She stood in the sunlight, her cheeks vividly red, her eyes wide with excitement and with fright. It was that fearful, piteous something about her whole attitude which from the first reached and appealed instantly to the sympathies of the minister.
“Yaes,” she said, nodding her head, and then very swiftly, as though she had learned the words by rote—“I am convert unto you, Excellency.”
“Convert!” His eyes kindled and he stared at her without speaking a moment. Her head drooped, as if from its own small weight.
“Yaes,” she said in the lowest, the faintest of voices, “I am convert—Chlistian!”
He seized both her hands, and held them warmly in his own.
“Come into my house, my child,” he said. “Let us talk it over.”
Her hands fluttered in his, then she suddenly withdrew them. They slipped back into her sleeves. She stood uncertainly before him, hesitating to pass through the gate he had opened for her.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Even while the minister in the coolness of his study softly and gently questioned his faltering “convert,” a wily and smooth-speaking Nakoda was visiting her step-mother. Madame Yamada, as the latter was called, knew the marriage broker well, and being the mother of two daughters by a marriage previous to that with Azalea’s father, she welcomed him with more than usual cordiality.
Would not the estimable Mr. Okido remove his shoes and eat the noon meal within her humble house?
The estimable Mr. Okido would. Madame Yamada sent a scullery maid flying to his feet, where, kneeling in the humblest attitude, she removed his dusty sandals. Then she brought fresh water with which to bathe his feet.
Madame Yamada, who had not engaged the services of Okido, was curious to know the nature of his mission to her. She disguised her curiosity, however, under the blandest of manners. With swift acuteness she introduced her daughters into the room and had them serve the man, throughout the meal glancing under her eyelashes to watch the effect of her daughters’ sundry charms upon the Nakoda, who she knew would not fail to dwell upon all such points with his employer. But strangely enough, Okido scarcely seemed to notice the presence of her daughters, and ate his meal in somewhat stolid silence. After the repast he permitted the pipe to be lighted for him and proceeded to smoke at his leisure.