At first I suspected nothing, feared nothing; I simply felt
dedicated to my country. What a stupendous joy there was in this
unquestioning surrender. Verily had I realized how, in
thoroughness of self-destruction, man can find supreme bliss.
For aught I know, this frenzy of mine might have come to a
gradual, natural end. But Sandip Babu would not have it so, he
would insist on revealing himself. The tone of his voice became
as intimate as a touch, every look flung itself on its knees in
beggary. And, through it all, there burned a passion which in
its violence made as though it would tear me up by the roots, and
drag me along by the hair.
I will not shirk the truth. This cataclysmal desire drew me by
day and by night. It seemed desperately alluring--this making
havoc of myself. What a shame it seemed, how terrible, and yet
how sweet! Then there was my overpowering curiosity, to which
there seemed no limit. He of whom I knew but little, who never
could assuredly be mine, whose youth flared so vigorously in a
hundred points of flame--oh, the mystery of his seething
passions, so immense, so tumultuous!
I began with a feeling of worship, but that soon passed away. I
ceased even to respect Sandip; on the contrary, I began to look
down upon him. Nevertheless this flesh-and-blood lute of mine,
fashioned with my feeling and fancy, found in him a master-
player. What though I shrank from his touch, and even came to
loathe the lute itself; its music was conjured up all the same.
I must confess there was something in me which ... what shall I
say? ... which makes me wish I could have died!
Chandranath Babu, when he finds leisure, comes to me. He has the
power to lift my mind up to an eminence from where I can see in a
moment the boundary of my life extended on all sides and so
realize that the lines, which I took from my bounds, were merely
imaginary.
But what is the use of it all? Do I really desire emancipation?
Let suffering come to our house; let the best in me shrivel up
and become black; but let this infatuation not leave me--such
seems to be my prayer.
When, before my marriage, I used to see a brother-in-law of mine,
now dead, mad with drink--beating his wife in his frenzy, and
then sobbing and howling in maudlin repentance, vowing never to
touch liquor again, and yet, the very same evening, sitting down
to drink and drink--it would fill me with disgust. But my
intoxication today is still more fearful. The stuff has not to
be procured or poured out: it springs within my veins, and I know
not how to resist it.
Must this continue to the end of my days? Now and again I start
and look upon myself, and think my life to be a nightmare which
will vanish all of a sudden with all its untruth. It has become
so frightfully incongruous. It has no connection with its past.
What it is, how it could have come to this pass, I cannot
understand.
One day my sister-in-law remarked with a cutting laugh: "What a
wonderfully hospitable Chota Rani we have! Her guest absolutely
will not budge. In our time there used to be guests, too; but
they had not such lavish looking after--we were so absurdly taken
up with our husbands. Poor brother Nikhil is paying the penalty
of being born too modern. He should have come as a guest if he
wanted to stay on. Now it looks as if it were time for him to
quit ... O you little demon, do your glances never fall, by
chance, on his agonized face?"
This sarcasm did not touch me; for I knew that these women had it
not in them to understand the nature of the cause of my devotion.
I was then wrapped in the protecting armour of the exaltation of
sacrifice, through which such shafts were powerless to reach and
shame me.