Late last year, Japan's Crown Princess Masako announced she was exhausted by the pressures of the palace and excused herself from her royal duties. Last month, her condition apparently worsening, she took refuge in her family's summer home in a wooded mountain resort.
Officials say they do not know when she will return.
Intelligent, well-bred, affable and cosmopolitan, Masako seemed the perfect addition to the world's oldest royal family when she wed Crown Prince Naruhito 11 years ago. But the weight of the crown has since proved almost too much for her to bear -- and, experts say, her plight could bode ill for the future of Japan's ancient Chrysanthemum Throne.
A flurry of recent reports in the tabloid press have noted it is unprecedented for the princess, who is with her mother and baby daughter, to be staying at a private residence and not an imperial villa; that even her official attendants have limited access to her; and that although the prince has visited her twice, he spent much of his time in a nearby hotel.
"Worries deepen over Princess Masako," said one typical report, in Shincho, a popular weekly magazine. ``Is she really recovering?''
Despite all Masako has going for her, and her popularity with a sympathetic public, she has been plagued by a burden as old as the throne itself -- her duty to produce an imperial heir.
Masako, 40, and Naruhito, 44, had their first and only child, Princess Aiko, two years ago, after eight years of marriage. An earlier pregnancy ended in a miscarriage, which the palace blamed largely on intense media attention.
But the birth of Aiko has done little to ease the tension.
Under a post-World War II law, only males can assume the throne. There are no princes in the generation after Naruhito, whose younger brother has two girls, but no sons. Princess Sayako, Naruhito's only sister, is 35 and says she has no immediate plans to marry.
With the likelihood fading that a boy will be born, the long-avoided topic of allowing a woman to assume the throne is now under serious discussion. Proponents stress Japan has had reigning empresses -- albeit not since Gosakuramachi in the late 1700s. Others point to Sweden, which, facing a similar crunch, changed its laws in 1979 so that Crown Princess Victoria could succeed her father.
"There is simply no reason why we shouldn't allow a woman to reign," said Satsuki Eda, a lawmaker and vice president of the Democratic Party, Japan's leading opposition bloc. "I think it is a very good thing that we are able to discuss this issue, without worrying about taboos."
Masako's woes go deeper than the succession crisis.
Since the late Emperor Hirohito -- Naruhito's grandfather -- renounced the idea that he was a living god after Japan's defeat in 1945, the royal family has acted as a "symbol of the nation," handing out awards, observing imperial rites and greeting foreign dignitaries at home and abroad.
Educated at Harvard, Oxford and Japan's top university before following in her father's footsteps and becoming a career diplomat, Masako was seen as a natural for that role. And at a time when Britain's Princess Diana was enchanting crowds around the world, it was hoped Masako would offer a little glitter to Japan's generally staid and circumspect royal family.
That hasn't happened.
Masako has made only five trips overseas since her wedding. Her husband is expected to attend weddings of members of the Danish and Spanish royal houses next month, but officials announced on Friday that Masako will not accompany him.
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