Long Hushka forbore to speak; though through the demeanor of his pupil he suffered as he would scarcely have believed it possible that he still could suffer. The Bhikkhu had lately been allowing himself to believe that the thankless labor of years was about to find its reward. And now as, little by little, that belief was broken down, it seemed to carry with it his very vitality, till he had lost courage to engage with Mahapra any more in the slightest controversy over the commentators or the higher criticism of the holy books. Indeed, the honey-throated was aging, visibly; and this Oman woke at last to see.
On the 3d of September the last meditation of the novices ended rather earlier than usual, at about seven o’clock. Hushka, who was master of the day, came in to dismiss them. He stood leaning against a pillar, near the door, wearily watching them file by, till the last had gone. Then Hushka turned to glance over the room, and beheld Oman still standing at its far end, his face gleaming pale in the waning light. Hushka gazed at him for a moment or two, and then moved slowly toward his pupil. Oman stood perfectly still, trembling a little, till the other halted within a foot of him. The two looked at each other till the novice dropped his eyes.
“Oman,” said Hushka, after a heavy pause; “Oman,” and he paused again, while the guilt-laden one grew cold, “art thou ill?”
For one, swift instant Oman looked at his master. “No, reverend sir, I am not ill,” he murmured.
“Oman! Oman! Repentest thou of thy faith?”
Oman gave a quick cry. “No!” he answered.
“Yet something troubles thee. Canst thou not confide in me? Shall not I, thy master, give thee help? Tell me, Oman, tell me what it is that lies in thy heart. Do not fear. I have suffered too long, too well, not to know compassion.”
Oman’s head drooped low. He clasped his two hands tightly over his breast, and then suddenly threw them out as if in supplication. Hushka, not understanding that Oman would have warded him off, took the hands gently in his own. The warm, living clasp suddenly broke through Oman’s carefully built barrier of concealment. He sank to his knees upon the stone pavement, and his brain burned with the fire of his knowledge. He was losing his self-control. As tears fell from his eyes, his thoughts also flowed, till he was overwhelmed in the torrent of his wretchedness, and crouched, rent with emotion, at the feet of the troubled man who supported him.
The dusk deepened. Through the long, carven hall, eerie shadows fell, and the orange light of the west melted to purple and then to black, till the two were alone in darkness. Hushka now knelt by Oman’s side, and soothed the youth with fragmentary words, till he was quieter in his grief. There followed silence, pregnant and foreboding. Hushka would not break it. Heavy-hearted, dreading unknown things, he bowed his head, waiting. And gradually it was borne in upon Oman that there was no longer any way of concealment. He must give utterance to the truth: his tragedy. How he began, how he told it, he could not afterwards remember. At first the words choked him, then they came faster, finally in fury, till the pent-up emotions of years were finding expression beside that of the remorse of yesterday. Hushka remained at his side, silent, stunned, at first, by the feeling displayed by this youth, this child to life. It was the first thing that impressed him:—the silent suffering that Oman must have known. Hushka could understand him there so entirely! He knew each smallest phase, each bitter turn of the wheel of solitary misery! In his heart, as yet, was only pity.
Oman came at last to the end of his strength and his confession. Crouching there, numb, blind with tears, swollen-lipped, breathing thickly and in gasps, he found himself, like one groping in a fog, uttering vague questions—doubts—hopes.