There the jamadar put his sinewy arms about the slender girl, and bent
his handsome face to implant a kiss on her red lips, but she thrust his
arms from her and drew back saying, "No, Ajeet!"
"Why, lotus--why, Gulab? Often from thy lips I have heard that there
is no love in thy heart for any man even for me, but is it not a lie,
the curious lie of a woman who resents a master?"
Ajeet in a mingling of awe and anger had dropped into the formal "thou"
pronoun instead of the familiar "you."
"No, Ajeet, it is the truth; I do not tell lies."
"But out there thou denounced those sons of depraved parents in defence
of Ajeet; thou bound up his hand as a mother dresses the wounds of a
child in her love--even mocked Bhowanee and the ordeal; then sayest
thou there is no love in thy heart for Ajeet."
"There is not; just the tie such as is between us, that is all. I
never learned love--I was but a pawn, a prize. Seest that, Ajeet?" and
Bootea laid a finger upon the iron bracelet on her arm--the badge of a
widow.
Ajeet Singh sneered: "A metal lie, a--"
"Stop!" The girl's voice was almost a scream of expostulation.
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