A little later the Bara Rani appeared. “Why
did you not send me word when Brother Nikhil came
in?” she complained. “As he was
late I thought I might as well finish my bath in the
meantime. However did he manage to get through
his meal so soon?”
“Why, did you want him for anything?”
“What is this about both of you going off to
Calcutta tomorrow? All I can say is, I am not
going to be left here alone. I should get startled
out of my life at every sound, with all these dacoits
about. Is it quite settled about your going tomorrow?”
“Yes,” said I, though I had only just
now heard it; and though, moreover, I was not at all
sure that before tomorrow our history might not take
such a turn as to make it all one whether we went
or stayed. After that, what our home, our life
would be like, was utterly beyond my ken—it
seemed so misty and phantom-like.
In a very few hours now my unseen fate would become
visible. Was there no one who could keep on
postponing the flight of these hours, from day to
day, and so make them long enough for me to set things
right, so far as lay in my power? The time during
which the seed lies underground is long—so
long indeed that one forgets that there is any danger
of its sprouting. But once its shoot shows up
above the surface, it grows and grows so fast, there
is no time to cover it up, neither with skirt, nor
body, nor even life itself.
I will try to think of it no more, but sit quiet—passive
and callous—let the crash come when it
may. By the day after tomorrow all will be over—publicity,
laughter, bewailing, questions, explanations—everything.
But I cannot forget the face of Amulya—beautiful,
radiant with devotion. He did not wait, despairing,
for the blow of fate to fall, but rushed into the
thick of danger. In my misery I do him reverence.
He is my boy-god. Under the pretext of his
playfulness he took from me the weight of my burden.
He would save me by taking the punishment meant for
me on his own head. But how am Ito bear this
terrible mercy of my God?
Oh, my child, my child, I do you reverence.
Little brother mine, I do you reverence. Pure
are you, beautiful are you, I do you reverence.
May you come to my arms, in the next birth, as my
own child—that is my prayer.
------
29. Any dainties to be offered ceremonially should
be made by the lady of the house herself. [Trans.].
Rumour became busy on every side. The police
were continually in and out. The servants of
the house were in a great flurry.
Khema, my maid, came up to me and said: “Oh,
Rani Mother! for goodness” sake put away my
gold necklace and armlets in your iron safe.”
To whom was I to explain that the Rani herself had
been weaving all this network of trouble, and had
got caught in it, too? I had to play the benign
protector and take charge of Khema’s ornaments
and Thako’s savings. The milk-woman, in
her turn, brought along and kept in my room a box
in which were a Benares __sari__ and some other of
her valued possessions. “I got these at
your wedding,” she told me.
