The Daughter of Brahma, I. A. R. Wylie [carter reed txt] 📗

association with so high a personage, nodded an understanding agreement.

Sarasvati had been standing by the window; she turned as the two women entered, but she did not at once advance to meet them. Indeed, it seemed as though she half recoiled, like some frightened child, and her eyes passed from one face to the other in dumb question. Lady Salby coughed delicately. She felt complete master of the situation, and could afford to be gracious.

"Dear Lady Hurst," she murmured, swaying ponderously forward. "So pleased that we should have met at last."

Sarasvati came to meet the outstretched hand. Her movements were lithe and graceful as a panther's, and the beautifully embroidered sevi which was draped about her figure with classic perception for the poetry of line became her as perfectly as the wild mass of furs and waving feathers became her visitor ill. And yet she trembled visibly, as though this revelation of European taste overwhelmed her with a sense of fear.

"You are kind to say so," she said, in an English which faltered. "I have been so frightened." She touched Mrs. Morell's reluctant hand and seemed to take comfort from that lady's dowdy simplicity. "So very frightened," she repeated, with a note of unconscious appeal in her soft voice.

Lady Salby laughed melodiously. She sank uninvited in the most comfortable chair by the fireside, and motioned to Mrs. Morell to follow her example.

"Frightened?" she said, raising her fine eyebrows. "Frightened of us, dear Lady Hurst?"

"Of every one," Sarasvati answered. She stood between the two women, her hands folded before her, and they studied her, the one through her lorgnettes, the other through her pince-nez, and both through the haze of their prejudices. Lady Salby repeated her carefully studied ripple.

"You must have more confidence," she said encouragingly. "I know foreigners are inclined to look upon us English people as terrible bears, but we really are quite nice when one gets to know us aren't we, Mrs. Morell?"

Mrs. Morell acquiesced awkwardly. Lady Salby's constant reference to 'us English,' was an all-betraying weakness which she had never been able to overcome partly because she did not realise its damaging effect.

"Won't you sit down?" she went on graciously, as their hostess remained standing. Sarasvati started. "I I thank you," she stammered. "I was thinking would you not be glad of something to eat? I believe it is usual--"

"Oh no, not at all, don't mention it," Mrs. Morell interrupted stiffly. "We had our tea before we left." "Indeed, our chief object in coming was to tell you how delighted we all are that you and your husband are coming out of your seclusion." Lady Salby added: "The Hursts have always been so popular, and Sir David is proving such a brilliant speaker. He is sure to get in; we are working our hardest for him."

Sarasvati looked at her visitor in grave wonder. "Work for him?" she repeated. "How can you work for him?" And in her tone and words there was at once pride and an unconscious disparagement.

Lady Salby threw back her plumed head with the amusement of superior wisdom.

"It is very easy indeed," she said. "Nowadays a man who hopes to get in without the help of women is utterly lost. Though he is too masculine to want women on the stage, he likes them to do all the dirty work behind the scenes, and so we help with the meetings and canvassing; write letters, make appointments, lend our motor-cars, our influence. Good gracious! why, we are so many unpaid agents."

"And can I do nothing?"

The tone had changed again, had become humble, almost beseeching.

Lady Salby shook her head emphatically.

"I think not. You see, my dear Lady Hurst, you as yet are a stranger to our ways and our people. The people are very foolish very prejudiced in fact, one has to be extraordinarily careful. Really, it is most difficult for me to explain. You are sure you will not be hurt by anything I may say?"

"No," Sarasvati answered. Her voice and expression were dull. She had as yet understood nothing, but this woman's manner increased her fear.

"You know it is all for your good," Lady Salby went on, who had by now found her seat in the saddle. "I want you to feel that I am speaking to you as a friend who would like to help you in the many difficulties of your new position." She laid her tightly gloved hand on Sarasvati's knee. "As I was saying, our people are very difficult to manage conservative you know, and they have to get accustomed to foreigners strangers. If you were to come amongst them suddenly you would be certain to damage your husband's cause."

"You mean that they hate me?" Sarasvati said simply and directly. The grey light of the winter afternoon fell on her face, which had suddenly grown pinched and wan.

Lady Salby gave an elegant, protesting gesture.

"My dear, certainly not, but they are very slow. They are suspicious. You must give them time."

"I know quite well," Sarasvati answered. "Everywhere it has been the same the people have looked at me they have followed me with their eyes, but without kindness. Then I did not mind, for they were not my people. But these are my people." She paused, and her expression grew strangely absorbed. "It is perhaps that they know I am not as they," she finished under her breath.

Lady Salby nodded approval.

"Exactly. They feel that you are of another race. So sensible of you to understand. And now you will be very patient, won't you?"

"You mean I must do nothing? I may not help him?" There was a hungry pleading in voice and eyes.

Lady Salby considered.

"Well, perhaps in little things if you would allow me to advise you. For instance what a charming dress you have got on! Do you know, I have been admiring it all the afternoon. Let me see, what was I saying? Oh, yes; for instance, there are trifling exterior matters mere conventionalities, you know. We have a saying that when we are in Rome we do as the Romans do, and I think our people would like you better if you took to their ways and dress. Now a nice tailor-made would make all the difference, wouldn't it, Mrs. Morell?"

"Certainly," said Mrs. Morell.

Sarasvati rose slowly to her feet. She was scarcely above the middle height, but the slightness of her build and her erect carriage gave her a dignity which for a moment silenced her visitor's loquacious tongue.

"My husband wishes that I keep to the dress of my caste," she said proudly. "He cares nothing for the thoughts of the common people."

"My dear--"Lady Salby flushed with annoyance "you will find that his ideas have changed. The thoughts of the common people have become very important to him indeed, and if you are wise you will ignore all that nonsense. Get yourself some nice evening dresses and surprise him. I can give you the name of an excellent dressmaker, and, once you have shown every one that you mean to be a real Englishwoman they will love you at once."

"And that will be good for him?" she asked thoughtfully.

"Of course. And, my dear Lady Hurst, there is another thing. I'm sure you won't mind my mentioning it, but you know we are all very serious Christians in this part of the world. It's old-fashioned, I daresay " the scion of the house of Goldschmidt & Co. expanded visibly " but I confess lam that way myself, and I think if you could manage to attend St. Stephen's regularly on Sunday it would make a very good impression." She paused a moment and glanced across at Mrs. Morell, who was listening in meek admiration. "Of course, you don't mind my asking, do you? You have been baptized?"

"Yes," Sarasvati answered instantly, "Father Romney--"

"Good gracious a Roman Catholic!"

The exclamation broke from both visitors in the same instant. Sarasvati looked from one blank face to the other. Her own face was full of a grave surprise.

"Yes," she said simply.

"Then then you are a Roman too?"

"I am what my husband is."

"What Sir David too?" Again an exchange of deploring glances. "Most unfortunate, most unfortunate!" murmured Lady Salby. "We are all such staunch Protestants," remarked Mrs. Morell, who evidently felt it was time she said something. "Really, I am afraid it will make a great difference."

"But I we can come to the church," Sarasvati interposed gently. "What can a name matter? Do not we all believe in the One God?"

The two women stared at her. She bore their scrutiny with calm, unconscious that she had struck at the foundation of their Christianity. Mrs. Morell drew herself up.

"Very liberal," she said frigidly. "Very liberal indeed."

"Of course, God is the father of all," murmured Lady Salby gracefully, with the air of having granted a concession. "But I think you had better speak to the vicar about it." Then she stopped, and there was an awkward silence.

Sarasvati's eyes had wandered to the window, and suddenly she clapped her hands with a childlike excitement which contrasted startlingly with her previous bearing.

"White rain I " she cried. "White rain!"

Lady Salby glanced over her shoulder.

"Dear me snow at last," she said. "I always think snow so beautiful, don't you? so soothing, so pure! I suppose you have seen it before?"

Sarasvati shook her head. She had reached the window and stood watching the slow, heavy flakes as they sank through the grey twilight. After a moment she came back to the fire, shivering.

"It is cold a dead thing," she said "It faUs straight into my heart." She held out her delicate hands to the flames, and Lady Salby's quick eyes inherited caught the gleam of gems.

"It is a great change for you, no doubt," she said, with recovered equanimity. "It is very warm in India, isn't it?"

"It is all warmth," Sarasvati answered under her breath. "There God is the sun."

Lady Salby overheard the last sentence. She had just remembered part of her mission, and her tone changed.

"How your people must miss you!" she said with sympathy.

Sarasvati looked up. Her fine instinct felt the nearness of a new danger, but it could not save her from her own ignorance.

"My people?" she repeated slowly.

"Your father, I mean. Let me see, I think I have heard his name, but these foreign words are so difficult for us poor English to remember. Wasn't it the Rajah of dear me! I have quite forgotten!"

Sarasvati stood in her favourite attitude, with her hands crossed before her. Her gaze had lost itself in the bright firelight.

"My father is God," she said dreamily. "Brahma, the AU One."

There was a long, unbroken silence, of which she was unconscious. Lady Salby rose.

"I think I must be going," she said, and her voice sounded as though she had been running. "We have been very pleased to meet you, Lady Hurst. For your own sake, as well as for that of your husband, I hope you will consider our advice."

Sarasvati looked up. She saw that the heavy face of the speaker was flushed, and that the lips were pursed; she looked at the little woman in black and recognised a bleak unfriendliness that was near hatred. And suddenly a wild, nameless fear of these women who came to her as her husband's friends rushed over her.

"I thank you, I will try," she said, and her voice rose scarcely above a whisper.

She felt the touch of two limp hands. She heard the rustle of silken petticoats and the heavy clang of the hall-door. She crept to the window and looked out. The lights of a carriage flashed over the thin white covering of snow and disappeared into the avenue. For a long time she stood there, watching one feathery flake follow another, and then she buried her face in a fold of her sevi as though to hide from the gathering darkness.

Thus David Hurst found her when he returned, an hour later, from a meeting in some outlying village. It had been a successful