The two sisters proceeded toward Azuchi, together and unhampered, united in their great expectations but widely divergent upon lesser grounds, those of apprehension. Esyo reasoned that Yodogima must say "No," and by so doing relieve her of the necessity for devising an untruth; Hideyoshi had sent Jokoin along for no other purpose than to make sure the delivery of the answer he, too, believed Yodogima should return. Jokoin anticipated alone the boredom of that to her way of thinking needless journey, for how could a princess, her own sister, so spoil a good prospect by saying anything but "Yes"? They had arrived now, and Yodogima received them in her boudoir--still open at the rear and overlooking the narrow lowland, butting up against a somber woods that covered a steep rising hillside beyond--yet it was growing late. There was no one to disturb them; Oyea had withdrawn to her own desolate chamber, apprehensive but resigned. Yodogima sat facing the dark of nightland. Jokoin at once became spokesman; she could not wait. Esyo held no interest in the gathering portent without, nor did she betray a conscious thought of things more ominous within. The clouds hung low and the air around dulled against the dead monotony of dawning sleep, over-borne and unrelated save as lettered against nature's unfathomed deep by myriads of changing, ever-noiseless fire-flies. "Come reason with me, with you and with him, verily the God-truth to know," pleaded Yodogima, silently, of the great, fathomless unreality lying just beyond, always ahead, alluringly beckoning, yet so disparagingly mute. "Really, one might think you lost in dreamland," ventured Jokoin, after waiting some seconds, patiently, perhaps, because quite satisfied. "Not dreaming, but coaxing," replied Esyo, "and were I in Yodogima's place I should do more than that; I should take the matter into my own hands, and answer as reason might dictate." "Sister!" cried Yodogima. "Would you, truly, deny your God, to satisfy vanity--and know him?" "I should do the most sensible thing under the circumstances: you have my deepest sympathy, Yodogima," continued Esyo. "And, what is more, I have confidence in you," replied Yodogima. "Well, I suppose, I'm not in it, then," suggested Jokoin. Neither sister answered; Esyo found it enough to resist expressing some sort of feeling, and Yodogima no longer interested only in the voiceless heavens, pondered the possibilities of Ieyasu's proposed encounter. Nor could she quite bring herself to trust probability, for had not Hideyoshi once vanquished the great Mondo, outwitted Kemotsu? What if her lover should meet with a worse fate, and that, too, only for her? "No," said she, to herself; "it must not be." Then the chance of his winning began to take hold, and her pulses tingled, and the spirit verge spoke in the voice of an ancestor: "Yes," whispered she, inaudibly, though the fire shone from her eyes as it had a Taira's ages ago.