Page:Tales of Bengal (Sita and Santa Chattopadhyay).djvu/26

Tales of Bengal display that race-course of a forehead, I should not be astonished if nobody even looked at her."

The owner of the race-course did not lower her head but kept her vacant eyes fixed upon the critic. Tara-sundari suddenly caught hold of Sobha's chin in order to bring her hair within the view of everyone. "See how she has done it," she exclaimed. "Do her hair loosely like this, and cover up a bit of that broad forehead. Holy Durga! Is this the way to treat human hair?"

Kalo's mother was looking hard at Sobha, as if to find out the secret of the fashion, and the girl feeling very shy at this inspection turned away her head.

Tara-sundari waited a moment as if to recover her lost breath, and then suddenly said with the tone of one inspired: "Look here, present your daughter to the bridegroom's people with her hair done loose. And do you know what a Jhapta is? The ornament some use on the forehead. Get one, and there you are! No one need know whether she has a forehead at all. Moreover, she will look beautiful, too."

Kalo's mother made a sorry face: "But that is not her only defect, she is too dark."

Tara-sundari was a picture of pride as she said, "Do you know, I have married eight daughters, eight! What if she is dark?. Give me the darkest girl with any sort of a nose to show, if I don't marry her, I will rub my nose on the pavement by way of penance."

"If she is a girl," she continued, "that's enough. Hear what I say. Have you seen powder? Get four pice worth of pink powder from the market and apply it to her face. She will soon look fairer. It you can't get powder, pass some meal through a piece of muslin and keep it handy. Then pass your hands very lightly over a whitewashed wall—not a mud wall—mind you, very lightly, and apply them to the girl's face. Then get some of the meal Rh