, to go away. But I sprang forward, and
caught her in my arms again, and said: Nay, dear Chaturika, do not go.
Stay just a little longer, for art thou not her shadow?

And yet once more she began to laugh, pushing me away, as she
exclaimed: It is utterly impossible, O Shatrunjaya, for I have many
things to do, and very little time. And I am not sure that I care to
be embraced, merely because I am the shadow of another. Thou must
contrive how thou canst, without me, to restrain thy insatiable
appetite of embracing other people, till sunset. Patience! thou hast
not long to wait.

And she went out and shut the door, and suddenly, just as it was
closing, she opened it again, and put in her head. And she said: Shall
I tell her of thy anxiety to embrace me, or leave it to thee? Dear
Chaturika! Ah! ah! Nectar when she turns towards thee: poison when she
turns away!

And then she shut the door and disappeared.

XI

And as the door shut behind her, she left the whole room filled to the
very brim with the red glow of triumphant love's emotion, and the
atmosphere of the ecstasy of happiness; and the laughter, of which she
seemed to be the incarnation, hung, so to say, in every corner of the
room. And my heart sang and my blood bubbled with the wave of the
ocean of anticipation that surged and swelled within me, so that I was
utterly unable to sit still, for sheer joy; and my soul began as it
were to dance in such excitement, that I could hardly refrain from
shouting, resembling one intoxicated by the abruptness of a sudden
change from certain death to the very apex of life's sweetness. And I
said to myself: Sunset! So, then, beyond a doubt, she has either
forgiven me, or is willing to forgive. And who knows? For if she has
forgiven once, she may forgive again: when again, it may be, she will
allow me to say good-bye. And at the thought, my heart began to burn
with dull fire, hurting me so that I could hardly breathe: and yet
strange! the pain was divided only by a hair from a sweetness so
intense that I laughed aloud, without knowing why, like one hovering
on the very verge of being mad. And so I remained, drowned in the
ocean of the torture and the nectar of love-longing, every now and
then waking as from a day-dream to wonder at the sun, who seemed to
dawdle on his way, as if on purpose to separate my soul from my body
with impatience. But at last, after all, day began slowly to come to
an end, and I set out for the pal