. Milton, start out to play with a trusting, unsuspecting child, confident that, in the unequal contest, your practiced weapons will swiftly beat down her weak defenses, and destroy her.”
“ I won’t admit,” said Milton, without a trace of the anger or impatience I had looked for, — “I won’t admit that any injury can come of it, though I have no intention of exculpating myself. I will say, whether you credit it or not, that there was no premeditation. The grievous story you told me earlier in the day was fresh in my mind, and I was filled with pity for the poor girl. Pity — that is to say — well, you shall have the truth without disguise, — it was not all pity. She has had a hold upon me for weeks, which I could not break away from. Not that she knew anything about it. All she has heard amiss from me she has heard to-night. It cannot hurt her. She is not one of the ignorant and unguarded class you speak of. She is well educated ; her training has been ample. She is far above danger from so small a mischance as this.”
“ Not so. Her education has not prepared her for experiences of this kind. Warnings against the snares of unscrupulous foreigners could hardly be taught in the schools for Japanese girls. Unhappily, her culture, though far from what it should be, has advanced sufficiently to render her keenly susceptible to severe misfortune. She is one of the few whose minds have been too rapidly and maturely developed for the position they are constrained to hold. Without foreign cultivation of any kind, she might have passed through life, even as the wife of a rude mechanic, and never felt the worst of the griefs and humiliations she has now to endure. Left unaware that the conditions of her existence were a perpetual degradation, she would have known little of the shame which now oppresses her. Fortunately, her scholarship yields her some compensations, and her own beautiful nature sustains her in patience. But there is one misery from which neither her studies nor her high character can protect her, and which, if it falls upon her, will be increased a thousand-fold by the very acuteness of her intelligence. She has no knowledge yet — at least I trust not — as to what her own heart is capable of. All I can wish for her is a composed and tranquil passage, without heavy sorrows, over the course marked out for her. But if her stronger affections are ever awakened by such wiles as a reckless libertine may employ, and if she learns what passionate love means, then her peace is gone, her future is a hopeless misery. And if you, Arthur Milton, set yourself to an undertaking so cowardly and base as to draw this good and noble girl away from the life to which she has resigned herself, only to leave her presently to everlasting despair, you are a monster of whom, I tell you plainly, I think the Almighty might well be helped to rid the world with the least possible loss of time.”
“I have said I shall go away from Japan,” answered Milton, “ and I mean to go. I cannot bring myself to share your apprehensions, but I will act as if I did. I consent to be governed by your extravagant theories, but it will never be apparent to me that a young woman’s whole life need be made wretched by a bit of harmless flirtation.”
“ Flirtation ! I tell you again that girls of Yone’s stamp know nothing of such a word. They either believe or disbelieve what is said to them. You do not require to be told whether your language and tone were calculated to delude her into a false conviction of your sincerity. You are well aware that if she had continued to listen understandingly, she would have taken your declarations in all honesty. She is not the girl to yield to them in any way affecting her good name, — never suppose that, — but she might have been touched by a spell which would endanger her peace of mind. I trust to God she has escaped it. She cannot know what a happy love is; it is too late for that. After all she has gone through, she had better die at once than learn what love in any form but that of friendship means.”
“ Of course you know, Dr. Charwell,” said Milton, after a few moments’ thought, “ that I could bring a score of opinions to set against yours. I have met more than one man, with as much experience as you have had, who would scream with glee at the notion of a Japanese girl breaking her heart on any pretense. Plenty of the ‘ old residents ' are quite as emphatic on their side of the question as you are on yours.”
“ Yes, you have fallen in with some of those hardened brutes — leaders of rational public opinion, they call themselves— who strive to establish a belief in the general profligacy of Japanese women, in order to lessen the scandal of their personal iniquities. I know the set, and what their evidence is worth; and so do you, I ’ll warrant, though you choose to quote them as entitled to credence. But I tell you that if you listen long to those cold-blooded reptiles, you will soon wish to forget you ever had a mother or a sister.”
“ Bad as they may be,” replied Milton, “ they have facts to support them. They do get possession of Japanese women without much difficulty, and generally with the connivance or approval of their fathers or brothers.”
“ That is a different matter. I make no attempt to defend such Japanese men as condemn their wives or daughters to shameful lives. The best contrived tortures of a couple of centuries ago would be too good for them. I speak only of the women. They are victims, not willful sinners. They are brought up to believe that the highest virtue is blind obedience to parental decrees. They accept their doom as a martyrdom, and surrender themselves to a contamination which, they assume, the dire need of their elders renders inevitable. It is often the saddest of sacrifices, yet foreigners, knowing this to be true, inhumanly pretend that the vicious course is adopted with satisfaction, if not with eagerness. Worse than all, the foreign women who come here with maxims of Christian charity in their mouths, ostensibly to aid in the work of civilization, — these women, almost without exception, join in the defamatory outcry, and, from the moment of their arrival, act upon the absurd theory that they are dealing with a race of beings among whom chastity, modesty, and delicacy are unknown. They treat their charges, not as if a single one of them possessed the naturally clean instincts of girlhood, but as if they must all be put through some humiliating process of moral purification before being admitted to companionship with these over-righteous messengers of social enlightenment. And the result ? But we are straying far from the track, Mr. Milton. Our subject is particular, not general. Your departure, I understand, will take place ” —
“ Within a week, as you shall see,” he answered.
I thanked him, but with an effort, for indeed nothing would have completely satisfied me except, probably, his immediate withdrawal, even at that impracticable hour, — on foot, if necessary, — to Yokohama, and his prompt embarkation from that port early in the morning. I had obtained, however, as much as I could expect; and with that partially consolatory reflection I retired, to pass the night in conjectures as to the steps required for my ill-guarded child’s welfare in future, mingled with deep regrets that, among the whole body of European and American residents settled in Japan, I could not bethink me of one true, large-hearted woman to whom I might confide the story of Yone’s life, and whose generous sympathy would supply the help which my sex and my rougher nature alike disqualified me from offering. Not one!
XVI.
TREACHERY.
As I sat alone, the next morning, still musing, with many misgivings, over the difficult situation, I was startled by the abrupt entrance of Milton, in vehement haste and much disorder, and so agitated as to be for some moments incapable of speech. He flung himself into a chair, and gazed at me intently, essaying at intervals to articulate, but repeatedly failing. I carried him a glass of spirits, part of which he drank, exclaiming, afterward, in a husky voice, —
“ I wish to God it was poison ! ” “ You don’t wish anything of the sort,” I replied; “ and I hoped, from our understanding of last night, that there would be no more occasion for these mock heroics. What has happened?”
He left the chair he had taken on first entering, and seated himself in another, close beside my table.
“We can be alone, I hope,” he said.
“ Certainly ; ” and I locked the office doors. Returning near him, and examining him attentively, I saw that he was in an unnatural state of excitement, from which I could not but draw alarming forebodings.
“ Come, what has happened ? ” I again demanded.
“ Worse — yes, much worse — than I could have believed,” he panted, in response.
“ Speak plainly, man ! ” I cried. “ To begin with, you have seen Yone.”
“ But I did not go to her,” he protested, eagerly. “ It was the purest accident.”
“ There, there,” I answered, “ leave off excusing yourself and your misdeeds. What has happened to Yone ? ”
“Nothing,—nothing serious, I hope — I believe. I have just left her, at the bridge near the Custom House. I think she will soon be coming to you. I — I wanted to see you first.”
“ Naturally,” said I, giving full vent to my contempt, and concerning myself in no degree about his feelings, now that I felt assured Yone was safe, — “naturally enough; you wanted me to hear your own story before getting the absolute truth from her.”
“ In any case,” he proceeded, “ you had best listen to me, at present. You can learn what you wish to learn from her, afterward. She has gone to the school, and may be here in a few moments. God knows I don’t want to see her again,—not now, if ever. I want to get over what I have to do, and be gone. No, sir, you have no conception of my motive in coming. I have broken faith, and disgraced myself; and I choose that you shall hear of it from me, rather than from one whose kind heart would lead her to soften — to conceal — my miserable ” —
He broke off abruptly, and so livid a pallor overspread his countenance that I forbore further reproaches. Presently he resumed: —
“ I was at work the best part of last night, packing and making ready, and by to-morrow I should have been prepared to start for Yokohama. I had not the remotest idea of seeing Yone again. But my cursed fortune brought us face to face, as I was walking about Tsukiji, early this morning. She was on her way to see you. Her curiosity, at least, was excited by what happened last night, and she was looking forward to an explanation, I suppose.”
“ No doubt I could have given her one that would have done no harm,” I answered.
“ But I could not,” he rejoined, excitedly. “ There was nothing for me to tell but the truth. I could have avoided her, — I tried to ; but to he with her, beside her, again — Good God, Charwell, don’t you know what temptation means ? I lost all thought of everything, — everything but her and myself. I forgot I had ever made a promise. I forgot that we could ever be separated. We walked together for an hour, — perhaps two hours.”
“ And what did you tell her ? ”
“ All — all that I ought not to have told her. But she acted very nobly, Charwell; you must not have a single doubt about her. She was all you could have wished. But for myself ” —
“ Ay, keep to yourself, young man,” I broke in, “and don’t you offend decency by undertaking to vindicate Yone Santo. We shall have the devils from hell, next, avouching the purity of the saints.”
“You may say and do to me what you please, Dr. Charwell. Take a pistol and fire it in my face, if you like. I deserve that, and more.”
“ If you have nothing in your head but theatrical shams,” said I, “ you had better go. You seem to have done your worst in every way. You have lied like a scoundrel, and you have sown unending sorrow in a gentle, harmless breast. I thank God I never before knew so foul a coward and villain, and I trust I never may see your like again. Now go!”
“ You strike me when I am down.”
“ Not I. I would, heavily enough, if it could do any good. But you had better get out of my sight. I see another visitor approaching. Not by that door; come this side. You can find your way through the house, and go out by the rear entrance.”
He went, with hesitating steps, and paused once, as if he would have spoken again ; but I would endure nothing more from him, and closed with violence the door through which he disappeared. Then, with a choking sensation, I turned to admit the child who grew dearer and dearer to me as each bitter stroke of fate befell her.
I had urgent cause to exercise all the self-control that remained to me, as I took her hand and led her to a seat. A single night, or, more probably, the last few hours, had wrought a change in her which only the most hardened in worldliness or professional self-righteousness could see unmoved. The fair, open brow was clouded, and marked with lines of pain. The soft, engaging smile, seldom brightly joyous, but always infinitely winning and endearing, had disappeared; and her lips were pressed closely together, as if to hold in restraint the expression. of an unwonted grief. The rich, dark eyes, which usually shone undimmed in frank and trustful sincerity, were cast down, under the influence of an emotion which she dreaded to betray. As I saw her slender form yielding to the physical weakness which the suffering of her earlier life had fastened upon her, I felt as if some dire fatality must have interwoven itself with the unhappy girl’s destiny, to overcome which no human skill could avail. All that my care had done to remedy the injuries inflicted upon her in childhood — little enough it was, I knew too well — was now, I feared, undone at a blow. It seemed impossible that she could still retain sufficient strength to carry her through another term of tribulation.
“ Thank you, good doctor,” she said, presently lifting her face. “ You did not look for me to-day. I asked permission to come to Tsukiji before the usual time, because something had made me anxious. You are always very kind, and I am sure you will help Yone a little.”
“ Yone has no need to ask that,” I answered. “I hope it is nothing too serious for us to dispose of easily.”
“ I do not know,” she sighed. “ I think it is serious, and I am afraid it cannot be easily mended. It hurts me a little to tell, and if I might ask for a good deal of time I should be easier. But if you are occupied I shall wait, or come another day.”
“ No, my child, I am not occupied,”
I replied, feeling at the moment that I would be willing to make it my sole business for weeks and months to come, if I could hope to heal the wound I feared she had received.
“ It ought not to be difficult for me to speak to you of anything,” she resumed. “I do not quite understand it, — so old a friend. Yet it is hard to begin. You will not be angry, — I know that.”
“ Never, Yone, never ; and being an old friend, I may be able to make it easier than you think.”
She glanced at me with some surprise, and I continued, clasping her right hand in a vague desire to impart to her some of my own strength: —
“ Now let me save you the trouble of beginning. It is about Mr. Milton.”
Again she gave me a startled look, and then bowed her head in assent, without speaking.
“ You came because of what occurred near your house, on the river, last night; but since you reached Tsukiji something more important has happened, and that is what I must hear about.”
She now gazed full in my face.
“You have seen him,” she said, in a low voice.
“Yes, I have seen him. Do not tremble so. He has not told me much, and you need not tell me any more than you wish to. I am quite sure that everything you have done is right.”
“ You know, perhaps, that Arthur has given me ” —
“Wait, Yone: why do you call him Arthur ? ”
“He asked me to do so last night, but then I was unwilling, He begged me again, very earnestly, this morning, and the things he said to me made me believe that it would not be wrong.”
“ There is no wrong about it, so far as you are concerned; but for the present it is better for you to speak of him as you always have done.”
“ I am sorry for that,” she murmured, dejectedly.
“ Why, Yone, does it please you,— do you wish to call him Arthur ? ”
“ No, it is not that,” she answered; “ but he told me it was right. I am grieved that he did so. I trusted him.”
“ And he deceived you. But that fault is his, not yours, my child,” said I, failing to seize at once the fact that already her concern was chiefly for him, and for his repute as an honest counselor.
“ He wished me to call him Arthur, because, he said, he loved me.”
“ No doubt, no doubt; but now, you see, since he deceived you in a small matter, it would be unwise to believe him in a larger one.”
“ But I did believe him,” she exclaimed ; “ I could not help but to believe him! Why should he trouble to tell me such a thing only for falsehood ? No one would do that. There is no reason in it. I do believe him.
“Yone, my poor girl, what can I say to you ? You must not believe him.
“ Doctor,” she replied, softly, but very firmly, and looking steadily into my eyes, while the delicate color of her face deepened painfully, — “ doctor, I wish to believe him.
“ Go on, then, Yone ; let me hear all you have to tell. I will speak afterward.”
She passed her disengaged hand across her forehead, and, struggling to command herself, answered thus : —
“ Last evening, by the river, he began to say things which were quite new to me. At first I did not listen attentively, and understood only a little part. Soon it seemed that he was making jests, for both of us to laugh at; but suddenly he spoke and acted in a way that gave me great surprise, — yes, and pain. Then, just before you joined us, he talked so wildly that I believed some trouble had disturbed his reason, and I was deeply alarmed for him. I saw that you were displeased. I had been displeased, too, but I could not bear to ask myself why. As I sat alone, beneath the stars, and recalled what had happened, strange thoughts came upon me. They were not wise, — I knew they were not wise, but I did not put them away. Doctor, I shall keep nothing from you: I could not compel myself to drive them away. They were with me through the night.”
Her lips trembled, and she paused, again pressing her hand to her brow.
“ And then ” —I presently suggested.
“ To-day he was more clear. I met him beyond Tsukiji, as I was coming to your house. He wished me to walk with him a little, and then he said he had loved me since he first saw me, though he had never before dared to tell it. I asked him why he had not dared, but he did not explain. Yet I know he was in earnest. His voice shook while he spoke. His cheeks were sometimes so pale as to frighten me, and sometimes like burning flames. He implored me to love him, too. He said I must go with him ” —
“What — where?” I hastily demanded.
“ Away, far from Japan. And that is the most serious question I have to ask you, doctor. He told me it would be right for me to go; that if I loved him one half as well as he loved me, I ought to go, and be always with him. Oh, doctor, you can tell me,— was it true ? Is it right ? Would the good men and women in your own country say it was right for me to go ? That is what I must know.”
“ Yone, do you really wish me to tell you how you should answer him ? ”
“ No, no, dear doctor, you do not understand,” she responded, in great agitation and distress; “ you need not tell me that. I did answer him. But what I wish to know is if he spoke — if his words were true, when he told me that he was right to ask me, and that I should be right to go.”
“Tell me first, Yone, what your answer was.”
“ Ah, that will pain me to repeat, for I was obliged to hurt his feelings. But I must not hide it from you. I showed him, as kindly as I could, how far distant such a thought must be from ray mind. I showed him that, though I could not suppose he would mislead me about what men and women might do or say in Western countries, it was my duty not to think of them, but of the rules which we in Japan learn from our elders. Only a worthless woman, I had been taught, would leave her home at a stranger’s commandment. And though Yone, the last of the daughters of Yamada, was a poor unlearned girl, no wickedness or shame should ever be spoken of her, or give her ancestors reason to look at her from above with scornful faces. It was severe, doctor, yet I did not wish to be severe; my meaning was only to be truthful and just; and he — Mr, Milton — saw that, I am sure, for he made no sign of anger.”
With a long and deep breath of thankfulness I drew her toward me, and lightly kissed her forehead. What! Had I allowed the faintest shadowy outline of a doubt as to the dear girl’s integrity to darken my mind, even for the briefest moment ? I turned away my head, utterly subdued.
“ Why, doctor, have I said anything to afflict you ? The tears are in your eyes. What shall happen when our strong doctor has tears in his eyes ? You have something still harder for me to hear, I am afraid. But I must know it all. Tell me, I do beg you, did he speak the truth ? ”
“ I can do no good, my dear, by concealing my thoughts, or making light of Mr. Milton’s conduct. You have to learn a rough lesson, which I hoped you might never need to be taught. That man has no truth in him. Everything about him is false. He has, I believe, an easy and indolent fancy for you, because you are a girl of much beauty, and your beauty is of a kind he never saw before. But if he loved you with honest and manly sincerity, he would never have approached you as he did. For it is not true, in any country on the earth, that a man is permitted to talk to a woman as he talked to you, unless he can honorably make her his wife. He has been a villain from first to last. He meant to persuade you to join him in a disgraceful flight, in spite of my watchfulness. He swore to me, last night, that he would never see you again, — that he would leave the country without doing more harm. He is a perjured caitiff ! ”
She lifted her hand with a gesture of entreaty.
“ Do not use such bitter words,” she said faintly. “ I feel that you are right. He is not good; but it wounds me to hear he has acted with so much unkindness, all at once. I hoped — oh, I did hope you could tell me that what he said was in some maimer true ; that in foreign lands there were unguilty ways of following the course he urged to me. It would have made no change in my mind, nor in my action. I must do what is right in my own eyes, and be led by the teaching of our own good men. But if you could have made me sure that he did not try to blind me by wicked lies, I should be so much less unhappy. I cannot bear to think such things of him, — such wicked, cruel things,”
Again the generous spirit was troubled more by the disclosure of his craft and falsehood than by the sorrow he had inflicted upon herself. But it was impossible for her to check or disguise, by any effort, the intensity of her own suffering. She pressed her hands convulsively to her breast, in the endeavor to control an anguish alike new and poignant.
“ He has done his infamous work, my poor Yone, — I see he has, — and done it swiftly.”
“ So swiftly, yes ; all in a day, all in one little hour.”
A tapping at the door of an inner room interrupted us. Supposing a servant to be there, I opened it without hesitation, but found no one on the other side. Looking about, however, I presently, to my amazement, saw Milton in an opposite corner, endeavoring to escape other observation than mine. He beckoned, and I went to him at once.
“ There is no way of getting out of this house of yours,” he said, in a whisper. “ The doors at the back are locked, and if I go by the side I shall be seen as I pass the windows of the room where you are. Help me away, somehow.”
“ You have been here ever since ? ” I asked.
“ I have,” he answered.
“ And have heard ” — " I have heard every word. My God ! What an ordeal, and what a revelation! ”
“ Come this way,” said I, intending to show him a passage by which he might depart unnoticed. But, as we turned, we saw Yone standing at the door. Her quick ear had caught our subdued tones, and had probably recognized Milton’s voice.
“ No, do not go,” she said, with a firmness I could not have expected. “ I beg you, doctor, to permit him to stay. It is well that Mr. Milton should know what I have heard from you, since he left me at the bridge, not long ago.”
The control of events was slipping out of my hands. Certainly, at this moment, I did not feel that I could interfere.
“ Come back, then,” I said, “ since she wishes it so.”
XVII.
THE STRUGGLE OF A NOBLE SOUL.
“ You need not tell me what you have heard,” Milton began, as soon as he reentered the room, addressing himself directly to Yone, and in response to her last remark. “ I know it all. I was close at hand. You have been told I am a traitor, a liar, and a perjurer. Oh, yes,” and he forced a laugh, “ I know the whole of it.”
“ Ah,” I interposed, “ you heard what I said, and that, I see, galled your pride; but I should like to know which of your senses was touched when you heard what this brave-hearted girl said.”
“ Do not speak of it, — not now,” he answered, in humbler accents. Then, turning again to Yone, he added, “ It was all true, all that part of it. You do not know, you cannot know, how horrible it is for me to say it, but it must come out. I have betrayed you ; I have spoken falsely. For this I cannot defend myself. I cannot even ask you to forgive me. But you have been made to believe one thing which is not true. Neither Dr. Charwell nor any man but myself has the right to say I do not love you ” —
“ Stop there ! ” I cried.
“ Why shall I ? ” he persisted. “ Let me tell the one excuse for my perfidy, poor as you choose to think it. I swear to you, Yone, that my whole heart ” —
I sprang toward him with, I imagine, a warning light in my eyes, from which he saw the madness of continuing in that strain ; but before I could act upon the impulse of hurling him forth into the street, Yone’s mild voice once more arrested me: —
“ Be not violent, dear doctor, and do him no harm, I beseech you. He cannot hurt me any more ; that is ended. And it is right he should know what my feelings are. No, Arthur Milton, I do not believe that you love me. It is not true that you did ever love me. You have caused me to love you, and that I cannot help, — not for many years, and perhaps not while I am alive. But if I love you, I do not respect you, and one single small word from my kindest friend and father, here, means more to me than all that you can avow. You have been drawn to me by what has pleased you in my foolish Japanese face. It would have been more happy for me if my miserable body had been scarred by the pestilence which disfigured so many thousands in my infancy. I was told that I had a fortunate escape. I now see that the scourge would have been a blessing. It would have saved me from your cruelty, Arthur Milton, which is worse to bear than disease, or — or death.”
Her voice sank as she uttered these words, to which Milton attempted no reply, only writhing and cringing, as if each sentence stung him like a lash.
“ I do not understand it,” she continued ; “ I do not seek to understand why you came to crush and to destroy, if you could, a simple woman who never thought harm of you, but who believed you were as good as your speech was gentle, and as honest as the face you wear. I shall never ask how a man like you could make it his sport to throw me into sorrow and shame.”
“ Don’t say that, Yone,” I exclaimed. “ Not shame, my poor child, not shame. Sorrow enough, and too much, dear girl, but not a touch of shame. I never held you in such honor as I do this day.”
“ Doctor, you do not know the whole,” she replied ; “ I had not time to tell you. Others do not think like you. I visited the school before I came here.”
For a short space I did not comprehend the full meaning of this statement. Then suddenly it rushed upon me.
“ Good Heaven, Yone,” I cried, “you have not done so thoughtless a thing as to tell those people what has happened! ”
“ Most of it I have told to the two older ladies,” she answered, calmly.
“ You have made an unfortunate mistake, my child,” said I.
“ I fear so now,” she admitted. “ But I could not know. I hoped, although they were not always mild in their speech, that they were still my friends. And this grief, doctor,” she continued, paying little heed to Milton, who sat apart, “ was new to me. I felt it was a grief belonging to women, — for women to understand and tell me how to heal. I did believe it was my duty to ask for help from some kind and generous ladies ” —
“ Not there, my dear ; you could not find help in that place.”
“ Also there is something else,” she proceeded, in a lower tone than before. “ You have seen, doctor, the little scrolls hanging from their walls, with beautiful words taken from the book of their faith. They have long been written in my mind, but I never had such thoughts about them as came to me this morning. One, more than all others : ‘ Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.’ With those words of invitation shining on their walls, it was my true hope that even if they could not welcome me as friends, they would aid me in faithful obedience to the religion they profess. Even if I had done wrong, by their rules they were bound to give me help. But I have done no wrong to any one. I told them the truth: that Milton, their countryman, had tried to make me forget the teachings of honor and uprightness ; that I had closed my eyes upon him forever, notwithstanding that my heart was full of tenderness for him ; and that I begged them to show me how that sacred promise of their prophet could give me ease in this great pain.”
“ This, also, I have driven her to ! ” cried Milton, when Yone paused, gathering strength to proceed. “ Is there no remedy, Charwell, — is there no way out of this misery ? ”
“ They turned away from me,” she resumed. “ They said I was a wicked girl. And that is false! ” She rose suddenly from her seat, and a flash of indignation, the first I had ever known to be kindled within her, shot from her eyes. “ Yamada’s daughter has many faults, — it does not become her to deny them ; but wicked she never was. Doctor, you will protect me from such disgrace. You cannot fail me. You always know me, and you will trust me.”
A confused outburst of execrations fell from Milton’s lips, but little notice of what he said was taken by Yone, who pursued intently her own train of thought:—
“ Many, oh, many times they have urged me to join their religion, and more than once I have reflected on it, — not because of what I heard from their lips, but for what I read in some of their books. I think, to-day, if they had not hidden their faces from me, and wounded me in my sorrow, — wounded me in spite of those solemn pledges in a holy name with which they cover their walls, — to-day, if they had offered me the charity of the wise and gracious Christ in whose ways they tell us that they walk,
I might have willingly, and perhaps gratefully, consented to their wish. But they are not what I thought them. Now I will look to the God of my fathers, whose priests are not learned, but are pitiful and kind. They cannot give me rest, — I know that; but they can make my life active in useful labor, and help me to forget a part of my own burden in lightening the burdens of others ; and that is the best I can hope for, in many dreary years to come.”
Parts of this touching lament were uncomprehended by Milton, as she had spoken alternately in English and in Japanese ; and she seemed at times almost unaware that she had listeners. As she concluded, she moved toward the door, unheeding the young man’s renewed appeal, —
“ Yone, wait; let us see if something may not yet be done. Charwell, in Heaven’s name, stop her.”
“ Not against her will,” I answered. " Do you wish to go now, Yone ? Are you strong enough ? ”
“ I wish to go,” she feebly responded.
“ Then I will go with you. Say nothing to hinder me. Obey your doctor ; you are not well enough to be alone. You, Mr. Milton, will, I hope, be here two hours hence. I have something of serious moment to say to you, quite different from anything you have yet heard.”
“ What! ” he said, eagerly, “ do you mean there is still a hope ? ”
I mean to give you one more chance; look to it that you appreciate its importance and its value.”
I found a spacious jin riki sha, and insisted on sitting beside her as she was drawn homeward. As we passed the little church which the ladies of the seminary were accustomed to attend, we encountered the Philipson twain, promenading. Their heads twirled around as if simultaneously moved by machinery, and their faces remained averted until we were at a distance. Yone grew a little paler than before, but gave no other sign of having observed the slight.
“ Yes, you will have to look elsewhere for your religion,” I said, to give her ideas a more active turn.
“ They could never tell me what I wish to know,” she replied ; “ I see that now. And I never shall enter their house again, unless great sickness or trouble is there. Or, if you mean to speak of the church itself, I do not think I should have gone to it often. I have never been there without discomfort. It is not pleasant to hear gentlemen and ladies, whose purpose I am sure is kind, telling strange things in a language which nobody can understand. I have always been sorry for them. The younger girls, with naughty mischief, would go to laugh at them, because, in spite of their earnestness, they had not really learned to speak Japanese. They would declare to us, before beginning, that their Lord would smooth away all differences of tongues and make everything plain ; but in truth very few of them said anything we could comprehend. No, no ; it was not by listening to them that I could have been relieved from trouble. I should have hoped to find what I needed by myself, with a little friendly help. One might almost be satisfied with those comforting legends which the ladies hang about their rooms. But though I wish to say no ill of any person, I think the words have meanings which those two stern sisters do not take into their souls.”
After this, she was silent until we had nearly reached her dwelling, when she spoke again : —
“ Doctor, he said he could not ask me to forgive him, — Mr. Milton, I mean. I did not heed him then, and I could not answer. I wish you would promise me to tell him that he has no need to ask. I shall forgive him. But he must not know it until he is going away, — just at the end. Nothing must happen that may lead him back to see me again. Only when you take leave of him, you can say that Yone will strive to forgive him, with all her — with all her strength.”
XVIII.
THE LAST HOPE.
Returning to my home, two hours later, I found Milton awaiting me.
“ You are punctual,” I said.
“ I have been here ever since. I was determined to wait for you, though I have twice been nearly driven away by one of those extraordinary missionary women, who seemed disposed to take absolute possession of the premises. She made me half wild by her attempts to drag me into conversation.”
“ Who was she ? ” I asked.
“ Jackman I think she said the name was.”
My heart sank. I could not comfort myself with a doubt as to the object of her call.
“ Here she is again ! ” exclaimed Milton, impatiently. “ I hope she has no business with you.”
“ None whatever. If she comes in, I will do my best to get rid of her, you may be sure.”
The unwelcome visitor entered in breathless haste, and, without waiting for forms of salutation, began to interrogate.
“ Have you heard the news, Dr. Charwell ? It concerns you.”
I was staggered by her audacity.
“ What news ? ” I asked, thrown off my guard. Recovering distantly, however, I added, “ I have heard no news, and if you will excuse me, Miss Jackman, I am too much occupied to listen to any now. I have an engagement with this gentleman.”
She had not failed to observe my momentary confusion.
“ I think you must have heard something,” she said ; “ but if not, it is plainly my duty to inform you.”
“I told you, Miss Jackman, that I have an engagement with this gentleman.”
She gazed at him curiously and intently, pinching her lips together in an aguish smile.
“ Perhaps this gentleman is Mr. Milton, of Boston,” she observed, with extreme pungency of utterance.
I made no reply.
“ Am I right, sir ? ” she continued, pertinaciously, addressing herself this time directly to Milton,
“ That is my name, madam,” he answered, shortly.
She glowed with exultation over the opportunity that had unexpectedly fallen to her. Now her proposed projectile would strike a double target.
“ I am not sure,” she proceeded, seating herself with stiff deliberation. “ but that I have a call to deliver myself even in the presence of this very individual. The matter may he important for him to hear. A word in season is never misplaced.”
Milton looked at her with surprise. He had no acquaintance with the robust and vigorous “ reclaimer,” and was utterly at a loss to understand the purpose of her remarks. I knew to what they tended, and endeavored to frustrate her malice by announcing an event which had been officially communicated to me the same morning, and thus introducing a theme which, I believed, would serve as a counter-irritant, and divert her fulminant energies into a new channel.
“ Ah! ” I cried, “ of course I know your news ! Speaking of delivering yourself gives me the cue. It is true: an imperial infant was born last night. I can’t imagine how you heard of it.”
The device was successful. A certain feature of the Mikado’s domestic system, sanctioned by immemorial usage, but not amenable to the canons of Western morality, had always been an object of this lady’s most impassioned denunciation. She sped madly off upon the tempting tangent.”
Who — who — who ”— she gasped.
“ Who is the mother ? ” I responded, catching the meaning of her incoherent appeal. “Not the Empress, I regret to say.”
“ Abominable ! ” she burst out, stamping her foot. “If I were the Empress ” —
“ Ah, if you were! ” I answered, quietly, by no means insensible to the humor of the suggestion, but unable, oppressed as I was by anxious cares, to derive any entertainment from it. My sole desire was to keep her ideas fixed upon this new and harmless topic. “ As it is,” I said, “ the young prince will enjoy the customary privileges of his paternity, and probably succeed to the throne. The dignitaries go to court to-day to offer congratulations.”
She rose, trembling with wrathful agitation.
“ It is a court of shame and infamy,” she railed ; “ it is a lost and abandoned court! ”
“ Not wholly, let us trust,” I remonstrated. “ There may yet be time for you to reclaim it, if you start at once.”
She shot a vicious glance at me, and for an instant appeared undetermined whether to remain and pursue her original design, or rush to the dissemination of the later and more momentous intelligence. The fear of being forestalled decided her, and she darted forth to unburden herself of the interesting fact and of the presumably righteous indignation with which it inspired her.
Excepting for his restlessness at the delay she had caused, Milton had regarded her demonstrations with indifference, being ignorant of her motive in intruding. I, on the contrary, was filled with dismay, for it was evident that she had come from the Philipsons, and had taken upon herself the congenial task of circulating their version of my poor child s sorrowful tale. Her reason for including me in the round of visitation was undoubtedly that she hoped to glean additional matter for redistribution. Milton’s presence would have been no check, but would rather have instigated her to especially offensive manifestations ; and it was a satisfaction to have warded off the explosion which would certainly have followed the disclosure of her errand. The expedient I used was simply the one which first presented itself, but it was vividly recalled at a later period by circumstances which impressed it indelibly upon my memory.
The moment she disappeared I locked the office doors and drew the window curtains together.
“ We will not be interrupted again by anybody,” I remarked.
“ I thank you, Dr. Charwell.”
Then, attacking the subject which had been weighing upon him, he said, —
“ Your last words, when you took Yone away, gave me something like hope. I trust you intended them to do so.”
Since my return he had not stirred from his position at one end of a table in an obscure corner of the room. I seated myself facing him, at the opposite side.
“ It wholly depends upon yourself, Mr. Milton,” I replied. “ If you have manlier qualities than you have shown in the last few days ; if the events of this morning have given you more correct ideas of justice and duty than you held before ; to put it plainly, if you are worth the effort I may be induced to make, then I don’t deny that there is something like hope.”
“ Do you think, Dr. Charwell, that any human being could go through what I have, see what I have seen, hear what I have heard, without becoming a changed man ? ”
“ I don’t know, I don’t know. My chief concern must be for Yone. At least, I suppose you know her better than you did. You will not pretend to question her goodness and nobleness now.”
“ God knows I do not.”
“ Her beauty needs no praise; and her cleverness and intelligence are not far behind it. She is not perfection. Persons of my age do not look for that in men or women. But she is as near to it as any being I ever saw. Now, the question is, Shall I attempt a thing most distasteful to myself, the wisdom of which I more than half distrust, but which will enable you to thoroughly comprehend and profit by the girl’s rare virtues ; or shall I take the safer course of sending you away, and allowing time to heal her bruises ? ”
“ I am bound to go if you exact it, but is it not possible to find a way that may be better for her ? ”
“ You can be sure, young man, that I have no other object in view. I understood you to say you would do anything in your power to repair the injury you have caused.”
“ I did ; and so I will, gladly, eagerly. Only show me that it is possible.”
“ I can make it possible. Or, not to be too positive, I do not doubt my ability to do so. But let there be no mistakes. You are to remember that I attempt it only by reason of my affection for Yone. If you second me heartily, and do your best to make her happy again, I will more than forgive you. And yet ” —
“ You hesitate, because you still distrust me,” broke in Milton. “ I have given you cause. If I did not feel this, you know I could not have undergone so patiently what you have said to me. But let me have the chance, and this time I will prove my title to confidence. There! I will offer you no more pledges. Try me, and you shall see.”
The haggard look already began to pass from his face, and his eyes brightened, apparently with good promise and sincere hopefulness. But this, again, might be only a transient phase of his variable, shifting nature.
“ After all,” I said, “ if my plan fails, it will only be another downward step on your part. Yone will not hear of it. Now, Mr. Milton, be good enough to tell me exactly what you proposed doing, if she had been the woman you thought her, and you had succeeded in getting her away.”
It was an unexpected question, and he answered with some confusion : —
“If I had succeeded — I meant — perhaps I had no fixed or immediate intention ; but I certainly proposed to keep to the letter every promise I had made for her happiness.”
“You would have taken her from Japan ?”
“ Yes, surely.”
“ Clandestinely, I presume.”
“ Is this line of inquiry necessary, Dr. Charwell ? ”
“ I must see my way, sir. I have no desire to say disagreeable things. I will try to avoid them. But we are on a new track now, and I must have a clear course before me.”
“ Certainly I could not have taken her otherwise than secretly.”
“ And what was your destination ? ”
“ Oh, that I cannot tell. Any place in the wide world where she would have wished to go.”
“ And for how long ? ”
“ For how long ? I don’t understand you.”
“ I wish to know at what time and place you would have proposed to desert her.”
“ Desert her ! You are trifling with me, Dr. Charwell. Desert her! I wish you could read my thoughts. She should never have ceased to be cherished and protected. I would have assisted her to realize every desire of her heart. Her lightest fancies should always have been gratified. I have abundant means, for that matter : more than enough, most persons will say. She should have asked for nothing on earth a second time, as long as she lived.”
“ Ah, as long as she lived,” I repeated, drawing my chair close to him, and looking him steadily in the face. “ Well, then, since you would not have deserted her, and would have devoted yourself to her as long as she lived, at what time and place would you have proposed to marry her ? ”
He started violently, knocking from the table a set of bronze ornaments, which he immediately stooped to pick up, keeping his face averted from me as he did so.
“ Why — why — you know,” he stammered, “ as regards that, there is an obstacle ; as matters stand, it is impossible. She is married already.”
“ I perceive, Mr. Milton, that you have not made yourself completely familiar with the phenomena of Japanese social life. You evidently know very little about the conjugal relation here ; which, to be sure, is too repulsive, in many features, to attract ardent inquirers. It happens to be the case that for the most trivial causes — I might almost say for any cause, or, indeed, no cause — a husband can cast off his wife, and leave her to follow a separate course of life. He is entirely free ; and. for all practical considerations that we need look at, so is she. Therefore there would have been no impassable barrier to marriage, at your earliest pleasure. But you will not imagine that I should approve any irregular proceeding. Nothing of that sort is in my mind. Nothing which might be deemed indecorous would satisfy my notion of what is fitting for Yone Santo. No running away for her ; no law-breaking, bad as the law may be. She has a husband already, as you say, and you consequently assume that she cannot marry you. But now let us suppose that I remove the obstacle; that I make it all clear and practicable, — reputably, and in perfect accordance with every conventional requirement.”
He changed his attitude as I thus addressed him, and stared at me, as if suddenly bereft of his senses.
“ You astound me, Charwell. I can’t take in such a train of thought. How can you make it possible ? How can it be done ? ”
“ For that matter,” I replied, “ the best explanation is in the byword of our immaculate spinster, Miss Sophia Pliilipson,— ‘ because we are in Japan.’ For once in a way, a beneficent use can be made of a detestable system. It is aftsurd to imagine that Santo Yorikichi is capable of estimating the worth of a woman like Yone, and he never had an idea of deep attachment to any human being. He married her with a dim notion that he might, thus ‘ get even ’ with the aristocratic class, to which, as he knew, she belonged. But he has outgrown that fancy, and I have little doubt that the constant proximity of a creature so delicate and refined, so antipathetic in all respects to his own coarse fibre, begins to weary him. Now, then, you see my drift.”
Another set of ideas began to work in his unstable mind. He clutched nervously at the arms of his chair, grasped his head in his hands, and by divers signs and gestures indicated an extreme disquietude.
“ I hardly think so,” lie said, hesitatingly. “ No, not yet. All these things are so new, — so remarkable to me. I am not sure I understand you, even now.”
“ The sole difficulty is that Santo is a well-to-do man, for his station, and may not come readily to terms. He dotes on money, but he has already a fair amount of it. However, I will undertake to satisfy him in one solid way or another. The separation can and shall be effected. In less than a week, I trust, Yone may be liberated, without any deviation from proper and recognized Japanese practice. She shall stand before you free from entanglement, utterly free from reproach, ready — unless she is more unforgiving than I can believe — to overlook what has passed, and to become your wife.”
“ My wife! ” he cried, while an expression of blank amazement and incredulity settled on his face, — “ my wife ! In God’s name, what are you raving about ? Are you talking to me of marriage with the divorced wife of a Japanese mechanic ? You must be mad ! ”
For a moment I was powerless to speak. Then my temper, never under the steadiest mastery, burst forth uncontrolled, and a blinding rage possessed me.
“ By the Lord, I believe I am mad ! ” I stormed. “ I swear I must have been out of my senses for the last half hour. I thought I was talking with a man, and I only now discover that it’s a dog. Come, take advantage of the hallucination, you hound ! Get out of my sight and reach, before I have time to think again what you really are.”
E. H. House.