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It is the still hour after Rādhā has been dressed, and the kuñja holds its breath. The maidservant has finished Her toilette with expert, trembling care, and now she stands fanning Her Prāṇeśvarī, the breeze from her hand stirring the loosened ends of Rādhā's hair. Into this hush the sakhīs come spilling through the leaves, laughing, having combed every forest in search of Her. Catching sight of them, Śrī Rādhā draws Her veil shyly across Her face and edges a little away from Śyāmasundara. And at once a wave of parihāsa-rasa, the sweet mellow of laughter and teasing, rises and breaks over the whole grove.

The sakhīs begin it. "Rādhe! We searched forest after forest for You, and here You sit in this secret bower as though nothing has happened. Where did You fall in with this menace? We do hope this womaniser has not gotten the better of You." Rādhā will not answer. So Krishna, never short of a boast, takes up the tale Himself: "Look, friends. Your Rādhā walked alone into this forest and was set upon by king Cupid's fiercest soldiers, the cuckoos and the bees, who pierced Her through with the five arrows. It was I who came and singlehandedly rescued Her from Cupid's grip, here in this safe haven of a bower. Why fear that I defeated Her?" But hearing such shameless words, Rādhā narrows Her eyes and Her brows and casts at Nāgara-rāja one glance that leaves Him utterly stupefied, His own boast turned against Him in an instant.

The sakhīs see it and pounce. "Śyāmasundara, tell us truly: did You save our sakhī from Cupid's grip, or did She save You from Cupid's grip?" Krishna, recovering a little from the spell of that glance, falls back on His one great credential. "O friends, you know well that I have shielded the people of Vraja from every danger. I bore Girirāja Govardhana on My left hand for seven days and seven nights, to guard them from Indra's hail and thunder; all Vraja knows it. Could a girl so tender and so easily frightened ever protect a great hero like Me? No, it was I who saved Her from Cupid."

Now the maidservant has her opening, and she presses it with all her clever, loving boldness. "O prince of the cowherds! With great endeavour You held one Govardhana Hill on one hand for seven days; but our mistress Rādhā carries Her two golden mountains about with Her every day, and easily. And what is this about carrying them, when You cannot so much as look at them without beginning to shiver with fear? So give up these proud jokes of Yours." See how she calls Him gopendra-kumāra, son of Nanda, king of the cowherds, and the name is itself a needle in the boast. For it is widely known in Vraja that Lord Viṣṇu, pleased with Nanda's worship, empowered this boy to guard His people and to fell every demon; the strength He brags of was a gift. And Govardhana, she reminds Him, lifted itself from the ground, pleased with the Govardhana-pūjā offered to it; Krishna had only to stand beneath and hold up His left arm. There is nothing in this to be proud of. "And even if You will insist that You raised the Hill Yourself, then it must have cost You no end of trouble. We shall see, then, what kind of great hero You truly are, if You can carry these mountains without going afraid and agitated."

And the wonder of it, O Rādhe, is that the joke is no exaggeration. The tradition treasures Karṇapura's witness in the Ānanda Vṛndāvana Campū, that very hour upon the hill: rādhālokana jāta sammada bharāt prasveda kampādikam, that the sight of Rādhā filled Him with such a rush of joy that He broke into perspiration and trembling, and the cowherds, seeing the changes pass over His body, thought lovingly, "Krishna tires of holding the Hill," and raised their own sticks to help bear it up. So even in the act for which the whole world praises Him, even with a mountain on His hand, He was undone by the sight of Her two mountain-breasts. The boast and the trembling were one and the same moment.

And the maidservant teases in just this secret way for a reason only she can know. For in the hour just past she had watched Him try to decorate Rādhā's limbs and fail at it, His hand too unsteady with love to set an ornament true. The other sakhīs were not there; they miss the hidden barb entirely. But Rādhā and Mādhava both know exactly in what connection she lets fly this joke, and within Themselves They are very pleased with the clever maidservant, and silently They praise her. This is the deepest note: the power that holds up the world is itself held, and humbled, and undone, by love.