All these people seemed either to have been in Japan themselves or to have friends and relations who knew the country thoroughly. A wonderful land, they assured him. The nation of the future, the Garden of the East, but of course Captain Barrington knew Japan well. No, he had never been there? Ah, but Mrs. Barrington must have described it all to him. Impossible! Really? Not since she was a baby? How very extraordinary! A charming country, so quaint, so original, so picturesque, such a place to relax in; and then the Japanese girls, the little _mousmés_, in their bright kimonos, who came fluttering round like little butterflies, who were so gentle and soft and grateful; but there! Captain Barrington was a married man, that was no affair of his. Ha! Ha! The elderly _roués_, who buzzed like February flies in the sunshine of Deauville, seemed to have particularly fruity memories of tea-house sprees and oriental philanderings under the cherry-blossoms of Yokohama. Evidently, Japan was just like the musical comedies. Geoffrey began to be ashamed of his ignorance concerning his wife's native country. Somebody had asked him, what exactly _bushido_ was. He had answered at random that it was made of rice and curry powder. By the hilarious reception given to this explanation he knew that he must have made a _gaffe_. So he asked one of the more erudite bores to give him the names of the best books about Japan. He would "mug it up," and get some answers off pat to the leading questions. The erudite one promptly lent him some volumes by Lafcadio Hearn and Pierre Loti's _Madame Chrysanthème_. He read the novel first of all. Rather spicy, wasn't it? Asako found the book. It was an illustrated edition; and the little drawings of Japanese scenes pleased her immensely, so that she began to read the letter press. "It is the story of a bad man and a bad woman," she said; "Geoffrey, why do you read bad things? They bring bad conditions." Geoffrey smiled. He was wondering whether the company of the fictitious _Chrysanthème_ was more demoralizing than that of the actual Mme. Laroche Meyerbeer, with whom his wife had been that day for a picnic lunch. "Besides, it isn't fair," his wife continued. "People read that book and then they think that all Japanese girls are bad like that." "Why, darling, I didn't think you had read it," Geoffrey expostulated, "who has been telling you about it?" "The Vicomte de Brie," Asako answered. "He called me _Chrysanthème_ and I asked him why." "Oh, did he?" said Geoffrey. Really it was time to put an end to lunch picnics and mermaidism. But Asako was so happy and so shiningly innocent.