"Let us be seated," said Hagané, with a pleasant smile. Pierre, as at a physical thrust, went backward into a chair. "Now, shall we smoke?" continued the other, his tone deepening in friendliness. Its suavity had the effect of smothering. Pierre fought it off with a rude weapon. "Certainly, your Highness. Cigarettes or opium?" "Ah! Do you keep the latter luxury?" inquired the prince, with interest. "Have Frenchmen adopted this--vice--also?" "I meant for you only," explained Pierre, foolishly. "You must be a new-comer, unaware that I, myself, had the drug excluded from Japan. You Christian Europeans had already forced it on China." Pierre did not look up or try to answer. He felt his every move a false one. The steadying of the coffee did not come fast enough. He was in a hurry to get in some telling thrust. He must defend himself and Yuki. Count Ronsard should, after all, acknowledge him a man. The smooth, cool tones of the other now flowed like a refreshing liquid through his brain. "Am I right in thinking this your first visit to Japan, Monsieur?" Pierre, half dazed, answered, with instinctive politeness, "My first, yes. But I have for years been interested." "May I venture to ask what special phase of our civilization has been honored with your interest?" Pierre's demon nudged him. "It's woman," he said, with a short, ugly laugh. Hagané's smile grew almost fatherly. "In that you are no exception to the majority of your countrymen, Monsieur." "To be accurate I should have said--_a_ woman." The nobleman took a long whiff at his cigarette before remarking thoughtfully, "It is an unending source of wonder to our students, Monsieur, that you of the West, even your greatest thinkers, take women so seriously. Now with us, apart from the one function of becoming the mothers of our sons, they are to men as playthings to children,--as flowers, or bright-colored birds." "Am I to infer, then, that to your Highness one woman would be about as desirable as another?" "Ah, Monsieur! You are caustic. Not quite that, I protest. There is discrimination, even in playthings. And we must always take into account the effect of physique,--and character,--upon possible sons." At repetition of this sickening thought Pierre's rage gave a convulsive bound. The veins in his temples burned the skin. His delicate hands clenched themselves into steel. He grasped the pistol, brandished it wildly, and putting his face close to Hagané hissed, "Leave out the name of Yuki, and your satyr's thoughts of her, if you expect to live!" The prince's raised hand concealed an expression of amusement. Sadness, not altogether convincing, took its place. Pierre sank back to his chair sulkily, ashamed of his violence.