The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1914-06-26
copyright: 1914: BY Harold Mac Grath.l
CHAPTER XIII.

CHAPTER XIII.
WN HERE Is an old saying in Rajput that woman and
the four winds were born at the same time, of the
same mother: blew hot, blew cold, balmily or tenn
p~estuously, from all points at once. Perhaps.
In the zenana of the royal palace there was a woman,
tall, 1.-THE, with a skin Of ivory and roses and eyes az
brown as the husk of a water chestnut. On her bare
ankles were gem incrusted anklets, on her arms bracelets
Of hammered gold, round her neck a rope of pearls and
emeralds and rubies and ~sapphires. And still she was
not happy.
From time to time her fingers strained at the roots OF
her glossy black hair and the whites Of her great eyes
eHstened. She bit her lips to keep back the sobs crowd
ing in her throat. She pressed her hands together 90
tightly that the little knuckles cracked.
al, All" she walled softly.
She paced the confines of her chamber with slow step,
with fast step: or leaned against the wall, her face hidden
In her arms; or pressed her hot cheeks against the
cool marble of the lattice.
Human nature is made up Of contrarieS. Why, when
We have had the courage cooly to plan murder, or to aid
or suggest it, why must We be troubled with remorse?
More than this, why must we battle against the silly i'm
pulse to tell the first we meet what we have done? Re-
morseI What is it?
Now, this woman of the senana believed not in the God
Of your fathers and mine. She was a pagan; her heaven
and he'll were ruled by a thousand gods, and her temples
were filled with their images. Yet this thing, remorse,
was stabbing her with it's hot needles till no torture de.
yised by man could equal It.
She was the poor, foolish woman who loved Durga
Ram; loved him as these wild Asiatic women love, from
murder to the poisoned cup. Loved him, and knew that
he loved her not, but used her for his own selfish ends.
There you have it. Had he loved her, remorse never
would have lifted its head or raised its voice. And again,
had not Umballah sought the white women this butterfly
of the harem might have died Of old age without unbur-
dsning her soul. Remorse is the result Of a crime COM
mitted uselessly. Humanity Is Interchangeable, for all its
variety Of skins. '
And here was this woman, wanting to tell some one!
Umballah had done a peculiar thing he had not laid
hand upon either Ramabai or Pundita. When asked the
reason for this generosity toward a man who but recently
put a price on his head Umballah smiled and explained
that Ramabai was not only broken politically but was a
religious outcast. It was happiness for such \ person to
die, 50 he preferred that Ramabai, should 1--we.
Secretly, however, Ramabais revolutionary friends
were still back of him, though they pretended to bow to
the yoke of the priests.
So upon this day matters stood thus: The colonel,
Kathlyn, Bruce, and Winnie were prisoners again; Ahmed
was in hiding; and Ramabai and his wife Knocked by those
who once had cheered them. The ~ingratitude Of kings is
as nothing when compared to the ingratitude of a people.
A most ridiculous country: to crown Kathlyn again
flor the third timel) and then to lock her up! Next to
superstition as a barrier to progress there stands custom.
Everything one did must be done as some one else had
done it; the initiative was still chained up in the temples,
1T belonged to the bald priests only.
But Umballah had made two mistakes he should have
permitted the white people to leave the country and given
a silken cord to the chief eunuch, to -rply as directed.
There are no written laws among the dark peoples that
forbid the disposal Of that chattel known as a woman Of
the harem or zenana. There are certain customs that
even the AN powerful British raj must ignore.
The ~catafalque Of the dead king rested upon the royal
platform. Two troopers stood below; otherwise the plat
form was deserted. When Ramabai and Pundita arrived
and mounted the platform to pay their last respects to q
kindly man the soldiers saluted gravely, even sorrowfully.
Ramabai, for his courage, his honesty and justice, was
their man; but they no longer dared serve him, since IL
would be at the expense Of their own lives.