“Ah, it is one of Krishna’s nights,” murmured Kota, dreamily.
For answer, Oman sighed; and the sigh came from his soul.
Kota turned and looked at the young man. Hitherto, Oman’s heart had been strange to her; she had never thought of questioning the workings of his brain. Now, suddenly, his humanity was apparent; and her heart went out to his human sorrow as she asked, gently: “Dost thou mourn, Oman?”
Oman, for whom no human voice had ever taken on this tone, felt a throb of gratitude. But he answered: “I do not mourn, mother. I do not mourn. And yet it is the time of love; and for me there is no love.”
Though caste forbade it, she went over and sat down at his side, and took his two hands in hers. “Thinkest thou there is none to love thee?” she asked, tenderly.
Oman’s head drooped to his knees; and, resting it there, he let some part of his sorrow find expression for the woman, and her tears rained down with his, while, forgetting all but her motherhood, she clasped him to her heart.
After Oman’s emotion had spent itself, and he had become quiet, Kota remained at his side, and together they looked off upon the village, over which the half-grown moon was now shedding a bluish silver light. The two sat silent, watching, till the moon was past mid-heaven, and halfway down the sky. Gokarna had not returned. He would evidently sleep that night with the snatakas and priests in the square of sacrifice. But at last Kota, rising reluctantly, left the night behind, and sought her rest in the house, while Oman lay down in his accustomed corner of the veranda, and, after a little, slept.
When he opened his eyes again, the sun was nearly in mid-sky. He would unquestionably get a beating from the master weaver, when he reached his loom. However, it must be faced; and, without pausing for food, he rose, thinking to make his ablutions at a fountain on the way. Reaching the veranda step, however, he paused. A man was standing there, silently: a man clad in mud-stained yellow robes, holding in his hand a wooden bowl. Oman looked at him with some curiosity. A century or two before, such men had overrun all India. Now, so rarely was one seen that he was an object of interest to every beholder. In the days when the wild Brahmanic leader, Kumarila Bhatta, had raised his brethren against the Buddhists, it had been death to this man to stand thus at a Brahman’s door; for, unquestionably, he was a Bhikkhu, a Buddhist mendicant monk, come out of Bágh, the one remaining stronghold of Buddhism in Malwa, one of the few left in all India. And the man stood here, quite still, silently asking alms. Pity and curiosity were nowadays the only sentiments with which even Brahmans regarded these harmless men. And Oman, after a moment’s halt, would have hurried on, but that he caught the expression in the wanderer’s eyes, and paused to look again.
Certainly it was a remarkable face. The eyes were very large, and dark, and long-lashed; and the look in them was such as one finds in oxen. The man’s body was lean to emaciation; but his face, owing to the round-cut hair, had more or less of a full appearance. His robes—which he wore in the regular Buddhist manner, over the left shoulder, under the right, and reaching to the heels,—were well worn, as were his sandals, and the knotty, wooden staff in his hand. On his back was a small bundle, fastened with a rope; and this, with an alms-bowl, completed his equipment for the eight months’ yearly pilgrimage prescribed for every Bhikkhu.
When his swift scrutiny was ended, Oman, following a sudden impulse, went a little closer to the man, and said, gently: “Peace to your heart, reverend sir. Let me fill your bowl with food.”