Chapter 18, "The Wind in the Pines"
Chapter 18, "The Wind in the Pines" (online): In which the Akashi lady moves to the city.
After Genji finishes his House o' Love, he writes to the Akashi lady telling her it's time to come to the city. She's reluctant, worrying that she'll ignored and mocked. Her father recalls that there's a villa on the Oi river that belonged to an ancestor; he contacts the family that's been growing crops on the land, subtly threatens them with his acquaintance with Genji, and arranges for the villa to be fixed up. Genji, by a happy coincidence, has been putting up a temple fairly nearby.
There is much poetic sadness at the parting; the Akashi lady's father is a monk and will not return to the city, but her mother decides to go with her.
When the Akashi lady and her mother leave, they take certain precautions; I can't tell if they're for safety or etiquette:
A single progress by land, the escort said, would be unmanageable, and a succession of convoys would only invite trouble. So it had been decided that so far as possible the journey would be an unobtrusive one by boat. The party set sail at perhaps seven or eight in the morning. . . .
A steady seasonal wind was blowing and they reached Oi on schedule, very careful not to attract attention on the land portion of the journey.
After a restless time, Genji makes his excuses to Murasaki:
"I have business at Katsura which a vague apprehension tells me I have neglected too long. Someone to whom I have made certain commitments is waiting there. And my chapel too, and those statues, sitting undecorated. It is quite time I did something about them. I will be away perhaps two or three days."
This sudden urge to visit Katsura and put his chapel in order made her suspect his actual motives. She was not happy. Those two or three days were likely to become days enough to rot the handle of the woodcutter's ax.
"I see you are being difficult again." He laughed. "You are in a small minority, my dear, for the whole world agrees that I have mended my ways."
I include the second paragraph because of the ax reference; a footnote indicates that "A Chinese woodcutter named Wang Chih found that his ax had rotted away as he stood watching a supernatural game of Go." I include the third paragraph because it's Genji being a passive-aggressive manipulative lying skank.
He goes and visits the Akashi lady and their daughter, who is charming and "no more than a baby," for help with timelines. (I went looking for an online chronology of the action, but couldn't find one.) All is lovely and G=P between them, but Genji is displeased at the appearance of a crowd of men who couldn't bear to be parted from him (no, I'm not exaggerating). So then he goes to Katsura, where "They abandoned themselves to music and to wine." Eventually, however, there's this bit which made me laugh: "Today they must definitely go back, said Genji, and soon. No rotting ax handles, please."
He's annoying again at Murasaki when he gets back, but manages to charm her into agreeing to raise his daughter. (I note that they have no children.) However, he's still not sure what to do at the end of the chapter, since the Akashi lady would certainly be displeased if her daughter were brought to Nijô.