The Peony Lantern

In Yedo there lived a samurai named Hagiwara. He was a samurai of the hatamoto, which is the most honorable rank among samurai.

He had a noble figure and a very beautiful face, and many ladies of Yedo loved him, openly or in secret. But he was still young, and his thoughts turned to pleasure rather than love. Morning, noon, and night he amused himself with the gay youth of the city. He was the prince and leader of joyful revels, both indoors and out, and often paraded the streets for long stretches with bands of his boon companions.

One bright winter day during the New Year Festival, he found himself with a company of laughing youths and maidens playing battledore and shuttlecock. He had wandered far from his own part of the city, into a suburb on the other side of Yedo, where the streets were quiet and the houses stood in gardens. Hagiwara wielded his heavy battledore with great skill and grace, catching the gilded shuttlecock and tossing it lightly into the air. But at length, with a careless or ill-judged stroke, he sent it flying over the heads of the players and over the bamboo fence of a nearby garden. He immediately ran after it. His companions cried, "Stay, Hagiwara; we have more than a dozen shuttlecocks here!"

"No," he said, "but this one was dove-colored and gilded."

"Foolish one!" answered his friends. "We have six shuttlecocks here, all dove-colored and gilded."

But he paid them no heed, for he had become filled with a strange desire for the lost shuttlecock. He scaled the bamboo fence and dropped into the garden on the other side. He had marked the very spot where the shuttlecock should have fallen, but it was not there. So he searched along the foot of the fence, but he could not find it. Up and down he went, beating the bushes with his battledore, his eyes on the ground, breathing heavily as if he had lost his dearest treasure. His friends called him, but he did not come, and they grew tired and went home. The light began to fail. Hagiwara, the samurai, looked up and saw a girl standing a few yards away. She beckoned him with her right hand, and in her left she held a gilded shuttlecock with dove-colored feathers.

The samurai shouted joyfully and ran forward. The girl drew away from him, still beckoning. The shuttlecock lured him, and he followed. So they went until they came to the house in the garden, with three stone steps leading up to it. Beside the lowest step grew a plum tree in blossom, and upon the highest step stood a fair and very young lady. She was splendidly dressed in robes of high festival. Her kimono was of water-blue silk, with ceremonial sleeves so long they touched the ground. Her underdress was scarlet, and her great brocade girdle was stiff and heavy with gold. In her hair were pins of gold, tortoiseshell, and coral.

When Hagiwara saw the lady, he knelt down at once and made a deep bow, touching his forehead to the ground.

Then the lady spoke, smiling with childlike pleasure. "Come into my house, Hagiwara Sama, samurai of the hatamoto. I am O'Tsuyu, the Lady of the Morning Dew. My dear handmaiden O'Yoné has brought you to me. Come in, for indeed I am glad to see you, and happy is this hour."

So the samurai went in, and they brought him to a room with ten mats, where they entertained him. The Lady of the Morning Dew danced before him in the ancient manner, while O'Yoné the handmaiden beat a small scarlet-tasseled drum.

Afterward, they set food before him: red rice of the festival and sweet warm wine, and he ate and drank what they gave him.

It was dark night when Hagiwara took his leave. "Come again, honorable lord, come again," said O'Yoné the handmaiden.

"Yes, lord, you must come," whispered the Lady of the Morning Dew.

The samurai laughed. "And if I do not come?" he said mockingly. "What if I do not come?"

The lady stiffened, and her childlike face grew gray, but she laid her hand upon Hagiwara's shoulder.

"Then," she said, "it will be death, lord. Death for you and for me. There is no other way." O'Yoné shuddered and hid her eyes with her sleeve.

The samurai went out into the night, very much afraid.

He wandered long, long, seeking his home but unable to find it, in the black darkness from end to end of the sleeping city. When at last he reached his familiar door, the late dawn was almost come. Weary, he threw himself upon his bed. Then he laughed. "After all, I left my shuttlecock behind," said Hagiwara the samurai.

The next day, Hagiwara sat alone in his house from morning till evening. He put his hands before him and thought, but did nothing else. At the end of the day, he said, "It is a joke that a couple of geisha have tried to play on me. Very clever, but they shall not fool me!" So he dressed in his best and went out to join his friends. For five or six days he was at jousts and parties, the gayest of the gay. His wit was sharp, his spirits wild.

Then he said, "By the gods, I am deathly tired of this," and took to walking the streets of Yedo alone. He went from one end of the great city to the other. He wandered by day and by night, through streets and alleys, by hills and moats and castle walls, but he did not find what he sought. He could not come upon the garden where his shuttlecock was lost, nor upon the Lady of the Morning Dew. His spirit had no rest. He fell sick and took to his bed, where he neither ate nor slept, growing thinner than a shadow. This was about the third month. In the sixth month, at the time of niubai, the hot and rainy season, he rose and, despite his faithful servant's pleas, wrapped a loose summer robe about him and went out.

"Alas! Alas!" cried the servant. "The young master has a fever, or perhaps he is mad."

Hagiwara did not falter. He looked neither right nor left. He went straight forward, for he said to himself, "All roads lead past my love's house." Soon he came to a quiet suburb, and to a certain house whose garden had a split bamboo fence. Hagiwara laughed softly and climbed over the fence.

"The same, the very same shall be the manner of our meeting," he said. He found the garden wild and overgrown. Moss covered the three stone steps. The plum tree rustled its green leaves dismally. The house was still, its shutters all closed, forlorn and deserted.

The samurai grew cold as he stood wondering. A soaking rain began to fall.

Then an old man came into the garden. He said to Hagiwara, "Sir, what are you doing here?"

"The white flower has fallen from the plum tree," said the samurai. "Where is the Lady of the Morning Dew?"

"She is dead," answered the old man. "Dead these five or six moons, of a strange and sudden sickness. She lies in the graveyard on the hill, and O'Yoné, her handmaid, lies beside her. She could not let her mistress wander alone through the long night of Yomi. For their sweet spirits' sake, I still tend this garden, but I am old and can do little. Oh, sir, they are truly dead. The grass grows on their graves."

Hagiwara went home. He took a slip of pure white wood and wrote upon it, in large, beautiful characters, the dear name of his lady. He set it up and burned incense and sweet perfumes before it, making every offering and due observance for the welfare of her departed spirit.

Then the Festival of Bon, the time of returning souls, drew near. The good people of Yedo took lanterns and visited their graves, bringing food and flowers to care for their beloved dead. On the thirteenth day of the seventh month, which is the most important day of Bon, Hagiwara the samurai walked in his garden by night for the coolness. It was windless and dark. A cicada hidden in the heart of a pomegranate flower sang shrilly now and then. Now and again a carp leaped in the round pond. For the rest, it was still, and not a leaf stirred.

About the hour of the Ox, Hagiwara heard footsteps in the lane beyond his garden hedge. Nearer and nearer they came.

"Women's geta," said the samurai, recognizing the hollow, echoing sound. Looking over his rose hedge, he saw two slender women come out of the dimness, hand in hand. One carried a lantern with a bunch of peony flowers tied to the handle. It was such a lantern as is used at Bon for the service of the dead. It swung as the two women walked, casting an unsteady light. As they came abreast of the samurai on the other side of the hedge, they turned their faces toward him. He knew them at once and gave a great cry.

The girl with the peony lantern held it up so the light fell on him.

"Hagiwara Sama!" she cried. "How wonderful! Why, lord, we were told you were dead. We have recited the Nembutsu for your soul every day these many moons!"

"Come in, come in, O'Yoné," he said. "And is it indeed your mistress that you hold by the hand? Can it be my lady? ... Oh, my love!"

O'Yoné answered, "Who else could it be?" and the two came in through the garden gate.

But the Lady of the Morning Dew held up her sleeve to hide her face.

"How did I lose you?" said the samurai. "How did I lose you, O'Yoné?"

"Lord," she said, "we have moved to a little house, a very little house, in the part of the city called the Green Hill. We were allowed to take nothing with us, and we are very poor now. With grief and want, my mistress has grown pale."

Then Hagiwara took his lady's sleeve to gently draw it from her face.

"Lord," she sobbed, "you will not love me; I am not fair."

But when he looked upon her, his love flamed up within him like a consuming fire and shook him from head to foot. He said not a word.

She drooped. "Lord," she murmured, "shall I go or stay?"

And he said, "Stay."

A little before daybreak, the samurai fell into a deep sleep and awoke to find himself alone in the clear light of morning. He lost no time, but rose and went out at once, making his way through Yedo to the Green Hill quarter. There he asked for the house of the Lady of the Morning Dew, but no one could direct him. He searched high and low, but in vain. It seemed to him that for the second time he had lost his dear lady, and he turned homeward in bitter despair. His way led him through the grounds of a certain temple. As he walked, he noticed two graves side by side. One was small and humble, but the other was marked by a fine monument, like the tomb of someone important. Before the monument hung a lantern with a bunch of peony flowers tied to its handle. It was such a lantern as is used at Bon for the service of the dead.

Long, long, the samurai stood as if in a dream. Then he smiled a little and said, "'We have moved to a little house ... a very little house ... on the Green Hill ... we were allowed to take nothing ... we are very poor ... with grief and want my mistress has grown pale...' A little house, a dark house, yet you will make room for me, oh, my beloved, pale one of my desires. We have loved for ten existences; leave me not now ... my dear." Then he went home.

His faithful servant met him and cried, "Now what is wrong with you, master?"

He said, "Why, nothing at all... I have never been merrier."

But the servant left, weeping, saying, "The mark of death is on his face... and I, where shall I go, I who carried him as a child in my arms?"

Every night for seven nights, the maidens with the peony lantern came to Hagiwara's dwelling. Fair weather or foul made no difference. They came at the hour of the Ox. There was a mystic wooing. By the strong bond of illusion, the living and the dead were bound together.

On the seventh night, the samurai's servant, wakeful with fear and sorrow, dared to peer into his lord's room through a crack in the wooden shutters. His hair stood on end and his blood ran cold to see Hagiwara in the arms of a fearful thing, smiling up at the horror that was its face, stroking its dank green robe with languid fingers. With daylight, the servant made his way to a holy man of his acquaintance. When he had told his story, he asked, "Is there any hope for Hagiwara Sama?"

"Alas," said the holy man, "who can withstand the power of Karma? Nevertheless, there is a little hope." So he told the servant what to do. Before nightfall, the servant had placed a sacred text above every door and window of his master's house, and he had rolled a golden emblem of the Tathagata into the silk of his master's girdle. When these things were done, Hagiwara, drawn two ways, became weak as water. His servant took him in his arms, laid him on his bed, and covered him lightly, and saw him fall into a deep sleep.

At the hour of the Ox, footsteps were heard in the lane outside the garden hedge. Nearer and nearer they came. They slowed and stopped.

"What does this mean, O'Yoné, O'Yoné?" said a piteous voice. "The house is asleep, and I do not see my lord."

"Come home, sweet lady. Hagiwara's heart is changed."

"No, I will not, O'Yoné, O'Yoné... you must find a way to bring me to my lord."

"Lady, we cannot enter here. See the Holy Writing over every door and window... we may not enter here."

There was a sound of bitter weeping and a long wail. "Lord, I have loved thee for ten existences." Then the footsteps retreated and their echo died away.

The next night was the same. Hagiwara slept in his weakness; his servant watched; the wraiths came and departed in sobbing despair.

On the third day, when Hagiwara went to the bath, a thief stole the golden emblem of the Tathagata from his girdle. Hagiwara did not notice. But that night he lay awake. It was his servant who slept, worn out with watching. Presently a great rain fell, and Hagiwara, waking, heard the sound upon the roof. The heavens opened, and for hours the rain fell. It tore the holy text from over the round window in Hagiwara's chamber.

At the hour of the Ox, footsteps were heard in the lane without the garden hedge. Nearer and nearer they came. They slowed and stopped.

"This is the last time, O'Yoné, O'Yoné, so bring me to my lord. Think of the love of ten existences. Great is the power of Karma. There must be a way..."

"Come, my beloved," called Hagiwara in a loud voice.

"Open, lord... open and I will come."

But Hagiwara could not move from his couch.

"Come, my beloved," he called a second time.

"I cannot come, though the separation wounds me like a sharp sword. Thus we suffer for the sins of a former life." So the lady spoke and moaned like the lost soul she was. But O'Yoné took her hand.

"See the round window," she said.

Hand in hand, the two rose lightly from the earth. Like vapor, they passed through the unguarded window. The samurai called a third time, "Come to me, beloved."

He was answered, "Lord, I come."

In the gray morning, Hagiwara's servant found his master cold and dead. At his feet stood the peony lantern, burning with a weird yellow flame. The servant shivered, took up the lantern, and blew out the light, for "I cannot bear it," he said.