Priest. I see a wound from a weapon on his breast.
Sadhu. As soon as Torapa rushed into the crowd, the young Saheb struck the Babu with the sword. Torapa saved the Babu by placing his hand in front of his own, which was cut, and there was the sign of a slight bruise on the Babu’s breast.
Priest. (Deeply thinking for some time, reads).
“Man knows this for certain, that understanding and goodness are necessary in the friend, the wife, and in servants.” I do not see a single person in this large house; but a person of a different caste and of another village, is weeping near the Babu. Ah! the poor man is a day-laborer, and his very hand is cut off. Why is his face all daubed over with blood?
Sadhu. When the young Saheb struck his hand with the sword, like an ichneumon making a noise when its tail is cut off, he in agony from the pain of his hand flew off after seizing with a bite the nose of the elder Saheb.
Torapa. That nose I have kept with me, and when the Babu will rise up alive again I will show him that (shows the nose cut off). Had the Babu been able to fly off himself, I would have taken his ears; but I would not have killed him, as he is a creature of God.
Priest. Justice is still alive. The Gods were saved from the injustice of Ravana, when the nose of Surpanaka was cut off: shall not the people be saved from the tyranny of the Indigo Planters by the cutting off of the elder Saheb’s nose?
Torapa. Let me now hide myself; I shall fly off in the night. That fool will overturn the whole village on account of his nose.
(Exit Torapa bowing down twice on the
earth near Nobin Madhab’s bed.)