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Updated: August 23, 2024
But to the questions he put Yoshio returned evasive answers, and, resuming his professional manner, spoke gravely of the loss of blood Craven had sustained, of the kick on the head from which he had lain two days insensible, and his consequent need of rest and sleep, finally departing as if to remove temptation from him.
After this meeting he had gone back to his tent to make his own final preparations with a feeling almost of exhilaration. To Yoshio, more than usually stolid, he had given all necessary instructions for the conveyance of his belongings to England. Remained only the letter to his wife a letter that seemed curiously hard to begin.
It was odd to be alone, she missed the familiar black form lying on the hearth-rug, but tonight she could not bear even Mouston's presence, and Mary had taken a request to Yoshio, to whose room the dog had been banished from the studio, that he would keep him until the morning. A tap at the door and Miss Craven appeared, anxious and questioning.
But he suppressed the inclination and held on to the thermometer until Yoshio solemnly removed it, studied it intently, and nodded approval. With the exact attention to detail that was his ruling passion he carefully rinsed the tiny glass instrument and returned it to its case before leaving the tent.
And when the two hours were passed and Yoshio woke him he sprang up, wide awake on the instant, refreshed by the short rest. In silence that was no longer sullen the valet indicated a complete Arab outfit he had brought back with him to the tent, but Craven waved it aside with a smile at the thought of Said's pertinacity and finished his dressing quickly.
Craven wants any sympathy, cherie," she said slowly, "I reserve all mine for Yoshio, he fusses so dreadfully when the 'honourable master' goes for those tremendous long rides or is out hunting.
She looked up from the tea urn she was manipulating, her eyes resting on him with the pleasure his physical appearance always gave her. "You've been quick!" "Yoshio," he replied laconically, handing her buttered toast. He ate little himself but drank two cups of tea, smoking the while innumerable cigarettes.
Life in itself is nothing to the Japanese, the disposal of it merely the exigency of a moment and withal a personal prerogative. By all the accepted canons of his own national ideals Yoshio should have stood on one side but he had chosen to interfere. Whatever the motive, Yoshio had paid his debt in full. The weeks at sea braced Craven as nothing else could have done.
He found there was no steamer leaving for Marseilles for nearly a week but he was able to secure berths for himself and Yoshio on a coasting boat crossing that night to Gibraltar, and at sunset he was on board waving fare-well to Said, who had come down to the quay to see the last of him, and was standing a distinctive figure among the rabble of loafers and water-side loungers of all nationalities who congregated night and morning to watch the arrival and departure of steamers.
"I'm a lazy kind of fellow," he replied quietly. "You weren't lazy in the Rockies," said Atherton sharply. "Oh, yes I was. There are grades of laziness." Atherton flung the stub of his cigar overboard and selecting a fresh one, cut the end off carefully. "Still got that Jap boy who was with you in America?" "Yoshio? Yes. I picked him up in San Francisco ten years ago. He'll never leave me now."
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