Page:Stories of Bengalee life - Prabhat Kumar Mukerji.pdf/256

244 "You must, then, have read the article?"

"Read it! Certainly. I have finished the whole of the magazine. Last night I fell asleep reading it in bed. I awoke to see the candle burnt quite down, and flickering with so great a flare that at first I was much alarmed."

"Ah! it is fortunate nothing caught fire."

"If through my reading that journal my curtains had caught fire and I had been burnt to death—the announcement of the event in the different newspapers would have been a fine advertisement for your Light of Bengal."

At first I could think of no suitable reply to this speech; a sort of metaphor was buzzing in my brain, that, like the wax of the candle of which she spoke, this educated maiden was tender and delicate, and bright like its flame. I gave a meaningless laugh, and at length said—"Since you are so fond of Bengali literature, why do you not write yourself?"

"If I wrote, who would read? In the first place, who would print it?"

I had a suspicion that Nirmala did write in secret, but I had not the courage to ask. The discussion turned upon the short story. I said that the present custom of giving a short story each month was a cause of great embarrassment to