There was a noise of heavy feet mounting upon the verandah. The feet
approached deliberately,-- halted beside him. Then, for long minutes,--
during which Hoichi felt his whole body shake to the beating of his
heart,-- there was dead silence.


At last the gruff voice muttered close to him:--


"Here is the biwa; but of the biwa-player I see -- only two ears!... So
that explains why he did not answer: he had no mouth to answer with --
there is nothing left of him but his ears... Now to my lord those ears I
will take -- in proof that the august commands have been obeyed, so far as
was possible"...


At that instant Hoichi felt his ears gripped by fingers of iron, and torn
off! Great as the pain was, he gave no cry. The heavy footfalls receded
along the verandah,-- descended into the garden,-- passed out to the
roadway,-- ceased. From either side of his head, the blind man felt a thick
warm trickling; but he dared not lift his hands...



Before sunrise the priest came back. He hastened at once to the verandah
in the rear, stepped and slipped upon something clammy, and uttered a cry
of horror; -- for he say, by the light of his lantern, that the clamminess
was blood. But he perceived Hoichi sitting there, in the attitude of
meditation -- with the blood still oozing from his wounds.