CHAPTER VII THE FESTIVAL OF RED LEAVES

unable to distract himself, he determined after a while to go to the Great Hall. As he passed by the flower-beds in front of his house he noticed that a faint tinge of green was already filming the bushes and under them the tokonatsu¹⁰³ were already in bloom. He plucked one and sent it to Ōmyōbu with a long letter and an acrostic poem in which he said that he was touched by the likeness of this flower to the child, but also hinted that he was perturbed by the child’s likeness to himself. ‘In this flower,’ he continued despondently, ‘I had hoped to see your beauty enshrined. But now I know that being mine yet not mine it can bring me no comfort to look upon it.’ After waiting a little while till a favourable moment should arise Ōmyōbu showed her mistress the letter, saying with a sigh ‘I fear that your answer will be but dust to the petals of this thirsting flower.’ But Fujitsubo, in whose heart also the new spring was awakening a host of tender thoughts, wrote in answer the poem: ‘Though it alone be the cause that these poor sleeves are wet with dew, yet goes my heart still with it, this child-flower of Yamato Land.’ This was all and it was roughly scribbled in a faint hand, but it was a comfort to Ōmyōbu to have even such a message as this to bring back. Genji knew quite well that it could lead to nothing. How many times had she sent him such messages before! Yet as he lay dejectedly gazing at the note, the mere sight of her handwriting soon stirred in him a frenzy of unreasoning excitement and delight. For a while he lay restlessly tossing on his bed. At last unable to remain any longer inactive he sprang up and went, as he had so often done before, to the western wing to seek distraction from the agitated thoughts which pursued him. He came towards the women’s apartments with his hair loose upon his shoulders, wearing a queer dressing-gown and, in order to amuse Murasaki, playing a tune on his flute as he walked. He peeped in at the door. She looked as she lay there for all the world like the fresh dewy flower that he had so recently plucked. She was growing a little bit spoilt and having heard some while ago that he had returned from Court she was rather cross with him for not coming to see her at once. She did not run to meet him