"The gods approve
The depth, and not the tumult of the soul."--_Wordsworth_.
"What a frightful row the natives are making in the city," was the
fractious comment of one heat-distracted tourist to another through the
mosquito netting which divided the two beds.
"Disgraceful!" peevishly assented the other as she turned restlessly
upon the thin, hot mattress, and heaved the one thin sheet to the foot
of the hot bed.
A sharper note had topped the heavy murmur which, like the rumble of a
distant sea, had beaten the air without ceasing throughout the night.
A film operator would have said that a crowd had woken up; a London
policeman, that a crowd was turning nasty, as the sharp note went
crescendo right along, until it took the definite tone of thousands of
human voices upraised in unrest of some kind.
This way and that surged the multitude, bowing unconsciously before the
gusts of passion which swept from every quarter.
The fret of the thousands of feet upon the paving sounded a silky
accompaniment to the strange throaty murmur of fast rising religious
hysteria; sharp, uncontrollable cries stood out like steel pencilling
against the velvet monotony of the throbbing drums; the never ceasing
tinkle of rings, and clanking of bracelets and holy chains against the
blare of the horns sounded as out of place as a child singing in a
thunder storm.
The high priest, with the face of Rome, with a beckoning gesture, drew
towards him other priests. Some also with the face of Rome, and some
with the face of the field labourer; some, gaunt and stern; some, jolly
and rotund; well, just like any gathering of clergy, of any creed, you
can see any day, in any country of Europe.
The chiming of the silver bell had stopped when the worshippers, upon
the peremptory command of the priests, fled pell-mell out of the temple
and down the steps to join the frenzied crowd; while from the direction
of the Praying Ghats there arose a roar of voices as two slim figures
sped swiftly up the narrow lane, which seemed to open of its own accord
before them.
The woman, clad from the waist downwards in one linen piece, came
running swiftly, lightly, undisturbed, almost hidden in the masses of
her hair blown before her by the rising wind.
Her naked body gleamed in the mixed lights; one hand, thrust out
through the hair, held a dagger with diamond hilt; the other was
clasped in the hand of the man who ran evenly and steadily beside her.
There was not apparently an inch of space to spare in all those narrow
streets; but by the madness of religion which drove the packed humanity
back against the walls, a way was made for her who appeared to the
multitude as the long-promised earthly incarnation of the Goddess of
Death.
When she had passed, those who were against the wall remained there,
standing crushed to death, supported by the indifferent neighbours who
had helped to drive in their ribs; and those who had slipped to their
knees in religious fervour, or by reason of the state of the street,
also remained prone upon the ground, the mass of people treading
indifferently upon their broken backs and necks, while the threatening
heavens were rent with screams of physical agony and cries of sensuous
delight.
Straight up the steps ran Leonie, and into the interior of the temple,
just as a priest, a lad, with his face twitching spasmodically, and
calling upon his god, fell dead at her feet, smitten by the force of
his religion.
Leonie, throwing up her arms, laughed as she put her cut and bleeding
foot upon the boy's neck--laughed until the place pealed and echoed
with the unseemly clamour, causing the crowds outside, held only in
check by the mental force of the handful of priests, to strain against
the invisible hypnotic barrier, and cry to high heaven for a sacrifice.
Then Leonie turned about and ran out on to the terrace, standing a
ghastly, beautiful figure before the multitude; and only a pair of
monkey eyes, in a pock-marked face, hidden by the deep shadows of a
corner inside the temple, saw the high priest with _roomal_ in hand,
creep stealthily up behind the girl.
No one in the tumult heard the growling of the elements; no one noticed
the clouds bent on enveloping the moon; no one but the pock-marked
woman understood what was towards for the appeasing of the outraged god.
"Blood!" screamed the tight packed ranks; "a sacrifice of blood! Kali
is hungry! Kali is thirsty! Give unto the Black Mother that which she
demands!"
Leonie flung up both arms and laughed, even as the high priest drew
back one step, scowling at the averted sacrifice.
"A sacrifice!" went up the cry from thousands of throats; "a sacrifice!
a sacrifice!"
Again Leonie flung out both arms, and, just as the _roomal_ was
slipping over the small head, with the scream of a tigress whose cub is
in danger, the ayah leapt straight at her beloved child, wrenching the
knotted handkerchief from the priest's hand.
A horrible cry of disappointed blood lust shook the very earth; drums
beat, horns screamed, daggers flashed in the dense mass, and fingers
met round many a throat.
They were mad indeed the people, but none so mad as Leonie as she stood
with feet apart glaring down at the ayah's sleek head, which she held
by the hair, in one hand.
So mad was she that the priests drew back as from one divine; all but
the high-caste youth who stood unnoticed amongst them and who advanced
one step as Leonie raised her face to the moon.
"She of the full moon," she chanted, "was the first worshipped one with
depths of days, of nights. They who, O worshipful one, gratify thee
with offerings, those well doers are entered into thy firmament!"
To which the waiting multitude thundered a response.
"A sacrifice! A sacrifice! A sacrifice!"
Over and over again went up the cry as men and women and children fell
foaming to the ground, "and conches and kettledrums, tabors and drums,
and cow-horns blared."
Then came a silence, deep, sinister, and foreboding; only for one
second before it was broken by a gasp, the catching of the breath in
ecstasy of thousands of mankind.
And followed screams of pure delight as Leonie flung back her hand, in
which gleamed the diamond hilted dagger, just as a terrific peal of
thunder crashed upon the searing flash of lightning, which flamed from
the dense clouds as they swept over and blotted out the moon.