littered the floor. Tatsu
had stopped his work abruptly, overcome by the very power of his own
delineation.

He was absent from the house for several hours. The long walk through
unseen streets and over unnoticed bridges had given the boon, at least,
of physical fatigue. Now, perhaps, he could get to sleep before the
black ants of thought had rediscovered him. Entering the room quietly
he closed the shoji, smoothed the bed-clothes with an impatient hand,
and knelt, for an instant, before the shrine. Perhaps, after all, rest
was not to come. The air was sweet and heavy with Ume-ko. The faint
perfume of sandalwood which, living, always hung about her garments,
flowed in with the odor of the plum. She must be near,--Ume herself,
in mortal garments. In the next room, the veranda, hiding in the
closet to spring out merrily upon him! He groaned and strove to plunge
his mind into prayer.

The unfinished picture stood close at hand. Suddenly he noticed it,
and, with a gasp, stooped to it. Something had changed; the whole
vibration of its lines were subtly new. There was the girl's figure,
the leaning willow, the man,--content, insensate, sprawling upon the
bank,--but the Kappa! Buddha the Merciful, could it be true? Where he
had left a Kappa, waiting until to-morrow to give the triumph, the
leering satisfaction at the human grief it fed on, rose the white form
and pitying face of Kwannon Sama,--she to whom his Ume loved to pray.
The eyes, soft, humid with compassion, looked directly out to his.
They were Ume's eyes! He caught up one brush after the other. All had
been used, and Ume's touch was upon them. Her aura permeated them.

He rushed now to the veranda. In leaving the rooms, three hours
before, he had not taken the usual stone step which led into the garden
under the branches of the plum, but had leaped directly from the low
flooring, not caring where he trod. He remembered now that the stone
had been white in the moonlight. It was now swept clean of petals, as
though by the hurried trailing of a woman's dress. Was this the way in
which she was to manifest herself? And would a spirit-robe brush
surfaces so vehemently? And would a ghostly hand use brushes and
pigments of ground-earth?

Unable to endure the room, he went again into the night, no further
this time than the little garden. In the neighborhood dogs were
barking fiercely, as though in the wake of a presence. By sound he
followed it