He had been filched from her--if it was he. She was too dulled by disappointment at first to do more than realise her loss, and the thought of her oath of fealty did not come to her at all until after three months' needless delay in trying the conspiracy case against some forty students in the college--a delay due entirely to the hair-splitting efforts of the counsel for the defence--Govinda settled it for himself by dying in prison of autumnal fever. His had never been a good life; he had almost died of it the year before; he might have died of it at home. But the loss of a son, even when he is not the only one, is a grievous loss to a Hindu household, and it brought enhanced and almost insensate anger to every member of it; except to Parbutti, who went about her household duties calmly, almost stupidly.
Then came the final blow. The bridegroom--was it he?--she wondered dully--shot himself with a revolver smuggled in to him by a woman, a young and pretty woman full of patriotism and poetry, a woman brought up on Western lines, who was almost worshipped by the Nationalist party of unrest.
Parbutti heard the tale, still calm to outward appearance. She heard women's voices, full of curiosity, tell of the deed of patriotism, as it was called: she heard them wonder what the woman agitator was really like, and say that Kâli Ma would surely, ere long, rise up in Her Power and smite the M'llechas hip and thigh.
And then they looked at her and shook their heads. Neither maid, wife, nor widow, it would be more difficult than ever to find fresh betrothals for her. Whereupon Ramabhai wept as she had wept before with sharp sobs and little outcries. And once more Parbutti said nothing, though she was quivering all over. It would be impossible to define her feelings, they were such an admixture of hatred, and love, of fear, and jealousy, and despair. And through it all came the question: "Was it he?"--while, as a background, sheer physical disappointment stretched every fibre of her mind and body almost to breaking joint.
So it went on until one day someone spoke to her almost as if she had been a widow, and bade her do something almost menial.
She did it without a word. It was noon time and the house was deserted; those who were in it being asleep. She sate for a while in the sunshine of the courtyard, her hands on her knees, doing nothing. Then suddenly she rose, and slipped into the room which Ramabhai used as a wardrobe.
When she emerged from it she was swathed in the scarlet and gold Benares khim-kob that had cost four hundred rupees, and her arms, her neck, her feet, were hung with golden ornaments.
They tinkled as she made her way down the steep stone stairs to Kâli's shrine. Dark, and still, and small, it lay, with a faint scent of incense about it; for the previous day had been a festival, and many folk had been to worship there.
But Kâli--Mai Kâli--would never have better worshipping than Parbutti meant to give her. How the idea had come to the girl's mind who can say; but dimly, out of her confused thoughts had grown the conviction that something must be done. She was the only one, now, who knew the secret; but it was useless in her hands. She could not go out and throw bombs, as he doubtless would have thrown them had he lived; so giving the Great Goddess the Blood for which she craved. Yes! he had meant to do it, for were not the aliens accursed? Had they not killed him?
She mixed everything up hopelessly; Mai Kâli and the Sacrament of Blood, her own loss and the public good; she felt angry, and weary, and disappointed; she felt that she ought to do something, that she must get Someone stronger than she was on her side, to do what she was helpless to do.