“‘I am O’Osu, messenger of the Emperor and avenger of evil.’

“‘Then,’ said the dying robber, ’thou shalt have a new name.  Until this hour my brother and I have been called the bravest men in the West.  To thee, august boy, I bequeath the title.  Let men call thee the bravest in Yamato.’

“From that day O’Osu was called ‘Yamato Take,’ and never did he wrong the name.”

Mary sighed when Mme. Fontaine had finished the story.  She yearned for the gift of language and the power to chain the attention of a circle of people.  How had she done it, this mysterious foreigner who could handle the English language even better than English people?  Her words were simple and gestures she used almost none.  It was her voice, Mary thought.  There was an undercurrent of dramatic power in it, like a subterranean river.  It could only be guessed at, but it was there, powerful and deep.  Even Miss Campbell, unreasonably prejudiced, felt the undercurrent.

“That is a charming story,” she observed.  “I suppose Japan is filled with many romantic stories of that sort.”

“Hundreds of them,” answered the widow.  “Volumes and volumes could be written about them and still the half not be told.”

“And you know many of them, I suppose?” asked Billie.

“Oh, yes.  One could not live in Japan without studying her history, so filled with romances and legends of heroic deeds.  It is fascinating, I assure you, and furnishes no end of subjects for decorations from a picture on a fan to the masterpiece of a great artist.”

There was a moment’s silence in the company of which Mme. Fontaine certainly seemed the center.  She looked suddenly very Japanese.  Against the white of her dress her soft skin gleamed like polished old ivory.  Her eyes were darker and more noticeably slanting than ever before.  If she only had had dark hair!  What country had given her those strangely incongruous locks?

And now it was proposed that they should wander in the garden, and off they started by various paths and bypaths all leading eventually to the little curved bridge at the far end, where Nancy had hung two large yellow lanterns on the ends of supple willow wands.

The Widow of Shanghai walked between Billie and Mr. Campbell, but she had little to say.  The moon, swinging over them like another yellow lantern, had glorified the garden into a little earthly paradise.  It seemed somehow inappropriate to speak above a whisper in the midst of so much exquisite beauty.  The wisteria had opened up during the day and now hung in magnificent purple clusters from an arbor across the main walk.

From the servants’ quarters came the tinkle of the samisen, and a breeze laden with the scent of flowers brought with it also the distant sound of voices and laughter.

Nicholas Grimm had joined Billie, and the two young people now lingered in the arbor.  In the curve of a path they caught an occasional glimpse of a white dress.  The music of Nancy’s laugh came to them mingled with Mary’s high, sweet note.  Gradually the voices died away.  The garden seemed to be under a spell.  Billie, sitting beside Nicholas in the arbor, waited breathlessly.  Then at last in the stillness there burst forth such a stream of full-throated singing as had never been heard.