“I have meant truly.”
She turned to go, but the Queen caught her by the hand.
“Why have you done this?” she asked, looking into the strange eyes of the strange woman.
Something like tears gathered in them for a moment, but she brushed them away as she said hurriedly:
“I was grateful. You saved my son. Is it not enough?”
“No, not enough!” cried the Queen. “There is more. Tell me, for death is upon us.”
“His footsteps are near,” said the Indian. “I will speak. I love my lord. In death I will not cheat him. What you have known is true. My child is no child of his. I will not go down to death with a lie upon my lips. Come and see.”
Dwaymenau was no more. Sundari, the Indian woman, awful and calm, led the Queen down the long ball and into her own chamber, where Mindon, the child, slept a drugged sleep. The Queen felt that she had never known her; she herself seemed diminished in stature as she followed the stately figure, with its still, dark face. Into this room the enemy were breaking, shouldering their way at the door—a rabble of terrible faces. Their fury was partly checked when only a sleeping child and two women confronted them, but their leader, a grim and evil-looking man, strode from the huddle.
“Where is the son of the King?” he shouted. “Speak, women! Whose is this boy?”
Sundari laid her hand upon her son’s shoulder. Not a muscle of her face flickered.