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Piari the contrary, I am surprised that I was able to recognise you. Well, it is getting on for twelve. Good-night!'

Piari's smiling face at once became pale and colourless. She paused for a moment and then said, ‘If you don't believe in spirits, you must believe in snakes and reptiles, tigers, bears, and wild boars in such an out-of-the-way place as this.'

'I do believe in their existence, certainly,' I answered, 'and I am always on guard against them.'

When she saw that I was going, she said, 'I know what kind of a man you are, and I had my fears that I should not be able to dissuade you. Yet I thought I might succeed in keeping you back by my tears and entreaties. But I see that the end of all this has been my tears and entreaties alone.' Not getting any reply from me, she continued, 'Well, go then. I won't spoil your luck by calling you back. If anything happens. your friends, the prince and his cronies, will hardly be of any use to you; it's I who will have to suffer for it, in this strange country. You know me little; you have thought fit to play the hero before me, but I, who am only a woman, shall not be able to say, if the question is raised, that I don't know you.'

She suppressed a sigh. I turned back smiling awkwardly: I felt a heaviness in my heart. 'Why, baiji,’ I said, 'even that would be a great gain to me. I had thought that I was absolutely friendless in the world: now I shall know that there is some one who cares for me, and who won't leave me neglected if anything happens to me.'

'Do you mean,' asked Piari, 'that you never realized that before? However much you insult me by calling