Amulya fumbled in the pocket of his tunic and pulled out, first a small edition of the __Gita__, which he placed on the table-- and then a little pistol, which he showed me, but said nothing further. Horror! It did not take him a moment to make up his mind to kill our good old cashier! [23] To look at his frank, open face one would not have thought him capable of hurting a fly, but how different were the words which came from his mouth. It was clear that the cashier's place in the world meant nothing real to him; it was a mere vacancy, lifeless, feelingless, with only stock phrases from the __Gita--Who kills the body kills naught! __ "Whatever do you mean, Amulya?" I exclaimed at length. "Don't you know that the dear old man has got a wife and children and that he is ..." "Where are we to find men who have no wives and children?" he interrupted. "Look here, Maharani, the thing we call pity is, at bottom, only pity for ourselves. We cannot bear to wound our own tender instincts, and so we do not strike at all--pity indeed! The height of cowardice!" To hear Sandip's phrases in the mouth of this mere boy staggered me. So delightfully, lovably immature was he--of that age when the good may still be believed in as good, of that age when one really lives and grows. The Mother in me awoke. For myself there was no longer good or bad--only death, beautiful alluring death. But to hear this stripling calmly talk of murdering an inoffensive old man as the right thing to do, made me shudder all over. The more clearly I saw that there was no sin in his heart, the more horrible appeared to me the sin of his words. I seemed to see the sin of the parents visited on the innocent child. The sight of his great big eyes shining with faith and enthusiasm touched me to the quick. He was going, in his fascination, straight to the jaws of the python, from which, once in, there was no return. How was he to be saved? Why does not my country become, for once, a real Mother--clasp him to her bosom and cry out: "Oh, my child, my child, what profits it that you should save me, if so it be that I should fail to save you?" I know, I know, that all Power on earth waxes great under compact with Satan. But the Mother is there, alone though she be, to contemn and stand against this devil's progress. The Mother cares not for mere success, however great--she wants to give life, to save life. My very soul, today, stretches out its hands in yearning to save this child. A while ago I suggested robbery to him. Whatever I may now say against it will be put down to a woman's weakness. They only love our weakness when it drags the world in its toils! "You need do nothing at all, Amulya, I will see to the money," I told him finally. When he had almost reached the door, I called him back.