Before him, and at the same
time could not see it, engaged in a deep reverie, which carried him
away from us, and from the whole performance.
"What is the matter with him?" was my thought, but I had no time
to ask him, because the witch was again in full swing, chasing
her own shadow.
But with the seventh goddess the programme was slightly changed.
The running of the old woman changed to leaping. Sometimes bending
down to the ground, like a black panther, she leaped up to some
worshipper, and halting before him touched his forehead with her
finger, while her long, thin body shook with inaudible laughter.
Then, again, as if shrinking back playfully from her shadow, and
chased by it, in some uncanny game, the witch appeared to us like
a horrid caricature of Dinorah, dancing her mad dance. Suddenly
she straightened herself to her full height, darted to the portico
and crouched before the smoking censer, beating her forehead against
the granite steps. Another jump, and she was quite close to us,
before the head of the monstrous Sivatherium. She knelt down again
and bowed her head to the ground several times, with the sound of
an empty barrel knocked against something hard.
We had hardly the time to spring to our feet and shrink back when
she appeared on the top of the Sivatherium's head, standing there
amongst the horns.
Narayan alone did not stir, and fearlessly looked straight in the
eyes of the frightful sorceress.
But what was this? Who spoke in those deep manly tones? Her lips
were moving, from her breast were issuing those quick, abrupt phrases,
but the voice sounded hollow as if coming from beneath the ground.
"Hush, hush!" whispered Sham Rao, his whole body trembling. "She
is going to prophesy!.... " "She?" incredulously inquired Mr. Y - -.
"This a woman's voice? I don't believe it for a moment. Someone's
uncle must be stowed away somewhere about the place. Not the
fabulous uncle she inherited from, but a real live one!.... "
Sham Rao winced under the irony of this supposition, and cast an
imploring look at the speaker.
"Woe to you! woe to you!" echoed the voice. "Woe to you, children
of the impure Jaya and Vijaya! of the mocking, unbelieving lingerers
round great Shiva's door! Ye, who are cursed by eighty thousand sages!
Woe to you who believe not in the goddess Kali, and you who deny us,
her Seven divine Sisters! Flesh-eating, yellow-legged vultures!
friends of the oppressors of our land! dogs who are not ashamed to
eat from the same trough with the Bellati!" (foreigners).
"It seems to me that your prophetess only foretells the past," said
Mr. Y - -, philosophically putting his hands in his pockets.
