Chapter XIX

So as he went away, the soul of Yogeshwara, in his ambush, almost leaped from his body, so extreme was his rage, and disgust, and disappointment, to see him go. And he exclaimed within himself: Ha! what! am I awake, or only dreaming? What! after lifting the matter to the very topmost pinnacle of success, has she actually dashed it, with a single stroke, to the very bottom, making everything worse by far than it was at the beginning? Is she mad, or what in the world can be the matter with her? Ha! now she has very effectually ruined herself, and her father, and me, and the kingdom, and all. Could she not hold her woman's tongue, and keep the secret? Ha! now indeed, all is lost. For now like a mad elephant he will be back upon us, in a very little while, to wreak his rage upon us all, and tear up the kingdom and the tree of my policy, by its very roots. Fool that I was, to stake all upon the discretion of a girl!

And all at once, he stopped short, struck with the thunderbolt of astonishment at the behaviour of the King's daughter. For when the King was gone, she stood awhile, looking at the door, by which he had disappeared, motionless as a tree, and turning paler and ever paler, till her face resembled the marble floor on which she stood. And suddenly she turned round. And as fate would have it, at that moment, her eyes fell on the seat, where he sat, and on the flower, that lay there, exactly as he placed it, when he lifted it with such affection from the floor. And she looked at it, for a single instant, and all at once, she flung herself upon her knees, with her face buried in her two arms, that rested on her basket, and she began to sob, as if, her heart being broken, she was about to break herself in pieces also.

And as he watched her, tears of compassion for her and her condition arose, as if against his will, in Yogeshwara's soul: for he had a daughter of his own. And he gazed at her distracted, and seizing his right ear with his hand, he began to pull it, utterly confounded and perplexed as to what was to be done. And he said within himself: Surely some assistance should be rendered to this unhappy maiden, no matter what blame she has incurred by her incomprehensible and utterly disastrous behaviour. For she seems about to abandon the body, in grief about something or other, as great as I have ever witnessed in my life. And yet if I go to her assistance, it will come out that I was a party to their interview, and that will never do. And yet I cannot stay here and watch her, as it were, dying before my eyes, in the very agony of grief.