566
Then Damayantí, of her own accord, said to her father, " Without doubt that man is my husband disguised as a cook. So let this amusing artifice be employed to bring him here. Let a messenger be sent to king Rituparna, and the moment he arrives let him say to that king, ' Nala has gone off somewhere or other, no tidings are heard of him; accordingly to-morrow morning Damayantí will again make her Svayamvara; so come quickly to Vidarbha this very day;' and the moment the king hears his speech, he will certainly come here in one day, together with that husband of mine who is skilled in chariot-driving." Having thus debated with her father, Damayantí sent off that very moment a messenger to the city of Kośalá with exactly this message. He went and told it, as it was given him to Rituparna, and the king thereupon, being excited, said affectionately to his attendant Nala, who was disguised as a cook: " Hrasvabáhu, you said— ' I possess skill in chariot-driving.' So take me this very day to Vidarbha if you have sufficient endurance." When Nala heard that, he said, " Good ! I will take you there," and thereupon he yoked swift horses, and made ready the splendid chariot. He said to himself; " Damayantí has spread this report of a Svayamvara in order to recover me, otherwise, I know, she would not have behaved in this way even in her dreams. So I will go there and see what happens." With such reflections he brought to Rituparna the chariot ready. And as soon as the king had mounted it, Nala proceeded to drive on that chariot with a speed exceeding even that of Garuda. Then Rituparna dropped his garment, and wished to stop the chariot in order to recover it, but Nala said to him,— " King, where is that garment of yours? Why the chariot has in this moment left it many yojanas behind." When Rituparna heard this, he said:— " Well, give me this skill in chariot-driving, and I will give you my skill in dice, so that the dice shall obey your command and you shall acquire skill in numbers. And now look; I will give you a proof of the truth of what I say. You see this tree in front of us; I will tell you the number of its leaves and fruits, and then do you count them for yourself and see." When he had said this, he told him the number of the leaves and fruits on that tree, and Nala counted them and found them exactly as many as he had said. Then Nala gave to Rituparna his skill in driving, and Rituparna gave to Nala his skill in dice and numbers.
And Nala tested that skill on another tree, and found the number of leaves and fruits to be exactly what he had guessed. And while he was rejoicing, a black man issued from his body, and he asked him who he was. Then he said, " I am Kali; when you were chosen by Damayantí, I entered your body out of jealousy, so you lost your fortune at play. And when Kárkotaka bit you in the forest, you were not consumed, but I was burnt, as you see, being in your body. For to whom is a treacherous injury done to
