"Ah, do you mean Sir Tatsu? Yes, I know. He, my father, has always
longed to have a son."

"A son is desirable when the price is not too great," said the old
dame, nodding sagely. "You are old enough to realize also, Miss Kano
Ume-ko, what is the meaning of adoption into a family where there is a
daughter of marriageable age."

Ume's face drooped over until the pebble caught a rosy glow. The old
servant chuckled. "Eh, young mistress, you know what I mean? You are
thinking of it?"

"I am trying very hard not to think of it," said Ume.

"Ma-a-a! And I have little wonder for that fact! Your father will
sacrifice you without a tear,--he cares but for pictures. And Mata is
helpless,--Mata cannot help her babe! Ara! It is a world of dust!"

"How old was my mother when she came here, Mata?"

"Just eighteen. Younger than you are now, my treasure."

"She was both beautiful and happy, you have said."

"Yes, both, both! Ah, how time speeds for the old. It seems but a
short year or more that we two entered here together, she and I. From
childhood I had nursed her. I thought your father old for her, in
spite of his young heart and increasing fame. But he loved her truly,
and has mourned for her. Even now he prays thrice daily before her
ihai on the shrine. And she loved him,--almost too deeply for a woman
of her class. She loved him, and was happy!"

"Only one year!" sighed Ume. "But it must be a great thing to be happy
even for one year. Some people are not happy ever at all."

"One must not think of personal happiness,--it is wicked. Does not
even your old mumbling abbot on the hill tell you so much? And now, of
all times, do not start the dreaming. You will be sacrificed to art,"
said Mata, gloomily.

"Do I look like my mother, Mata San?"

The old dame wiped her eyes on her sleeve that she might see more
clearly. Something in the girl's pure, upraised face caught at her
heart, and the tears came afresh. "Wait," she whispered; "stay where
you are, and you shall see your mother's face." She went into her tiny
chamber, and from her treasures brought out a metal mirror given her by
the young wife, Uta-ko. "Look,--close," she said, placing it in Ume's
hand. "That is the bride of nineteen years ago. Never have you looked
so like her as at this hour!"

Kano came back alone,--tired, dusty, and discouraged. Tatsu had
escaped him, he said, at the first glimpse of the Sumida River. There