Page:Karl Gjellerup - The Pilgrim Kamanita - 1911.djvu/273

 "Woe is me!" he called out. "Yes, that is certainly Angulimala, and I, wretched man, have betrayed my king into putting himself in his power."

At the same time I could see plainly that he only quivered so with fear because he imagined himself to be in the power of his deadly enemy.

"This horrible fellow," he went on, "has deceived us all—has cheated the Master himself and also my all-too-credulous wife, who, like all women, lays much store by such tales of conversion. So we have all walked into the trap."

And his glances wandered hither and thither, as though he descried half a dozen robbers behind every tree. With stuttering voice and trembling hand he adjured the king to seek safety for his precious person in immediate flight.

Then I stepped forward and spoke—

"Calm thyself, my husband! I am in a position to convince thee, as also my noble sovereign, that here no trap has been laid, and that no danger threatens."

And I now related how, talked over by Angulimala, I had, together with him, projected an attack on the life of my husband, and how our plan was frustrated by that very conversion of my ally.

When Satagira heard how near he had been to death, he was obliged to support himself on the arm of the chamberlain, in order not to sink to earth.

I prostrated myself before the king, and begged him to pardon my husband as I had pardoned him, saying that, led away by passion, he had sinned, and in the whole matter had assuredly, though all unconsciously, followed the leading of a higher power that intended to bring to pass before our eyes the greatest of all wonders, so that