in lumps to a canvas satchel. When the satchel is full he takes it out into the woods where the men live and I don’t know what they do with it. I wish he could sell the gold and become rich for then I could go back to Yian where all the gardens are sweet and the river flows under the thousand bridges.’
‘Where is this city?’ I asked faintly.
‘Yian? I don’t know. It is sweet with perfume and the sound of silver bells all day long. Yesterday I carried a blossom of dried lotus buds from Yian, in my breast, and all the woods were fragrant. Did you smell it?’
‘Yes.’
‘I wondered last night whether you did. How beautiful your dog is; I love him. Yesterday I thought most about your dog but last night—’
‘Last night,’ I repeated below my breath.
‘I thought of you. Why do you wear the dragon claw?’
I raised my hand impulsively to my forehead, covering the scar.
‘What do you know of the dragon claw?’ I muttered.
‘It is the symbol of Ye-Laou, and Ye-Laou rules the Kuen-Yuin, my step-father says. My step-father tells me everything that I know. We lived in Yian until I was sixteen years old. I am eighteen now; that is two years we have lived in the forest. Look! – see those scarlet birds! What are they? There are birds of the same color in Yian.’
‘Where is Yian, Ysonde?’ I asked with deadly calmness.
‘Yian? I don’t know.’
‘But you have lived there?’
‘Yes, a very long time.’
‘Is it across the ocean, Ysonde?’
‘It is across seven oceans and the great river which is longer than from the earth to the moon.’
‘Who told you that?’
‘Who? My step-father; he tells me everything.’
‘Will you tell me his name, Ysonde?’
‘I don’t know it, he is my step-father, that is all.’
‘And what is your name?’
‘You know it, Ysonde.’
‘Yes, but what other name?’
‘That is all, Ysonde. Have you two names? Why do you look at me so impatiently?’
‘Does your step-father make gold? Have you seen him make it?’
‘Oh yes. He made it also in Yian and I loved to watch the sparks at night whirling like golden bees. Yian is lovely – if it is all like our garden and the gardens around. I can see the thousand bridges from my garden and the white mountain beyond—’
‘And the people – tell me of the people, Ysonde!’ I urged gently.
‘The people of Yian? I could see them in swarms like ants – oh! many, many millions crossing and recrossing the thousand bridges.’
‘But how did they look? Did they dress as I do?’
‘I don’t know. They were very far away, moving specks on the thousand bridges. For sixteen years I saw them every day from my garden but I never went out of my garden into the streets of Yian, for my step-father forbade me.’
‘You never saw a living creature nearby in Yian?’ I asked in despair.
‘My birds, oh such tall, wise-looking birds, all over gray and rose color.’
She leaned over the gleaming water and drew her polished hand across the surface.
‘Why do you ask me these questions,’ she murmured; ‘are you displeased?’
‘Tell me about your step-father,’ I insisted. ‘Does he look as I do? Does he dress, does he speak as I do? Is he American?’
‘American? I don’t know. He does not dress as you do and he does not look as you do. He is old, very, very old. He speaks sometimes as you do, sometimes as they do in Yian. I speak also in both manners.’
‘Then speak as they do in Yian,’ I urged impatiently, ‘speak as – why, Ysonde! why are you crying? Have I hurt you? – I did not intend – I did not dream of your caring! There Ysonde, forgive me – see, I beg you on my knees here at your feet.’
I stopped, my eyes fastened on a small golden ball which hung from her waist by a golden chain. I saw it trembling against her thigh, I saw it change color, now crimson, now purple, now flaming scarlet. It was the symbol of the Kuen-Yuin.
She bent over me and laid her fingers gently on my arm.
‘Why do you ask me such things?’ she said, while the tears glistened on her lashes. ‘It hurts me here—’ she pressed her hand to her breast – ‘it pains – I don’t know why. Ah, now your eyes are hard and cold again; you are looking at the golden globe which hangs from my waist. Do you wish to know also what that is?’
‘Yes,’ I muttered, my eyes fixed on the infernal colored flames which subsided as I spoke, leaving the ball a pale gilt again.
‘It is the symbol of the Kuen-Yuin,’ she said in a trembling voice; ‘why do you ask?’
‘Is it yours?’
‘Y – yes.’
‘Where did you get it?’ I cried harshly.
‘My – my step-fa—’
Then she pushed me away from her with all the strength of her slender wrists and covered her face.
If I slipped my arm about her and drew her to me – if I kissed away the tears that fell slowly between her fingers – if I told her how I loved her – how it cut me to the heart to see her unhappy – after all that is my own business. When she smiled through her tears, the pure love and sweetness in her eyes lifted my soul higher than the high moon vaguely glimmering through the sunlit blue above. My happiness was so sudden, so fierce and overwhelming that I only knelt there, her fingers clasped in mine, my eyes raised to the blue vault and the glimmering moon. Then something in the long grass beside me moved close to my knees and a damp acrid odor filled my nostrils.
‘Ysonde!’ I cried, but the touch of her hand was already gone and my two clenched fists were cold and damp with dew.
‘Ysonde!’ I called again, my tongue stiff with fright – but I called as one awakening from a dream – a horrid dream, for my nostrils quivered with the damp acrid odor and I felt the crab-reptile clinging to my knee. Why had the night fallen so swiftly – and where was I – where? – stiff, chilled, torn, and bleeding, lying flung like a corpse over my own threshold with Voyou licking my face and Barris stooping above me in the light of a lamp that flared and smoked in the night breeze like a torch. Faugh! the choking stench of the lamp aroused me and I cried out:
‘Ysonde!’
