h something of
reverence in his gesture. He looked into her eyes and he spoke very
earnestly. Every word seemed to come from his heart.

"Dear Miss Penelope," he said, "it is very, very kind of you to have
come here and warned me. Only you cannot quite understand what this
thing means to me. Remember what I told you once. Life and death to your
people in this country seem to be the greatest things which the mind of
man can hold. It is not so with us. We are brought up differently. In a
worthy cause a true Japanese is ready to take death by the hand at any
moment. So it is with me now. I have no regret. Even if I had, even if
life were a garden of roses for me, what is ordained must come. A little
sooner or a little later, it makes no matter."

She sank on her knees before him.

"Can't you understand why I am here?" she cried passionately. "It was I
who told of the silken cord and knife!"

He was wholly unmoved. He even smiled, as though the thing were of no
moment.

"It was right that you should do so," he declared. "You must not
reproach yourself with that."

"But I do! I do!" she cried again. "I always shall! Don't you understand
that if you stay here they will treat you--"

He interrupted, laying his hand gently upon her shoulder.

"Dear young lady," he said, "you need never fear that I shall wait for
the touch of your men of law. Death is too easily won for that. If the
end which you have spoken of comes, there is another way--another house
of rest which I can reach."

She rose slowly to her feet. The absolute serenity of his manner bespoke
an impregnability of purpose before which the words died away on her
lips. She realized that she might as well plead with the dead!

"You do not mind," he whispered, "if I tell you that you must not stay
here any longer?"

He led her toward the door. Upon the threshold he took her cold fingers
into his hand and kissed them reverently.

"Do not be too despondent," he said. "I have a star somewhere which
burns for me. Tonight I have been looking for it. It is there still," he
added, pointing to the wide open window. "It is there, undimmed, clearer
and brighter than ever. I have no fear."

She passed away without looking up again. The Prince listened to her
footsteps dying away in the corridor. Then he closed the door, and,
entering his bedroom, undressed himself and slept...

When Prince Maiyo awoke on the following morning, the sunshine was
streaming into the roo