The Japanese Lantern

by Isobel Chace

“I shall have to change,” she said.

  “But of course,” he agreed. “I can wait.”

  Yoshiko stood uncertainly, gazing down at him.

  “Will you come and help me, Jonquil?” she said at last.

  The two girls went out together and Yoshiko hurried over to the corner of her improvised room, where Nobuko had already drawn the screens, dividing it from Jonquil’s and Alexander’s, and pulled the large woven casket in which she kept her best kimono down on to the floor.

  “I am so sorry to ask you to come with me,” she apologized, “but with this kimono I cannot tie the obi myself, it is so stiff and awkward.”

  In silence she hurried out of her Western clothes and into several layers of inner kimonos, before fastening the last and most beautiful, tying it quickly in front of her. When she produced the obi, Jonquil could see why she had needed help; it was made in a very stiff brocaded material and was not at all easy to tie in the large bow at the back that was required. At last they were both satisfied that they could do no better and Yoshiko took one last critical look at herself in the mirror.

  “Why do you think he has come, Jonquil?” she asked. ‘My father would be terribly angry if he knew. And Taki himself, I never imagined that he would take out a girl. Do you think he has given up the idea of marrying me?”

  “Because he wants to take you out?” Jonquil asked, bewildered by the other girl’s reasoning.

  “I don t think he would take out a girl he meant to marry,” she said thoughtfully. “I think that he has understood that I shall marry a Westerner, someone like Jason, who understands both.”

  She snatched up her geta and hurried back to the living room.

  “I am ready, Taki-san,” she said diffidently from the doorway.

  He looked up and smiled at her. Jonquil could see that he approved of the kimono and she had to admit that she had never seen Yoshiko look so magnificent as she did at that moment.

  “Good.” Kagami Taki stood up and came towards them in the doorway. “Then shall we go?”

  Yoshiko nodded, her eyes on the floor, and then her body stiffened.

  “Jonquil!” she exclaimed in horror. “You did not take his shoes! He will ruin the tatami mats if he walks all over them in his shoes!” But although it was Jonquil she reproached verbally, it was Kagami-san who took the brunt of her displeasure. He shrugged his shoulders lightly and laughed at her.

  “I thought this was a Western house,” he said slyly.

  Yoshiko cast him a speaking look and bent down to change out of her own sandals into her geta. She opened the front door and bowed to Kagami-san to precede her.

  “Goodbye, Jonquil,” she called out, and then she was gone, her wooden sandals clattering along the path towards the car.

  In the early morning light the trees looked a beautiful, misty grey against the pearly sky. The weeping willows merged into the water beneath them, and the little bridges, forming walks across the streams and rock gardens, curved all the way up into the heavens.

  Jonquil opened her window wider and then, overcome by temptation, climbed out of it and dropped silently on to the lawn beneath. This was too good an opportunity to miss—the whole gardens to herself with none to watch her as she explored them.

  She went first to the miniature lake, her footsteps leaving dark patches in the dew-laden grass, and stood on the first of the little bridges, gazing down at the clear waters below. Fish abounded, their bodies flashing in the near sunlight, giving off sparks of gold, silver, blue, green, as they twisted and turned in the cool water, occasionally colliding with a water lily and sending ripples over the surface.

  Jonquil could have watched them for hours, but curiosity to see the rest led her on and upwards, over the bridges and finally to a little garden house, perched above the garden like a temple. Looking down, she could see how small the area of the garden really was. It was incredible that so much should have been packed into so small a place. But not an inch was wasted. Vista opened up into vista, and all the paths eventually led back to where they had started from.

  Reluctantly she made her way back down again to the house. The sun had burst through the mist now and trees became their natural hues of green and burning red. The moment of fairyland was past, but the moment of reality was almost as beautiful and it was with real regret that Jonquil decided that she ought to go in.

  The Japanese were right, she thought, to set so much store by their gardens. They were oddly soothing places, designed to make one forget one’s worries. In Australia she would have taken a horse and ridden for miles out into the blue. But in a small island such a course was obviously not possible and the garden proved to be a very practical alternative.

  For Jonquil seemed to have a great deal to think about, a great deal that she couldn’t even begin to understand. Kagami-san had brought Yoshiko home late the night before and had said goodbye to her formally on the front door step. Yoshiko had clearly enjoyed herself and she went off to bed singing snatches of the latest songs she had heard, an odd mixture of Japanese melody, heavily influenced by the United States.

  Yoshiko was behind most of Jonquil’s worries. For a moment yesterday she had wondered whether Nobuko had been right, but reason made it only too clear that that couldn’t be true. Yoshiko herself was so certain that she would eventually marry Jason. Jonquil sighed and finally admitted to herself that she didn’t know what to do about Edward and that she felt lost and more than a little afraid.

  She peeped in through the windows and saw that Alexander was still sleeping. For a moment she hesitated, and then, before she could change her mind, she retraced her footsteps up to the garden house, feeling rather wicked in her truancy.

  The first time she had gone up there she had not ventured into it, but this time she tried the door and was surprised to find that it was open. She gave it a push and it creaked slightly as it swung slowly outwards towards her. She peered round the lintel and was surprised to see that a bed-roll had been spread on the floor and that someone was fast asleep on it. Silently she crept over to it, to see who could be there. A cobweb brushed against her brow and she muttered with distaste, trying to brush it away. In the same instant she felt someone grab her ankle and she collapsed in a heap on the bedclothes.

  Humiliated and more than a little shaken, she tried to free herself, but the harder she struggled the harder the hands held her.

  “Be still, you little fool,” a maddeningly calm voice said in her ear. “You’ll tear your dress if you don’t let me untangle you first.”

  Sure enough she saw that she had caught her skirt on a nail in the wall and waited as patiently as she could while he unhooked her.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked reproachfully. “Why didn’t you tell us you were coming? And why did you just ring off like that when I phoned you?”

  She turned her indignant face round to look Jason straight in the eye. His lips twitched.

  “I came to spy on you,” he said in mock solemn tones.

  For an instant she took him seriously and her eyes widened with astonishment, but then she saw his shoulders shaking with mirth and was hard to put to it not to strike him.

  “Oh, Jason!” she exclaimed. “Don’t be so maddening!”

  “I’m sorry,” he apologized immediately. “I didn’t think you’d be hurt by my ringing off. Someone came into the room and I didn’t want him to know that I had been speaking to you. And I came because I thought you wanted me to. Wasn’t that why you rang?”

  Painfully she shook her head. She was sorely tempted to lie to him, but there was Yoshiko to consider. His mouth tightened and the gaiety went out of his face.

  “Then why did you ring?” he asked, bleakly.

  “I wanted to tell Mrs. Tate that Mitchi Boko was in Kyoto,” she confessed miserably.

  “Why?” he demanded, but she only shook her head, not knowing how to answer him,

  “Oh, go back to the house and have your breakfast,” he said impatiently.

/>   She got shakily to her feet.

  “Are —aren’t you coming?” she asked tentatively.

  He gave a short laugh.

  “I’ll come after a decent interval,” he said. “I’d hate anyone to think that we’d arranged to meet here.”

  She turned and left him, the colour high in her cheeks. Of course he would hate it, but she would have dearly liked to tell him that she would have hated it far, far more, just because he was Jason Tate!

  CHAPTER VIII

  Jonquil stared back mutinously at herself in the mirror, her grey eyes darker than ever with the hint of temper lurking in the back of them. She would wear her favourite dress, she decided, a dress of yellow silk that fitted her figure like a glove, the skirt minutely embroidered in white. She looked very well in it, she knew, and she wanted to look her most beautiful this evening. Beautiful enough: to show that loveliness did not necessarily depend on one’s being Japanese.

  Never would she be able to forget the humiliation of that morning! As she thought of it the colour crept up her face again. It had been bad enough having to eat breakfast as though nothing had happened, with Jason in an impishly-perverse mood, trying to make her laugh.

  “It is fun having you here,” Yoshiko had sighed. I wish—oh, no matter.”

  But Jason had insisted.

  “What do you wish?” he had asked.

  Yoshiko had cast a look of apology at Jonquil.

  I wish you had been here yesterday,” she had said reluctantly, “when that Edward came!”

  Immediately Jason’s eyes had narrowed.

  “So Edward came here,” he said gently.

  And then—Jonquil never would know what had come over her — she had laughed, rather well, when she came to think of it, and had said lightly:

  “Oh, yes, I meant to tell you. He told me he had come all the way from Manila just to see me! Wasn’t that sweet? Of course, I didn’t entirely believe him, but it was so charmingly said—” She had broken off, meeting Jason’s eyes.

  “Yes?” he had encouraged her.

  “And he’s going to take me out tonight, she had finished uncertainly.

  “And who is going to look after Alexander?” Jason had asked, returning to his breakfast as though the whole matter was one of complete indifference to him.

  “I am,” Yoshiko had said quickly. ‘Taki took me to Osaka last night and it is Jonquil’s turn tonight.”

  Jason had shrugged his shoulders slightly and had allowed the matter to drop.

  Why? Jonquil demanded of her reflected face. Why should he have told her to have nothing to do with Edward and then make no difficulties at all when she said she was going out with him? He could easily have prevented her. He could have said that he wanted to take Yoshiko out himself and that it was Jonquil’s job to look after Alexander. He could have said almost anything. Impatiently she turned away. There could only be one reason, and that was not one that she liked the look of; he thought he had done his duty in warning her about Edward and now he was leaving her to sink or swim as she liked. And she was just a little bit afraid. She was not at all sure that she would be able to manage Edward. He was perfectly charming, of course, she told herself hastily. But, even if Jason had said nothing, she would still have had a niggling doubt about him.

  She gave her dress a final brush and went to say goodnight to Alexander. He had just had his bath, and when she bent down to kiss him he hugged her tightly, smelling strongly of soap and clean small boy.

  “Goodness,” she laughed, “who scrubbed you tonight?”

  Alexander laughed with her.

  “Uncle Jason. He had a bath too and we splashed everywhere. Nobuko told Jason that he ought to clean it up himself!” He giggled, very impressed that his uncle should have shared his disgrace.

  “And what did he say?” Jonquil asked curiously.

  “He told Nobuko to leave it for you,” the small boy chuckled again, his whole body shaking with his mirth. “But she cleaned it all up for you.”

  He hugged Jonquil again, sniffing at her perfume.

  “You don’t smell the same as Mummy,” he said at last. “But I like it.” He settled down into the bedclothes. “I can still smell it!”

  “Still smell what?” his uncle asked him from the entrance to his room.

  “Jonquil. You smell her,” he commanded.

  Jonquil tucked the small boy firmly in and stood up hastily. But she was not to escape. Jason came towards her and put his hands on her shoulders, thoughtfully savouring the scent.

  “Mmm,” he agreed. “Very nice.”

  He released her, nodded a goodnight to the boy, and followed her out of the room, pulling the screen shut behind him.

  “How about letting Edward go hang,” he suggested, and coming out with me instead?”

  She couldn’t see his eyes, shadowed as they were by his brows.

  “I couldn’t,” she said in a panic. “It would be most awfully rude. He’s got seats for the puppets and everything. I couldn’t let him down now.” She could still feel the place on her shoulders where his hands had rested and she longed to put up her own hands and hug the moment to her, but she couldn’t with him looking at her like that.

  “I suppose you can’t,” he agreed reluctantly. But it will be my turn soon, Jonquil. I’m not as patient as you imagine!”

  Patient? She hadn’t ever thought of him as being at all patient! She looked up at him, a little bewildered, and he smiled down at her.

  “Enjoy your puppets,” he said gently. “You’ll be able to tell us all about them tomorrow.”

  He turned on his heel and went into the living room, leaving her standing in the hall. Oh, if only, she thought, if only I could have gone out with him! She almost went after him to tell him that she had changed her mind, but at that moment Edward’s car drew up and she went out to meet him before he could get out to ring the front door bell.

  “All set to enjoy yourself?” Edward asked. She nodded, pulling her stole into a more comfortable position.

  “You’ve certainly done me proud,” he grinned. “I didn’t know a girl could look so good.”

  “Thank you,” she murmured. She wondered what he would have thought if she had admitted that she hadn’t given him a single thought the entire time she had been dressing.

  “I hope you’re not too hungry yet,” he went on happily. “The puppets begin earlier than I thought and I’m afraid we shall have to eat afterwards.”

  “That’s fine with me,” Jonquil smiled. “I’d rather eat later without having to hurry. Tell me about the puppets, Edward. Are they very special?”

  He pulled his mouth down at the corners with comical dismay.

  “Why do you insist on my knowing everything Japanese?” he asked her. “I keep telling you I’m a stranger here myself!”

  “But I don’t entirely believe you,” she reminded him. “Anyway, you said you’d been reading it all up.”

  “Next time I take you out I’ll come armed with a guidebook,” he suggested. “Full of facts and relevant statistics!”

  She laughed with him.

  “I’m afraid I have an insatiable curiosity,” she admitted. “Even Yoshiko finds it trying at times, I think.”

  His eyes twinkled.

  “Ah, but then Yoshiko is a girl herself,” he said sadly. “No man would ever agree with that!”

  Jonquil tried to be amused with the remark, but it was a little too false for her taste. She was used to the Australian cattlemen’s bluntness and frankly preferred it.

  “What did you say to Nobuko in the garden yesterday?” she asked.

  He was startled, and some of his easy charm left him.

  “Who is Nobuko?”

  Jonquil felt suddenly on top of the situation and found herself smiling.

  “Jason’s old amah. The one you sent back to the house yesterday morning—in Japanese!”

  She was rather amused to see that Edward didn’t look angry, or anything very much except sulky, a
nd there is nothing very frightening about a sulky small boy.

  “How did you know that I spoke to her in Japanese?” he asked at last.

  Jonquil chuckled.

  “I heard you,” she said.

  She cast another fleeting glance at him to see how he had taken that. He had recovered somewhat, she noticed, his obvious charm was returning fast and he was even able to smile at her.

  “It’s very easy to pick up a rude sentence or two in any language,” he explained, almost easily. “The very first thing I learnt in French was how to swear!” He laughed then, and if Jonquil thought she detected a note of relief in his laughter, she might just as easily have been mistaken.

  “Why are you so determined to prove that I’ve been in Japan before?” he asked her.

  She was rather at a loss to know how to answer that, so she merely said that the idea amused her and rather gratefully accepted his lead when he changed the topic of conversation.

  It was not so interesting driving in the dark. Once they had left Kyoto they might have been anywhere in the world, and so she was glad when they entered Osaka and made their way to the small and ancient theatre that housed the Bunraku puppets.

  It was a much smaller theatre than Jonquil had expected, the seats cramped together to fit into , the small space. The atmosphere of age-old tradition hung heavily over the audience. The same stories had been presented in exactly the same way to their parents and to their parents’ parents before them. This was a part of old Japan.

  Edward presented their tickets and they were shown to their seats. Jonquil found her seat fairly comfortable, but Edward had the greatest difficulty in disposing of his long legs, and only solved the problem by digging his knees into the man in front of him, who fortunately appeared to be quite used to having such neighbours.

  Puppet shows to Jonquil had always meant dolls dangling from a number of strings, or glove puppets, or something similar. These were quite different. Each doll had three men manipulating it, and it was some time before she could take in the story at all for watching the human beings, all dressed uniformly in what looked like a medieval executioner’s dress.