A fortnight later, the snow-capped peak of the lordly and beautiful Mount Fusiyama appeared in sight, and a few hours afterward the steamer rounded the promontory and cast anchor in the port of Yokohama. The ship was soon surrounded by some score of native boats, and having taken their place in the “sampan” of the Grand Hotel, Frederick and his inamorata were rowed on shore. The first few days were spent in visiting the various sights and curiosities of the place, and so enchanted were the couple with the beauty and picturesque aspect of the environs that they determined to remain for a time in Japan.
With the assistance of the hotel officials, they secured a very pretty Japanese “yashiki,” or villa, situated at about half an hour's distance from the town, and caused such European furniture as they were likely to require to be transported thither. When all was ready, they took up their residence there, with a large retinue of native servants, both male and female. These were under the orders of an ex-Samurai (member of the lower grades of the nobility), who spoke both English and German, and who was to act as their interpreter and major-domo.
The secrecy with which it had been necessary to observe all their relations until the moment when they left Batavia, had imbued their intrigue with a certain degree of piquancy, and the constant change of scene which had passed before their eyes like a kaleidoscope, since they left Java, had prevented any danger of monotony and ennui. The experiment which they were now, however, [Pg 128] about to enter upon was a most perilous one. With no European society in the neighborhood, and dependent solely on one another for conversation and diversion, it was only natural that a man of Frederick's character and temperament should soon begin to weary of the sameness and dreariness of his existence. It is useless to expect that any man should remain in a state of perpetual adoration for an indefinite length of time before his lady-love, no matter how beautiful she may be. Familiarity breeds contempt, and this is especially the case when the lady is no longer young and has become sentimental and exacting. Accustomed as Nina had been at Batavia to see Frederick, and in fact all the other men by whom she was surrounded, anxious for a smile and ever ready to execute her slightest behest, it cut her to the very heart to see how, after the first few weeks of their residence in Japan, her lover's affection toward her decreased. He betrayed traces of weariness in her society, and spent much of his time in riding about alone in the neighborhood.
At about a quarter of an hour's distance from the house, and standing on the banks of a small river, was a pretty village, of which the chief attraction was a “chaya,” or tea-house. It was here that Frederick's horse might have been frequently seen walking up and down, attended by his “betto” (native groom), while his master was being entertained by the graceful “mousmes,” who constitute so charming a feature of every Japanese restaurant.
Stretched on a mat of the most immaculate whiteness, Frederick would remain for hours, lazily sipping his tea and watching the voluptuous dances of the “geishas” (dancing-girls). Although not beautiful, yet the Japanese women, when young, are exceedingly pretty and captivating. They have many winning and gracious little ways, and are thoroughly impressed with the notion that their sole mission in life is to provide amusement for the sterner sex.
[Pg 129]
The young man appreciated these little excursions into the country all the more since, with commendable caution, Madame Van der Beck had insisted that all the female servants employed in the house should be married women. In order to realize what this meant, it must be explained that on their wedding-day, the Japanese wives are obliged by custom and tradition to shave off their eyebrows and to stain their teeth a brilliant black, so that their husbands may have no further grounds for jealousy. Their appearance is therefore scarcely prepossessing.
Nina, more and more embittered by her lover's ever-increasing indifference, lost much of her former good humor and cheerfulness. She spent the whole day brooding alone in the gardens which surrounded her villa. These were laid out with much ingenuity and artistic feeling by one of the most famous Japanese landscape gardeners. Miniature rivers traversed the ground in every direction, spanned by miniature bridges, and with miniature temples and pagodas on their banks. There were also miniature waterfalls, miniature junks, and even miniature trees, the latter being especially curious. By some method which has been kept a profound secret by the great guild of horticulturists at Tokio, trees even two hundred and three hundred years old have been treated in such a manner as to stunt their growth and to prevent them from attaining a height of more than two or, at the most, three feet. Their trunks are gnarled and twisted by age, but there is no trace of the pruning-knife, and they constitute an exact representation in miniature of the grand old sycamore, oak, and cedar trees which line the magnificent fifty-mile avenue which leads up to the sacred shrines of “Nikko.” The object which the Japanese have in view in thus stunting the growth of certain classes of their trees is the fact that owing to the want of space the inhabitants of cities are obliged to content themselves with very small gardens. In order to make these appear larger [Pg 130] and to allow for the composition of the landscape, which is the Japanese ideal of a garden, they are obliged to arrange everything in miniature, and since trees of normal size would be out of keeping with the rest they have discovered an ingenious scheme of dwarfing them to a corresponding size.
One day, a few minutes after Frederick had arrived on his customary visit to the (tea-house), he was suddenly called out into the court-yard, where he found his betto stretched dead on the ground. Frederick had been in such a hurry to get away from home that he had ridden too fast, and the unfortunate native, whose duty, as in all oriental countries, it was to run before the horse, had, on reaching his destination, expired of the rupture of an aneurism of the heart. Much annoyed by this incident, Frederick ordered the corpse to be conveyed home at once, and spent the remainder of the day with the pretty “mousmes” at the tea-house.
When he returned home that evening, the widow of his ill-fated groom rushed up to him and, kissing his boot, entreated his pardon for the “stupidity of which her husband had been guilty in dying while out with the master and occasioning him thereby the trouble of attending to his own horse.”
Frederick, much amused at this display of truly oriental courtesy, tossed the woman a few yen notes and entered the the house, laughing, with the intention of telling Madame Van der Beck about it. The smile, however, faded from his lips when he came into her presence, for, having learned from the men who had brought home the groom's body, the nature of the place where Frederick was in the habit of passing his days, her feelings of jealousy and anger were aroused to a boiling pitch. Thoroughly spoiled, accustomed to have every whim humored, and with no notion of how to control her temper, she gave full vent to a perfect torrent [Pg 131] of reproaches and abuse against the man for whom she had sacrificed husband, rank, and position. She taunted him bitterly with his ingratitude, and it was only with the greatest difficulty that he at length succeeded in restoring her to anything like calm.
Had she but known the true character and the past record of the man to whom she had so rashly confided her happiness, it is probable that she would have exercised a greater restraint over her temper. Frederick had now lost all sense of her charms and attractions, and was determined to cut himself loose from bonds which, though gilded, had become irksome to him. Moreover, he lived in constant dread that her husband, Mr. Van der Beck, would end by discovering their place of refuge. This last encounter with his mistress brought matters to a climax, and he determined to put into execution, without any further delay, the projects which he had been maturing for some time past.
A few days later, he rode into Yokohama and took the train up to Tokio. There he directed his jinrikisha, as the little two-wheeled carriages (drawn at a sharp trot by one, two, or three coolies, harnessed tandem fashion) are called, to take him to the quarter of the metropolis inhabited by the merchants dealing in furs. After considerable trouble, he succeeded in finding some skins of the wild-cat, with which he returned to the railway station and thence to Yokohama.
On reaching home, he seized the earliest possible moment to lock himself up in his room, where he spent an hour in cutting off the short, hard hairs of the furs which he had purchased, and, locking them away in a small box, he then destroyed the skins.
While stationed in the interior of Java, a native soldier to whom he had shown some acts of kindness had displayed his gratitude by making him acquainted with the properties of the chopped hair of a wild-cat when mixed [Pg 132] with food. These hairs are swallowed without being noticed, but remain stuck by their points in the intestines. Any attempts to remove them or to relieve the patient by means of medicines are useless, since the hairs merely bend in order to give way to the medicament and then resume their former position. In a very short space of time, they produce terrible and incurable ulcerations of the intestines, and in the course of a few weeks the victim, who is unable to take any further food or nourishment, wastes away and finally dies of exhaustion and inanition.
It was of this fiendish method that Frederick was about to avail himself for the purpose of getting rid of his rich inamorata, whose money, however, he was determined at all costs to retain.
Mme. Van der Beck soon began to notice an agreeable change in the conduct of Frederick. His indifference and coldness vanished entirely and he became once more an attentive and devoted lover. He no longer spent his days at the “chaya,” but remained at home, and only left the house to accompany her on her drives in the lovely environs of Yokohama. Nina was at first at a loss to understand the reason of so radical a reformation, but finally made up her mind that it was to be attributed to the sorrow she had manifested at his neglect; and her love for him revived in all its former intensity.
One day while driving in the neighborhood their attention was suddenly attracted by cries for assistance which proceeded from the banks of a small stream. On approaching the spot they found that an English phaeton of somewhat antiquated build, and drawn by an exceedingly vicious looking pair of half-broken Japanese ponies, had been overturned into the water. The carriage was imbedded in the mud, and the grooms were making frantic efforts to extricate the terrified horses from the tangle of harness and reins. On the bank stood a Japanese gentleman in native costume, [Pg 133] who was giving directions to his men. Frederick, having alighted, courteously raised his hat and inquired if he could be of any assistance, an offer which was gratefully accepted. With the help of his servants the ponies were at length freed, but it was found impossible to pull the heavy and cumbrous vehicle out of the mud. At Nina's pressing solicitation, the Japanese, who, judging by his dress and appearance, was evidently a man of high rank, allowed himself to be prevailed upon to accept a seat in her carriage and to be driven to his home. The latter was an extremely pretty country house surrounded by vast grounds. On taking leave of them, with many profuse expressions of gratitu............