Page:Anandamath, The Abbey of Bliss - Chatterjee.djvu/196

168 the whole night and wondered what was coming. Hindus thought, "Let the Sannyasins come; may mother Durga so ordain that this may happen." Mussulmans said, "Allaho Akbar! Is the Quoran Sherif going to turn all false after such a long time? We say our prayers at all the five prescribed hours, and yet we have not been able to defeat the rabble of Hindus with tilaks on their brow. Alas, the world is a huge sham." So some wept and some smiled and all passed the night on the tip-toe of fear.

All this reached Kalyani's ears; in fact no one, old or young, was unaware of it. Kalyani said to herself, "God be praised, Thy work is done now. To day I shall go to see my husband, Madhusudan help me."

At the dead of night Kalyani left her bed, opened the backdoor, looked on all sides, and, finding nobody about, silently came out of Gouri Devi's house to the highway. She prayed to her own god and said "Look, lord, that I may not fail to see him at Padachinha to-night."

Kalyani arrived at the gate. The warder cried, "Who goes there?" Kalyani was frightened and said, "I am a woman." The warder said, "Nobody may cross the gate, that's the order." This reached the ears of the Daffadar who said, "There is no prohibition against going out, it's only against anybody's coming in." The warder then said to Kalyani, in broken Bengali; "Go, mother, there's no bar to your going. But it is a risky thing to venture out to-night. Who knows what may