h much about the lake and Yae
Smith, promising to return within forty-eight hours.

At daybreak next morning Yae was hammering at Geoffrey's door.

"Wake up, old sleepy captain," she cried.

Geoffrey got the boat ready; and Yae prepared a picnic breakfast to be
eaten on the way. Poor Reggie, of course, had work at the Embassy; he
could not come.

It was an ideal excursion. They reached Senju, the wood-cutter's
village at the end of the lake. They ascended the forest path as far
as the upper lake, a mere pond of reeds and sedges, which the bears
are supposed to haunt.

Geoffrey and Yae, however, saw nothing more alarming than the village
curs.

"Returned in safety from the land of danger!" cried the girl, as she
sprang ashore at the steps of the villa.

The air and exercise had wearied Geoffrey. After lunch he changed into
a kimono of Reggie's. Then he lay down on his bed and was soon fast
asleep.

How long he slept he could not say; but he awoke slowly out of
confusing dreams. Somebody was in his room. Somebody was near his bed.
Was it Asako? Was it a dream?

No, it was his comrade of the morning's voyage. It was Yae Smith. She
was sitting on the bed beside him. She was gazing into his face with
her soft, still, cat-like eyes. What was she doing that for? She was
stroking his arm. Her touch was soft. He did not stop her.

Her hair was let down to below her waist, long black hair, more silky
in texture and more wavy than that of a pure Japanese woman. Her
kimono was wide open at the throat. A sweet fragrance exhaled from her
body.

"Big captain, may I?" she pleaded.

"What?" said Geoffrey, still half asleep.

"Just lie by your side--just once,--just for the last time," she
cooed.

Geoffrey was for going to sleep again, well pleased with his dream.
But Yae slipped an arm across his chest, and caught his shoulder in
her hand. She nestled closer to him.

"Geoffrey," she murmured, "I love you so much. You are so strong and
so big, Geoffrey. I want to stay like this always, always, holding
on to you till I make you love me. Love me just a little, Geoffrey.
Nobody will ever know. Geoffrey, it must be nice to have me near you.
Geoffrey, you must, you must want to love me."

She was hugging his body now in an embrace astonishingly powerful
for so small a creature. It was this pressure which finally awoke
Geoffrey. Gently he disengaged her arms and sat up in the bed.

She was clinging to his neck now, wild