She released him and whirled a pace or two away, draperies swirling, jewels scintillating cold fire in hopeless emulation of the radiance of her tear-gemmed eyes.
"Naraini?" stammered Amber, recalling what he had heard of the woman.
"Naraini!"
"Aye, my lord, Naraini, thy wedded wife!" The rounded little chin went up a trifle and her eyes gleamed angrily. "Am I no longer thy Naraini, then? Or wouldst thou deny that thou art Har Dyal, my king and my beloved? Hast thou indeed forgotten the child that was given thee for wife when thy father reigned in Khandawar and thou wert but a boy—a boy of ten, the Maharaj Har Dyal? Hast thou forgotten the little maid they brought thee from the north, Lalji—the maiden who had grown to womanhood ere thy return from thy travels to take up thy father's crown?… Aie! Thou canst never forget, Beloved; though years and the multitude of faces have come between us as a veil, thou dost remember—even as thou didst remember when the message of the Bell came to thee across the great black waters, and thou didst learn that the days of thy exile were numbered, that the hour approached when again thou shouldst sit in the place of thy fathers and rule the world as once they ruled it."
A denial stuck in Amber's throat. The words would not come, nor would they, he believed, have served his purpose could he have commanded them. If he had found no argument wherewith to persuade Salig Singh, he found none wherewith to refute the claim of this golden-faced woman who recognised him for her husband. He was wholly dismayed and aghast. But while he lingered in indecision, staring in the woman's face, her look of petulance was replaced by one of divine forgiveness and compassion. And she gave him no time to think or to avoid her; in a twinkling she had thrown herself upon him again, was in his arms and crushing her lips upon his.
"Nay," she murmured, "but I did wrong thee, Beloved! Perchance," she told him archly, "thou didst not think to see me so soon, or in this garden? Perchance surprise hath robbed thee of thy wits—and thy tongue as well, O wordless one? Or thou art overcome with joy, as I am overcome, and smitten dumb by it, as I am not? Aho, Lalji! was ever a woman at loss for words to voice her happiness?" And nestling to him she laughed quietly, with a note as tender and sweet as the cooing of a wood-dove to its mate.
"Nay, but there is a mistake." He recovered the power of speech tardily, and would have put her from him; but she held tight to him. "I am not thy husband, nor yet a Rajput. I come from America, the far land where thy husband died…. Nay, it doth pain me to hurt thee so, Ranee, but the mistake is not of my making, and it hath been carried too far. Thy husband died in my presence—"
"It is so, then!" she cut him short. And his arms were suddenly empty, to his huge relief. "Indeed they had warned me that thou wouldst tell this story and deny me—why, I know not, unless it be that thou art unworthy of thy lineage, a coward and a weakling!" Her small foot stamped angrily and on every limb of her round body bracelets and anklets clashed and shimmered. "And so thou hast returned only to forswear me and thy kingdom, O thou of little spirit!" The scarlet lips curled and the eyes grew cold and hard with contempt. "If that be so, tell me, why hast thou returned at all? To die? For that thou must surely come to, if it be in thy mind to defy the behests of the Voice, thou king without a kingdom!… Why, then, art thou here, rather than running to hide in some far place, thinking to escape with thy worthless life—worthless even to thee, who art too craven to make a man's use of it—from the Vengeance of the Body?… Dost think I am to be tricked and hoodwinked—I, in whose heart thine image hath been enshrined these many weary years?"
"I neither think, nor know, nor greatly care, Ranee," Amber interposed wearily. "Doubtless I deserve thine anger and thy scorn, since I am not he who thou wouldst have me be. If death must be my portion for this offence, for that I resemble Har Dyal Rutton … then it is written that I am to die. My business here in Khandawar hath concern neither with thee, nor with the State, not yet with the Gateway of Swords—of the very name of which I am weary…. Now," and his mouth settled in lines of unmistakable resolve, "I will go; nor do I think that there be any here to stop me."
He wheeled about, prepared to fight his way out of the palace, if need be. Indeed, it was in his mind that a death there were as easy as one an hour after sunrise; for he had little doubt but that he was to die if he remained obdurate, and the hospitality of the Rajput would cease to protect him the moment he set foot upon the marble bund of his bungalow.
But the woman sprang after him and caught his arm. "Of thy pity," she begged breathlessly, "hold for a space until I have taken thought…. Thou knowest that if what thou hast told me be the truth, then am I widow before my time—widowed and doomed!"