“I think it will not be!”
And a large tear pearled itself on the long lashes of Prajapati and spilt down the bloom of her cheek as she watched her baby daughter in the arms of a dark-skinned nurse lulling her to sleep with strange and wistful songs of the native people, by the lotuses on the great marble tank in the shade of the pippalas.
And presently the evening came, gliding with silent steps through the woods and along the waters, veiled as a maid who steals to meet her star-eyed lover. And having beheld the pomps of sunset, the mountains withdrew into their mysteries and a star stood on each of their summits for guard, and in a great peace the moon floated upward, resplendent. Then the beauty of heaven and earth became marvellous and remote, and the earth was no longer for men but Gods.
Now that night Maya, the Great Lady, asleep beside her lord in the pleasure pavilion when moonlight blanched the dewy lawns like snow, dreamed a dream. Nor was it the first. This lady was vision-haunted. Her eyes, her ears, were open to all the starry influences to all the weeping of winds and the tales the reeds whisper to one another in lonely places. But this dream came, not flitting ghostly along the ways of sleep nor with the morning dissolving cloud-like, illusive, scarcely to be grasped or recorded, more a feeling than a thought, but clear, majestic, terrible and beautiful, so that she found herself (and knew not how) sitting up, awake, aware, breathless, as it were a Queen to whom has been made a great annunciation from equal powers. And, with an awakening hand laid upon her husband, she spoke, nor did her voice tremble:
“Beloved, awake! I have dreamed. For it seemed to me that the four Guardian Divine Kings lifted me from my bed and bore me away to the great mountains and laid me down. And heavenly spirits, shining as stars, came about me and bathed me in the pure waters of a mountain lake, freeing me of all human stain. And when this was done they laid me down again, clothing me in the gold of divine garments and shedding perfumes about me. And I saw a lordly elephant, white as silver, wandering beneath the trees. For, as you know, this is the symbol of royalty. And touching me on the right side with his trunk, he appeared to melt into a cloud and pass like a vapor into my womb. In the darkness I have seen a great light shine, and in the air myriads of radiant spirits sang my joy. And O, beloved, all is well!”
And he stammering, amazed:
“Beloved, when you awaked me, the music of these very spirits rang in my ears, and they cried to me with voices more tunable than all songs of birds or harmony of well-touched lutes, ‘The child shall be born when the Flower-Star shines in the east.’ And as you touched me, I awoke.”
And more they could not say, but clung to each other, trembling for joy and wonder. Nor could any sleep come to them that night, for in their gladness it seemed they stood on the shining shores of heaven, its light about them like an ocean. And when on the morrow these dreams were told to Prajapati, she rejoiced with them, no thought of envy to cloud the crystal of her soul. And when they were laid before the dream-readers, they could presage nothing but good, and being called in before the Maharaja where he sat in state with his Maharanis, they spoke as follows:
“A lord of men shall be born, a great and awful ruler. Let the soul of the Maharaja be exalted, and the heart of the Maharani rejoice and triumph, since to their house is given a son whose kingdom is the earth and the fullness of it.”
Then the Maharaja shouted for joy, while Maya the Maharani, listened with dreaming eyes.