The Dragon Painter | Page 9

and down, until it was weariness to watch him. Within the rooms he was merely one curved ear, bent in the direction of the entrance gate. His nervousness communicated itself to the women of the house. They, too, were listening. More than one innocent visitor had been thrown into panic by the sight of three strained faces at the gate, and three pairs of shining eyes set instantly upon them.
One twilight hour, late in August, Tatsu came. After an eager day of watching, old Kano had just begun to tell himself that hope was over. Tatsu had certainly been killed. The ihai might as well be set up, and prayers offered for the dead man's soul. Umè-ko, wearied by the heat, and the incessant strain, lay prone upon her matted floor, listening to the chirp of a bell cricket that hung in a tiny bamboo cage near by. The clear notes of the refrain, struck regularly with the sound of a fairy bell, had begun to help and soothe her. Mata sat dozing on the kitchen step.
A loud, sudden knock shattered in an instant this precarious calm. Kano went through the house like a storm. Mata, being nearest, flung the panel of the gate aside. There stood a creature with tattered blue robe just to the knees, bare feet, bare head, with wild, tossing locks of hair, and eyes that gleamed with a panther's light.
"Is it--is it--Tatsu?" screamed the old man, hurling his voice before him.
"It is a madman," declared the servant, and flattened herself against the hedge.
Umè said nothing at all. After one look into the stranger's face she had withdrawn, herself unseen, into the shadowy rooms.
"I am Tatsu of Kiu Shiu," announced the apparition, in a voice of strange depth and sweetness. "Is this the home of Kano Indara?"
"Yes, yes, I am Kano Indara," said the artist, almost grovelling on the stones. "Enter, dear sir, I beseech. You must be weary. Accompany me in this direction, august youth. Mata, bring tea to the guest-room."
Tatsu followed his tempestuous host in silence. As they gained the room Kano motioned him to a cushion, and prepared to take a seat opposite. Tatsu suddenly sank to his knees, bowing again and again, stiffly, in a manner long forgotten in fashionable Yeddo.
"Discard the ceremony of bowing, I entreat," said Kano.
"Why? Is it not a custom here?"
"Yes,--to a lesser extent. But between us, dear youth, it is unnecessary."
"Why should it be unnecessary between us?" persisted the unsmiling guest.
"Because we are artists, therefore brothers," explained Kano, in an encouraging voice.
Tatsu frowned. "Who are you, and why have you sent for me?"
"Do you inquire who I am?" said Kano, scarcely believing his ears.
"It is what I asked."
"I am Kano Indara." The old man folded his arms proudly, waiting for the effect.
Tatsu moved impatiently upon his velvet cushion. "Of course I knew that. It was the name on the scrap of paper that guided me here."
"Is it possible that you do not yet know the meaning of the name of Kano?" asked the artist, incredulously. A thin red tingled to his cheek,--the hurt of childish vanity.
"There is one of that name in my village," said Tatsu. "He is a scavenger, and often gives me fine large sheets of paper."
Old Kano's lip trembled. "I am not of his sort. Men call me an artist."
"Oh, an artist! Does that mean a painter of dragons, like me?"
"Among other things of earth and air I have attempted to paint dragons," said Kano.
"I paint nothing else," declared Tatsu, and seemed to lose interest in the conversation.
Kano looked hard into his face. "You say that you paint nothing else?" he challenged. "Are not these--all of them--your work, the creations of your fancy?" He reached out for the roll that Uchida had brought. His hands trembled. In his nervous excitement the papers fell, scattering broadcast over the floor.
Tatsu's dark face flashed into light. "My pictures! My pictures!" he cried aloud, like a child. "They always blow off down the mountain!"
Kano picked up a study at random. It was of a mountain tarn lying quiet in the sun. Trees in a windless silence sprang straight upward from the brink. Beyond and above these a few tall peaks stood thin and pale, cutting a sky that was empty of all but light.
"Where is the dragon here?" challenged the old man.
"Asleep under the lake."
"And where here?" he asked quickly, in order to hide his discomfiture. The second picture was a scene of heavy rain descending upon a village. "Oh, I perceive for myself," he hurried on before Tatsu could reply. "The dragon lies full length, half sleeping, on the soaking cloud."
Tatsu's lip curled, but he remained silent.
The old man's hands rattled among the edges of the papers. "Ah, here, Master Painter, are you overthrown!" he cried triumphantly,