The king timidly approached his beloved and was terribly distressed to see her condition. She lay on the ground, clad in old and coarse garments with all her personal adornments thrown off.

Her wretched attire so eminently matched her wretched design, as though destiny were proclaiming her widowhood! Drawing close to her, the king asked in soft accents, ‘Why are you angry, my soul’s delight?

As the king touched her with his hand, saying, ‘Why are you so angry, my queen?’ Kaikeyi threw it aside and flashed upon him a furious glance like an enraged serpent, with her two whishes for its tongues and the boons for its fangs, looking for a vital spot. As fate would have it, says Tulasi, the king took it all as the playfulness of love.

Said the king again and again, ‘Tell me the cause of your anger, O fair-faced, bright-eyed dame, with voice as melodious as the notes of a cuckoo and gait resembling that of an elephant.

Who, my dear, has done you wrong? Who is there with a head to spare and whom does death desire to claim? Tell me, what pauper I should make a king and what king I should banish from his kingdom.

I could slay even an immortal were he your enemy; of what account, then, are men and women, who are but wretched worms? You know my disposition, O beautiful lady; my mind is enamoured of your face as the partridge is of the moon.

O my beloved, my subjects and my family and everything that I own, my sons, my life itself are all at your disposal. If I tell you a word of untruth, O good lady, I should be guilty of falsely swearing by Rama a hundred times!