_Nandini_
What will you do with us?
_Voice_
Nothing, I only want to know you.
_Nandini_
When you talk of knowing, it frightens me.
_Voice_
Why?
_Nandini_
I feel that you have no patience with things that cannot be known,
but can only be felt.
_Voice_
I dare not trust such things lest they should play me false. Now
go away, don’t waste my time.--No, no, wait a little. Give me that
tassel of red oleanders which hangs from your hair.
_Nandini_
What will you do with it?
_Voice_
When I look at those flowers it seems to me as if the red light of my
evil star has appeared in their shape. At times I want to snatch them
from you and tear them to pieces. Again I think that if Nandini were
ever to place that spray of flowers on my head, with her own hands,
then----
_Nandini_
Then what?
_Voice_
Then perhaps I might die in peace.
_Nandini_
Some one loves red oleanders and calls me by that name. It is in
remembrance of him that I wear these flowers.
_Voice_
Then, I tell you, they’re going to be _his_ evil star as well as
_mine_.
_Nandini_
Don’t say such things, for shame! I am going.
_Voice_
Where?
_Nandini_