Shadowings

soon found every cause to think with regret of his Kyoto days. Then he discovered that he still loved his first wife—loved her more than he could ever love the second—and he began to feel how unjust and how ungrateful he had been. Gradually his repentance deepened into a remorse that left him no peace of mind. Memories of the woman he had wronged—her gentle speech, her smiles, her dainty, pretty ways, her faultless patience—continually haunted him.

Sometimes in dreams he saw her at her loom, weaving as when she toiled night and day to help him during the years of their distress; more often he saw her kneeling alone in the desolate little room where he had left her, hiding her tears with her poor worn sleeve. Even in the hours of official duty, his thoughts would wander back to her; then he would ask himself how she was living, what she was doing. Something in his heart assured him that she could not accept another husband and that she never would refuse to pardon him. And he secretly resolved to seek her out as soon as he could return to Kyoto—then to beg her forgiveness, to take her back, and to do everything that a man could do to make atonement. But the years went by.