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He tottered and fell backward. Ito was on the top of him. Asako closed her eyes. She heard a hoarse roar like a lion. When she dared to look again, she saw Tanaka kneeling over Ito's body. With a wrench he pulled Sadako's dagger out of the prostrate mass. It was followed by a jet of blood, and then by a steady trickle from body, mouth and nostrils, which spread over the matting.
"Well, hurry up and get back," said his master, "or we shall be home before you." With renewed bowings he disappeared. Asako was laughing. "We can never get rid of Tanaka," she said, "can we? He follows us like a detective." "Sometimes I think he is deliberately spying on us," said her husband. "Cheer up," said Reggie, "they all do that." The party dispersed at the Imperial Hotel.
Then she remembered how entirely Japanese she had become in appearance. Mr. Ito called during the afternoon to wish a Merry Christmas. Asako regaled him with thin green tea and little square cakes of ground rice, filled with a kind of bean paste called "an." She kept Tanaka in the room all the time; for Sadako's remarks about marriage with Ito had alarmed her.
Viscount Tanaka is a great curio-collector, and when he heard of this Pagoda, he longed for it. He mentioned his desire to the Korean Minister for the Imperial Household, and the Minister told him to take it if he wanted it. A few days afterwards, Viscount Tanaka, when bidding the Emperor farewell, thanked him for the gift.
She drew her sword. "Help! Help!" she cried. "Tanaka!" Something wrenched at her wrist, and the blade fell. At the same moment the inner shoji flew open like the shutter of a camera. Tanaka rushed into the room. Asako did not turn to look again until she was outside the room with her maid and her cook trembling beside her.
"I went out of the front door and there was Master Tanaka, telling the rickshaw-men the latest gossip about us. I said to him, 'Tanaka, are you married? 'Yes, Lordship, he answered, 'I am widower. 'Any children? I asked again. 'I have two progenies, he said; 'they are soldiers of His Majesty the Emperor. 'Why, how old are you? I asked. 'Forty-three years, he answered.
Tanaka had a rich collection of foreign and idiomatic phrases, which he must have learned by heart from a book and with which he adorned his conversation. On his own initiative he had appeared next morning to conduct the two visitors to the Emperor's palace, which he gave them to understand was open for that day only, and as a special privilege due to Tanaka's influence.
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