"The wonder is that it has not happened before. It was not an accident. He threw himself into the well at night when we were all asleep. It was the best way out of the difficulty that he himself had created by turning Christian. It will prevent further trouble and vexation, even though it saddles the family with a widow." "Have the funeral rites been performed?" "How can an outcaste receive the funeral rites of an orthodox Hindu?" the other asked contemptuously. "He has been burned, then, without them?" said Bopaul, regarding the man with increasing displeasure. He did not like the tone adopted. "It is strange we have heard nothing of the affair." "There has been no burning and no burial for the excellent reason that we have not yet recovered the body from the well." "It has been seen, of course?" "His cap has been found." "Have you only his cap as evidence?" "Isn't that sufficient? The master considers it ample, and he and his wife are already beginning to make preparations for the ceremony of breaking the bangles and shaving the widow's head." "Is that so? Surely it is full early for the widow rites when the body of her husband is still missing?" "If he were a respectable Hindu, religious and obedient to the law of caste, it might be a trifle early; but in this case the man has been dead to the family ever since his return from England. It was a cursed day on which his father consented to his crossing the black water. Alive or dead the sooner his position is recognised, and his wife treated accordingly, the better pleased shall we all be." "I don't believe Ananda is dead," remarked Bopaul, after a few seconds' consideration. "He is not the man to commit suicide. It is far more likely that he has gone away in the night and has made his escape from those who waited for him with no kindly intentions." "Run away or dead, it is all the same," persisted the other. "And as for his wife she would have become as truculent as himself. Did you hear how she tried to escape with him? We discovered her absence on the night the child died and followed her. They were brought back together; and as a reward for his pains Ananda was beaten by order of his uncle." "Beaten! Surely his father did not give his consent to such an extreme course?" "The big master was not asked and he knew nothing about it. He became sick after the child's funeral, and he has gone to one of his silk-farms ten miles away. He knows nothing and he cares nothing. His spirit is broken by the wickedness of his son, who deserves all that we gave him." "Possibly Ananda has joined his father," suggested Bopaul, who refused absolutely to believe in the theory of suicide. "Not he! The stick fell too long and too heavily--for we all took turns--to leave him with strength or spirit to run away again. After we had finished with him he could not stand."