Page:Krishnakanta's Will (Chatterjee, Roy).pdf/33

Rh entreating him to take pity and forgive her, but he spoke not a word. He was thinking of Rohini. How beautiful and clever she was! And what was Bhramar by her side? What recommendation had she save that she was a good and gentle girl? But he did not mean to forsake her; he wanted only to live apart from her for a time. And Rohini—he could throw her over any moment when he had got tired of her.

"Oh, have pity on me," entreated Bhramar, her eyes bathed in tears. "Speak a kind word, oh, do! O God! and this was in store for me!"

Her appeal surely rose to heaven, but Gobindalal paid no heed to it.

"Oh, speak but one kind word," she urged again. "Will you not?"

"I want to leave you," said Gobindalal deliberately, and steeling his heart against all pity.

She was stunned. She said no more. She rose from her lowly position; paused; moved up to the door. Going out she stumbled, fell down and swooned away.

"What have I done that you want to leave me?" This question Bhramar never put to Gobindalal, but after the scene described in the preceding pages this was upon her mind night and day. Gobindalal too asked himself what her fault was. Bhramar was surely in the wrong, he thought, for she ought to have considered before she wrote such a sharp letter to him. We will, however, give the debate that he had with his conscience.

Gobindalal. Her fault is she was jealous. And isn't it quite as bad as anything?

Conscience. Hadn't she a good reason to be jealous? You cannot deny your illicit connection with Rohini.

G. When she first had her suspicions I was quite innocent.

C. Yes; but in your mind you knew you were guilty. And since by your conduct you gave your wife reason to be jealous as much before as after committing yourself to evil, could she have been anything but jealous?

G. But it seems to me that had she not been jealous I should never have gone wrong. Do we not sometimes drive an honest man to go astray by giving him a bad name?

C. The fault then, in your opinion, lies not at the door of him who goes to the bad, but him who gives him a bad name. Nice argument this!

G. Nice or not nice, I am sure she ought never to have gone to her father's since she was told that I was coming home and was on the way. Besides I think she could never have found it in her heart to write such a stinging letter to me if she had had the least regard for my feelings.

C. If she knew that she had had good grounds for her suspicion she was perfectly justified in acting as she had done. Can a wife see her husband go wrong and not resent it?

G. But she knew nothing for certain; and she acted on a mere rumour, which she should not have done. She ought to have asked me.

C. And did you care to ask her?

G. I did not.

C. Then how could you hold her wrong for never telling her suspicions to you? But that's not it. I will tell you what it really is.

G. And that is?

C. It is just this. You took a fancy to Rohini, and so you wished in your mind to get her. But why did Krishnakanta give your share of the property to your wife? Because, besides feeling sure she would soon want to make it over to you, he hoped that such a step might open your eyes to your folly and win you back from the path you are treading.

G. She does want to make it over to me, but I will not accept it, not I.

C. Why? The property is yours. It was acquired by your late father, and you are his heir.

G. But since my uncle, on his death-bed, had bestowed it upon her, it is no longer mine.

C. Your uncle had no right to bestow it upon your wife. He knew that very well; but he did so, thinking it might disenchant you, as I have said, and make you turn from the path you are pursuing.

G. But I will not stoop to accept a gift from my wife. I had much rather starve than do so.

C. In other words you would sooner give up your wife and give up your property than lose Rohini. Well, then go your way. If you are resolved upon your ruin no one can help it.