'Don't you forget, my dear,' she said mockingly, 'to tell that story of my pool of tears! Properly told in the circle of your friends or before his highness the prince and his satellites, it might even turn the scale of your fortune.'
I left her tent without saying another word, but the woman's coarse banter and shameless laughter continued to torment me like the bite of a scorpion.
Going back to my tent I drank a cup of tea and lit a cigar. As my brain cooled, I began to think, 'Who is this woman?' I could distinctly remember the facts of my life as far back as my fifth year, and yet, so far as I could see, there was nothing to suggest her. At the same time it was clear that she knew me well; she even knew about my aunt. She knew also that I was poor. What designs could she have on me? It was equally clear, however, that she wanted me away with all her heart. And yet why was she interested in my staying or going? She had said, 'Are profit and loss the only things in this world? Is there nothing like affection or love?' I could not help smiling at the thought of these words which she, whom I had never seen before, had uttered so glibly. But, most of all, her parting words of derision pricked and irritated me remorselessly and incessantly.
Towards evening the prince and his friends returned from their sport. I heard from an attendant that the bag consisted of eight doves. The prince sent for me but I feigned illness and lay in bed, whence, till late at night, I could hear Piari's songs and the drunken appreciation of the prince's party.
95
