Copyright 1997
Revised 11/99


		       THE YOUTH WHO BECAME A MAIDEN

			 (From an Indian Folktale)

		       Retold by Christopher Leeson

	The vampire, whom King Trivikramasena had seized at his graveside,
sought to distract his brave captor by telling him still another story:

				     #

	Once upon a time in the city of Sivapura there was a king named
Yasahketu who placed the onerous burdens of government on the shoulders of
his councilor Prajnasagara and, with his queen, lived a wasteful life of
self-indulgence.  In the course of time, the king sired upon his consort a
daughter whom they named Sasiprabha, which means Moon-Lustre, for she
displayed the pale beauty of the moon.  In due time this girl grew to
womanhood.

	One day the princess came out into the palace garden to watch the
celebrations of the festival of spring.  As she was picking flowers she
unknowingly inclined herself to reveal one charming breast.  Shis was seen
by the son of a rich brahmin, Manahsvamin, who, like her, had come to
attend the spring festival.  The instant he set eyes on her, in spite of a
name which means "Mind's Master," the young man was bewitched with a
yearning passion and was no longer master of his own mind at all.

	"Is she the Goddess of Desire?  Or is she a sylph that has come
from the deep forest?" he asked himself.  While the youth stood wondering,
the princess turned his way, and deigned to look with interest and
pleasure.

	While the pair stood staring, there arose a loud clamor and they
raised their heads to see what was happening.  Bearing down on them,
uprooting the trees along the road, a berserk elephant came running.  The
companions of the princess fled in panic and the princess was left
abandoned in the path of the enraged beast.  Instantly Manahsvamin dashed
toward her, swept her into his arms, and carried her out of the elephant's
path.  Then the princess was again surrounded by her attendants, who,
praising the brahmin's courage, escorted her back to her own quarters, not
noticing that she kept stealing covert glances over her shoulder at her
bold rescuer.  At home the princess could not stop thinking of the youth
and every day thereafter she burned with the fires of love.

	Manahsvamin had followed the princess until she vanished into her
chambers.  And he thought: "I cannot hope to endure life without her.  My
only salvation may be my teacher, Master Muladeva, the skillful sorcerer."

	Somehow the young brahmin struggled through the day and a long,
sleepless night, and then in the morning went off to visit Master Muladeva.
Manahsvamin bowed to the master mage and told him his desire which, with a
smile, Muladeva promised to satisfy.  The magician took a magic bead, put
it into his own mouth, and changed himself into an noble-looking old
brahmin; then he pushed into Manahsvamin's mouth still another bead, which
changed him instantly into a beautiful girl.

	"What have you done?!" exclaimed the youth.

	"Be patient, my pupil," the sorcerer admonished, and then he
explained his plan in detail.  It sounded so cunningly wrought that
Manahsvamin decided that he had surely found the right helper.

	Thereupon the crafty Muladeva escorted the transformed Manahsvamin
to the marketplace to buy some clothes suitable for a highborn maid and her
father, and from hence conducted his pupil to the sire of the boy's
beloved, who was, of course, the idle king.  Securing an audience, the
disguised wizard made of his liege the following request:

	"Your Majesty, I have one son, and for him I have asked for this
girl in marriage and brought her from afar.  But when I arrived home I
found that my son had gone adventuring and thus the marriage cannot proceed
until I locate the boy.  While I am away, I beg you, Sire, keep this
blameless girl under your protection."

	Wary of offending a powerful brahmin who might place a curse upon
his house, King Yasahketu promised to do the favor and summoned his
daughter Moon-Lustre into the hall.  He said to her: "Daughter, keep this
girl with you in your chambers and treat her like your own sister!"

	So the princess promised to do this and conducted the transformed
Manahsvamin to her own chambers.  And while the false brahmin went his way,
Manahsvamin remained near his beloved in the shape of a girl.

	After a few days the princess came to trust in her companion's
friendship and affection.  The imposter then felt emboldened and one night
Manahsvamin whispered softly from the adjoining bed, questioning the
princess as to why she was not eating well and always lay at night tossing
and turning.

	"Why are you so unhappy, my dear?  Every day you grow paler, and
more colorless and thin, as though you were separated from your lover.
Tell me, what is the matter?  Is there any reason why you should not trust
your loving and innocent friend?  If you do not tell me what is wrong, I
shall refuse my meals also!"

	The princess sighed.  "Why should I not trust you?  I will tell you
all, my sister:

	One day I went out to watch the flower festival of spring and there
I saw a handsome youth.  He was as fine as snow or pearls or moonlight --
he was like a god.  But while my eyes feasted on his beauty there was a
sudden thunder like Doomsday and a monstrous wild elephant came down upon
us.  My attendants left me behind, but that young brahmin boy took me into
his arms and swept me out of the way.  When I touched his body I felt
. . . I don't know what.  Alas, before we could say a word, my companions
returned and took me from his embrace.  I was beside myself.  It was as
though I had been thrown from the bliss of paradise down to the sordid
earth!

	"Ever since, even when I am wide-awake, I imagine that the lord of
my dreams lies beside me.  I imagine that he has used some clever ruse to
win his way into my chamber.  At night when I lay awake I seem to hear him
urge me to love him.  But I know nothing about youth, neither his name nor
his family -- and I have no way of finding with him.  And so the agony of
separation burns my soul with fire."

	The boy in the body of a maiden now saw that his ends were
achieved.  He took the bead from his mouth and showed himself in his
natural form.

	"Darling with the dazzling eyes," he addressed her, "I am the one
whom you have won with your glances in that garden!"

	"But how do you take the shape of a maiden?" the princess asked in
amazement.

	The cunning adventurer was ready with a lie.  "When my meeting with
you was cut short, I fell to such immoderate lamentations that the gods
deemedme unmanly, and so gave me the form of a girl.  It is your
declaration of true love for me which has broken their cruel spell."

	Then the princess was overwhelmed by joy and they married each
other in the informal manner that the Gandharvas practice in Heaven.  Their
nuptials were followed by such a feast of affection that their mutual
passions temporarily sated.  Henceforth Manahsvamin contentedly lived in
two different forms: by day a girl, by night a youth.

	Several days passed in this way.  As it happened, a neighboring
king had sent his daughter Mrigankavati with a very large marriage dowry to
Councilor Prajnasagara's son.  Moon-Lustre was invited to the wedding of
her cousin and took with her the disguised youth Manahsvamin among her
retinue of maids-in-waiting.

	But what Fortune gives, she oft will endanger!  When the bridegroom
saw the supposed girl, he was utterly smitten with passion and, robbed of
reason, he went with his new bride to a home without joy.  Once there, he
totally immersed himself in longing for the beauty of Manahsvamin.  Before
long, the bridegroom fell into a swoon, a victim of unrestrained desire.
His father Prajnasagara came hurrying to his son's house to find out what
was wrong.  Comforted by his father, the young man raved deliriously of his
yearning, leading his father to believe that his son had lost his senses
and might die if his desire was not achieved.

	The good councilor notified the king of his cause of distress and
the gracious monarch soon appeared at his servant's house.  After having
seen that boy was indeed suffering from the seventh degree of
love-sickness, the king conferred with his ministers.

	"The girl has been entrusted to me by a brahmin," he said.  "Her
hand is spoken for.  How can I marry her to another?  Alack, unless I
permit it the boy will certainly perish of love's cruel wounds.  -- And
when he has died, his father, my councilor, must surely depart this world
from grief, and at my councilor's death the kingdom shall surely be ill-run
and fall into ruin!  Advise me, Wise Ones, what can we do?"

	The ministers debated and advised the king that regardless of
circumstances, the maid must marry the councilor's son.  The brahmin will
be enraged, they owned, but he could be mollified by generous gifts when he
returned.

	The monarch agreed despite his misgivings and consented to give the
supposed girl to the councilor's son.  When a propitious hour for the
nuptials had been calculated, Manahsvamin was brought from the princess'
chambers to meet with the king.  When he had overcome his immediate dismay
at the prospect of a forced marriage, he addressed the king courageously:

	"Your Majesty, if you invalidate your pledge to my father-in-law,
that is for the gods, not myself, to judge.  I have no choice but to bow to
your will, for you are mighty in power, but I will do so on this condition
only: I shall not be forced to sleep with my husband until he has returned
from a pilgrimage of six months to the holy places, for then I shall know
that he loves me truly and is of good, pious heart.  If this condition is
not met, I swear that I shall kill myself by biting off my tongue!"

	The king conveyed Manahsvamin's condition to the councilor's son, a
man too much in love to gainsay his beloved's lightest whim.  The false
girl and the youth were married before all the mighty of the kingdom and,
as soon as the wedding was over, he lodged his new bride along with
Mrigankavati in a well-guarded wing of his house.  Thereafter, the
twice-married man faithfully departed upon the agreed pilgrimage.

	So life went on until there came a night when their servants were
asleep outside and Mrigankavati, filled with ennui, whispered to
Manahsvamin in their common bedroom: "Tell me a story, sister bride, for I
cannot sleep."

	The false maiden cunningly told her the legend of King Ila -- how
that hero, the scion of the Solar Dynasty, had been cursed by the White
Goddess to become a woman who bewitched all the world, and how he and King
Budha met by accident, fell in love and wed, and how the hero Pururavas was
born from their passion.  Manahsvamin concluded his story slyly: "So it may
happen once in a while, either at divine command or by the power of magical
tokens, that a man becomes a woman and a woman a man.  And in any shape
that pleases them, the Great Ones enjoy the carnal experiences which spring
from their earnest passions."

	When the naive young Mrigankavati eard this story she admitted to
her companion: "While I was listening to your tale my body began tingling
and my heart beat wildly.  Why should that be so?  Tell me, my friend!"

	"Those are the signs of love, my dear!" said the brahmin.  "Is this
the first time you have felt them?"

	Softly Mrigankavati nodded and whispered: "Darling, I trust you
more than any other friend.  What I am asking you is forbidden, but I must
ask it nonetheless: Can you think of some stratagem by which a handsome
young man may be smuggled into our rooms?"

	Manahsvamin, who had grown faithless to the king's daughter since
coming to know the beauteous Mrigankavati, replied: "If that is what you
want, I shall tell you something.  God Vishnu has granted me a special
talent by which I can change myself at will into a man by night.  -- And
for thy sake, and because I love you, I shall now become a man."  He took
the bead from his mouth and showed himself in his natural guise -- as
handsome and virile a youth as the still-virgin bride had ever hoped to
meet.  With her inhibitions dispelled by the intimacy she and Manahsvamin
had already established, a feast of love was consummated with such zest as
suited the midnight hour.

	So from that night on, the young brahmin lived happily with the
bride of the councilor's son, by day a woman and a man at night.  When he
knew that the councilor's heir was due to return in a few days, he escaped
the house by darkness and eloped with his new bride.

	At this point Manahsvamin's teacher Muladeva, who had followed all
these strange events by means of his cunning arts, decided that he would
play a new and better joke upon everyone involved.  Once again he assumed
the form of the ancient brahmin, but this time he was accompanied by
another pupil, Sasin.

	The sorcerer betook himself to King Yasahketu and said, "Your
Majesty, I have located my son, he who stands beside me now.  I beg you to
restore me my daughter-in-law so that the marriage we have planned may be
celebrated with all dispatch."

	The king, fearing that the brahmin would curse him, took counsel
with his wise men and brought back this reply: "Venerable One, due to
pressing matters of state, I had to marry your daughter to a wealthy young
man of very good family.  Forgive me, please!  To make up for deed I shall
give you my own daughter for your son to wed, and give you much gold also!"

	Muladeva, the crafty wizard, feigned indignation and spoke angrily,
but finally permitted himself to be persuaded.  True to his word, the king
bestowed his daughter Moon-Lustre upon Muladeva's pupil, Sasin, the
magician's pretended son.  Thereupon Muladeva took the pair, who were now
bride and groom, back to his own home.  But there they met Manahsvamin, who
had heard the news of the wedding and was very angry.  A contentious
argument arose between him and Sasin while Muladeva looked on in amusement.

	Manahsvamin declared: "Moon-Lustre should be mine, for I have
already married her as a virgin -- which was the intent of both myself and
Muladeva when this folly began!"

	Sasin gainsaid him: "What has Moon-Lustre to do with you any
longer, fool?  She is my lawful wife; her own father has married her to me
in the presence of the sacred rites!"

	"But you have wed her under false pretenses!" declared Manahsvamin.

	"Your pretenses were even more false -- and you are greedy besides.
You crave two wives while I have none."

	And so they clamored without reaching a solution.

						#

	  "So the story is all but ended," said the vampire to his captor.
"Tell me therefore, Your Majesty, when the elders of their clans mediated
the dispute, to whom did they decide the princess Moon-Lustre belonged?
Was it to whom she loved and chose for herself, or to that one whom she had
married with the consent of the father?"

	"In my opinion," replied the king, "she belongs fairly to Sasin,
for it was to Sasin that the king had given his daughter lawfully and
publicly.  Manahsvamin had taken her by stealth and married her without
ceremony.  It has never been the law that the thief is to be considered the
owner of the property which he has stolen."

	"You are wise, Sire," said the vampire.  "Listen and I will tell
you yet another story to make you forget your toils."

	And so the vampire told story after story, throughout the long
night, hoping that the king would grow sleepy and careless, thereby
permiting him to escape.


THE END