The Book of Deceive
said the young man, “now you are Flower of the Cherry indeed.”
“Child,” she said, “go home and think of me no more. I am too old for such as you.”
“Old!” he said; “why, there lies not a year between us!”
“No, not a year—no year, but an eternity,” said Flower of the Cherry. “Think no more of me,” she said; but the lover thought of nothing else. His young blood was on fire. He could not eat, nor drink, nor sleep. He pined and grew pale, he wandered day and night, his heart heavy with longing. He lived in torment; weak he grew, and weaker. One night he fell fainting at the entrance of the street of the geisha. Sakura-ko came home at dawn from a festival in a great house. There she found him. She said no word, but she bore him to his house outside Gim, and stayed with him there full three moons. And after that time he was nursed back to ruddy health. Swiftly, swiftly, the glad days sped by for both of them.