And when he pleaded?—It was long before he attempted it; but it was at last irrepressible. More than his sister and Lurlee, he knew what struggle would ensue in Tara's heart if she were called upon too suddenly to renounce her own faith; for he had lived, young as he still was, more in the world. On this point, he had as yet forborne to address her at all. But such love as his for the deserted girl, must be spoken by himself. Lurlee and Zyna had told him all they had said, and it seemed strange to both that he was silent; but he had judged rightly. What the girl could bear from them, could not have been endured from him till her bodily strength assisted her mind to bear it, and he waited his opportunity.
It was the first time she had ever mentioned her own affairs; almost the only time she had spoken freely at all. She had reverted to the past, to the day of the attack on Tooljapoor, and to Fazil's recovery of her mother's ornaments; for the Brahmun women had bathed her that day, and she had performed some simple ceremonies of her faith for purification after her illness, and charitable gifts had been distributed by Fazil and Lurlee on her behalf. So she had suffered Zyna to twist a garland of flowers into her hair as she used to do in camp, and to put on her some of the old ornaments which, while she was yet decked for the Sutee, had been brought away with her: and when Fazil, who had been absent all day in the camp, returned before sunset for the evening prayer, he found her talking earnestly with his sister.
Still pale, but only showing the traces of illness in the purity of her colour, Tara had perhaps never looked more lovely than in the resumption of some of her former richness and elegance of costume; and as Fazil entered the court, for the moment unobserved by her and Zyna, who were seated together, he stopped involuntarily to regard her.
Tara would have fled when they saw him, but Zyna would not have it so.
"Look," she said, "brother, is she not like herself once more? See how I have decked her for her sacrifice of thanks to-day! Surely all that is past is as a dream, and Tara is again what she was the evening she was taken away from us. Is she not, brother? She is not changed?"
"Yes," he said, "changed, I think, in spirit in her new life, as we had hoped—that is all! Tara, sit down: we will all remain together, and you must hear me now, with Zyna as witness.
"There is nothing new to say," he continued, after a pause—"nothing. It is only the old tale, once told before, when you believed it: and it is not changed, only confirmed. Ah! we have both been tried since; and if out of that trial you have come, like me, strengthened, then there is no doubt. Tara! in the deadly struggle by that hideous pile, with the crash of music, and frantic screams of the people in your ears, even then your heart bore witness to me that I was true. Am I false now?"
"O no, no, no!" cried the girl, throwing herself uncontrollably at his feet, after her old Hindu fashion. "Not false, not false! You are my lord and my saviour, and I worship you! I will be your slave, your servant, for my life, and Zyna knows it; but consider——"
"Not thus, beloved," he said, gravely but kindly stooping and raising her up, "will I hear that, but so, face to face. There is no shame in it now—none; for it is our destiny, Tara: let it be as honoured as, methinks, it is loved. Sit there and listen." And Zyna put her arm round her, and they sat down together side by side.