“Company in name, you say! Then are you chaste?”
"In my mind, I surrendered myself completely to Protap, hence I cannot be called chaste. I am a vile sinner.”
“Otherwise?”
“Otherwise I am perfectly chaste.”
“How with regard to Foster?”
“I am chaste, body and soul.”
Chandrashekhar threw sharp, quick glances along with the passes and said, “Mind you, speak the truth.”
The slumbering girl caught a sudden contraction of the brow and said, “I have told you the truth and the truth alone.”
Chandrashekhar again heaved a sigh and said,
“Then what led you a Brahmin girl to lose your caste?”
“You are versed in all the Shastras, I will ask you to say if I have lost my caste. I didn't partake of the Englishman’s food, I didn’t drink water touched by him, every day I used to cook my own food and a Hindu serving—woman used to help me. I lived in the same boat no doubt, but that was on the Ganges.” [1]
Chandrashekhar bowed down his head. He reflected for a while and then exclaimed, “Alas! alas! what a grievous wrong have I done, I well—nigh killed a woman!" A little while after he again began:
“Why didn’t you disclose all these things?”
“Who would care to put faith on my words?”
“Does any one know about them?”
“Yes, Foster and Parvati.”
“Where is Parvati?”
- ↑ The Ganges is considered by the Hindus to be sacred, and many light transgressions are purged away if committed on its waters
