FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   >>  
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
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   >>  



Top keywords:
directly
 

garments

 

veranda

 

garden

 

permeated

 
looked
 
satisfaction
 

compassion

 
leaving
 

morrow


triumph

 

leering

 
rushed
 

Kwannon

 
caught
 

pitying

 
Unable
 
endure
 

ground

 

pigments


vehemently

 

ghostly

 

brushes

 

presence

 

fiercely

 

barking

 

neighborhood

 

surfaces

 

flooring

 

caring


waiting

 
remembered
 

leaped

 

branches

 

moonlight

 
manifest
 

spirit

 
trailing
 

petals

 
hurried

Entering
 

rediscovered

 
quietly
 
closed
 

thought

 

smoothed

 
Perhaps
 

impatient

 
clothes
 

instant