The widow then wrote to Rajah Bickermanji’s stepmother, a very clever woman, and asked her to intercede, that she might die with her husband. Then his stepmother said: “My son, allow this suttee to take place, and within eight days I will give you my reasons.”
This aroused the curiosity of his nature, and, much against his will, he consented; so the woman had her own way.
He waited impatiently for the eight days to be over, and then went to his stepmother, who ordered a dooly, and, taking with her a goat, asked him to accompany her to the nearest temple. Arrived there, she asked him to stand at the door, and left the goat outside.
“If, when I come to the door, I say ‘kill,’ you are to kill the goat, but if not, stand where you are,” were the old woman’s instructions as she went to make her offering of fruit and flowers and sweets.
Soon she returned, and said: “Kill,” so Bickermanji cut off the head of the goat. “Sit upon the head, my son.”
And he did as he was told, but no sooner had he done so, when the head rose up into the air with him, away through space for hundreds of miles, until he came to a wall which surrounded a space twelve miles square. In this was a garden and beautiful house; and after wandering some little time, Bickermanji found water and food, a comfortable couch to lie upon, and a hookah, or native pipe, to smoke, but not a human being was anywhere to be seen. This puzzled him, but as he was both hungry and tired, he made a good meal, smoked his hookah, and laid down to sleep.
“If I sleep, I sleep, if I die, I die; a man can but die once.”
Now the place belonged to a purree, or winged fairy being, who used to come to it during the night, and remain away all day. The servants came an hour or two beforehand just to see everything was comfortable; and when they found Bickermanji lying fast asleep, they wished to kill him, but an old woman interceded on his behalf, so they let him alone until the purree came.
Bickermanji was greatly surprised to see a strange winged being standing before him, and expected immediate death; but the Strange One spoke kindly, and begged him not to fear, but to make the place his home for as long as he liked.
Each day passed by quietly, and in the pleasures and ease of his present existence, Bickermanji soon forgot his kingdom, his wife, and his children.