CHAPTER VIII
the strange ways of sin.
ike the Mahomedan girls, Shaibalini had also been peeping through the slightly opened door of her room. All the three were women and so all of them were affected with the feeling of curiosity which is common to their class. Again, all the three were sick with fear, and it is the characteristic of fear that it excites in one, the desire of repeatedly seeing the object of fear. Shaibalini, therefore, had seen every thing from start to finish. When all left, Shaibalini found that she was alone in that house, and began to reflect. She thought within herself, "What should I do now; I am alone, but what need I fear in that? I have nothing on earth to be afraid of. There is nothing more horrible than death itself, and what can there be to frighten a soul that always seeks death? But then, why that death does not come upon me? It is very easy to commit suicide—is it actually so? Stay! Let me consider. I had been on the river for
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