Who can interfere with a king's command? At once the boy was called, and
the marriage garlands were exchanged between him and the princess.
At this point I came up close to my wise Grannie and asked her eagerly:
"When then?"
In the bottom of my heart there was a devout wish to substitute myself
for that fortunate wood-gatherer of seven years old. The night was
resonant with the patter of rain. The earthen lamp by my bedside was
burning low. My grandmother's voice droned on as she told the story.
And all these things served to create in a corner of my credulous heart
the belief that I had been gathering sticks in the dawn of some
indefinite time in the kingdom of some unknown king, and in a moment
garlands had been exchanged between me and the princess, beautiful as
the Goddess of Grace. She had a gold band on her hair and gold earrings
in her ears. She had a necklace and bracelets of gold, and a golden
waist-chain round her waist, and a pair of golden anklets tinkled above
her feet.
If my grandmother were an author, how many explanations she would have
to offer for this little story! First of all, every one would ask why
the king remained twelve years in the forest? Secondly, why should the
king's daughter remain unmarried all that while? This would be regarded
as absurd.
Even if she could have got so far without a quarrel, still there would
have been a great hue and cry about the marriage itself. First, it never
happened. Secondly, how could there be a marriage between a princess of
the Warrior Caste and a boy of the priestly Brahman Caste? Her readers
would have imagined at once that the writer was preaching against our
social customs in an underhand way. And they would write letters to the
papers.
So I pray with all my heart that my grandmother may be born a
grandmother again, and not through some cursed fate take birth as her
luckless grandson.