ntain lily, and raw fish. Each course--and their
name was many--was served on a little two-inch-high lacquer table,
with everything to match. Sometimes it was gold lacquer, then
again green, once red and another black. But it was all a dream of
color that shaded in with the little maids who served it; and they,
swift, noiseless and pretty, were trained to graceful perfection.
The few furnishings of the room were priceless. Uncle sat by in
his silken robes, gracious and courteous, surprising me with his
knowledge of current events. In the guise of host, he is charming.
That is, if only he would not always talk with dropped eyelids,
giving the impression that he is half dreaming and is only partly
conscious of the world and its follies. And all the time I know
perfectly well that he sees everything around him and clean on to
the city limits.

Again and again in his talks he referred to his color prints and
the years of patience required to collect them. Right then, Mate,
I made a vow to study the pesky things as they have seldom been
attacked before--even though I never had much use for pictures in
which you cannot tell the top side from the bottom, without a
label. But then, Jack says, my artistic temperament will never
keep me awake at night. Now I decided all at once to make a
collection. Heaven knows what I will do with it. But Uncle grew
so enthusiastic he included his niece in the conversation, and
while his humor was at high tide I coaxed him into a promise that
Sada might come down to Hiroshima very soon, and help me look for
prints.

Yes, indeed there was a dance afterwards, and everything was
deadly, hysterically solemn--so rigidly proper, so stiffly
conventional that it palled. It was the most maleless house of
revelry I ever saw. Why, even the kakemono were pictures of
perfect ladies and the gate-man was a withered old woman.

There was absolutely nothing wrong I could name. It was all
exquisitely, daintily, lawfully Japanese. But I sat by my window
till early morning. There was a very ghost of a summer moon. Out
of the night came the velvety tones of a mighty bell; the sing-song
prayers of many priests; the rippling laugh of a little child and
the tinkling of a samisen. Every sound made for simple joy and
peace. But I thought of the girl somewhere beyond the twinkling
street lights, who, with mixed races in her blood and a strange
religion in her heart, had dreamed dreams of this as a