Читать книгу Broken Butterflies онлайн

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A row of shoes in the entrance of the tea house told them that most of the others had already arrived. A flock of maidservants met them, took their hats and canes, waiting while Kent and Kittrick took off their shoes. Kikuchi appeared. "We are nearly all of us here," he smiled. "Come in. Make yourself at home, Mr. Kent, Kittrick-san will tell you that we don't stand on ceremony."

In a large room, unfurnished save for a few kakemono pictures, they found Kubota and half a dozen Foreign Office men, with six or seven correspondents, talking, smoking. Butterfield of the Times and Templeton of the Express were old hands, with many years in Japan behind them. Most of the others were far more recent arrivals. Some of them showed by the self-conscious lack of ease of the white man when he first finds himself, socially, in stocking feet, that they were still new in Japan. Kent was introduced. The conversation flowed on, in groups. Tea and cigarettes were served.

A maid slid aside some of the partitions and they looked into a large room with small, individual lacquered tables set in three sides of a square, each with a cushion on the matting. "Please take your seats, gentlemen," Kubota waved them in. "Take your places where you please."