Leaving the room after urging Miya once more to give the matter further thought, Tomo had an uneasy foreboding that the affair would make Yukitomo angry with Michimasa and Miya, so that once again he would vent his spleen on herself. It was Yukitomo’s habit whenever Michimasa created some unpleasantness to attack Tomo as though Michimasa were her child and not his own as well.

But Yukitomo, who in one of his good moods had taken Maki out into the garden to show Takao the red dragonflies dancing about the new heads of pampas grass, handed the child back to Maki when he saw Tomo’s face and came back to the veranda.

‘So Michimasa’s done it again, eh?’ he said with a wry smile before Tomo could say anything. ‘It seems Miya’s threatening to go back to her parents …’ Either Suga or Yumi had apparently already reported the outlines of the affair, but Tomo nevertheless gave him an account in meticulous detail.

Yukitomo nodded as he listened, then when Tomo had finished suggested in a mild tone that rather than complain to Michimasa it would be better to send him to Echigo for a month or so to see the oilfield there, in order to give the domestic quarrel time to blow over. A relative of theirs who worked for the company was leaving for Kashiwazaki the next day, so he could be asked to take along Michimasa, who could do the sights of Niigata and perhaps Sado Island, and at the same time be gently initiated by the relative, who was a man of the world, into the art of handling a wife. Michimasa himself might possibly benefit a little thereby and it would also give Miya a chance to have second thoughts. Michimasa, who was fond of seeing unfamiliar places, was certain to be delighted. Tomo was impressed by the good sense of her husband’s plan. She looked at him with new hope: now that they had found a wife for Michimasa, perhaps even Yukitomo, who normally regarded his son as the bane of his existence, would feel a more natural affection for him.

For two or three days after Michimasa had left on his journey, Miya kept to her room complaining that she felt unwell, but the absence of the other party to the quarrel must have taken the fight out of her for she said nothing more about returning to her parents’ home.

‘Here, Miya,’ said Yukitomo in a hearty voice as he flung open the sliding doors and came in to sit by the bed where Miya’s small face, innocent of all cosmetics, rested against the pillow. ‘I’m thinking of taking Maki and Takao to Enoshima and staying the night. Why don’t you come with us?’

Miya sat up as though cheered by the youthfulness of his voice.