Page:Tales from the Indian Epics.djvu/78

72 escaped abused Damayanti as an evil spirit and the cause of their ill fortune. The queen, fearing for her life, left them and fled into the forest. There she met some Brahmans, for the merchants had come near to the city of Suvahu, King of the Chedis. The Brahmans led her to the gates of the city, and she entered it. But her hair was loose, her single garment hardly held together, and her face was worn with grief and hardship. And as she walked through the streets, the children, thinking her a mad woman, ran after her and mocked her.

At last she reached the royal palace where, through the doors, she saw the king's mother surrounded by a number of her attendants. Timidly Damayanti asked an aged nurse who stood by to take her into the presence of the queen mother. The nurse led her inside the palace and on the way asked her who she was. Damayanti said, "I am a serving maid, although of a high caste. I had a devoted husband, but he lost his fortune at dice. Then like a madman he left me and fled into the woods, and for many days I have been following him but have failed to find him." The nurse repeated what Damayanti had said to the king's mother and the latter was touched with her condition and her great beauty. "Stay with me," she said, "my men will search the woods, and sooner or later will find your lord and bring him back to you." Damayanti was weary with walking and she gladly accepted the kind offer. "I will willingly stay with you! O mother of heroes," she said. "But you must protect me, so that other men may not woo me. For I love my husband only." The queen approved her words and sent for her daughter-in-law, Sunanda, Queen of the Chedis. When the queen came, her mother said to her, "Sunanda, my daughter,