deserted thee. Come now, and I will
take thee home.

And she said with a shriek: Nay nay, for the ghost of my father is
waiting there, to drive me away. Come away into the wood where it is
dark. And she dragged him by the hand, and she whispered: Babhru, I have
a thing to ask of thee. Wilt thou kill me with thy knife in the
darkness? for otherwise I must abandon the body of my own accord.

And Babhru started, and he exclaimed, with horror: Aranyani, art thou
mad? What! should I kill thee, I, kill thee, who art my very soul?

V

And she gazed at him awhile in silence, and then, there came into her
eyes an anguish that was mixed with disappointment and despair. And she
turned away, and murmured, as if speaking to herself, with melancholy:
He also is my enemy. They will not even kill her. They keep her living,
when she only asks for death, not even letting her escape, shutting her
like a prisoner in the dungeon of her lonely soul. Even Chamu would not
kill her: though she prayed him. He only laughed. And yet she was
already dead, slain long ago, and done away, leaving nothing but a
corpse.

And she stood for a moment, as if reflecting, and all at once, she
turned, and looked at Babhru, with a face that was wan in the moonlight,
and eyes that were filled with anxiety, and misery and pain. And
suddenly, they changed, becoming filled with laughter and hatred and
derision. And she came up close to him, as if to whisper in his ear, and
suddenly she struck him in the face, with a shout of laughter. And she
said, contemptuously: Thou wilt not kill me? Poor Babhru, thou hast not
even yet begun to understand. Dost thou remember Aranyani, that told
thee stories, long long ago, in the wood? She is dead. Far away in the
desert they took her heart, and tore it and trod it into pieces, and
flung her body out, to wander in the world alone, dressed in the clothes
of misery and shame. And this it is, thou wilt not kill. Thou wouldst
actually keep her miserable body still alive, to live with in the
torture of this wood, where Aranyani lived long ago, to suffer every
instant the horror of recollection, and to be mocked for ever by the
memory of a happiness that is changed into despair. Like monkeys that go
by among the trees, they found a fruit, and bit it, only to go on and
leave it lying, deserted and outraged and dishonoured on the ground.
Thou thinkest to find happiness in watching her dead body? Thou wilt not
kill her, poor Babh