adored. All women do. But if a woman loves a man too much, he runs
away. If she loves him just enough, he stays. If she loves him a little
less than enough, he runs after her.

"If I were a man," said Isonna, "I would care for only such pretty
things as you--not for wars and fightings--even great deaths. For what
is the last heaven but a state of bliss! And if one has all the bliss
one can bear or understand here on earth, is that not a heaven? And
truly if I were a man, it would be extreme bliss to touch you, here, and
here, and here, to put an arm about you so, to sit in the andon light,
so--"

All of which things the adoring maid illustrated, to her saddened
mistress, in the light of the night lamp, and to all of them her
mistress agreed.

THE GOING OF THE SOLDIER

XIV

THE GOING OF THE SOLDIER

For the soldier must go. There was not a vestige of excuse for remaining
longer. The terrible mother had entered his chamber, had looked at him,
had said briefly that he was quite well. And Hoshiko herself had done
everything but ask him flatly to stay. How could she do that? Isonna had
warned her constantly of the sort of woman who did that in Japan. The
mere asking would be enough--in such a woman--to advertise her as of
joy. And for want of this word of asking, the heaven she had made was
closing.

But Isonna and some of the circumstances of the case had taught her more
and more that any more forwardness would be seriously misconstrued by
the invalid.

"You are awake," said Isonna, mysteriously, who was not blind to the
maturing of the thing called womanhood.

"Ah," sighed the happy and miserable girl, "if to wake means this, then
I wish that I might always have slept."

"You did not sleep," said the still mysterious maid.

"What did I then, little beast?"

"You dreamed."

"Then," begged the girl, with a piteous smile, "make me to dream again,
and take care that I never wake."

"Ah, sweet mistress," said the maid, "there comes to all, in the matter
of men, a time to sleep, a time to dream, and a time to wake. The sleep
is best. For in that one knows nothing. The dream is sweet. But it never
lasts. The waking sometimes is good--sometimes evil. Good it is if all
is fair between a man and a woman. Evil it is if all is not. And,
mistress dear, all is not fair between you and him. So there is another
thing after the waking--which the gods make."

"What is that, wise little beast?" laughed Hosh