"I will die for the King's honour if need be," she muttered, true by instinct to her life-idea, even in the midst of her mingled joy and amazement. She sate for some time after Akbar left her, trying to piece together the tangled clues she held; but such intricate balancing of facts was beyond her. She lived only by what she felt, so she was without guide in following up the actions of others.
That the diamond had been stolen she knew; and now it was evident that Birbal had kept the knowledge of the theft from the King--doubtless to save him from distress. This latter thought leapt to her heart and found instant harbour there, so that she began to reproach herself with having gone so near to making such forethought of no avail; a forethought that had done its work too, since as the Most High had seen the diamond but the evening before it must have been recovered. The incident was therefore over--small thanks to her!
And yet the King had bidden her challenge the whole world on his behalf! She crept home and looked at her father's corselet and sword wonderingly. How had it come about that the Great Hope of her life was about to be realised, and she could scarce feel any joy in it?
Meanwhile Akbar was doffing his ascetic's robe, and donning the heron-plumed turban of empire. It was a change to which he was accustomed; but this morning, he felt that something of his interview with Âtma Devi lingered with him.
He paused for a moment as he passed to the Private Hall of Audience with Birbal to look out across the palace courtyard and so through the Arch of Victory to India stretching wide and far beyond it.
"If I leave this place," he said quietly, "as leave it surely I shall some day, thus condemning myself to sonlessness, I shall go down to the ages as one who failed--who built dream-palaces unfit for humanity; therefore fit home for the bats, the foxes, the hyenas."
"This will I warrant, sire!" replied Birbal, hotly, in instant defence of his master. "Let who will come to Akbar's Arch of Triumph in the future, it shall remain to them unforgettable, unforgotten, until Death kills memory!"
"The memory of a great defeat," continued the King shaking his head. "And to my mind a greater one if I remain!" He turned and laid his hand on Birbal's shoulder. "Yea! old friend. I have failed--why strain thyself to hide it? Wherefore--God knows! for I have striven." He paused, then went on, "There was a woman at the tank this morning who said that Love was all things. Is it so? Have I not loved enough? Is that the solving of the riddle--is it the Master-Key?"
Birbal's face was a fine study in sarcastic disagreement. "Mayhap, my King! The poets have it so; though in God's truth this wondrous key has unlocked naught for me--save nothingness!"
"A perfect mating," went on the dreamer, absorbed in his own thoughts. "The Twain once more as One, sex and its vain search forgotten. Strange if it should be so! Strange if the finding of Self in the Giving of Self should bring back memory yet forgetfulness of that far beginning when the Ocean of Light everlasting, quiescent, stirred into ripples of Shadow, and the One became Two."