“Our king is weeping in his room that his daughter is now no more. I think that there is something wrong with his majesty’s brains to-day. Come and console him.”
The queen, who knew nothing of what had happened, ran to her husband’s room, quite astonished at the change. The husband reported everything to her—the sage-looking minister’s son, the barber’s son-in-law, and everything, and then concluded that their daughter and son-in-law were no more.
“What! compose yourself. Our son-in-law is sitting in his durbar. Our daughter is just adorning herself in her dressing-room. Were you dreaming? Are you in your right senses?” said the queen.
The king ordered the executioner to bring the heads, which, on examination, proved to be those of the minister’s son and of the foster-sister. The queen told everything of the one-day-wife-giving engagement, and her own arrangements about it. The old king could not understand what all this meant. He drew out his sword and ran to the durbar like a maddened lion, and stood armed before his son-in-law.
“Relate to me your true origin, and everything respecting yourself. Speak the truth. How came you to learn medicine? If you are a prince why should you leave your own dominions and come down here? What about this wicked agreement of giving your wife to another? Who is this minister’s son?”
Subuddhi, without omitting a single point, related everything that had taken place, even to the putting out of his eyes. The old man threw down his sword, took his son-in-law in his arms almost, for so great was his joy at the excellent way which fate had prepared for his escape, and said:
“My son, my life, my eye. True it is, true it is. Dharma alone conquers, and you that hold that motto have conquered everything. The vile wretch whom, notwithstanding the series of rogueries that he practised upon you, you protected, has at last found out that his Adharmam never conquers. But he never found it out. It was his Adharmam that cut him off on the very night of his supposed complete conquest by it.”
Letters were sent at once to Têvai, inviting Suguṇa and Dharmaśîla to the happy rejoicings at the prince and princess’s delivery, and a re-marriage was celebrated with all pomp, in honour of their lucky escape. Dharmaśîla, as he disliked his son, never shed a single tear for his loss. Subuddhi lived for a long time, giving much consolation to his own and his wife’s parents. Through the blessings of Kâlî they had several intelligent sons.
[1] Têvai is the classical name of the modern town of Râmnâd in the district of Madurâ.