‘Yes, that’s a good idea – since they’ve come all this way, they ought to have some memories to take back with them besides the usual tower at Asakusa and the Imperial Palace. It’s not long before the summer fireworks display on the Sumida, so while I’m about it shall I take them to the Kusumi’s on that day so that they can see them?’

Tomo reflected wryly that it was hardly necessary to go to quite so much trouble for the houseboy’s parents but she stayed silent, knowing that to speak up at such times would only make her husband despise her all the more as an interfering busybody.

They took them to see not only the fireworks but the Bon dancing as well, and even out of town as far as Enoshima and Kamakura, on which occasions Suga went with them for all the world as though she really intended to become Konno’s wife, with her hair done up in a youthful chignon with the front generously fluffed up, dressed in a thin summer kimono of Akashi crepe with a vertical stripe that showed off to perfection the fair complexion of which she was so proud. Far from being put out by all this, Yukitomo would ask them all kinds of questions about their day when they returned, taking pleasure in the wonder shown by Konno’s folks from the country. It was very different from the days when Suga was younger, when he would show his displeasure if she so much as spoke to another man. Could it be that he had reached an age to take pleasure in seeing her on friendly terms with a man so young and ineffectual? Or could it be that now that he had Miya he hoped to pass Suga off on Konno?

Close to them though she was, Tomo could tell neither Yukitomo’s nor Suga’s true feelings.

She toyed with the idea of an indirect warning to Suga, but even if Suga had not been oddly excited lately, the very mention of Konno would have been enough to put her visibly on her guard, so Tomo decided to let well enough alone and remain a passive observer.

Could it be that in her late thirties a belated love was at last putting forth buds in Suga? Even should it be so, if she were really infatuated with someone like Konno, a man with no true ability, lacking both judgment and firmness of character, she was certainly heading for unhappiness. Tomo’s own nature made it painfully impossible for her to dismiss the affair as Suga’s own foolishness. At such times, she could forget nothing, not even how when she had first gone to fetch Suga she had been asked by Suga’s mother, now dead, to look after her daughter’s future welfare.