Page:The further side of silence (IA furthersideofsil00clifiala).pdf/222

 the disease he half recognized but lacked the courage to name; and when at length disguise was no longer possible, it was to Minah that he told the truth, told it with the crude and brutal bluntness which natives keep for the breaking of ill tidings. He lay in wait for her by the little bathing raft on the river's brink, where Minah was wont to fill the gourds with water for her house, and he began his tale at once without preface or preparation.

"Sister, it is the evil sickness," he said. "Without doubt it is the sickness that is not good. For me, I can do nought to aid this man of thine, for the devil of this sickness is a very strong devil. Therefore, give me the money that is due to me, and suffer me to depart, for I also greatly fear to contract the evil. And, Sister, it were well for you speedily to seek a divorce from Mamat, as in such cases is permitted by law, lest you, too, become afflicted, for this disease is one that can by no means be medicined, even if Petera Guru himself were to take a hand in the charming away of the evil humours."

No one in Malaya ever names leprosy. It is spoken of as rarely as possible, and then by all manner of euphonisms, lest hearing its name pronounced it should seek out the speaker and abide with him for- ever. But when the words "the evil sickness" sounded in her cars, Minah understood their full meaning. The shock was violent, the grief and horror intense; yet her first conscious feeling was a throb of relief, almost of joy. Her man was a leper! No other woman would ever now be found to wed