Indira and Other Stories/The Two Rings/Chapter 4
IV
After the wedding, Dhana Das returned home with his wife and daughter. Four more years elapsed. Purandar was still absent. After all, what did it matter to Hiranmayi now, if he did return?
Hiranmayi felt vaguely depressed at the thought that the friend of her childhood had absented himself all these seven years. "How can I believe," she thought, "that he has stayed away for so many years simply because he cannot forget me? Who knows whether he is alive or dead? It is not permitted to me to wish for the sight of him, now that I am another's wife. But why should I not hope and pray that my childhood's companion is still alive?"
About this time, her old father began to wear an anxious and harassed countenance, and finally fell seriously ill of a disease which caused his death. His wife refused to survive him. Hiranmayi had no other relatives than her parents, and entreated her mother with tears to change her fatal resolution, but the merchant's widow was obdurate. And so Hiranmayi was left all alone in the world.
Before dying, Hiranmayi's mother had tried to reassure her daughter. "See, my child," she had said, "you have no cause for anxiety. After all, you are a married woman. When the appointed interval has elapsed, who knows but you may meet your husband. You are no longer a mere girl. Above all, you have the best helper in the world, plenty of money. Your father has made due arrangements for that."
Alas, on this point the good lady was mistaken. When enquiries were made after Dhana Das's death, it was found that all his hard-won savings had disappeared. His daughter's sole possessions turned out to be her jewels, the family house, and the furniture. It seemed that for years the old man had been incurring losses in business. He had told no one of his bad investments and had struggled silently to repair his losses. Finally he had given up all hope of ever recovering his former competence. It was anxiety and business worries that had caused his illness and death.
When the news of the unfortunate merchant's failure in business spread about, creditors came and pressed Hiranmayi to pay her father's debts. She made enquiries and learned that the claims thus set up were just, and, a true merchant's daughter, sold all she had to clear her father's fair fame and pay his debts.
Reduced finally to dire need, the poor girl hired a small thatched hut on the outskirts of the town and dwelt there in extreme obscurity and poverty. Her only hope now lay in her spiritual guide, the guru, Ananda Swami. Unfortunately, he was then absent in a far country, nor had Hiranmayi anyone whom she could send to communicate her misfortunes to her only surviving friend and guardian.