"Father, Father! Mother is dying!" The terror in my tone aroused
him instantly. I sobbed out the fatal tidings.

"Never mind that hallucination of yours." Father gave his characteristic
negation to a new situation. "Your mother is in excellent health.
If we get any bad news, we shall leave tomorrow."

"You shall never forgive yourself for not starting now!" Anguish
caused me to add bitterly, "Nor shall I ever forgive you!"

The melancholy morning came with explicit words: "Mother dangerously
ill; marriage postponed; come at once."

Father and I left distractedly. One of my uncles met us en route
at a transfer point. A train thundered toward us, looming with
telescopic increase. From my inner tumult, an abrupt determination
arose to hurl myself on the railroad tracks. Already bereft, I
felt, of my mother, I could not endure a world suddenly barren to
the bone. I loved Mother as my dearest friend on earth. Her solacing
black eyes had been my surest refuge in the trifling tragedies of
childhood.

"Does she yet live?" I stopped for one last question to my uncle.

"Of course she is alive!" He was not slow to interpret the desperation
in my face. But I scarcely believed him.

When we reached our Calcutta home, it was only to confront the
stunning mystery of death. I collapsed into an almost lifeless