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The Shadow of the East

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THE SHADOW OF THE EAST



BY

E. M. HULL

1921



"_The fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's
teeth are set on edge_."

_Ezekiel xviii 2_.




CHAPTER I


The American yacht lying off the harbour at Yokohama was
brilliantly lit from stem to stern. Between it and the shore the
reflection of the full moon glittered on the water up to the steps
of the big black landing-stage. The glamour of the eastern night
and the moonlight combined to lend enchantment to a scene that by
day is blatant and tawdry, and the countless coloured lamps
twinkling along the sea wall and dotted over the Bluff transformed
the Japanese town into fairyland.

The night was warm and still, and there was barely a ripple on the
water. The Bay was full of craft--liners, tramps, and yachts
swinging slowly with the tide, and hurrying to and fro sampans and
electric launches jostled indiscriminately.

On board the yacht three men were lying in long chairs on the
deck. Jermyn Atherton, the millionaire owner, a tall thin American
whose keen, clever face looked singularly youthful under a thick
crop of iron-grey hair, sat forward in his chair to light a fresh
cigar, and then turned to the man on his right. "I guess I've had
every official in Japan hunting for you these last two days,
Barry. If I hadn't had your wire from Tokio this morning I should
have gone to our Consul and churned up the whole Japanese Secret
Service and made an international affair of it," he laughed.
"Where in all creation were you? I should hardly have thought it
possible to get out of touch in this little old island. The
authorities, too, knew all about you, and reckoned they could lay
their hands on you in twelve hours. I rattled them up some," he
added, with evident satisfaction.

The Englishman smiled.

"You seem to have done," he said dryly. "When I got into Tokio
this morning I was fallen on by a hysterical inspector of police
who implored me with tears to communicate immediately with an
infuriated American who was raising Cain in Yokohama over my
disappearance. As a matter of fact I was in a little village
twenty miles inland from Tokio--quite off the beaten track.
There's an old Shinto temple there that I have been wanting to
sketch for a long time."

"Atherton's luck!" commented the American complacently. "It
generally holds good. I couldn't leave Japan without seeing you,
and I must sail tonight."

"What's your hurry--Wall Street going to the dogs without you?"

"No. I've cut out from Wall Street. I've made all the money I
want, and I'm only concerned with spending it now. No, the fact is
I--er--I left home rather suddenly."

A soft chuckle came from the recumbent occupant of the third
chair, but Atherton ignored it and hurried on, twirling rapidly,
as he spoke, a single eyeglass attached to a thin black cord.

"Ever since Nina and I were married last year we've been going the
devil of a pace. We had to entertain every one who had entertained
us--and a few more folk besides. There was something doing all day
and every day until at last it seemed to me that I never saw my
wife except at the other end of a dining table with a crowd of
silly fools in between us. I reckoned I'd just about had enough of
it. Came on me just like a flash sitting in my office down town
one morning, so I buzzed home right away in the auto and told her
I was sick of the whole thing and that I wanted her to come away
with me and see what real life was like--out West or anywhere else
on earth away from that durned society crowd. I'll admit I lost my
temper and did some shouting. Nina couldn't see it from my point
of view.

"My God, Jermyn! I should think not," drawled a sleepy voice from
the third chair, and a short, immensely stout man struggled up
into a sitting position, mopping his forehead vigorously. "You've
the instincts of a Turk rather than of an enlightened American
citizen. You've not seen my sister-in-law yet, Mr. Craven," he
turned to the Englishman. "She's a peach! Smartest little girl in
N'York. Leader of society--dollars no object--small wonder she
didn't fall in with Jermyn's prehistoric notions. You're a cave
man, elder brother--I put my money on Nina every time. Hell! isn't
it hot?" He sank down again full length, flapping his handkerchief
feebly at a persistent mosquito.

"We argued for a week," resumed Jermyn Atherton when his brother's
sleepy drawl subsided, "and didn't seem to get any further on. At
last I lost my temper completely and decided to clear out alone if
Nina wouldn't come with me. Leslie was not doing anything at the
time, so I persuaded him to come along too."

Leslie Atherton sat up again with a jerk.

"_Persuaded_!" he exploded, "A dam' queer notion of
persuasion. Shanghaied, I call it. Ran me to earth at the club at
five o'clock, and we sailed at eight. If my man hadn't been fond
of the sea and keen on the trip himself, I should have left America
for a cruise round the world in the clothes I stood up in--and Jermyn's
duds would be about as useful to me as a suit of reach-me-downs off
the line. Persuasion? Shucks! Jermyn thought it was kind of funny to
start right off on an ocean trip at a moment's notice and show Nina
he didn't care a durn. Crazy notion of humour." He lay back languidly
and covered his face with a large silk handkerchief.

Barry Craven turned toward his host with amused curiosity in his
grey eyes.

"Well?" He asked at length.

Atherton returned his look with a slightly embarrassed smile.

"It hasn't been so blamed funny after all," he said quietly. "A
Chinese coffin-ship from 'Frisco would be hilarious compared with
this trip," rapped a sarcastic voice from behind the silk
handkerchief.

"I've felt a brute ever since we lost sight of Sandy Hook,"
continued Atherton, looking away toward the twinkling lights on
shore, "and as soon as we put in here I couldn't stand it any
longer, so I cabled to Nina that I was returning at once. I'm
quite prepared to eat humble pie and all the rest of it--in fact
I shall relish it," with a sudden shy laugh.

His brother heaved his vast bulk clear of the deck chair with a
mighty effort.

"Humble pie! Huh!" he snorted contemptuously. "She'll kill the
fatted calf and put a halo of glory round your head and invite
in all the neighbours 'for this my prodigal husband has returned
to me!'" He ducked with surprising swiftness to avoid a book that
Atherton hurled at his head and shook a chubby forefinger at him
reprovingly.

"Don't assault the only guide, philosopher and friend you've got
who has the courage to tell you a few home truths. Say, Jermyn,
d'y'know why I finally consented to come on this crazy cruise,
anyway? Because Nina got me on the phone while you were hammering
away at me at the club and ordered me to go right along with you
and see you didn't do any dam foolishness. Oh, she's got me to
heel right enough. Well! I guess I'll turn in and get to sleep
before those fool engines start chump-chumping under my pillow.
You boys will want a pow-wow to your two selves; there are times
when three is a crowd. Good-bye, Mr. Craven, pleased to have met
you. Hope to see you in the Adirondacks next summer--a bit more
crowded than the Rockies, which are Jermyn's Mecca, but more home
comforts--appeal to a man of my build." He slipped away with the
noiseless tread that is habitual to heavy men.

Jermyn Atherton looked after his retreating figure and laughed
uproariously.

"Isn't he the darndest? A clam is communicative compared with
Leslie. Fancy him having that card up his sleeve all the while.
Nina's had the bulge on me right straight along."

He pushed a cigar-box across the wicker table between them.

"No, thanks," said Craven, taking a case from his pocket. "I'll
have a cigarette, if you don't mind."

The American settled himself in his chair, his hands clasped
behind his head, staring at the harbour lights, his thoughts
very obviously some thousands of miles away. Craven watched
him speculatively. Atherton the big game-hunter, Atherton the
mine-owner, he knew perfectly--but Atherton the New York broker,
Atherton married, he was unacquainted with and he was trying to
adjust and consolidate the two personalities.

It was the same Atherton--but more human, more humble, if such a
word could be applied to an American millionaire. He felt a sudden
curiosity to see the woman who had brought that new look into his
old friend's keen blue eyes. He was conscious of an odd feeling of
envy. Atherton became aware at last of his attentive gaze and
grinned sheepishly.

"Must seem a bit of a fool to you, old man, but I feel like a boy
going home for the holidays and that's the truth. But I've been
yapping about my own affair all evening. What about you--staying
on in Japan? Been here quite a while now, haven't you?"

"Just over a year."

"Like it?"

"Yes, Japan has got into my bones."

"Lazy kind of life, isn't it?"

There was no apparent change in Atherton's drawl, but Craven
turned his head quickly and looked at him before answering.

"I'm a lazy kind of fellow," he replied quietly.

"You weren't lazy in the Rockies," said Atherton sharply.

"Oh, yes I was. There are grades of laziness."

Atherton flung the stub of his cigar overboard and selecting a
fresh one, cut the end off carefully.

"Still got that Jap boy who was with you in America?"

"Yoshio? Yes. I picked him up in San Francisco ten years ago.
He'll never leave me now."

"Saved his life, didn't you? He spun me a great yarn one day in
camp."

Craven laughed and shrugged. "Yoshio has an Oriental imagination
and quite a flair for romance. I did pull him out of a hole in
'Frisco but he was putting up a very tidy little show on his own
account. He's the toughest little beggar I've ever come across and
doesn't know the meaning of fear. If I'm ever in a big scrap I
hope I shall have Yoshio behind me."

"You seem to be pretty well known over yonder," said Atherton with
a vague movement of his head toward the shore.

"It is not a big town and the foreign population is not vast.
Besides, there are traditions. I am the second Barry Craven to
live in Yokohama--my father lived several years and finally died
here. He was obsessed with Japan."

"And with the Japanese?"

"And with the Japanese."

Atherton frowned at the glowing end of his cigar.

"Nina and I ran down to see Craven Towers when we were on our
wedding trip in England last year," he said at length with seeming
irrelevance. "Your agent, Mr. Peters, ran us round."

"Good old Peters," murmured Craven lazily. "The place would have
gone to the bow-wows long ago if it hadn't been for him. He adored
my mother and has the worst possible opinion of me. But he's a
loyal old bird, he probably endowed me with all the virtues for
your benefit."

But Atherton ignored the comment. He polished his eyeglass
vigorously and screwed it firmly into position.

"If I was an Englishman with a place like Craven Towers that had
been in my family for generations," he said soberly, "I should go
home and marry a nice girl and settle down on my estate."

"That's precisely Peters' opinion," replied Craven promptly with a
good-tempered laugh. "I get reams from him to that effect nearly
every mail--with detailed descriptions of all the eligible
debutantes whom he thinks suitable. I often wonder whether he runs
the estate on the same lines and keeps a matrimonial agency for
the tenants."

Atherton laughed with him but persisted.

"If your own countrywomen don't appeal to you, take a run out to
the States and see what we can do for you."

The laugh died out of Craven's eyes and he moved restlessly in his
chair.

"It's no good, Jermyn. I'm not a marrying man," he said shortly.

Atherton smiled grimly at the recollection of a similar remark
emphatically uttered by himself at their last meeting.

For a time neither spoke. Each was conscious of a vague difference
in the other, developed during the years that had elapsed since
their last meeting--an intangible barrier checking the open
confidence of earlier days.

It was growing late. The sampans had nearly all disappeared and
only an occasional launch skimmed across the harbour.

A neighbouring yacht's band that had been silent for the last hour
began to play again--appropriately to the vicinity--Puccini's
well-known opera. The strains came subdued but clear across the
water on the scent-laden air. Craven sat forward in his chair, his
heels on the ground, his hands loosely clasped between his knees,
whistling softly the Consul's solo in the first act. From behind a
cloud of cigar smoke Atherton watched him keenly, and as he
watched he was thinking rapidly. He was used to making decisions
quickly--he was accustomed to accepting risks at which others
shied, but the risk he was now contemplating meant the taking of
an unwarranted liberty that might be resented and might result in
the loss of a friendship that he valued. But he was going to take the
risk--as he had taken many another--he had known that from the
first. He screwed his eyeglass firmer into his eye, a characteristic
gesture well-known on the New York stock market.

"Ever see _Madame Butterfly_? he asked abruptly.

"Yes."

Atherton blew another big cloud of smoke.

"Damn fool, Pinkerton," he said gruffly, "Never could see the
attraction myself--dancing girls--almond eyes--and all that sort
of thing."

Craven made no answer but his whistling stopped suddenly and the
knuckles of his clasped hands whitened. Atherton looked away
quickly and his eyeglass fell with a little tinkle against a
waistcoat button. There was another long pause. Finally the music
died away and the stillness was broken only by the soft slap-slap
of the water against the ship's side.

Atherton scowled at his immaculate deck shoes and then seized his
eyeglass again decisively.

"Say, Barry, you saved my life in the Rockies that trip and I
guess a fellow whose life you've saved has a pull on you no one
else has. Anyhow I'll chance it, and if I'm a damned interfering
meddler it's up to you to say so and I'll apologise--handsomely.
Are you in a hole?"

Craven got up, walked away to the side of the yacht and leaning on
the rail stared down into the water. A solitary sampan was passing
the broad streak of moonlight and he watched it intently until it
passed and merged into the shadows beyond.

"I've been the usual fool," he said at last quietly.

"Oh, hell!" came softly from behind him. "Chuck it, Barry. Clear
out right now--with us. I'll put off sailing until tomorrow."

"I--can't."

Atherton rose and joined him, and for a moment his hand rested on
the younger man's shoulder.

"I'm sorry--dashed sorry," he murmured. "Gee!" he added with a
half shy, half humorous glance, wiping his forehead frankly, "I'd
rather face a grizzly than do that again. Leslie keeps telling me
that my habit of butting in will land me in the family vault
before my time."

Craven smiled wryly.

"It's all right. I'm grateful--really. But I must hoe my own row."

The American swung irresolutely on his heels.

"That's so, that's so," he agreed reluctantly. "Oh damn it all,"
he burst out, "have a drink!" and going back to the table he
pounded in the stopper of a soda-water-bottle savagely.

Craven laughed constrainedly as he tilted the whisky into a glass.

"Universal panacea," he said a little bitterly, "but it's not my
method of oblivion."

He put the peg tumbler down with a smothered sigh.

"I must be off, Jermyn. It's time you were getting under way. It's
been like the old days to have had a yarn with you again. Good
luck and a quick run home--you lucky devil."

Atherton walked with him to the head of the gangway and watched
him into the launch.

"We shall count on you for the Adirondacks in the summer," he
called out cheerily, leaning far over the rail.

Craven looked up with a smile and waved his hand, but did not
answer and the motor boat shot away toward the shore.

He landed on the big pier and lingered for a moment to watch the
launch speeding back to the yacht. Then he walked slowly down the
length of the stage and at the entrance found his rickshaw
waiting. The two men who were squatting on the ground leaped up at
his approach and one hurriedly lit a great dragon-painted paper
lantern while the other held out a light dustcoat. Craven tossed
it into the rickshaw and silently pointing toward the north,
climbed in. He leaned back and lit a cigarette. The men sprang
away in a quick dog-trot along the Bund, and then started to climb
the hillside at the back of the town. They wound slowly up the
narrow tortuous roads, past numberless villas, hung with lights,
from which voices floated out into the quiet air.

The moon was brilliant and the night wonderfully light, but Craven
paid no attention to the beauty of the scene or to the gaily lit
villas. Atherton's invitation had been curiously hard to decline
and even now an almost overpowering desire came over him to bid
his men retrace their steps to the harbour. Then hard on the heels
of that desire came thoughts that softened the hard lines that had
gathered about his mouth. He pitched his cigarette away as if with
it he threw from him an actual temptation, and resolutely put out
of his mind Atherton and the suggestion of flight.

Still climbing upward the rickshaw passed the last of the
outlying European villas and turned down a side road where there
were no houses. For a couple of miles the men raced along a level
track cut on the side of a hill that rose steeply on the one hand
and on the other fell away precipitously down to the sea until
they halted with a sudden jerk beside a wooden gateway with a
creeper-covered roof on either side of which two matsu trees stood
like tall sentinels.

Waiting by the open gate was a short, powerful looking Japanese
dressed in European clothes. He came forward as Craven alighted
and gathering up the coat and hat from the floor of the rickshaw,
dismissed the Japanese who vanished further along the road into
the shadows. Then he turned and waited for his master to precede
him through the gateway, but Craven signed to him to go on, and as
the man disappeared up the garden path he crossed the road and
standing on the edge of the cliff looked down across the harbour.
The American yacht was the biggest craft of her kind in the roads
and easily discernible in the moonlight. The brilliant deck
illumination had been shut off and only a few lights showed. He
gave a quick sigh. Atherton's coming had been like a bar drawn
suddenly across the stream down which he was drifting. If Jermyn
had only come last year! The envy he had felt earlier in the
evening increased. He thought of the look he had seen in Atherton's
eyes and the intonation of his voice when the American spoke of the
wife to whom he was returning. What did love like that mean to a
man? What factor in Atherton's strenuous and adventurous life had
affected him as this had done? What were the ethics of a love that
rose purely above physical attraction--environment--temperament; a
love that grew and strengthened and absorbed until it ceased to be a
part of life and became life itself--the main issue, the fundamental
essence?

And as Craven watched he saw the yacht steam slowly down the bay.
He drew a deep breath.

"You lucky, lucky devil," he whispered again and swung on his
heel. He paused for a moment just within the gateway where on the
only level part of the garden lay a miniature lake, hedged round
with bamboo, clumps of oleander, fed by a little twisting stream
that came tumbling and splashing down the hillside in a series of
tiny waterfalls, its banks fringed with azalea bushes and slender
cherry trees. Then he walked slowly along the path that led
upward, winding to and fro through clusters of pines and cedars
and over mossy slopes to the little house which stood in a
clearing at the top of the garden surrounded by fir trees and
backed by a high creeper-clad palisade.

From the wide verandah, built out on piles over the terrace, there
was an uninterrupted view of the harbour. He climbed the four
wooden stairs and on the top step turned and looked again down on
to the bay. The yacht was now invisible, but in his mind he
followed her slipping down toward the open sea. And Atherton--what
were his thoughts while pacing the broad deck or lying in his
cabin listening to the screw whose every revolution was taking him
nearer the centre of his earthly happiness? Were they anything
like his own, he wondered, as he stood there bareheaded in the
moonlight, looking strangely big and incongruous on the balcony of
the little fairylike doll's house?

He shrugged impatiently. The comparison was an insult, he thought
bitterly. Again he stared out to sea, straining his eyes; trying
vainly to pick up the yacht's lights far down the bay. It was very
still, a tiny breeze whispered in the pines and drifted across his
face the sweet perfume of a flowering shrub. A cicada chirped in
the grass at his feet.

Then behind him came a faint rustle of silk. He heard the soft
sibilant sound of a breath drawn quickly in.

"Will my lord honourably be pleased to enter?" the voice was very
low and sweet and the English very slow and careful.

Craven did not move.

"Try again, O Hara San."

A low bubble of girlish laughter rippled out.

"Please to come in, Bar-ree."

He turned slowly, looking bigger than ever by contrast with the
slender little Japanese girl who faced him. She was barely
seventeen, dainty and fragile as a porcelain figure, wholly in
keeping with her exquisite setting and yet the flush on her
cheeks--free from the thick disfiguring white paste used by the
women of her country--and the vivid animation of her face were
oddly occidental, and the eyes raised so eagerly to Craven's were
as grey as his own.

He held out his arms and she fluttered into them with a little
breathless murmur, clinging to him passionately.

"Little O Hara San," he said gently as she pressed closer to him.
He tilted her head, stooping to kiss the tiny mouth that trembled
at the touch of his lips. She closed her eyes and he felt an
almost convulsive shudder shake her.

"Have you missed me, O Hara San?" "It is a thousand moons since
you are gone," she whispered unsteadily.

"Are you glad to see me?"

Her grey eyes opened suddenly with a look of utter content and
happiness.

"You know, Bar-ree. Oh, Bar-ree!"

His face clouded, the teasing word that rose to his lips died away
unspoken and he pressed her head against him almost roughly to
hide the look of trusting devotion that suddenly hurt him. For a
few moments she lay still, then slipped free of his arms and stood
before him, swaying slightly from side to side, her hands busily
patting her hair into order and smiling up at him happily.

"Being very rude. Forgetting honourable hospitality. You please
forgive?"

She backed a few steps toward the doorway and her pliant figure
bent for an instant in the prescribed form of Japanese courtesy
and salutation. Then she clasped both hands together with a little
cry of dismay. "Oh, so sorree," she murmured in contrition,
"forgot honourable lord forbidding that."

"Your honourable lord will beat you with a very big stick if you
forget again," said Craven laughing as he followed her into the
little room. O Hara San pouted her scarlet lips at him and laughed
softly as she subsided on to a mat on the floor and clapped her
hands. Craven sat down opposite her more slowly. In spite of the
months he had spent in Japan he still found it difficult to adapt
his long legs to the national attitude.

In answer to the summons an old armah brought tea and little rice
cakes which O Hara San dispensed with great dignity and
seriousness. She drank innumerable cupfuls while Craven took three
or four to please her and then lit a cigarette. He smoked in
silence watching the dainty little kneeling figure, following the
quick movements of her hands as she manipulated the fragile china
on the low stool before her, the restraint she imposed upon
herself as she struggled with the excited happiness that
manifested itself in the rapid heaving of her bosom, and the
transient smile on her lips, and a heavy frown gathered on his
face. She looked up suddenly, the tiny cup poised in her hand
midway to her mouth.

"You happy in Tokio?"

"Yes."

It was not the answer for which she had hoped and her eyes
dropped at the curt monosyllable. She put the cup back on the
tray and folded her hands in her lap with a faint little sigh
of disappointment, her head drooping pensively. Craven knew
instinctively that he had hurt her and hated himself. It was like
striking a child. But presently she looked up again and gazed at
him soberly, wrinkling her forehead in unconscious imitation of
his.

"O Hara San very bad selfish girl. Hoping you very _un_happy
in Tokio," she said contritely.

He laughed at the naive confession and the gloom vanished from his
face as he stood up, his long limbs cramped with the uncongenial
attitude.

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