Krishnakanta's Will (Chatterjee, Roy)/Part 1/Chapter 16
CHAPTER XVI.
Without losing a moment Gobindalal plunged in, swam, dived down and brought her up to the surface. He then bore her out of the water and placed her on the landing. Outwardly she showed no signs of life, for she was quite unconscious, and there was a full suspension of her breath.
With the assistance of the man, however, who had the care of the garden Gobindalal removed her to a room in the garden-house and laid her on a couch. Her eyes were closed, the wet seeming to impart a much darker hue to the hairy arches above. Her fair gentle brow which now showed no signs of shame or fear, bespoke yet, as it seemed, some sorrow in her heart. This evening as she lay stretched on the couch before him, the light shining fitfully upon her, she looked so bewitching fascinating in Gobindalal's eye that he loved her. The beautiful and delicate cast of her face, the round supple limbs soaked in water, the long dishevelled hair hanging down in clusters at the bed's head, from which water was dripping—these made a deep impression on Gobindalal's mind. He felt such pity for her that he could hardly keep the tears out of his eyes. "O God," said he, "why didst Thou give her beauty if Thou wouldst make her unhappy!" His heart wrung to think that he was the unfortunate cause of this sad catastrophe.
"If there be life in her I will save her," said Gobindalal. He knew what to do in such cases as this. He raised her now to a sitting, now to a standing, posture; turned her this way and that and on every side, and continued this operation until she had thrown up nearly the whole of the quantity of water she had swallowed. This, however, did not induce respiration. But though this seemed a very difficult thing to accomplish Gobindalal was acquainted with the process, and he at once proceeded to try it. He told the gardener, who was a Uriah, to blow into her mouth while he slowly moved her arms up and down. The fellow was afraid. A cold sweat seemed to break upon him. If his master had told him to go before a tiger he might not have refused to do his bidding; but now he totally refused to obey him. It was, as it seemed to him, a preposterous order—a thing contrary to nature or reason, and he said, "I can't do it, master, I am sure I can't."
"Then you move her arms up and down, and I will do the blowing," said Gobindalal. And he showed him how the arms should be raised slowly and brought slowly down again while he blowed into her mouth. Gobindalal put his mouth to hers to blow. A thrill ran through his frame. But he was awake to nothing—nothing but his sacred duty—the duty to try his utmost to save her life. The operation of moving her arms up and down, and blowing continued for nearly two hours, at the end of which Rohini breathed. She belonged to the world again.