"Chapter One\n\nBimala's Story\n\nI\n\n\nMOTHER, today there comes back to mind the vermilion mark [1] at\nthe parting of your hair, the __sari__ [2] which you used to\nwear, with its wide red border, and those wonderful eyes of\nyours, full of depth and peace.  They came at the start of my\nlife's journey, like the first streak of dawn, giving me golden\nprovision to carry me on my way.\n\nThe sky which gives light is blue, and my mother's face was dark,\nbut she had the radiance of holiness, and her beauty would put to\nshame all the vanity of the beautiful.\n\nEveryone says that I resemble my mother.  In my childhood I used\nto resent this.  It made me angry with my mirror.  I thought that\nit was God's unfairness which was wrapped round my limbs--that my\ndark features were not my due, but had come to me by some\nmisunderstanding.  All that remained for me to ask of my God in\nreparation was, that I might grow up to be a model of what woman\nshould be, as one reads it in some epic poem.\n\nWhen the proposal came for my marriage, an astrologer was sent,\nwho consulted my palm and said, \"This girl has good signs.  She\nwill become an ideal wife.\"\n\nAnd all the women who heard it said: \"No wonder, for she\nresembles her mother.\"\n\nI was married into a Rajah's house.  When I was a child, I was\nquite familiar with the description of the Prince of the fairy\nstory.  But my husband's face was not of a kind that one's\nimagination would place in fairyland.  It was dark, even as mine\nwas.  The feeling of shrinking, which I had about my own lack of\nphysical beauty, was lifted a little; at the same time a touch of\nregret was left lingering in my heart.\n\nBut when the physical appearance evades the scrutiny of our\nsenses and enters the sanctuary of our hearts, then it can forget\nitself.  I know, from my childhood's experience, how devotion is\nbeauty itself, in its inner aspect.  When my mother arranged the\ndifferent fruits, carefully peeled by her own loving hands, on\nthe white stone plate, and gently waved her fan to drive away the\nflies while my father sat down to his meals, her service would\nlose itself in a beauty which passed beyond outward forms.  Even\nin my infancy I could feel its power.  It transcended all\ndebates, or doubts, or calculations: it was pure music.\n\nI distinctly remember after my marriage, when, early in the\nmorning, I would cautiously and silently get up and take the dust\n[3] of my husband's feet without waking him, how at such moments\nI could feel the vermilion mark upon my forehead shining out like\nthe morning star.\n\nOne day, he happened to awake, and smiled as he asked me: \"What\nis that, Bimala?  What __are__ you doing?\"\n\nI can never forget the shame of being detected by him.  He might\npossibly have thought that I was trying to earn merit secretly.\nBut no, no!  That had nothing to do with merit.  It was my\nwoman's heart, which must worship in order to love.\n\nMy father-in-law's house was old in dignity from the days of the\n__Badshahs__.  Some of its manners were of the Moguls and\nPathans, some of its customs of Manu and Parashar.  But my\nhusband was absolutely modern.  He was the first of the house to\ngo through a college course and take his M.A.  degree.  His elder\nbrother had died young, of drink, and had left no children.  My\nhusband did not drink and was not given to dissipation.  So\nforeign to the family was this abstinence, that to many it hardly\nseemed decent!  Purity, they imagined, was only becoming in those\non whom fortune had not smiled.  It is the moon which has room\nfor stains, not the stars.\n\nMy husband's parents had died long ago, and his old grandmother\nwas mistress of the house.  My husband was the apple of her eye,\nthe jewel on her bosom.  And so he never met with much difficulty\nin overstepping any of the ancient usages.  When he brought in\nMiss Gilby, to teach me and be my companion, he stuck to his\nresolve in spite of the poison secreted by all the wagging\ntongues at home and outside.\n\nMy husband had then just got through his B.A.  examination and\nwas reading for his M.A.  degree; so he had to stay in Calcutta\nto attend college.  He used to write to me almost every day, a\nfew lines only, and simple words, but his bold, round handwriting\nwould look up into my face, oh, so tenderly!  I kept his letters\nin a sandalwood box and covered them every day with the flowers I\ngathered in the garden.\n\nAt that time the Prince of the fairy tale had faded, like the\nmoon in the morning light.  I had the Prince of my real world\nenthroned in my heart.  I was his queen.  I had my seat by his\nside.  But my real joy was, that my true place was at his feet.\n\nSince then, I have been educated, and introduced to the modern\nage in its own language, and therefore these words that I write\nseem to blush with shame in their prose setting.  Except for my\nacquaintance with this modern standard of life, I should know,\nquite naturally, that just as my being born a woman was not in my\nown hands, so the element of devotion in woman's love is not like\na hackneyed passage quoted from a romantic poem to be piously\nwritten down in round hand in a school-girl's copy-book.\n\nBut my husband would not give me any opportunity for worship.\nThat was his greatness.  They are cowards who claim absolute\ndevotion from their wives as their right; that is a humiliation\nfor both.\n\nHis love for me seemed to overflow my limits by its flood of\nwealth and service.  But my necessity was more for giving than\nfor receiving; for love is a vagabond, who can make his flowers\nbloom in the wayside dust, better than in the crystal jars kept\nin the drawing-room.\n\nMy husband could not break completely with the old-time\ntraditions which prevailed in our family.  It was difficult,\ntherefore, for us to meet at any hour of the day we pleased.  [4]\nI knew exactly the time that he could come to me, and therefore\nour meeting had all the care of loving preparation.  It was like\nthe rhyming of a poem; it had to come through the path of the\nmetre.\n\nAfter finishing the day's work and taking my afternoon bath, I\nwould do up my hair and renew my vermilion mark and put on my\n__sari__, carefully crinkled; and then, bringing back my body\nand mind from all distractions of household duties, I would\ndedicate it at this special hour, with special ceremonies, to one\nindividual.  That time, each day, with him was short; but it was\ninfinite.\n\nMy husband used to say, that man and wife are equal in love\nbecause of their equal claim on each other.  I never argued the\npoint with him, but my heart said that devotion never stands in\nthe way of true equality; it only raises the level of the ground\nof meeting.  Therefore the joy of the higher equality remains\npermanent; it never slides down to the vulgar level of triviality.\n\nMy beloved, it was worthy of you that you never expected worship\nfrom me.  But if you had accepted it, you would have done me a\nreal service.  You showed your love by decorating me, by\neducating me, by giving me what I asked for, and what I did not.\nI have seen what depth of love there was in your eyes when you\ngazed at me.  I have known the secret sigh of pain you suppressed\nin your love for me.  You loved my body as if it were a flower of\nparadise.  You loved my whole nature as if it had been given you\nby some rare providence.\n\nSuch lavish devotion made me proud to think that the wealth was\nall my own which drove you to my gate.  But vanity such as this\nonly checks the flow of free surrender in a woman's love.  When I\nsit on the queen's throne and claim homage, then the claim only\ngoes on magnifying itself; it is never satisfied.  Can there be\nany real happiness for a woman in merely feeling that she has\npower over a man?  To surrender one's pride in devotion is\nwoman's only salvation.\n\nIt comes back to me today how, in the days of our happiness, the\nfires of envy sprung up all around us.  That was only natural,\nfor had I not stepped into my good fortune by a mere chance, and\nwithout deserving it?  But providence does not allow a run of\nluck to last for ever, unless its debt of honour be fully paid,\nday by day, through many a long day, and thus made secure.  God\nmay grant us gifts, but the merit of being able to take and hold\nthem must be our own.  Alas for the boons that slip through\nunworthy hands!\n\nMy husband's grandmother and mother were both renowned for their\nbeauty.  And my widowed sister-in-law was also of a beauty rarely\nto be seen.  When, in turn, fate left them desolate, the\ngrandmother vowed she would not insist on having beauty for her\nremaining grandson when he married.  Only the auspicious marks\nwith which I was endowed gained me an entry into this family--\notherwise, I had no claim to be here.\n\nIn this house of luxury, but few of its ladies had received their\nmeed of respect.  They had, however, got used to the ways of the\nfamily, and managed to keep their heads above water, buoyed up by\ntheir dignity as __Ranis__ of an ancient house, in spite of\ntheir daily tears being drowned in the foam of wine, and by the\ntinkle of the \"dancing girls\" anklets.  Was the credit due to me\nthat my husband did not touch liquor, nor squander his manhood in\nthe markets of woman's flesh?  What charm did I know to soothe\nthe wild and wandering mind of men?  It was my good luck, nothing\nelse.  For fate proved utterly callous to my sister-in-law.  Her\nfestivity died out, while yet the evening was early, leaving the\nlight of her beauty shining in vain over empty halls--burning and\nburning, with no accompanying music!\n\nHis sister-in-law affected a contempt for my husband's modern\nnotions.  How absurd to keep the family ship, laden with all the\nweight of its time-honoured glory, sailing under the colours of\nhis slip of a girl-wife alone!  Often have I felt the lash of\nscorn.  \"A thief who had stolen a husband's love!\"  \"A sham\nhidden in the shamelessness of her new-fangled finery!\"  The\nmany-coloured garments of modern fashion with which my husband\nloved to adorn me roused jealous wrath.  \"Is not she ashamed to\nmake a show-window of herself--and with her looks, too!\"\n\nMy husband was aware of all this, but his gentleness knew no\nbounds.  He used to implore me to forgive her.\n\nI remember I once told him: \"Women's minds are so petty, so\ncrooked!\"  \"Like the feet of Chinese women,\" he replied.  \"Has\nnot the pressure of society cramped them into pettiness and\ncrookedness?  They are but pawns of the fate which gambles with\nthem.  What responsibility have they of their own?\"\n\nMy sister-in-law never failed to get from my husband whatever she\nwanted.  He did not stop to consider whether her requests were\nright or reasonable.  But what exasperated me most was that she\nwas not grateful for this.  I had promised my husband that I\nwould not talk back at her, but this set me raging all the more,\ninwardly.  I used to feel that goodness has a limit, which, if\npassed, somehow seems to make men cowardly.  Shall I tell the\nwhole truth?  I have often wished that my husband had the\nmanliness to be a little less good.\n\nMy sister-in-law, the Bara Rani, [5] was still young and had no\npretensions to saintliness.  Rather, her talk and jest and laugh\ninclined to be forward.  The young maids with whom she surrounded\nherself were also impudent to a degree.  But there was none to\ngainsay her--for was not this the custom of the house?  It seemed\nto me that my good fortune in having a stainless husband was a\nspecial eyesore to her.  He, however, felt more the sorrow of her\nlot than the defects of her character.\n\n------\n\n1. The mark of Hindu wifehood and the symbol of all the devotion\nthat it implies.\n\n2. The __sari__ is the dress of the Hindu woman.\n\n3. Taking the dust of the feet is a formal offering of reverence\nand is done by lightly touching the feet of the revered one and\nthen one's own head with the same hand.  The wife does not\nordinarily do this to the husband.\n\n4. It would not be reckoned good form for the husband to be\ncontinually going into the zenana, except at particular hours for\nmeals or rest.\n\n5. __Bara__ = Senior; __Chota__ = Junior.  In joint\nfamilies of rank, though the widows remain entitled only to a\nlife-interest in their husbands' share, their rank remains to\nthem according to seniority, and the titles \"Senior\" and \"Junior\"\ncontinue to distinguish the elder and younger branches, even\nthough the junior branch be the one in power.\n\n\n\nII\n\n\n\nMy husband was very eager to take me out of __purdah__.  [6]\n\nOne day I said to him: \"What do I want with the outside world?\"\n\n\"The outside world may want you,\" he replied.\n\n\"If the outside world has got on so long without me, it may go on\nfor some time longer.  It need not pine to death for want of me.\"\n\n\"Let it perish, for all I care!  That is not troubling me.  I am\nthinking about myself.\"\n\n\"Oh, indeed.  Tell me what about yourself?\"\n\nMy husband was silent, with a smile.\n\nI knew his way, and protested at once: \"No, no, you are not going\nto run away from me like that!  I want to have this out with\nyou.\"\n\n\"Can one ever finish a subject with words?\"\n\n\"Do stop speaking in riddles.  Tell me...\"\n\n\"What I want is, that I should have you, and you should have me,\nmore fully in the outside world.  That is where we are still in\ndebt to each other.\"\n\n\"Is anything wanting, then, in the love we have here at home?\"\n\n\"Here you are wrapped up in me.  You know neither what you have,\nnor what you want.\"\n\n\"I cannot bear to hear you talk like this.\"\n\n\"I would have you come into the heart of the outer world and meet\nreality.  Merely going on with your household duties, living all\nyour life in the world of household conventions and the drudgery\nof household tasks--you were not made for that!  If we meet, and\nrecognize each other, in the real world, then only will our love\nbe true.\"\n\n\"If there be any drawback here to our full recognition of each\nother, then I have nothing to say.  But as for myself, I feel no\nwant.\"\n\n\"Well, even if the drawback is only on my side, why shouldn't you\nhelp to remove it?\"\n\nSuch discussions repeatedly occurred.  One day he said: \"The\ngreedy man who is fond of his fish stew has no compunction in\ncutting up the fish according to his need.  But the man who loves\nthe fish wants to enjoy it in the water; and if that is\nimpossible he waits on the bank; and even if he comes back home\nwithout a sight of it he has the consolation of knowing that the\nfish is all right.  Perfect gain is the best of all; but if that\nis impossible, then the next best gain is perfect losing.\"\n\nI never liked the way my husband had of talking on this subject,\nbut that is not the reason why I refused to leave the zenana.\nHis grandmother was still alive.  My husband had filled more than\na hundred and twenty per cent of the house with the twentieth\ncentury, against her taste; but she had borne it uncomplaining.\nShe would have borne it, likewise, if the daughter-in-law [7] of\nthe Rajah's house had left its seclusion.  She was even prepared\nfor this happening.  But I did not consider it important enough\nto give her the pain of it.  I have read in books that we are\ncalled \"caged birds\".  I cannot speak for others, but I had so\nmuch in this cage of mine that there was not room for it in the\nuniverse--at least that is what I then felt.\n\nThe grandmother, in her old age, was very fond of me.  At the\nbottom of her fondness was the thought that, with the conspiracy\nof favourable stars which attended me, I had been able to attract\nmy husband's love.  Were not men naturally inclined to plunge\ndownwards?  None of the others, for all their beauty, had been\nable to prevent their husbands going headlong into the burning\ndepths which consumed and destroyed them.  She believed that I\nhad been the means of extinguishing this fire, so deadly to the\nmen of the family.  So she kept me in the shelter of her bosom,\nand trembled if I was in the least bit unwell.\n\nHis grandmother did not like the dresses and ornaments my husband\nbrought from European shops to deck me with.  But she reflected:\n\"Men will have some absurd hobby or other, which is sure to be\nexpensive.  It is no use trying to check their extravagance; one\nis glad enough if they stop short of ruin.  If my Nikhil had not\nbeen busy dressing up his wife there is no knowing whom else he\nmight have spent his money on!\"  So whenever any new dress of\nmine arrived she used to send for my husband and make merry over\nit.\n\nThus it came about that it was her taste which changed.  The\ninfluence of the modern age fell so strongly upon her, that her\nevenings refused to pass if I did not tell her stories out of\nEnglish books.\n\nAfter his grandmother's death, my husband wanted me to go and\nlive with him in Calcutta.  But I could not bring myself to do\nthat.  Was not this our House, which she had kept under her\nsheltering care through all her trials and troubles?  Would not a\ncurse come upon me if I deserted it and went off to town?  This\nwas the thought that kept me back, as her empty seat\nreproachfully looked up at me.  That noble lady had come into\nthis house at the age of eight, and had died in her seventy-ninth\nyear.  She had not spent a happy life.  Fate had hurled shaft\nafter shaft at her breast, only to draw out more and more the\nimperishable spirit within.  This great house was hallowed with\nher tears.  What should I do in the dust of Calcutta, away from\nit?\n\nMy husband's idea was that this would be a good opportunity for\nleaving to my sister-in-law the consolation of ruling over the\nhousehold, giving our life, at the same time, more room to branch\nout in Calcutta.  That is just where my difficulty came in.  She\nhad worried my life out, she ill brooked my husband's happiness,\nand for this she was to be rewarded!  And what of the day when we\nshould have to come back here?  Should I then get back my seat at\nthe head?\n\n\"What do you want with that seat?\"  my husband would say.  \"Are\nthere not more precious things in life?\"\n\nMen never understand these things.  They have their nests in the\noutside world; they little know the whole of what the household\nstands for.  In these matters they ought to follow womanly\nguidance.  Such were my thoughts at that time.\n\nI felt the real point was, that one ought to stand up for one's\nrights.  To go away, and leave everything in the hands of the\nenemy, would be nothing short of owning defeat.\n\nBut why did not my husband compel me to go with him to Calcutta?\nI know the reason.  He did not use his power, just because he had\nit.\n\n------\n\n6. The seclusion of the zenana, and all the customs peculiar to\nit, are designated by the general term \"Purdah\", which means\nScreen.\n\n7. The prestige of the daughter-in-law is of the first importance\nin a Hindu household of rank [Trans.].\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\nIF one had to fill in, little by little, the gap between day and\nnight, it would take an eternity to do it.  But the sun rises and\nthe darkness is dispelled--a moment is sufficient to overcome an\ninfinite distance.\n\nOne day there came the new era of __Swadeshi__ [8] in Bengal;\nbut as to how it happened, we had no distinct vision.  There was\nno gradual slope connecting the past with the present.  For that\nreason, I imagine, the new epoch came in like a flood, breaking\ndown the dykes and sweeping all our prudence and fear before it.\nWe had no time even to think about, or understand, what had\nhappened, or what was about to happen.\n\nMy sight and my mind, my hopes and my desires, became red with\nthe passion of this new age.  Though, up to this time, the walls\nof the home--which was the ultimate world to my mind--remained\nunbroken, yet I stood looking over into the distance, and I heard\na voice from the far horizon, whose meaning was not perfectly\nclear to me, but whose call went straight to my heart.\n\nFrom the time my husband had been a college student he had been\ntrying to get the things required by our people produced in our\nown country.  There are plenty of date trees in our district.  He\ntried to invent an apparatus for extracting the juice and boiling\nit into sugar and treacle.  I heard that it was a great success,\nonly it extracted more money than juice.  After a while he came\nto the conclusion that our attempts at reviving our industries\nwere not succeeding for want of a bank of our own.  He was, at\nthe time, trying to teach me political economy.  This alone would\nnot have done much harm, but he also took it into his head to\nteach his countrymen ideas of thrift, so as to pave the way for a\nbank; and then he actually started a small bank.  Its high rate\nof interest, which made the villagers flock so enthusiastically\nto put in their money, ended by swamping the bank altogether.\n\nThe old officers of the estate felt troubled and frightened.\nThere was jubilation in the enemy's camp.  Of all the family,\nonly my husband's grandmother remained unmoved.  She would scold\nme, saying: \"Why are you all plaguing him so?  Is it the fate of\nthe estate that is worrying you?  How many times have I seen this\nestate in the hands of the court receiver!  Are men like women?\nMen are born spendthrifts and only know how to waste.  Look here,\nchild, count yourself fortunate that your husband is not wasting\nhimself as well!\"\n\nMy husband's list of charities was a long one.  He would assist\nto the bitter end of utter failure anyone who wanted to invent a\nnew loom or rice-husking machine.  But what annoyed me most was\nthe way that Sandip Babu [9] used to fleece him on the pretext of\n__Swadeshi__ work.  Whenever he wanted to start a newspaper,\nor travel about preaching the Cause, or take a change of air by\nthe advice of his doctor, my husband would unquestioningly supply\nhim with the money.  This was over and above the regular living\nallowance which Sandip Babu also received from him.  The\nstrangest part of it was that my husband and Sandip Babu did not\nagree in their opinions.\n\nAs soon as the __Swadeshi__ storm reached my blood, I said to\nmy husband: \"I must burn all my foreign clothes.\"\n\n\"Why burn them?\"  said he.  \"You need not wear them as long as\nyou please.\"\n\n\"As long as I please!  Not in this life ...\"\n\n\"Very well, do not wear them for the rest of your life, then.\nBut why this bonfire business?\"\n\n\"Would you thwart me in my resolve?\"\n\n\"What I want to say is this: Why not try to build up something?\nYou should not waste even a tenth part of your energies in this\ndestructive excitement.\"\n\n\"Such excitement will give us the energy to build.\"\n\n\"That is as much as to say, that you cannot light the house\nunless you set fire to it.\"\n\nThen there came another trouble.  When Miss Gilby first came to\nour house there was a great flutter, which afterwards calmed down\nwhen they got used to her.  Now the whole thing was stirred up\nafresh.  I had never bothered myself before as to whether Miss\nGilby was European or Indian, but I began to do so now.  I said\nto my husband: \"We must get rid of Miss Gilby.\"\n\nHe kept silent.\n\nI talked to him wildly, and he went away sad at heart.\n\nAfter a fit of weeping, I felt in a more reasonable mood when we\nmet at night.  \"I cannot,\" my husband said, \"look upon Miss Gilby\nthrough a mist of abstraction, just because she is English.\nCannot you get over the barrier of her name after such a long\nacquaintance?  Cannot you realize that she loves you?\"\n\nI felt a little ashamed and replied with some sharpness: \"Let her\nremain.  I am not over anxious to send her away.\"  And Miss Gilby\nremained.\n\nBut one day I was told that she had been insulted by a young\nfellow on her way to church.  This was a boy whom we were\nsupporting.  My husband turned him out of the house.  There was\nnot a single soul, that day, who could forgive my husband for\nthat act--not even I.  This time Miss Gilby left of her own\naccord.  She shed tears when she came to say good-bye, but my\nmood would not melt.  To slander the poor boy so--and such a fine\nboy, too, who would forget his daily bath and food in his\nenthusiasm for __Swadeshi__.\n\nMy husband escorted Miss Gilby to the railway station in his own\ncarriage.  I was sure he was going too far.  When exaggerated\naccounts of the incident gave rise to a public scandal, which\nfound its way to the newspapers, I felt he had been rightly\nserved.\n\nI had often become anxious at my husband's doings, but had never\nbefore been ashamed; yet now I had to blush for him!  I did not\nknow exactly, nor did I care, what wrong poor Noren might, or\nmight not, have done to Miss Gilby, but the idea of sitting in\njudgement on such a matter at such a time!  I should have refused\nto damp the spirit which prompted young Noren to defy the\nEnglishwoman.  I could not but look upon it as a sign of\ncowardice in my husband, that he should fail to understand this\nsimple thing.  And so I blushed for him.\n\nAnd yet it was not that my husband refused to support\n__Swadeshi__, or was in any way against the Cause.  Only he\nhad not been able whole-heartedly to accept the spirit of\n__Bande Mataram__.  [10]\n\n\"I am willing,\" he said, \"to serve my country; but my worship I\nreserve for Right which is far greater than my country.  To\nworship my country as a god is to bring a curse upon it.\"\n\n------\n\n8. The Nationalist movement, which began more as an economic than\na political one, having as its main object the encouragement of\nindigenous industries [Trans.].\n\n9. \"Babu\" is a term of respect, like \"Father\" or \"Mister,\" but\nhas also meant in colonial days a person who understands some\nEnglish.  [on-line ed.]\n\n10. Lit.: \"Hail Mother\"; the opening words of a song by Bankim\nChatterjee, the famous Bengali novelist.  The song has now become\nthe national anthem, and __Bande Mataram__ the national cry,\nsince the days of the __Swadeshi__ movement [Trans.].\n\n\n\nChapter Two\n\nBimala's Story\n\nIV\n\n\n\nTHIS was the time when Sandip Babu with his followers came to our\nneighbourhood to preach __Swadeshi__.\n\nThere is to be a big meeting in our temple pavilion.  We women\nare sitting there, on one side, behind a screen.  Triumphant\nshouts of __Bande Mataram__ come nearer: and to them I am\nthrilling through and through.  Suddenly a stream of barefooted\nyouths in turbans, clad in ascetic ochre, rushes into the\nquadrangle, like a silt-reddened freshet into a dry river-bed at\nthe first burst of the rains.  The whole place is filled with an\nimmense crowd, through which Sandip Babu is borne, seated in a\nbig chair hoisted on the shoulders of ten or twelve of the\nyouths.\n\n__Bande Mataram!  Bande Mataram!  Bande Mataram__!  It seems\nas though the skies would be rent and scattered into a thousand\nfragments.\n\nI had seen Sandip Babu's photograph before.  There was something\nin his features which I did not quite like.  Not that he was bad-\nlooking--far from it: he had a splendidly handsome face.  Yet, I\nknow not why, it seemed to me, in spite of all its brilliance,\nthat too much of base alloy had gone into its making.  The light\nin his eyes somehow did not shine true.  That was why I did not\nlike it when my husband unquestioningly gave in to all his\ndemands.  I could bear the waste of money; but it vexed me to\nthink that he was imposing on my husband, taking advantage of\nfriendship.  His bearing was not that of an ascetic, nor even of\na person of moderate means, but foppish all over.  Love of\ncomfort seemed to ...  any number of such reflections come back\nto me today, but let them be.\n\nWhen, however, Sandip Babu began to speak that afternoon, and the\nhearts of the crowd swayed and surged to his words, as though\nthey would break all bounds, I saw him wonderfully transformed.\nEspecially when his features were suddenly lit up by a shaft of\nlight from the slowly setting sun, as it sunk below the roof-line\nof the pavilion, he seemed to me to be marked out by the gods as\ntheir messenger to mortal men and women.\n\nFrom beginning to end of his speech, each one of his utterances\nwas a stormy outburst.  There was no limit to the confidence of\nhis assurance.  I do not know how it happened, but I found I had\nimpatiently pushed away the screen from before me and had fixed\nmy gaze upon him.  Yet there was none in that crowd who paid any\nheed to my doings.  Only once, I noticed, his eyes, like stars in\nfateful Orion, flashed full on my face.\n\nI was utterly unconscious of myself.  I was no longer the lady of\nthe Rajah's house, but the sole representative of Bengal's\nwomanhood.  And he was the champion of Bengal.  As the sky had\nshed its light over him, so he must receive the consecration of a\nwoman's benediction ...\n\nIt seemed clear to me that, since he had caught sight of me, the\nfire in his words had flamed up more fiercely.  Indra's [11]\nsteed refused to be reined in, and there came the roar of thunder\nand the flash of lightning.  I said within myself that his\nlanguage had caught fire from my eyes; for we women are not only\nthe deities of the household fire, but the flame of the soul\nitself.\n\nI returned home that evening radiant with a new pride and joy.\nThe storm within me had shifted my whole being from one centre to\nanother.  Like the Greek maidens of old, I fain would cut off my\nlong, resplendent tresses to make a bowstring for my hero.  Had\nmy outward ornaments been connected with my inner feelings, then\nmy necklet, my armlets, my bracelets, would all have burst their\nbonds and flung themselves over that assembly like a shower of\nmeteors.  Only some personal sacrifice, I felt, could help me to\nbear the tumult of my exaltation.\n\nWhen my husband came home later, I was trembling lest he should\nutter a sound out of tune with the triumphant paean which was\nstill ringing in my ears, lest his fanaticism for truth should\nlead him to express disapproval of anything that had been said\nthat afternoon.  For then I should have openly defied and\nhumiliated him.  But he did not say a word ...  which I did not\nlike either.\n\nHe should have said: \"Sandip has brought me to my senses.  I now\nrealize how mistaken I have been all this time.\"\n\nI somehow felt that he was spitefully silent, that he obstinately\nrefused to be enthusiastic.  I asked how long Sandip Babu was\ngoing to be with us.\n\n\"He is off to Rangpur early tomorrow morning,\" said my husband.\n\n\"Must it be tomorrow?\"\n\n\"Yes, he is already engaged to speak there.\"\n\nI was silent for a while and then asked again: \"Could he not\npossibly stay a day longer?\"\n\n\"That may hardly be possible, but why?\"\n\n\"I want to invite him to dinner and attend on him myself.\"\n\nMy husband was surprised.  He had often entreated me to be\npresent when he had particular friends to dinner, but I had never\nlet myself be persuaded.  He gazed at me curiously, in silence,\nwith a look I did not quite understand.\n\nI was suddenly overcome with a sense of shame.  \"No, no,\" I\nexclaimed, \"that would never do!\"\n\n\"Why not!\"  said he.  \"I will ask him myself, and if it is at all\npossible he will surely stay on for tomorrow.\"\n\nIt turned out to be quite possible.\n\nI will tell the exact truth.  That day I reproached my Creator\nbecause he had not made me surpassingly beautiful--not to steal\nany heart away, but because beauty is glory.  In this great day\nthe men of the country should realize its goddess in its\nwomanhood.  But, alas, the eyes of men fail to discern the\ngoddess, if outward beauty be lacking.  Would Sandip Babu find\nthe __Shakti__ of the Motherland manifest in me?  Or would he\nsimply take me to be an ordinary, domestic woman?\n\nThat morning I scented my flowing hair and tied it in a loose\nknot, bound by a cunningly intertwined red silk ribbon.  Dinner,\nyou see, was to be served at midday, and there was no time to dry\nmy hair after my bath and do it up plaited in the ordinary way.\nI put on a gold-bordered white __sari__, and my short-sleeve\nmuslin jacket was also gold-bordered.\n\nI felt that there was a certain restraint about my costume and\nthat nothing could well have been simpler.  But my sister-in-law,\nwho happened to be passing by, stopped dead before me, surveyed\nme from head to foot and with compressed lips smiled a meaning\nsmile.  When I asked her the reason, \"I am admiring your get-up!\"\nshe said.\n\n\"What is there so entertaining about it?\"  I enquired,\nconsiderably annoyed.\n\n\"It's superb,\" she said.  \"I was only thinking that one of those\nlow-necked English bodices would have made it perfect.\"  Not only\nher mouth and eyes, but her whole body seemed to ripple with\nsuppressed laughter as she left the room.\n\nI was very, very angry, and wanted to change everything and put\non my everyday clothes.  But I cannot tell exactly why I could\nnot carry out my impulse.  Women are the ornaments of society--\nthus I reasoned with myself--and my husband would never like it,\nif I appeared before Sandip Babu unworthily clad.\n\nMy idea had been to make my appearance after they had sat down to\ndinner.  In the bustle of looking after the serving the first\nawkwardness would have passed off.  But dinner was not ready in\ntime, and it was getting late.  Meanwhile my husband had sent for\nme to introduce the guest.\n\nI was feeling horribly shy about looking Sandip Babu in the face.\nHowever, I managed to recover myself enough to say: \"I am so\nsorry dinner is getting late.\"\n\nHe boldly came and sat right beside me as he replied: \"I get a\ndinner of some kind every day, but the Goddess of Plenty keeps\nbehind the scenes.  Now that the goddess herself has appeared, it\nmatters little if the dinner lags behind.\"\n\nHe was just as emphatic in his manners as he was in his public\nspeaking.  He had no hesitation and seemed to be accustomed to\noccupy, unchallenged, his chosen seat.  He claimed the right to\nintimacy so confidently, that the blame would seem to belong to\nthose who should dispute it.\n\nI was in terror lest Sandip Babu should take me for a shrinking,\nold-fashioned bundle of inanity.  But, for the life of me, I\ncould not sparkle in repartees such as might charm or dazzle him.\nWhat could have possessed me, I angrily wondered, to appear\nbefore him in such an absurd way?\n\nI was about to retire when dinner was over, but Sandip Babu, as\nbold as ever, placed himself in my way.\n\n\"You must not,\" he said, \"think me greedy.  It was not the dinner\nthat kept me staying on, it was your invitation.  If you were to\nrun away now, that would not be playing fair with your guest.\"\n\nIf he had not said these words with a careless ease, they would\nhave been out of tune.  But, after all, he was such a great\nfriend of my husband that I was like his sister.\n\nWhile I was struggling to climb up this high wave of intimacy, my\nhusband came to the rescue, saying: \"Why not come back to us\nafter you have taken your dinner?\"\n\n\"But you must give your word,\" said Sandip Babu, \"before we let\nyou off.\"\n\n\"I will come,\" said I, with a slight smile.\n\n\"Let me tell you,\" continued Sandip Babu, \"why I cannot trust\nyou.  Nikhil has been married these nine years, and all this\nwhile you have eluded me.  If you do this again for another nine\nyears, we shall never meet again.\"\n\nI took up the spirit of his remark as I dropped my voice to\nreply: \"Why even then should we not meet?\"\n\n\"My horoscope tells me I am to die early.  None of my forefathers\nhave survived their thirtieth year.  I am now twenty-seven.\"\n\nHe knew this would go home.  This time there must have been a\nshade of concern in my low voice as I said: \"The blessings of the\nwhole country are sure to avert the evil influence of the stars.\"\n\n\"Then the blessings of the country must be voiced by its goddess.\nThis is the reason for my anxiety that you should return, so that\nmy talisman may begin to work from today.\"\n\nSandip Babu had such a way of taking things by storm that I got\nno opportunity of resenting what I never should have permitted in\nanother.\n\n\"So,\" he concluded with a laugh, \"I am going to hold this husband\nof yours as a hostage till you come back.\"\n\nAs I was coming away, he exclaimed: \"May I trouble you for a\ntrifle?\"\n\nI started and turned round.\n\n\"Don't be alarmed,\" he said.  \"It's merely a glass of water.  You\nmight have noticed that I did not drink any water with my dinner.\nI take it a little later.\"\n\nUpon this I had to make a show of interest and ask him the\nreason.  He began to give the history of his dyspepsia.  I was\ntold how he had been a martyr to it for seven months, and how,\nafter the usual course of nuisances, which included different\nallopathic and homoeopathic misadventures, he had obtained the\nmost wonderful results by indigenous methods.\n\n\"Do you know,\" he added, with a smile, \"God has built even my\ninfirmities in such a manner that they yield only under the\nbombardment of __Swadeshi__ pills.\"\n\nMy husband, at this, broke his silence.  \"You must confess,\" said\nhe, \"that you have as immense an attraction for foreign medicine\nas the earth has for meteors.  You have three shelves in your\nsitting-room full of...\"\n\nSandip Babu broke in: \"Do you know what they are?  They are the\npunitive police.  They come, not because they are wanted, but\nbecause they are imposed on us by the rule of this modern age,\nexacting fines and-inflicting injuries.\"\n\nMy husband could not bear exaggerations, and I could see he\ndisliked this.  But all ornaments are exaggerations.  They are\nnot made by God, but by man.  Once I remember in defence of some\nuntruth of mine I said to my husband: \"Only the trees and beasts\nand birds tell unmitigated truths, because these poor things have\nnot the power to invent.  In this men show their superiority to\nthe lower creatures, and women beat even men.  Neither is a\nprofusion of ornament unbecoming for a woman, nor a profusion of\nuntruth.\"\n\nAs I came out into the passage leading to the zenana I found my\nsister-in-law, standing near a window overlooking the reception\nrooms, peeping through the venetian shutter.\n\n\"You here?\"  I asked in surprise.\n\n\"Eavesdropping!\"  she replied.\n\n------\n\n11. The Jupiter Pluvius of Hindu mythology.\n\nV\n\n\n\nWhen I returned, Sandip Babu was tenderly apologetic.  \"I am\nafraid we have spoilt your appetite,\" he said.\n\nI felt greatly ashamed.  Indeed, I had been too indecently quick\nover my dinner.  With a little calculation, it would become quite\nevident that my non-eating had surpassed the eating.  But I had\nno idea that anyone could have been deliberately calculating.\n\nI suppose Sandip Babu detected my feeling of shame, which only\naugmented it.  \"I was sure,\" he said, \"that you had the impulse\nof the wild deer to run away, but it is a great boon that you\ntook the trouble to keep your promise with me.\"\n\nI could not think of any suitable reply and so I sat down,\nblushing and uncomfortable, at one end of the sofa.  The vision\nthat I had of myself, as the __Shakti__ of Womanhood,\nincarnate, crowning Sandip Babu simply with my presence, majestic\nand unashamed, failed me altogether.\n\nSandip Babu deliberately started a discussion with my husband.\nHe knew that his keen wit flashed to the best effect in an\nargument.  I have often since observed, that he never lost an\nopportunity for a passage at arms whenever I happened to be\npresent.\n\nHe was familiar with my husband's views on the cult of __Bande\nMataram__, and began in a provoking way: \"So you do not allow\nthat there is room for an appeal to the imagination in patriotic\nwork?\"\n\n\"It has its place, Sandip, I admit, but I do not believe in\ngiving it the whole place.  I would know my country in its frank\nreality, and for this I am both afraid and ashamed to make use of\nhypnotic texts of patriotism.\"\n\n\"What you call hypnotic texts I call truth.  I truly believe my\ncountry to be my God.  I worship Humanity.  God manifests Himself\nboth in man and in his country.\"\n\n\"If that is what you really believe, there should be no\ndifference for you between man and man, and so between country\nand country.\"\n\n\"Quite true.  But my powers are limited, so my worship of\nHumanity is continued in the worship of my country.\"\n\n\"I have nothing against your worship as such, but how is it you\npropose to conduct your worship of God by hating other countries\nin which He is equally manifest?\"\n\n\"Hate is also an adjunct of worship.  Arjuna won Mahadeva's\nfavour by wrestling with him.  God will be with us in the end, if\nwe are prepared to give Him battle.\"\n\n\"If that be so, then those who are serving and those who are\nharming the country are both His devotees.  Why, then, trouble to\npreach patriotism?\"\n\n\"In the case of one's own country, it is different.  There the\nheart clearly demands worship.\"\n\n\"If you push the same argument further you can say that since God\nis manifested in us, our __self__ has to be worshipped before\nall else; because our natural instinct claims it.\"\n\n\"Look here, Nikhil, this is all merely dry logic.  Can't you\nrecognize that there is such a thing as feeling?\"\n\n\"I tell you the truth, Sandip,\" my husband replied.  \"It is my\nfeelings that are outraged, whenever you try to pass off\ninjustice as a duty, and unrighteousness as a moral ideal.  The\nfact, that I am incapable of stealing, is not due to my\npossessing logical faculties, but to my having some feeling of\nrespect for myself and love for ideals.\"\n\nI was raging inwardly.  At last I could keep silent no longer.\n\"Is not the history of every country,\" I cried, \"whether England,\nFrance, Germany, or Russia, the history of stealing for the sake\nof one's own country?\"\n\n\"They have to answer for these thefts; they are doing so even\nnow; their history is not yet ended.\"\n\n\"At any rate,\" interposed Sandip Babu, \"why should we not follow\nsuit?  Let us first fill our country's coffers with stolen goods\nand then take centuries, like these other countries, to answer\nfor them, if we must.  But, I ask you, where do you find this\n'answering' in history?\"\n\n\"When Rome was answering for her sin no one knew it.  All that\ntime, there was apparently no limit to her prosperity.  But do\nyou not see one thing: how these political bags of theirs are\nbursting with lies and treacheries, breaking their backs under\ntheir weight?\"\n\nNever before had I had any opportunity of being present at a\ndiscussion between my husband and his men friends.  Whenever he\nargued with me I could feel his reluctance to push me into a\ncorner.  This arose out of the very love he bore me.  Today for\nthe first time I saw his fencer's skill in debate.\n\nNevertheless, my heart refused to accept my husband's position.\nI was struggling to find some answer, but it would not come.\nWhen the word \"righteousness\" comes into an argument, it sounds\nugly to say that a thing can be too good to be useful.\n\nAll of a sudden Sandip Babu turned to me with the question: \"What\ndo __you__ say to this?\"\n\n\"I do not care about fine distinctions,\" I broke out.  \"I will\ntell you broadly what I feel.  I am only human.  I am covetous.\nI would have good things for my country.  If I am obliged, I\nwould snatch them and filch them.  I have anger.  I would be\nangry for my country's sake.  If necessary, I would smite and\nslay to avenge her insults.  I have my desire to be fascinated,\nand fascination must be supplied to me in bodily shape by my\ncountry.  She must have some visible symbol casting its spell\nupon my mind.  I would make my country a Person, and call her\nMother, Goddess, Durga--for whom I would redden the earth with\nsacrificial offerings.  I am human, not divine.\"\n\nSandip Babu leapt to his feet with uplifted arms and shouted\n\"Hurrah!\"--The next moment he corrected himself and cried:\n\"__Bande Mataram__.\"\n\nA shadow of pain passed over the face of my husband.  He said to\nme in a very gentle voice: \"Neither am I divine: I am human.  And\ntherefore I dare not permit the evil which is in me to be\nexaggerated into an image of my country--never, never!\"\n\nSandip Babu cried out: \"See, Nikhil, how in the heart of a woman\nTruth takes flesh and blood.  Woman knows how to be cruel: her\nvirulence is like a blind storm.  It is beautifully fearful.  In\nman it is ugly, because it harbours in its centre the gnawing\nworms of reason and thought.  I tell you, Nikhil, it is our women\nwho will save the country.  This is not the time for nice\nscruples.  We must be unswervingly, unreasoningly brutal.  We\nmust sin.  We must give our women red sandal paste with which to\nanoint and enthrone our sin.  Don't you remember what the poet\nsays:\n\n/*\n  Come, Sin, O beautiful Sin,\n  Let thy stinging red kisses pour down fiery red wine into our\n    blood.\n  Sound the trumpet of imperious evil\n  And cross our forehead with the wreath of exulting lawlessness,\n  O Deity of Desecration,\n  Smear our breasts with the blackest mud of disrepute,\n    unashamed.\n*/\n\nDown with that righteousness, which cannot smilingly bring rack\nand ruin.\"\n\nWhen Sandip Babu, standing with his head high, insulted at a\nmoment's impulse all that men have cherished as their highest, in\nall countries and in all times, a shiver went right through my\nbody.\n\nBut, with a stamp of his foot, he continued his declamation: \"I\ncan see that you are that beautiful spirit of fire, which burns\nthe home to ashes and lights up the larger world with its flame.\nGive to us the indomitable courage to go to the bottom of Ruin\nitself.  Impart grace to all that is baneful.\"\n\nIt was not clear to whom Sandip Babu addressed his last appeal.\nIt might have been She whom he worshipped with his __Bande\nMataram__.  It might have been the Womanhood of his country.\nOr it might have been its representative, the woman before him.\nHe would have gone further in the same strain, but my husband\nsuddenly rose from his seat and touched him lightly on the\nshoulder saying: \"Sandip, Chandranath Babu is here.\"\n\nI started and turned round, to find an aged gentleman at the\ndoor, calm and dignified, in doubt as to whether he should come\nin or retire.  His face was touched with a gentle light like that\nof the setting sun.\n\nMy husband came up to me and whispered: \"This is my master, of\nwhom I have so often told you.  Make your obeisance to him.\"\n\nI bent reverently and took the dust of his feet.  He gave me his\nblessing saying: \"May God protect you always, my little mother.\"\nI was sorely in need of such a blessing at that moment.\n\n\n\nNikhil's Story\n\nI\n\n\n\nOne day I had the faith to believe that I should be able to bear\nwhatever came from my God.  I never had the trial.  Now I think\nit has come.\n\nI used to test my strength of mind by imagining all kinds of evil\nwhich might happen to me--poverty, imprisonment, dishonour,\ndeath--even Bimala's.  And when I said to myself that I should be\nable to receive these with firmness, I am sure I did not\nexaggerate.  Only I could never even imagine one thing, and today\nit is that of which I am thinking, and wondering whether I can\nreally bear it.  There is a thorn somewhere pricking in my heart,\nconstantly giving me pain while I am about my daily work.  It\nseems to persist even when I am asleep.  The very moment I wake\nup in the morning, I find that the bloom has gone from the face\nof the sky.  What is it?  What has happened?\n\nMy mind has become so sensitive, that even my past life, which\ncame to me in the disguise of happiness, seems to wring my very\nheart with its falsehood; and the shame and sorrow which are\ncoming close to me are losing their cover of privacy, all the\nmore because they try to veil their faces.  My heart has become\nall eyes.  The things that should not be seen, the things I do\nnot want to see--these I must see.\n\nThe day has come at last when my ill-starred life has to reveal\nits destitution in a long-drawn series of exposures.  This\npenury, all unexpected, has taken its seat in the heart where\nplenitude seemed to reign.  The fees which I paid to delusion for\njust nine years of my youth have now to be returned with interest\nto Truth till the end of my days.\n\nWhat is the use of straining to keep up my pride?  What harm if I\nconfess that I have something lacking in me?  Possibly it is that\nunreasoning forcefulness which women love to find in men.  But is\nstrength mere display of muscularity?  Must strength have no\nscruples in treading the weak underfoot?\n\nBut why all these arguments?  Worthiness cannot be earned merely\nby disputing about it.  And I am unworthy, unworthy, unworthy.\n\nWhat if I am unworthy?  The true value of love is this, that it\ncan ever bless the unworthy with its own prodigality.  For the\nworthy there are many rewards on God's earth, but God has\nspecially reserved love for the unworthy.\n\nUp till now Bimala was my home-made Bimala, the product of the\nconfined space and the daily routine of small duties.  Did the\nlove which I received from her, I asked myself, come from the\ndeep spring of her heart, or was it merely like the daily\nprovision of pipe water pumped up by the municipal steam-engine\nof society?\n\nI longed to find Bimala blossoming fully in all her truth and\npower.  But the thing I forgot to calculate was, that one must\ngive up all claims based on conventional rights, if one would\nfind a person freely revealed in truth.\n\nWhy did I fail to think of this?  Was it because of the husband's\npride of possession over his wife?  No.  It was because I placed\nthe fullest trust upon love.  I was vain enough to think that I\nhad the power in me to bear the sight of truth in its awful\nnakedness.  It was tempting Providence, but still I clung to my\nproud determination to come out victorious in the trial.\n\nBimala had failed to understand me in one thing.  She could not\nfully realize that I held as weakness all imposition of force.\nOnly the weak dare not be just.  They shirk their responsibility\nof fairness and try quickly to get at results through the short-\ncuts of injustice.  Bimala has no patience with patience.  She\nloves to find in men the turbulent, the angry, the unjust.  Her\nrespect must have its element of fear.\n\nI had hoped that when Bimala found herself free in the outer\nworld she would be rescued from her infatuation for tyranny.  But\nnow I feel sure that this infatuation is deep down in her nature.\nHer love is for the boisterous.  From the tip of her tongue to\nthe pit of her stomach she must tingle with red pepper in order\nto enjoy the simple fare of life.  But my determination was,\nnever to do my duty with frantic impetuosity, helped on by the\nfiery liquor of excitement.  I know Bimala finds it difficult to\nrespect me for this, taking my scruples for feebleness--and she\nis quite angry with me because I am not running amuck crying\n__Bande Mataram__.\n\nFor the matter of that, I have become unpopular with all my\ncountrymen because I have not joined them in their carousals.\nThey are certain that either I have a longing for some title, or\nelse that I am afraid of the police.  The police on their side\nsuspect me of harbouring some hidden design and protesting too\nmuch in my mildness.\n\nWhat I really feel is this, that those who cannot find food for\ntheir enthusiasm in a knowledge of their country as it actually\nis, or those who cannot love men just because they are men--who\nneeds must shout and deify their country in order to keep up\ntheir excitement--these love excitement more than their country.\n\nTo try to give our infatuation a higher place than Truth is a\nsign of inherent slavishness.  Where our minds are free we find\nourselves lost.  Our moribund vitality must have for its rider\neither some fantasy, or someone in authority, or a sanction from\nthe pundits, in order to make it move.  So long as we are\nimpervious to truth and have to be moved by some hypnotic\nstimulus, we must know that we lack the capacity for self-\ngovernment.  Whatever may be our condition, we shall either need\nsome imaginary ghost or some actual medicine-man to terrorize\nover us.\n\nThe other day when Sandip accused me of lack of imagination,\nsaying that this prevented me from realizing my country in a\nvisible image, Bimala agreed with him.  I did not say anything in\nmy defence, because to win in argument does not lead to\nhappiness.  Her difference of opinion is not due to any\ninequality of intelligence, but rather to dissimilarity of\nnature.\n\nThey accuse me of being unimaginative--that is, according to\nthem, I may have oil in my lamp, but no flame.  Now this is\nexactly the accusation which I bring against them.  I would say\nto them: \"You are dark, even as the flints are.  You must come to\nviolent conflicts and make a noise in order to produce your\nsparks.  But their disconnected flashes merely assist your pride,\nand not your clear vision.\"\n\nI have been noticing for some time that there is a gross cupidity\nabout Sandip.  His fleshly feelings make him harbour delusions\nabout his religion and impel him into a tyrannical attitude in\nhis patriotism.  His intellect is keen, but his nature is coarse,\nand so he glorifies his selfish lusts under high-sounding names.\nThe cheap consolations of hatred are as urgently necessary for\nhim as the satisfaction of his appetites.  Bimala has often\nwarned me, in the old days, of his hankering after money.  I\nunderstood this, but I could not bring myself to haggle with\nSandip.  I felt ashamed even to own to myself that he was trying\nto take advantage of me.\n\nIt will, however, be difficult to explain to Bimala today that\nSandip's love of country is but a different phase of his covetous\nself-love.  Bimala's hero-worship of Sandip makes me hesitate all\nthe more to talk to her about him, lest some touch of jealousy\nmay lead me unwittingly into exaggeration.  It may be that the\npain at my heart is already making me see a distorted picture of\nSandip.  And yet it is better perhaps to speak out than to keep\nmy feelings gnawing within me.\n\nII\n\n\n\nI have known my master these thirty years.  Neither calumny, nor\ndisaster, nor death itself has any terrors for him.  Nothing\ncould have saved me, born as I was into the traditions of this\nfamily of ours, but that he has established his own life in the\ncentre of mine, with its peace and truth and spiritual vision,\nthus making it possible for me to realize goodness in its truth.\n\nMy master came to me that day and said: \"Is it necessary to\ndetain Sandip here any longer?\"\n\nHis nature was so sensitive to all omens of evil that he had at\nonce understood.  He was not easily moved, but that day he felt\nthe dark shadow of trouble ahead.  Do I not know how well he\nloves me?\n\nAt tea-time I said to Sandip: \"I have just had a letter from\nRangpur.  They are complaining that I am selfishly detaining you.\nWhen will you be going there?\"\n\nBimala was pouring out the tea.  Her face fell at once.  She\nthrew just one enquiring glance at Sandip.\n\n\"I have been thinking,\" said Sandip, \"that this wandering up and\ndown means a tremendous waste of energy.  I feel that if I could\nwork from a centre I could achieve more permanent results.\"\n\nWith this he looked up at Bimala and asked: \"Do you not think so\ntoo?\"\n\nBimala hesitated for a reply and then said: \"Both ways seem good\n--to do the work from a centre, as well as by travelling about.\nThat in which you find greater satisfaction is the way for you.\"\n\n\"Then let me speak out my mind,\" said Sandip.  \"I have never yet\nfound any one source of inspiration suffice me for good.  That is\nwhy I have been constantly moving about, rousing enthusiasm in\nthe people, from which in turn I draw my own store of energy.\nToday you have given me the message of my country.  Such fire I\nhave never beheld in any man.  I shall be able to spread the fire\nof enthusiasm in my country by borrowing it from you.  No, do not\nbe ashamed.  You are far above all modesty and diffidence.  You\nare the Queen Bee of our hive, and we the workers shall rally\naround you.  You shall be our centre, our inspiration.\"\n\nBimala flushed all over with bashful pride and her hand shook as\nshe went on pouring out the tea.\n\nAnother day my master came to me and said: \"Why don't you two go\nup to Darjeeling for a change?  You are not looking well.  Have\nyou been getting enough sleep?\"\n\nI asked Bimala in the evening whether she would care to have a\ntrip to the Hills.  I knew she had a great longing to see the\nHimalayas.  But she refused ...  The country's Cause, I suppose!\n\nI must not lose my faith: I shall wait.  The passage from the\nnarrow to the larger world is stormy.  When she is familiar with\nthis freedom, then I shall know where my place is.  If I discover\nthat I do not fit in with the arrangement of the outer world,\nthen I shall not quarrel with my fate, but silently take my leave\n...  Use force?  But for what?  Can force prevail against Truth?\n\n\n\nSandip's Story\n\nI\n\n\n\nThe impotent man says: \"That which has come to my share is mine.\"\nAnd the weak man assents.  But the lesson of the whole world is:\n\"That is really mine which I can snatch away.\"  My country does\nnot become mine simply because it is the country of my birth.  It\nbecomes mine on the day when I am able to win it by force.\n\nEvery man has a natural right to possess, and therefore greed is\nnatural.  It is not in the wisdom of nature that we should be\ncontent to be deprived.  What my mind covets, my surroundings\nmust supply.  This is the only true understanding between our\ninner and outer nature in this world.  Let moral ideals remain\nmerely for those poor anaemic creatures of starved desire whose\ngrasp is weak.  Those who can desire with all their soul and\nenjoy with all their heart, those who have no hesitation or\nscruple, it is they who are the anointed of Providence.  Nature\nspreads out her riches and loveliest treasures for their benefit.\nThey swim across streams, leap over walls, kick open doors, to\nhelp themselves to whatever is worth taking.  In such a getting\none can rejoice; such wresting as this gives value to the thing\ntaken.\n\nNature surrenders herself, but only to the robber.  For she\ndelights in this forceful desire, this forceful abduction.  And\nso she does not put the garland of her acceptance round the lean,\nscraggy neck of the ascetic.  The music of the wedding march is\nstruck.  The time of the wedding I must not let pass.  My heart\ntherefore is eager.  For, who is the bridegroom?  It is I.  The\nbridegroom's place belongs to him who, torch in hand, can come in\ntime.  The bridegroom in Nature's wedding hall comes unexpected\nand uninvited.\n\nAshamed?  No, I am never ashamed!  I ask for whatever I want, and\nI do not always wait to ask before I take it.  Those who are\ndeprived by their own diffidence dignify their privation by the\nname of modesty.  The world into which we are born is the world\nof reality.  When a man goes away from the market of real things\nwith empty hands and empty stomach, merely filling his bag with\nbig sounding words, I wonder why he ever came into this hard\nworld at all.  Did these men get their appointment from the\nepicures of the religious world, to play set tunes on sweet,\npious texts in that pleasure garden where blossom airy nothings?\nI neither affect those tunes nor do I find any sustenance in\nthose blossoms.\n\nWhat I desire, I desire positively, superlatively.  I want to\nknead it with both my hands and both my feet; I want to smear it\nall over my body; I want to gorge myself with it to the full.\nThe scrannel pipes of those who have worn themselves out by their\nmoral fastings, till they have become flat and pale like starved\nvermin infesting a long-deserted bed, will never reach my ear.\n\nI would conceal nothing, because that would be cowardly.  But if\nI cannot bring myself to conceal when concealment is needful,\nthat also is cowardly.  Because you have your greed, you build\nyour walls.  Because I have my greed, I break through them.  You\nuse your power: I use my craft.  These are the realities of life.\nOn these depend kingdoms and empires and all the great\nenterprises of men.\n\nAs for those __avatars__ who come down from their paradise to\ntalk to us in some holy jargon--their words are not real.\nTherefore, in spite of all the applause they get, these sayings\nof theirs only find a place in the hiding corners of the weak.\n\nThey are despised by those who are strong, the rulers of the\nworld.  Those who have had the courage to see this have won\nsuccess, while those poor wretches who are dragged one way by\nnature and the other way by these ava tars, they set one foot in\nthe boat of the real and the other in the boat of the unreal, and\nthus are in a pitiable plight, able neither to advance nor to\nkeep their place.\n\nThere are many men who seem to have been born only with an\nobsession to die.  Possibly there is a beauty, like that of a\nsunset, in this lingering death in life which seems to fascinate\nthem.  Nikhil lives this kind of life, if life it may be called.\nYears ago, I had a great argument with him on this point.\n\n\"It is true,\" he said, \"that you cannot get anything except by\nforce.  But then what is this force?  And then also, what is this\ngetting?  The strength I believe in is the strength of\nrenouncing.\"\n\n\"So you,\" I exclaimed, \"are infatuated with the glory of\nbankruptcy.\"\n\n\"Just as desperately as the chick is infatuated about the\nbankruptcy of its shell,\" he replied.  \"The shell is real enough,\nyet it is given up in exchange for intangible light and air.  A\nsorry exchange, I suppose you would call it?\"\n\nWhen once Nikhil gets on to metaphor, there is no hope of making\nhim see that he is merely dealing with words, not with realities.\nWell, well, let him be happy with his metaphors.  We are the\nflesh-eaters of the world; we have teeth and nails; we pursue and\ngrab and tear.  We are not satisfied with chewing in the evening\nthe cud of the grass we have eaten in the morning.  Anyhow, we\ncannot allow your metaphor-mongers to bar the door to our\nsustenance.  In that case we shall simply steal or rob, for we\nmust live.\n\nPeople will say that I am starting some novel theory just because\nthose who are moving in this world are in the habit of talking\ndifferently though they are really acting up to it all the time.\nTherefore they fail to understand, as I do, that this is the only\nworking moral principle.  In point of fact, I know that my idea\nis not an empty theory at all, for it has been proved in\npractical life.  I have found that my way always wins over the\nhearts of women, who are creatures of this world of reality and\ndo not roam about in cloud-land, as men do, in idea-filled\nballoons.\n\nWomen find in my features, my manner, my gait, my speech, a\nmasterful passion--not a passion dried thin with the heat of\nasceticism, not a passion with its face turned back at every step\nin doubt and debate, but a full-blooded passion.  It roars and\nrolls on, like a flood, with the cry: \"I want, I want, I want.\"\nWomen feel, in their own heart of hearts, that this indomitable\npassion is the lifeblood of the world, acknowledging no law but\nitself, and therefore victorious.  For this reason they have so\noften abandoned themselves to be swept away on the flood-tide of\nmy passion, recking naught as to whether it takes them to life or\nto death.  This power which wins these women is the power of\nmighty men, the power which wins the world of reality.\n\nThose who imagine the greater desirability of another world\nmerely shift their desires from the earth to the skies.  It\nremains to be seen how high their gushing fountain will play, and\nfor how long.  But this much is certain: women were not created\nfor these pale creatures--these lotus-eaters of idealism.\n\n\"Affinity!\"  When it suited my need, I have often said that God\nhas created special pairs of men and women, and that the union of\nsuch is the only legitimate union, higher than all unions made by\nlaw.  The reason of it is, that though man wants to follow\nnature, he can find no pleasure in it unless he screens himself\nwith some phrase--and that is why this world is so overflowing\nwith lies.\n\n\"Affinity!\"  Why should there be only one?  There may be affinity\nwith thousands.  It was never in my agreement with nature that I\nshould overlook all my innumerable affinities for the sake of\nonly one.  I have discovered many in my own life up to now, yet\nthat has not closed the door to one more--and that one is clearly\nvisible to my eyes.  She has also discovered her own affinity to\nme.\n\nAnd then?\n\nThen, if I do not win I am a coward.\n\n\n\nChapter Three\n\nBimala's Story\n\nVI\n\n\n\nI WONDER what could have happened to my feeling of shame.  The\nfact is, I had no time to think about myself.  My days and nights\nwere passing in a whirl, like an eddy with myself in the centre.\nNo gap was left for hesitation or delicacy to enter.\n\nOne day my sister-in-law remarked to my husband: \"Up to now the\nwomen of this house have been kept weeping.  Here comes the men's\nturn.\n\n\"We must see that they do not miss it,\" she continued, turning to\nme.  \"I see you are out for the fray, Chota [12] Rani!  Hurl your\nshafts straight at their hearts.\"\n\nHer keen eyes looked me up and down.  Not one of the colours into\nwhich my toilet, my dress, my manners, my speech, had blossomed\nout had escaped her.  I am ashamed to speak of it today, but I\nfelt no shame then.  Something within me was at work of which I\nwas not even conscious.  I used to overdress, it is true, but\nmore like an automaton, with no particular design.  No doubt I\nknew which effort of mine would prove specially pleasing to\nSandip Babu, but that required no intuition, for he would discuss\nit openly before all of them.\n\nOne day he said to my husband: \"Do you know, Nikhil, when I first\nsaw our Queen Bee, she was sitting there so demurely in her gold-\nbordered __sari__.  Her eyes were gazing inquiringly into\nspace, like stars which had lost their way, just as if she had\nbeen for ages standing on the edge of some darkness, looking out\nfor something unknown.  But when I saw her, I felt a quiver run\nthrough me.  It seemed to me that the gold border of her\n__sari__ was her own inner fire flaming out and twining round\nher.  That is the flame we want, visible fire!  Look here, Queen\nBee, you really must do us the favour of dressing once more as a\nliving flame.\"\n\nSo long I had been like a small river at the border of a village.\nMy rhythm and my language were different from what they are now.\nBut the tide came up from the sea, and my breast heaved; my banks\ngave way and the great drumbeats of the sea waves echoed in my\nmad current.  I could not understand the meaning of that sound in\nmy blood.  Where was that former self of mine?  Whence came\nfoaming into me this surging flood of glory?  Sandip's hungry\neyes burnt like the lamps of worship before my shrine.  All his\ngaze proclaimed that I was a wonder in beauty and power; and the\nloudness of his praise, spoken and unspoken, drowned all other\nvoices in my world.  Had the Creator created me afresh, I\nwondered?  Did he wish to make up now for neglecting me so long?\nI who before was plain had become suddenly beautiful.  I who\nbefore had been of no account now felt in myself all the\nsplendour of Bengal itself.\n\nFor Sandip Babu was not a mere individual.  In him was the\nconfluence of millions of minds of the country.  When he called\nme the Queen Bee of the hive, I was acclaimed with a chorus of\npraise by all our patriot workers.  After that, the loud jests of\nmy sister-in-law could not touch me any longer.  My relations\nwith all the world underwent a change.  Sandip Babu made it clear\nhow all the country was in need of me.  I had no difficulty in\nbelieving this at the time, for I felt that I had the power to do\neverything.  Divine strength had come to me.  It was something\nwhich I had never felt before, which was beyond myself.  I had no\ntime to question it to find out what was its nature.  It seemed\nto belong to me, and yet to transcend me.  It comprehended the\nwhole of Bengal.\n\nSandip Babu would consult me about every little thing touching\nthe Cause.  At first I felt very awkward and would hang back, but\nthat soon wore off.  Whatever I suggested seemed to astonish him.\nHe would go into raptures and say: \"Men can only think.  You\nwomen have a way of understanding without thinking.  Woman was\ncreated out of God's own fancy.  Man, He had to hammer into\nshape.\"\n\nLetters used to come to Sandip Babu from all parts of the country\nwhich were submitted to me for my opinion.  Occasionally he\ndisagreed with me.  But I would not argue with him.  Then after a\nday or two--as if a new light had suddenly dawned upon him--he\nwould send for me and say: \"It was my mistake.  Your suggestion\nwas the correct one.\"  He would often confess to me that wherever\nhe had taken steps contrary to my advice he had gone wrong.  Thus\nI gradually came to be convinced that behind whatever was taking\nplace was Sandip Babu, and behind Sandip Babu was the plain\ncommon sense of a woman.  The glory of a great responsibility\nfilled my being.\n\nMy husband had no place in our counsels.  Sandip Babu treated him\nas a younger brother, of whom personally one may be very fond and\nyet have no use for his business advice.  He would tenderly and\nsmilingly talk about my husband's childlike innocence, saying\nthat his curious doctrine and perversities of mind had a flavour\nof humour which made them all the more lovable.  It was seemingly\nthis very affection for Nikhil which led Sandip Babu to forbear\nfrom troubling him with the burden of the country.\n\nNature has many anodynes in her pharmacy, which she secretly\nadministers when vital relations are being insidiously severed,\nso that none may know of the operation, till at last one awakes\nto know what a great rent has been made.  When the knife was busy\nwith my life's most intimate tie, my mind was so clouded with\nfumes of intoxicating gas that I was not in the least aware of\nwhat a cruel thing was happening.  Possibly this is woman's\nnature.  When her passion is roused she loses her sensibility for\nall that is outside it.  When, like the river, we women keep to\nour banks, we give nourishment with all that we have: when we\noverflow them we destroy with all that we are.\n\n------\n\n12. Bimala.  the younger brother's wife, was the __Chota__ or\nJunior Rani.\n\n\n\nSandip's Story\n\nII\n\n\n\nI can see that something has gone wrong.  I got an inkling of it\nthe other day.\n\nEver since my arrival, Nikhil's sitting-room had become a thing\namphibious--half women's apartment, half men's: Bimala had access\nto it from the zenana, it was not barred to me from the outer\nside.  If we had only gone slow, and made use of our privileges\nwith some restraint, we might not have fallen foul of other\npeople.  But we went ahead so vehemently that we could not think\nof the consequences.\n\nWhenever Bee comes into Nikhil's room, I somehow get to know of\nit from mine.  There are the tinkle of bangles and other little\nsounds; the door is perhaps shut with a shade of unnecessary\nvehemence; the bookcase is a trifle stiff and creaks if jerked\nopen.  When I enter I find Bee, with her back to the door, ever\nso busy selecting a book from the shelves.  And as I offer to\nassist her in this difficult task she starts and protests; and\nthen we naturally get on to other topics.\n\nThe other day, on an inauspicious [13] Thursday afternoon, I\nsallied forth from my room at the call of these same sounds.\nThere was a man on guard in the passage.  I walked on without so\nmuch as glancing at him, but as I approached the door he put\nhimself in my way saying: \"Not that way, sir.\"\n\n\"Not that way!  Why?\"\n\n\"The Rani Mother is there.\"\n\n\"Oh, very well.  Tell your Rani Mother that Sandip Babu wants to\nsee her.\"\n\n\"That cannot be, sir.  It is against orders.\"\n\nI felt highly indignant.  \"I order you!\"  I said in a raised\nvoice.\n\n\"Go and announce me.\"\n\nThe fellow was somewhat taken aback at my attitude.  In the\nmeantime I had neared the door.  I was on the point of reaching\nit, when he followed after me and took me by the arm saying: \"No,\nsir, you must not.\"\n\nWhat!  To be touched by a flunkey!  I snatched away my arm and\ngave the man a sounding blow.  At this moment Bee came out of the\nroom to find the man about to insult me.\n\nI shall never forget the picture of her wrath!  That Bee is\nbeautiful is a discovery of my own.  Most of our people would see\nnothing in her.  Her tall, slim figure these boors would call\n\"lanky\".  But it is just this lithesomeness of hers that I\nadmire--like an up-leaping fountain of life, coming direct out of\nthe depths of the Creator's heart.  Her complexion is dark, but\nit is the lustrous darkness of a sword-blade, keen and\nscintillating.\n\n\"Nanku!\"  she commanded, as she stood in the doorway, pointing\nwith her finger, \"leave us.\"\n\n\"Do not be angry with him,\" said I.  \"If it is against orders, it\nis I who should retire.\"\n\nBee's voice was still trembling as she replied: \"You must not go.\nCome in.\"\n\nIt was not a request, but again a command!  I followed her in,\nand taking a chair fanned myself with a fan which was on the\ntable.  Bee scribbled something with a pencil on a sheet of paper\nand, summoning a servant, handed it to him saying: \"Take this to\nthe Maharaja.\"\n\n\"Forgive me,\" I resumed.  \"I was unable to control myself, and\nhit that man of yours.\n\n\"You served him right,\" said Bee.\n\n\"But it was not the poor fellow's fault, after all.  He was only\nobeying his orders.\"\n\nHere Nikhil came in, and as he did so I left my seat with a rapid\nmovement and went and stood near the window with my back to the\nroom.\n\n\"Nanku, the guard, has insulted Sandip Babu,\" said Bee to Nikhil.\n\nNikhil seemed to be so genuinely surprised that I had to turn\nround and stare at him.  Even an outrageously good man fails in\nkeeping up his pride of truthfulness before his wife--if she be\nthe proper kind of woman.\n\n\"He insolently stood in the way when Sandip Babu was coming in\nhere,\" continued Bee.  \"He said he had orders ...\"\n\n\"Whose orders?\"  asked Nikhil.\n\n\"How am I to know?\"  exclaimed Bee impatiently, her eyes brimming\nover with mortification.\n\nNikhil sent for the man and questioned him.  \"It was not my\nfault,\" Nanku repeated sullenly.  \"I had my orders.\"\n\n\"Who gave you the order?\"\n\n\"The Bara Rani Mother.\"\n\nWe were all silent for a while.  After the man had left, Bee\nsaid: \"Nanku must go!\"\n\nNikhil remained silent.  I could see that his sense of justice\nwould not allow this.  There was no end to his qualms.  But this\ntime he was up against a tough problem.  Bee was not the woman to\ntake things lying down.  She would have to get even with her\nsister-in-law by punishing this fellow.  And as Nikhil remained\nsilent, her eyes flashed fire.  She knew not how to pour her\nscorn upon her husband's feebleness of spirit.  Nikhil left the\nroom after a while without another word.\n\nThe next day Nanku was not to be seen.  On inquiry, I learnt that\nhe had been sent off to some other part of the estates, and that\nhis wages had not suffered by such transfer.\n\nI could catch glimpses of the ravages of the storm raging over\nthis, behind the scenes.  All I can say is, that Nikhil is a\ncurious creature, quite out of the common.\n\nThe upshot was, that after this Bee began to send for me to the\nsitting-room, for a chat, without any contrivance, or pretence of\nits being an accident.  Thus from bare suggestion we came to\nbroad hint: the implied came to be expressed.  The daughter-in-\nlaw of a princely house lives in a starry region so remote from\nthe ordinary outsider that there is not even a regular road for\nhis approach.  What a triumphal progress of Truth was this which,\ngradually but persistently, thrust aside veil after veil of\nobscuring custom, till at length Nature herself was laid bare.\n\nTruth?  Of course it was the truth!  The attraction of man and\nwoman for each other is fundamental.  The whole world of matter,\nfrom the speck of dust upwards, is ranged on its side.  And yet\nmen would keep it hidden away out of sight, behind a tissue of\nwords; and with home-made sanctions and prohibitions make of it a\ndomestic utensil.  Why, it's as absurd as melting down the solar\nsystem to make a watch-chain for one's son-in-law!  [14]\n\nWhen, in spite of all, reality awakes at the call of what is but\nnaked truth, what a gnashing of teeth and beating of breasts is\nthere!  But can one carry on a quarrel with a storm?  It never\ntakes the trouble to reply, it only gives a shaking.\n\nI am enjoying the sight of this truth, as it gradually reveals\nitself.  These tremblings of steps, these turnings of the face,\nare sweet to me: and sweet are the deceptions which deceive not\nonly others, but also Bee herself.  When Reality has to meet the\nunreal, deception is its principal weapon; for its enemies always\ntry to shame Reality by calling it gross, and so it needs must\nhide itself, or else put on some disguise.  The circumstances are\nsuch that it dare not frankly avow: \"Yes, I am gross, because I\nam true.  I am flesh.  I am passion.  I am hunger, unashamed and\ncruel.\"\n\nAll is now clear to me.  The curtain flaps, and through it I can\nsee the preparations for the catastrophe.  The little red ribbon,\nwhich peeps through the luxuriant masses of her hair, with its\nflush of secret longing, it is the lolling tongue of the red\nstorm cloud.  I feel the warmth of each turn of her __sari__,\neach suggestion of her raiment, of which even the wearer may not\nbe fully conscious.\n\nBee was not conscious, because she was ashamed of the reality; to\nwhich men have given a bad name, calling it Satan; and so it has\nto steal into the garden of paradise in the guise of a snake, and\nwhisper secrets into the ears of man's chosen consort and make\nher rebellious; then farewell to all ease; and after that comes\ndeath!\n\nMy poor little Queen Bee is living in a dream.  She knows not\nwhich way she is treading.  It would not be safe to awaken her\nbefore the time.  It is best for me to pretend to be equally\nunconscious.\n\nThe other day, at dinner, she was gazing at me in a curious sort\nof way, little realizing what such glances mean!  As my eyes met\nhers, she turned away with a flush.  \"You are surprised at my\nappetite,\" I remarked.  \"I can hide everything, except that I am\ngreedy!  Anyhow, why trouble to blush for me, since I am\nshameless?\"\n\nThis only made her colour more furiously, as she stammered: \"No,\nno, I was only...\"\n\n\"I know,\" I interrupted.  \"Women have a weakness for greedy men;\nfor it is this greed of ours which gives them the upper hand.\nThe indulgence which I have always received at their hands has\nmade me all the more shameless.  I do not mind your watching the\ngood things disappear, not one bit.  I mean to enjoy every one of\nthem.\"\n\nThe other day I was reading an English book in which sex-problems\nwere treated in an audaciously realistic manner.  I had left it\nlying in the sitting-room.  As I went there the next afternoon,\nfor something or other, I found Bee seated with this book in her\nhand.  When she heard my footsteps she hurriedly put it down and\nplaced another book over it--a volume of Mrs Hemans's poems.\n\n\"I have never been able to make out,\" I began, \"why women are so\nshy about being caught reading poetry.  We men--lawyers,\nmechanics, or what not--may well feel ashamed.  If we must read\npoetry, it should be at dead of night, within closed doors.  But\nyou women are so akin to poesy.  The Creator Himself is a lyric\npoet, and Jayadeva [15] must have practised the divine art seated\nat His feet.\"\n\nBee made no reply, but only blushed uncomfortably.  She made as\nif she would leave the room.  Whereupon I protested: \"No, no,\npray read on.  I will just take a book I left here, and run\naway.\"  With which I took up my book from the table.  \"Lucky you\ndid not think of glancing over its pages,\" I continued, \"or you\nwould have wanted to chastise me.\"\n\n\"Indeed!  Why?\"  asked Bee.\n\n\"Because it is not poetry,\" said I.  \"Only blunt things, bluntly\nput, without any finicking niceness.  I wish Nikhil would read\nit.\"\n\nBee frowned a little as she murmured: \"What makes you wish that?\"\n\n\"He is a man, you see, one of us.  My only quarrel with him is\nthat he delights in a misty vision of this world.  Have you not\nobserved how this trait of his makes him look on __Swadeshi__\nas if it was some poem of which the metre must be kept correct at\nevery step?  We, with the clubs of our prose, are the iconoclasts\nof metre.\"\n\n\"What has your book to do with __Swadeshi__?\"\n\n\"You would know if you only read it.  Nikhil wants to go by made-\nup maxims, in __Swadeshi__ as in everything else; so he knocks\nup against human nature at every turn, and then falls to abusing\nit.  He never will realize that human nature was created long\nbefore phrases were, and will survive them too.\"\n\nBee was silent for a while and then gravely said: \"Is it not a\npart of human nature to try and rise superior to itself?\"\n\nI smiled inwardly.  \"These are not your words\", I thought to\nmyself.  \"You have learnt them from Nikhil.  You are a healthy\nhuman being.  Your flesh and blood have responded to the call of\nreality.  You are burning in every vein with life-fire--do I not\nknow it?  How long should they keep you cool with the wet towel\nof moral precepts?\"\n\n\"The weak are in the majority,\" I said aloud.  \"They are\ncontinually poisoning the ears of men by repeating these\nshibboleths.  Nature has denied them strength--it is thus that\nthey try to enfeeble others.\"\n\n\"We women are weak,\" replied Bimala.  \"So I suppose we must join\nin the conspiracy of the weak.\"\n\n\"Women weak!\"  I exclaimed with a laugh.  \"Men belaud you as\ndelicate and fragile, so as to delude you into thinking\nyourselves weak.  But it is you women who are strong.  Men make a\ngreat outward show of their so-called freedom, but those who know\ntheir inner minds are aware of their bondage.  They have\nmanufactured scriptures with their own hands to bind themselves;\nwith their very idealism they have made golden fetters of women\nto wind round their body and mind.  If men had not that\nextraordinary faculty of entangling themselves in meshes of their\nown contriving, nothing could have kept them bound.  But as for\nyou women, you have desired to conceive reality with body and\nsoul.  You have given birth to reality.  You have suckled reality\nat your breasts.\"\n\nBee was well read for a woman, and would not easily give in to my\narguments.  \"If that were true,\" she objected, \"men would not\nhave found women attractive.\"\n\n\"Women realize the danger,\" I replied.  \"They know that men love\ndelusions, so they give them full measure by borrowing their own\nphrases.  They know that man, the drunkard, values intoxication\nmore than food, and so they try to pass themselves off as an\nintoxicant.  As a matter of fact, but for the sake of man, woman\nhas no need for any make-believe.\"\n\n\"Why, then, are you troubling to destroy the illusion?\"\n\n\"For freedom.  I want the country to be free.  I want human\nrelations to be free.\"\n\n------\n\n13. According to the Hindu calendar [Trans.].\n\n14. The son-in-law is the pet of a Hindu household.\n\n15. A Vaishnava poet (Sanskrit) whose lyrics of the adoration of\nthe Divinity serve as well to express all shades of human passion\n[Trans.].\n\nIII\n\n\n\nI was aware that it is unsafe suddenly to awake a sleep-walker.\nBut I am so impetuous by nature, a halting gait does not suit me.\nI knew I was overbold that day.  I knew that the first shock of\nsuch ideas is apt to be almost intolerable.  But with women it is\nalways audacity that wins.\n\nJust as we were getting on nicely, who should walk in but\nNikhil's old tutor Chandranath Babu.  The world would have been\nnot half a bad place to live in but for these schoolmasters, who\nmake one want to quit in disgust.  The Nikhil type wants to keep\nthe world always a school.  This incarnation of a school turned\nup that afternoon at the psychological moment.\n\nWe all remain schoolboys in some corner of our hearts, and I,\neven I, felt somewhat pulled up.  As for poor Bee, she at once\ntook her place solemnly, like the topmost girl of the class on\nthe front bench.  All of a sudden she seemed to remember that she\nhad to face her examination.\n\nSome people are so like eternal pointsmen lying in wait by the\nline, to shunt one's train of thought from one rail to another.\n\nChandranath Babu had no sooner come in than he cast about for\nsome excuse to retire, mumbling: \"I beg your pardon, I...\"\n\nBefore he could finish, Bee went up to him and made a profound\nobeisance, saying: \"Pray do not leave us, sir.  Will you not take\na seat?\"  She looked like a drowning person clutching at him for\nsupport--the little coward!\n\nBut possibly I was mistaken.  It is quite likely that there was a\ntouch of womanly wile in it.  She wanted, perhaps, to raise her\nvalue in my eyes.  She might have been pointedly saying to me:\n\"Please don't imagine for a moment that I am entirely overcome by\nyou.  My respect for Chandranath Babu is even greater.\"\n\nWell, indulge in your respect by all means!  Schoolmasters thrive\non it.  But not being one of them, I have no use for that empty\ncompliment.\n\nChandranath Babu began to talk about __Swadeshi__.  I thought\nI would let him go on with his monologues.  There is nothing like\nletting an old man talk himself out.  It makes him feel that he\nis winding up the world, forgetting all the while how far away\nthe real world is from his wagging tongue.\n\nBut even my worst enemy would not accuse me of patience.  And\nwhen Chandranath Babu went on to say: \"If we expect to gather\nfruit where we have sown no seed, then we ...\"  I had to\ninterrupt him.\n\n\"Who wants fruit?\"  I cried.  \"We go by the Author of the Gita\nwho says that we are concerned only with the doing, not with the\nfruit of our deeds.\"\n\n\"What is it then that you do want?\"  asked Chandranath Babu.\n\n\"Thorns!\"  I exclaimed, \"which cost nothing to plant.\"\n\n\"Thorns do not obstruct others only,\" he replied.  \"They have a\nway of hurting one's own feet.\"\n\n\"That is all right for a copy-book,\" I retorted.  \"But the real\nthing is that we have this burning at heart.  Now we have only to\ncultivate thorns for other's soles; afterwards when they hurt us\nwe shall find leisure to repent.  But why be frightened even of\nthat?  When at last we have to die it will be time enough to get\ncold.  While we are on fire let us seethe and boil.\"\n\nChandranath Babu smiled.  \"Seethe by all means,\" he said, \"but do\nnot mistake it for work, or heroism.  Nations which have got on\nin the world have done so by action, not by ebullition.  Those\nwho have always lain in dread of work, when with a start they\nawake to their sorry plight, they look to short-cuts and scamping\nfor their deliverance.\"\n\nI was girding up my loins to deliver a crushing reply, when\nNikhil came back.  Chandranath Babu rose, and looking towards\nBee, said: \"Let me go now, my little mother, I have some work to\nattend to.\"\n\nAs he left, I showed Nikhil the book in my hand.  \"I was telling\nQueen Bee about this book,\" I said.\n\nNinety-nine per cent of people have to be deluded with lies, but\nit is easier to delude this perpetual pupil of the schoolmaster\nwith the truth.  He is best cheated openly.  So, in playing with\nhim, the simplest course was to lay my cards on the table.\n\nNikhil read the title on the cover, but said nothing.  \"These\nwriters,\" I continued, \"are busy with their brooms, sweeping away\nthe dust of epithets with which men have covered up this world of\nours.  So, as I was saying, I wish you would read it.\"\n\n\"I have read it,\" said Nikhil.\n\n\"Well, what do you say?\"\n\n\"It is all very well for those who really care to think, but\npoison for those who shirk thought.\"\n\n\"What do you mean?\"\n\n\"Those who preach 'Equal Rights of Property' should not be\nthieves.  For, if they are, they would be preaching lies.  When\npassion is in the ascendant, this kind of book is not rightly\nunderstood.\"\n\n\"Passion,\" I replied, \"is the street lamp which guides us.  To\ncall it untrue is as hopeless as to expect to see better by\nplucking out our natural eyes.\"\n\nNikhil was visibly growing excited.  \"I accept the truth of\npassion,\" he said, \"only when I recognize the truth of restraint.\nBy pressing what we want to see right into our eyes we only\ninjure them: we do not see.  So does the violence of passion,\nwhich would leave no space between the mind and its object,\ndefeat its purpose.\"\n\n\"It is simply your intellectual foppery,\" I replied, \"which makes\nyou indulge in moral delicacy, ignoring the savage side of truth.\nThis merely helps you to mystify things, and so you fail to do\nyour work with any degree of strength.\"\n\n\"The intrusion of strength,\" said Nikhil impatiently, \"where\nstrength is out of place, does not help you in your work ...  But\nwhy are we arguing about these things?  Vain arguments only brush\noff the fresh bloom of truth.\"\n\nI wanted Bee to join in the discussion, but she had not said a\nword up to now.  Could I have given her too rude a shock, leaving\nher assailed with doubts and wanting to learn her lesson afresh\nfrom the schoolmaster?  Still, a thorough shaking-up is\nessential.  One must begin by realizing that things supposed to\nbe unshakeable can be shaken.\n\n\"I am glad I had this talk with you,\" I said to Nikhil, \"for I\nwas on the point of lending this book to Queen Bee to read.\"\n\n\"What harm?\"  said Nikhil.  \"If I could read the book, why not\nBimala too?  All I want to say is, that in Europe people look at\neverything from the viewpoint of science.  But man is neither\nmere physiology, nor biology, nor psychology, nor even sociology.\nFor God's sake don't forget that.  Man is infinitely more than\nthe natural science of himself.  You laugh at me, calling me the\nschoolmaster's pupil, but that is what you are, not I.  You want\nto find the truth of man from your science teachers, and not from\nyour own inner being.\"\n\n\"But why all this excitement?\"  I mocked.\n\n\"Because I see you are bent on insulting man and making him\npetty.\"\n\n\"Where on earth do you see all that?\"\n\n\"In the air, in my outraged feelings.  You would go on wounding\nthe great, the unselfish, the beautiful in man.\"\n\n\"What mad idea is this of yours?\"\n\nNikhil suddenly stood up.  \"I tell you plainly, Sandip,\" he said,\n\"man may be wounded unto death, but he will not die.  This is the\nreason why I am ready to suffer all, knowing all, with eyes\nopen.\"\n\nWith these words he hurriedly left the room.\n\nI was staring blankly at his retreating figure, when the sound of\na book, falling from the table, made me turn to find Bee\nfollowing him with quick, nervous steps, making a detour to avoid\npassing too near me.\n\nA curious creature, that Nikhil!  He feels the danger threatening\nhis home, and yet why does he not turn me out?  I know, he is\nwaiting for Bimal to give him the cue.  If Bimal tells him that\ntheir mating has been a misfit, he will bow his head and admit\nthat it may have been a blunder!  He has not the strength of mind\nto understand that to acknowledge a mistake is the greatest of\nall mistakes.  He is a typical example of how ideas make for\nweakness.  I have not seen another like him--so whimsical a\nproduct of nature!  He would hardly do as a character in a novel\nor drama, to say nothing of real life.\n\nAnd Bee?  I am afraid her dream-life is over from today.  She has\nat length understood the nature of the current which is bearing\nher along.  Now she must either advance or retreat, open-eyed.\nThe chances are she will now advance a step, and then retreat a\nstep.  But that does not disturb me.  When one is on fire, this\nrushing to and fro makes the blaze all the fiercer.  The fright\nshe has got will only fan her passion.\n\nPerhaps I had better not say much to her, but simply select some\nmodern books for her to read.  Let her gradually come to the\nconviction that to acknowledge and respect passion as the supreme\nreality, is to be modern--not to be ashamed of it, not to glorify\nrestraint.  If she finds shelter in some such word as \"modern\",\nshe will find strength.\n\nBe that as it may, I must see this out to the end of the Fifth\nAct.  I cannot, unfortunately, boast of being merely a spectator,\nseated in the royal box, applauding now and again.  There is a\nwrench at my heart, a pang in every nerve.  When I have put out\nthe light and am in my bed, little touches, little glances,\nlittle words flit about and fill the darkness.  When I get up in\nthe morning, I thrill with lively anticipations, my blood seems\nto course through me to the strains of music ...\n\nThere was a double photo-frame on the table with Bee's photograph\nby the side of Nikhil's.  I had taken out hers.  Yesterday I\nshowed Bee the empty side and said: \"Theft becomes necessary only\nbecause of miserliness, so its sin must be divided between the\nmiser and the thief.  Do you not think so?\"\n\n\"It was not a good one,\" observed Bee simply, with a little\nsmile.\n\n\"What is to be done?\"  said I.  \"A portrait cannot be better than\na portrait.  I must be content with it, such as it is.\"\n\nBee took up a book and began to turn over the pages.  \"If you are\nannoyed,\" I went on, \"I must make a shift to fill up the\nvacancy.\"\n\nToday I have filled it up.  This photograph of mine was taken in\nmy early youth.  My face was then fresher, and so was my mind.\nThen I still cherished some illusions about this world and the\nnext.  Faith deceives men, but it has one great merit: it imparts\na radiance to the features.\n\nMy portrait now reposes next to Nikhil's, for are not the two of\nus old friends?\n\n\n\nChapter Four\n\nNikhil's Story\n\nIII\n\n\nI WAS never self-conscious.  But nowadays I often try to take an\noutside view--to see myself as Bimal sees me.  What a dismally\nsolemn picture it makes, my habit of taking things too seriously!\n\nBetter, surely, to laugh away the world than flood it with tears.\nThat is, in fact, how the world gets on.  We relish our food and\nrest, only because we can dismiss, as so many empty shadows, the\nsorrows scattered everywhere, both in the home and in the outer\nworld.  If we took them as true, even for a moment, where would\nbe our appetite, our sleep?\n\nBut I cannot dismiss myself as one of these shadows, and so the\nload of my sorrow lies eternally heavy on the heart of my world.\n\nWhy not stand out aloof in the highway of the universe, and feel\nyourself to be part of the all?  In the midst of the immense,\nage-long concourse of humanity, what is Bimal to you?  Your wife?\nWhat is a wife?  A bubble of a name blown big with your own\nbreath, so carefully guarded night and day, yet ready to burst at\nany pin-prick from outside.\n\nMy wife--and so, forsooth, my very own!  If she says: \"No, I am\nmyself\"--am I to reply: \"How can that be?  Are you not mine?\"\n\n\"My wife\"--Does that amount to an argument, much less the truth?\nCan one imprison a whole personality within that name?\n\nMy wife!--Have I not cherished in this little world all that is\npurest and sweetest in my life, never for a moment letting it\ndown from my bosom to the dust?  What incense of worship, what\nmusic of passion, what flowers of my spring and of my autumn,\nhave I not offered up at its shrine?  If, like a toy paper-boat,\nshe be swept along into the muddy waters of the gutter--would I\nnot also...  ?\n\nThere it is again, my incorrigible solemnity!  Why \"muddy\"?  What\n\"gutter\" names, called in a fit of jealousy, do not change the\nfacts of the world.  If Bimal is not mine, she is not; and no\nfuming, or fretting, or arguing will serve to prove that she is.\nIf my heart is breaking--let it break!  That will not make the\nworld bankrupt--nor even me; for man is so much greater than the\nthings he loses in this life.  The very ocean of tears has its\nother shore, else none would have ever wept.\n\nBut then there is Society to be considered ...  which let Society\nconsider!  If I weep it is for myself, not for Society.  If Bimal\nshould say she is not mine, what care I where my Society wife may\nbe?\n\nSuffering there must be; but I must save myself, by any means in\nmy power, from one form of self-torture: I must never think that\nmy life loses its value because of any neglect it may suffer.\nThe full value of my life does not all go to buy my narrow\ndomestic world; its great commerce does not stand or fall with\nsome petty success or failure in the bartering of my personal\njoys and sorrows.\n\nThe time has come when I must divest Bimala of all the ideal\ndecorations with which I decked her.  It was owing to my own\nweakness that I indulged in such idolatry.  I was too greedy.  I\ncreated an angel of Bimala, in order to exaggerate my own\nenjoyment.  But Bimala is what she is.  It is preposterous to\nexpect that she should assume the rôle of an angel for my\npleasure.  The Creator is under no obligation to supply me with\nangels, just because I have an avidity for imaginary perfection.\n\nI must acknowledge that I have merely been an accident in\nBimala's life.  Her nature, perhaps, can only find true union\nwith one like Sandip.  At the same time, I must not, in false\nmodesty, accept my rejection as my desert.  Sandip certainly has\nattractive qualities, which had their sway also upon myself; but\nyet, I feel sure, he is not a greater man than I.  If the wreath\nof victory falls to his lot today, and I am overlooked, then the\ndispenser of the wreath will be called to judgement.\n\nI say this in no spirit of boasting.  Sheer necessity has driven\nme to the pass, that to secure myself from utter desolation I\nmust recognize all the value that I truly possess.  Therefore,\nthrough the, terrible experience of suffering let there come upon\nme the joy of deliverance--deliverance from self-distrust.\n\nI have come to distinguish what is really in me from what I\nfoolishly imagined to be there.  The profit and loss account has\nbeen settled, and that which remains is myself--not a crippled\nself, dressed in rags and tatters, not a sick self to be nursed\non invalid diet, but a spirit which has gone through the worst,\nand has survived.\n\nMy master passed through my room a moment ago and said with his\nhand on my shoulder.  \"Get away to bed, Nikhil, the night is far\nadvanced.\"\n\nThe fact is, it has become so difficult for me to go to bed till\nlate--till Bimal is fast asleep.  In the day-time we meet, and\neven converse, but what am I to say when we are alone together,\nin the silence of the night?--so ashamed do I feel in mind and\nbody.\n\n\"How is it, sir, you have not yet retired?\"  I asked in my turn.\nMy master smiled a little, as he left me, saying: \"My sleeping\ndays are over.  I have now attained the waking age.\"\n\nI had written thus far, and was about to rise to go off bedwards\nwhen, through the window before me, I saw the heavy pall of July\ncloud suddenly part a little, and a big star shine through.  It\nseemed to say to me: \"Dreamland ties are made, and dreamland ties\nare broken, but I am here for ever--the everlasting lamp of the\nbridal night.\"\n\nAll at once my heart was full with the thought that my Eternal\nLove was steadfastly waiting for me through the ages, behind the\nveil of material things.  Through many a life, in many a mirror,\nhave I seen her image--broken mirrors, crooked mirrors, dusty\nmirrors.  Whenever I have sought to make the mirror my very own,\nand shut it up within my box, I have lost sight of the image.\nBut what of that.  What have I to do with the mirror, or even the\nimage?\n\nMy beloved, your smile shall never fade, and every dawn there\nshall appear fresh for me the vermilion mark on your forehead!\n\n\"What childish cajolery of self-deception,\" mocks some devil from\nhis dark corner--\"silly prattle to make children quiet!\"\n\nThat may be.  But millions and millions of children, with their\nmillion cries, have to be kept quiet.  Can it be that all this\nmultitude is quieted with only a lie?  No, my Eternal Love cannot\ndeceive me, for she is true!\n\nShe is true; that is why I have seen her and shall see her so\noften, even in my mistakes, even through the thickest mist of\ntears.  I have seen her and lost her in the crowd of life's\nmarket-place, and found her again; and I shall find her once more\nwhen I have escaped through the loophole of death.\n\nAh, cruel one, play with me no longer!  If I have failed to track\nyou by the marks of your footsteps on the way, by the scent of\nyour tresses lingering in the air, make me not weep for that for\never.  The unveiled star tells me not to fear.  That which is\neternal must always be there.\n\nNow let me go and see my Bimala.  She must have spread her tired\nlimbs on the bed, limp after her struggles, and be asleep.  I\nwill leave a kiss on her forehead without waking her--that shall\nbe the flower-offering of my worship.  I believe I could forget\neverything after death--all my mistakes, all my sufferings--but\nsome vibration of the memory of that kiss would remain; for the\nwreath which is being woven out of the kisses of many a\nsuccessive birth is to crown the Eternal Beloved.\n\nAs the gong of the watch rang out, sounding the hour of two, my\nsister-in-law came into the room.  \"Whatever are you doing,\nbrother dear?\"  [16] she cried.  \"For pity's sake go to bed and\nstop worrying so.  I cannot bear to look on that awful shadow of\npain on your face.\"  Tears welled up in her eyes and overflowed\nas she entreated me thus.\n\nI could not utter a word, but took the dust of her feet, as I\nwent off to bed.\n\n------\n\n16. When a relationship is established by marriage, or by mutual\nunderstanding arising out of special friendship or affection, the\npersons so related call each other in terms of such relationship,\nand not by name.  [Trans.].\n\n\n\nBimala's Story\n\nVII\n\n\n\nAt first I suspected nothing, feared nothing; I simply felt\ndedicated to my country.  What a stupendous joy there was in this\nunquestioning surrender.  Verily had I realized how, in\nthoroughness of self-destruction, man can find supreme bliss.\n\nFor aught I know, this frenzy of mine might have come to a\ngradual, natural end.  But Sandip Babu would not have it so, he\nwould insist on revealing himself.  The tone of his voice became\nas intimate as a touch, every look flung itself on its knees in\nbeggary.  And, through it all, there burned a passion which in\nits violence made as though it would tear me up by the roots, and\ndrag me along by the hair.\n\nI will not shirk the truth.  This cataclysmal desire drew me by\nday and by night.  It seemed desperately alluring--this making\nhavoc of myself.  What a shame it seemed, how terrible, and yet\nhow sweet!  Then there was my overpowering curiosity, to which\nthere seemed no limit.  He of whom I knew but little, who never\ncould assuredly be mine, whose youth flared so vigorously in a\nhundred points of flame--oh, the mystery of his seething\npassions, so immense, so tumultuous!\n\nI began with a feeling of worship, but that soon passed away.  I\nceased even to respect Sandip; on the contrary, I began to look\ndown upon him.  Nevertheless this flesh-and-blood lute of mine,\nfashioned with my feeling and fancy, found in him a master-\nplayer.  What though I shrank from his touch, and even came to\nloathe the lute itself; its music was conjured up all the same.\n\nI must confess there was something in me which ...  what shall I\nsay?  ...  which makes me wish I could have died!\n\nChandranath Babu, when he finds leisure, comes to me.  He has the\npower to lift my mind up to an eminence from where I can see in a\nmoment the boundary of my life extended on all sides and so\nrealize that the lines, which I took from my bounds, were merely\nimaginary.\n\nBut what is the use of it all?  Do I really desire emancipation?\nLet suffering come to our house; let the best in me shrivel up\nand become black; but let this infatuation not leave me--such\nseems to be my prayer.\n\nWhen, before my marriage, I used to see a brother-in-law of mine,\nnow dead, mad with drink--beating his wife in his frenzy, and\nthen sobbing and howling in maudlin repentance, vowing never to\ntouch liquor again, and yet, the very same evening, sitting down\nto drink and drink--it would fill me with disgust.  But my\nintoxication today is still more fearful.  The stuff has not to\nbe procured or poured out: it springs within my veins, and I know\nnot how to resist it.\n\nMust this continue to the end of my days?  Now and again I start\nand look upon myself, and think my life to be a nightmare which\nwill vanish all of a sudden with all its untruth.  It has become\nso frightfully incongruous.  It has no connection with its past.\nWhat it is, how it could have come to this pass, I cannot\nunderstand.\n\nOne day my sister-in-law remarked with a cutting laugh: \"What a\nwonderfully hospitable Chota Rani we have!  Her guest absolutely\nwill not budge.  In our time there used to be guests, too; but\nthey had not such lavish looking after--we were so absurdly taken\nup with our husbands.  Poor brother Nikhil is paying the penalty\nof being born too modern.  He should have come as a guest if he\nwanted to stay on.  Now it looks as if it were time for him to\nquit ...  O you little demon, do your glances never fall, by\nchance, on his agonized face?\"\n\nThis sarcasm did not touch me; for I knew that these women had it\nnot in them to understand the nature of the cause of my devotion.\nI was then wrapped in the protecting armour of the exaltation of\nsacrifice, through which such shafts were powerless to reach and\nshame me.\n\nVIII\n\n\n\nFor some time all talk of the country's cause has been dropped.\nOur conversation nowadays has become full of modern sex-problems,\nand various other matters, with a sprinkling of poetry, both old\nVaishnava and modern English, accompanied by a running undertone\nof melody, low down in the bass, such as I have never in my life\nheard before, which seems to me to sound the true manly note, the\nnote of power.\n\nThe day had come when all cover was gone.  There was no longer\neven the pretence of a reason why Sandip Babu should linger on,\nor why I should have confidential talks with him every now and\nthen.  I felt thoroughly vexed with myself, with my sister-in-\nlaw, with the ways of the world, and I vowed I would never again\ngo to the outer apartments, not if I were to die for it.\n\nFor two whole days I did not stir out.  Then, for the first time,\nI discovered how far I had travelled.  My life felt utterly\ntasteless.  Whatever I touched I wanted to thrust away.  I felt\nmyself waiting--from the crown of my head to the tips of my toes\n--waiting for something, somebody; my blood kept tingling with\nsome expectation.\n\nI tried busying myself with extra work.  The bedroom floor was\nclean enough but I insisted on its being scrubbed over again\nunder my eyes.  Things were arranged in the cabinets in one kind\nof order; I pulled them all out and rearranged them in a\ndifferent way.  I found no time that afternoon even to do up my\nhair; I hurriedly tied it into a loose knot, and went and worried\neverybody, fussing about the store-room.  The stores seemed\nshort, and pilfering must have been going on of late, but I could\nnot muster up the courage to take any particular person to task--\nfor might not the thought have crossed somebody's mind: \"Where\nwere your eyes all these days!\"\n\nIn short, I behaved that day as one possessed.  The next day I\ntried to do some reading.  What I read I have no idea, but after\na spell of absentmindedness I found I had wandered away, book in\nhand, along the passage leading towards the outer apartments, and\nwas standing by a window looking out upon the verandah running\nalong the row of rooms on the opposite side of the quadrangle.\nOne of these rooms, I felt, had crossed over to another shore,\nand the ferry had ceased to ply.  I felt like the ghost of myself\nof two days ago, doomed to remain where I was, and yet not really\nthere, blankly looking out for ever.\n\nAs I stood there, I saw Sandip come out of his room into the\nverandah, a newspaper in his hand.  I could see that he looked\nextraordinarily disturbed.  The courtyard, the railings, in\nfront, seemed to rouse his wrath.  He flung away his newspaper\nwith a gesture which seemed to want to rend the space before him.\n\nI felt I could no longer keep my vow.  I was about to move on\ntowards the sitting-room, when I found my sister-in-law behind\nme.  \"O Lord, this beats everything!\"  she ejaculated, as she\nglided away.  I could not proceed to the outer apartments.\n\nThe next morning when my maid came calling, \"Rani Mother, it is\ngetting late for giving out the stores,\" I flung the keys to her,\nsaying, \"Tell Harimati to see to it,\" and went on with some\nembroidery of English pattern on which I was engaged, seated near\nthe window.\n\nThen came a servant with a letter.  \"From Sandip Babu,\" said he.\nWhat unbounded boldness!  What must the messenger have thought?\nThere was a tremor within my breast as I opened the envelope.\nThere was no address on the letter, only the words: __An urgent\nmatter--touching the Cause.  Sandip__.\n\nI flung aside the embroidery.  I was up on my feet in a moment,\ngiving a touch or two to my hair by the mirror.  I kept the\n__sari__ I had on, changing only my jacket--for one of my\njackets had its associations.\n\nI had to pass through one of the verandahs, where my sister-in-\nlaw used to sit in the morning slicing betel-nut.  I refused to\nfeel awkward.  \"Whither away, Chota Rani?\"  she cried.\n\n\"To the sitting-room outside.\"\n\n\"So early!  A matinée, eh?\"\n\nAnd, as I passed on without further reply, she hummed after me a\nflippant song.\n\nIX\n\n\n\nWhen I was about to enter the sitting-room, I saw Sandip immersed\nin an illustrated catalogue of British Academy pictures, with his\nback to the door.  He has a great notion of himself as an expert\nin matters of Art.\n\nOne day my husband said to him: \"If the artists ever want a\nteacher, they need never lack for one so long as you are there.\"\nIt had not been my husband's habit to speak cuttingly, but\nlatterly there has been a change and he never spares Sandip.\n\n\"What makes you suppose that artists need no teachers?\"  Sandip\nretorted.\n\n\"Art is a creation,\" my husband replied.  \"So we should humbly be\ncontent to receive our lessons about Art from the work of the\nartist.\"\n\nSandip laughed at this modesty, saying: \"You think that meekness\nis a kind of capital which increases your wealth the more you use\nit.  It is my conviction that those who lack pride only float\nabout like water reeds which have no roots in the soil.\"\n\nMy mind used to be full of contradictions when they talked thus.\nOn the one hand I was eager that my husband should win in\nargument and that Sandip's pride should be shamed.  Yet, on the\nother, it was Sandip's unabashed pride which attracted me so.  It\nshone like a precious diamond, which knows no diffidence, and\nsparkles in the face of the sun itself.\n\nI entered the room.  I knew Sandip could hear my footsteps as I\nwent forward, but he pretended not to, and kept his eyes on the\nbook.\n\nI dreaded his Art talks, for I could not overcome my delicacy\nabout the pictures he talked of, and the things he said, and had\nmuch ado in putting on an air of overdone insensibility to hide\nmy qualms.  So, I was almost on the point of retracing my steps,\nwhen, with a deep sigh, Sandip raised his eyes, and affected to\nbe startled at the sight of me.  \"Ah, you have come!\"  he said.\n\nIn his words, in his tone, in his eyes, there was a world of\nsuppressed reproach, as if the claims he had acquired over me\nmade my absence, even for these two or three days, a grievous\nwrong.  I knew this attitude was an insult to me, but, alas, I\nhad not the power to resent it.\n\nI made no reply, but though I was looking another way, I could\nnot help feeling that Sandip's plaintive gaze had planted itself\nright on my face, and would take no denial.  I did so wish he\nwould say something, so that I could shelter myself behind his\nwords.  I cannot tell how long this went on, but at last I could\nstand it no longer.  \"What is this matter,\" I asked, \"you are\nwanting to tell me about?\"\n\nSandip again affected surprise as he said: \"Must there always be\nsome matter?  Is friendship by itself a crime?  Oh, Queen Bee, to\nthink that you should make so light of the greatest thing on\nearth!  Is the heart's worship to be shut out like a stray cur?\"\n\nThere was again that tremor within me.  I could feel the crisis\ncoming, too importunate to be put off.  Joy and fear struggled\nfor the mastery.  Would my shoulders, I wondered, be broad enough\nto stand its shock, or would it not leave me overthrown, with my\nface in the dust?\n\nI was trembling all over.  Steadying myself with an effort I\nrepeated: \"You summoned me for something touching the Cause, so I\nhave left my household duties to attend to it.\"\n\n\"That is just what I was trying to explain,\" he said, with a dry\nlaugh.  \"Do you not know that I come to worship?  Have I not told\nyou that, in you, I visualize the __Shakti__ of our country?\nThe Geography of a country is not the whole truth.  No one can\ngive up his life for a map!  When I see you before me, then only\ndo I realize how lovely my country is.  When you have anointed me\nwith your own hands, then shall I know I have the sanction of my\ncountry; and if, with that in my heart, I fall fighting, it shall\nnot be on the dust of some map-made land, but on a lovingly\nspread skirt--do you know what kind of skirt?--like that of the\nearthen-red __sari__ you wore the other day, with a broad\nblood-red border.  Can I ever forget it?  Such are the visions\nwhich give vigour to life, and joy to death!\"\n\nSandip's eyes took fire as he went on, but whether it was the\nfire of worship, or of passion, I could not tell.  I was reminded\nof the day on which I first heard him speak, when I could not be\nsure whether he was a person, or just a living flame.\n\nI had not the power to utter a word.  You cannot take shelter\nbehind the walls of decorum when in a moment the fire leaps up\nand, with the flash of its sword and the roar of its laughter,\ndestroys all the miser's stores.  I was in terror lest he should\nforget himself and take me by the hand.  For he shook like a\nquivering tongue of fire; his eyes showered scorching sparks on\nme.\n\n\"Are you for ever determined,\" he cried after a pause, \"to make\ngods of your petty household duties--you who have it in you to\nsend us to life or to death?  Is this power of yours to be kept\nveiled in a zenana?  Cast away all false shame, I pray you; snap\nyour fingers at the whispering around.  Take your plunge today\ninto the freedom of the outer world.\"\n\nWhen, in Sandip's appeals, his worship of the country gets to be\nsubtly interwoven with his worship of me, then does my blood\ndance, indeed, and the barriers of my hesitation totter.  His\ntalks about Art and Sex, his distinctions between Real and\nUnreal, had but clogged my attempts at response with some\nrevolting nastiness.  This, however, now burst again into a glow\nbefore which my repugnance faded away.  I felt that my\nresplendent womanhood made me indeed a goddess.  Why should not\nits glory flash from my forehead with visible brilliance?  Why\ndoes not my voice find a word, some audible cry, which would be\nlike a sacred spell to my country for its fire initiation?\n\nAll of a sudden my maid Khema rushed into the room, dishevelled.\n\"Give me my wages and let me go,\" she screamed.  \"Never in all my\nlife have I been so ...\"  The rest of her speech was drowned in\nsobs.\n\n\"What is the matter?\"\n\nThako, the Bara Rani's maid, it appeared, had for no rhyme or\nreason reviled her in unmeasured terms.  She was in such a state,\nit was no manner of use trying to pacify her by saying I would\nlook into the matter afterwards.\n\nThe slime of domestic life that lay beneath the lotus bank of\nwomanhood came to the surface.  Rather than allow Sandip a\nprolonged vision of it, I had to hurry back within.\n\n\n\nX\n\n\nMy sister-in-law was absorbed in her betel-nuts, the suspicion of\na smile playing about her lips, as if nothing untoward had\nhappened.  She was still humming the same song.\n\n\"Why has your Thako been calling poor Khema names?\"  I burst out.\n\n\"Indeed?  The wretch!  I will have her broomed out of the house.\nWhat a shame to spoil your morning out like this!  As for Khema,\nwhere are the hussy's manners to go and disturb you when you are\nengaged?  Anyhow, Chota Rani, don't you worry yourself with these\ndomestic squabbles.  Leave them to me, and return to your\nfriend.\"\n\nHow suddenly the wind in the sails of our mind veers round!  This\ngoing to meet Sandip outside seemed, in the light of the zenana\ncode, such an extraordinarily out-of-the-way thing to do that I\nwent off to my own room, at a loss for a reply.  I knew this was\nmy sister-in-law's doing and that she had egged her maid on to\ncontrive this scene.  But I had brought myself to such an\nunstable poise that I dared not have my fling.\n\nWhy, it was only the other day that I found I could not keep up\nto the last the unbending hauteur with which I had demanded from\nmy husband the dismissal of the man Nanku.  I felt suddenly\nabashed when the Bara Rani came up and said: \"It is really all my\nfault, brother dear.  We are old-fashioned folk, and I did not\nquite like the ways of your Sandip Babu, so I only told the guard\n...  but how was I to know that our Chota Rani would take this as\nan insult?--I thought it would be the other way about!  Just my\nincorrigible silliness!\"\n\nThe thing which seems so glorious when viewed from the heights of\nthe country's cause, looks so muddy when seen from the bottom.\nOne begins by getting angry, and then feels disgusted.\n\nI shut myself into my room, sitting by the window, thinking how\neasy life would be if only one could keep in harmony with one's\nsurroundings.  How simply the senior Rani sits in her verandah\nwith her betel-nuts and how inaccessible to me has become my\nnatural seat beside my daily duties!  Where will it all end, I\nasked myself?  Shall I ever recover, as from a delirium, and\nforget it all; or am I to be dragged to depths from which there\ncan be no escape in this life?  How on earth did I manage to let\nmy good fortune escape me, and spoil my life so?  Every wall of\nthis bedroom of mine, which I first entered nine years ago as a\nbride, stares at me in dismay.\n\nWhen my husband came home, after his M.A.  examination, he\nbrought for me this orchid belonging to some far-away land beyond\nthe seas.  From beneath these few little leaves sprang such a\ncascade of blossoms, it looked as if they were pouring forth from\nsome overturned urn of Beauty.  We decided, together, to hang it\nhere, over this window.  It flowered only that once, but we have\nalways been in hope of its doing so once more.  Curiously enough\nI have kept on watering it these days, from force of habit, and\nit is still green.\n\nIt is now four years since I framed a photograph of my husband in\nivory and put it in the niche over there.  If I happen to look\nthat way I have to lower my eyes.  Up to last week I used\nregularly to put there the flowers of my worship, every morning\nafter my bath.  My husband has often chided me over this.\n\n\"It shames me to see you place me on a height to which I do not\nbelong,\" he said one day.\n\n\"What nonsense!\"\n\n\"I am not only ashamed, but also jealous!\"\n\n\"Just hear him!  Jealous of whom, pray?\"\n\n\"Of that false me.  It only shows that I am too petty for you,\nthat you want some extraordinary man who can overpower you with\nhis superiority, and so you needs must take refuge in making for\nyourself another 'me'.\"\n\n\"This kind of talk only makes me angry,\" said I.\n\n\"What is the use of being angry with me?\"  he replied.  \"Blame\nyour fate which allowed you no choice, but made you take me\nblindfold.  This keeps you trying to retrieve its blunder by\nmaking me out a paragon.\"\n\nI felt so hurt at the bare idea that tears started to my eyes\nthat day.  And whenever I think of that now, I cannot raise my\neyes to the niche.\n\nFor now there is another photograph in my jewel case.  The other\nday, when arranging the sitting-room, I brought away that double\nphoto frame, the one in which Sandip's portrait was next to my\nhusband's.  To this portrait I have no flowers of worship to\noffer, but it remains hidden away under my gems.  It has all the\ngreater fascination because kept secret.  I look at it now and\nthen with doors closed.  At night I turn up the lamp, and sit\nwith it in my hand, gazing and gazing.  And every night I think\nof burning it in the flame of the lamp, to be done with it for\never; but every night I heave a sigh and smother it again in my\npearls and diamonds.\n\nAh, wretched woman!  What a wealth of love was twined round each\none of those jewels!  Oh, why am I not dead?\n\nSandip had impressed it on me that hesitation is not in the\nnature of woman.  For her, neither right nor left has any\nexistence--she only moves forward.  When the women of our country\nwake up, he repeatedly insisted, their voice will be unmistakably\nconfident in its utterance of the cry: \"I want.\"\n\n\"I want!\"  Sandip went on one day--this was the primal word at\nthe root of all creation.  It had no maxim to guide it, but it\nbecame fire and wrought itself into suns and stars.  Its\npartiality is terrible.  Because it had a desire for man, it\nruthlessly sacrificed millions of beasts for millions of years to\nachieve that desire.  That terrible word \"I want\" has taken flesh\nin woman, and therefore men, who are cowards, try with all their\nmight to keep back this primeval flood With their earthen dykes.\nThey are afraid lest, laughing and dancing as it goes, it should\nwash away all the hedges and props of their pumpkin field.  Men,\nin every age, flatter themselves that they have secured this\nforce within the bounds of their convenience, but it gathers and\ngrows.  Now it is calm and deep like a lake, but gradually its\npressure will increase, the dykes will give way, and the force\nwhich has so long been dumb will rush forward with the roar: \"I\nwant!\"\n\nThese words of Sandip echo in my heart-beats like a war-drum.\nThey shame into silence all my conflicts with myself.  What do I\ncare what people may think of me?  Of what value are that orchid\nand that niche in my bedroom?  What power have they to belittle\nme, to put me to shame?  The primal fire of creation burns in me.\n\nI felt a strong desire to snatch down the orchid and fling it out\nof the window, to denude the niche of its picture, to lay bare\nand naked the unashamed spirit of destruction that raged within\nme.  My arm was raised to do it, but a sudden pang passed through\nmy breast, tears started to my eyes.  I threw myself down and\nsobbed: \"What is the end of all this, what is the end?\"\n\n\n\nSandip's Story\n\nIV\n\n\n\nWhen I read these pages of the story of my life I seriously\nquestion myself: Is this Sandip?  Am I made of words?  Am I\nmerely a book with a covering of flesh and blood?\n\nThe earth is not a dead thing like the moon.  She breathes.  Her\nrivers and oceans send up vapours in which she is clothed.  She\nis covered with a mantle of her own dust which flies about the\nair.  The onlooker, gazing upon the earth from the outside, can\nsee only the light reflected from this vapour and this dust.  The\ntracks of the mighty continents are not distinctly visible.\n\nThe man, who is alive as this earth is, is likewise always\nenveloped in the mist of the ideas which he is breathing out.\nHis real land and water remain hidden, and he appears to be made\nof only lights and shadows.\n\nIt seems to me, in this story of my life, that, like a living\nplant, I am displaying the picture of an ideal world.  But I am\nnot merely what I want, what I think--I am also what I do not\nlove, what I do not wish to be.  My creation had begun before I\nwas born.  I had no choice in regard to my surroundings and so\nmust make the best of such material as comes to my hand.\n\nMy theory of life makes me certain that the Great is cruel To be\njust is for ordinary men--it is reserved for the great to be\nunjust.  The surface of the earth was even.  The volcano butted\nit with its fiery horn and found its own eminence--its justice\nwas not towards its obstacle, but towards itself.  Successful\ninjustice and genuine cruelty have been the only forces by which\nindividual or nation has become millionaire or monarch.\n\nThat is why I preach the great discipline of Injustice.  I say to\neveryone: Deliverance is based upon injustice.  Injustice is the\nfire which must keep on burning something in order to save itself\nfrom becoming ashes.  Whenever an individual or nation becomes\nincapable of perpetrating injustice it is swept into the dust-bin\nof the world.\n\nAs yet this is only my idea--it is not completely myself.  There\nare rifts in the armour through which something peeps out which\nis extremely soft and sensitive.  Because, as I say, the best\npart of myself was created before I came to this stage of\nexistence.\n\nFrom time to time I try my followers in their lesson of cruelty.\nOne day we went on a picnic.  A goat was grazing by.  I asked\nthem: \"Who is there among you that can cut off a leg of that\ngoat, alive, with this knife, and bring it to me?\"  While they\nall hesitated, I went myself and did it.  One of them fainted at\nthe sight.  But when they saw me unmoved they took the dust of my\nfeet, saying that I was above all human weaknesses.  That is to\nsay, they saw that day the vaporous envelope which was my idea,\nbut failed to perceive the inner me, which by a curious freak of\nfate has been created tender and merciful.\n\nIn the present chapter of my life, which is growing in interest\nevery day round Bimala and Nikhil, there is also much that\nremains hidden underneath.  This malady of ideas which afflicts\nme is shaping my life within: nevertheless a great part of my\nlife remains outside its influence; and so there is set up a\ndiscrepancy between my outward life and its inner design which I\ntry my best to keep concealed even from myself; otherwise it may\nwreck not only my plans, but my very life.\n\nLife is indefinite--a bundle of contradictions.  We men, with our\nideas, strive to give it a particular shape by melting it into a\nparticular mould--into the definiteness of success.  All the\nworld-conquerors, from Alexander down to the American\nmillionaires, mould themselves into a sword or a mint, and thus\nfind that distinct image of themselves which is the source of\ntheir success.\n\nThe chief controversy between Nikhil and myself arises from this:\nthat though I say \"know thyself\", and Nikhil also says \"know\nthyself\", his interpretation makes this \"knowing\" tantamount to\n\"not knowing\".\n\n\"Winning your kind of success,\" Nikhil once objected, \"is success\ngained at the cost of the soul: but the soul is greater than\nsuccess.\"\n\nI simply said in answer: \"Your words are too vague.\"\n\n\"That I cannot help,\" Nikhil replied.  \"A machine is distinct\nenough, but not so life.  If to gain distinctness you try to know\nlife as a machine, then such mere distinctness cannot stand for\ntruth.  The soul is not as distinct as success, and so you only\nlose your soul if you seek it in your success.\"\n\n\"Where, then, is this wonderful soul?\"\n\n\"Where it knows itself in the infinite and transcends its\nsuccess.\"\n\n\"But how does all this apply to our work for the country?\"\n\n\"It is the same thing.  Where our country makes itself the final\nobject, it gains success at the cost of the soul.  Where it\nrecognizes the Greatest as greater than all, there it may miss\nsuccess, but gains its soul.\"\n\n\"Is there any example of this in history?\"\n\n\"Man is so great that he can despise not only the success, but\nalso the example.  Possibly example is lacking, just as there is\nno example of the flower in the seed.  But there is the urgence\nof the flower in the seed all the same.\"\n\nIt is not that I do not at all understand Nikhil's point of view;\nthat is rather where my danger lies.  I was born in India and the\npoison of its spirituality runs in my blood.  However loudly I\nmay proclaim the madness of walking in the path of self-\nabnegation, I cannot avoid it altogether.\n\nThis is exactly how such curious anomalies happen nowadays in our\ncountry.  We must have our religion and also our nationalism; our\n__Bhagavadgita__ and also our __Bande Mataram__.  The result is that\nboth of them suffer.  It is like performing with an English military\nband, side by side with our Indian festive pipes.  I must make it\nthe purpose of my life to put an end to this hideous confusion.\n\nI want the western military style to prevail, not the Indian.\nWe shall then not be ashamed of the flag of our passion, which\nmother Nature has sent with us as our standard into the\nbattlefield of life.  Passion is beautiful and pure--pure as the\nlily that comes out of the slimy soil.  It rises superior to its\ndefilement and needs no Pears' soap to wash it clean.\n\n\n\nV\n\n\nA question has been worrying me the last few days.  Why am I\nallowing my life to become entangled with Bimala's?  Am I a\ndrifting log to be caught up at any and every obstacle?\n\nNot that I have any false shame at Bimala becoming an object of\nmy desire.  It is only too clear how she wants me, and so I look\non her as quite legitimately mine.  The fruit hangs on the branch\nby the stem, but that is no reason why the claim of the stem\nshould be eternal.  Ripe fruit cannot for ever swear by its\nslackening stem-hold.  All its sweetness has been accumulated for\nme; to surrender itself to my hand is the reason of its\nexistence, its very nature, its true morality.  So I must pluck\nit, for it becomes me not to make it futile.\n\nBut what is teasing me is that I am getting entangled.  Am I not\nborn to rule?--to bestride my proper steed, the crowd, and drive\nit as I will; the reins in my hand, the destination known only to\nme, and for it the thorns, the mire, on the road?  This steed now\nawaits me at the door, pawing and champing its bit, its neighing\nfilling the skies.  But where am I, and what am I about, letting\nday after day of golden opportunity slip by?\n\nI used to think I was like a storm--that the torn flowers with\nwhich I strewed my path would not impede my progress.  But I am\nonly wandering round and round a flower like a bee--not a storm.\nSo, as I was saying, the colouring of ideas which man gives\nhimself is only superficial.  The inner man remains as ordinary\nas ever.  If someone, who could see right into me, were to write\nmy biography, he would make me out to be no different from that\nlout of a Panchu, or even from Nikhil!\n\nLast night I was turning over the pages of my old diary ...  I\nhad just graduated, and my brain was bursting with philosophy.\nEven so early I had vowed not to harbour any illusions, whether\nof my own or other's imagining, but to build my life on a solid\nbasis of reality.  But what has since been its actual story?\nWhere is its solidity?  It has rather been a network, where,\nthough the thread be continuous, more space is taken up by the\nholes.  Fight as I may, these will not own defeat.  Just as I was\ncongratulating myself on steadily following the thread, here I am\nbadly caught in a hole!  For I have become susceptible to\ncompunctions.\n\n\"I want it; it is here; let me take it\"--This is a clear-cut,\nstraightforward policy.  Those who can pursue its course with\nvigour needs must win through in the end.  But the gods would not\nhave it that such journey should be easy, so they have deputed\nthe siren Sympathy to distract the wayfarer, to dim his vision\nwith her tearful mist.\n\nI can see that poor Bimala is struggling like a snared deer.\nWhat a piteous alarm there is in her eyes!  How she is torn with\nstraining at her bonds!  This sight, of course, should gladden\nthe heart of a true hunter.  And so do I rejoice; but, then, I am\nalso touched; and therefore I dally, and standing on the brink I\nam hesitating to pull the noose fast.\n\nThere have been moments, I know, when I could have bounded up to\nher, clasped her hands and folded her to my breast, unresisting.\nHad I done so, she would not have said one word.  She was aware\nthat some crisis was impending, which in a moment would change\nthe meaning of the whole world.  Standing before that cavern of\nthe incalculable but yet expected, her face went pale and her\neyes glowed with a fearful ecstasy.  Within that moment, when it\narrives, an eternity will take shape, which our destiny awaits,\nholding its breath.\n\nBut I have let this moment slip by.  I did not, with\nuncompromising strength, press the almost certain into the\nabsolutely assured.  I now see clearly that some hidden elements\nin my nature have openly ranged themselves as obstacles in my\npath.\n\nThat is exactly how Ravana, whom I look upon as the real hero of\nthe __Ramayana__, met with his doom.  He kept Sita in his\nAsoka garden, awaiting her pleasure, instead of taking her\nstraight into his harem.  This weak spot in his otherwise grand\ncharacter made the whole of the abduction episode futile.\nAnother such touch of compunction made him disregard, and be\nlenient to, his traitorous brother Bibhisan, only to get himself\nkilled for his pains.\n\nThus does the tragic in life come by its own.  In the beginning\nit lies, a little thing, in some dark under-vault, and ends by\noverthrowing the whole superstructure.  The real tragedy is, that\nman does not know himself for what he really is.\n\nVI\n\n\n\nThen again there is Nikhil.  Crank though he be, laugh at him as\nI may, I cannot get rid of the idea that he is my friend.  At\nfirst I gave no thought to his point of view, but of late it has\nbegun to shame and hurt me.  Therefore I have been trying to talk\nand argue with him in the same enthusiastic way as of old, but it\ndoes not ring true.  It is even leading me at times into such a\nlength of unnaturalness as to pretend to agree with him.  But\nsuch hypocrisy is not in my nature, nor in that of Nikhil either.\nThis, at least, is something we have in common.  That is why,\nnowadays, I would rather not come across him, and have taken to\nfighting shy of his presence.\n\nAll these are signs of weakness.  No sooner is the possibility of\na wrong admitted than it becomes actual, and clutches you by the\nthroat, however you may then try to shake off all belief in it.\nWhat I should like to be able to tell Nikhil frankly is, that\nhappenings such as these must be looked in the face--as great\nRealities--and that which is the Truth should not be allowed to\nstand between true friends.\n\nThere is no denying that I have really weakened.  It was not this\nweakness which won over Bimala; she burnt her wings in the blaze\nof the full strength of my unhesitating manliness.  Whenever\nsmoke obscures its lustre she also becomes confused, and draws\nback.  Then comes a thorough revulsion of feeling, and she fain\nwould take back the garland she has put round my neck, but\ncannot; and so she only closes her eyes, to shut it out of sight.\n\nBut all the same I must not swerve from the path I have chalked\nout.  It would never do to abandon the cause of the country,\nespecially at the present time.  I shall simply make Bimala one\nwith my country.  The turbulent west wind which has swept away\nthe country's veil of conscience, will sweep away the veil of the\nwife from Bimala's face, and in that uncovering there will be no\nshame.  The ship will rock as it bears the crowd across the\nocean, flying the pennant of __Bande Mataram__, and it will\nserve as the cradle to my power, as well as to my love.\n\nBimala will see such a majestic vision of deliverance, that her\nbonds will slip from about her, without shame, without her even\nbeing aware of it.  Fascinated by the beauty of this terrible\nwrecking power, she will not hesitate a moment to be cruel.  I\nhave seen in Bimala's nature the cruelty which is the inherent\nforce of existence--the cruelty which with its unrelenting might\nkeeps the world beautiful.\n\nIf only women could be set free from the artificial fetters put\nround them by men, we could see on earth the living image of\nKali, the shameless, pitiless goddess.  I am a worshipper of\nKali, and one day I shall truly worship her, setting Bimala on\nher altar of Destruction.  For this let me get ready.\n\nThe way of retreat is absolutely closed for both of us.  We shall\ndespoil each other: get to hate each other: but never more be\nfree.\n\n\n\nChapter Five\n\nNikhil's Story\n\nIV\n\n\n\nEVERYTHING is rippling and waving with the flood of August.  The\nyoung shoots of rice have the sheen of an infant's limbs.  The\nwater has invaded the garden next to our house.  The morning\nlight, like the love of the blue sky, is lavished upon the earth\n...  Why cannot I sing?  The water of the distant river is\nshimmering with light; the leaves are glistening; the rice-\nfields, with their fitful shivers, break into gleams of gold; and\nin this symphony of Autumn, only I remain voiceless.  The\nsunshine of the world strikes my heart, but is not reflected\nback.\n\nWhen I realize the lack of expressiveness in myself, I know why I\nam deprived.  Who could bear my company day and night without a\nbreak?  Bimala is full of the energy of life, and so she has\nnever become stale to me for a moment, in all these nine years of\nour wedded life.\n\nMy life has only its dumb depths; but no murmuring rush.  I can\nonly receive: not impart movement.  And therefore my company is\nlike fasting.  I recognize clearly today that Bimala has been\nlanguishing because of a famine of companionship.\n\nThen whom shall I blame?  Like Vidyapati I can only lament:\n\n/*\n  It is August, the sky breaks into a passionate rain;\n  Alas, empty is my house.\n*/\n\nMy house, I now see, was built to remain empty, because its doors\ncannot open.  But I never knew till now that its divinity had\nbeen sitting outside.  I had fondly believed that she had\naccepted my sacrifice, and granted in return her boon.  But,\nalas, my house has all along been empty.\n\nEvery year, about this time, it was our practice to go in a\nhouse-boat over the broads of Samalda.  I used to tell Bimala\nthat a song must come back to its refrain over and over again.\nThe original refrain of every song is in Nature, where the rain-\nladen wind passes over the rippling stream, where the green\nearth, drawing its shadow-veil over its face, keeps its ear close\nto the speaking water.  There, at the beginning of time, a man\nand a woman first met--not within walls.  And therefore we two\nmust come back to Nature, at least once a year, to tune our love\nanew to the first pure note of the meeting of hearts.\n\nThe first two anniversaries of our married life I spent in\nCalcutta, where I went through my examinations.  But from the\nnext year onwards, for seven years without a break, we have\ncelebrated our union among the blossoming water-lilies.  Now\nbegins the next octave of my life.\n\nIt was difficult for me to ignore the fact that the same month of\nAugust had come round again this year.  Does Bimala remember it,\nI wonder?--she has given me no reminder.  Everything is mute\nabout me.\n\n/*\n  It is August, the sky breaks into a passionate rain;\n  Alas, empty is my house.\n*/\n\nThe house which becomes empty through the parting of lovers,\nstill has music left in the heart of its emptiness.  But the\nhouse that is empty because hearts are asunder, is awful in its\nsilence.  Even the cry of pain is out of place there.\n\nThis cry of pain must be silenced in me.  So long as I continue\nto suffer, Bimala will never have true freedom.  I must free her\ncompletely, otherwise I shall never gain my freedom from untruth\n...\n\nI think I have come to the verge of understanding one thing.  Man\nhas so fanned the flame of the loves of men and women, as to make\nit overpass its rightful domain, and now, even in the name of\nhumanity itself, he cannot bring it back under control.  Man's\nworship has idolized his passion.  But there must be no more\nhuman sacrifices at its shrine ...\n\nI went into my bedroom this morning, to fetch a book.  It is long\nsince I have been there in the day-time.  A pang passed through\nme as I looked round it today, in the morning light.  On the\nclothes rack was hanging a __sari__ of Bimala's, crinkled\nready for wear.  On the dressing-table were her perfumes, her\ncomb, her hair-pins, and with them, still, her vermilion box!\nUnderneath were her tiny gold-embroidered slippers.\n\nOnce, in the old days, when Bimala had not yet overcome her\nobjections to shoes, I had got these out from Lucknow, to tempt\nher.  The first time she was ready to drop for very shame, to go\nin them even from the room to the verandah.  Since then she has\nworn out many shoes, but has treasured up this pair.  When first\nshowing her the slippers, I chaffed her over a curious practice\nof hers; \"I have caught you taking the dust of my feet, thinking\nme asleep!  These are the offerings of my worship to ward the\ndust off the feet of my wakeful divinity.\"  \"You must not say\nsuch things,\" she protested, \"or I will never wear your shoes!\"\n\nThis bedroom of mine--it has a subtle atmosphere which goes\nstraight to my heart.  I was never aware, as I am today, how my\nthirsting heart has been sending out its roots to cling round\neach and every familiar object.  The severing of the main root, I\nsee, is not enough to set life free.  Even these little slippers\nserve to hold one back.\n\nMy wandering eyes fall on the niche.  My portrait there is\nlooking the same as ever, in spite of the flowers scattered round\nit having been withered black!  Of all the things in the room\ntheir greeting strikes me as sincere.  They are still here simply\nbecause it was not felt worth while even to remove them.  Never\nmind; let me welcome truth, albeit in such sere and sorry garb,\nand look forward to the time when I shall be able to do so\nunmoved, as does my photograph.\n\nAs I stood there, Bimal came in from behind.  I hastily turned my\neyes from the niche to the shelves as I muttered: \"I came to get\nAmiel's Journal.\"  What need had Ito volunteer an explanation?  I\nfelt like a wrong-doer, a trespasser, prying into a secret not\nmeant for me.  I could not look Bimal in the face, but hurried\naway.\n\nV\n\n\n\nI had just made the discovery that it was useless to keep up a\npretence of reading in my room outside, and also that it was\nequally beyond me to busy myself attending to anything at all--so\nthat all the days of my future bid fair to congeal into one solid\nmass and settle heavily on my breast for good--when Panchu, the\ntenant of a neighbouring __zamindar__, came up to me with a\nbasketful of cocoa-nuts and greeted me with a profound obeisance.\n\n\"Well, Panchu,\" said I.  \"What is all this for?\"\n\nI had got to know Panchu through my master.  He was extremely\npoor, nor was I in a position to do anything for him; so I\nsupposed this present was intended to procure a tip to help the\npoor fellow to make both ends meet.  I took some money from my\npurse and held it out towards him, but with folded hands he\nprotested: \"I cannot take that, sir!\"\n\n\"Why, what is the matter?\"\n\n\"Let me make a clean breast of it, sir.  Once, when I was hard\npressed, I stole some cocoa-nuts from the garden here.  I am\ngetting old, and may die any day, so I have come to pay them\nback.\"\n\nAmiel's Journal could not have done me any good that day.  But\nthese words of Panchu lightened my heart.  There are more things\nin life than the union or separation of man and woman.  The great\nworld stretches far beyond, and one can truly measure one's joys\nand sorrows when standing in its midst.\n\nPanchu was devoted to my master.  I know well enough how he\nmanages to eke out a livelihood.  He is up before dawn every day,\nand with a basket of __pan__ leaves, twists of tobacco,\ncoloured cotton yarn, little combs, looking-glasses, and other\ntrinkets beloved of the village women, he wades through the knee-\ndeep water of the marsh and goes over to the Namasudra quarters.\nThere he barters his goods for rice, which fetches him a little\nmore than their price in money.  If he can get back soon enough\nhe goes out again, after a hurried meal, to the sweetmeat\nseller's, where he assists in beating sugar for wafers.  As soon\nas he comes home he sits at his shell-bangle making, plodding on\noften till midnight.  All this cruel toil does not earn, for\nhimself and his family, a bare two meals a day during much more\nthan half the year.  His method of eating is to begin with a good\nfilling draught of water, and his staple food is the cheapest\nkind of seedy banana.  And yet the family has to go with only one\nmeal a day for the rest of the year.\n\nAt one time I had an idea of making him a charity allowance,\n\"But,\" said my master, \"your gift may destroy the man, it cannot\ndestroy the hardship of his lot.  Mother Bengal has not only this\none Panchu.  If the milk in her breasts has run dry, that cannot\nbe supplied from the outside.\"\n\nThese are thoughts which give one pause, and I decided to devote\nmyself to working it out.  That very day I said to Bimal: \"Let us\ndedicate our lives to removing the root of this sorrow in our\ncountry.\"\n\n\"You are my Prince Siddharta, [17] I see,\" she replied with a\nsmile.  \"But do not let the torrent of your feelings end by\nsweeping me away also!\"\n\n\"Siddharta took his vows alone.  I want ours to be a joint\narrangement.\"\n\nThe idea passed away in talk.  The fact is, Bimala is at heart\nwhat is called a \"lady\".  Though her own people are not well off,\nshe was born a Rani.  She has no doubts in her mind that there is\na lower unit of measure for the trials and troubles of the \"lower\nclasses\".  Want is, of course, a permanent feature of their\nlives, but does not necessarily mean \"want\" to them.  Their very\nsmallness protects them, as the banks protect the pool; by\nwidening bounds only the slime is exposed.\n\nThe real fact is that Bimala has only come into my home, not into\nmy life.  I had magnified her so, leaving her such a large place,\nthat when I lost her, my whole way of life became narrow and\nconfined.  I had thrust aside all other objects into a corner to\nmake room for Bimala--taken up as I was with decorating her and\ndressing her and educating her and moving round her day and\nnight; forgetting how great is humanity and how nobly precious is\nman's life.  When the actualities of everyday things get the\nbetter of the man, then is Truth lost sight of and freedom\nmissed.  So painfully important did Bimala make the mere\nactualities, that the truth remained concealed from me.  That is\nwhy I find no gap in my misery, and spread this minute point of\nmy emptiness over all the world.  And so, for hours on this\nAutumn morning, the refrain has been humming in my ears:\n\n/*\n  It is the month of August, and the sky breaks into a passionate\n    rain;\n  Alas, my house is empty.\n*/\n\n------\n\n17. The name by which Buddha was known when a Prince, before\nrenouncing the world.\n\n\n\nBimala's Story\n\nXI\n\n\n\nThe change which had, in a moment, come over the mind of Bengal\nwas tremendous.  It was as if the Ganges had touched the ashes of\nthe sixty thousand sons of Sagar [18] which no fire could\nenkindle, no other water knead again into living clay.  The ashes\nof lifeless Bengal suddenly spoke up: \"Here am I.\"\n\nI have read somewhere that in ancient Greece a sculptor had the\ngood fortune to impart life to the image made by his own hand.\nEven in that miracle, however, there was the process of form\npreceding life.  But where was the unity in this heap of barren\nashes?  Had they been hard like stone, we might have had hopes of\nsome form emerging, even as Ahalya, though turned to stone, at\nlast won back her humanity.  But these scattered ashes must have\ndropped to the dust through gaps in the Creator's fingers, to be\nblown hither and thither by the wind.  They had become heaped up,\nbut were never before united.  Yet in this day which had come to\nBengal, even this collection of looseness had taken shape, and\nproclaimed in a thundering voice, at our very door: \"Here I am.\"\n\nHow could we help thinking that it was all supernatural?  This\nmoment of our history seemed to have dropped into our hand like a\njewel from the crown of some drunken god.  It had no resemblance\nto our past; and so we were led to hope that all our wants and\nmiseries would disappear by the spell of some magic charm, that\nfor us there was no longer any boundary line between the possible\nand the impossible.  Everything seemed to be saying to us: \"It is\ncoming; it has come!\"\n\nThus we came to cherish the belief that our history needed no\nsteed, but that like heaven's chariot it would move with its own\ninherent power--At least no wages would have to be paid to the\ncharioteer; only his wine cup would have to be filled again and\nagain.  And then in some impossible paradise the goal of our\nhopes would be reached.\n\nMy husband was not altogether unmoved, but through all our\nexcitement it was the strain of sadness in him which deepened and\ndeepened.  He seemed to have a vision of something beyond the\nsurging present.\n\nI remember one day, in the course of the arguments he continually\nhad with Sandip, he said: \"Good fortune comes to our gate and\nannounces itself, only to prove that we have not the power to\nreceive it--that we have not kept things ready to be able to\ninvite it into our house.\"\n\n\"No,\" was Sandip's answer.  \"You talk like an atheist because you\ndo not believe in our gods.  To us it has been made quite visible\nthat the Goddess has come with her boon, yet you distrust the\nobvious signs of her presence.\"\n\n\"It is because I strongly believe in my God,\" said my husband,\n\"that I feel so certain that our preparations for his worship are\nlacking.  God has power to give the boon, but we must have power\nto accept it.\"\n\nThis kind of talk from my husband would only annoy me.  I could\nnot keep from joining in: \"You think this excitement is only a\nfire of drunkenness, but does not drunkenness, up to a point,\ngive strength?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" my husband replied.  \"It may give strength, but not\nweapons.\"\n\n\"But strength is the gift of God,\" I went on.  \"Weapons can be\nsupplied by mere mechanics.\"\n\nMy husband smiled.  \"The mechanics will claim their wages before\nthey deliver their supplies,\" he said.\n\nSandip swelled his chest as he retorted: \"Don't you trouble about\nthat.  Their wages shall be paid.\"\n\n\"I shall bespeak the festive music when the payment has been\nmade, not before,\" my husband answered.\n\n\"You needn't imagine that we are depending on your bounty for the\nmusic,\" said Sandip scornfully.  \"Our festival is above all money\npayments.\"\n\nAnd in his thick voice he began to sing:\n\n/*\n  \"My lover of the unpriced love, spurning payments,\n  Plays upon the simple pipe, bought for nothing,\n  Drawing my heart away.\"\n*/\n\nThen with a smile he turned to me and said: \"If I sing, Queen\nBee, it is only to prove that when music comes into one's life,\nthe lack of a good voice is no matter.  When we sing merely on\nthe strength of our tunefulness, the song is belittled.  Now that\na full flood of music has swept over our country, let Nikhil\npractise his scales, while we rouse the land with our cracked\nvoices:\n\n/*\n  \"My house cries to me: Why go out to lose your all?\n  My life says: All that you have, fling to the winds!\n  If we must lose our all, let us lose it: what is it worth after\n    all?\n  If I must court ruin, let me do it smilingly;\n  For my quest is the death-draught of immortality.\n*/\n\n\"The truth is, Nikhil, that we have all lost our hearts.  None\ncan hold us any longer within the bounds of the easily possible,\nin our forward rush to the hopelessly impossible.\n\n/*\n  \"Those who would draw us back,\n  They know not the fearful joy of recklessness.\n  They know not that we have had our call\n  From the end of the crooked path.\n  All that is good and straight and trim--\n  Let it topple over in the dust.\"\n*/\n\nI thought that my husband was going to continue the discussion,\nbut he rose silently from his seat and left us.\n\nThe thing that was agitating me within was merely a variation of\nthe stormy passion outside, which swept the country from one end\nto the other.  The car of the wielder of my destiny was fast\napproaching, and the sound of its wheels reverberated in my\nbeing.  I had a constant feeling that something extraordinary\nmight happen any moment, for which, however, the responsibility\nwould not be mine.  Was I not removed from the plane in which\nright and wrong, and the feelings of others, have to be\nconsidered?  Had I ever wanted this--had I ever been waiting or\nhoping for any such thing?  Look at my whole life and tell me\nthen, if I was in any way accountable.\n\nThrough all my past I had been consistent in my devotion--but\nwhen at length it came to receiving the boon, a different god\nappeared!  And just as the awakened country, with its __Bande\nMataram__, thrills in salutation to the unrealized future\nbefore it, so do all my veins and nerves send forth shocks of\nwelcome to the unthought-of, the unknown, the importunate\nStranger.\n\nOne night I left my bed and slipped out of my room on to the open\nterrace.  Beyond our garden wall are fields of ripening rice.\nThrough the gaps in the village groves to the North, glimpses of\nthe river are seen.  The whole scene slept in the darkness like\nthe vague embryo of some future creation.\n\nIn that future I saw my country, a woman like myself, standing\nexpectant.  She has been drawn forth from her home corner by the\nsudden call of some Unknown.  She has had no time to pause or\nponder, or to light herself a torch, as she rushes forward into\nthe darkness ahead.  I know well how her very soul responds to\nthe distant flute-strains which call her; how her breast rises\nand falls; how she feels she nears it, nay it is already hers, so\nthat it matters not even if she run blindfold.  She is no mother.\nThere is no call to her of children in their hunger, no home to\nbe lighted of an evening, no household work to be done.  So; she\nhies to her tryst, for this is the land of the Vaishnava Poets.\nShe has left home, forgotten domestic duties; she has nothing but\nan unfathomable yearning which hurries her on--by what road, to\nwhat goal, she recks not.\n\nI, also, am possessed of just such a yearning.  I likewise have\nlost my home and also lost my way.  Both the end and the means\nhave become equally shadowy to me.  There remain only the\nyearning and the hurrying on.  Ah!  wretched wanderer through the\nnight, when the dawn reddens you will see no trace of a way to\nreturn.  But why return?  Death will serve as well.  If the Dark\nwhich sounded the flute should lead to destruction, why trouble\nabout the hereafter?  When I am merged in its blackness, neither\nI, nor good and bad, nor laughter, nor tears, shall be any more!\n\n------\n\n18. The condition of the curse which had reduced them to ashes\nwas such that they could only be restored to life if the stream\nof the Ganges was brought down to them.  [Trans.].\n\nXII\n\n\n\nIn Bengal the machinery of time being thus suddenly run at full\npressure, things which were difficult became easy, one following\nsoon after another.  Nothing could be held back any more, even in\nour corner of the country.  In the beginning our district was\nbackward, for my husband was unwilling to put any compulsion on\nthe villagers.  \"Those who make sacrifices for their country's\nsake are indeed her servants,\" he would say, \"but those who\ncompel others to make them in her name are her enemies.  They\nwould cut freedom at the root, to gain it at the top.\"\n\nBut when Sandip came and settled here, and his followers began to\nmove about the country, speaking in towns and market-places,\nwaves of excitement came rolling up to us as well.  A band of\nyoung fellows of the locality attached themselves to him, some\neven who had been known as a disgrace to the village.  But the\nglow of their genuine enthusiasm lighted them up, within as well\nas without.  It became quite clear that when the pure breezes of\na great joy and hope sweep through the land, all dirt and decay\nare cleansed away.  It is hard, indeed, for men to be frank and\nstraight and healthy, when their country is in the throes of\ndejection.\n\nThen were all eyes turned on my husband, from whose estates alone\nforeign sugar and salt and cloths had not been banished.  Even\nthe estate officers began to feel awkward and ashamed over it.\nAnd yet, some time ago, when my husband began to import country-\nmade articles into our village, he had been secretly and openly\ntwitted for his folly, by old and young alike.  When\n__Swadeshi__ had not yet become a boast, we had despised it\nwith all our hearts.\n\nMy husband still sharpens his Indian-made pencils with his\nIndian-made knife, does his writing with reed pens, drinks his\nwater out of a bell-metal vessel, and works at night in the light\nof an old-fashioned castor-oil lamp.  But this dull, milk-and-\nwater __Swadeshi__ of his never appealed to us.  Rather, we\nhad always felt ashamed of the inelegant, unfashionable furniture\nof his reception-rooms, especially when he had the magistrate, or\nany other European, as his guest.\n\nMy husband used to make light of my protests.  \"Why allow such\ntrifles to upset you?\"  he would say with a smile.\n\n\"They will think us barbarians, or at all events wanting in\nrefinement.\"\n\n\"If they do, I will pay them back by thinking that their\nrefinement does not go deeper than their white skins.\"\n\nMy husband had an ordinary brass pot on his writing-table which\nhe used as a flower-vase.  It has often happened that, when I had\nnews of some European guest, I would steal into his room and put\nin its place a crystal vase of European make.  \"Look here,\nBimala,\" he objected at length, \"that brass pot is as unconscious\nof itself as those blossoms are; but this thing protests its\npurpose so loudly, it is only fit for artificial flowers.\"\n\nThe Bara Rani, alone, pandered to my husband's whims.  Once she\ncomes panting to say: \"Oh, brother, have you heard?  Such lovely\nIndian soaps have come out!  My days of luxury are gone by;\nstill, if they contain no animal fat, I should like to try some.\"\n\nThis sort of thing makes my husband beam all over, and the house\nis deluged with Indian scents and soaps.  Soaps indeed!  They are\nmore like lumps of caustic soda.  And do I not know that what my\nsister-in-law uses on herself are the European soaps of old,\nwhile these are made over to the maids for washing clothes?\n\nAnother time it is: \"Oh, brother dear, do get me some of these\nnew Indian pen-holders.\"\n\nHer \"brother\" bubbles up as usual, and the Bara Rani's room\nbecomes littered with all kinds of awful sticks that go by the\nname of __Swadeshi__ pen-holders.  Not that it makes any\ndifference to her, for reading and writing are out of her line.\nStill, in her writing-case, lies the selfsame ivory pen-holder,\nthe only one ever handled.\n\nThe fact is, all this was intended as a hit at me, because I\nwould not keep my husband company in his vagaries.  It was no\ngood trying to show up my sister-in-law's insincerity; my\nhusband's face would set so hard, if I barely touched on it.  One\nonly gets into trouble, trying to save such people from being\nimposed upon!\n\nThe Bara Rani loves sewing.  One day I could not help blurting\nout: \"What a humbug you are, sister!  When your 'brother' is\npresent, your mouth waters at the very mention of __Swadeshi__\nscissors, but it is the English-made article every time when you\nwork.\"\n\n\"What harm?\"  she replied.  \"Do you not see what pleasure it\ngives him?  We have grown up together in this house, since he was\na boy.  I simply cannot bear, as you can, the sight of the smile\nleaving his face.  Poor dear, he has no amusement except this\nplaying at shop-keeping.  You are his only dissipation, and you\nwill yet be his ruin!\"\n\n\"Whatever you may say, it is not right to be double-faced,\" I\nretorted.\n\nMy sister-in-law laughed out in my face.  \"Oh, our artless little\nChota Rani!--straight as a schoolmaster's rod, eh?  But a woman\nis not built that way.  She is soft and supple, so that she may\nbend without being crooked.\"\n\nI could not forget those words: \"You are his dissipation, and\nwill be his ruin!\"  Today I feel--if a man needs must have some\nintoxicant, let it not be a woman.\n\nXIII\n\n\n\nSuksar, within our estates, is one of the biggest trade centres\nin the district.  On one side of a stretch of water there is held\na daily bazar; on the other, a weekly market.  During the rains\nwhen this piece of water gets connected with the river, and boats\ncan come through, great quantities of cotton yarns, and woollen\nstuffs for the coming winter, are brought in for sale.\n\nAt the height of our enthusiasm, Sandip laid it down that all\nforeign articles, together with the demon of foreign influence,\nmust be driven out of our territory.\n\n\"Of course!\"  said I, girding myself up for a fight.\n\n\"I have had words with Nikhil about it,\" said Sandip.  \"He tells\nme, he does not mind speechifying, but he will not have\ncoercion.\"\n\n\"I will see to that,\" I said, with a proud sense of power.  I\nknew how deep was my husband's love for me.  Had I been in my\nsenses I should have allowed myself to be torn to pieces rather\nthan assert my claim to that, at such a time.  But Sandip had to\nbe impressed with the full strength of my __Shakti__.\n\nSandip had brought home to me, in his irresistible way, how the\ncosmic Energy was revealed for each individual in the shape of\nsome special affinity.  Vaishnava Philosophy, he said, speaks of\nthe __Shakti__ of Delight that dwells in the heart of\ncreation, ever attracting the heart of her Eternal Lover.  Men\nhave a perpetual longing to bring out this __Shakti__ from the\nhidden depths of their own nature, and those of us who succeed in\ndoing so at once clearly understand the meaning of the music\ncoming to us from the Dark.  He broke out singing:\n\n/*\n  \"My flute, that was busy with its song,\n  Is silent now when we stand face to face.\n  My call went seeking you from sky to sky\n    When you lay hidden;\n  But now all my cry finds its smile\n    In the face of my beloved.\"\n*/\n\nListening to his allegories, I had forgotten that I was plain and\nsimple Bimala.  I was __Shakti__; also an embodiment of\nUniversal joy.  Nothing could fetter me, nothing was impossible\nfor me; whatever I touched would gain new life.  The world around\nme was a fresh creation of mine; for behold, before my heart's\nresponse had touched it, there had not been this wealth of gold\nin the Autumn sky!  And this hero, this true servant of the\ncountry, this devotee of mine--this flaming intelligence, this\nburning energy, this shining genius--him also was I creating from\nmoment to moment.  Have I not seen how my presence pours fresh\nlife into him time after time?\n\nThe other day Sandip begged me to receive a young lad, Amulya, an\nardent disciple of his.  In a moment I could see a new light\nflash out from the boy's eyes, and knew that he, too, had a\nvision of __Shakti__ manifest, that my creative force had\nbegun its work in his blood.  \"What sorcery is this of yours!\"\nexclaimed Sandip next day.  \"Amulya is a boy no longer, the wick\nof his life is all ablaze.  Who can hide your fire under your\nhome-roof?  Every one of them must be touched up by it, sooner or\nlater, and when every lamp is alight what a grand carnival of a\n__Dewali__ we shall have in the country!\"\n\nBlinded with the brilliance of my own glory I had decided to\ngrant my devotee this boon.  I was overweeningly confident that\nnone could baulk me of what I really wanted.  When I returned to\nmy room after my talk with Sandip, I loosed my hair and tied it\nup over again.  Miss Gilby had taught me a way of brushing it up\nfrom the neck and piling it in a knot over my head.  This style\nwas a favourite one with my husband.  \"It is a pity,\" he once\nsaid, \"that Providence should have chosen poor me, instead of\npoet Kalidas, for revealing all the wonders of a woman's neck.\nThe poet would probably have likened it to a flower-stem; but I\nfeel it to be a torch, holding aloft the black flame of your\nhair.\"  With which he ...  but why, oh why, do I go back to all\nthat?\n\nI sent for my husband.  In the old days I could contrive a\nhundred and one excuses, good or bad, to get him to come to me.\nNow that all this had stopped for days I had lost the art of\ncontriving.\n\n\n\nNikhil's Story\n\nVI\n\n\n\nPanchu's wife has just died of a lingering consumption.  Panchu\nmust undergo a purification ceremony to cleanse himself of sin\nand to propitiate his community.  The community has calculated\nand informed him that it will cost one hundred and twenty-three\nrupees.\n\n\"How absurd!\"  I cried, highly indignant.  \"Don't submit to this,\nPanchu.  What can they do to you?\"\n\nRaising to me his patient eyes like those of a tired-out beast of\nburden, he said: \"There is my eldest girl, sir, she will have to\nbe married.  And my poor wife's last rites have to be put\nthrough.\"\n\n\"Even if the sin were yours, Panchu,\" I mused aloud, \"you have\nsurely suffered enough for it already.\"\n\n\"That is so, sir,\" he naïvely assented.  \"I had to sell part of\nmy land and mortgage the rest to meet the doctor's bills.  But\nthere is no escape from the offerings I have to make the\nBrahmins.\"\n\nWhat was the use of arguing?  When will come the time, I\nwondered, for the purification of the Brahmins themselves who can\naccept such offerings?\n\nAfter his wife's illness and funeral, Panchu, who had been\ntottering on the brink of starvation, went altogether beyond his\ndepth.  In a desperate attempt to gain consolation of some sort\nhe took to sitting at the feet of a wandering ascetic, and\nsucceeded in acquiring philosophy enough to forget that his\nchildren went hungry.  He kept himself steeped for a time in the\nidea that the world is vanity, and if of pleasure it has none,\npain also is a delusion.  Then, at last, one night he left his\nlittle ones in their tumble-down hovel, and started off wandering\non his own account.\n\nI knew nothing of this at the time, for just then a veritable\nocean-churning by gods and demons was going on in my mind.  Nor\ndid my master tell me that he had taken Panchu's deserted\nchildren under his own roof and was caring for them, though alone\nin the house, with his school to attend to the whole day.\n\nAfter a month Panchu came back, his ascetic fervour considerably\nworn off.  His eldest boy and girl nestled up to him, crying:\n\"Where have you been all this time, father?\"  His youngest boy\nfilled his lap; his second girl leant over his back with her arms\naround his neck; and they all wept together.  \"O sir!\"  sobbed\nPanchu, at length, to my master.  \"I have not the power to give\nthese little ones enough to eat--I am not free to run away from\nthem.  What has been my sin that I should be scourged so, bound\nhand and foot?\"\n\nIn the meantime the thread of Panchu's little trade connections\nhad snapped and he found he could not resume them.  He clung on\nto the shelter of my master's roof, which had first received him\non his return, and said not a word of going back home.  \"Look\nhere, Panchu,\" my master was at last driven to say.  \"If you\ndon't take care of your cottage, it will tumble down altogether.\nI will lend you some money with which you can do a bit of\npeddling and return it me little by little.\"\n\nPanchu was not excessively pleased--was there then no such thing\nas charity on earth?  And when my master asked him to write out a\nreceipt for the money, he felt that this favour, demanding a\nreturn, was hardly worth having.  My master, however, did not\ncare to make an outward gift which would leave an inward\nobligation.  To destroy self-respect is to destroy caste, was his\nidea.\n\nAfter signing the note, Panchu's obeisance to my master fell off\nconsiderably in its reverence--the dust-taking was left out.  It\nmade my master smile; he asked nothing better than that courtesy\nshould stoop less low.  \"Respect given and taken truly balances\nthe account between man and man,\" was the way he put it, \"but\nveneration is overpayment.\"\n\nPanchu began to buy cloth at the market and peddle it about the\nvillage.  He did not get much of cash payment, it is true, but\nwhat he could realize in kind, in the way of rice, jute, and\nother field produce, went towards settlement of his account.  In\ntwo month's time he was able to pay back an instalment of my\nmaster's debt, and with it there was a corresponding reduction in\nthe depth of his bow.  He must have begun to feel that he had\nbeen revering as a saint a mere man, who had not even risen\nsuperior to the lure of lucre.\n\nWhile Panchu was thus engaged, the full shock of the\n__Swadeshi__ flood fell on him.\n\nVII\n\n\n\nIt was vacation time, and many youths of our village and its\nneighbourhood had come home from their schools and colleges.\nThey attached themselves to Sandip's leadership with enthusiasm,\nand some, in their excess of zeal, gave up their studies\naltogether.  Many of the boys had been free pupils of my school\nhere, and some held college scholarships from me in Calcutta.\nThey came up in a body, and demanded that I should banish foreign\ngoods from my Suksar market.\n\nI told them I could not do it.\n\nThey were sarcastic: \"Why, Maharaja, will the loss be too much\nfor you?\"\n\nI took no notice of the insult in their tone, and was about to\nreply that the loss would fall on the poor traders and their\ncustomers, not on me, when my master, who was present,\ninterposed.\n\n\"Yes, the loss will be his--not yours, that is clear enough,\" he\nsaid.\n\n\"But for one's country .  .\"\n\n\"The country does not mean the soil, but the men on it,\"\ninterrupted my master again.  \"Have you yet wasted so much as a\nglance on what was happening to them?  But now you would dictate\nwhat salt they shall eat, what clothes they shall wear.  Why\nshould they put up with such tyranny, and why should we let\nthem?\"\n\n\"But we have taken to Indian salt and sugar and cloth ourselves.\"\n\n\"You may do as you please to work off your irritation, to keep up\nyour fanaticism.  You are well off, you need not mind the cost.\nThe poor do not want to stand in your way, but you insist on\ntheir submitting to your compulsion.  As it is, every moment of\ntheirs is a life-and-death struggle for a bare living; you cannot\neven imagine the difference a few pice means to them--so little\nhave you in common.  You have spent your whole past in a superior\ncompartment, and now you come down to use them as tools for the\nwreaking of your wrath.  I call it cowardly.\"\n\nThey were all old pupils of my master, so they did not venture to\nbe disrespectful, though they were quivering with indignation.\nThey turned to me.  \"Will you then be the only one, Maharaja, to\nput obstacles in the way of what the country would achieve?\"\n\n\"Who am I, that I should dare do such a thing?  Would I not\nrather lay down my life to help it?\"\n\nThe M.A.  student smiled a crooked smile, as he asked: \"May we\nenquire what you are actually doing to help?\"\n\n\"I have imported Indian mill-made yarn and kept it for sale in my\nSuksar market, and also sent bales of it to markets belonging to\nneighbouring __zamindars__.\"\n\n\"But we have been to your market, Maharaja,\" the same student\nexclaimed, \"and found nobody buying this yarn.\"\n\n\"That is neither my fault nor the fault of my market.  It only\nshows the whole country has not taken your vow.\"\n\n\"That is not all,\" my master went on.  \"It shows that what you\nhave pledged yourselves to do is only to pester others.  You want\ndealers, who have not taken your vow, to buy that yarn; weavers,\nwho have not taken your vow, to make it up; then their wares\neventually to be foisted on to consumers who, also, have not\ntaken your vow.  The method?  Your clamour, and the\n__zamindars'__ oppression.  The result: all righteousness\nyours, all privations theirs!\"\n\n\"And may we venture to ask, further, what your share of the\nprivation has been?\"  pursued a science student.\n\n\"You want to know, do you?\"  replied my master.  \"It is Nikhil\nhimself who has to buy up that Indian mill yarn; he has had to\nstart a weaving school to get it woven; and to judge by his past\nbrilliant business exploits, by the time his cotton fabrics leave\nthe loom their cost will be that of cloth-of-gold; so they will\nonly find a use, perhaps, as curtains for his drawing-room, even\nthough their flimsiness may fail to screen him.  When you get\ntired of your vow, you will laugh the loudest at their artistic\neffect.  And if their workmanship is ever truly appreciated at\nall, it will be by foreigners.\"\n\nI have known my master all my life, but have never seen him so\nagitated.  I could see that the pain had been silently\naccumulating in his heart for some time, because of his\nsurpassing love for me, and that his habitual self-possession had\nbecome secretly undermined to the breaking point.\n\n\"You are our elders,\" said the medical student.  \"It is unseemly\nthat we should bandy words with you.  But tell us, pray, finally,\nare you determined not to oust foreign articles from your\nmarket?\"\n\n\"I will not,\" I said, \"because they are not mine.\"\n\n\"Because that will cause you a loss!\"  smiled the M.A.  student.\n\n\"Because he, whose is the loss, is the best judge,\" retorted my\nmaster.\n\nWith a shout of __Bande Mataram__ they left us.\n\n\n\nChapter Six\n\nNikhil's Story\n\nVIII\n\n\n\nA FEW days later, my master brought Panchu round to me.  His\n__zamindar__, it appeared, had fined him a hundred rupees, and\nwas threatening him with ejectment.\n\n\"For what fault?\"  I enquired.\n\n\"Because,\" I was told, \"he has been found selling foreign cloths.\nHe begged and prayed Harish Kundu, his __zamindar__, to let\nhim sell off his stock, bought with borrowed money, promising\nfaithfully never to do it again; but the __zamindar__ would\nnot hear of it, and insisted on his burning the foreign stuff\nthere and then, if he wanted to be let off.  Panchu in his\ndesperation blurted out defiantly: \"I can't afford it!  You are\nrich; why not buy it up and burn it?\"  This only made Harish\nKundu red in the face as he shouted: \"The scoundrel must be\ntaught manners, give him a shoe-beating!\"  So poor Panchu got\ninsulted as well as fined.\n\n\"What happened to the cloth?\"\n\n\"The whole bale was burnt.\"\n\n\"Who else was there?\"\n\n\"Any number of people, who all kept shouting __Bande\nMataram__.  Sandip was also there.  He took up some of the\nashes, crying: 'Brothers!  This is the first funeral pyre lighted\nby your village in celebration of the last rites of foreign\ncommerce.  These are sacred ashes.  Smear yourselves with them in\ntoken of your __Swadeshi__ vow.'\"\n\n\"Panchu,\" said I, turning to him, \"you must lodge a complaint.\"\n\n\"No one will bear me witness,\" he replied.\n\n\"None bear witness?--Sandip!  Sandip!\"\n\nSandip came out of his room at my call.  \"What is the matter?\"\nhe asked.\n\n\"Won't you bear witness to the burning of this man's cloth?\"\n\nSandip smiled.  \"Of course I shall be a witness in the case,\" he\nsaid.  \"But I shall be on the opposite side.\"\n\n\"What do you mean,\" I exclaimed, \"by being a witness on this or\nthat side?  Will you not bear witness to the truth?\"\n\n\"Is the thing which happens the only truth?\"\n\n\"What other truths can there be?\"\n\n\"The things that ought to happen!  The truth we must build up\nwill require a great deal of untruth in the process.  Those who\nhave made their way in the world have created truth, not blindly\nfollowed it.\"\n\n\"And so--\"\n\n\"And so I will bear what you people are pleased to call false\nwitness, as they have done who have created empires, built up\nsocial systems, founded religious organizations.  Those who would\nrule do not dread untruths; the shackles of truth are reserved\nfor those who will fall under their sway.  Have you not read\nhistory?  Do you not know that in the immense cauldrons, where\nvast political developments are simmering, untruths are the main\ningredients?\"\n\n\"Political cookery on a large scale is doubtless going on, but--\"\n\n\"Oh, I know!  You, of course, will never do any of the cooking.\nYou prefer to be one of those down whose throats the hotchpotch\nwhich is being cooked will be crammed.  They will partition\nBengal and say it is for your benefit.  They will seal the doors\nof education and call it raising the standard.  But you will\nalways remain good boys, snivelling in your corners.  We bad men,\nhowever, must see whether we cannot erect a defensive\nfortification of untruth.\"\n\n\"It is no use arguing about these things, Nikhil,\" my master\ninterposed.  \"How can they who do not feel the truth within them,\nrealize that to bring it out from its obscurity into the light is\nman's highest aim--not to keep on heaping material outside?\"\n\nSandip laughed.  \"Right, sir!\"  said he.  \"Quite a correct speech\nfor a schoolmaster.  That is the kind of stuff I have read in\nbooks; but in the real world I have seen that man's chief\nbusiness is the accumulation of outside material.  Those who are\nmasters in the art, advertise the biggest lies in their business,\nenter false accounts in their political ledgers with their\nbroadest-pointed pens, launch their newspapers daily laden with\nuntruths, and send preachers abroad to disseminate falsehood like\nflies carrying pestilential germs.  I am a humble follower of\nthese great ones.  When I was attached to the Congress party I\nnever hesitated to dilute ten per cent of truth with ninety per\ncent of untruth.  And now, merely because I have ceased to belong\nto that party, I have not forgotten the basic fact that man's\ngoal is not truth but success.\"\n\n\"True success,\" corrected my master.\n\n\"Maybe,\" replied Sandip, \"but the fruit of true success ripens\nonly by cultivating the field of untruth, after tearing up the\nsoil and pounding it into dust.  Truth grows up by itself like\nweeds and thorns, and only worms can expect to get fruit from\nit!\"  With this he flung out of the room.\n\nMy master smiled as he looked towards me.  \"Do you know, Nikhil,\"\nhe said, \"I believe Sandip is not irreligious--his religion is of\nthe obverse side of truth, like the dark moon, which is still a\nmoon, for all that its light has gone over to the wrong side.\"\n\n\"That is why,\" I assented, \"I have always had an affection for\nhim, though we have never been able to agree.  I cannot contemn\nhim, even now; though he has hurt me sorely, and may yet hurt me\nmore.\"\n\n\"I have begun to realize that,\" said my master.  \"I have long\nwondered how you could go on putting up with him.  I have, at\ntimes, even suspected you of weakness.  I now see that though you\ntwo do not rhyme, your rhythm is the same.\"\n\n\"Fate seems bent on writing __Paradise Lost__ in blank verse,\nin my case, and so has no use for a rhyming friend!\"  I remarked,\npursuing his conceit.\n\n\"But what of Panchu?\"  resumed my master.\n\n\"You say Harish Kundu wants to eject him from his ancestral\nholding.  Supposing I buy it up and then keep him on as my\ntenant?\"\n\n\"And his fine?\"\n\n\"How can the __zamindar__ realize that if he becomes my\ntenant?\"\n\n\"His burnt bale of cloth?\"\n\n\"I will procure him another.  I should like to see anyone\ninterfering with a tenant of mine, for trading as he pleases!\"\n\n\"I am afraid, sir,\" interposed Panchu despondently, \"while you\nbig folk are doing the fighting, the police and the law vultures\nwill merrily gather round, and the crowd will enjoy the fun, but\nwhen it comes to getting killed, it will be the turn of only poor\nme!\"\n\n\"Why, what harm can come to you?\"\n\n\"They will burn down my house, sir, children and all!\"\n\n\"Very well, I will take charge of your children,\" said my master.\n\"You may go on with any trade you like.  They shan't touch you.\"\n\nThat very day I bought up Panchu's holding and entered into\nformal possession.  Then the trouble began.\n\nPanchu had inherited the holding of his grandfather as his sole\nsurviving heir.  Everybody knew this.  But at this juncture an\naunt turned up from somewhere, with her boxes and bundles, her\nrosary, and a widowed niece.  She ensconced herself in Panchu's\nhome and laid claim to a life interest in all he had.\n\nPanchu was dumbfounded.  \"My aunt died long ago,\" he protested.\n\nIn reply he was told that he was thinking of his uncle's first\nwife, but that the former had lost no time in taking to himself a\nsecond.\n\n\"But my uncle died before my aunt,\" exclaimed Panchu, still more\nmystified.  \"Where was the time for him to marry again?\"\n\nThis was not denied.  But Panchu was reminded that it had never\nbeen asserted that the second wife had come after the death of\nthe first, but the former had been married by his uncle during\nthe latter's lifetime.  Not relishing the idea of living with a\nco-wife she had remained in her father's house till her husband's\ndeath, after which she had got religion and retired to holy\nBrindaban, whence she was now coming.  These facts were well\nknown to the officers of Harish Kundu, as well as to some of his\ntenants.  And if the __zamindar's__ summons should be\nperemptory enough, even some of those who had partaken of the\nmarriage feast would be forthcoming!\n\nIX\n\n\n\nOne afternoon, when I happened to be specially busy, word came to\nmy office room that Bimala had sent for me.  I was startled.\n\n\"Who did you say had sent for me?\"  I asked the messenger.\n\n\"The Rani Mother.\"\n\n\"The Bara Rani?\"\n\n\"No, sir, the Chota Rani Mother.\"\n\nThe Chota Rani!  It seemed a century since I had been sent for by\nher.  I kept them all waiting there, and went off into the inner\napartments.  When I stepped into our room I had another shock of\nsurprise to find Bimala there with a distinct suggestion of being\ndressed up.  The room, which from persistent neglect had latterly\nacquired an air of having grown absent-minded, had regained\nsomething of its old order this afternoon.  I stood there\nsilently, looking enquiringly at Bimala.\n\nShe flushed a little and the fingers of her right hand toyed for\na time with the bangles on her left arm.  Then she abruptly broke\nthe silence.  \"Look here!  Is it right that ours should be the\nonly market in all Bengal which allows foreign goods?\"\n\n\"What, then, would be the right thing to do?\"  I asked.\n\n\"Order them to be cleared out!\"\n\n\"But the goods are not mine.\"\n\n\"Is not the market yours?\"\n\n\"It is much more theirs who use it for trade.\"\n\n\"Let them trade in Indian goods, then.\"\n\n\"Nothing would please me better.  But suppose they do not?\"\n\n\"Nonsense!  How dare they be so insolent?  Are you not ...\"\n\n\"I am very busy this afternoon and cannot stop to argue it out.\nBut I must refuse to tyrannize.\"\n\n\"It would not be tyranny for selfish gain, but for the sake of\nthe country.\"\n\n\"To tyrannize for the country is to tyrannize over the country.\nBut that I am afraid you will never understand.\"  With this I\ncame away.\n\nAll of a sudden the world shone out for me with a fresh\nclearness.  I seemed to feel it in my blood, that the Earth had\nlost the weight of its earthiness, and its daily task of\nsustaining life no longer appeared a burden, as with a wonderful\naccess of power it whirled through space telling its beads of\ndays and nights.  What endless work, and withal what illimitable\nenergy of freedom!  None shall check it, oh, none can ever check\nit!  From the depths of my being an uprush of joy, like a\nwaterspout, sprang high to storm the skies.\n\nI repeatedly asked myself the meaning of this outburst of\nfeeling.  At first there was no intelligible answer.  Then it\nbecame clear that the bond against which I had been fretting\ninwardly, night and day, had broken.  To my surprise I discovered\nthat my mind was freed from all mistiness.  I could see\neverything relating to Bimala as if vividly pictured on a camera\nscreen.  It was palpable that she had specially dressed herself\nup to coax that order out of me.  Till that moment, I had never\nviewed Bimala's adornment as a thing apart from herself.  But\ntoday the elaborate manner in which she had done up her hair, in\nthe English fashion, made it appear a mere decoration.  That\nwhich before had the mystery of her personality about it, and was\npriceless to me, was now out to sell itself cheap.\n\nAs I came away from that broken cage of a bedroom, out into the\ngolden sunlight of the open, there was the avenue of bauhinias,\nalong the gravelled path in front of my verandah, suffusing the\nsky with a rosy flush.  A group of starlings beneath the trees\nwere noisily chattering away.  In the distance an empty bullock\ncart, with its nose on the ground, held up its tail aloft--one of\nits unharnessed bullocks grazing, the other resting on the grass,\nits eyes dropping for very comfort, while a crow on its back was\npecking away at the insects on its body.\n\nI seemed to have come closer to the heartbeats of the great earth\nin all the simplicity of its daily life; its warm breath fell on\nme with the perfume of the bauhinia blossoms; and an anthem,\ninexpressibly sweet, seemed to peal forth from this world, where\nI, in my freedom, live in the freedom of all else.\n\nWe, men, are knights whose quest is that freedom to which our\nideals call us.  She who makes for us the banner under which we\nfare forth is the true Woman for us.  We must tear away the\ndisguise of her who weaves our net of enchantment at home, and\nknow her for what she is.  We must beware of clothing her in the\nwitchery of our own longings and imaginings, and thus allow her\nto distract us from our true quest.\n\nToday I feel that I shall win through.  I have come to the\ngateway of the simple; I am now content to see things as they\nare.  I have gained freedom myself; I shall allow freedom to\nothers.  In my work will be my salvation.\n\nI know that, time and again, my heart will ache, but now that I\nunderstand its pain in all its truth, I can disregard it.  Now\nthat I know it concerns only me, what after all can be its value?\nThe suffering which belongs to all mankind shall be my crown.\n\nSave me, Truth!  Never again let me hanker after the false\nparadise of Illusion.  If I must walk alone, let me at least\ntread your path.  Let the drum-beats of Truth lead me to Victory.\n\n\n\nSandip's Story\n\nVII\n\n\n\nBimala sent for me that day, but for a time she could not utter a\nword; her eyes kept brimming up to the verge of overflowing.  I\ncould see at once that she had been unsuccessful with Nikhil.\nShe had been so proudly confident that she would have her own\nway--but I had never shared her confidence.  Woman knows man well\nenough where he is weak, but she is quite unable to fathom him\nwhere he is strong.  The fact is that man is as much a mystery to\nwoman as woman is to man.  If that were not so, the separation of\nthe sexes would only have been a waste of Nature's energy.\n\nAh pride, pride!  The trouble was, not that the necessary thing\nhad failed of accomplishment, but that the entreaty, which had\ncost her such a struggle to make, should have been refused.  What\na wealth of colour and movement, suggestion and deception, group\nthemselves round this \"me\" and \"mine\" in woman.  That is just\nwhere her beauty lies--she is ever so much more personal than\nman.  When man was being made, the Creator was a schoolmaster--\nHis bag full of commandments and principles; but when He came to\nwoman, He resigned His headmastership and turned artist, with\nonly His brush and paint-box.\n\nWhen Bimala stood silently there, flushed and tearful in her\nbroken pride, like a storm-cloud, laden with rain and charged\nwith lightning, lowering over the horizon, she looked so\nabsolutely sweet that I had to go right up to her and take her\nby the hand.  It was trembling, but she did not snatch it away.\n\n\"Bee,\" said I, \"we two are colleagues, for our aims are one.\nLet us sit down and talk it over.\"\n\nI led her, unresisting, to a seat.  But strange!  at that very\npoint the rush of my impetuosity suffered an unaccountable check\n--just as the current of the mighty Padma, roaring on in its\nirresistible course, all of a sudden gets turned away from the\nbank it is crumbling by some trifling obstacle beneath the\nsurface.  When I pressed Bimala's hand my nerves rang music, like\ntuned-up strings; but the symphony stopped short at the first\nmovement.\n\nWhat stood in the way?  Nothing singly; it was a tangle of a\nmultitude of things--nothing definitely palpable, but only that\nunaccountable sense of obstruction.  Anyhow, this much has become\nplain to me, that I cannot swear to what I really am.  It is\nbecause I am such a mystery to my own mind that my attraction for\nmyself is so strong!  If once the whole of myself should become\nknown to me, I would then fling it all away--and reach beatitude!\n\nAs she sat down, Bimala went ashy pale.  She, too, must have\nrealized what a crisis had come and gone, leaving her unscathed.\nThe comet had passed by, but the brush of its burning tail had\novercome her.  To help her to recover herself I said: \"Obstacles\nthere will be, but let us fight them through, and not be down-\nhearted.  Is not that best, Queen?\"\n\nBimala cleared her throat with a little cough, but simply to\nmurmur: \"Yes.\"\n\n\"Let us sketch out our plan of action,\" I continued, as I drew a\npiece of paper and a pencil from my pocket.\n\nI began to make a list of the workers who had joined us from\nCalcutta and to assign their duties to each.  Bimala interrupted\nme before I was through, saying wearily: \"Leave it now; I will\njoin you again this evening\" and then she hurried out of the\nroom.  It was evident she was not in a state to attend to\nanything.  She must be alone with herself for a while--perhaps\nlie down on her bed and have a good cry!\n\nWhen she left me, my intoxication began to deepen, as the cloud\ncolours grow richer after the sun is down.  I felt I had let the\nmoment of moments slip by.  What an awful coward I had been!  She\nmust have left me in sheer disgust at my qualms--and she was\nright!\n\nWhile I was tingling all over with these reflections, a servant\ncame in and announced Amulya, one of our boys.  I felt like\nsending him away for the time, but he stepped in before I could\nmake up my mind.  Then we fell to discussing the news of the\nfights which were raging in different quarters over cloth and\nsugar and salt; and the air was soon clear of all fumes of\nintoxication.  I felt as if awakened from a dream.  I leapt to my\nfeet feeling quite ready for the fray--Bande Mataram!\n\nThe news was various.  Most of the traders who were tenants of\nHarish Kundu had come over to us.  Many of Nikhil's officials\nwere also secretly on our side, pulling the wires in our\ninterest.  The Marwari shopkeepers were offering to pay a\npenalty, if only allowed to clear their present stocks.  Only\nsome Mahomedan traders were still obdurate.\n\nOne of them was taking home some German-made shawls for his\nfamily.  These were confiscated and burnt by one of our village\nboys.  This had given rise to trouble.  We offered to buy him\nIndian woollen stuffs in their place.  But where were cheap\nIndian woollens to be had?  We could not very well indulge him in\nCashmere shawls!  He came and complained to Nikhil, who advised\nhim to go to law.  Of course Nikhil's men saw to it that the\ntrial should come to nothing, even his law-agent being on our\nside!\n\nThe point is, if we have to replace burnt foreign clothes with\nIndian cloth every time, and on the top of that fight through a\nlaw-suit, where is the money to come from?  And the beauty of it\nis that this destruction of foreign goods is increasing their\ndemand and sending up the foreigner's profits--very like what\nhappened to the fortunate shopkeeper whose chandeliers the nabob\ndelighted in smashing, tickled by the tinkle of the breaking\nglass.\n\nThe next problem is--since there is no such thing as cheap and\ngaudy Indian woollen stuff, should we be rigorous in our boycott\nof foreign flannels and memos, or make an exception in their\nfavour?\n\n\"Look here!\"  said I at length on the first point, \"we are not\ngoing to keep on making presents of Indian stuff to those who\nhave got their foreign purchases confiscated.  The penalty is\nintended to fall on them, not on us.  If they go to law, we must\nretaliate by burning down their granaries!--What startles you,\nAmulya?  It is not the prospect of a grand illumination that\ndelights me!  You must remember, this is War.  If you are afraid\nof causing suffering, go in for love-making, you will never do\nfor this work!\"\n\nThe second problem I solved by deciding to allow no compromise\nwith foreign articles, in any circumstance whatever.  In the good\nold days, when these gaily coloured foreign shawls were unknown,\nour peasantry used to manage well enough with plain cotton\nquilts--they must learn to do so again.  They may not look as\ngorgeous, but this is not the time to think of looks.\n\nMost of the boatmen had been won over to refuse to carry foreign\ngoods, but the chief of them, Mirjan, was still insubordinate.\n\n\"Could you not get his boat sunk?\"  I asked our manager here.\n\n\"Nothing easier, sir,\" he replied.  \"But what if afterwards I am\nheld responsible?\"\n\n\"Why be so clumsy as to leave any loophole for responsibility?\nHowever, if there must be any, my shoulders will be there to bear\nit.\"\n\nMirjan's boat was tied near the landing-place after its freight\nhad been taken over to the market-place.  There was no one on it,\nfor the manager had arranged for some entertainment to which all\nhad been invited.  After dusk the boat, loaded with rubbish, was\nholed and set adrift.  It sank in mid-stream.\n\nMirjan understood the whole thing.  He came to me in tears to beg\nfor mercy.  \"I was wrong, sir--\" he began.\n\n\"What makes you realize that all of a sudden?\"  I sneered.\n\nHe made no direct reply.  \"The boat was worth two thousand\nrupees,\" he said.  \"I now see my mistake, and if excused this\ntime I will never ...\"  with which he threw himself at my feet.\n\nI asked him to come ten days later.  If only we could pay him\nthat two thousand rupees at once, we could buy him up body and\nsoul.  This is just the sort of man who could render us immense\nservice, if won over.  We shall never be able to make any headway\nunless we can lay our hands on plenty of money.\n\nAs soon as Bimala came into the sitting-room, in the evening, I\nsaid as I rose up to receive her: \"Queen!  Everything is ready,\nsuccess is at hand, but we must have money.\n\n\"Money?  How much money?\"\n\n\"Not so very much, but by hook or by crook we must have it!\"\n\n\"But how much?\"\n\n\"A mere fifty thousand rupees will do for the present.\"\n\nBimala blenched inwardly at the figure, but tried not to show it.\nHow could she again admit defeat?\n\n\"Queen!\"  said I, \"you only can make the impossible possible.\nIndeed you have already done so.  Oh, that I could show you the\nextent of your achievement--then you would know it.  But the time\nfor that is not now.  Now we want money!\"\n\n\"You shall have it,\" she said.\n\nI could see that the thought of selling her jewels had occurred\nto her.  So I said: \"Your jewels must remain in reserve.  One can\nnever tell when they may be wanted.\"  And then, as Bimala stared\nblankly at me in silence, I went on: \"This money must come from\nyour husband's treasury.\"\n\nBimala was still more taken aback.  After a long pause she said:\n\"But how am Ito get his money?\"\n\n\"Is not his money yours as well?\"\n\n\"Ah, no!\"  she said, her wounded pride hurt afresh.\n\n\"If not,\" I cried, \"neither is it his, but his country's, whom he\nhas deprived of it, in her time of need!\"\n\n\"But how am Ito get it?\"  she repeated.\n\n\"Get it you shall and must.  You know best how.  You must get it\nfor Her to whom it rightfully belongs.  __Bande Mataram__!\nThese are the magic words which will open the door of his iron\nsafe, break through the walls of his strong-room, and confound\nthe hearts of those who are disloyal to its call.  Say __Bande\nMataram__, Bee!\"\n\n\"__Bande Mataram__!\"\n\n\n\nChapter Seven\n\nSandip's Story\n\nVIII\n\n\n\nWE are men, we are kings, we must have our tribute.  Ever since\nwe have come upon the Earth we have been plundering her; and the\nmore we claimed, the more she submitted.  From primeval days have\nwe men been plucking fruits, cutting down trees, digging up the\nsoil, killing beast, bird and fish.  From the bottom of the sea,\nfrom underneath the ground, from the very jaws of death, it has\nall been grabbing and grabbing and grabbing--no strong-box in\nNature's store-room has been respected or left unrifled.  The one\ndelight of this Earth is to fulfil the claims of those who are\nmen.  She has been made fertile and beautiful and complete\nthrough her endless sacrifices to them.  But for this, she would\nbe lost in the wilderness, not knowing herself, the doors of her\nheart shut, her diamonds and pearls never seeing the light.\n\nLikewise, by sheer force of our claims, we men have opened up all\nthe latent possibilities of women.  In the process of\nsurrendering themselves to us, they have ever gained their true\ngreatness.  Because they had to bring all the diamonds of their\nhappiness and the pearls of their sorrow into our royal treasury,\nthey have found their true wealth.  So for men to accept is truly\nto give: for women to give is truly to gain.\n\nThe demand I have just made from Bimala, however, is indeed a\nlarge one!  At first I felt scruples; for is it not the habit of\nman's mind to be in purposeless conflict with itself?  I thought\nI had imposed too hard a task.  My first impulse was to call her\nback, and tell her I would rather not make her life wretched by\ndragging her into all these troubles.  I forgot, for the moment,\nthat it was the mission of man to be aggressive, to make woman's\nexistence fruitful by stirring up disquiet in the depth of her\npassivity, to make the whole world blessed by churning up the\nimmeasurable abyss of suffering!  This is why man's hands are so\nstrong, his grip so firm.  Bimala had been longing with all her\nheart that I, Sandip, should demand of her some great sacrifice--\nshould call her to her death.  How else could she be happy?  Had\nshe not waited all these weary years only for an opportunity to\nweep out her heart--so satiated was she with the monotony of her\nplacid happiness?  And therefore, at the very sight of me, her\nheart's horizon darkened with the rain clouds of her impending\ndays of anguish.  If I pity her and save her from her sorrows,\nwhat then was the purpose of my being born a man?\n\nThe real reason of my qualms is that my demand happens to be for\nmoney.  That savours of beggary, for money is man's, not woman's.\nThat is why I had to make it a big figure.  A thousand or two\nwould have the air of petty theft.  Fifty thousand has all the\nexpanse of romantic brigandage.  Ah, but riches should really\nhave been mine!  So many of my desires have had to halt, again\nand again, on the road to accomplishment simply for want of\nmoney.  This does not become me!  Had my fate been merely unjust,\nit could be forgiven--but its bad taste is unpardonable.  It is\nnot simply a hardship that a man like me should be at his wit's\nend to pay his house rent, or should have to carefully count out\nthe coins for an Intermediate Class railway ticket--it is vulgar!\n\nIt is equally clear that Nikhil's paternal estates are a\nsuperfluity to him.  For him it would not have been at all\nunbecoming to be poor.  He would have cheerfully pulled in the\ndouble harness of indigent mediocrity with that precious master\nof his.  I should love to have, just for once, the chance to\nfling about fifty thousand rupees in the service of my country\nand to the satisfaction of myself.  I am a nabob born, and it is\na great dream of mine to get rid of this disguise of poverty,\nthough it be for a day only, and to see myself in my true\ncharacter.  I have grave misgivings, however, as to Bimala ever\ngetting that fifty thousand rupees within her reach, and it will\nprobably be only a thousand or two which will actually come to\nhand.  Be it so.  The wise man is content with half a loaf, or\nany fraction for that matter, rather than no bread.  I must\nreturn to these personal reflections of mine later.  News comes\nthat I am wanted at once.  Something has gone wrong ...\n\nIt seems that the police have got a clue to the man who sank\nMirjan's boat for us.  He was an old offender.  They are on his\ntrail, but he should be too practised a hand to be caught\nblabbing.  However, one never knows.  Nikhil's back is up, and\nhis manager may not be able to have things his own way.\n\n\"If I get into trouble, sir,\" said the manager when I saw him, \"I\nshall have to drag you in!\"\n\n\"Where is the noose with which you can catch me?\"  I asked.\n\n\"I have a letter of yours, and several of Amulya Babu's.\"  I\ncould not see that the letter marked \"urgent\" to which I had been\nhurried into writing a reply was wanted urgently for this purpose\nonly!  I am getting to learn quite a number of things.\n\nThe point now is, that the police must be bribed and hush-money\npaid to Mirjan for his boat.  It is also becoming evident that\nmuch of the cost of this patriotic venture of ours will find its\nway as profit into the pockets of Nikhil's manager.  However, I\nmust shut my eyes to that for the present, for is he not shouting\n__Bande Mataram__ as lustily as I am?\n\nThis kind of work has always to be carried on with leaky vessels\nwhich let as much through as they fetch in.  We all have a hidden\nfund of moral judgement stored away within us, and so I was about\nto wax indignant with the manager, and enter in my diary a tirade\nagainst the unreliability of our countrymen.  But, if there be a\ngod, I must acknowledge with gratitude to him that he has given\nme a clear-seeing mind, which allows nothing inside or outside it\nto remain vague.  I may delude others, but never myself.  So I\nwas unable to continue angry.\n\nWhatever is true is neither good nor bad, but simply true, and\nthat is Science.  A lake is only the remnant of water which has\nnot been sucked into the ground.  Underneath the cult of __Bande\nMataram__, as indeed at the bottom of all mundane affairs,\nthere is a region of slime, whose absorbing power must be\nreckoned with.  The manager will take what he wants; I also have\nmy own wants.  These lesser wants form a part of the wants of the\ngreat Cause--the horse must be fed and the wheels must be oiled\nif the best progress is to be made.\n\nThe long and short of it is that money we must have, and that\nsoon.  We must take whatever comes the readiest, for we cannot\nafford to wait.  I know that the immediate often swallows up the\nultimate; that the five thousand rupees of today may nip in the\nbud the fifty thousand rupees of tomorrow.  But I must accept the\npenalty.  Have I not often twitted Nikhil that they who walk in\nthe paths of restraint have never known what sacrifice is?  It is\nwe greedy folk who have to sacrifice our greed at every step!\n\nOf the cardinal sins of man, Desire is for men who are men--but\nDelusion, which is only for cowards, hampers them.  Because\ndelusion keeps them wrapped up in past and future, but is the\nvery deuce for confounding their footsteps in the present.  Those\nwho are always straining their ears for the call of the remote,\nto the neglect of the call of the imminent, are like Sakuntala\n[19] absorbed in the memories of her lover.  The guest comes\nunheeded, and the curse descends, depriving them of the very\nobject of their desire.\n\nThe other day I pressed Bimala's hand, and that touch still stirs\nher mind, as it vibrates in mine.  Its thrill must not be\ndeadened by repetition, for then what is now music will descend\nto mere argument.  There is at present no room in her mind for\nthe question \"why?\"  So I must not deprive Bimala, who is one of\nthose creatures for whom illusion is necessary, of her full\nsupply of it.\n\nAs for me, I have so much else to do that I shall have to be\ncontent for the present with the foam of the wine cup of passion.\nO man of desire!  Curb your greed, and practise your hand on the\nharp of illusion till you can bring out all the delicate nuances\nof suggestion.  This is not the time to drain the cup to the\ndregs.\n\n------\n\n19. Sakuntala, after the king, her lover, went back to his\nkingdom, promising to send for her, was so lost in thoughts of\nhim, that she failed to hear the call of her hermit guest who\nthereupon cursed her, saying that the object of her love would\nforget all about her.  [Trans.].\n\nIX\n\n\n\nOur work proceeds apace.  But though we have shouted ourselves\nhoarse, proclaiming the Mussulmans to be our brethren, we have\ncome to realize that we shall never be able to bring them wholly\nround to our side.  So they must be suppressed altogether and\nmade to understand that we are the masters.  They are now showing\ntheir teeth, but one day they shall dance like tame bears to the\ntune we play.\n\n\"If the idea of a United India is a true one,\" objects Nikhil,\n\"Mussulmans are a necessary part of it.\"\n\n\"Quite so,\" said I, \"but we must know their place and keep them\nthere, otherwise they will constantly be giving trouble.\"\n\n\"So you want to make trouble to prevent trouble?\"\n\n\"What, then, is your plan?\"\n\n\"There is only one well-known way of avoiding quarrels,\" said\nNikhil meaningly.\n\nI know that, like tales written by good people, Nikhil's\ndiscourse always ends in a moral.  The strange part of it is that\nwith all his familiarity with moral precepts, he still believes\nin them!  He is an incorrigible schoolboy.  His only merit is his\nsincerity.  The mischief with people like him is that they will\nnot admit the finality even of death, but keep their eyes always\nfixed on a hereafter.\n\nI have long been nursing a plan which, if only I could carry it\nout, would set fire to the whole country.  True patriotism will\nnever be roused in our countrymen unless they can visualize the\nmotherland.  We must make a goddess of her.  My colleagues saw\nthe point at once.  \"Let us devise an appropriate image!\"  they\nexclaimed.  \"It will not do if you devise it,\" I admonished\nthem.  \"We must get one of the current images accepted as\nrepresenting the country--the worship of the people must flow\ntowards it along the deep-cut grooves of custom.\"\n\nBut Nikhil's needs must argue even about this.  \"We must not seek\nthe help of illusions,\" he said to me some time ago, \"for what we\nbelieve to be the true cause.\"\n\n\"Illusions are necessary for lesser minds,\" I said, \"and to this\nclass the greater portion of the world belongs.  That is why\ndivinities are set up in every country to keep up the illusions\nof the people, for men are only too well aware of their\nweakness.\"\n\n\"No,\" he replied.  \"God is necessary to clear away our illusions.\nThe divinities which keep them alive are false gods.\"\n\n\"What of that?  If need be, even false gods must be invoked,\nrather than let the work suffer.  Unfortunately for us, our\nillusions are alive enough, but we do not know how to make them\nserve our purpose.  Look at the Brahmins.  In spite of our\ntreating them as demi-gods, and untiringly taking the dust of\ntheir feet, they are a force going to waste.\n\n\"There will always be a large class of people, given to\ngrovelling, who can never be made to do anything unless they are\nbespattered with the dust of somebody's feet, be it on their\nheads or on their backs!  What a pity if after keeping Brahmins\nsaved up in our armoury for all these ages--keen and serviceable\n--they cannot be utilized to urge on this rabble in the time of\nour need.\"\n\nBut it is impossible to drive all this into Nikhil's head.  He\nhas such a prejudice in favour of truth--as though there exists\nsuch an objective reality!  How often have I tried to explain to\nhim that where untruth truly exists, there it is indeed the\ntruth.  This was understood in our country in the old days, and\nso they had the courage to declare that for those of little\nunderstanding untruth is the truth.  For them, who can truly\nbelieve their country to be a goddess, her image will do duty for\nthe truth.  With our nature and our traditions we are unable to\nrealize our country as she is, but we can easily bring ourselves\nto believe in her image.  Those who want to do real work must not\nignore this fact.\n\nNikhil only got excited.  \"Because you have lost the power of\nwalking in the path of truth's attainment,\" he cried, \"you keep\nwaiting for some miraculous boon to drop from the skies!  That is\nwhy when your service to the country has fallen centuries into\narrears all you can think of is, to make of it an image and\nstretch out your hands in expectation of gratuitous favours.\"\n\n\"We want to perform the impossible,\" I said.  \"So our country\nneeds must be made into a god.\"\n\n\"You mean you have no heart for possible tasks,\" replied Nikhil.\n\"Whatever is already there is to be left undisturbed; yet there\nmust be a supernatural result:\"\n\n\"Look here, Nikhil,\" I said at length, thoroughly exasperated.\n\n\"The things you have been saying are good enough as moral\nlessons.  These ideas have served their purpose, as milk for\nbabes, at one stage of man's evolution, but will no longer do,\nnow that man has cut his teeth.\n\n\"Do we not see before our very eyes how things, of which we never\neven dreamt of sowing the seed, are sprouting up on every side?\nBy what power?  That of the deity in our country who is becoming\nmanifest.  It is for the genius of the age to give that deity its\nimage.  Genius does not argue, it creates.  I only give form to\nwhat the country imagines.\n\n\"I will spread it abroad that the goddess has vouchsafed me a\ndream.  I will tell the Brahmins that they have been appointed\nher priests, and that their downfall has been due to their\ndereliction of duty in not seeing to the proper performance of\nher worship.  Do you say I shall be uttering lies?  No, say I, it\nis the truth--nay more, the truth which the country has so long\nbeen waiting to learn from my lips.  If only I could get the\nopportunity to deliver my message, you would see the stupendous\nresult.\"\n\n\"What I am afraid of,\" said Nikhil, \"is, that my lifetime is\nlimited and the result you speak of is not the final result.  It\nwill have after-effects which may not be immediately apparent.\"\n\n\"I only seek the result,\" said I, \"which belongs to today.\"\n\n\"The result I seek,\" answered Nikhil, \"belongs to all time.\"\n\nNikhil may have had his share of Bengal's greatest gift--\nimagination, but he has allowed it to be overshadowed and nearly\nkilled by an exotic conscientiousness.  Just look at the worship\nof Durga which Bengal has carried to such heights.  That is one\nof her greatest achievements.  I can swear that Durga is a\npolitical goddess and was conceived as the image of the\n__Shakti__ of patriotism in the days when Bengal was praying\nto be delivered from Mussulman domination.  What other province\nof India has succeeded in giving such wonderful visual expression\nto the ideal of its quest?\n\nNothing betrayed Nikhil's loss of the divine gift of imagination\nmore conclusively than his reply to me.  \"During the Mussulman\ndomination,\" he said, \"the Maratha and the Sikh asked for fruit\nfrom the arms which they themselves took up.  The Bengali\ncontented himself with placing weapons in the hands of his\ngoddess and muttering incantations to her; and as his country did\nnot really happen to be a goddess the only fruit he got was the\nlopped-off heads of the goats and buffaloes of the sacrifice.\nThe day that we seek the good of the country along the path of\nrighteousness, He who is greater than our country will grant us\ntrue fruition.\"\n\nThe unfortunate part of it is that Nikhil's words sound so fine\nwhen put down on paper.  My words, however, are not meant to be\nscribbled on paper, but to be scored into the heart of the\ncountry.  The Pandit records his Treatise on Agriculture in\nprinter's ink; but the cultivator at the point of his plough\nimpresses his endeavour deep in the soil.\n\nX\n\n\n\nWhen I next saw Bimala I pitched my key high without further ado.\n\"Have we been able,\" I began, \"to believe with all our heart in\nthe god for whose worship we have been born all these millions of\nyears, until he actually made himself visible to us?\n\n\"How often have I told you,\" I continued, \"that had I not seen\nyou I never would have known all my country as One.  I know not\nyet whether you rightly understand me.  The gods are invisible\nonly in their heaven--on earth they show themselves to mortal\nmen.\"\n\nBimala looked at me in a strange kind of way as she gravely\nreplied: \"Indeed I understand you, Sandip.\"  This was the first\ntime she called me plain Sandip.\n\n\"Krishna,\" I continued, \"whom Arjuna ordinarily knew only as the\ndriver of his chariot, had also His universal aspect, of which,\ntoo, Arjuna had a vision one day, and that day he saw the Truth.\nI have seen your Universal Aspect in my country.  The Ganges and\nthe Brahmaputra are the chains of gold that wind round and round\nyour neck; in the woodland fringes on the distant banks of the\ndark waters of the river, I have seen your collyrium-darkened\neyelashes; the changeful sheen of your __sari__ moves for me\nin the play of light and shade amongst the swaying shoots of\ngreen corn; and the blazing summer heat, which makes the whole\nsky lie gasping like a red-tongued lion in the desert, is nothing\nbut your cruel radiance.\n\n\"Since the goddess has vouchsafed her presence to her votary in\nsuch wonderful guise, it is for me to proclaim her worship\nthroughout our land, and then shall the country gain new life.\n'Your image make we in temple after temple.' [20] But this our\npeople have not yet fully realized.  So I would call on them in\nyour name and offer for their worship an image from which none\nshall be able to withhold belief.  Oh give me this boon, this\npower.\"\n\nBimala's eyelids drooped and she became rigid in her seat like a\nfigure of stone.  Had I continued she would have gone off into a\ntrance.  When I ceased speaking she opened wide her eyes, and\nmurmured with fixed gaze, as though still dazed: \"O Traveller in\nthe path of Destruction!  Who is there that can stay your\nprogress?  Do I not see that none shall stand in the way of your\ndesires?  Kings shall lay their crowns at your feet; the wealthy\nshall hasten to throw open their treasure for your acceptance;\nthose who have nothing else shall beg to be allowed to offer\ntheir lives.  O my king, my god!  What you have seen in me I know\nnot, but I have seen the immensity of your grandeur in my heart.\nWho am I, what am I, in its presence?  Ah, the awful power of\nDevastation!  Never shall I truly live till it kills me utterly!\nI can bear it no longer, my heart is breaking!\"\n\nBimala slid down from her seat and fell at my feet, which she\nclasped, and then she sobbed and sobbed and sobbed.\n\nThis is hypnotism indeed--the charm which can subdue the world!\nNo materials, no weapons--but just the delusion of irresistible\nsuggestion.  Who says \"Truth shall Triumph\"?  [21] Delusion\nshall win in the end.  The Bengali understood this when he\nconceived the image of the ten-handed goddess astride her lion,\nand spread her worship in the land.  Bengal must now create a new\nimage to enchant and conquer the world.  __Bande Mataram__!\n\nI gently lifted Bimala back into her chair, and lest reaction\nshould set in, I began again without losing time: \"Queen!  The\nDivine Mother has laid on me the duty of establishing her worship\nin the land.  But, alas, I am poor!\"\n\nBimala was still flushed, her eyes clouded, her accents thick, as\nshe replied: \"You poor?  Is not all that each one has yours?\nWhat are my caskets full of jewellery for?  Drag away from me all\nmy gold and gems for your worship.  I have no use for them!\"\n\nOnce before Bimala had offered up her ornaments.  I am not\nusually in the habit of drawing lines, but I felt I had to draw\nthe line there.  [22] I know why I feel this hesitation.  It is\nfor man to give ornaments to woman; to take them from her wounds\nhis manliness.\n\nBut I must forget myself.  Am I taking them?  They are for the\nDivine Mother, to be poured in worship at her feet.  Oh, but it\nmust be a grand ceremony of worship such as the country has never\nbeheld before.  It must be a landmark in our history.  It shall\nbe my supreme legacy to the Nation.  Ignorant men worship gods.\nI, Sandip, shall create them.\n\nBut all this is a far cry.  What about the urgent immediate?  At\nleast three thousand is indispensably necessary--five thousand\nwould do roundly and nicely.  But how on earth am I to mention\nmoney after the high flight we have just taken?  And yet time is\nprecious!\n\nI crushed all hesitation under foot as I jumped up and made my\nplunge: \"Queen!  Our purse is empty, our work about to stop!\"\n\nBimala winced.  I could see she was thinking of that impossible\nfifty thousand rupees.  What a load she must have been carrying\nwithin her bosom, struggling under it, perhaps, through sleepless\nnights!  What else had she with which to express her loving\nworship?  Debarred from offering her heart at my feet, she\nhankers to make this sum of money, so hopelessly large for her,\nthe bearer of her imprisoned feelings.  The thought of what she\nmust have gone through gives me a twinge of pain; for she is now\nwholly mine.  The wrench of plucking up the plant by the roots is\nover.  It is now only careful tending and nurture that is needed.\n\n\"Queen!\"  said I, \"that fifty thousand rupees is not particularly\nwanted just now.  I calculate that, for the present, five\nthousand or even three will serve.\"\n\nThe relief made her heart rebound.  \"I shall fetch you five\nthousand,\" she said in tones which seemed like an outburst of\nsong--the song which Radhika of the Vaishnava lyrics sang:\n\n/*\n  For my lover will I bind in my hair\n  The flower which has no equal in the three worlds!\n*/\n\n--it is the same tune, the same song: five thousand will I bring!\nThat flower will I bind in my hair!\n\nThe narrow restraint of the flute brings out this quality of\nsong.  I must not allow the pressure of too much greed to flatten\nout the reed, for then, as I fear, music will give place to the\nquestions \"Why?\"  \"What is the use of so much?\"  \"How am I to get\nit?\"--not a word of which will rhyme with what Radhika sang!  So,\nas I was saying, illusion alone is real--it is the flute itself;\nwhile truth is but its empty hollow.  Nikhil has of late got a\ntaste of that pure emptiness--one can see it in his face, which\npains even me.  But it was Nikhil's boast that he wanted the\nTruth, while mine was that I would never let go illusion from my\ngrasp.  Each has been suited to his taste, so why complain?\n\nTo keep Bimala's heart in the rarefied air of idealism, I cut\nshort all further discussion over the five thousand rupees.  I\nreverted to the demon-destroying goddess and her worship.  When\nwas the ceremony to be held and where?  There is a great annual\nfair at Ruimari, within Nikhil's estates, where hundreds of\nthousands of pilgrims assemble.  That would be a grand place to\ninaugurate the worship of our goddess!\n\nBimala waxed intensely enthusiastic.  This was not the burning of\nforeign cloth or the people's granaries, so even Nikhil could\nhave no objection--so thought she.  But I smiled inwardly.  How\nlittle these two persons, who have been together, day and night,\nfor nine whole years, know of each other!  They know something\nperhaps of their home life, but when it comes to outside concerns\nthey are entirely at sea.  They had cherished the belief that the\nharmony of the home with the outside was perfect.  Today they\nrealize to their cost that it is too late to repair their neglect\nof years, and seek to harmonize them now.\n\nWhat does it matter?  Let those who have made the mistake learn\ntheir error by knocking against the world.  Why need I bother\nabout their plight?  For the present I find it wearisome to keep\nBimala soaring much longer, like a captive balloon, in regions\nethereal.  I had better get quite through with the matter in\nhand.\n\nWhen Bimala rose to depart and had neared the door I remarked in\nmy most casual manner: \"So, about the money ...\"\n\nBimala halted and faced back as she said: \"On the expiry of the\nmonth, when our personal allowances become due ...\"\n\n\"That, I am afraid, would be much too late.\"\n\n\"When do you want it then?\"\n\n\"Tomorrow.\n\n\"Tomorrow you shall have it.\"\n\n------\n\n20. A line from Bankim Chatterjee's national song __Bande\nMataram__.\n\n21. A quotation from the Upanishads.\n\n22. There is a world of sentiment attached to the ornaments worn\nby women in Bengal.\n\nThey are not merely indicative of the love and regard of the\ngiver, but the wearing of them symbolizes all that is held best\nin wifehood--the constant solicitude for her husband's welfare,\nthe successful performance of the material and spiritual duties\nof the household entrusted to her care.  When the husband dies,\nand the responsibility for the household changes hands, then are\nall ornaments cast aside as a sign of the widow's renunciation of\nworldly concerns.  At any other time the giving up of omaments is\nalways a sign of supreme distress and as such appeals acutely to\nthe sense of chivalry of any Bengali who may happen to witness it\n[Trans.].\n\n\n\nChapter Eight\n\nNikhil's Story\n\nX\n\n\n\nPARAGRAPHS and letters against me have begun to come out in the\nlocal papers; cartoons and lampoons are to follow, I am told.\nJets of wit and humour are being splashed about, and the lies\nthus scattered are convulsing the whole country.  They know that\nthe monopoly of mud-throwing is theirs, and the innocent passer-\nby cannot escape unsoiled.\n\nThey are saying that the residents in my estates, from the\nhighest to the lowest, are in favour of __Swadeshi__, but they\ndare not declare themselves, for fear of me.  The few who have\nbeen brave enough to defy me have felt the full rigour of my\npersecution.  I am in secret league with the police, and in\nprivate communication with the magistrate, and these frantic\nefforts of mine to add a foreign title of my own earning to the\none I have inherited, will not, it is opined, go in vain.\n\nOn the other hand, the papers are full of praise for those\ndevoted sons of the motherland, the Kundu and the Chakravarti\n__zamindars__.  If only, say they, the country had a few more\nof such staunch patriots, the mills of Manchester would have, had\nto sound their own dirge to the tune of __Bande Mataram__.\n\nThen comes a letter in blood-red ink, giving a list of the\ntraitorous __zamindars__ whose treasuries have been burnt down\nbecause of their failing to support the Cause.  Holy Fire, it\ngoes on to say, has been aroused to its sacred function of\npurifying the country; and other agencies are also at work to see\nthat those who are not true sons of the motherland do cease to\nencumber her lap.  The signature is an obvious __nom-de-\nplume__.\n\nI could see that this was the doing of our local students.  So I\nsent for some of them and showed them the letter.\n\nThe B.A.  student gravely informed me that they also had heard\nthat a band of desperate patriots had been formed who would stick\nat nothing in order to clear away all obstacles to the success of\n__Swadeshi__.\n\n\"If,\" said I, \"even one of our countrymen succumbs to these\noverbearing desperadoes, that will indeed be a defeat for the\ncountry!\"\n\n\"We fail to follow you, Maharaja,\" said the history student.\n\"'Our country,\" I tried to explain, \"has been brought to death's\ndoor through sheer fear--from fear of the gods down to fear of\nthe police; and if you set up, in the name of freedom, the fear\nof some other bogey, whatever it may be called; if you would\nraise your victorious standard on the cowardice of the country by\nmeans of downright oppression, then no true lover of the country\ncan bow to your decision.\"\n\n\"Is there any country, sir,\" pursued the history student, \"where\nsubmission to Government is not due to fear?\"\n\n\"The freedom that exists in any country,\" I replied, \"may be\nmeasured by the extent of this reign of fear.  Where its threat\nis confined to those who would hurt or plunder, there the\nGovernment may claim to have freed man from the violence of man.\nBut if fear is to regulate how people are to dress, where they\nshall trade, or what they must eat, then is man's freedom of will\nutterly ignored, and manhood destroyed at the root.\"\n\n\"Is not such coercion of the individual will seen in other\ncountries too?\"  continued the history student.\n\n\"Who denies it?\"  I exclaimed.  \"But in every country man has\ndestroyed himself to the extent that he has permitted slavery to\nflourish.\"\n\n\"Does it not rather show,\" interposed a Master of Arts, \"that\ntrading in slavery is inherent in man--a fundamental fact of his\nnature?\"\n\n\"Sandip Babu made the whole thing clear,\" said a graduate.  \"He\ngave us the example of Harish Kundu, your neighbouring\n__zamindar__.  From his estates you cannot ferret out a single\nounce of foreign salt.  Why?  Because he has always ruled with an\niron hand.  In the case of those who are slaves by nature, the\nlack of a strong master is the greatest of all calamities.\"\n\n\"Why, sir!\"  chimed in an undergraduate, \"have you not heard of\nthe obstreperous tenant of Chakravarti, the other __zamindar__\nclose by--how the law was set on him till he was reduced to utter\ndestitution?  When at last he was left with nothing to eat, he\nstarted out to sell his wife's silver ornaments, but no one dared\nbuy them.  Then Chakravarti's manager offered him five rupees for\nthe lot.  They were worth over thirty, but he had to accept or\nstarve.  After taking over the bundle from him the manager coolly\nsaid that those five rupees would be credited towards his rent!\nWe felt like having nothing more to do with Chakravarti or his\nmanager after that, but Sandip Babu told us that if we threw over\nall the live people, we should have only dead bodies from the\nburning-grounds to carry on the work with!  These live men, he\npointed out, know what they want and how to get it--they are born\nrulers.  Those who do not know how to desire for themselves, must\nlive in accordance with, or die by virtue of, the desires of such\nas these.  Sandip Babu contrasted them--Kundu and Chakravarti--\nwith you, Maharaja.  You, he said, for all your good intentions,\nwill never succeed in planting __Swadeshi__ within your\nterritory.\"\n\n\"It is my desire,\" I said, \"to plant something greater than\n__Swadeshi__.  I am not after dead logs but living trees--and\nthese will take time to grow.\"\n\n\"I am afraid, sir,\" sneered the history student, \"that you will\nget neither log nor tree.  Sandip Babu rightly teaches that in\norder to get, you must snatch.  This is taking all of us some\ntime to learn, because it runs counter to what we were taught at\nschool.  I have seen with my own eyes that when a rent-collector\nof Harish Kundu's found one of the tenants with nothing which\ncould be sold up to pay his rent, he was made to sell his young\nwife!  Buyers were not wanting, and the __zamindar's__ demand\nwas satisfied.  I tell you, sir, the sight of that man's distress\nprevented my getting sleep for nights together!  But, feel it as\nI did, this much I realized, that the man who knows how to get\nthe money he is out for, even by selling up his debtor's wife, is\na better man than I am.  I confess it is beyond me--I am a\nweakling, my eyes fill with tears.  If anybody can save our\ncountry it is these Kundus and these Chakravartis and their\nofficials!\"\n\nI was shocked beyond words.  \"If what you say be true,\" I cried,\n\"I clearly see that it must be the one endeavour of my life to\nsave the country from these same Kundus and Chakravartis and\nofficials.  The slavery that has entered into our very bones is\nbreaking out, at this opportunity, as ghastly tyranny.  You have\nbeen so used to submit to domination through fear, you have come\nto believe that to make others submit is a kind of religion.  My\nfight shall be against this weakness, this atrocious cruelty!\"\nThese things, which are so simple to ordinary folk, get so\ntwisted in the minds of our B.A.'s and M.A.'s, the only purpose\nof whose historical quibbles seems to be to torture the truth!\n\nXI\n\n\n\nI am worried over Panchu's sham aunt.  It will be difficult to\ndisprove her, for though witnesses of a real event may be few or\neven wanting, innumerable proofs of a thing that has not happened\ncan always be marshalled.  The object of this move is, evidently,\nto get the sale of Panchu's holding to me set aside.  Being\nunable to find any other way out of it, I was thinking of\nallowing Panchu to hold a permanent tenure in my estates and\nbuilding him a cottage on it.  But my master would not have it.\nI should not give in to these nefarious tactics so easily, he\nobjected, and offered to attend to the matter himself.\n\n\"You, sir!\"  I cried, considerably surprised.\n\n\"Yes, I,\" he repeated.\n\nI could not see, at all clearly, what my master could do to\ncounteract these legal machinations.  That evening, at the time\nhe usually came to me, he did not turn up.  On my making\ninquiries, his servant said he had left home with a few things\npacked in a small trunk, and some bedding, saying he would be\nback in a few days.  I thought he might have sallied forth to\nhunt for witnesses in Panchu's uncle's village.  In that case,\nhowever, I was sure that his would be a hopeless quest ...\n\nDuring the day I forget myself in my work.  As the late autumn\nafternoon wears on, the colours of the sky become turbid, and so\ndo the feelings of my mind.  There are many in this world whose\nminds dwell in brick-built houses--they can afford to ignore the\nthing called the outside.  But my mind lives under the trees in\nthe open, directly receives upon itself the messages borne by the\nfree winds, and responds from the bottom of its heart to all the\nmusical cadences of light and darkness.\n\nWhile the day is bright and the world in the pursuit of its\nnumberless tasks crowds around, then it seems as if my life wants\nnothing else.  But when the colours of the sky fade away and the\nblinds are drawn down over the windows of heaven, then my heart\ntells me that evening falls just for the purpose of shutting out\nthe world, to mark the time when the darkness must be filled with\nthe One.  This is the end to which earth, sky, and waters\nconspire, and I cannot harden myself against accepting its\nmeaning.  So when the gloaming deepens over the world, like the\ngaze of the dark eyes of the beloved, then my whole being tells\nme that work alone cannot be the truth of life, that work is not\nthe be-all and the end-all of man, for man is not simply a serf--\neven though the serfdom be of the True and the Good.\n\nAlas, Nikhil, have you for ever parted company with that self of\nyours who used to be set free under the starlight, to plunge into\nthe infinite depths of the night's darkness after the day's work\nwas done?  How terribly alone is he, who misses companionship in\nthe midst of the multitudinousness of life.\n\nThe other day, when the afternoon had reached the meeting-point\nof day and night, I had no work, nor the mind for work, nor was\nmy master there to keep me company.  With my empty, drifting\nheart longing to anchor on to something, I traced my steps\ntowards the inner gardens.  I was very fond of chrysanthemums and\nhad rows of them, of all varieties, banked up in pots against one\nof the garden walls.  When they were in flower, it looked like a\nwave of green breaking into iridescent foam.  It was some time\nsince I had been to this part of the grounds, and I was beguiled\ninto a cheerful expectancy at the thought of meeting my\nchrysanthemums after our long separation.\n\nAs I went in, the full moon had just peeped over the wall, her\nslanting rays leaving its foot in deep shadow.  It seemed as if\nshe had come a-tiptoe from behind, and clasped the darkness over\nthe eyes, smiling mischievously.  When I came near the bank of\nchrysanthemums, I saw a figure stretched on the grass in front.\nMy heart gave a sudden thud.  The figure also sat up with a start\nat my footsteps.\n\nWhat was to be done next?  I was wondering whether it would do to\nbeat a precipitate retreat.  Bimala, also, was doubtless casting\nabout for some way of escape.  But it was as awkward to go as to\nstay!  Before I could make up my mind, Bimala rose, pulled the\nend of her __sari__ over her head, and walked off towards the\ninner apartments.\n\nThis brief pause had been enough to make real to me the cruel\nload of Bimala's misery.  The plaint of my own life vanished from\nme in a moment.  I called out: \"Bimala!\"\n\nShe started and stayed her steps, but did not turn back.  I went\nround and stood before her.  Her face was in the shade, the\nmoonlight fell on mine.  Her eyes were downcast, her hands\nclenched.\n\n\"Bimala,\" said I, \"why should I seek to keep you fast in this\nclosed cage of mine?  Do I not know that thus you cannot but pine\nand droop?\"\n\nShe stood still, without raising her eyes or uttering a word.\n\n\"I know,\" I continued, \"that if I insist on keeping you shackled\nmy whole life will be reduced to nothing but an iron chain.  What\npleasure can that be to me?\"\n\nShe was still silent.\n\n\"So,\" I concluded, \"I tell you, truly, Bimala, you are free.\nWhatever I may or may not have been to you, I refuse to be your\nfetters.\"  With which I came away towards the outer apartments.\n\nNo, no, it was not a generous impulse, nor indifference.  I had\nsimply come to understand that never would I be free until I\ncould set free.  To try to keep Bimala as a garland round my\nneck, would have meant keeping a weight hanging over my heart.\nHave I not been praying with all my strength, that if happiness\nmay not be mine, let it go; if grief needs must be my lot, let it\ncome; but let me not be kept in bondage.  To clutch hold of that\nwhich is untrue as though it were true, is only to throttle\noneself.  May I be saved from such self-destruction.\n\nWhen I entered my room, I found my master waiting there.  My\nagitated feelings were still heaving within me.  \"Freedom, sir,\"\nI began unceremoniously, without greeting or inquiry, \"freedom is\nthe biggest thing for man.  Nothing can be compared to it--\nnothing at all!\"\n\nSurprised at my outburst, my master looked up at me in silence.\n\n\"One can understand nothing from books,\" I went on.  \"We read in\nthe scriptures that our desires are bonds, fettering us as well\nas others.  But such words, by themselves, are so empty.  It is\nonly when we get to the point of letting the bird out of its cage\nthat we can realize how free the bird has set us.  Whatever we\ncage, shackles us with desire whose bonds are stronger than those\nof iron chains.  I tell you, sir, this is just what the world has\nfailed to understand.  They all seek to reform something outside\nthemselves.  But reform is wanted only in one's own desires,\nnowhere else, nowhere else!\"\n\n\"We think,\" he said, \"that we are our own masters when we get in\nour hands the object of our desire--but we are really our own\nmasters only when we are able to cast out our desires from our\nminds.\"\n\n\"When we put all this into words, sir,\" I went on, \"it sounds\nlike some bald-headed injunction, but when we realize even a\nlittle of it we find it to be __amrita__--which the gods have\ndrunk and become immortal.  We cannot see Beauty till we let go\nour hold of it.  It was Buddha who conquered the world, not\nAlexander--this is untrue when stated in dry prose--oh when shall\nwe be able to sing it?  When shall all these most intimate truths\nof the universe overflow the pages of printed books and leap out\nin a sacred stream like the Ganges from the Gangotrie?\"\n\nI was suddenly reminded of my master's absence during the last\nfew days and of my ignorance as to its reason.  I felt somewhat\nfoolish as I asked him: \"And where have you been all this while,\nsir?\"\n\n\"Staying with Panchu,\" he replied.\n\n\"Indeed!\"  I exclaimed.  \"Have you been there all these days?\"\n\n\"Yes.  I wanted to come to an understanding with the woman who\ncalls herself his aunt.  She could hardly be induced to believe\nthat there could be such an odd character among the gentlefolk as\nthe one who sought their hospitality.  When she found I really\nmeant to stay on, she began to feel rather ashamed of herself.\n'Mother,' said I, 'you are not going to get rid of me, even if\nyou abuse me!  And so long as I stay, Panchu stays also.  For you\nsee, do you not, that I cannot stand by and see his motherless\nlittle ones sent out into the streets?'\n\n\"She listened to my talks in this strain for a couple of days\nwithout saying yes or no.  This morning I found her tying up her\nbundles.  'We are going back to Brindaban,' she said.  'Let us\nhave our expenses for the journey.' I knew she was not going to\nBrindaban, and also that the cost of her journey would be\nsubstantial.  So I have come to you.\"\n\n\"The required cost shall be paid,\" I said.\n\n\"The old woman is not a bad sort,\" my master went on musingly.\n\"Panchu was not sure of her caste, and would not let her touch\nthe water-jar, or anything at all of his.  So they were\ncontinually bickering.  When she found I had no objection to her\ntouch, she looked after me devotedly.  She is a splendid cook!\n\n\"But all remnants of Panchu's respect for me vanished!  To the\nlast he had thought that I was at least a simple sort of person.\nBut here was I, risking my caste without a qualm to win over the\nold woman for my purpose.  Had I tried to steal a march on her by\ntutoring a witness for the trial, that would have been a\ndifferent matter.  Tactics must be met by tactics.  But stratagem\nat the expense of orthodoxy is more than he can tolerate!\n\n\"Anyhow, I must stay on a few days at Panchu's even after the\nwoman leaves, for Harish Kundu may be up to any kind of devilry.\nHe has been telling his satellites that he was content to have\nfurnished Panchu with an aunt, but I have gone the length of\nsupplying him with a father.  He would like to see, now, how many\nfathers of his can save him!\"\n\n\"We may or may not be able to save him,\" I said; \"but if we\nshould perish in the attempt to save the country from the\nthousand-and-one snares--of religion, custom and selfishness--\nwhich these people are busy spreading, we shall at least die\nhappy.\"\n\n\n\nBimala's Story\n\nXIV\n\n\n\nWho could have thought that so much would happen in this one\nlife?  I feel as if I have passed through a whole series of\nbirths, time has been flying so fast, I did not feel it move at\nall, till the shock came the other day.\n\nI knew there would be words between us when I made up my mind to\nask my husband to banish foreign goods from our market.  But it\nwas my firm belief that I had no need to meet argument by\nargument, for there was magic in the very air about me.  Had not\nso tremendous a man as Sandip fallen helplessly at my feet, like\na wave of the mighty sea breaking on the shore?  Had I called\nhim?  No, it was the summons of that magic spell of mine.  And\nAmulya, poor dear boy, when he first came to me--how the current\nof his life flushed with colour, like the river at dawn!  Truly\nhave I realized how a goddess feels when she looks upon the\nradiant face of her devotee.\n\nWith the confidence begotten of these proofs of my power, I was\nready to meet my husband like a lightning-charged cloud.  But\nwhat was it that happened?  Never in all these nine years have I\nseen such a far-away, distraught look in his eyes--like the\ndesert sky--with no merciful moisture of its own, no colour\nreflected, even, from what it looked upon.  I should have been so\nrelieved if his anger had flashed out!  But I could find nothing\nin him which I could touch.  I felt as unreal as a dream--a dream\nwhich would leave only the blackness of night when it was over.\n\nIn the old days I used to be jealous of my sister-in-law for her\nbeauty.  Then I used to feel that Providence had given me no\npower of my own, that my whole strength lay in the love which my\nhusband had bestowed on me.  Now that I had drained to the dregs\nthe cup of power and could not do without its intoxication, I\nsuddenly found it dashed to pieces at my feet, leaving me nothing\nto live for.\n\nHow feverishly I had sat to do my hair that day.  Oh, shame,\nshame on me, the utter shame of it!  My sister-in-law, when\npassing by, had exclaimed: \"Aha, Chota Rani!  Your hair seems\nready to jump off.  Don't let it carry your head with it.\"\n\nAnd then, the other day in the garden, how easy my husband found\nit to tell me that he set me free!  But can freedom--empty\nfreedom--be given and taken so easily as all that?  It is like\nsetting a fish free in the sky--for how can I move or live\noutside the atmosphere of loving care which has always sustained\nme?\n\nWhen I came to my room today, I saw only furniture--only the\nbedstead, only the looking-glass, only the clothes-rack--not the\nall-pervading heart which used to be there, over all.  Instead of\nit there was freedom, only freedom, mere emptiness!  A dried-up\nwatercourse with all its rocks and pebbles laid bare.  No\nfeeling, only furniture!\n\nWhen I had arrived at a state of utter bewilderment, wondering\nwhether anything true was left in my life, and whereabouts it\ncould be, I happened to meet Sandip again.  Then life struck\nagainst life, and the sparks flew in the same old way.  Here was\ntruth--impetuous truth--which rushed in and overflowed all\nbounds, truth which was a thousand times truer than the Bara Rani\nwith her maid, Thako and her silly songs, and all the rest of\nthem who talked and laughed and wandered about ...\n\n\"Fifty thousand!\"  Sandip had demanded.\n\n\"What is fifty thousand?\"  cried my intoxicated heart.  \"You\nshall have it!\"\n\nHow to get it, where to get it, were minor points not worth\ntroubling over.  Look at me.  Had I not risen, all in one moment,\nfrom my nothingness to a height above everything?  So shall all\nthings come at my beck and call.  I shall get it, get it, get it\n--there cannot be any doubt.\n\nThus had I come away from Sandip the other day.  Then as I looked\nabout me, where was it--the tree of plenty?  Oh, why does this\nouter world insult the heart so?\n\nAnd yet get it I must; how, I do not care; for sin there cannot\nbe.  Sin taints only the weak; I with my __Shakti__ am beyond\nits reach.  Only a commoner can be a thief, the king conquers and\ntakes his rightful spoil ...  I must find out where the treasury\nis; who takes the money in; who guards it.\n\nI spent half the night standing in the outer verandah peering at\nthe row of office buildings.  But how to get that fifty thousand\nrupees out of the clutches of those iron bars?  If by some\n__mantram__ I could have made all those guards fall dead in\ntheir places, I would not have hesitated--so pitiless did I feel!\n\nBut while a whole gang of robbers seemed dancing a war-dance\nwithin the whirling brain of its Rani, the great house of the\nRajas slept in peace.  The gong of the watch sounded hour after\nhour, and the sky overhead placidly looked on.\n\nAt last I sent for Amulya.\n\n\"Money is wanted for the Cause,\" I told him.  \"Can you not get it\nout of the treasury?\"\n\n\"Why not?\"  said he, with his chest thrown out.\n\nAlas!  had I not said \"Why not?\"  to Sandip just in the same way?\nThe poor lad's confidence could rouse no hopes in my mind.\n\n\"How will you do it?\"  I asked.\n\nThe wild plans he began to unfold would hardly bear repetition\noutside the pages of a penny dreadful.\n\n\"No, Amulya,\" I said severely, \"you must not be childish.\"\n\n\"Very well, then,\" he said, \"let me bribe those watchmen.\"\n\n\"Where is the money to come from?\"\n\n\"I can loot the bazar,\" he burst out, without blenching.\n\n\"Leave all that alone.  I have my ornaments, they will serve.\n\n\"But,\" said Amulya, \"it strikes me that the cashier cannot be\nbribed.  Never mind, there is another and simpler way.\"\n\n\"What is that?\"\n\n\"Why need you hear it?  It is quite simple.\"\n\n\"Still, I should like to know.\"\n\nAmulya fumbled in the pocket of his tunic and pulled out, first a\nsmall edition of the __Gita__, which he placed on the table--\nand then a little pistol, which he showed me, but said nothing\nfurther.\n\nHorror!  It did not take him a moment to make up his mind to kill\nour good old cashier!  [23] To look at his frank, open face one\nwould not have thought him capable of hurting a fly, but how\ndifferent were the words which came from his mouth.  It was clear\nthat the cashier's place in the world meant nothing real to him;\nit was a mere vacancy, lifeless, feelingless, with only stock\nphrases from the __Gita--Who kills the body kills naught! __\n\n\"Whatever do you mean, Amulya?\"  I exclaimed at length.  \"Don't\nyou know that the dear old man has got a wife and children and\nthat he is ...\"\n\n\"Where are we to find men who have no wives and children?\"  he\ninterrupted.  \"Look here, Maharani, the thing we call pity is, at\nbottom, only pity for ourselves.  We cannot bear to wound our own\ntender instincts, and so we do not strike at all--pity indeed!\nThe height of cowardice!\"\n\nTo hear Sandip's phrases in the mouth of this mere boy staggered\nme.  So delightfully, lovably immature was he--of that age when\nthe good may still be believed in as good, of that age when one\nreally lives and grows.  The Mother in me awoke.\n\nFor myself there was no longer good or bad--only death, beautiful\nalluring death.  But to hear this stripling calmly talk of\nmurdering an inoffensive old man as the right thing to do, made\nme shudder all over.  The more clearly I saw that there was no\nsin in his heart, the more horrible appeared to me the sin of his\nwords.  I seemed to see the sin of the parents visited on the\ninnocent child.\n\nThe sight of his great big eyes shining with faith and enthusiasm\ntouched me to the quick.  He was going, in his fascination,\nstraight to the jaws of the python, from which, once in, there\nwas no return.  How was he to be saved?  Why does not my country\nbecome, for once, a real Mother--clasp him to her bosom and cry\nout: \"Oh, my child, my child, what profits it that you should\nsave me, if so it be that I should fail to save you?\"\n\nI know, I know, that all Power on earth waxes great under compact\nwith Satan.  But the Mother is there, alone though she be, to\ncontemn and stand against this devil's progress.  The Mother\ncares not for mere success, however great--she wants to give\nlife, to save life.  My very soul, today, stretches out its hands\nin yearning to save this child.\n\nA while ago I suggested robbery to him.  Whatever I may now say\nagainst it will be put down to a woman's weakness.  They only\nlove our weakness when it drags the world in its toils!\n\n\"You need do nothing at all, Amulya, I will see to the money,\" I\ntold him finally.  When he had almost reached the door, I called\nhim back.\n\n\"Amulya,\" said I, \"I am your elder sister.  Today is not the\nBrothers' Day [24] according to the calendar, but all the days in\nthe year are really Brothers' Days.  My blessing be with you: may\nGod keep you always.\"\n\nThese unexpected words from my lips took Amulya by surprise.  He\nstood stock-still for a time.  Then, coming to himself, he\nprostrated himself at my feet in acceptance of the relationship\nand did me reverence.  When he rose his eyes were full of tears\n...  O little brother mine!  I am fast going to my death--let me\ntake all your sin away with me.  May no taint from me ever\ntarnish your innocence!\n\nI said to him: \"Let your offering of reverence be that pistol!\"\n\n\"What do you want with it, sister?\"\n\n\"I will practise death.\"\n\n\"Right, sister.  Our women, also, must know how to die, to deal\ndeath!\"  with which Amulya handed me the pistol.  The radiance of\nhis youthful countenance seemed to tinge my life with the touch\nof a new dawn.  I put away the pistol within my clothes.  May\nthis reverence-offering be the last resource in my extremity ...\n\nThe door to the mother's chamber in my woman's heart once opened,\nI thought it would always remain open.  But this pathway to the\nsupreme good was closed when the mistress took the place of the\nmother and locked it again.  The very next day I saw Sandip; and\nmadness, naked and rampant, danced upon my heart.\n\nWhat was this?  Was this, then, my truer self?  Never!  I had\nnever before known this shameless, this cruel one within me.  The\nsnake-charmer had come, pretending to draw this snake from within\nthe fold of my garment--but it was never there, it was his all\nthe time.  Some demon has gained possession of me, and what I am\ndoing today is the play of his activity--it has nothing to do\nwith me.\n\nThis demon, in the guise of a god, had come with his ruddy torch\nto call me that day, saying: \"I am your Country.  I am your\nSandip.  I am more to you than anything else of yours.  __Bande\nMataram__!\"  And with folded hands I had responded: \"You are my\nreligion.  You are my heaven.  Whatever else is mine shall be\nswept away before my love for you.  __Bande Mataram__!\"\n\nFive thousand is it?  Five thousand it shall be!  You want it\ntomorrow?  Tomorrow you shall have it!  In this desperate orgy,\nthat gift of five thousand shall be as the foam of wine--and then\nfor the riotous revel!  The immovable world shall sway under our\nfeet, fire shall flash from our eyes, a storm shall roar in our\nears, what is or is not in front shall become equally dim.  And\nthen with tottering footsteps we shall plunge to our death--in a\nmoment all fire will be extinguished, the ashes will be\nscattered, and nothing will remain behind.\n\n------\n\n23. The cashier is the official who is most in touch with the\nladies of a __zamindar's__ household, directly taking their\nrequisitions for household stores and doing their shopping for\nthem, and so he becomes more a member of the family than the\nothers.  [Trans.].\n\n24. The daughter of the house occupies a place of specially\ntender affection in a Bengali household (perhaps in Hindu\nhouseholds all over India) because, by dictate of custom, she\nmust be given away in marriage so early.  She thus takes\ncorresponding memories with her to her husband's home, where she\nhas to begin as a stranger before she can get into her place.\nThe resulting feeling, of the mistress of her new home for the\none she has left, has taken ceremonial form as the Brothers' Day,\non which the brothers are invited to the married sisters' houses.\nWhere the sister is the elder, she offers her blessing and\nreceives the brother's reverence, and vice versa.  Presents,\ncalled the offerings of reverence (or blessing), are exchanged.\n[Trans.].\n\n\n\nChapter Nine\n\nBimala's Story\n\nXV\n\n\n\nFOR a time I was utterly at a loss to think of any way of getting\nthat money.  Then, the other day, in the light of intense\nexcitement, suddenly the whole picture stood out clear before me.\n\nEvery year my husband makes a reverence-offering of six thousand\nrupees to my sister-in-law at the time of the Durga Puja.  Every\nyear it is deposited in her account at the bank in Calcutta.\nThis year the offering was made as usual, but it has not yet been\nsent to the bank, being kept meanwhile in an iron safe, in a\ncorner of the little dressing-room attached to our bedroom.\n\nEvery year my husband takes the money to the bank himself.  This\nyear he has not yet had an opportunity of going to town.  How\ncould I fail to see the hand of Providence in this?  The money\nhas been held up because the country wants it--who could have the\npower to take it away from her to the bank?  And how can I have\nthe power to refuse to take the money?  The goddess revelling in\ndestruction holds out her blood-cup crying: \"Give me drink.  I am\nthirsty.\"  I will give her my own heart's blood with that five\nthousand rupees.  Mother, the loser of that money will scarcely\nfeel the loss, but me you will utterly ruin!\n\nMany a time, in the old days, have I inwardly called the Senior\nRani a thief, for I charged her with wheedling money out of my\ntrusting husband.  After her husband's death, she often used to\nmake away with things belonging to the estate for her own use.\nThis I used to point out to my husband, but he remained silent.\nI would get angry and say: \"If you feel generous, make gifts by\nall means, but why allow yourself to be robbed?\"  Providence must\nhave smiled, then, at these complaints of mine, for tonight I am\non the way to rob my husband's safe of my sister-in-law's money.\nMy husband's custom was to let his keys remain in his pockets\nwhen he took off his clothes for the night, leaving them in the\ndressing-room.  I picked out the key of the safe and opened it.\nThe slight sound it made seemed to wake the whole world!  A\nsudden chill turned my hands and feet icy cold, and I shivered\nall over.\n\nThere was a drawer inside the safe.  On opening this I found the\nmoney, not in currency notes, but in gold rolled up in paper.  I\nhad no time to count out what I wanted.  There were twenty rolls,\nall of which I took and tied up in a corner of my __sari__.\n\nWhat a weight it was.  The burden of the theft crushed my heart\nto the dust.  Perhaps notes would have made it seem less like\nthieving, but this was all gold.\n\nAfter I had stolen into my room like a thief, it felt like my own\nroom no longer.  All the most precious rights which I had over it\nvanished at the touch of my theft.  I began to mutter to myself,\nas though telling __mantrams: Bande Mataram, Bande Mataram__,\nmy Country, my golden Country, all this gold is for you, for none\nelse!\n\nBut in the night the mind is weak.  I came back into the bedroom\nwhere my husband was asleep, closing my eyes as I passed through,\nand went off to the open terrace beyond, on which I lay prone,\nclasping to my breast the end of the __sari__ tied over the\ngold.  And each one of the rolls gave me a shock of pain.\n\nThe silent night stood there with forefinger upraised.  I could\nnot think of my house as separate from my country: I had robbed\nmy house, I had robbed my country.  For this sin my house had\nceased to be mine, my country also was estranged from me.  Had I\ndied begging for my country, even unsuccessfully, that would have\nbeen worship, acceptable to the gods.  But theft is never\nworship--how then can I offer this gold?  Ah me!  I am doomed to\ndeath myself, must I desecrate my country with my impious touch?\nThe way to put the money back is closed to me.  I have not\nthe strength to return to the room, take again that key, open\nonce more that safe--I should swoon on the threshold of my\nhusband's door.  The only road left now is the road in front.\nNeither have I the strength deliberately to sit down and count\nthe coins.  Let them remain behind their coverings: I cannot\ncalculate.\n\nThere was no mist in the winter sky.  The stars were shining\nbrightly.  If, thought I to myself, as I lay out there, I had to\nsteal these stars one by one, like golden coins, for my country--\nthese stars so carefully stored up in the bosom of the darkness--\nthen the sky would be blinded, the night widowed for ever, and my\ntheft would rob the whole world.  But was not also this very\nthing I had done a robbing of the whole world--not only of money,\nbut of trust, of righteousness?\n\nI spent the night lying on the terrace.  When at last it was\nmorning, and I was sure that my husband had risen and left the\nroom, then only with my shawl pulled over my head, could I\nretrace my steps towards the bedroom.\n\nMy sister-in-law was about, with her brass pot, watering her\nplants.  When she saw me passing in the distance she cried: \"Have\nyou heard the news, Chota Rani?\"\n\nI stopped in silence, all in a tremor.  It seemed to me that the\nrolls of sovereigns were bulging through the shawl.  I feared\nthey would burst and scatter in a ringing shower, exposing to all\nthe servants of the house the thief who had made herself\ndestitute by robbing her own wealth.\n\n\"Your band of robbers,\" she went on, \"have sent an anonymous\nmessage threatening to loot the treasury.\"\n\nI remained as silent as a thief.\n\n\"I was advising Brother Nikhil to seek your protection,\" she\ncontinued banteringly.  \"Call off your minions, Robber Queen!  We\nwill offer sacrifices to your __Bande Mataram__ if you will\nbut save us.  What doings there are these days!--but for the\nLord's sake, spare our house at least from burglary.\"\n\nI hastened into my room without reply.  I had put my foot on\nquicksand, and could not now withdraw it.  Struggling would only\nsend me down deeper.\n\nIf only the time would arrive when I could hand over the money to\nSandip!  I could bear it no longer, its weight was breaking\nthrough my very ribs.\n\nIt was still early when I got word that Sandip was awaiting me.\nToday I had no thought of adornment.  Wrapped as I was in my\nshawl, I went off to the outer apartments.  As I entered the\nsitting-room I saw Sandip and Amulya there, together.  All my\ndignity, all my honour, seemed to run tingling through my body\nfrom head to foot and vanish into the ground.  I should have to\nlay bare a woman's uttermost shame in sight of this boy!  Could\nthey have been discussing my deed in their meeting place?  Had\nany vestige of a veil of decency been left for me?\n\nWe women shall never understand men.  When they are bent on\nmaking a road for some achievement, they think nothing of\nbreaking the heart of the world into pieces to pave it for the\nprogress of their chariot.  When they are mad with the\nintoxication of creating, they rejoice in destroying the creation\nof the Creator.  This heart-breaking shame of mine will not\nattract even a glance from their eyes.  They have no feeling for\nlife itself--all their eagerness is for their object.  What am I\nto them but a meadow flower in the path of a torrent in flood?\n\nWhat good will this extinction of me be to Sandip?  Only five\nthousand rupees?  Was not I good for something more than only\nfive thousand rupees?  Yes, indeed!  Did I not learn that from\nSandip himself, and was I not able in the light of this knowledge\nto despise all else in my world?  I was the giver of light, of\nlife, of __Shakti__, of immortality--in that belief, in that\njoy, I had burst all my bounds and come into the open.  Had\nanyone then fulfilled for me that joy, I should have lived in my\ndeath.  I should have lost nothing in the loss of my all.\nDo they want to tell me now that all this was false?  The psalm\nof my praise which was sung so devotedly, did it bring me down\nfrom my heaven, not to make heaven of earth, but only to level\nheaven itself with the dust?\n\n\n\nXVI\n\n\n\"The money, Queen?\"  said Sandip with his keen glance full on my\nface.\n\nAmulya also fixed his gaze on me.  Though not my own mother's\nchild, yet the dear lad is brother to me; for mother is mother\nall the world over.  With his guileless face, his gentle eyes,\nhis innocent youth, he looked at me.  And I, a woman--of his\nmother's sex--how could I hand him poison, just because he asked\nfor it?\n\n\"The money, Queen!\"  Sandip's insolent demand rang in my ears.\nFor very shame and vexation I felt I wanted to fling that gold at\nSandip's head.  I could hardly undo the knot of my __sari__,\nmy fingers trembled so.  At last the paper rolls dropped on the\ntable.\n\nSandip's face grew black ...  He must have thought that the rolls\nwere of silver ...  What contempt was in his looks.  What utter\ndisgust at incapacity.  It was almost as if he could have struck\nme!  He must have suspected that I had come to parley with him,\nto offer to compound his claim for five thousand rupees with a\nfew hundreds.  There was a moment when I thought he would snatch\nup the rolls and throw them out of the window, declaring that he\nwas no beggar, but a king claiming tribute.\n\n\"Is that all?\"  asked Amulya with such pity welling up in his\nvoice that I wanted to sob out aloud.  I kept my heart tightly\npressed down, and merely nodded my head.  Sandip was speechless.\nHe neither touched the rolls, nor uttered a sound.\n\nMy humiliation went straight to the boy's heart.  With a sudden,\nfeigned enthusiasm he exclaimed: \"It's plenty.  It will do\nsplendidly.  You have saved us.\"  With which he tore open the\ncovering of one of the rolls.\n\nThe sovereigns shone out.  And in a moment the black covering\nseemed to be lifted from Sandip's countenance also.  His delight\nbeamed forth from his features.  Unable to control his sudden\nrevulsion of feeling, he sprang up from his seat towards me.\nWhat he intended I know not.  I flashed a lightning glance\ntowards Amulya--the colour had left the boy's face as at the\nstroke of a whip.  Then with all my strength I thrust Sandip from\nme.  As he reeled back his head struck the edge of the marble\ntable and he dropped on the floor.  There he lay awhile,\nmotionless.  Exhausted with my effort, I sank back on my seat.\n\nAmulya's face lightened with a joyful radiance.  He did not even\nturn towards Sandip, but came straight up, took the dust of my\nfeet, and then remained there, sitting on the floor in front of\nme.  O my little brother, my child!  This reverence of yours is\nthe last touch of heaven left in my empty world!  I could contain\nmyself no longer, and my tears flowed fast.  I covered my eyes\nwith the end of my __sari__, which I pressed to my face with\nboth my hands, and sobbed and sobbed.  And every time that I felt\non my feet his tender touch trying to comfort me my tears broke\nout afresh.\n\nAfter a little, when I had recovered myself and taken my hands\nfrom my face, I saw Sandip back at the table, gathering up the\nsovereigns in his handkerchief, as if nothing had happened.\nAmulya rose to his seat, from his place near my feet, his wet\neyes shining.\n\n\nSandip coolly looked up at my face as he remarked: \"It is six\nthousand.\"\n\n\"What do we want with so much, Sandip Babu?\"  cried Amulya.\n\"Three thousand five hundred is all we need for our work.\"\n\n\"Our wants are not for this one place only,\" Sandip replied.  \"We\nshall want all we can get.\"\n\n\"That may be,\" said Amulya.  \"But in future I undertake to get\nyou all you want.  Out of this, Sandip Babu, please return the\nextra two thousand five hundred to the Maharani.\"\n\nSandip glanced enquiringly at me.\n\n\"No, no,\" I exclaimed.  \"I shall never touch that money again.\nDo with it as you will.\"\n\n\"Can man ever give as woman can?\"  said Sandip, looking towards\nAmulya.\n\n\"They are goddesses!\"  agreed Amulya with enthusiasm.\n\n\"We men can at best give of our power,\" continued Sandip.  \"But\nwomen give themselves.  Out of their own life they give birth,\nout of their own life they give sustenance.  Such gifts are the\nonly true gifts.\"  Then turning to me, \"Queen!\"  said he, \"if\nwhat you have given us had been only money I would not have\ntouched it.  But you have given that which is more to you than\nlife itself!\"\n\nThere must be two different persons inside men.  One of these in\nme can understand that Sandip is trying to delude me; the other\nis content to be deluded.  Sandip has power, but no strength of\nrighteousness.  The weapon of his which rouses up life smites it\nagain to death.  He has the unfailing quiver of the gods, but the\nshafts in them are of the demons.\n\nSandip's handkerchief was not large enough to hold all the coins.\n\"Queen,\" he asked, \"can you give me another?\"  When I gave him\nmine, he reverently touched his forehead with it, and then\nsuddenly kneeling on the floor he made me an obeisance.\n\"Goddess!\"  he said, \"it was to offer my reverence that I had\napproached you, but you repulsed me, and rolled me in the dust.\nBe it so, I accept your repulse as your boon to me, I raise it to\nmy head in salutation!\"  with which he pointed to the place where\nhe had been hurt.\n\nHad I then misunderstood him?  Could it be that his outstretched\nhands had really been directed towards my feet?  Yet, surely,\neven Amulya had seen the passion that flamed out of his eyes, his\nface.  But Sandip is such an adept in setting music to his chant\nof praise that I cannot argue; I lose my power of seeing truth;\nmy sight is clouded over like an opium-eater's eyes.  And so,\nafter all, he gave me back twice as much in return for the blow I\nhad dealt him--the wound on his head ended by making me bleed at\nheart.  When I had received Sandip's obeisance my theft seemed to\ngain a dignity, and the gold glittering on the table to smile\naway all fear of disgrace, all stings of conscience.\n\nLike me Amulya also was won back.  His devotion to Sandip, which\nhad suffered a momentary check, blazed up anew.  The flower-vase\nof his mind filled once more with offerings for the worship of\nSandip and me.  His simple faith shone out of his eyes with the\npure light of the morning star at dawn.\n\nAfter I had offered worship and received worship my sin became\nradiant.  And as Amulya looked on my face he raised his folded\nhands in salutation and cried __Bande Mataram__!  I cannot\nexpect to have this adoration surrounding me for ever; and yet\nthis has come to be the only means of keeping alive my self-\nrespect.\n\nI can no longer enter my bedroom.  The bedstead seems to thrust\nout a forbidding hand, the iron safe frowns at me.  I want to get\naway from this continual insult to myself which is rankling\nwithin me.  I want to keep running to Sandip to hear him sing my\npraises.  There is just this one little altar of worship which\nhas kept its head above the all-pervading depths of my dishonour,\nand so I want to cleave to it night and day; for on whichever\nside I step away from it, there is only emptiness.\n\nPraise, praise, I want unceasing praise.  I cannot live if my\nwine-cup be left empty for a single moment.  So, as the very\nprice of my life, I want Sandip of all the world, today.\n\nXVII\n\n\n\nWhen my husband nowadays comes in for his meals I feel I cannot\nsit before him; and yet it is such a shame not to be near him\nthat I feel I cannot do that either.  So I seat myself where we\ncannot look at each other's face.  That was how I was sitting the\nother day when the Bara Rani came and joined us.\n\n\"It is all very well for you, brother,\" said she, \"to laugh away\nthese threatening letters.  But they do frighten me so.  Have you\nsent off that money you gave me to the Calcutta bank?\"\n\n\"No, I have not yet had the time to get it away,\" my husband\nreplied.\n\n\"You are so careless, brother dear, you had better look out...\"\n\n\"But it is in the iron safe right inside the inner dressing-\nroom,\" said my husband with a reassuring smile.\n\n\"What if they get in there?  You can never tell!\"\n\n\"If they go so far, they might as well carry you off too!\"\n\n\"Don't you fear, no one will come for poor me.  The real\nattraction is in your room!  But joking apart, don't run the risk\nof keeping money in the room like that.\"\n\n\"They will be taking along the Government revenue to Calcutta in\na few days now; I will send this money to the bank under the same\nescort.\"\n\n\"Very well.  But see you don't forget all about it, you are so\nabsent-minded.\"\n\n\"Even if that money gets lost, while in my room, the loss cannot\nbe yours, Sister Rani.\"\n\n\"Now, now, brother, you will make me very angry if you talk in\nthat way.  Was I making any difference between yours and mine?\nWhat if your money is lost, does not that hurt me?  If Providence\nhas thought fit to take away my all, it has not left me\ninsensible to the value of the most devoted brother known since\nthe days of Lakshman.\"  [25]\n\n\"Well, Junior Rani, are you turned into a wooden doll?  You have\nnot spoken a word yet.  Do you know, brother, our Junior Rani\nthinks I try to flatter you.  If things came to that pass I\nshould not hesitate to do so, but I know my dear old brother does\nnot need it!\"\n\nThus the Senior Rani chattered on, not forgetting now and then to\ndraw her brother's attention to this or that special delicacy\namongst the dishes that were being served.  My head was all the\ntime in a whirl.  The crisis was fast coming.  Something must be\ndone about replacing that money.  And as I kept asking myself\nwhat could be done, and how it was to be done, the unceasing\npatter of my sister-in-law's words seemed more and more\nintolerable.\n\nWhat made it all the worse was, that nothing could escape my\nsister-in-law's keen eyes.  Every now and then she was casting\nside glances towards me.  What she could read in my face I do not\nknow, but to me it seemed that everything was written there only\ntoo plainly.\n\nThen I did an infinitely rash thing.  Affecting an easy, amused\nlaugh I said: \"All the Senior Rani's suspicions, I see, are\nreserved for me--her fears of thieves and robbers are only a\nfeint.\"\n\nThe Senior Rani smiled mischievously.  \"You are right, sister\nmine.  A woman's theft is the most fatal of all thefts.  But how\ncan you elude my watchfulness?  Am I a man, that you should\nhoodwink me?\"\n\n\"If you fear me so,\" I retorted, \"let me keep in your hands all I\nhave, as security.  If I cause you loss, you can then repay\nyourself.\"\n\n\"Just listen to her, our simple little Junior Rani!\"  she laughed\nback, turning to my husband.  \"Does she not know that there are\nlosses which no security can make good, either in this world or\nin the next?\"\n\nMy husband did not join in our exchange of words.  When he had\nfinished, he went off to the outer apartments, for nowadays he\ndoes not take his mid-day rest in our room.\n\nAll my more valuable jewels were in deposit in the treasury in\ncharge of the cashier.  Still what I kept with me must have been\nworth thirty or forty thousand.  I took my jewel-box to the Bara\nRani's room and opened it out before her, saying: \"I leave these\nwith you, sister.  They will keep you quite safe from all worry.\"\n\nThe Bara Rani made a gesture of mock despair.  \"You positively\nastound me, Chota Rani!\"  she said.  \"Do you really suppose I\nspend sleepless nights for fear of being robbed by you?\"\n\n\"What harm if you did have a wholesome fear of me?  Does anybody\nknow anybody else in this world?\"\n\n\"You want to teach me a lesson by trusting me?  No, no!  I am\nbothered enough to know what to do with my own jewels, without\nkeeping watch over yours.  Take them away, there's a dear, so\nmany prying servants are about.\"\n\nI went straight from my sister-in-law's room to the sitting-room\noutside, and sent for Amulya.  With him Sandip came along too.  I\nwas in a great hurry, and said to Sandip: \"If you don't mind, I\nwant to have a word or two with Amulya.  Would you...\"\n\nSandip smiled a wry smile.  \"So Amulya and I are separate in your\neyes?  If you have set about to wean him from me, I must confess\nI have no power to retain him.\"\n\nI made no reply, but stood waiting.\n\n\"Be it so,\" Sandip went on.  \"Finish your special talk with\nAmulya.  But then you must give me a special talk all to myself\ntoo, or it will mean a defeat for me.  I can stand everything,\nbut not defeat.  My share must always be the lion's share.  This\nhas been my constant quarrel with Providence.  I will defeat the\nDispenser of my fate, but not take defeat at his hands.\"  With a\ncrushing look at Amulya, Sandip walked out of the room.\n\n\"Amulya, my own little brother, you must do one thing for me,\" I\nsaid.\n\n\"I will stake my life for whatever duty you may lay on me,\nsister.\"\n\nI brought out my jewel-box from the folds of my shawl and placed\nit before him.  \"Sell or pawn these,\" I said, \"and get me six\nthousand rupees as fast as ever you can.\"\n\n\"No, no, Sister Rani,\" said Amulya, touched to the quick.  \"Let\nthese jewels be.  I will get you six thousand all the same.\"\n\n\"Oh, don't be silly,\" I said impatiently.  \"There is no time for\nany nonsense.  Take this box.  Get away to Calcutta by the night\ntrain.  And bring me the money by the day after tomorrow\npositively.\"\n\nAmulya took a diamond necklace out of the box, held it up to the\nlight and put it back gloomily.\n\n\"I know,\" I told him, \"that you will never get the proper price\nfor these diamonds, so I am giving you jewels worth about thirty\nthousand.  I don't care if they all go, but I must have that six\nthousand without fail.\"\n\n\"Do you know, Sister Rani,\" said Amulya, \"I have had a quarrel\nwith Sandip Babu over that six thousand rupees he took from you?\nI cannot tell you how ashamed I felt.  But Sandip Babu would have\nit that we must give up even our shame for the country.  That may\nbe so.  But this is somehow different.  I do not fear to die for\nthe country, to kill for the country--that much __Shakti__ has\nbeen given me.  But I cannot forget the shame of having taken\nmoney from you.  There Sandip Babu is ahead of me.  He has no\nregrets or compunctions.  He says we must get rid of the idea\nthat the money belongs to the one in whose box it happens to be--\nif we cannot, where is the magic of __Bande Mataram__?\"\n\nAmulya gathered enthusiasm as he talked on.  He always warms up\nwhen he has me for a listener.  \"The Gita tells us,\" he\ncontinued, \"that no one can kill the soul.  Killing is a mere\nword.  So also is the taking away of money.  Whose is the money?\nNo one has created it.  No one can take it away with him when he\ndeparts this life, for it is no part of his soul.  Today it is\nmine, tomorrow my son's, the next day his creditor's.  Since, in\nfact, money belongs to no one, why should any blame attach to our\npatriots if, instead of leaving it for some worthless son, they\ntake it for their own use?\"\n\nWhen I hear Sandip's words uttered by this boy, I tremble all\nover.  Let those who are snake-charmers play with snakes; if harm\ncomes to them, they are prepared for it.  But these boys are so\ninnocent, all the world is ready with its blessing to protect\nthem.  They play with a snake not knowing its nature, and when we\nsee them smilingly, trustfully, putting their hands within reach\nof its fangs, then we understand how terribly dangerous the snake\nis.  Sandip is right when he suspects that though I, for myself,\nmay be ready to die at his hands, this boy I shall wean from him\nand save.\n\n\"So the money is wanted for the use of your patriots?\"  I\nquestioned with a smile.\n\n\"Of course it is!\"  said Amulya proudly.  \"Are they not our\nkings?  Poverty takes away from their regal power.  Do you know,\nwe always insist on Sandip Babu travelling First Class?  He never\nshirks kingly honours--he accepts them not for himself, but for\nthe glory of us all.  The greatest weapon of those who rule the\nworld, Sandip Babu has told us, is the hypnotism of their\ndisplay.  To take the vow of poverty would be for them not merely\na penance--it would mean suicide.\"\n\nAt this point Sandip noiselessly entered the room.  I threw my\nshawl over the jewel-case with a rapid movement.\n\n\"The special-talk business not yet over?\"  he asked with a sneer\nin his tone.\n\n\"Yes, we've quite finished,\" said Amulya apologetically.  \"It was\nnothing much.\"\n\n\"No, Amulya,\" I said, \"we have not quite finished.\"\n\n\"So exit Sandip for the second time, I suppose?\"  said Sandip.\n\n\"If you please.\"\n\n\"And as to Sandip's re-entry.\"\n\n\"Not today.  I have no time.\"\n\n\"I see!\"  said Sandip as his eyes flashed.  \"No time to waste,\nonly for special talks!\"\n\nJealousy!  Where the strong man shows weakness, there the weaker\nsex cannot help beating her drums of victory.  So I repeated\nfirmly: \"I really have no time.\"\n\nSandip went away looking black.  Amulya was greatly perturbed.\n\"Sister Rani,\" he pleaded, \"Sandip Babu is annoyed.\"\n\n\"He has neither cause nor right to be annoyed,\" I said with some\nvehemence.  \"Let me caution you about one thing, Amulya.  Say\nnothing to Sandip Babu about the sale of my jewels--on your\nlife.\"\n\n\"No, I will not.\"\n\n\"Then you had better not delay any more.  You must get away by\ntonight's train.\"\n\nAmulya and I left the room together.  As we came out on the\nverandah Sandip was standing there.  I could see he was waiting\nto waylay Amulya.  To prevent that I had to engage him.  \"What is\nit you wanted to tell me, Sandip Babu?\"  I asked.\n\n\"I have nothing special to say--mere small talk.  And since you\nhave not the time .  .  \"\n\n\"I can give you just a little.\"\n\nBy this time Amulya had left.  As we entered the room Sandip\nasked: \"What was that box Amulya carried away?\"\n\nThe box had not escaped his eyes.  I remained firm.  \"If I could\nhave told you, it would have been made over to him in your\npresence!\"\n\n\"So you think Amulya will not tell me?\"\n\n\"No, he will not.\"\n\nSandip could not conceal his anger any longer.  \"You think you\nwill gain the mastery over me?\"  he blazed out.  \"That shall\nnever be.  Amulya, there, would die a happy death if I deigned to\ntrample him under foot.  I will never, so long as I live, allow\nyou to bring him to your feet!\"\n\nOh, the weak!  the weak!  At last Sandip has realized that he is\nweak before me!  That is why there is this sudden outburst of\nanger.  He has understood that he cannot meet the power that I\nwield, with mere strength.  With a glance I can crumble his\nstrongest fortifications.  So he must needs resort to bluster.  I\nsimply smiled in contemptuous silence.  At last have I come to a\nlevel above him.  I must never lose this vantage ground; never\ndescend lower again.  Amidst all my degradation this bit of\ndignity must remain to me!\n\n\"I know,\" said Sandip, after a pause, \"it was your jewel-case.\"\n\n\"You may guess as you please,\" said I, \"but you will get nothing\nout of me.\n\n\"So you trust Amulya more than you trust me?  Do you know that\nthe boy is the shadow of my shadow, the echo of my echo--that he\nis nothing if I am not at his side?\"\n\n\"Where he is not your echo, he is himself, Amulya.  And that is\nwhere I trust him more than I can trust your echo!\"\n\n\"You must not forget that you are under a promise to render up\nall your ornaments to me for the worship of the Divine Mother.\nIn fact your offering has already been made.\"\n\n\"Whatever ornaments the gods leave to me will be offered up to\nthe gods.  But how can I offer those which have been stolen away\nfrom me?\"\n\n\"Look here, it is no use your trying to give me the slip in that\nfashion.  Now is the time for grim work.  Let that work be\nfinished, then you can make a display of your woman's wiles to\nyour heart's content--and I will help you in your game.\"\n\nThe moment I had stolen my husband's money and paid it to Sandip,\nthe music that was in our relations stopped.  Not only did I\ndestroy all my own value by making myself cheap, but Sandip's\npowers, too, lost scope for their full play.  You cannot employ\nyour marksmanship against a thing which is right in your grasp.\nSo Sandip has lost his aspect of the hero; a tone of low\nquarrelsomeness has come into his words.\n\nSandip kept his brilliant eyes fixed full on my face till they\nseemed to blaze with all the thirst of the mid-day sky.  Once or\ntwice he fidgeted with his feet, as though to leave his seat, as\nif to spring right on me.  My whole body seemed to swim, my veins\nthrobbed, the hot blood surged up to my ears; I felt that if I\nremained there, I should never get up at all.  With a supreme\neffort I tore myself off the chair, and hastened towards the\ndoor.\n\nFrom Sandip's dry throat there came a muffled cry: \"Whither would\nyou flee, Queen?\"  The next moment he left his seat with a bound\nto seize hold of me.  At the sound of footsteps outside the door,\nhowever, he rapidly retreated and fell back into his chair.  I\nchecked my steps near the bookshelf, where I stood staring at the\nnames of the books.\n\nAs my husband entered the room, Sandip exclaimed: \"I say, Nikhil,\ndon't you keep Browning among your books here?  I was just\ntelling Queen Bee of our college club.  Do you remember that\ncontest of ours over the translation of those lines from\nBrowning?  You don't?\n\n/*\n  \"She should never have looked at me,\n  If she meant I should not love her,\n  There are plenty ...  men you call such,\n  I suppose ...  she may discover\n  All her soul to, if she pleases,\n  And yet leave much as she found them:\n  But I'm not so, and she knew it\n  When she fixed me, glancing round them.\n*/\n\n\"I managed to get together the words to render it into Bengali,\nsomehow, but the result was hardly likely to be a 'joy forever'\nto the people of Bengal.  I really did think at one time that I\nwas on the verge of becoming a poet, but Providence was kind\nenough to save me from that disaster.  Do you remember old\nDakshina?  If he had not become a Salt Inspector, he would have\nbeen a poet.  I remember his rendering to this day ...\n\n\"No, Queen Bee, it is no use rummaging those bookshelves.  Nikhil\nhas ceased to read poetry since his marriage--perhaps he has no\nfurther need for it.  But I suppose 'the fever fit of poesy', as\nthe Sanskrit has it, is about to attack me again.\"\n\n\"I have come to give you a warning, Sandip,\" said my husband.\n\n\"About the fever fit of poesy?\"\n\nMy husband took no notice of this attempt at humour.  \"For some\ntime,\" he continued, \"Mahomedan preachers have been about\nstirring up the local Mussulmans.  They are all wild with you,\nand may attack you any moment.\"\n\n\"Are you come to advise flight?\"\n\n\"I have come to give you information, not to offer advice.\"\n\n\"Had these estates been mine, such a warning would have been\nnecessary for the preachers, not for me.  If, instead of trying\nto frighten me, you give them a taste of your intimidation, that\nwould be worthier both of you and me.  Do you know that your\nweakness is weakening your neighbouring __zamindars__ also?\"\n\n\"I did not offer you my advice, Sandip.  I wish you, too, would\nrefrain from giving me yours.  Besides, it is useless.  And there\nis another thing I want to tell you.  You and your followers have\nbeen secretly worrying and oppressing my tenantry.  I cannot\nallow that any longer.  So I must ask you to leave my territory.\"\n\n\"For fear of the Mussulmans, or is there any other fear you have\nto threaten me with?\"\n\n\"There are fears the want of which is cowardice.  In the name of\nthose fears, I tell you, Sandip, you must go.  In five days I\nshall be starting for Calcutta.  I want you to accompany me.  You\nmay of course stay in my house there--to that there is no\nobjection.\"\n\n\"All right, I have still five day's time then.  Meanwhile, Queen\nBee, let me hum to you my song of parting from your honey-hive.\nAh!  you poet of modern Bengal!  Throw open your doors and let me\nplunder your words.  The theft is really yours, for it is my song\nwhich you have made your own--let the name be yours by all means,\nbut the song is mine.\"  With this Sandip struck up in a deep,\nhusky voice, which threatened to be out of tune, a song in the\nBhairavi mode:\n\n/*\n  \"In the springtime of your kingdom, my Queen,\n  Meetings and partings chase each other in their endless hide\n    and seek,\n  And flowers blossom in the wake of those that droop and die in\n    the shade.\n  In the springtime of your kingdom, my Queen,\n  My meeting with you had its own songs,\n  But has not also my leave-taking any gift to offer you?\n  That gift is my secret hope, which I keep hidden in the shadows\n    of your flower garden,\n  That the rains of July may sweetly temper your fiery June.\"\n*/\n\nHis boldness was immense--boldness which had no veil, but was naked\nas fire.  One finds no time to stop it: it is like trying\nto resist a thunderbolt: the lightning flashes: it laughs at all\nresistance.\n\nI left the room.  As I was passing along the verandah towards the\ninner apartments, Amulya suddenly made his appearance and came\nand stood before me.\n\n\"Fear nothing, Sister Rani,\" he said.  \"I am off tonight and\nshall not return unsuccessful.\"\n\n\"Amulya,\" said I, looking straight into his earnest, youthful\nface, \"I fear nothing for myself, but may I never cease to fear\nfor you.\"\n\nAmulya turned to go, but before he was out of sight I called him\nback and asked: \"Have you a mother, Amulya?\"\n\n\"I have.\"\n\n\"A sister?\"\n\n\"No, I am the only child of my mother.  My father died when I was\nquite little.\"\n\n\"Then go back to your mother, Amulya.\"\n\n\"But, Sister Rani, I have now both mother and sister.\"\n\n\"Then, Amulya, before you leave tonight, come and have your\ndinner here.\"\n\n\"There won't be time for that.  Let me take some food for the\njourney, consecrated with your touch.\"\n\n\"What do you specially like, Amulya?\"\n\"If I had been with my mother I should have had lots of Poush\ncakes.  Make some for me with your own hands, Sister Rani!\"\n\n------\n\n25. Of the __Ramayana__.  The story of his devotion to his\nelder brother Rama and his brother's wife Sita, has become a\nbyword.\n\n\n\nChapter Ten\n\nNikhil's Story\n\nXII\n\n\n\nI LEARNT from my master that Sandip had joined forces with Harish\nKundu, and there was to be a grand celebration of the worship of\nthe demon-destroying Goddess.  Harish Kundu was extorting the\nexpenses from his tenantry.  Pandits Kaviratna and Vidyavagish\nhad been commissioned to compose a hymn with a double meaning.\n\nMy master has just had a passage at arms with Sandip over this.\n\"Evolution is at work amongst the gods as well,\" says Sandip.\n\"The grandson has to remodel the gods created by the grandfather\nto suit his own taste, or else he is left an atheist.  It is my\nmission to modernize the ancient deities.  I am born the saviour\nof the gods, to emancipate them from the thraldom of the past.\"\n\nI have seen from our boyhood what a juggler with ideas is Sandip.\nHe has no interest in discovering truth, but to make a quizzical\ndisplay of it rejoices his heart.  Had he been born in the wilds\nof Africa he would have spent a glorious time inventing argument\nafter argument to prove that cannibalism is the best means of\npromoting true communion between man and man.  But those who deal\nin delusion end by deluding themselves, and I fully believe that,\neach time Sandip creates a new fallacy, he persuades himself that\nhe has found the truth, however contradictory his creations may\nbe to one another.\n\nHowever, I shall not give a helping hand to establish a liquor\ndistillery in my country.  The young men, who are ready to offer\ntheir services for their country's cause, must not fall into this\nhabit of getting intoxicated.  The people who want to exact work\nby drugging methods set more value on the excitement than on the\nminds they intoxicate.\n\nI had to tell Sandip, in Bimala's presence, that he must go.\nPerhaps both will impute to me the wrong motive.  But I must free\nmyself also from all fear of being misunderstood.  Let even\nBimala misunderstand me ...\n\nA number of Mahomedan preachers are being sent over from Dacca.\nThe Mussulmans in my territory had come to have almost as much of\nan aversion to the killing of cows as the Hindus.  But now cases\nof cow-killing are cropping up here and there.  I had the news\nfirst from some of my Mussulman tenants with expressions of their\ndisapproval.  Here was a situation which I could see would be\ndifficult to meet.  At the bottom was a pretence of fanaticism,\nwhich would cease to be a pretence if obstructed.  That is just\nwhere the ingenuity of the move came in!\n\nI sent for some of my principal Hindu tenants and tried to get\nthem to see the matter in its proper light.  \"We can be staunch\nin our own convictions,\" I said, \"but we have no control over\nthose of others.  For all that many of us are Vaishnavas, those\nof us who are Shaktas go on with their animal sacrifices just the\nsame.  That cannot be helped.  We must, in the same way, let the\nMussulmans do as they think best.  So please refrain from all\ndisturbance.\"\n\n\"Maharaja,\" they replied, \"these outrages have been unknown for\nso long.\"\n\n\"That was so,\" I said, \"because such was their spontaneous\ndesire.  Let us behave in such a way that the same may become\ntrue, over again.  But a breach of the peace is not the way to\nbring this about.\"\n\n\"No, Maharaja,\" they insisted, \"those good old days are gone.\nThis will never stop unless you put it down with a strong hand.\"\n\n\"Oppression,\" I replied, \"will not only not prevent cow-killing,\nit may lead to the killing of men as well.\"\n\nOne of them had had an English education.  He had learnt to\nrepeat the phrases of the day.  \"It is not only a question of\northodoxy,\" he argued.  \"Our country is mainly agricultural, and\ncows are ...\"\n\n\"Buffaloes in this country,\" I interrupted, \"likewise give milk\nand are used for ploughing.  And therefore, so long as we dance\nfrantic dances on our temple pavements, smeared with their blood,\ntheir severed heads carried on our shoulders, religion will only\nlaugh at us if we quarrel with Mussulmans in her name, and\nnothing but the quarrel itself will remain true.  If the cow\nalone is to be held sacred from slaughter, and not the buffalo,\nthen that is bigotry, not religion.\"\n\n\"But are you not aware, sir, of what is behind all this?\"\npursued the English-knowing tenant.  \"This has only become\npossible because the Mussulman is assured of safety, even if he\nbreaks the law.  Have you not heard of the Pachur case?\"\n\n\"Why is it possible,\" I asked, \"to use the Mussulmans thus, as\ntools against us?  Is it not because we have fashioned them into\nsuch with our own intolerance?  That is how Providence punishes\nus.  Our accumulated sins are being visited on our own heads.\"\n\n\"Oh, well, if that be so, let them be visited on us.  But we\nshall have our revenge.  We have undermined what was the greatest\nstrength of the authorities, their devotion to their own laws.\nOnce they were truly kings, dispensing justice; now they\nthemselves will become law-breakers, and so no better than\nrobbers.  This may not go down to history, but we shall carry it\nin our hearts for all time ...\"\n\nThe evil reports about me which are spreading from paper to paper\nare making me notorious.  News comes that my effigy has been\nburnt at the river-side burning-ground of the Chakravartis, with\ndue ceremony and enthusiasm; and other insults are in\ncontemplation.  The trouble was that they had come to ask me to\ntake shares in a Cotton Mill they wanted to start.  I had to tell\nthem that I did not so much mind the loss of my own money, but I\nwould not be a party to causing a loss to so many poor\nshareholders.\n\n\"Are we to understand, Maharaja,\" said my visitors, \"that the\nprosperity of the country does not interest you?\"\n\n\"Industry may lead to the country's prosperity,\" I explained,\n\"but a mere desire for its prosperity will not make for success\nin industry.  Even when our heads were cool, our industries did\nnot flourish.  Why should we suppose that they will do so just\nbecause we have become frantic?\"\n\n\"Why not say plainly that you will not risk your money?\"\n\n\"I will put in my money when I see that it is industry which\nprompts you.  But, because you have lighted a fire, it does not\nfollow that you have the food to cook over it.\"\n\nXIII\n\n\n\nWhat is this?  Our Chakua sub-treasury looted!  A remittance of\nseven thousand five hundred rupees was due from there to\nheadquarters.  The local cashier had changed the cash at the\nGovernment Treasury into small currency notes for convenience in\ncarrying, and had kept them ready in bundles.  In the middle of\nthe night an armed band had raided the room, and wounded Kasim,\nthe man on guard.  The curious part of it was that they had taken\nonly six thousand rupees and left the rest scattered on the\nfloor, though it would have been as easy to carry that away also.\nAnyhow, the raid of the dacoits was over; now the police raid\nwould begin.  Peace was out of the question.\n\nWhen I went inside, I found the news had travelled before me.\n\"What a terrible thing, brother,\" exclaimed the Bara Rani.\n\"Whatever shall we do?\"\n\nI made light of the matter to reassure her.  \"We still have\nsomething left,\" I said with a smile.  \"We shall manage to get\nalong somehow.\"\n\n\"Don't joke about it, brother dear.  Why are they all so angry\nwith you?  Can't you humour them?  Why put everybody out?\"\n\n\"I cannot let the country go to rack and ruin, even if that would\nplease everybody.\"\n\n\"That was a shocking thing they did at the burning-grounds.  It's\na horrid shame to treat you so.  The Chota Rani has got rid of\nall her fears by dint of the Englishwoman's teaching, but as for\nme, I had to send for the priest to avert the omen before I could\nget any peace of mind.  For my sake, dear, do get away to\nCalcutta.  I tremble to think what they may do, if you stay on\nhere.\"\n\nMy sister-in-law's genuine anxiety touched me deeply.\n\n\"And, brother,\" she went on, \"did I not warn you, it was not well\nto keep so much money in your room?  They might get wind of it\nany day.  It is not the money--but who knows...\"\n\nTo calm her I promised to remove the money to the treasury at\nonce, and then get it away to Calcutta with the first escort\ngoing.  We went together to my bedroom.  The dressing-room door\nwas shut.  When I knocked, Bimala called out: \"I am dressing.\"\n\n\"I wonder at the Chota Rani,\" exclaimed my sister-in-law,\n\"dressing so early in the day!  One of their __Bande Mataram__\nmeetings, I suppose.  Robber Queen!\"  she called out in jest to\nBimala.  \"Are you counting your spoils inside?\"\n\n\"I will attend to the money a little later,\" I said, as I came\naway to my office room outside.\n\nI found the Police Inspector waiting for me.  \"Any trace of the\ndacoits?\"  I asked.\n\n\"I have my suspicions.\"\n\n\"On whom?\"\n\n\"Kasim, the guard.\"\n\n\"Kasim?  But was he not wounded?\"\n\n\"A mere nothing.  A flesh wound on the leg.  Probably self-\ninflicted.\"\n\n\"But I cannot bring myself to believe it.  He is such a trusted\nservant.\"\n\n\"You may have trusted him, but that does not prevent his being a\nthief.  Have I not seen men trusted for twenty years together,\nsuddenly developing...\"\n\n\"Even if it were so, I could not send him to gaol.  But why\nshould he have left the rest of the money lying about?\"\n\n\"To put us off the scent.  Whatever you may say, Maharaja, he\nmust be an old hand at the game.  He mounts guard during his\nwatch, right enough, but I feel sure he has a finger in all the\ndacoities going on in the neighbourhood.\"\n\nWith this the Inspector proceeded to recount the various methods\nby which it was possible to be concerned in a dacoity twenty or\nthirty miles away, and yet be back in time for duty.\n\n\"Have you brought Kasim here?\"  I asked.\n\n\"No,\" was the reply, \"he is in the lock-up.  The Magistrate is\ndue for the investigation.\"\n\n\"I want to see him,\" I said.\n\nWhen I went to his cell he fell at my feet, weeping.  \"In God's\nname,\" he said, \"I swear I did not do this thing.\"\n\n\"I do not doubt you, Kasim,\" I assured him.  \"Fear nothing.  They\ncan do nothing to you, if you are innocent.\"\n\nKasim, however, was unable to give a coherent account of the\nincident.  He was obviously exaggerating.  Four or five hundred\nmen, big guns, numberless swords, figured in his narrative.  It\nmust have been either his disturbed state of mind or a desire to\naccount for his easy defeat.  He would have it that this was\nHarish Kundu's doing; he was even sure he had heard the voice of\nEkram, the head retainer of the Kundus.\n\n\"Look here, Kasim,\" I had to warn him, \"don't you be dragging\nother people in with your stories.  You are not called upon to\nmake out a case against Harish Kundu, or anybody else.\"\n\nXIV\n\n\n\nOn returning home I asked my master to come over.  He shook his\nhead gravely.  \"I see no good in this,\" said he--\"this setting\naside of conscience and putting the country in its place.  All\nthe sins of the country will now break out, hideous and\nunashamed.\"\n\n\"Who do you think could have ...\"\n\n\"Don't ask me.  But sin is rampant.  Send them all away, right\naway from here.\"\n\n\"I have given them one more day.  They will be leaving the day\nafter tomorrow.\"\n\n\"And another thing.  Take Bimala away to Calcutta.  She is\ngetting too narrow a view of the outside world from here, she\ncannot see men and things in their true proportions.  Let her see\nthe world--men and their work--give her abroad vision.\"\n\n\"That is exactly what I was thinking.\"\n\n\"Well, don't make any delay about it.  I tell you, Nikhil, man's\nhistory has to be built by the united effort of all the races in\nthe world, and therefore this selling of conscience for political\nreasons--this making a fetish of one's country, won't do.  I know\nthat Europe does not at heart admit this, but there she has not\nthe right to pose as our teacher.  Men who die for the truth\nbecome immortal: and, if a whole people can die for the truth, it\nwill also achieve immortality in the history of humanity.  Here,\nin this land of India, amid the mocking laughter of Satan\npiercing the sky, may the feeling for this truth become real!\nWhat a terrible epidemic of sin has been brought into our country\nfrom foreign lands...\"\n\nThe whole day passed in the turmoil of investigation.  I was\ntired out when I retired for the night.  I left over sending my\nsister-in-law's money to the treasury till next morning.\n\nI woke up from my sleep at dead of night.  The room was dark.  I\nthought I heard a moaning somewhere.  Somebody must have been\ncrying.  Sounds of sobbing came heavy with tears like fitful\ngusts of wind in the rainy night.  It seemed to me that the cry\nrose from the heart of my room itself.  I was alone.  For some\ndays Bimala had her bed in another room adjoining mine.  I rose\nup and when I went out I found her in the balcony lying prone\nupon her face on the bare floor.\n\nThis is something that cannot be written in words.  He only knows\nit who sits in the bosom of the world and receives all its pangs\nin His own heart.  The sky is dumb, the stars are mute, the night\nis still, and in the midst of it all that one sleepless cry!\n\nWe give these sufferings names, bad or good, according to the\nclassifications of the books, but this agony which is welling up\nfrom a torn heart, pouring into the fathomless dark, has it any\nname?  When in that midnight, standing under the silent stars, I\nlooked upon that figure, my mind was struck with awe, and I said\nto myself: \"Who am Ito judge her?\"  O life, O death, O God of the\ninfinite existence, I bow my head in silence to the mystery which\nis in you.\n\nOnce I thought I should turn back.  But I could not.  I sat down\non the ground near Bimala and placed my hand on her head.  At the\nfirst touch her whole body seemed to stiffen, but the next moment\nthe hardness gave way, and the tears burst out.  I gently passed\nmy fingers over her forehead.  Suddenly her hands groping for my\nfeet grasped them and drew them to herself, pressing them against\nher breast with such force that I thought her heart would break.\n\n\n\nBimala's Story\n\nXVIII\n\n\n\nAmulya is due to return from Calcutta this morning.  I told the\nservants to let me know as soon as he arrived, but could not keep\nstill.  At last I went outside to await him in the sitting-room.\n\nWhen I sent him off to sell the jewels I must have been thinking\nonly of myself.  It never even crossed my mind that so young a\nboy, trying to sell such valuable jewellery, would at once be\nsuspected.  So helpless are we women, we needs must place on\nothers the burden of our danger.  When we go to our death we drag\ndown those who are about us.\n\nI had said with pride that I would save Amulya--as if she who was\ndrowning could save others.  But instead of saving him, I have\nsent him to his doom.  My little brother, such a sister have I\nbeen to you that Death must have smiled on that Brothers' Day\nwhen I gave you my blessing--I, who wander distracted with the\nburden of my own evil-doing.\n\nI feel today that man is at times attacked with evil as with the\nplague.  Some germ finds its way in from somewhere, and then in\nthe space of one night Death stalks in.  Why cannot the stricken\none be kept far away from the rest of the world?  I, at least,\nhave realized how terrible is the contagion--like a fiery torch\nwhich burns that it may set the world on fire.\n\nIt struck nine.  I could not get rid of the idea that Amulya was\nin trouble, that he had fallen into the clutches of the police.\nThere must be great excitement in the Police Office--whose are\nthe jewels?--where did he get them?  And in the end I shall have\nto furnish the answer, in public, before all the world.\n\nWhat is that answer to be?  Your day has come at last, Bara Rani,\nyou whom I have so long despised.  You, in the shape of the\npublic, the world, will have your revenge.  O God, save me this\ntime, and I will cast all my pride at my sister-in-law's feet.\n\nI could bear it no longer.  I went straight to the Bara Rani.\nShe was in the verandah, spicing her betel leaves, Thako at her\nside.  The sight of Thako made me shrink back for a moment, but I\novercame all hesitation, and making a low obeisance I took the\ndust of my elder sister-in-law's feet.\n\n\"Bless my soul, Chota Rani,\" she exclaimed, \"what has come upon\nyou?  Why this sudden reverence?\"\n\n\"It is my birthday, sister,\" said I.  \"I have caused you pain.\nGive me your blessing today that I may never do so again.  My\nmind is so small.\"  I repeated my obeisance and left her\nhurriedly, but she called me back.\n\n\"You never before told me that this was your birthday, Chotie\ndarling!  Be sure to come and have lunch with me this afternoon.\nYou positively must.\"\n\nO God, let it really be my birthday today.  Can I not be born\nover again?  Cleanse me, my God, and purify me and give me one\nmore trial!\n\nI went again to the sitting-room to find Sandip there.  A feeling\nof disgust seemed to poison my very blood.  The face of his,\nwhich I saw in the morning light, had nothing of the magic\nradiance of genius.\n\n\"Will you leave the room,\" I blurted out.\n\nSandip smiled.  \"Since Amulya is not here,\" he remarked, \"I\nshould think my turn had come for a special talk.\"\n\nMy fate was coming back upon me.  How was Ito take away the right\nI myself had given.  \"I would be alone,\" I repeated.\n\n\"Queen,\" he said, \"the presence of another person does not\nprevent your being alone.  Do not mistake me for one of the\ncrowd.  I, Sandip, am always alone, even when surrounded by\nthousands.\"\n\n\"Please come some other time.  This morning I am ...\"\n\n\"Waiting for Amulya?\"\n\nI turned to leave the room for sheer vexation, when Sandip drew\nout from the folds of his cloak that jewel-casket of mine and\nbanged it down on the marble table.  I was thoroughly startled.\n\"Has not Amulya gone, then?\"  I exclaimed.\n\n\"Gone where?\"\n\n\"To Calcutta?\"\n\n\"No,\" chuckled Sandip.\n\nAh, then my blessing had come true, in spite of all.  He was\nsaved.  Let God's punishment fall on me, the thief, if only\nAmulya be safe.\n\nThe change in my countenance roused Sandip's scorn.  \"So pleased,\nQueen!\"  sneered he.  \"Are these jewels so very precious?  How\nthen did you bring yourself to offer them to the Goddess?  Your\ngift was actually made.  Would you now take it back?\"\n\nPride dies hard and raises its fangs to the last.  It was clear\nto me I must show Sandip I did not care a rap about these jewels.\n\"If they have excited your greed,\" I said, \"you may have them.\"\n\n\"My greed today embraces the wealth of all Bengal,\" replied\nSandip.  \"Is there a greater force than greed?  It is the steed\nof the great ones of the earth, as is the elephant, Airauat, the\nsteed of Indra.  So then these jewels are mine?\"\n\nAs Sandip took up and replaced the casket under his cloak, Amulya\nrushed in.  There were dark rings under his eyes, his lips were\ndry, his hair tumbled: the freshness of his youth seemed to have\nwithered in a single day.  Pangs gripped my heart as I looked on\nhim.\n\n\"My box!\"  he cried, as he went straight up to Sandip without a\nglance at me.  \"Have you taken that jewel-box from my trunk?\"\n\n\"Your jewel-box?\"  mocked Sandip.\n\n\"It was my trunk!\"\nSandip burst out into a laugh.  \"Your distinctions between mine\nand yours are getting rather thin, Amulya,\" he cried.  \"You will\ndie a religious preacher yet, I see.\"\n\nAmulya sank on a chair with his face in his hands.  I went up to\nhim and placing my hand on his head asked him: \"What is your\ntrouble, Amulya?\"\n\nHe stood straight up as he replied: \"I had set my heart, Sister\nRani, on returning your jewels to you with my own hand.  Sandip\nBabu knew this, but he forestalled me.\"\n\n\"What do I care for my jewels?\"  I said.  \"Let them go.  No harm\nis done.\n\n\"Go?  Where?\"  asked the mystified boy.\n\n\"The jewels are mine,\" said Sandip.  \"Insignia bestowed on me by\nmy Queen!\"\n\n\"No, no, no,\" broke out Amulya wildly.  \"Never, Sister Rani!  I\nbrought them back for you.  You shall not give them away to\nanybody else.\"\n\n\"I accept your gift, my little brother,\" said I.  \"But let him,\nwho hankers after them, satisfy his greed.\"\n\nAmulya glared at Sandip like a beast of prey, as he growled:\n\"Look here, Sandip Babu, you know that even hanging has no\nterrors for me.  If you dare take away that box of jewels ...\"\n\nWith an attempt at a sarcastic laugh Sandip said: \"You also ought\nto know by this time, Amulya, that I am not the man to be afraid\nof you.\"\n\n\"Queen Bee,\" he went on, turning to me, \"I did not come here\ntoday to take these jewels, I came to give them to you.  You\nwould have done wrong to take my gift at Amulya's hands.  In\norder to prevent it, I had first to make them clearly mine.  Now\nthese my jewels are my gift to you.  Here they are!  Patch up any\nunderstanding with this boy you like.  I must go.  You have been\nat your special talks all these days together, leaving me out of\nthem.  If special happenings now come to pass, don't blame me.\n\n\"Amulya,\" he continued, \"I have sent on your trunks and things to\nyour lodgings.  Don't you be keeping any belongings of yours in\nmy room any longer.\"  With this parting shot, Sandip flung out of\nthe room.\n\nXIX\n\n\n\n\"I have had no peace of mind, Amulya,\" I said to him, \"ever since\nI sent you off to sell my jewels.\"\n\n\"Why, Sister Rani?\"\n\n\"I was afraid lest you should get into trouble with them, lest\nthey should suspect you for a thief.  I would rather go without\nthat six thousand.  You must now do another thing for me--go home\nat once, home to your mother.\"\n\nAmulya produced a small bundle and said: \"But, sister, I have got\nthe six thousand.\"\n\n\"Where from?\"\n\n\"I tried hard to get gold,\" he went on, without replying to my\nquestion, \"but could not.  So I had to bring it in notes.\"\n\n\"Tell me truly, Amulya, swear by me, where did you get this\nmoney?\"\n\n\"That I will not tell you.\"\n\nEverything seemed to grow dark before my eyes.  \"What terrible\nthing have you done, Amulya?\"  I cried.  \"Is it then ...\"\n\n\"I know you will say I got this money wrongly.  Very well, I\nadmit it.  But I have paid the full price for my wrong-doing.  So\nnow the money is mine.\"\n\nI no longer had any desire to learn more about it.  My very\nblood-vessels contracted, making my whole body shrink within\nitself.\n\n\"Take it away, Amulya,\" I implored.  \"Put it back where you got\nit from.\"\n\n\"That would be hard indeed!\"\n\n\"It is not hard, brother dear.  It was an evil moment when you\nfirst came to me.  Even Sandip has not been able to harm you as I\nhave done.\"\n\nSandip's name seemed to stab him.\n\n\"Sandip!\"  he cried.  \"It was you alone who made me come to know\nthat man for what he is.  Do you know, sister, he has not spent a\npice out of those sovereigns he took from you?  He shut himself\ninto his room, after he left you, and gloated over the gold,\npouring it out in a heap on the floor.  'This is not money,' he\nexclaimed, 'but the petals of the divine lotus of power;\ncrystallized strains of music from the pipes that play in the\nparadise of wealth!  I cannot find it in my heart to change them,\nfor they seem longing to fulfil their destiny of adorning the\nneck of Beauty.  Amulya, my boy, don't you look at these with\nyour fleshly eye, they are Lakshmi's smile, the gracious radiance\nof Indra's queen.  No, no, I can't give them up to that boor of a\nmanager.  I am sure, Amulya, he was telling us lies.  The police\nhaven't traced the man who sank that boat.  It's the manager who\nwants to make something out of it.  We must get those letters\nback from him.'\n\n\"I asked him how we were to do this; he told me to use force or\nthreats.  I offered to do so if he would return the gold.  That,\nhe said, we could consider later.  I will not trouble you,\nsister, with all I did to frighten the man into giving up those\nletters and burn them--it is a long story.  That very night I\ncame to Sandip and said: 'We are now safe.  Let me have the\nsovereigns to return them tomorrow to my sister, the Maharani.'\nBut he cried, 'What infatuation is this of yours?  Your precious\nsister's skirt bids fair to hide the whole country from you.  Say\n__Bande Mataram__ and exorcize the evil spirit.'\n\n\"You know, Sister Rani, the power of Sandip's magic.  The gold\nremained with him.  And I spent the whole dark night on the\nbathing-steps of the lake muttering __Bande Mataram__.\n\n\"Then when you gave me your jewels to sell, I went again to\nSandip.  I could see he was angry with me.  But he tried not to\nshow it.  'If I still have them hoarded up in any box of mine you\nmay take them,' said he, as he flung me his keys.  They were\nnowhere to be seen.  'Tell me where they are,' I said.  'I will\ndo so,' he replied, 'when I find your infatuation has left you.\nNot now.'\n\n\"When I found I could not move him, I had to employ other\nmethods.  Then I tried to get the sovereigns from him in exchange\nfor my currency notes for six thousand rupees.  'You shall have\nthem,' he said, and disappeared into his bedroom, leaving me\nwaiting outside.  There he broke open my trunk and came straight\nto you with your casket through some other passage.  He would not\nlet me bring it, and now he dares call it his gift.  How can I\ntell how much he has deprived me of?  I shall never forgive him.\n\n\"But, oh sister, his power over me has been utterly broken.  And\nit is you who have broken it!\"\n\n\"Brother dear,\" said I, \"if that is so, then my life is\njustified.  But more remains to be done, Amulya.  It is not\nenough that the spell has been destroyed.  Its stains must be\nwashed away.  Don't delay any longer, go at once and put back the\nmoney where you took it from.  Can you not do it, dear?\"\n\n\"With your blessing everything is possible, Sister Rani.\"\n\n\"Remember, it will not be your expiation alone, but mine also.  I\nam a woman; the outside world is closed to me, else I would have\ngone myself.  My hardest punishment is that I must put on you the\nburden of my sin.\"\n\n\"Don't say that, sister.  The path I was treading was not your\npath.  It attracted me because of its dangers and difficulties.\nNow that your path calls me, let it be a thousand times more\ndifficult and dangerous, the dust of your feet will help me to\nwin through.  Is it then your command that this money be\nreplaced?\"\n\n\"Not my command, brother mine, but a command from above.\"\n\n\"Of that I know nothing.  It is enough for me that this command\nfrom above comes from your lips.  And, sister, I thought I had an\ninvitation here.  I must not lose that.  You must give me your\n__prasad__ [26] before I go.  Then, if I can possibly manage\nit, I will finish my duty in the evening.\"\n\nTears came to my eyes when I tried to smile as I said: \"So be\nit.\"\n\n------\n\n26. Food consecrated by the touch of a revered person.\n\n\n\nChapter Eleven\n\nBimala's Story\n\nXX\n\n\n\nWITH Amulya's departure my heart sank within me.  On what\nperilous adventure had I sent this only son of his mother?  O\nGod, why need my expiation have such pomp and circumstance?\nCould I not be allowed to suffer alone without inviting all this\nmultitude to share my punishment?  Oh, let not this innocent\nchild fall victim to Your wrath.\n\nI called him back--\"Amulya!\"\n\nMy voice sounded so feebly, it failed to reach him.\n\nI went up to the door and called again: \"Amulya!\"\n\nHe had gone.\n\n\"Who is there?\"\n\n\"Rani Mother!\"\n\n\"Go and tell Amulya Babu that I want him.\"\n\nWhat exactly happened I could not make out--the man, perhaps, was\nnot familiar with Amulya's name--but he returned almost at once\nfollowed by Sandip.\n\n\"The very moment you sent me away,\" he said as he came in, \"I had\na presentiment that you would call me back.  The attraction of\nthe same moon causes both ebb and flow.  I was so sure of being\nsent for, that I was actually waiting out in the passage.  As\nsoon as I caught sight of your man, coming from your room, I\nsaid: 'Yes, yes, I am coming, I am coming at once!'--before he\ncould utter a word.  That up-country lout was surprised, I can\ntell you!  He stared at me, open-mouthed, as if he thought I knew\nmagic.\n\n\"All the fights in the world, Queen Bee,\" Sandip rambled on, \"are\nreally fights between hypnotic forces.  Spell cast against spell\n--noiseless weapons which reach even invisible targets.  At last I\nhave met in you my match.  Your quiver is full, I know, you\nartful warrior Queen!  You are the only one in the world who has\nbeen able to turn Sandip out and call Sandip back, at your sweet\nwill.  Well, your quarry is at your feet.  What will you do with\nhim now?  Will you give him the coup de grâce, or keep him in\nyour cage?  Let me warn you beforehand, Queen, you will find the\nbeast as difficult to kill outright as to keep in bondage.\nAnyway, why lose time in trying your magic weapons?\"\n\nSandip must have felt the shadow of approaching defeat, and this\nmade him try to gain time by chattering away without waiting for\na reply.  I believe he knew that I had sent the messenger for\nAmulya, whose name the man must have mentioned.  In spite of that\nhe had deliberately played this trick.  He was now trying to\navoid giving me any opening to tell him that it was Amulya I\nwanted, not him.  But his stratagem was futile, for I could see\nhis weakness through it.  I must not yield up a pin's point of\nthe ground I had gained.\n\n\"Sandip Babu,\" I said, \"I wonder how you can go on making these\nendless speeches, without a stop.  Do you get them up by heart,\nbeforehand?\"\n\nSandip's face flushed instantly.\n\n\"I have heard,\" I continued, \"that our professional reciters keep\na book full of all kinds of ready-made discourses, which can be\nfitted into any subject.  Have you also a book?\"\n\nSandip ground out his reply through his teeth.  \"God has given\nyou women a plentiful supply of coquetry to start with, and on\nthe top of that you have the milliner and the jeweller to help\nyou; but do not think we men are so helpless ...\"\n\n\"You had better go back and look up your book, Sandip Babu.  You\nare getting your words all wrong.  That's just the trouble with\ntrying to repeat things by rote.\"\n\n\"You!\"  shouted Sandip, losing all control over himself.  \"You to\ninsult me thus!  What is there left of you that I do not know to\nthe very bottom?  What ...\"  He became speechless.\n\nSandip, the wielder of magic spells, is reduced to utter\npowerlessness, whenever his spell refuses to work.  From a king\nhe fell to the level of a boor.  Oh, the joy of witnessing his\nweakness!  The harsher he became in his rudeness, the more did\nthis joy well up within me.  His snaky coils, with which he used\nto snare me, are exhausted--I am free.  I am saved, saved.  Be\nrude to me, insult me, for that shows you in your truth; but\nspare me your songs of praise, which were false.\n\nMy husband came in at this juncture.  Sandip had not the\nelasticity to recover himself in a moment, as he used to do\nbefore.  My husband looked at him for a while in surprise.  Had\nthis happened some days ago I should have felt ashamed.  But\ntoday I was pleased--whatever my husband might think.  I wanted\nto have it out to the finish with my weakening adversary.\n\nFinding us both silent and constrained, my husband hesitated a\nlittle, and then took a chair.  \"Sandip,\" he said, \"I have been\nlooking for you, and was told you were here.\"\n\n\"I am here,\" said Sandip with some emphasis.  \"Queen Bee sent for\nme early this morning.  And I, the humble worker of the hive,\nleft all else to attend her summons.\"\n\n\"I am going to Calcutta tomorrow.  You will come with me.\n\n\"And why, pray?  Do you take me for one of your retinue?\"\n\n\"Oh, very well, take it that you are going to Calcutta, and that\nI am your follower.\"\n\n\"I have no business there.\"\n\n\"All the more reason for going.  You have too much business\nhere.\"\n\n\"I don't propose to stir.\"\n\n\"Then I propose to shift you.\"\n\n\"Forcibly?\"\n\n\"Forcibly.\"\n\n\"Very well, then, I will make a move.  But the world is not\ndivided between Calcutta and your estates.  There are other\nplaces on the map.\"\n\n\"From the way you have been going on, one would hardly have\nthought that there was any other place in the world except my\nestates.\"\n\nSandip stood up.  \"It does happen at times,\" he said, \"that a\nman's whole world is reduced to a single spot.  I have realized\nmy universe in this sitting-room of yours, that is why I have\nbeen a fixture here.\"\n\nThen he turned to me.  \"None but you, Queen Bee,\" he said, \"will\nunderstand my words--perhaps not even you.  I salute you.  With\nworship in my heart I leave you.  My watchword has changed since\nyou have come across my vision.  It is no longer __Bande\nMataram__ (Hail Mother), but Hail Beloved, Hail Enchantress.\nThe mother protects, the mistress leads to destruction--but sweet\nis that destruction.  You have made the anklet sounds of the\ndance of death tinkle in my heart.  You have changed for me, your\ndevotee, the picture I had of this Bengal of ours--'the soft\nbreeze-cooled land of pure water and sweet fruit.' [27] You have\nno pity, my beloved.  You have come to me with your poison cup\nand I shall drain it, either to die in agony or live triumphing\nover death.\n\n\"Yes,\" he continued.  \"The mother's day is past.  O love, my\nlove, you have made as naught for me the truth and right and\nheaven itself.  All duties have become as shadows: all rules and\nrestraints have snapped their bonds.  O love, my love, I could\nset fire to all the world outside this land on which you have set\nyour dainty feet, and dance in mad revel over the ashes ...\nThese are mild men.  These are good men.  They would do good to\nall--as if this all were a reality!  No, no!  There is no reality\nin the world save this one real love of mine.  I do you\nreverence.  My devotion to you has made me cruel; my worship of\nyou has lighted the raging flame of destruction within me.  I am\nnot righteous.  I have no beliefs, I only believe in her whom,\nabove all else in the world, I have been able to realize.\"\n\nWonderful!  It was wonderful, indeed.  Only a minute ago I had\ndespised this man with all my heart.  But what I had thought to\nbe dead ashes now glowed with living fire.  The fire in him is\ntrue, that is beyond doubt.  Oh why has God made man such a mixed\ncreature?  Was it only to show his supernatural sleight of hand?\nOnly a few minutes ago I had thought that Sandip, whom I had once\ntaken to be a hero, was only the stage hero of melodrama.  But\nthat is not so, not so.  Even behind the trappings of the\ntheatre, a true hero may sometimes be lurking.\n\nThere is much in Sandip that is coarse, that is sensuous, that is\nfalse, much that is overlaid with layer after layer of fleshly\ncovering.  Yet--yet it is best to confess that there is a great\ndeal in the depths of him which we do not, cannot understand--\nmuch in ourselves too.  A wonderful thing is man.  What great\nmysterious purpose he is working out only the Terrible One [28]\nknows--meanwhile we groan under the brunt of it.  Shiva is the\nLord of Chaos.  He is all Joy.  He will destroy our bonds.\n\nI cannot but feel, again and again, that there are two persons in\nme.  One recoils from Sandip in his terrible aspect of Chaos--the\nother feels that very vision to be sweetly alluring.  The sinking\nship drags down all who are swimming round it.  Sandip is just\nsuch a force of destruction.  His immense attraction gets hold of\none before fear can come to the rescue, and then, in the\ntwinkling of an eye, one is drawn away, irresistibly, from all\nlight, all good, all freedom of the sky, all air that can be\nbreathed--from lifelong accumulations, from everyday cares--right\nto the bottom of dissolution.\n\nFrom some realm of calamity has Sandip come as its messenger; and\nas he stalks the land, muttering unholy incantations, to him\nflock all the boys and youths.  The mother, seated in the lotus-\nheart of the Country, is wailing her heart out; for they have\nbroken open her store-room, there to hold their drunken revelry.\nHer vintage of the draught for the immortals they would pour out\non the dust; her time-honoured vessels they would smash to\npieces.  True, I feel with her; but, at the same time, I cannot\nhelp being infected with their excitement.\n\nTruth itself has sent us this temptation to test our trustiness\nin upholding its commandments.  Intoxication masquerades in\nheavenly garb, and dances before the pilgrims saying: \"Fools you\nare that pursue the fruitless path of renunciation.  Its way is\nlong, its time passing slow.  So the Wielder of the Thunderbolt\nhas sent me to you.  Behold, I the beautiful, the passionate, I\nwill accept you--in my embrace you shall find fulfilment.\"\n\nAfter a pause Sandip addressed me again: \"Goddess, the time has\ncome for me to leave you.  It is well.  The work of your nearness\nhas been done.  By lingering longer it would only become undone\nagain, little by little.  All is lost, if in our greed we try to\ncheapen that which is the greatest thing on earth.  That which is\neternal within the moment only becomes shallow if spread out in\ntime.  We were about to spoil our infinite moment, when it was\nyour uplifted thunderbolt which came to the rescue.  You\nintervened to save the purity of your own worship--and in so\ndoing you also saved your worshipper.  In my leave-taking today\nyour worship stands out the biggest thing.  Goddess, I, also, set\nyou free today.  My earthen temple could hold you no longer--\nevery moment it was on the point of breaking apart.  Today I\ndepart to worship your larger image in a larger temple.  I can\ngain you more truly only at a distance from yourself.  Here I had\nonly your favour, there I shall be vouchsafed your boon.\"\n\nMy jewel-casket was lying on the table.  I held it up aloft as I\nsaid: \"I charge you to convey these my jewels to the object of my\nworship--to whom I have dedicated them through you.\"\n\nMy husband remained silent.  Sandip left the room.\n\n------\n\n27. Quotation from the National song--__Bande Mataram__.\n\n28. Rudra, the Terrible, a name of Shiva.  [Trans.].\n\nXXI\n\n\n\nI had just sat down to make some cakes for Amulya when the Bara\nRani came upon the scene.  \"Oh dear,\" she exclaimed, \"has it come\nto this that you must make cakes for your own birthday?\"\n\n\"Is there no one else for whom I could be making them?\"  I asked.\n\n\"But this is not the day when you should think of feasting\nothers.  It is for us to feast you.  I was just thinking of\nmaking something up [29] when I heard the staggering news which\ncompletely upset me.  A gang of five or six hundred men, they\nsay, has raided one of our treasuries and made off with six\nthousand rupees.  Our house will be looted next, they expect.\"\n\nI felt greatly relieved.  So it was our own money after all.  I\nwanted to send for Amulya at once and tell him that he need only\nhand over those notes to my husband and leave the explanations to\nme.\n\n\"You are a wonderful creature!\"  my sister-in-law broke out, at\nthe change in my countenance.  \"Have you then really no such\nthing as fear?\"\n\n\"I cannot believe it,\" I said.  \"Why should they loot our house?\"\n\n\"Not believe it, indeed!  Who could have believed that they would\nattack our treasury, either?\"\n\nI made no reply, but bent over my cakes, putting in the cocoa-nut\nstuffing.\n\n\"Well, I'm off,\" said the Bara Rani after a prolonged stare at\nme.  \"I must see Brother Nikhil and get something done about\nsending off my money to Calcutta, before it's too late.\"\n\nShe was no sooner gone than I left the cakes to take care of\nthemselves and rushed to my dressing-room, shutting myself\ninside.  My husband's tunic with the keys in its pocket was still\nhanging there--so forgetful was he.  I took the key of the iron\nsafe off the ring and kept it by me, hidden in the folds of my\ndress.\n\nThen there came a knocking at the door.  \"I am dressing,\" I\ncalled out.  I could hear the Bara Rani saying: \"Only a minute\nago I saw her making cakes and now she is busy dressing up.  What\nnext, I wonder!  One of their __Bande Mataram__ meetings is\non, I suppose.  I say, Robber Queen,\" she called out to me, \"are\nyou taking stock of your loot?\"\n\nWhen they went away I hardly know what made me open the safe.\nPerhaps there was a lurking hope that it might all be a dream.\nWhat if, on pulling out the inside drawer, I should find the\nrolls of gold there, just as before?  ...  Alas, everything was\nempty as the trust which had been betrayed.\n\nI had to go through the farce of dressing.  I had to do my hair\nup all over again, quite unnecessarily.  When I came out my\nsister-in-law railed at me: \"How many times are you going to\ndress today?\"\n\n\"My birthday!\"  I said.\n\n\"Oh, any pretext seems good enough,\" she went on.  \"Many vain\npeople have I seen in my day, but you beat them all hollow.\"\n\nI was about to summon a servant to send after Amulya, when one of\nthe men came up with a little note, which he handed to me.  It\nwas from Amulya.  \"Sister,\" he wrote, \"you invited me this\nafternoon, but I thought I should not wait.  Let me first execute\nyour bidding and then come for my __prasad__.  I may be a\nlittle late.\"\n\nTo whom could he be going to return that money?  into what fresh\nentanglement was the poor boy rushing?  O miserable woman, you\ncan only send him off like an arrow, but not recall him if you\nmiss your aim.\n\nI should have declared at once that I was at the bottom of this\nrobbery.  But women live on the trust of their surroundings--this\nis their whole world.  If once it is out that this trust has been\nsecretly betrayed, their place in their world is lost.  They have\nthen to stand upon the fragments of the thing they have broken,\nand its jagged edges keep on wounding them at every turn.  To sin\nis easy enough, but to make up for it is above all difficult for\na woman.\n\nFor some time past all easy approaches for communion with my\nhusband have been closed to me.  How then could I burst on him\nwith this stupendous news?  He was very late in coming for his\nmeal today--nearly two o'clock.  He was absent-minded and hardly\ntouched any food.  I had lost even the right to press him to take\na little more.  I had to avert my face to wipe away my tears.\n\nI wanted so badly to say to him: \"Do come into our room and rest\nawhile; you look so tired.\"  I had just cleared my throat with a\nlittle cough, when a servant hurried in to say that the Police\nInspector had brought Panchu up to the palace.  My husband, with\nthe shadow on his face deepened, left his meal unfinished and\nwent out.\n\nA little later the Bara Rani appeared.  \"Why did you not send me\nword when Brother Nikhil came in?\"  she complained.  \"As he was\nlate I thought I might as well finish my bath in the meantime.\nHowever did he manage to get through his meal so soon?\"\n\n\"Why, did you want him for anything?\"\n\n\"What is this about both of you going off to Calcutta tomorrow?\nAll I can say is, I am not going to be left here alone.  I should\nget startled out of my life at every sound, with all these\ndacoits about.  Is it quite settled about your going tomorrow?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said I, though I had only just now heard it; and though,\nmoreover, I was not at all sure that before tomorrow our history\nmight not take such a turn as to make it all one whether we went\nor stayed.  After that, what our home, our life would be like,\nwas utterly beyond my ken--it seemed so misty and phantom-like.\n\nIn a very few hours now my unseen fate would become visible.  Was\nthere no one who could keep on postponing the flight of these\nhours, from day to day, and so make them long enough for me to\nset things right, so far as lay in my power?  The time during\nwhich the seed lies underground is long--so long indeed that one\nforgets that there is any danger of its sprouting.  But once its\nshoot shows up above the surface, it grows and grows so fast,\nthere is no time to cover it up, neither with skirt, nor body,\nnor even life itself.\n\nI will try to think of it no more, but sit quiet--passive and\ncallous--let the crash come when it may.  By the day after\ntomorrow all will be over--publicity, laughter, bewailing,\nquestions, explanations--everything.\n\nBut I cannot forget the face of Amulya--beautiful, radiant with\ndevotion.  He did not wait, despairing, for the blow of fate to\nfall, but rushed into the thick of danger.  In my misery I do him\nreverence.  He is my boy-god.  Under the pretext of his\nplayfulness he took from me the weight of my burden.  He would\nsave me by taking the punishment meant for me on his own head.\nBut how am Ito bear this terrible mercy of my God?\n\nOh, my child, my child, I do you reverence.  Little brother mine,\nI do you reverence.  Pure are you, beautiful are you, I do you\nreverence.  May you come to my arms, in the next birth, as my own\nchild--that is my prayer.\n\n------\n\n29. Any dainties to be offered ceremonially should be made by the\nlady of the house herself.  [Trans.].\n\nXXII\n\n\n\nRumour became busy on every side.  The police were continually in\nand out.  The servants of the house were in a great flurry.\n\nKhema, my maid, came up to me and said: \"Oh, Rani Mother! for\ngoodness\" sake put away my gold necklace and armlets in your iron\nsafe.\"  To whom was I to explain that the Rani herself had been\nweaving all this network of trouble, and had got caught in it,\ntoo?  I had to play the benign protector and take charge of\nKhema's ornaments and Thako's savings.  The milk-woman, in her\nturn, brought along and kept in my room a box in which were a\nBenares __sari__ and some other of her valued possessions.  \"I\ngot these at your wedding,\" she told me.\n\nWhen, tomorrow, my iron safe will be opened in the presence of\nthese--Khema, Thako, the milk-woman and all the rest ...  Let me\nnot think of it!  Let me rather try to think what it will be like\nwhen this third day of Magh comes round again after a year has\npassed.  Will all the wounds of my home life then be still as\nfresh as ever?  ...\n\nAmulya writes that he will come later in the evening.  I cannot\nremain alone with my thoughts, doing nothing.  So I sit down\nagain to make cakes for him.  I have finished making quite a\nquantity, but still I must go on.  Who will eat them?  I shall\ndistribute them amongst the servants.  I must do so this very\nnight.  Tonight is my limit.  Tomorrow will not be in my hands.\n\nI went on untiringly, frying cake after cake.  Every now and then\nit seemed to me that there was some noise in the direction of my\nrooms, upstairs.  Could it be that my husband had missed the key\nof the safe, and the Bara Rani had assembled all the servants to\nhelp him to hunt for it?  No, I must not pay heed to these\nsounds.  Let me shut the door.\n\nI rose to do so, when Thako came panting in: \"Rani Mother, oh,\nRani Mother!\"\n\n\"Oh get away!\"  I snapped out, cutting her short.  \"Don't come\nbothering me.\"\n\n\"The Bara Rani Mother wants you,\" she went on.  \"Her nephew has\nbrought such a wonderful machine from Calcutta.  It talks like a\nman.  Do come and hear it!\"\n\nI did not know whether to laugh or to cry.  So, of all things, a\ngramophone needs must come on the scene at such a time, repeating\nat every winding the nasal twang of its theatrical songs!  What a\nfearsome thing results when a machine apes a man.\n\nThe shades of evening began to fall.  I knew that Amulya would\nnot delay to announce himself--yet I could not wait.  I summone\nd a servant and said: \"Go and tell Amulya Babu to come straight\nin here.\"  The man came back after a while to say that Amulya was\nnot in--he had not come back since he had gone.\n\n\"Gone!\"  The last word struck my ears like a wail in the\ngathering darkness.  Amulya gone!  Had he then come like a streak\nof light from the setting sun, only to be gone for ever?  All\nkinds of possible and impossible dangers flitted through my mind.\nIt was I who had sent him to his death.  What if he was fearless?\nThat only showed his own greatness of heart.  But after this how\nwas Ito go on living all by myself?\n\nI had no memento of Amulya save that pistol--his reverence-\noffering.  It seemed to me that this was a sign given by\nProvidence.  This guilt which had contaminated my life at its\nvery root--my God in the form of a child had left with me the\nmeans of wiping it away, and then vanished.  Oh the loving gift--\nthe saving grave that lay hidden within it!\n\nI opened my box and took out the pistol, lifting it reverently to\nmy forehead.  At that moment the gongs clanged out from the\ntemple attached to our house.  I prostrated myself in salutation.\n\nIn the evening I feasted the whole household with my cakes.  \"You\nhave managed a wonderful birthday feast--and all by yourself\ntoo!\"  exclaimed my sister-in-law.  \"But you must leave something\nfor us to do.\"  With this she turned on her gramophone and let\nloose the shrill treble of the Calcutta actresses all over the\nplace.  It seemed like a stable full of neighing fillies.\n\nIt got quite late before the feasting was over.  I had a sudden\nlonging to end my birthday celebration by taking the dust of my\nhusband's feet.  I went up to the bedroom and found him fast\nasleep.  He had had such a worrying, trying day.  I raised the\nedge of the mosquito curtain very very gently, and laid my head\nnear his feet.  My hair must have touched him, for he moved his\nlegs in his sleep and pushed my head away.\n\nI then went out and sat in the west verandah.  A silk-cotton\ntree, which had shed all its leaves, stood there in the distance,\nlike a skeleton.  Behind it the crescent moon was setting.  All\nof a sudden I had the feeling that the very stars in the sky were\nafraid of me--that the whole of the night world was looking\naskance at me.  Why?  Because I was alone.\n\nThere is nothing so strange in creation as the man who is alone.\nEven he whose near ones have all died, one by one, is not alone--\ncompanionship comes for him from behind the screen of death.  But\nhe, whose kin are there, yet no longer near, who has dropped out\nof all the varied companionship of a full home--the starry\nuniverse itself seems to bristle to look on him in his darkness.\n\nWhere I am, I am not.  I am far away from those who are around\nme.  I live and move upon a world-wide chasm of separation,\nunstable as the dew-drop upon the lotus leaf.\n\nWhy do not men change wholly when they change?  When I look into\nmy heart, I find everything that was there, still there--only\nthey are topsy-turvy.  Things that were well-ordered have become\njumbled up.  The gems that were strung into a necklace are now\nrolling in the dust.  And so my heart is breaking.\n\nI feel I want to die.  Yet in my heart everything still lives--\nnor even in death can I see the end of it all: rather, in death\nthere seems to be ever so much more of repining.  What is to be\nended must be ended in this life--there is no other way out.\n\nOh forgive me just once, only this time, Lord!  All that you gave\ninto my hands as the wealth of my life, I have made into my\nburden.  I can neither bear it longer, nor give it up.  O Lord,\nsound once again those flute strains which you played for me,\nlong ago, standing at the rosy edge of my morning sky--and let\nall my complexities become simple and easy.  Nothing save the\nmusic of your flute can make whole that which has been broken,\nand pure that which has been sullied.  Create my home anew with\nyour music.  No other way can I see.\n\nI threw myself prone on the ground and sobbed aloud.  It was for\nmercy that I prayed--some little mercy from somewhere, some\nshelter, some sign of forgiveness, some hope that might bring\nabout the end.  \"Lord,\" I vowed to myself, \"I will lie here,\nwaiting and waiting, touching neither food nor drink, so long as\nyour blessing does not reach me.\"\n\nI heard the sound of footsteps.  Who says that the gods do not\nshow themselves to mortal men?  I did not raise my face to look\nup, lest the sight of it should break the spell.  Come, oh come,\ncome and let your feet touch my head.  Come, Lord, and set your\nfoot upon my throbbing heart, and at that moment let me die.\n\nHe came and sat near my head.  Who?  My husband!  At the first\ntouch of his presence I felt that I should swoon.  And then the\npain at my heart burst its way out in an overwhelming flood of\ntears, tearing through all my obstructing veins and nerves.  I\nstrained his feet to my bosom--oh, why could not their impress\nremain there for ever?\n\nHe tenderly stroked my head.  I received his blessing.  Now I\nshall be able to take up the penalty of public humiliation which\nwill be mine tomorrow, and offer it, in all sincerity, at the\nfeet of my God.\n\nBut what keeps crushing my heart is the thought that the festive\nflutes which were played at my wedding, nine years ago, welcoming\nme to this house, will never sound for me again in this life.\nWhat rigour of penance is there which can serve to bring me once\nmore, as a bride adorned for her husband, to my place upon that\nsame bridal seat?  How many years, how many ages, aeons, must\npass before I can find my way back to that day of nine years ago?\n\nGod can create new things, but has even He the power to create\nafresh that which has been destroyed?\n\n\n\nChapter Twelve\n\nNikhil's Story\n\nXV\n\n\n\nTODAY we are going to Calcutta.  Our joys and sorrows lie heavy\non us if we merely go on accumulating them.  Keeping them and\naccumulating them alike are false.  As master of the house I am\nin an artificial position--in reality I am a wayfarer on the path\nof life.  That is why the true Master of the House gets hurt at\nevery step and at last there comes the supreme hurt of death.\n\nMy union with you, my love, was only of the wayside; it was well\nenough so long as we followed the same road; it will only hamper\nus if we try to preserve it further.  We are now leaving its\nbonds behind.  We are started on our journey beyond, and it will\nbe enough if we can throw each other a glance, or feel the touch\nof each other's hands in passing.  After that?  After that there\nis the larger world-path, the endless current of universal life.\n\nHow little can you deprive me of, my love, after all?  Whenever I\nset my ear to it, I can hear the flute which is playing, its\nfountain of melody gushing forth from the flute-stops of\nseparation.  The immortal draught of the goddess is never\nexhausted.  She sometimes breaks the bowl from which we drink it,\nonly to smile at seeing us so disconsolate over the trifling\nloss.  I will not stop to pick up my broken bowl.  I will march\nforward, albeit with unsatisfied heart.\n\nThe Bara Rani came and asked me: \"What is the meaning, brother,\nof all these books being packed up and sent off in box-loads?\"\n\n\"It only means,\" I replied, \"that I have not yet been able to get\nover my fondness for them.\"\n\n\"I only wish you would keep your fondness for some other things\nas well!  Do you mean you are never coming back home?\"\n\n\"I shall be coming and going, but shall not immure myself here\nany more.\"\n\n\"Oh indeed!  Then just come along to my room and see how many\nthings __I__ have been unable to shake off __my__ fondness\nfor.\"  With this she took me by the hand and marched me off.\n\nIn my sister-in-law's rooms I found numberless boxes and bundles\nready packed.  She opened one of the boxes and said: \"See,\nbrother, look at all my __pan__-making things.  In this bottle\nI have catechu powder scented with the pollen of screw-pine\nblossoms.  These little tin boxes are all for different kinds of\nspices.  I have not forgotten my playing cards and draught-board\neither.  If you two are over-busy, I shall manage to make other\nfriends there, who will give me a game.  Do you remember this\ncomb?  It was one of the __Swadeshi__ combs you brought for\nme...\"\n\n\"But what is all this for, Sister Rani?  Why have you been\npacking up all these things?\"\n\n\"Do you think I am not going with you?\"\n\n\"What an extraordinary idea!\"\n\n\"Don't you be afraid!  I am not going there to flirt with you,\nnor to quarrel with the Chota Rani!  One must die sooner or\nlater, and it is just as well to be on the bank of the holy\nGanges before it is too late.  It is too horrible to think of\nbeing cremated in your wretched burning-ground here, under that\nstumpy banian tree--that is why I have been refusing to die, and\nhave plagued you all this time.\"\n\nAt last I could hear the true voice of home.  The Bara Rani came\ninto our house as its bride, when I was only six years old.  We\nhave played together, through the drowsy afternoons, in a corner\nof the roof-terrace.  I have thrown down to her green amras from\nthe tree-top, to be made into deliciously indigestible chutnies\nby slicing them up with mustard, salt and fragrant herbs.  It was\nmy part to gather for her all the forbidden things from the\nstore-room to be used in the marriage celebration of her doll;\nfor, in the penal code of my grandmother, I alone was exempt from\npunishment.  And I used to be appointed her messenger to my\nbrother, whenever she wanted to coax something special out of\nhim, because he could not resist my importunity.  I also remember\nhow, when I suffered under the rigorous régime of the doctors of\nthose days--who would not allow anything except warm water and\nsugared cardamom seeds during feverish attacks--my sister-in-law\ncould not bear my privation and used to bring me delicacies on\nthe sly.  What a scolding she got one day when she was caught!\n\nAnd then, as we grew up, our mutual joys and sorrows took on\ndeeper tones of intimacy.  How we quarrelled!  Sometimes\nconflicts of worldly interests roused suspicions and jealousies,\nmaking breaches in our love; and when the Chota Rani came in\nbetween us, these breaches seemed as if they would never be\nmended, but it always turned out that the healing forces at\nbottom proved more powerful than the wounds on the surface.\n\nSo has a true relationship grown up between us, from our\nchildhood up till now, and its branching foliage has spread and\nbroadened over every room and verandah and terrace of this great\nhouse.  When I saw the Bara Rani make ready, with all her\nbelongings, to depart from this house of ours, all the ties that\nbound us, to their wide-spreading ends, felt the shock.\n\nThe reason was clear to me, why she had made up her mind to drift\naway towards the unknown, cutting asunder all her lifelong bonds\nof daily habit, and of the house itself, which she had never left\nfor a day since she first entered it at the age of nine.  And yet\nit was this real reason which she could not allow to escape her\nlips, preferring rather to put forward any other paltry excuse.\n\nShe had only this one relationship left in all the world, and the\npoor, unfortunate, widowed and childless woman had cherished it\nwith all the tenderness hoarded in her heart.  How deeply she had\nfelt our proposed separation I never realized so keenly as when I\nstood amongst her scattered boxes and bundles.\n\nI could see at once that the little differences she used to have\nwith Bimala, about money matters, did not proceed from any sordid\nworldliness, but because she felt that her claims in regard to\nthis one relationship of her life had been overridden and its\nties weakened for her by the coming in between of this other\nwoman from goodness knows where!  She had been hurt at every turn\nand yet had not the right to complain.\n\nAnd Bimala?  She also had felt that the Senior Rani's claim over\nme was not based merely on our social connection, but went much\ndeeper; and she was jealous of these ties between us, reaching\nback to our childhood.\n\nToday my heart knocked heavily against the doors of my breast.  I\nsank down upon one of the boxes as I said: \"How I should love,\nSister Rani, to go back to the days when we first met in this old\nhouse of ours.\"\n\n\"No, brother dear,\" she replied with a sigh, \"I would not live my\nlife again--not as a woman!  Let what I have had to bear end with\nthis one birth.  I could not bear it over again.\"\n\nI said to her: \"The freedom to which we pass through sorrow is\ngreater than the sorrow.\"\n\n\"That may be so for you men.  Freedom is for you.  But we women\nwould keep others bound.  We would rather be put into bondage\nourselves.  No, no, brother, you will never get free from our\ntoils.  If you needs must spread your wings, you will have to\ntake us with you; we refuse to be left behind.  That is why I\nhave gathered together all this weight of luggage.  It would\nnever do to allow men to run too light.\"\n\n\"I can feel the weight of your words,\" I said laughing, \"and if\nwe men do not complain of your burdens, it is because women pay\nus so handsomely for what they make us carry.\"\n\n\"You carry it,\" she said, \"because it is made up of many small\nthings.  Whichever one you think of rejecting pleads that it is\nso light.  And so with much lightness we weigh you down ...  When\ndo we start?\"\n\n\"The train leaves at half past eleven tonight.  There will be\nlots of time.\"\n\n\"Look here, do be good for once and listen to just one word of\nmine.  Take a good nap this afternoon.  You know you never get\nany sleep in the train.  You look so pulled down, you might go to\npieces any moment.  Come along, get through your bath first.\"\n\nAs we went towards my room, Khema, the maid, came up and with an\nultra-modest pull at her veil told us, in deprecatingly low\ntones, that the Police Inspector had arrived with a prisoner and\nwanted to see the Maharaja.\n\n\"Is the Maharaja a thief, or a robber,\" the Bara Rani flared up,\n\"that he should be set upon so by the police?  Go and tell the\nInspector that the Maharaja is at his bath.\"\n\n\"Let me just go and see what is the matter,\" I pleaded.  \"It may\nbe something urgent.\"\n\n\"No, no,\" my sister-in-law insisted.  \"Our Chota Rani was making\na heap of cakes last night.  I'll send some to the Inspector, to\nkeep him quiet till you're ready.\"  With this she pushed me into\nmy room and shut the door on me.\n\nI had not the power to resist such tyranny--so rare is it in this\nworld.  Let the Inspector while away the time eating cakes.  What\nif business is a bit neglected?\n\nThe police had been in great form these last few days arresting\nnow this one, now that.  Each day some innocent person or other\nwould be brought along to enliven the assembly in my office-room.\nOne more such unfortunate, I supposed, must have been brought in\nthat day.  But why should the Inspector alone be regaled with\ncakes?  That would not do at all.  I thumped vigorously on the\ndoor.\n\n\"If you are going mad, be quick and pour some water over your\nhead--that will keep you cool,\" said my sister-in-law from the\npassage.\n\n\"Send down cakes for two,\" I shouted.  \"The person who has been\nbrought in as the thief probably deserves them better.  Tell the\nman to give him a good big helping.\"\n\nI hurried through my bath.  When I came out, I found Bimal\nsitting on the floor outside.  [30] Could this be my Bimal of\nold, my proud, sensitive Bimal?\n\nWhat favour could she be wanting to beg, seated like this at my\ndoor?\n\nAs I stopped short, she stood up and said gently with downcast\neyes: \"I would have a word with you.\"\n\n\"Come inside then,\" I said.\n\n\"But are you going out on any particular business?\"\n\n\"I was, but let that be.  I want to hear ...\"\n\n\"No, finish your business first.  We will have our talk after you\nhave had your dinner.\"\n\nI went off to my sitting-room, to find the Police Inspector's\nplate quite empty.  The person he had brought with him, however,\nwas still busy eating.\n\n\"Hullo!\"  I ejaculated in surprise.  \"You, Amulya?\"\n\n\"It is I, sir,\" said Amulya with his mouth full of cake.  \"I've\nhad quite a feast.  And if you don't mind, I'll take the rest\nwith me.\"  With this he proceeded to tie up the remaining cakes\nin his handkerchief.\n\n\"What does this mean?\"  I asked, staring at the Inspector.\n\nThe man laughed.  \"We are no nearer, sir,\" he said, \"to solving\nthe problem of the thief: meanwhile the mystery of the theft\ndeepens.\"  He then produced something tied up in a rag, which\nwhen untied disclosed a bundle of currency notes.  \"This,\nMaharaja,\" said the Inspector, \"is your six thousand rupees!\"\n\n\"Where was it found?\"\n\n\"In Amulya Babu's hands.  He went last evening to the manager of\nyour Chakna sub-office to tell him that the money had been found.\nThe manager seemed to be in a greater state of trepidation at the\nrecovery than he had been at the robbery.  He was afraid he would\nbe suspected of having made away with the notes and of now making\nup a cock-and-bull story for fear of being found out.  He asked\nAmulya to wait, on the pretext of getting him some refreshment,\nand came straight over to the Police Office.  I rode off at once,\nkept Amulya with me, and have been busy with him the whole\nmorning.  He refuses to tell us where he got the money from.  I\nwarned him he would be kept under restraint till he did so.  In\nthat case, he informed me he would have to lie.  Very well, I\nsaid, he might do so if he pleased.  Then he stated that he had\nfound the money under a bush.  I pointed out to him that it was\nnot quite so easy to lie as all that.  Under what bush?  Where\nwas the place?  Why was he there?--All this would have to be\nstated as well.  'Don't you worry,' he said, 'there is plenty of\ntime to invent all that.'\"\n\n\"But, Inspector,\" I said, \"why are you badgering a respectable\nyoung gentleman like Amulya Babu?\"\n\n\"I have no desire to harass him,\" said the Inspector.  \"He is not\nonly a gentleman, but the son of Nibaran Babu, my school-fellow.\nLet me tell you, Maharaja, exactly what must have happened.\nAmulya knows the thief, but wants to shield him by drawing\nsuspicion on himself.  That is just the sort of bravado he loves\nto indulge in.\"  The Inspector turned to Amulya.  \"Look here,\nyoung man,\" he continued, \"I also was eighteen once upon a time,\nand a student in the Ripon College.  I nearly got into gaol\ntrying to rescue a hack driver from a police constable.  It was a\nnear shave.\"  Then he turned again to me and said: \"Maharaja, the\nreal thief will now probably escape, but I think I can tell you\nwho is at the bottom of it all.\"\n\n\"Who is it, then?\"  I asked.\n\n\"The manager, in collusion with the guard, Kasim.\"\n\nWhen the Inspector, having argued out his theory to his own\nsatisfaction, at last departed, I said to Amulya: \"If you will\ntell me who took the money, I promise you no one shall be hurt.\"\n\n\"I did,\" said he.\n\n\"But how can that be?  What about the gang of armed men?...\"\n\n\"It was I, by myself, alone!\"\n\nWhat Amulya then told me was indeed extraordinary.  The manager\nhad just finished his supper and was on the verandah rinsing out\nhis mouth.  The place was somewhat dark.  Amulya had a revolver\nin each pocket, one loaded with blank cartridges, the other with\nball.  He had a mask over his face.  He flashed a bull's-eye\nlantern in the manager's face and fired a blank shot.  The man\nswooned away.  Some of the guards, who were off duty, came\nrunning up, but when Amulya fired another blank shot at them they\nlost no time in taking cover.  Then Kasim, who was on duty, came\nup whirling a quarterstaff.  This time Amulya aimed a bullet at\nhis legs, and finding himself hit, Kasim collapsed on the floor.\nAmulya then made the trembling manager, who had come to his\nsenses, open the safe and deliver up six thousand rupees.\nFinally, he took one of the estate horses and galloped off a few\nmiles, there let the animal loose, and quietly walked up here, to\nour place.\n\n\"What made you do all this, Amulya?\"  I asked.\n\n\"There was a grave reason, Maharaja,\" he replied.\n\n\"But why, then, did you try to return the money?\"\n\n\"Let her come, at whose command I did so.  In her presence I\nshall make a clean breast of it.\"\n\n\"And who may 'she' be?\"\n\n\"My sister, the Chota Rani!\"\n\nI sent for Bimala.  She came hesitatingly, barefoot, with a white\nshawl over her head.  I had never seen my Bimal like this before.\nShe seemed to have wrapped herself in a morning light.\n\nAmulya prostrated himself in salutation and took the dust of her\nfeet.  Then, as he rose, he said: \"Your command has been\nexecuted, sister.  The money is returned.\"\n\n\"You have saved me, my little brother,\" said Bimal.\n\n\"With your image in my mind, I have not uttered a single lie,\"\nAmulya continued.  \"My watchword __Bande Mataram__ has been\ncast away at your feet for good.  I have also received my reward,\nyour __prasad__, as soon as I came to the palace.\"\n\nBimal looked at him blankly, unable to follow his last words.\nAmulya brought out his handkerchief, and untying it showed her\nthe cakes put away inside.  \"I did not eat them all,\" he said.\n\"I have kept these to eat after you have helped me with your own\nhands.\"\n\nI could see that I was not wanted here.  I went out of the room.\nI could only preach and preach, so I mused, and get my effigy\nburnt for my pains.  I had not yet been able to bring back a\nsingle soul from the path of death.  They who have the power, can\ndo so by a mere sign.  My words have not that ineffable meaning.\nI am not a flame, only a black coal, which has gone out.  I can\nlight no lamp.  That is what the story of my life shows--my row\nof lamps has remained unlit.\n\n------\n\n30. Sitting on the bare floor is a sign of mourning, and so, by\nassociation of ideas, of an abject attitude of mind.  [Trans.].\n\nXVI\n\n\n\nI returned slowly towards the inner apartments.  The Bara Rani's\nroom must have been drawing me again.  It had become an absolute\nnecessity for me, that day, to feel that this life of mine had\nbeen able to strike some real, some responsive chord in some\nother harp of life.  One cannot realize one's own existence by\nremaining within oneself--it has to be sought outside.\n\nAs I passed in front of my sister-in-law's room, she came out\nsaying: \"I was afraid you would be late again this afternoon.\nHowever.  I ordered your dinner as soon as I heard you coming.\nIt will be served in a minute.\"\n\n\"Meanwhile,\" I said; \"let me take out that money of yours and\nhave it kept ready to take with us.\"\n\nAs we walked on towards my room she asked me if the Police\nInspector had made any report about the robbery.  I somehow did\nnot feel inclined to tell her all the details of how that six\nthousand had come back.  \"That's just what all the fuss is\nabout,\" I said evasively.\n\nWhen I went into my dressing-room and took out my bunch of keys,\nI did not find the key of the iron safe on the ring.  What an\nabsurdly absent-minded fellow I was, to be sure!  Only this\nmorning I had been opening so many boxes and things, and never\nnoticed that this key was not there.\n\n\"What has happened to your key?\"  she asked me.\n\nI went on fumbling in this pocket and that, but could give her no\nanswer.  I hunted in the same place over and over again.  It\ndawned on both of us that it could not be a case of the key being\nmislaid.  Someone must have taken it off the ring.  Who could it\nbe?  Who else could have come into this room?\n\n\"Don't you worry about it,\" she said to me.  \"Get through your\ndinner first.  The Chota Rani must have kept it herself, seeing\nhow absent-minded you are getting.\"\n\nI was, however, greatly disturbed.  It was never Bimal's habit to\ntake any key of mine without telling me about it.  Bimal was not\npresent at my meal-time that day: she was busy feasting Amulya in\nher own room.  My sister-in-law wanted to send for her, but I\nasked her not to do so.\n\nI had just finished my dinner when Bimal came in.  I would have\npreferred not to discuss the matter of the key in the Bara Rani's\npresence, but as soon as she saw Bimal, she asked her: \"Do you\nknow, dear, where the key of the safe is?\"\n\n\"I have it,\" was the reply.\n\n\"Didn't I say so!\"  exclaimed my sister-in-law triumphantly.\n\"Our Chota Rani pretends not to care about these robberies, but\nshe takes precautions on the sly, all the same.\"\n\nThe look on Bimal's face made my mind misgive me.  \"Let the key\nbe, now,\" I said.  \"I will take out that money in the evening.\"\n\n\"There you go again, putting it off,\" said the Bara Rani.  \"Why\nnot take it out and send it to the treasury while you have it in\nmind?\"\n\n\"I have taken it out already,\" said Bimal.\n\nI was startled.\n\n\"Where have you kept it, then?\"  asked my sister-in-law.\n\n\"I have spent it.\"\n\n\"Just listen to her!  Whatever did you spend all that money on?\"\n\nBimal made no reply.  I asked her nothing further.  The Bara Rani\nseemed about to make some further remark to Bimala, but checked\nherself.  \"Well, that is all right, anyway,\" she said at length,\nas she looked towards me.  \"Just what I used to do with my\nhusband's loose cash.  I knew it was no use leaving it with him--\nhis hundred and one hangers-on would be sure to get hold of it.\nYou are much the same, dear!  What a number of ways you men know\nof getting through money.  We can only save it from you by\nstealing it ourselves!  Come along now.  Off with you to bed.\"\n\nThe Bara Rani led me to my room, but I hardly knew where I was\ngoing.  She sat by my bed after I was stretched on it, and smiled\nat Bimal as she said: \"Give me one of your pans, Chotie darling--\nwhat?  You have none!  You have become a regular mem-sahib.  Then\nsend for some from my room.\"\n\n\"But have you had your dinner yet?\"  I anxiously enquired.\n\n\"Oh long ago,\" she replied--clearly a fib.\n\nShe kept on chattering away there at my bedside, on all manner of\nthings.  The maid came and told Bimal that her dinner had been\nserved and was getting cold, but she gave no sign of having heard\nit.  \"Not had your dinner yet?  What nonsense!  It's fearfully\nlate.\"  With this the Bara Rani took Bimal away with her.\n\nI could divine that there was some connection between the taking\nout of this six thousand and the robbing of the other.  But I\nhave no curiosity to learn the nature of it.  I shall never ask.\n\nProvidence leaves our life moulded in the rough--its object being\nthat we ourselves should put the finishing touches, shaping it\ninto its final form to our taste.  There has always been the\nhankering within me to express some great idea in the process of\ngiving shape to my life on the lines suggested by the Creator.\nIn this endeavour I have spent all my days.  How severely I have\ncurbed my desires, repressed myself at every step, only the\nSearcher of the Heart knows.\n\nBut the difficulty is, that one's life is not solely one's own.\nHe who would create it must do so with the help of his\nsurroundings, or he will fail.  So it was my constant dream to\ndraw Bimal to join me in this work of creating myself.  I loved\nher with all my soul; on the strength of that, I could not but\nsucceed in winning her to my purpose--that was my firm belief.\n\nThen I discovered that those who could simply and naturally draw\ntheir environment into the process of their self-creation\nbelonged to one species of the genus \"man\",--and I to another.  I\nhad received the vital spark, but could not impart it.  Those to\nwhom I have surrendered my all have taken my all, but not myself\nwith it.\n\nMy trial is hard indeed.  Just when I want a helpmate most, I am\nthrown back on myself alone.  Nevertheless, I record my vow that\neven in this trial I shall win through.  Alone, then, shall I\ntread my thorny path to the end of this life's journey ...\n\nI have begun to suspect that there has all along been a vein of\ntyranny in me.  There was a despotism in my desire to mould my\nrelations with Bimala in a hard, clear-cut, perfect form.  But\nman's life was not meant to be cast in a mould.  And if we try to\nshape the good, as so much mere material, it takes a terrible\nrevenge by losing its life.\n\nI did not realize all this while that it must have been this\nunconscious tyranny of mine which made us gradually drift apart.\nBimala's life, not finding its true level by reason of my\npressure from above, has had to find an outlet by undermining its\nbanks at the bottom.  She has had to steal this six thousand\nrupees because she could not be open with me, because she felt\nthat, in certain things, I despotically differed from her.\n\nMen, such as I, possessed with one idea, are indeed at one with\nthose who can manage to agree with us; but those who do not, can\nonly get on with us by cheating us.  It is our unyielding\nobstinacy, which drives even the simplest to tortuous ways.  In\ntrying to manufacture a helpmate, we spoil a wife.\n\nCould I not go back to the beginning?  Then, indeed, I should\nfollow the path of the simple.  I should not try to fetter my\nlife's companion with my ideas, but play the joyous pipes of my\nlove and say: \"Do you love me?  Then may you grow true to\nyourself in the light of your love.  Let my suggestions be\nsuppressed, let God's design, which is in you, triumph, and my\nideas retire abashed.\"\n\nBut can even Nature's nursing heal the open wound, into which our\naccumulated differences have broken out?  The covering veil,\nbeneath the privacy of which Nature's silent forces alone can\nwork, has been torn asunder.  Wounds must be bandaged--can we not\nbandage our wound with our love, so that the day may come when\nits scar will no longer be visible?  It is not too late?  So much\ntime has been lost in misunderstanding; it has taken right up to\nnow to come to an understanding; how much more time will it take\nfor the correcting?  What if the wound does eventually heal?--can\nthe devastation it has wrought ever be made good?\n\nThere was a slight sound near the door.  As I turned over I saw\nBimala's retreating figure through the open doorway.  She must\nhave been waiting by the door, hesitating whether to come in or\nnot, and at last have decided to go back.  I jumped up and\nbounded to the door, calling: \"Bimal.\"\n\nShe stopped on her way.  She had her back to me.  I went and took\nher by the hand and led her into our room.  She threw herself\nface downwards on a pillow, and sobbed and sobbed.  I said\nnothing, but held her hand as I sat by her head.\n\nWhen her storm of grief had abated she sat up.  I tried to draw\nher to my breast, but she pushed my arms away and knelt at my\nfeet, touching them repeatedly with her head, in obeisance.  I\nhastily drew my feet back, but she clasped them in her arms,\nsaying in a choking voice: \"No, no, no, you must not take away\nyour feet.  Let me do my worship.\"\n\nI kept still.  Who was I to stop her?  Was I the god of her\nworship that I should have any qualms?\n\n\n\nBimala's Story\n\nXXIII\n\n\n\nCome, come!  Now is the time to set sail towards that great\nconfluence, where the river of love meets the sea of worship.  In\nthat pure blue all the weight of its muddiness sinks and\ndisappears.\n\nI now fear nothing--neither myself, nor anybody else.  I have\npassed through fire.  What was inflammable has been burnt to\nashes; what is left is deathless.  I have dedicated myself to the\nfeet of him, who has received all my sin into the depths of his\nown pain.\n\nTonight we go to Calcutta.  My inward troubles have so long\nprevented my looking after my things.  Now let me arrange and\npack them.\n\nAfter a while I found my husband had come in and was taking a\nhand in the packing.\n\n\"This won't do,\" I said.  \"Did you not promise me you would have\na sleep?\"\n\n\"I might have made the promise,\" he replied, \"but my sleep did\nnot, and it was nowhere to be found.\"\n\n\"No, no,\" I repeated, \"this will never do.  Lie down for a while,\nat least.\"\n\n\"But how can you get through all this alone?\"\n\n\"Of course I can.\"\n\n\"Well, you may boast of being able to do without me.  But frankly\nI can't do without you.  Even sleep refused to come to me, alone,\nin that room.\"  Then he set to work again.\n\nBut there was an interruption, in the shape of a servant, who\ncame and said that Sandip Babu had called and had asked to be\nannounced.  I did not dare to ask whom he wanted.  The light of\nthe sky seemed suddenly to be shut down, like the leaves of a\nsensitive plant.\n\n\"Come, Bimal,\" said my husband.  \"Let us go and hear what Sandip\nhas to tell us.  Since he has come back again, after taking his\nleave, he must have something special to say.\"\n\nI went, simply because it would have been still more embarrassing\nto stay.  Sandip was staring at a picture on the wall.  As we\nentered he said: \"You must be wondering why the fellow has\nreturned.  But you know the ghost is never laid till all the\nrites are complete.\"  With these words he brought out of his\npocket something tied in his handkerchief, and laying it on the\ntable, undid the knot.  It was those sovereigns.\n\n\"Don't you mistake me, Nikhil,\" he said.  \"You must not imagine\nthat the contagion of your company has suddenly turned me honest;\nI am not the man to come back in slobbering repentance to return\nill-gotten money.  But...\"\n\nHe left his speech unfinished.  After a pause he turned towards\nNikhil, but said to me: \"After all these days, Queen Bee, the\nghost of compunction has found an entry into my hitherto\nuntroubled conscience.  As I have to wrestle with it every night,\nafter my first sleep is over, I cannot call it a phantom of my\nimagination.  There is no escape even for me till its debt is\npaid.  Into the hands of that spirit, therefore, let me make\nrestitution.  Goddess!  From you, alone, of all the world, I\nshall not be able to take away anything.  I shall not be rid of\nyou till I am destitute.  Take these back!\"\n\nHe took out at the same time the jewel-casket from under his\ntunic and put it down, and then left us with hasty steps.\n\n\"Listen to me, Sandip,\" my husband called after him.\n\n\"I have not the time, Nikhil,\" said Sandip as he paused near the\ndoor.  \"The Mussulmans, I am told, have taken me for an\ninvaluable gem, and are conspiring to loot me and hide me away in\ntheir graveyard.  But I feel that it is necessary that I should\nlive.  I have just twenty-five minutes to catch the North-bound\ntrain.  So, for the present, I must be gone.  We shall have our\ntalk out at the next convenient opportunity.  If you take my\nadvice, don't you delay in getting away either.  I salute you,\nQueen Bee, Queen of the bleeding hearts, Queen of desolation!\"\n\nSandip then left almost at a run.  I stood stock-still; I had\nnever realized in such a manner before, how trivial, how paltry,\nthis gold and these jewels were.  Only a short while ago I was so\nbusy thinking what I should take with me, and how I should pack\nit.  Now I felt that there was no need to take anything at all.\nTo set out and go forth was the important thing.\n\nMy husband left his seat and came up and took me by the hand.\n\"It is getting late,\" he said.  \"There is not much time left to\ncomplete our preparations for the journey.\"\n\nAt this point Chandranath Babu suddenly came in.  Finding us both\ntogether, he fell back for a moment.  Then he said, \"Forgive me,\nmy little mother, if I intrude.  Nikhil, the Mussulmans are out\nof hand.  They are looting Harish Kundu's treasury.  That does\nnot so much matter.  But what is intolerable is the violence that\nis being done to the women of their house.\"\n\n\"I am off,\" said my husband.\n\n\"What can you do there?\"  I pleaded, as I held him by the hand.\n\"Oh, sir,\" I appealed to his master.  \"Will you not tell him not\nto go?\"\n\n\"My little mother,\" he replied, \"there is no time to do anything\nelse.\"\n\n\"Don't be alarmed, Bimal,\" said my husband, as he left us.\n\nWhen I went to the window I saw my husband galloping away on\nhorseback, with not a weapon in his hands.\n\nIn another minute the Bara Rani came running in.  \"What have you\ndone, Chotie darling,\" she cried.  \"How could you let him go?\"\n\n\"Call the Dewan at once,\" she said, turning to a servant.\n\nThe Ranis never appeared before the Dewan, but the Bara Rani had\nno thought that day for appearances.\n\n\"Send a mounted man to bring back the Maharaja at once,\" she\nsaid, as soon as the Dewan came up.\n\n\"We have all entreated him to stay, Rani Mother,\" said the Dewan,\n\"but he refused to turn back.\"\n\n\"Send word to him that the Bara Rani is ill, that she is on her\ndeath-bed,\" cried my sister-in-law wildly.\n\nWhen the Dewan had left she turned on me with a furious outburst.\n\"Oh, you witch, you ogress, you could not die yourself, but needs\nmust send him to his death!  ...\"\n\nThe light of the day began to fade.  The sun set behind the\nfeathery foliage of the blossoming __Sajna__ tree.  I can see\nevery different shade of that sunset even today.  Two masses of\ncloud on either side of the sinking orb made it look like a great\nbird with fiery-feathered wings outspread.  It seemed to me that\nthis fateful day was taking its flight, to cross the ocean of\nnight.\n\nIt became darker and darker.  Like the flames of a distant\nvillage on fire, leaping up every now and then above the horizon,\na distant din swelled up in recurring waves into the darkness.\n\nThe bells of the evening worship rang out from our temple.  I\nknew the Bara Rani was sitting there, with palms joined in silent\nprayer.  But I could not move a step from the window.\n\nThe roads, the village beyond, and the still more distant fringe\nof trees, grew more and more vague.  The lake in our grounds\nlooked up into the sky with a dull lustre, like a blind man's\neye.  On the left the tower seemed to be craning its neck to\ncatch sight of something that was happening.\n\nThe sounds of night take on all manner of disguises.  A twig\nsnaps, and one thinks that somebody is running for his life.  A\ndoor slams, and one feels it to be the sudden heart-thump of a\nstartled world.\n\nLights would suddenly flicker under the shade of the distant\ntrees, and then go out again.  Horses' hoofs would clatter, now\nand again, only to turn out to be riders leaving the palace\ngates.\n\nI continually had the feeling that, if only I could die, all this\nturmoil would come to an end.  So long as I was alive my sins\nwould remain rampant, scattering destruction on every side.  I\nremembered the pistol in my box.  But my feet refused to leave\nthe window in quest of it.  Was I not awaiting my fate?\n\nThe gong of the watch solemnly struck ten.  A little later,\ngroups of lights appeared in the distance and a great crowd wound\nits way, like some great serpent, along the roads in the\ndarkness, towards the palace gates.\n\nThe Dewan rushed to the gate at the sound.  Just then a rider\ncame galloping in.  \"What's the news, Jata?\"  asked the Dewan.\n\n\"Not good,\" was the reply.\n\nI could hear these words distinctly from my window.  But\nsomething was next whispered which I could not catch.\n\nThen came a palanquin, followed by a litter.  The doctor was\nwalking alongside the palanquin.\n\n\"What do you think, doctor?\"  asked the Dewan.\n\n\"Can't say yet,\" the doctor replied.  \"The wound in the head is a\nserious one.\"\n\n\"And Amulya Babu?\"\n\n\"He has a bullet through the heart.  He is done for.\""