Page:Tales of Bengal (Sita and Santa Chattopadhyay).djvu/45

Rh of the Creator. So you came in, the child-queen of my heart. Shankar was then with his mother's relations. I left him there willingly. I did not want any more ties of affection, but the world is full of them, so I could not escape. How I brought you up, with what care and love, you know well. I sheltered you from sorrow and sin to the best of my power. But who can go against destiny? It is I who must deal you the first great blow of your life. I tried hard to shirk this terrible duty. But I could not find any other way."

I sat there silent, my heart turning cold within my breast.

What I heard was terrible for me. I did not know what sin was, but I understood I owed my being to sin. Then it was I knew what had caused my mother to desert her baby. It was not poverty; she was afraid of herself, she feared to contaminate me. She gave me up to this saintly man in the hope that his merit might wash away my sin. But can any one wash a piece of charcoal white? The sin of my birth clung to me.

The old man went on, "My child, I have loved you above everything. But man is weak, he is stained easily. I know that I have caused you pain sometimes by my treatment of you, as one whose touch makes me unclean, yet I could not help it. I have ever loved and cared for you as my own child, and now that I am dying, I have only one favour to ask of you. I found out long ago, what perhaps you do not know yet. To Shankar you have become as the apple of his eye. He confessed it to me to-day, my darling. I know that you are pure as the water of the sacred Ganga. But society will not recognise it. You are an outcast by its laws. Swear to me, my child, touching my white hair, that you will do nothing to make Shankar ashamed before his fellow-men; that you will leave him, the last of my race, free to live a life worthy of his Rh