Page:Indira and Other Stories.pdf/30

 could tell me how to go there. Myself a life-long denizen of the seclusion of a zenana, I did not even know in what district my home was, or in what direction it lay. How then could anyone else guide me? In such fashion a whole year glided by. Then, all of a sudden, a ray of light shone on my darkness. It was as if I had seen a familiar star in a break in the clouds in the rainy season.

One day Ramram Babu called me to him and said:

"I have asked a very important guest to dine with me to-day. He is my banker, and I owe him money. See that to-day's meal is exceptionally good, otherwise I shall be greatly annoyed."

I did my very best. The dining-room was in the women's apartments, and so I was ordered to wait at table. Only Ramram Babu and his guest sat down to eat.

I had already served the first course when they arrived. Presently I went to serve the second course, a dish of meat. I was of course