"
Understanding why Banarnali wanted to go (From fear of ghosts, the
burning-ground being considered haunted.), Bidhu said: "I daresay!
Meanwhile, I suppose I am to sit here alone!"
Conversation ceased again. Five minutes seemed like an hour. In their
minds they cursed the two, who had gone to fetch the wood, and they
began to suspect that they sat gossiping in some pleasant nook. There
was no sound anywhere, except the incessant noise of frogs and crickets
from the tank. Then suddenly they fancied that the bed
shook slightly, as if the dead body had turned on its side. Bidhu and
Banamali trembled, and began muttering: "Ram, Ram." A deep sigh was
heard in the room. In a moment the watchers leapt out of the hut, and
raced for the village.
After running aboat three miles, they met their colleagues coming back
with a lantern. As a matter of fact, they had gone to smoke, and knew
nothing about the wood. But they declared that a tree had been cut down,
and that, when it was split up, it would be brought along at once. Then
Bidhu and Banamali told them what had happened in the hut.
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