She passed, smiling softly, though a vague trouble seemed to clutch at her heart. She had found him asleep so often of late, and if the driver slept, the oxen might well pause in their task of drawing water, and so the fields which needed it so much be deprived for yet another day of their life-giving draught. They were not, however, pausing now, at any rate. Their slow circling brought her sleeping husband to Sarsuti's eyes, and carried him away again, wheeling round by the well from whose depths a stream of water splashed drowsily into a wooden trough and then hurried away--a little ribbed ribbon of light--out of the shade of the great banyan tree into the sun-saturated soil beyond where the young millet was sprouting.

How cool it was, after her hot walk from the village! No wonder he slept! She sat herself down beside the runnel of water where a jasmine bush threw wild whips of leaf and blossom over the damp earth. There was no need to wake him yet. The bullocks would not pause now that she was there to make them do their work.

That was her task in life!--to make them do their work.

She sighed, and yet she smiled again, as the slow-circling oxen brought her husband Prema almost to her feet once more. How handsome he was, his bare head lying on the turban he had pressed into the service of a pillow. And his slender limbs! How ingeniously he had curved them on the forked seat so as to gain a comfortable resting-place! Trust Prema to make himself and everyone else in the world comfortable! A sudden leap of her heart sent the blood to dye her dark face still darker, as she thought of the softness, the warmth, the colour he had brought into her life.

How long had they been married? Ten years--a whole ten years, and there was never a child yet. It was getting time. No! No! Not yet--not yet! She need not look that in the face yet.

She rose suddenly as the wheeling oxen brought him to her once more, and staying them with one swift word, bent over the sleeping man.

"Prem!" she said. "Prema! I am here." His arms were round her in an instant, his lips on hers; for here, out in the shadow amongst the sunshine, they were alone.

"Sarsuti! Wife!" he murmured drowsily, then with a laugh, shook his long length and stood beside her, his arm still about her waist. Tall as he was, she was almost as tall, a straight, upstanding Jatni woman with eyebrows like a broad bar across her face.

But, as her dark eyes met his in passionate adoration, something in the sight of his exceeding beauty smote her to the heart. The thought that there was none to inherit it, the knowledge that if it passed it would leave nothing behind it. It is a thought which has driven many an Indian woman to take another woman by the hand and lead her home to be a hand-maiden to the lord. It drove Sarsuti--after long weeks, nay, months of thought--almost to speech.

"Prem!" she faltered, hiding her face on his breast,

"I have been thinking--thou needst a son--and----" But she could get no further, partly because the words seemed to choke her, partly because Prema, turning her face to his with his soft, supple hand, stopped her mouth with kisses.

What was the use? What was the use, she asked herself fiercely, thinking of such things when she loved him so? Some morning, aye! some summer morning after a summer's night, she would rather make the Dream-compeller send her to sleep, once and for all!--to sleep and dreams of Prema and his love! Then he could marry again, and there would be children to light up the old house, a son to light the funeral pyre.

But now--no! Not yet!...

The sunshine filtering through the broad leaves dappled them with light and shade; the oxen resting stood head down, nosing at the damp earth; the water, ceasing to splash, ran silently more and more slowly on its way, and all around them a yellow glare of heat hemmed them in breathlessly. Yet here, at the well, the jasmine grew green, a big datura lily, rejoicing in the shade, threw out its wide white blossoms, and, looking down to the mirror-like pool of water into which the long, unending circle of deftly-arranged earthen pots and ropes dipped, you could see the tufts of maidenhair fern which came God knows whence. They were like love in the heart--Heaven--sent!

"Thou wilt call at the Lala-jee's this evening, Sarsuti," said Prema, with a faint note of half-shamed uneasiness in his voice, as, his midday meal of milk and hearth-cakes over, she prepared to go back. "He deals more justly with thee than with me--may he be accursed, and may the footsteps of a dog ..."

"S'st! Prema," she interrupted, "the Lala-jee is no worse than his kind; and we have asked so much--lately."

Yes! she thought as she trudged homewards, they had asked much, for Prema had a lavish hand. Yet she would, of course, have him keep up his position as head man of the village; the position that had been hers by right as the only child of her father. Prema, her cousin, had gained it through his marriage to her, by special favour of the Sirkar, in memory of good service done in the Mutiny time by the old man. He had been a better husbandman than Prema, and money had gone fast these few years since he died, though she had tried to keep things as they had been. Still, who could grudge Prema the handsomest yoke of oxen in the country-side, the fleetest mare? And those mad experiments of his with new ploughs, new seeds that the Huzoors spoke about! It was well to keep to the soft side of the masters, no doubt, yet it should be done discreetly--and when was Prema ever discreet? She almost laughed, even while she stooped to let the water from an overflooded plot run into the next by removing the clod which her husband had forgotten, thinking of his indiscreetness--of the gifts he showered on her when he had money in his pocket to pay for them; sometimes when he had not. Of course, the Lala-jee would listen to reason and lend more on the coming crop--who could deny Prem anything?

But the Lala was curiously obdurate. He was an old man, who had backed the luck of the village for three generations, and never had a dispute with his creditors.

"See you, daughter," he said. "Prem for all he is head man and thy husband, is but man, and there is none to come after him."

Her face darkened with a hot blush again.

"The land will be there," she replied, haughtily.

"Aye, but who will own it! Strangers, they say, from far away. I have no dealings with strangers."

"There will be my share," she protested.

"Aye! but how wilt thou fare with strangers also, thou--childless widow?" he asked.

Her hot anger flamed up. "Wait thou and see! Meanwhile, since thou art afraid, take this," she tore off the solid gold bangle she wore, "'tis worth fifty rupees at the veriest pawnshop--give me forty!"

"Nay," replied the bunnya, with spirit. "'Tis worth a good seventy-five, though thy man--I'll warrant me--paid a hundred. So seventy-five thou shalt have; but, look you, daughter--or, if thou willest it, mother--keep Prem in leash, or a surety the footsteps of a dog will show on his ashes."

She looked at him, startled. Curious how the phrase, born of a belief that one can read the reward of the dead from the marks which show on his funeral pyre, should crop up. First from Prem, regarding the Lala-jee, next from the Lala-jee concerning Prem. Was there any truth in it, she wondered? She had the money, that was one comfort, and Prema would be pleased. Then, when the Biluch mare foaled, and they sold it as a yearling for the three hundred rupees Prem thought it would fetch, she would tell him how she had pawned his gift; meanwhile, a brass bracelet, to be had at the shop for a rupee, would serve to deceive his eyes. But not the sharp ones of Veru, the young widow who was the only other inhabitant of the wide courtyard with its slips of arcaded rooms round about it, and great stacks of millet stalks, and huge bee-hive stores of grain.

Her eyes were on it from the moment Sarsuti, sitting down above her on the little raised mud dais, began to spin.

"Thou needst not stare so, girl," broke in Sarsuti, at last. "Yes! I have pawned it. He needed money, and he is more to me than aught else beside--more than thou, husbandless, can dream, child."

Veru--she was indeed but little more than a child, this virgin widow of Sarsuti's half-brother, who had been born and died in his father's old age--held her head lower over her wheel, and said nothing. Her widow's shroud seemed to swallow her up. Yet in that Jat household she was kindly enough treated, for Sarsuti's strong arms loved work, and she had a great pity in her great soft heart for all unloved things. Here was no question of shaven head or daily fasting. Veru simply led a cloistered life, and did what share her strength allowed of the daily work. Of late that had not been much; she had complained of fatigue, and had sat all day spinning feverishly as if to make up for her failure in other ways; for she was a sensitive little thing, ready to cry at a word of blame.

So the evening passed by. Prema was not to be back from the well till late, not, indeed, until the moon set; for the young millet had been neglected somewhat, and even he was roused to the necessity for action. Water it must have, or there would be no crop. Thus, as the sun set, Sarsuti cooked the supper, reserving the best dough cakes, the choicest morsels of the pickled carrots against her husband's return, and then, being weary, lay down so as to freshen herself up to receive him as he should be received. The night was hot, there was a restlessness in it which found its way into her mind, and she lay awake for some time thinking of what the Lala-jee had said. Yes! It was time, it was growing time for so many things. Yes! she must harden her heart and be wise--the footsteps of the ...

Here she fell asleep.

When she woke, there was pitch darkness. The moon had set. What had happened? Had Prema returned, and, full of kindliness as ever, seen she was tired and so refrained from waking her? She put out her hand and touched his bed, but he was not there. How late he was! And where was Veru? Veru, who should have been watching for him.

"Veru! lazy child--art asleep?"

Her question came back to her unanswered; Veru, also, was not in the wide courtyard. Where were they?

The very conjunction of her thought regarding them, woke in her a sudden swift pang of jealousy.

Where were they?

A minute later, holding an oil cresset in her hand as a guard against snakes, she was passing swiftly through the deserted village on her way to the well. Prema might have fallen asleep--he might be asleep still. The night was so dark, she held the lamp high above her head so as to throw its light before her on the narrow edge of a pathway between the flooded fields. It was so still, she could hear the faint sob made by some deadly thing slipping from her coming into the water, over which a wandering firefly would flash, revealing an inky glimmer between the rising shoots of corn. Ahead, that massed shadow was the banyan tree. The fireflies were thick there, thick as cressets at a bridal feast ...

If Prema slept--Yes! if he slept, to be awakened by a kiss.

Underneath the arching branches of the banyan tree it was dark indeed, but the silence of it told her that the oxen anyhow were at rest.

And Prema!

As she held the light forward, something on the ground at her feet caught her eye--jasmine! Jasmine twined into a wreath. For whose head? Not hers!

"Prema!" she called. "Prem!"

There was no answer. But he was there for all that; half resting on the forked seat, as if he had flung himself upon it when weary; weary and content; his head thrown back upon his arm, his whole body lax with sleep--and with content.

She had seen him look thus so often! "Prem!" she whispered. "Prem!" and touched him on the bosom.

Then a hideous shriek of terror and horror startled the sleeping oxen into forward movement, as from the folds of his clothes, like some evil thought, there slipped a snake, swift, curved, disappearing into the darkness.

"Prem! Prem! Speak to me! Oh, Prem--speak!"

As she flung herself upon him, the forward movement of the oxen forced her to her knees, so heeding it not at all, one hand holding the light close to his face as she strove vainly to rouse him, she was dragged along the accustomed round, until the beasts, recognising the unaccustomed strain, paused once more.

"Prem! Say thou art not dead--say only that, Prem!" she moaned.

Her voice seemed to reach him on the far edge of the great Blank, for his eyelids quivered. Then, for one moment, he looked at her, and there was appeal in his eyes.

"Wife--Veru--my----" It was scarcely a whisper, but she heard it, and with a cry of joy, she caught him in her strong arms, laid him on the ground, and, tearing his cloth aside, sought for the wound. Finding it, her lips were on it in a second. Ah! could kisses draw the poison, surely her frantic love must avail.

But no. His eyelids closed. There was no sound, only a little quiver that she felt through her lips. Then his beauty lay still beneath them.

After a time she drew herself away from him, and laid his head upon her lap. So she sat, dazed, thinking of that jasmine wreath in the dust, and of that half-heard whisper--

"Wife--Veru--my----" My--what?

* * * * *

"And there is none to come after him," said the village worthies, when the fire of Prema's burning had died down to smouldering embers, and the oldest man of his clan in the village had performed the rites which should have been the duty of a son.

And then they shook their heads wisely, thinking that men of Prem Singh's kind ran an ill risk in the next world without a son to perform the funeral obsequies; especially, nowadays, when the law prevented a dutiful wife from ensuring her husband's safety and salvation by burning herself on his funeral pyre. Yea! it was an ill world indeed in which the fostered virtue of a woman you had cared for and cossetted might not avail to save the man she loved from the pains of purgatory. And then they drifted away, full of surmise and deep desire concerning the headship of the village. Mai Sarsuti could not hold it as a widow, though she could hold the land; and there were no relations--none. So the coast was clear for many claims.

Sarsuti meanwhile had not clamoured--as many an Indian widow does even nowadays--to be allowed to sacrifice herself for her husband's salvation. She had scarcely wept. She had, on the contrary, spoken sternly to Veru, bidding her keep her foolish tears until all things had been done in due order to keep away the evil spirits and ensure peace to the departed.

Then, after all the ceremonies were completed, and Prem's beauty lay swathed awaiting sunset for its burning, she had sat on one side of his low bier, while Veru sat on the other, and the wail had risen piercingly--

"Naked he came, naked he has gone; this empty dwelling-house belongs neither to you nor to me."

There had been a menace in her voice, high-pitched, clear, almost impassive, while Veru's had been broken by sobs.

So now that frail weakling was asleep, wearied out by her woe, while Sarsuti sat where the bier had been, still in all the glory of her wifely raiment, still with the vermilion stain upon her forehead, still wearing round her neck the blessed marriage cord with which he had so often toyed. For she had point-blank refused to allow it to be broken. Time enough for the widow's shroud, she had said. To-day she was still Prem's wife--he had scarce had time to die.

So she sat quite still, looking at the place where he had lain, thinking of those last words. Had she really heard them? Was it possible, the thing that had leapt to her mind?

Deep down in her heart she knew vaguely that the feet of her idol had been of clay; that with Prem all things were possible. Poor, wandering feet, which might yet have kept to the straight path, if--Oh, Prem! Prem! Had it been her fault? Or was she wronging him?

Then, suddenly, that recurring phrase recurred to her once more.

"The footstep of a dog--the footstep of a dog."

Was it past midnight? Had another day begun--the day of judgment? Surely; then she could see--yea! She could prove it was not true.

The moon was just sinking as, close-wrapped in her veil, she crept down to the edge of the nullah, where the burning-ground lay; a gruesome place, haunted by the spirits of the departed, not to be ventured near after dark. But Sarsuti had forgotten all the village lore, she had forgotten everything save that deadly doubt.

Yonder, it must be on the point close to the water, for still an almost mist-like vapour lingered there. She sped past the faintly lighted patches on the hard-baked soil which told of other burnings, murmuring a prayer for the peace of dead souls, and so found herself beside that little pile of dear ashes. A breeze from the coming dawn stirred them, sending a grey flake or two to meet her.

"Prem!" she whispered; then, as she stooped to look, the whisper passed to a cry--

"Oh! Prema! Prema!"

She lay there face down, her hands grovelling in the still warm embers on which there showed unmistakably the footstep of a dog!

And the moon sank, so there was darkness for a while. Then in the far east the horizon lightened, bringing a grey mystery to the wide expanse of the level world. And behind the greyness came a primrose dawn, and the sun, rising serene and bright, sent a shaft of light to touch her as she lay.

Then she rose, and dusting the dear ashes from her almost blistered hands, she crept back to the wide courtyard, where Veru still slept, worn out by sorrow. She stood watching her asleep, wondering at her own blindness. Then she touched her on the bosom.

"Wake!" she cried, in a loud voice. "Wake! Oh, Veru! And speak the truth!"

The girl started up, and the eyes of the two women met.

* * * * *

The village was bitterly disappointed; but, of course, there was nothing to be done but wait and see if the child was a son, for Mai Sarsuti had stolen a march on them. She had gone straight to the burra-sahib, straight to the head district official, and told him of her hopes. What is more, she had petitioned for trustees to work the land, seeing that she and her sister-in-law were poor widows; and she, especially, unfit for work.

So three of the village elders had been convened to see to the land and render account to the sahib, who would be sure to keep an eye on them seeing that Mai Sarsuti was an upstanding, straightforward Jatni, just the kind to whom the sahib-logue gave consideration. And, after all, she and hers deserved it, for they came of a long line of virtuous, loyal people.

So Sarsuti, with Vera, lived in the seclusion which befitted her recent loss; though, according to custom, she still wore a wife's dress. But she grew haggard as the months went by. Small wonder, said the village matrons, when they returned from their occasional visits, seeing that she awaited a fatherless child.

Then one morning, Veru, looking very worn and frightened, and ill, came to tell the elders that a son had been born to Sarsuti. Perhaps it was as well, they thought, since otherwise there might be disputes about the headship. Now there could be none; and as there would be a very long minority under the care of the sahibs, Prem's son would come in to free land, and money laid up in the bank. A rich headman was always a prop to the village. So their wives went to congratulate the new-made mother.

She was looking haggard still, and scarcely seemed to rejoice in her great gift; but that, perhaps, might come by and bye.

But it did not. Sometimes she would take the baby and look at it long and earnestly. Then she would give it back to Veru, whose arms were seldom empty of Prem's child, and return to the work of the house, or sit watching them gravely from her spinning-wheel, her large dark eyes full of wistful pain.

So the months sped by.

And still Sarsuti wore a wife's dress and smeared vermilion on her forehead; and the mangala sutram, still unbroken, held the wife's medal round her throat. It would be time, she answered proudly to the shocked village women, to think of breaking it when Prem should have been dead a year, and the child be able to suck cow's milk.

She prepared for the anniversary by purchasing a Maw's feeding bottle, and an eagerness grew to her face as she watched little Prem take it, and roll over contentedly to sleep, like the fat good-natured little lump of a healthy child as he was. But Veru wept.

Still, Maw had supplanted Motherhood when the night came round again on which Sarsuti had heard that faint whisper from her dying husband. The child slept as a child should, and Veru, once more worn out by tears, slept also.

But, as on that night a year ago, Sarsuti sat on the place where Prem's bier had lain and thought, her dark eyes full of a great resolve. Suddenly she rose, tall, straight, upstanding, and passed to where the child lay. She stooped and kissed it--kissed it for the first time--then, throwing her arms skywards, murmured to High Heaven, "Lo! I have saved him--I, his wife"; and so, catching up a small bundle which she had prepared, passed into the darkness of the night.

* * * * *

They found her charred body at dawn, face downwards, where the footsteps of a dog had shown upon Prem's ashes.

She had saturated her clothes with paraffin, and set fire to herself deliberately.

"Lo! how she loved him," said the village elders, behind their outward and decorous disapproval. "See you, she is decked as a bride with all her jewels. Now, with a son in his house, and suttee on his pyre, there is no fear but what Prem hath found freedom."

"Ay!" assented the Lala-jee. "The footstep of a dog will not be seen on his ashes."