"The gold hem round her robe's straight virgin folds coiled like a snake asleep upon the floor, the sparkling jewel fastened on her breast shone bright and steady as a distant star.
"There was no tremor in her perfumed hair, there was no quiver in her perfumed breath; the cold blue stones about her throat and waist, the loose gold circlet on her slender wrist, the jasmine-blossom chaplet in her hair, looked as though carved in stone, so still she stood before the dead man on the marble floor.
"His red blood crept in curves to find her feet and clasp them in a claim for vengeance due, while those around cried 'Justice from the King!'
"Until she smiled--her small, kind face so wise, and her clear voice came echoing through the Hall. 'Vengeance is mine,' she said, 'and not the King's. Send forth no army, spill no blood for me. Search not the water-mirror for a sign. I know the answer of the sun and stars. So send our heralds out, and bid these Kings come as Kings should, and not as murderers to plead their cause before the King, my son. Come with all state as to a wedding feast, come with all hope as bridegrooms to the bride. My son shall choose my lover, so prepare all things in order--music, feasting, flowers.' (Then turned to where I stood, and said aside: 'Forget not thou to make a jasmine crown.')
"O Âtma mâta! wherefore was I blind?
Did I not know how wise thou wert, how kind,
How cold thy hand, how warm the heart behind?
"Fair, strong, and bold he stood, the little King; the noonday sun above the child's bare head scarce cast a shadow on his small, bare feet, standing so straight beside the water's edge, where, half afloat upon the clear, still depths, a small round raft of jasmine-blossoms lay ready to give the omen.
"Heaped so high, so piled with little scented stars, that I--her servant with the crown she had bespoke--stood wondering what need there was of all. And round about the mirror-pool in rank sat Âtma's lovers waiting the decree.
"Till suddenly the baby raised his hand. (There was a loose gold circlet on his wrist, which smote him on the breast as it fell back, making him wince, so all too large it was.) But the child bit his lip and took no heed, knowing his kingly part right royally; so, parrot-wise, he lisped the ordered words: 'My mother Âtma hath no need for love; since she hath mine. She hath no need, my lords, for you as lovers, but she sends by me, as sister sends her brothers, that which sure should heal the strife and make you brothers too.'
"So at the last he stooped, and with a push sent the flower-raft afloat upon the pool, dipping and dancing on the waves it made, so that the loose, white blossoms of the pile floated to drift like stars upon the depths, leaving what lay beneath them clear and cold.
"O Âtma mâta! why was I not blind?
Thy face, thy face was there in flowers enshrined!
Thy cold dead face, with cold dead flowers entwined.