Asako gradually accustomed herself to the noises of the house.  First, there was the clattering of the amado, the wooden shutters whose removal announced the beginning of the day, then the gurgling and the expectorations which accompanied the family ablutions, then the harsh sound of the men’s voices and their rattling laughter, the sound of their geta on the gravel paths of the garden like the tedious dropping of heavy rain on an iron roof, then the flicking and dusting of the maids as they went about their daily soji (house-cleaning), their shrill mouselike chirps and their silly giggle; then the afternoon stillness when every one was absent or sleeping; and then, the revival of life and bustle at about six o’clock, when the clogs were shuffled off at the front door, when the teacups began to jingle, and when sounds of swishing water came up from the bath-house, the crackle of the wood-fire under the bathtub, the smell of the burning logs, and the distant odours of the kitchen.

Outside, the twilight was beginning to gather.  A big black crow flopped lazily on to the branch of the neighbouring pine-tree.  His harsh croak disturbed Asako’s mind like a threat.  High overhead passed a flight of wild geese in military formation on their way to the continent of Asia.  Lights began to peep among the trees.  Behind the squat pagoda a sky of raspberry pink closed the background.

The twilight is brief in Japan.  The night is velvety; and the moonlight and the starlight transfigure the dolls’ house architecture, the warped pine-trees, the feathery bamboo clumps and the pagoda spires.

From a downstair room there came the twang of cousin Sadako’s koto, a kind of zither instrument, upon which she played interminable melancholy sonatas of liquid, detached notes, like desultory thoughts against a background of silence.  There was no accompaniment to this music and no song to chime with it; for, as the Japanese say, the accompaniment for koto music is the summer night-time and its heavy fragrance, and the voice with which it harmonizes is the whisper of the breeze in the pine-branches.

Long after Sadako had finished her practice, came borne upon the distance the still more melancholy pipe of a student’s flute.  This was the last human sound.  After that the night was left to the orchestra of the insects—­the grasshoppers, the crickets and the semi (cicadas).  Asako soon was able to distinguish at least ten or twelve different songs, all metallic in character, like clock springs being slowly wound up and then let down with a run.  The night and the house vibrated with these infinitesimal chromatics.  Sometimes Asako thought the creatures must have got into her room, and feared for entanglements in her hair.  Then she remembered that her mother’s nickname had been “the Semi” and that she had been so called because she was always happy and singing in her little house by the river.