13

In the midst of all the confusion a letter arrived from Yu~giri. The old lady, now dimly aware of what was happening, took it as evidence that another night would pass without a visit. Worse and worse—nothing now could keep her daughter from being paraded before the world as an utter simpleton. And she herself—what could have persuaded her to write so damaging a letter?

These were her last thoughts. She was no more.

I need not describe the grief and desolation she left behind. She had been ill much of the time, victim of a malign possession, and more than once they had thought that she was dying. It had been assumed that this was another such seizure, and the priests had been feverishly at work. But it was soon apparent that the end had come. The princess clung to her, longing to go wherever she had gone.

“We must accept the inevitable, my lady.” The women offered the usual platitudes. “Of course you are sad, but she has gone the way from which there is no returning. However much you may wish to go with her, it is not possible.” They pulled her from her mother's side. “You are inviting bad luck, and your dear mother will have much to reprove you for. Do please come with us.”

But the girl seemed to waste away before their eyes, and to understand nothing of what was said to her.

The altar was taken down. Two and three at a time, the priests were departing. Intimates of the family remained, as might have been expected, but everything was over, and the house was still and lonely.