The Lady or The Tiger: The Ending

The youth stood before the two doors.  Behind one of the doors was a ferocious tiger, a hungry beast that would leap upon him and end his life in a second.  Behind the other was a lady, with whom the young man was seen talking to.  If the man had opened the door to the lady, a priest would emerge into the arena, followed by a band of choristers and dancing maidens blowing joyous airs on golden horns.  The pair would be wedded on a spot in a joyous occasion.

The youth had to chose, the right door or the left.  A single choice.

The man's heart was pounding.  His stomach was doing summersault.  Icy sweat rolled down his chin.

All audience's eyes were on him.  Silence befell on the arena in anticipation.

He looked towards the princess.  Their eyes locked and he pleaded silently for a sign of which door to choose.  The princess she knew what was behind each door; she knew which door contained the lion and which the lady.

The princess kept her face hard and expressionless.  She was determined to not let even a small grimace take upon her features.  With a solemn expression, she raised her hand and flicked it to the right.  A discrete movement that nobody spotted.  Just like that, a quick rightward motion of her hand, she sent him to his doom.

The man's eyes glittered up at her with thanks, and he confidently walked up to the door on the right hand side of the stadium.  With a quick inhale, he placed a firm grip on the handles and gave it a hard pull.  The door sprung outwards and out jumped the tiger.  It lashed out at his chest, its claw digging deeply into the man's flash.  Blood gashed from the wound.  The man yelled out in pain.  

"Why?" he scream.

The man stumbled backward and tried to run away.  But the tiger was too fast.  It latched on his throat and bit, puncturing the windpipe.  The man gasped for air but none came.  The man stumbled and fell.

The arena was stained red from the man's blood.  

He took a final glimpse at his lover.  Tears formed in his eyes.  The man put all of his trust in her decision, his mind never hesitating to command his body to seal his fate.  That meeting with the other woman was just a quick chat, nothing more.  She was his old hometown friend and they hadn't seen each other for a long time.  He had never been unfaithful to her and loved her deeply.

She looked away from him.  Although she knew her beloved would be killed by the tiger, she did not want watch him live happily with another woman.  She knew that she could not live with herself after what she had done that day, but she also knew that she could not live knowing that the man she loved, would be in the arms of another.

The young man's eyes closed and he was put out of his misery.

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I think the lady would have sent the man to the tiger because I don't think that she would want to watch him live his life happily married to a woman other than herself.  I believe that because she has lived her life under the influence of the king who is labeled 'semi-barbaric', she will not be merciful as that is not what she has learned.  She is described as "fervent," "imperils," and barbaric.  The author also describes her as arrogant and even states that "savage blood [was] transmitted through long lines of wholly barbaric ancestors."  The princess hated the lady behind the door and was passionately jealous.  While many times the princess thought in horror of the man being devoured by the lion, she thought even more times of the lady winning her love.  The princess is not described as the sort of woman who would sacrifice her own life and happiness for the sake of one she loves.  Therefore, based on the textual evidence in the story, the princess, regardless of the young man's faith in her, sent him to the door with the tiger.