"We'll go home to-morrow. I made final arrangements with the priest to-day. My, but he's a hard one to drive a bargain with! We will settle the money part in the morning so that we can get a good start before night," said her father.
Shama Sahai gave a sigh of relief at the prospects of an early start for home and was about to close her eyes so that she might sleep and be rested for the journey, when she heard her mother say: "Where are we to leave her?"
"The priest said to take her to the inner court of the red temple with the offerings. He will perform the necessary ceremonies in a short time and we can leave her there," answered the man. "I wanted it done to-day so that we could get off on the road in the cool of the morning, but he would not have it so."
"Have you bought our food yet? We won't need so much rice without Shama, you know," said the mother.
"I haven't forgotten that when that's just what we are getting rid of her for, you may be sure. Yes, I bought it this afternoon. We'll miss the girl in carrying the load, I suppose, but you can carry it and the baby too just as well as not. How much better it is to get rid of a widow in this way and have one less to feed than to have the cursed creature always around in the way. We'll not go hungry now. A good business we've done here at Kamadabad, old woman, although you did waste a lot of time and money by being sick, for of course we had to pay extra for the longer stay. That old rupee-snatcher of a landlord wouldn't give in an anna because you had been sick. He said that he really ought to have charged more, for when people are sick they lie down longer and so wear out his floor more quickly. You were a fine one, you were, to get sick!" the man snarled.
"Yes, but you wouldn't have been here at all or have thought of bringing the girl, if I hadn't suggested it," snapped the old woman in her turn.
Shama Sahai lay perfectly quiet as the couple, still mumbling unkind remarks at each other, came in and lay down on the floor. She scarcely breathed for fear that they should find out that she was awake. But when she knew that they were asleep, she crept out-of-doors and darting around a corner sank down upon some steps. She knew from what she had overheard that her parents-in-law were planning to go home in the morning without her and that the priest was to have her. As she remembered the evil, swollen face of the man who had watched her that first day at the temple, she shuddered and, drawing her sari more closely about her, crept farther back into the doorway.
Only one thought would come—she must run away where the priest could not get her and she must go at once. Peeping out from the doorway, she looked up and down the street. No one was astir; only a quiet form here and there on the little porches could be seen in the dim light of the street lamps. She would go to the white memsahib. The memsahib and the new god would surely save her.
Like a spirit the girl took her flight through the streets, the lightness of her footfall awaking not the most restless of the sleepers.
When she reached the familiar compound, she did not hesitate, but, running up to the veranda, shook the sleeping chokidar.