t now crawled, cold, toward it.
Why should Ume-ko have left him again, and at such an hour? Why should
she have pinned to her pillow a slip of written paper? He would not
read it! Yes, yes,--he must,--he must read instantly. Perhaps the
Something was still to be prevented! He caught the letter up, held it
as best he could in quivering hands, and read:

Because of my unworthiness, O master, my heart's beloved, I have been
allowed to come between you and the work you were given of the gods to
do. The fault is all mine, and must come from my evil deeds in a
previous life. By sacrifice of joy and life I now attempt to expiate
it. I go to the leaning willow where the water speaks. One thing only
I shall ask of you,--that you admit to your mind no thought of
self-destruction, for this would heavily burden my poor soul, far off
in the Meido-land. Oh, live, my beloved, that I, in spirit, may still
be near you. I will come. You shall know that I am near,--only, as
the petals of the plum tree fall in the wind of spring, so must my
earthly joy depart from me. Farewell, O thou who art loved as no
mortal was ever loved before thee.

Your erring wife,
Ume-ko.

* * * * * *

In his fantastic night-robe with its design of a huge fish, ungirdled
and wild of eyes, Tatsu rushed through the drowsy streets of Yeddo.
The few pedestrians, catching sight of him, withdrew, with cries of
fear, into gateways and alleys.

At the leaning willow he paused, threw an arm about it, and swayed far
over like a drunkard, his eyes blinking down upon the stream. Ume-ko's
words, at the time of their utterance scarcely noted, came now as an
echo, hideously clear. "That which fell here would be carried very
swiftly out to sea." His nails broke against the bark. She,--his
wife,--must have been thinking of it even then, while he,--he,--blind
brute and dotard--sprawled upon the earth feeding his eyes of flesh
upon the sight of her. But, after all, could she have really done it?
Surely the gods, by miracle, must have checked so disproportionate a
sacrifice! Suddenly his wandering gaze was caught and held by a little
shoe among the willow roots. It was of black lacquer, with a thong of
rose-colored velvet. With one cry, that seemed to tear asunder the
physical walls of his body, he loosed his arm and fell.

IX

His body was found some moments later by old Kano and a bridge keeper.
It was caught