"Dost think I will suffer that thief of a mahajan to go on draining the people? He is rich and he will not pay his drivers the price other merchants do. I will therefore stop his well-laden carts and pay them for him. Get thee gone!" and with another kick he turned away.
With a mingled expression of sorrow and anger in her face, Rajhani rose. She was not quite like other Indian women. Till her mother died she had been brought up with Vansie, then her father married her to Hari Rām and she left the district. Her nature was gentle and she had imbibed a certain amount of religious knowledge, but an Eastern woman is a thing with no personality, a creature to be driven to and fro like the leaves in autumn. So she had suffered and her soul was ofttimes angry within her. Her love for Hari Rām was so strong and of so jealous a nature that she could not endure to be parted from him, but would follow him from place to place though the journeys were long and difficult. But for her cunning and great care it is doubtful whether he would so long have escaped detection.
Now she rose from the ground, and her large eyes were full of fierce passion and determination. She picked the little naked baby up from the floor of the mud hut, bound it on to her hip, muttering—
"He shall not be hanged," and went forth.
"Of course, if there is any fear of the man being attacked we must send him protection. You had better tell off a dozen men. At the same time I should keep the matter quiet. Let the mahajan start as if he knew nothing; but be in the neighbourhood, and if he is attacked show yourselves," the Commissioner spoke thus in answer to a report Superintendent Jenkins had just brought in.
At that very moment the tent curtain was pushed on one side and a chaprassi entered, followed by an Indian woman.
"Sahib," he said, salaaming, "this woman says she must speak with your Mightiness, so I have brought her to you."
The Commissioner looked up, and for a second examined the woman, who had stepped forward, and with outstretched hands, salaaming to the ground, said—
"I have news for you, my lord."