The walls echoed to the soft thud of their flying feet--down one path, up another, round by the tomb, scaring the parrots to a screaming wheel. Confident in her superior knowledge, she paused on the topmost step, ere scudding across the causeway, to fling back a handful of flowers lingering in a fold. He set his teeth hard. If she tried short cuts, so could he; and he was round the next square so fast, that she gave a little shriek and dived into the thickest part of the garden, whither the water was flowing, and where the beasts and birds and creeping things innumerable found a cool, damp refuge. His blood was up--the jade must be caught and kissed, if only in revenge! The flutter of her saffron skirt at the opposite side of a square made him try strategy. He crept into the thickest undergrowth and waited.
Something else waited, not a footfall off, but he did not see it. His eyes were on that saffron flutter, pausing, advancing, retreating, pausing again. Naraini had lost the bearings of her pursuer, and, like a child playing "I spy," was on the alert for a surprise.
Suddenly came a cry as she caught sight of him, a shout as he bounded out; both lost in a yell arresting her flight and his, as if it had turned them to stone. He stood with the wide nostrils and fixed eyes of ghastly fear, clinging for support to the branch above him, whence the flowers fell pattering to the ground. On his ankle two spots of blood, bright against the brown skin. Across the path a big, black rope of a thing, curving swiftly to the roses beyond.
"Snake! snake!"
Her cry echoed his, as she ran back to him; but he struck at her with clenched hand.
"Go, woman--she-devil! Thou hast killed me. Curse thee! oh, curse thee for beguiling me! It has bitten me. Holy Gunga, I am dead! and I was the bridegroom. 'Tis thy fault. I was the bridegroom." He had sunk to the ground clasping his ankle, and rocked himself backward and forward, moaning and shuddering in impotent fear. Naraini stood by him. There was no hope: the big, black rope of a thing did its work well; yet, even so, anger was her first thought.
"It was a lie! 'Tis not my fault! Why didst come? Why didst follow? And if thou art the bridegroom, was not I the bride?" Then something leaped to memory. She threw her hands above her head and beat them wildly in passionate despair and horror.
"He is dead! he is dead! And I am the bride."
The words rang through the garden, and pierced even his grovelling fear. As he turned to fly, he clutched at her skirts, and dragged himself to her fiercely.
"The bride? Then the widow! my widow! Thou hast killed me, but thou canst not escape me. A widow! a widow! a widow!"