The momentary and fleeting suggestions of remorse were very slight, however, even with Ahalya. Neila, who knew all, watched her mistress in perpetual wonder; for she had changed utterly. She was a gazelle transformed to a tigress; and the handmaid, who worshipped her with the worship of a slave for a queen, now feared her while she loved her, and because she loved her, also feared. Neila, never told anything in words, had known all from the first, and from that first had acted as go-between. In spite of the cynicism of Fidá, who, after the Mohammedan fashion, trusted no woman, she had proved faithful to both of them, and had held the interests of both at heart. For, if Ahalya were her princess, Fidá was a captive prince, a man rarely beautiful in form, and, moreover, the very first that, to her knowledge, had ever succeeded in doing what he had done. He had risen to great heights in her eyes; and if Ahalya sometimes called her lover by the name of her wooden god, Neila carried the matter farther yet, and half believed that Fidá was really more than human. In this different-wise ten weeks passed, and it came to be the third Ashtaka[4] of Magghar Poh (December). This sacrifice and festival, begun at noon, was wont to continue till midnight; and the Rajah, jealous of Brahman prerogatives, never failed to take a chief place in such rites. Fidá, an outcast according to Hindoo codes, was, during this holy ceremony, not allowed on sacred ground; and he therefore gave himself up to the propitious time, and spent eight of the twelve hours at Ahalya’s side. It wanted ten minutes to two when he left her, by the now usual means of the low window in her room. Wrapping himself closely in the long, white cloak of thin woollen stuff that made part of his winter clothing, he started across the little, dark courtyard. [4] On every eighth day through December and January there is a special Brahman sacrifice called the “Ashtaka.” (See Grihya-Sutras, Vol. I, p. 203, M. Müller edit.)