)--with which the conversation was studded. As the realization of
her solitude made her nerves more jumpy, she began to imagine that the
women were forever talking about her, criticizing her unfavorably and
disposing of her future.

The only man whom she saw during the hot summer months, besides the
inevitable Tanaka, was Mr. Ito, the lawyer. He could talk quite
good English. He was not so egotistical and bitter as Sadako. He had
traveled in America and Europe. He seemed to understand the trouble of
Asako's mind, and would offer sympathetic advice.

"It is difficult to go to school when we are no longer children,"
he would say sententiously. "Asa San must be patient. Asa San must
forget. Asa San must take Japanese husband. I think it is the only
way."

"Oh, no," the poor girl shivered; "I wouldn't marry again for
anything."

"But," Ito went on relentlessly, "it is hurtful to the body when once
it has custom to be married. I think that is reason why so many widow
women are unfortunate and become mad."

Every day he would spend an hour or so in conversation with Asako. She
thought that this was a sign of friendliness and sympathy. As a matter
of fact, his object at first was to improve his English. Later on more
ambitious projects developed in his fertile brain.

He would talk about New York and London in his queer stilted way. He
had been a fireman on board ship, a teacher of _jiujitsu_, a juggler,
a quack dentist, Heaven knows what else. Driven by the conscientious
inquisitiveness of his race, he had endured hardships, contempt and
rough treatment with the smiling patience inculcated in the Japanese
people by their education. "We must chew our gall, and bide our time,"
they say, when the too powerful foreigner insults or abuses them.

He had seen the magnificence of our cities, the vastness of our
undertakings and had returned to Japan with great relief to find that
life among his own people was less strenuous and fierce, that it was
ordered by circumstances and the family system, that less was left
to individual courage and enterprise, that things happened more often
than things were done. The impersonality of Japan was as restful to
him as it is aggravating to a European.

But it must not be imagined that Ito was an idle man. On the contrary,
he was exceedingly hard working and ambitious. His dream was to become
a statesman, to enjoy unlimited patronage, to make men and to break
men, and to die a peer. When