Krishna Kanta's Will (Chatterjee, Knight)/Part 2/Chapter 14
CHAPTER XIV.
seventh year.
Truly the end of Bhramar's life approached. For many days her mortal illness had been kept in check by treatment, but now it no longer yielded to remedies. She was wasting away day by day.
In the month Agrahâyan Bhramar took to her bed, and never again left it. Mâdhabi Nâth came and stayed with her, vainly trying remedies. Jâmini came to the Haridrâ house to give the last cares to her sister.
The disease would not yield to remedies. Thus the month of Pous passed. In Mâgh Bhramar gave up taking physic. She said to Jâmini, "You need not give me any more physic, sister. With next month's full moon I shall die. See, sister, that on that night you do not leave me. If you see that I am likely to outlive the night of the full moon don't forget to ensure my death by an inward pinch; be sure you let me die that night."
Jâmini wept, but Bhramar would take no more physic. As she did not she had no relief from her disease, but she became daily more cheerful. After so long Bhramar had begun to be pleasant again. It was her first smile after six years. Like the brightening of a lamp before it expires. As the days went by, the nearer death approached, the more calm, cheerful, and smiling was Bhramar. At length the terrible last day arrived. Bhramar saw from the restlessness of the family, and from Jâmini's tears, that it had come. The pain she suffered told the same tale. She said to Jâmini, "This is my last day." Receiving no reply, she went on, "Sister, on this, my last day, I have a request to make, be sure you carry it out." Jâmini kept weeping in silence. Bhramar repeated, "I have one request, do not weep to-day. Wait till I am gone, weep then, I shall not return to forbid you; but to-day I wish to say to you, unhindered, before I die the few words that I can speak."
Jâmini dried her eyes and sat near, but could not speak for the sobs that checked her utterance.
"Another request is that except you no one shall come here just now. In time I will see every one, but let no one come now. I shall not have another chance of speaking to you."
How much longer could Jâmini restrain her tears? Gradually the night came. Bhramar asked, "Is it a moonlight night, sister?"
Jâmini, opening the venetians, replied, "Divinely bright. The full moon has arisen in all its glory."
"Then open all the shutters. Let me die gazing at the moonlight. Are there any flowers blooming in the garden below the window?"
Standing at that window in the dawn Bhramar and Gobind Lâl had talked together. She had not been at that window now for seven years. She had not opened it all this time. Jâmini opened it with difficulty, and said, "There is no flower garden here, only weeds and one or two dying shrubs. No flowers or leaves."
"There was a garden there seven years ago. It has gone to ruin. I have not seen it all these years."
Bhramar remained long silent, then she said, "Let flowers be brought for me, sister, from wherever you can get them. Don't you see this is my phulsajjâ?"[1]
At Jâmini's bidding the servants brought heaps of flowers. Bhramar said, "Scatter them over my bed. To-day is my phulsajjâ."
Jâmini obeyed. Then tears streamed from Bhramar's eyes, and her sister asked her why she wept.
"Sister," she replied, "One great sorrow remains. On the day that he left me, and started for Benares, that day I entreated the gods, with tears, to grant me one more meeting with him. I was bold enough to say, 'If I am faithful, I shall meet him again.' But ‘I have not seen him. Oh, if I could but have seen him on this my last day! In one day, sister, I should have forgotten seven years of suffering."
"Will you see him?"
"Of whom do you speak?" asked Bhramar, startled.
"Of Gobind Lâl," said Jâmini calmly. "He is here. Father sent him news of your illness, and he has come to see you once again. He arrived to-day, but in your state I feared to tell you. He also has not the courage to come in."
Bhramar, weeping, said, “Oh, sister, let me see him but once, only once more in this life. Let me see him once again."
Jâmini went out. Presently, with noiseless footsteps, Gobind Lâl, after seven years, entered his own sleeping chamber.
The two wept, but neither spoke. Bhramar signed to her husband to sit on the bed. Gobind Lâl, weeping bitterly, obeyed. Bhramar bid him come closer to her. He did so. Then Bhramar stretched forth her hand and touching his feet, took thence a grain of dust[2] and placed it on her head saying, "Pardon all my faults and bless me, that I may be happy in another life."
Gobind Lâl could not speak, but he took Bhramar's hand in his. So they remained long, hand-in-hand. Bhramar silently passed away.