It was already an hour and a half since the race began. All this
time the witch never rested, stopping only for a few seconds, to
disappear under the water.
"She is a fiend, she cannot be a woman!" exclaimed the colonel,
seeing the head of the witch immersed for the sixth time in the water.
"Hang me if I know!" grumbled Mr. Y---, nervously pulling his beard.
"The only thing I know is that a grain of her cursed rice entered
my throat, and I can't get it out!"
"Hush, hush! Please, do be quiet!" implored Sham Rao. "By talking
you will spoil the whole business!"
I glanced at Narayan and lost myself in conjectures. His features,
which usually were so calm and serene, were quite altered at this
moment, by a deep shadow of suffering. His lips trembled, and
the pupils of his eyes were dilated, as if by a dose of belladonna.
His eyes were lifted over the heads of the crowd, as if in his
disgust he tried not to see what was before him, and at the same
time could not see it, engaged in a deep reverie, which carried him
away from us, and from the whole performance.
"What is the matter with him?" was my thought, but I had no time
to ask him, because the witch was again in full swing, chasing
her own shadow.
But with the seventh goddess the programme was slightly changed.
The running of the old woman changed to leaping. Sometimes bending
down to the ground, like a black panther, she leaped up to some
worshipper, and halting before him touched his forehead with her
finger, while her long, thin body shook with inaudible laughter.
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