Part 33 (2/2)

”My sister, the Chota Rani!”

I sent for Bimala. She came hesitatingly, barefoot, with a white shawl over her head. I had never seen my Bimal like this before.

She seemed to have wrapped herself in a morning light.

Amulya prostrated himself in salutation and took the dust of her feet. Then, as he rose, he said: ”Your command has been executed, sister. The money is returned.”

”You have saved me, my little brother,” said Bimal.

”With your image in my mind, I have not uttered a single lie,”

Amulya continued. ”My watchword __Bande Mataram__ has been cast away at your feet for good. I have also received my reward, your __prasad__, as soon as I came to the palace.”

Bimal looked at him blankly, unable to follow his last words.

Amulya brought out his handkerchief, and untying it showed her the cakes put away inside. ”I did not eat them all,” he said.

”I have kept these to eat after you have helped me with your own hands.”

I could see that I was not wanted here. I went out of the room.

I could only preach and preach, so I mused, and get my effigy burnt for my pains. I had not yet been able to bring back a single soul from the path of death. They who have the power, can do so by a mere sign. My words have not that ineffable meaning.

I am not a flame, only a black coal, which has gone out. I can light no lamp. That is what the story of my life shows--my row of lamps has remained unlit.

30. Sitting on the bare floor is a sign of mourning, and so, by a.s.sociation of ideas, of an abject att.i.tude of mind. [Trans.].

XVI

I returned slowly towards the inner apartments. The Bara Rani's room must have been drawing me again. It had become an absolute necessity for me, that day, to feel that this life of mine had been able to strike some real, some responsive chord in some other harp of life. One cannot realize one's own existence by remaining within oneself--it has to be sought outside.

As I pa.s.sed in front of my sister-in-law's room, she came out saying: ”I was afraid you would be late again this afternoon.

However. I ordered your dinner as soon as I heard you coming.

It will be served in a minute.”

”Meanwhile,” I said; ”let me take out that money of yours and have it kept ready to take with us.”

As we walked on towards my room she asked me if the Police Inspector had made any report about the robbery. I somehow did not feel inclined to tell her all the details of how that six thousand had come back. ”That's just what all the fuss is about,” I said evasively.

When I went into my dressing-room and took out my bunch of keys, I did not find the key of the iron safe on the ring. What an absurdly absent-minded fellow I was, to be sure! Only this morning I had been opening so many boxes and things, and never noticed that this key was not there.

”What has happened to your key?” she asked me.

I went on fumbling in this pocket and that, but could give her no answer. I hunted in the same place over and over again. It dawned on both of us that it could not be a case of the key being mislaid. Someone must have taken it off the ring. Who could it be? Who else could have come into this room?

”Don't you worry about it,” she said to me. ”Get through your dinner first. The Chota Rani must have kept it herself, seeing how absent-minded you are getting.”

I was, however, greatly disturbed. It was never Bimal's habit to take any key of mine without telling me about it. Bimal was not present at my meal-time that day: she was busy feasting Amulya in her own room. My sister-in-law wanted to send for her, but I asked her not to do so.

I had just finished my dinner when Bimal came in. I would have preferred not to discuss the matter of the key in the Bara Rani's presence, but as soon as she saw Bimal, she asked her: ”Do you know, dear, where the key of the safe is?”

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