The old woman, in her widow's shroud, stole over towards it, walking softly as if afraid of crushing the roses. But there was no awe in her face now; only a vast curiosity, as one by one she lifted the lids and looked in. For this she knew, this was common to all women.
Suddenly she glanced round at her son, and nodded archly ere proceeding with her inspection.
'Yea! She is good, and thou art blessed in one who careth for thy love,' she said softly.
Poor Chris!
He stood staring at his mother, staring at the paints and patches, staring at everything feminine in this world and the next, without a word, without almost a thought.
Only with a sort of vague wonder if this--this inconceivable position--was the common ground between those things feminine?
A sniff at a silver-topped bottle of White-Rose scent ended the inspection by bringing a sudden recollection, a sudden new interest to his mother's face.
'Lo! I had nigh forgotten,' she said, searching in the folds of her shroud with some trepidation, then relieved, coming towards him. 'Naraini--thou dost remember thy cousin Naraini, Krishn, though she was but a child when thou didst leave?'--
'Yea, I remember,' he said, his bewilderment passing into something tangible, something that sent him hot and cold, that made him clinch his hands and try to bring the dull surprise back again. 'What then?'
'The girl hath a fancy--Didst thou, by chance, seek our house that morning, Krishn? I tell her it could not be, that thou wouldst not have gone away, but girls' fancies are ill to soothe; and she hath wept all night lest by her petulance she had driven thee forth. She did penance for it, poor child, within the hour, for having shown evil temper to a holy one; but since the pujâri's tale, she will have it that it was thou--So I gave my word I would ask thee, just to comfort her, though it is idle----'