"Oh! Aiyoh! Aiyoh! Aiyoh!"
The cry came from Gunga herself. It dominated the chorus of lamentation and silenced every other tongue. Suddenly the sound of a thud upon the floor startled the company. A childish scream followed.
"Water! bring water!" said one of the women. "The lady Dorama has fainted and let the child fall!"
CHAPTER VII
Ananda stood at the open door of the little room looking out at the view. The earth was smiling under the tropical sun. Birds and flowers responded to its tempered heat; and song and sweet odours were lavishly spent upon the soft air. An oleander bush with its willow foliage tossed trusses of almond-scented, pink blossom, at the entrance of the yard. The luxuriant vine of a gourd spread its thick leafage over a part of the ground enclosed. Just outside a rose bush, laden with clusters of blossoms and buds, threw its thorny branches over the warm, sunbaked, mud wall. A pair of tawny fritillary butterflies fluttered over the petals of the rose, and a blue roller bird flew across the sky, a living streak of brilliant azure upon the ethereal blue haze. Crested hoopoes ran along the base of the wall seeking ants and cooing softly in their contentment.
Above foliage, flower and building rose the noble mountain mass in the distance, with its sholahs of virgin forest, its glades and slopes of green grass and peaks of bare grey rock. Ananda's spirit stirred within him as his eye followed the familiar outline of the beautiful spur of the Western Ghats. How often he had watched it under its different aspects and learned to love it, whether it was shrouding itself in a grey mantle of rain-laden vapour, or shining through a transparent haze of blue.
He recalled the expeditions of his youth when his father had taken him to the hill for the day and he had returned with the spoil of the forest; ferns and orchids and long supple bamboos, strange leaves and flowers that could not be made to grow in his own garden. He remembered a tiger, caught and speared by the natives, which was brought in by exulting herdsmen to be shown to his father. A hyæna was also carried in in like manner slung upon a green bamboo cut from the forest. He remembered how tightly he had clung to his father's hand in his fear of the big beasts with their strong jaws hanging open and the formidable teeth visible; and how his father reassured him each time, bidding him be brave and behave like a man. Ananda sighed; ah, he would show his own son the same sights, and teach him to be a man!
The thought of the child changed the current of his musings. Where was the boy at the present moment? Where was the boy's mother? Only a wall or two separated them. Why did they not come and greet him? It was perfectly feasible. There was no fear of contamination in the open air. An interview might take place in the little yard or in the compound beyond without detriment to caste.
He listened for the sound of voices. The house was very silent. The room apportioned to his use was remote from the kitchen and women's quarters; but with that large family there were usually people moving in all parts of the building.