Kimono Part 42

Her appearance was against her. She wore a j.a.panese kimono, unpleasantly reminiscent of Yae. Her hair was disordered and frantic-looking. Her eyes were red with weeping.

"Let me say at once," observed Reggie, as he offered her a chair, "that I am in no way responsible for your husband's shortcomings. I have too many of my own."

Asako could never understand Reggie when he talked in that sarcastic tone.

"I want to know exactly what happened," she begged. "I have no one else who can tell me."

"Your husband says that nothing actually happened," replied Reggie brutally.

The girl realised that this statement was far from being the vindication of Geoffrey which she had begun to hope for.

"But what did you actually see?" she asked.

"I saw Miss Smith with your husband. As it was in my house, they might have asked my leave first."

Asako s.h.i.+vered.

"But do you think Geoffrey had been--love-making to Miss Smith?"

"I don't know," said Reggie wearily. "From what I heard, I think Miss Smith was doing most of the love-making to Geoffrey; but he did not seem to object to the process."

Asako's yearnings for proof of her husband's innocence were crushed.

"What shall I do?" she pleaded.

"I'm sure I don't know." This scene to Reggie was becoming positively silly. "Take him back to England as soon as possible, I should think."

"But would he fall in love with women in England?"

"Possibly."

"Then what am I to do?"

"Grin and bear it. That's what we all have to do."

"Oh, Mr. Forsyth," Asako implored, "you know my husband so well. Do you think he is a bad man?"

"No, not worse than the rest of us," answered Reggie, who felt quite maddened by this talk. "He is a bit of a fool, and a good deal of a blunderer."

"But do you think Geoffrey was to blame for what happened?"

"I have told you, my dear Mrs. Barrington, that your husband a.s.sured me that nothing actually happened. I am quite sure this is true, for your husband is a very honourable man--in details."

"You mean," said Asako, gulping out the words, "that Miss Smith was not actually Geoffrey's--mistress; they did not--sin together."

Asako did not know how intimate were the relations between Reggie and Yae. She did not understand therefore how cruelly her words lanced him. But, more than the shafts of memory it was the imbecility of the whole scene which almost made the young man scream.

"Exactly," he answered. "In the words of the Bible, she lay with him, but he knew her not."

"Then, do you think I ought to forgive Geoffrey?"

This was too much. Reggie leaped to his feet.

"My dear lady, that is really a question for yourself and yourself alone. Personally, I do not at present feel like forgiving anybody.

Least of all, can I forgive fools. Geoffrey Harrington is a fool. He was a fool to marry, a fool to marry you, a fool to come to j.a.pan when everybody warned him not to, a fool to talk to Yae when everybody told him that she was a dangerous woman. No, personally, at present I cannot forgive Geoffrey Barrington. But it is very late and I am very tired, and I'm sure you are, too. I would advise you to go home to your erring husband; and to-morrow morning we shall all be thinking more clearly. As the French say, _L'oreiller raccommode tout_."

Asako still made no movement.

"Well, dear lady, if you wish to wait longer, you will excuse me, if, instead of talking rot, I play to you. It is more soothing to the nerves."

He sat down at the piano, and struck up the _Merry Widow_ chorus,--

"I'll go off to Maxim's: I've done with lovers' dreams; The girls will laugh and greet me, they will not trick and cheat me; Lolo, Dodo, Joujou, Cloclo, Margot, Frou-frou, I'm going off to Maxim's, and you may go to--"

The pianist swung around on his stool: his visitor had gone.

"Thank G.o.d," he sighed; and within a quarter of an hour he was asleep.

He awoke in the small hours with that sick restless feeling on his chest, which he described as a conviction of sin.

"Good G.o.d!" he said aloud; "what a cad I've been!"

He realised that an unspoiled and gentle creature had paid him the greatest of all compliments by coming to him for advice in the extremity of her soul's misery. He had received her with silly _badinage_ and cheap cynicism.

At breakfast he learned that things were much more serious than he had imagined, that Asako had actually left her husband and was living with her j.a.panese cousins. What he had thought to be a lover's quarrel, he now recognised to be the s.h.i.+pwreck of two lives. With a kindly word he might have prevented this disaster.

He drove straight to the Fujinami mansion, at the risk of being late for the Requiem Ma.s.s. He found two evil-eyed hooligans posted at the gate, who stopped his rickshaw, and, informing him that none of the Fujinami family were at home, seemed prepared to resist his entry with force.

During the reception of the Austrian Emba.s.sy which followed the Ma.s.s, an incident occurred which altered the whole set of the young diplomat's thoughts, and, most surprisingly, sent him posting down to the Imperial Hotel to find Geoffrey Harrington, as one who has discovered a treasure and must share it with his friend.

The big Englishman was contemplating a whisky-and-soda in the hall of the hotel. It was by no means the first of its series. He gazed dully at Reggie.

"Thought you were at Chuzenji," he said thickly.

"I had to come down for the special service for the Archduke Franz Ferdinand," said Reggie, excitedly. "They gave us a regular wake, champagne by the gallon! Several of the _corps diplomatique_ became inspired! They saw visions and made prophesyings. Von Falkenturm, the German military attache, was shouting out, 'We've got to fight. We're going to fight! We don't care who we fight! Russia, France, England: yes, the whole lot of them!' The man was drunk, of course; but, after, all, _in vino veritas_. The rest of the square-heads were getting very rattled, and at last they succeeded in suppressing Falkenturm. But, I tell you, Geoffrey, it's coming at last; it's really coming!"

"What's coming?"

"Why, the Great War. Thank G.o.d, it's coming!"

"Why thank G.o.d?"

"Because we've all become too artificial and beastly. We want exterminating, and to start afresh. We shall escape at last from women and drawing-rooms and silly gossip. We shall become men. It will give us all something to do and something to think about."

"Yes," echoed Geoffrey, "I wish I could get something to do."