Part 2 (1/2)

”If it does, he may come back at any time and eat us up,” said Dehra, more alarmed than ever. ”Let us go away.”

”The Rakshas has gone away,” said a little jackal with a friendly face, who came running up to the princesses, ”and you can stay in his palace for quite a while. I will let you know when he is coming back.”

So the princesses went through the great gateway and across the courtyard into the palace, where they found gold and jewels and lovely silk dresses, and a beautiful marble tank filled with the clearest of water, where they could bathe every day.

Red lotus leaves floated on the water, and the sisters twined some of them in their hair, for the red lotus is a royal flower and princesses may wear them.

”If any stranger comes here,” said Nala, ”and asks for food or a drink of water, when you are alone in the house, be sure to smear your face with charcoal and put on some ragged clothes to make yourself look ugly before you let them in.”

”Why must I do this?” asked Dehra.

”Because if they see how pretty you are they will take you away and we shall not see each other any more.”

”You must do the same then,” said Dehra, ”for you are prettier than I,”

and then the princesses looked over the edge of the tank at their reflections in the water. Both were lovely, but Nala was a little taller than her sister and a little more graceful. Both had beautiful complexions, with teeth like pearls and eyes that shone like stars.

One day while Dehra was in the jungle talking to their friend the jackal, a prince who had been out hunting came to the palace and asked for water, as he and his attendants were very hot and thirsty. But before Nala went to see what they wanted she covered her silk dress with a ragged one and made her face dirty with charcoal.

When the Prince's attendants saw a dirty-faced, ragged girl admit them to such a beautiful palace, they laughed outright, but the Prince said to himself, ”If her face and hands were clean and her clothes mended, she would be a very pretty girl.”

Neither Nala nor the Prince could understand each other, but at last she made out that he was thirsty, so she hastened to bring him a pitcher of water. But instead of drinking the water, the Prince threw a part of it over Nala's head and face!

Very much surprised, Nala cried out, ”Oh, oh!” and started back, but the charcoal was washed from her face, and there she stood, the loveliest maiden the Prince had ever seen, even in her ragged dress, and he fell in love with her at once.

He unfastened the ragged dress and it fell off, leaving her prettier than ever in her yellow saree and a string of great rubies around her neck.

”My father is a Rajah,” said the Prince, ”and I am going to take you to his palace, and you shall be my wife.”

Then a beautiful palanquin was brought and Nala was carefully placed in it and carried away from the Rakshas' palace. On they went through the jungle, and the frightened Princess could only pull aside the curtains and look out upon the Prince riding ahead on his white horse, while the monkeys swung from the boughs and the parrots darted in and out among the branches as they had done on the day when she and her sister had run away from their cruel stepmother.

She was very unhappy and sobbed out, ”Oh, Dehra, Dehra! I want you, and what will you do without me?”

And then Nala began to think how she should let her sister know the way the Prince had taken her, so she tore a little piece off her saree and wrapped one of her rubies in it and dropped it on the ground.

She kept on doing this every little while until only one ruby was left, but they had now come to the palace of the Rajah and Ranee, the Prince's father and mother.

”Follow her, Dehra,” she remembered the golden letters had said, and so Nala dropped the last of her rubies just outside the palace, saying to herself, ”If Dehra does follow me, the rubies will lead her to me.”

The Prince's father and mother welcomed the beautiful Princess very gladly. The Rajah gave her a new ruby necklace and the Ranee was delighted at the prospect of such a beautiful daughter-in-law. In a week they were married and every one was very kind to Nala.

But poor Dehra sat in the Rakshas' palace crying as if her heart would break. ”Nala, Nala! where are you?” she cried over and over again, but no one answered her.

Then she went out of the palace, past the tank where the red lotus flowers lay on the clear water, saying to herself, ”Some one has stolen her.”

Then she looked at the golden letters over the gate.

_”Follow her, Dehra; you shall see How kind and cruel Fate can be.”_

”Half of it is surely true,” she said aloud, and suddenly, from behind her, the jackal asked, ”Which half is true?”