Part 19 (2/2)

So, for a second, the girl stood surprised, hesitating. She was extraordinarily beautiful. A slender slip of a girl about fourteen, with a long round throat poising the delicate oval of her face, and black lashes sweeping to meet the bar of her brows above her soft velvety eyes. There was a likeness still to the little orphan cousin who had come to make one more mouth to feed in the patriarchal household when he was a big boy just keen for college: the girl-child over whom his mother had smiled mysteriously, and talked of the years to come when the head of the house would have had his fill of education for his boy, and permit marriage. Yes, this was she, his cousin, little Naraini.

'There is naught amiss, my lord,' she said suddenly, drawing back in her turn with an offended air. 'I too am Brahmin, my hand is pure.'

So, indignantly, she dropped her alms of parched wheat into the gutter, and slammed the door.

Chris, down on his knees, his blood on fire, picked every grain up, and then, his head in a greater whirl than ever, made his way back to the river steps, to his hidden clothes, to the last hold he had on Western life and thought.

The steps were almost deserted in the noontide; therefore, wearied out with his vigil of the night and the excitement of the day, he lay down deliberately to sleep, feeling even this--this possibility of going to bed without one--to be a relief after all the paraphernalia of pillows, mattresses, blankets, and sheets.

When he woke, the sun had begun to sink, and the stream of wors.h.i.+p was setting templewards again. But the crowd was a different one; more temporal, less spiritual. More eager for gossip, less concerned with salvation; and Chris, who had gained confidence in his disguise by this time, left the shadow of the trees in order to listen to the talk. Even to such as he, it was an opportunity of gauging the mind of the mult.i.tude, which did not often present itself; and, being refreshed by his long sleep, he saw clearly that he, personally, might find this a useful experience.

The wildness of the rumours current, however, the absurdity of the beliefs he heard put forward, were beyond his patience, and more than once he drew down an unwelcome interest in himself by his flat denials.

His disguise, however--if it could be called a disguise seeing that he was, indeed, what he professed to be--held out, and so, by degrees, he grew bolder; telling himself that the day would not be lost if he could begin to practise what he had preached in Shark Lane, and raise his voice for the truth's sake.

It was not, however, till the first twinkling lights of the evening service showed in the temples, and the red and green signals on the railway bridge answered the challenge, that he found himself in the position he had advocated; that is one in opposition to many.

He did not shrink from the situation when it came; he had too much grit for that.

”It is a lie,” he rea.s.serted, and turning to the larger crowd beyond the listening few, raised his voice.

”Listen, friends, and I will tell you why it is not true that this golden paper fell from Heaven into Kali's temple. Why, her priests lie when they say it did. Listen, for I am Brahmin. I know the G.o.ds and their ways, and I know the _Huzoors_ and their ways also.”

”Who is the lad? he speaks well,” pa.s.sed in murmurs among the crowd which closed in to see and hear better. Chris pulled himself together as he stood, his figure showing clear against the light that lingered on the river.

”Who am I?” he echoed. ”Listen, and I will tell you; I am twice born, regenerate--a Brahmin of the Brahmins.”

There was sudden stir in the crowd, a murmur, 'Let her pa.s.s--she knows.' And then in that clear s.p.a.ce where he stood, a woman stood also; a Hindoo widow, with bare arm uplifted from her white shroud.

'Lie not, Krishn Davenund!' she said. 'Thou art outcast, accursed! I, thy mother, say it.' The face, clear cut, pale with continued fasting, showed no pain, no regret, only stern reproof. 'Thou art not twice-born now. Oh! son of my desolation,' she went on, her voice shrilling as she spoke, 'thou art twice-dead. Go back to thy new ways, to thy new wife!'

A sudden stretch of her hand towards the scarlet-clad young girl, shrinking by her side, told its tale of something more bitter than bigotry; of a mother's jealousy.

Chris, who had fallen back from that unexpected betrayal, gave a hasty glance round, and what he saw in the faces of the crowd made him realise his position.

'Hush, mother!' he began; but it was too late.

Her story was well known among the priests. They were in arms at once, and, ere a minute pa.s.sed, Chris found himself at bay, ankle deep in the water into which he had been driven, his back against the sacred temple of Viseshwar: so adding to his crime by its defilement.

'Listen!' he called.

But the crowd were already past that, and the cries 'He is a spy!' 'He hath defiled us!' 'Whom hath he not touched?' 'He hath been here all day!' 'He is sent to make us Christians!' rose on all sides.

Chris, his back to the temple, set his teeth. Beyond the crowd, that was kept at a yard's distance yet by something in his face, he could see two women, scarlet and white robed, sobbing in each other's arms, and the sight made him savage for their pain.

'How can I defile you?' he cried; 'I am Brahmin. Yonder is my mother.

My father all know. Who dares to take my birthright from me?'

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