of her who had been wife to him they both
loved.

"All the gods bless you--all the gods--for giving me that one name. For
in all the earths and heavens together there is none so sweet as--wife
to Shijiro Arisuga."

And there, that night, Hoshiko married little Yone.

"Now go and die," she wept at farewell, "and here I will wait--wait,
until I, also, die--wait for that touch of your spirit on my arm, wait
for your hand in the dark Meido. But if you do not die? if the gods are
not ready yet for you--you will come?"

"I will come again," said Hoshiko, weeping, too, which was strange for a
soldier.

And there they parted, only a moment after they were married, and
Hoshiko was ordered to join the Guards and hurry to the Yalu, where
their prey was fattening.

TEIKOKU BANZAI

XXXIII

TEIKOKU BANZAI

Then, at last, after three months of marching and wading and six days of
fighting, they faced the Russian intrenchments at that place beyond
Wiju, which some call, to this day, Hamatan, but which is Yujuho. And
the Imperial Guards were there. Shijiro Arisuga, if he were there, also,
must have observed with joy that the Guards had the right of the line
and would reach the Russian intrenchments first--perhaps off toward
Kiuliencheng, where the battery of six pieces was still stubbornly
firing. He would know that the Guards must give many happy ones their
opportunity for the great red death. Perhaps he could, then, see far
enough into the future to know that his own regiment would have the
advance and be cut to pieces. It would hurl itself straight upon those
stubborn guns. They would tear bloody lanes in its ranks. And Hoshiko
would be in the forefront of it.

Kuroki's artillery ceased, Zassuliche's ceased, and that stillness which
the soldier knows for the prelude to the assault fell. The two shots
from the right was the advance. Zanzi raised his hand, and into the
smoke raced Hoshiko with the colors. And she did not forget Arisuga's
glory--nor his father's--nor that dream of his when the small white
death was closing down upon him. She understood that he was there. And
not only he.

His ancestors were looking on--the stately samurai. And hers--the humble
eta. His father whom she here redeemed. The emperor with his thousand
eyes. The myriads of the gods. The army. The world. The heavens!

Yet she forgot nothing which Arisuga had taught her. She went forward
with two others. To her right, to her left,