Now the bamboo hedges which shut out the main street-line bent over, at times almost to the earth, writhing, stretching, and squeaking at the confining strips of wood that sought to hold them erect. Besides the hedge-bamboo, "sa-sa," the fence had an inner line of cruel orange-thorn. Yuki had watched the elemental conflict greedily. Suddenly a snatch of Carmen's love-song rode the wind. It was the sound she had expected. Her little hands sought each other within the silken sleeves, and clutched so fiercely that a nail snapped. Again came the song, nearer this time, just without the gate. It was a strange, incongruous note, as if an English lark should rise from the bruised and battered hedge. Yuki heard a movement in the next room, where Tetsujo sat among his books. Perhaps it was coincidence that Suzumé brought her, exactly at this moment, a fresh tray of tea. The blue gardeners strolled together into full view, and stooped, as if to discuss the condition of a botan bush, now beaten down. Square upon the back of one of them fell a queer winged missive, a scrap of foreign paper weighted with a pebble. Yuki saw it clearly. Old Suzumé, with a stifled gasp, crouched in her place. The girl poured tea for herself, and drank it calmly. The pelted gardener, without so much as a look around, lifted the scrap of paper as if it had been a broken bud, and slipped it, weight and all, into his sleeve. The Carmen song stopped. Suzumé, with a last sly glance, slipped from the room. Yuki pressed one hand to her throat. It would be no harm to sing the answering strain. What though her father and her jailers heard? If once the song sped forth, not even their craft could recall it. Pierre would understand, then, that she heard, but was a prisoner; that even the written note he threw could not be received. Once, twice, the white lips parted, and the slender throat stiffened for an answering phrase; but no sound came. It was as in nightmare dreams, where one seeks to cry aloud, and finds that the voice is gone. Now her father was on his feet. She heard his long, swinging stride go through the house. At the door she heard him kick his wooden clogs, and give a gruff order to O Maru San. Then the harsh scraping feet passed along the garden stones, the little bell clamored, and the gate-panel closed with a bang.