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veil age had imposed.
    Furthermore, he now possessed his future much more surely than any youth could. The reason why young men patter on about the future so was simply that they didn’t yet have it. Possessing by letting go of things was a secret of ownership unknown to youth.
    Just as Kiyoaki had not influenced the times in which he had lived, Honda too did not affect his. In place of the era when Kiyoaki had perished on the battlefield of romantic emotions, a new period was coming when young men would die on real battlefields. Its forerunner was the death of Isao. In other words, Kiyoaki and his reincarnation, Isao, had died contrasting deaths on contrasting battlefields.
    And Honda? There was no sign of death in him! He had never desired death passionately, nor had he ever tried to evade its onslaught. However, now that he had suddenly become the target of the fiery shafts of the tropical sun that poured down on him the livelong day, the beautiful, dense, luxuriant greenery all about seemed possibly the stunning luxuriance of death itself. “A long time ago, perhaps twenty-seven or twenty-eight years, when two Siamese princes came to Japan to study, I was privileged to know them for some time. One was the younger brother of Rama VI, Prince Pattanadid; and the other was Prince Kridsada, his cousin, a grandson of Rama IV. I wonder what they’re doing now. I had hoped to see them when I got to Bangkok, but it seems presumptuous to impose myself on people who have surely forgotten me.”
    “Why didn’t you tell me before?” said the omniscient Hishikawa, hastening to reproach Honda’s reserve. “Whatever you ask, I can find a solution.”
    “Well, then, do you think I might be able to see the two princes?”
    “I shouldn’t go so far as to say that. Rama VIII, their uncle, depends very much on them, and they are both in Lausanne with him now. Most of the important members of the royal family have gone to Switzerland and the palace is empty.”
    “I’m sorry to hear it.”
    “But there’s a possibility of seeing a member of Prince Pattanadid’s family. It’s a strange story. His Royal Highness’s youngest daughter, a little girl about seven, is staying in Bangkok alone with her ladies-in-waiting. The poor thing is practically a prisoner in a small mansion they call the Rosette Palace.
    “Why is that?”
    “It would be an embarrassment to the family if they took her abroad; she’s thought to be retarded. Ever since the Princess was able to talk, she’s been saying: ‘I’m not really a Siamese princess. I’m the reincarnation of a Japanese, and my real home is in Japan.’ She won’t change her story no matter what people say. If anyone objects, she throws a tantrum. So the rumor is that all her attendants have gone along with her delusion and brought her up to believe whatever she wishes. An audience is rather difficult, but since you have relations with the royal princes, I think I can do something—depending on how I approach those responsible for her.”

2
     
     H AVING HEARD the story of the poor little mad Princess, Honda was not at once moved to seek an audience.
    He knew that she would be within his reach like some brilliant, little golden temple. And just as temples never fly away, he felt that the Princess too would always be there. Madness in this country would surely be like its architecture or its monotonous, elegant dances that went on and on in their eternal splendor. Another day, he thought, when his mood had changed, he would request an audience.
    Perhaps this procrastination came in part from the listlessness one experienced in the tropics and in part from his advancing years. His hair was turning gray, and his sight would have been growing less acute too were it not, fortunately, that he had been slightly nearsighted since childhood. He still managed well without the assistance of an old man’s spectacles.
    His age enabled him to use the laws taught him by experience as