“Seen him! Oh, Ranee, Ranee, be careful! Why, he is a slave! If he were seen speaking with thee—they would burn him!”
Ahalya laughed joyously. “None saw him but me. He came before Ragunáth. And, Neila, he told me a strange thing. He said: ‘I come from Yemen; and my race is the race of Asra, who must die if they cherish love!’ What could he mean by that? To die because one loved! I should not die, I think. Neila, Neila, he was young, and his eyes shone. Neila! I am lonely! Go bring to me the young Bhavani. Say to him that I will tell him the tale he loves most to hear: of Prince Arjuna and the great bow and the beautiful Princess Draupadi.” Ahalya smiled. “Go tell him, Neila, and put away that endless work of thine.”
Obediently the girl rose, left her embroidery lying on the cushions, and went out of the room. When she was gone, Ahalya stretched herself still more lazily on her divan, closed her eyes to the light, and, as if she saw with her mind things more beautiful than real, smiled slightly, and began to sing the swaying melody of the poppy dance. About her was a perfect stillness. Not a sound, not so much as the tones of women’s voices from the interior of the zenana, penetrated to her solitude. Perhaps her reverie was broken by the silence, but she only smiled the more; for it had come to be an uncanny habit with her to smile through her loneliest and saddest hours. Only at those rare times when joy or interest lifted her out of herself did her face show all the strength and purity of its melancholy beauty. Her heritage from her mother was a self-defence of constant concealment, and a kind of inward cynicism, which, never revealed on the surface, was nevertheless constantly nourished and strengthened by the many humiliations of her existence. Just now she was considering her performance of the evening before, and the results of it, when, after she had left the theatre, her lord had come to her in great anger, expecting tears, repentance, and abasement from her, and had got only petulance, rebellion, and remorseless laughter, so that finally, worked into a fierce rage, he had left her alone to wake to a realization of her offence. This realization had by no means come; and she fully expected the Rajah to appear before her that evening humbly craving favor; for experience had taught her that she need never be the first to surrender. Rai-Khizar-Pál loved her far more dearly than she, unhappy child, cared for him, grave, honorable, and just as he was; and it was to her carelessness of favor and the consummate skill with which she let that carelessness be known, that the Lady Ahalya owed the favoritism she enjoyed and the rooms she lived in.
These rooms were the choicest in the zenana. They consisted of a tiny suite of three, opening from a passage that led directly into the main palace. The first of them was an antechamber, heavily spread with rugs, walled with carved wood brought from Ceylon, and lighted day and night by a single crimson lamp suspended from the ceiling. The second room, in which Ahalya now lay, was a light and pleasant place, its floors covered with silken rugs, the walls frescoed gayly with birds and flowers, the furniture and the thousand ornaments it contained all of the costliest variety, and, at the end farthest from the windows, a little shrine to Rahda, the Lady of Love. The last room, accessible only through the other two, was the sleeping-room, its walls hidden by silken hangings of pale purple and gold; its couch covered with cloth of gold; the chests to hold the Ranee’s garments, of precious woods inlaid with ivory and pearl, lined with sandal-wood; and teak-wood toiletstands displaying mirrors, brushes, perfumes, and cosmetics wherewith a woman might be beautified:—a heavily gilded room indeed, and one in which Ahalya spent little time.
Beyond these apartments of the favorite wife, across the whole length of this inner palace wing, stretched a long, narrow room, furnished with every luxury that Indian ingenuity could devise. This was the women’s day-room,—their common lounging-place,—where wife and slave met together in free converse. Around it were ranged the rooms of the other wives: Malati’s, where the young Bhavani, Rai-Khizar-Pál’s only son, the heir of Mandu, lodged with his mother; Bhimeg’s the Kshatriya woman’s; and those of Chundoor, the despised Sudra wife. At the end of the wing, farthest from the palace, lived the women slaves; and beyond was a separate house for the eunuchs. Such was the zenana, in the days of Indian rule in Mandu: a place full of life and color and sound; of interminable jealousy, strife, and bitterness; a place which only one man ever entered; he on whom all these women must expend the human love and fidelity that lay seething in their hearts.
In the meantime, to Ahalya, waiting on her couch, came Neila, bringing with her a lad ten years old, shaggy-headed, with big, black eyes, and a sturdy figure, who went up and kissed the Ranee affectionately. His eyes were bright with excitement as he cried to her: “Alaha! Alaha!” (it was his name for her), “I have been riding to-day! Kasya put me upon a horse, and we went almost to the old temple and back. And—and I am to go every day now!” Trained studiously to the dignity of his birth, he gave little active sign of his pleasure; but his face expressed his delight, and Ahalya, more demonstrative than he, threw her arms about him and laughed in sympathy.
“Beautiful, Bhavani! Beautiful! Now thou wilt soon be given a bow; and then—”
“Then I shall really go and contend in the games before the beautiful Draupadi!”
“Yes. Shall we play it now? You will be Arjuna, and these cushions your horse. Pile them up! Pile them up!”
“Yes, and you are Draupadi, there on the divan, and I will ride before you and contend with—with—”