nconscious of what she said.

"The Abbot said, 'Do not describe her. What talk is this for holy men?
The young monks must not hear. Some of them have never seen a woman.
Should a monk speak of such toys?' But the wanderer disobeyed and spoke,
and there was a great tumult, and the monks threw him out at the command
of the young Abbot, and he wandered down to Peshawar, and it was he
later--the evil one!--that brought his sister, Lilavanti the Dancer, to
Peshawar, and the Abbot fell into her snare. That was his revenge!"

Her face was fixed and strange, for a moment her cheek looked hollow,
her eyes dim and grief-worn. What was she seeing?--what remembering? Was
it a story--a memory? What was it?

"She was beautiful?" I prompted.

"Men have said so, but for it he surrendered the Peace. Do not speak of
her accursed beauty."

Her voice died away to a drowsy murmur; her head dropped on my shoulder
and for the mere delight of contact I sat still and scarcely breathed,
praying that she might speak again, but the good minute was gone. She
drew one or two deep breaths, and sat up with a bewildered look that
quickly passed.

"I was quite sleepy for a minute. The climb was so strenuous. Hark--I
hear the Flute of Krishna again."

And again I could hear nothing, but she said it was sounding from the
trees at the base of the hill. Later when we climbed down I found she
was right--that a peasant lad, dark and amazingly beautiful as
these Kashmiris often are, was playing on the flute to a girl at his
feet--looking up at him with rapt eyes. He flung Vanna a flower as we
passed. She caught it and put it in her bosom. A singular blossom, three
petals of purest white, set against three leaves of purest green, and
lower down the stem the three green leaves were repeated. It was still
in her bosom after dinner, and I looked at it more closely.

"That is a curious flower," I said. "Three and three and three. Nine.
That makes the mystic number. I never saw a purer white. What is it?"

"Of course it is mystic," she said seriously. "It is the Ninefold
Flower. You saw who gave it?"

"That peasant lad."

She smiled.

"You will see more some day. Some might not even have seen that."

"Does it grow here?"

"This is the first I have seen. It is said to grow only where the gods
walk. Do you know that throughout all India Kashmir is said to be holy
ground? It was called long ago the land of the gods, and of strange, but
not evil, sorce