The mistress shook her head.
"What?" cried the maid, "Fatkoura no longer loves music? Has she then forgotten that she owes the light of day to it? For when the Sun-goddess, enraged with the gods, withdrew into a cavern, it was by letting her hear divine music for the first time that she was led back to heaven!"
Fatkoura uttered a sigh, and made no answer.
"Shall I grind some ink for you? Your paper has long remained as stainless as the snow on Mount Fusi. If you have a grief, cast it into the mould of verse, and you will be rid of it."
"No, Tika; love is not to be got rid of; it is a burning pain, which devours one by day and by night, and never sleeps."
"Unhappy love, perhaps; but you are beloved, mistress!" said Tika, drawing nearer.
"I know not what serpent hidden in the depths of my heart tells me that I am not."
"What!" said Tika in amaze, "has he not revealed his deep passion by a thousand acts of folly? Did he not come but lately, at the risk of his life,—for the wrath of the Kisaki might well prove fatal,—merely to behold you for one instant?"
"Yes; and he vanished without exchanging a single word with me, Tika!" added Fatkoura, seizing the young girl's wrists in a nervous grasp. "He did not even look at me."
"Impossible!" said Tika; "has he not told you that he loved you?"