First Light

by Sunil Gangopadhyay

  Chapter XLIV

  Basantamanjari rose before dawn and came and stood on the deck of the bajra. Around her the vast waters stretched, lusty and turbulent, and as boundless as the sea. Facing east she sank to her knees. Every morning she kneeled thus waiting for the sun to rise above the Brahmaputra. Then, when her eyes beheld the wonder of the great crimson globe leap up from the dark swirling water, she brought her palms together in a pranam. Closing her eyes she strained her senses as though, by doing so, she would be enabled to hear the music of the spheres. Sometimes she hummed a few strains that sounded like muffled weeping. She sang rarely these days and, even then, only to herself.

  Basantamanjari had everything a women could want—a splendid home with many servants, pretty clothes and jewels and a husband who loved her to distraction and indulged her every whim. God had even blessed her with a son. He was six years old now, a beautiful child and very intelligent. But none of her good fortune seemed to touch her. It looked as though she belonged to another world and had strayed into this one by mistake. Her body was here but her soul was somewhere else. She spent hours gazing at the moon, the rising sun, a stretch of water, even a clump of trees—her eyes steadfast, her lips moving soundlessly.

  This morning, as Basantamanjari waited for the day to break, a strange agitation came over her. Her eyelids fluttered, her heart beat fast and drops of dew appeared on her brow. She rose and ran down the steps to Dwarika’s chamber. Dwarika lay sprawled on satin sheets in the middle of a vast carved bedstead. He looked every inch a zamindar with his fair complexion, ample paunch and salt and pepper whiskers. He had bought an estate in Jangipur, in the new province of East Bengal and Assam, and was enjoying a pleasure cruise in the waters surrounding it. ‘Ogo!’ Basantamanjari tried to shake her husband out of his slumbers, ‘Give orders to the boatmen to set sail. We’ve been anchored here for three days—’

  ‘What … what?’ Dwarika started up in the middle of a snore. ‘We’ve been here for three days and I want to move on.’ ‘Yes … yes—in the afternoon,’ Dwarika mumbled indistinctly. Then, turning over to the other side, he started snoring once again. ‘No!’ Basantamanjari cried, beside herself in her desperation. ‘We must move on now. This very instant.’ She pushed him with all the strength in her delicate arms till he was forced to open his eyes. ‘It’s barely dawn, ‘ he said helplessly, trying to dissuade her, ‘The boatmen are fast asleep.’

  ‘They’ll wake up at your command. Even if we could go in a small boat—’

  ‘Go where?’

  ‘To a place … I don’t know quite where. But come with me please. I’ve a great longing—’

  Dwarika sat up with a groan. No matter how hard he tried to resist her strange fancies he always had to give in at some point or the other. His little wife held him securely in her clutches. He rose and dressed quickly then, waking up one of the men, took his place in the boat with Basantamanjari at his side. The tiny craft skimmed over the dark water under a sky heavy with cloud. ‘It’s not going to rain, is it?’ Dwarika asked fearfully. ‘I don’t want to get drenched.’

  ‘A few drops of water won’t harm the great zamindar babu!’ Basantamanjari laughed merrily throwing her head back and making her long diamond earrings flash and sparkle against her arched neck. Dwarika gazed at her, his eyes glowing with admiration. What a beauty she was! The years hadn’t touched her. She was slim and graceful like a young girl and her skin was as smooth and unflawed as a rose-flushed marble.

  Presently they came to the mouth of a river meandering away from the Brahmaputra. It was so slender, one could even call it a stream. ‘Shall we go back Basi?’ Dwarika looked up hopefully, ‘We’ve been sailing for over an hour. Chhotku must be awake by now.’ The truth was that he had started feeling hungry. Dwarika, though not born a zamindar, loved to indulge himself like one. He glanced at his wife as he spoke and was faintly alarmed. She sat so still, she scarcely breathed, her large dark eyes fixed on the stream.

  ‘Can we sail down that for a while?’ she pointed a finger without turning her head.

  ‘There’s nothing to see there Ma Thakrun,’ the boatman answered for Dwarika. ‘That is the Dharala river. It gets so shallow after a while and so choked with trees that the boat can’t move.’

  ‘I love trees,’ Basantamanjari murmured.

  ‘Just for a few minutes then,’ Dwarika conceded. Then we’ll go back. I’m dying for a cup of tea.’

  After a quarter of an hour’s sailing the oars started making a scraping sound as though touching the pebbles on the river bed. ‘The water is only knee deep here,’ the boatman announced and, almost at the same time Basantamanjari cried out, ‘Stop! Stop!’

  ‘Why?’ Dwarika exclaimed, alarmed. ‘The forests here are infested with wild animals. Do you want to become food for one?’ Basantamanjari pointed to a small stone structure, almost buried in trees, on the farther bank. ‘That’s a temple,’ she announced omnisciently. ‘Let’s go and see it.’

  ‘How do you know it’s a temple?’ Dwarika asked, his eyes following the direction of the pointing finger. Then, as if trying to reason with a child, he said, ‘Even if is, it must have been abandoned years ago. There’s nothing to see—.’

  ‘There is! There is!’ Basantamanjari cried with a strange insistence. Then, when the boat came to a halt, its keel grazing the tree roots that lay submerged in the water, she leaped out and ran towards the broken steps. Dwarika followed her as best as he could. Suddenly she stopped and whirled around. ‘There’s something there,’ she told Dwarika her eyes burning into his.

  ‘Then we shan’t go in,’ Dwarika’s voice sounded relieved. ‘Let’s start on our way back home. It’s late enough as it is.’ But Basantamanjari shook her head. Her eyes filled with tears. ‘You go in and look,’ she begged him in a choking voice. ‘Why should I?’ Dwarika cried impatiently. ‘It was not my idea. And anyway—’ Before he could finish his sentence Basantamanjari sank to her knees and started knocking her head at his feet. ‘Go,’ she cried, bursting into tears and repeating over and over again, ‘You must. Or it will be too late. Too late.’ Dwarika sighed. Everyone who knew her, including her own father, believed she was imbalanced. Only he, Dwarika, had always insisted that she was different, perhaps, from other women but not abnormal. But now even he had to admit that her brain was unhinged. And her condition was getting worse day by day. He decided to take her to see a specialist the moment they reached Calcutta. For the time being, of course, he had no option but to obey her. Lifting his dhuti fastidiously with one hand, Dwarika picked his way gingerly towards the ruined shrine his shining pumps squelching noisily over wet earth and rotting leaves. Negotiating the moss-covered crumbling steps with difficulty he stepped through the open door into the inner sanctum and peered cautiously around. At first he could see nothing. Then, his eyes getting accustomed to the dark, he discerned a broken clay image of Kali standing in a niche against a wall. The head, its fiery red tongue sticking out fearfully, had rolled away and was resting in a corner. One arm was gone. The Shiva at her feet, however, was surprisingly large and whole. But what was that dark red patch just below its navel and on the ground where it lay. Dwarika went a few steps forward then recoiled in shock and horror. For what he saw was not a clay image but a man in his prime. The dark patch was blood, thick clotted blood that stood out in great globs around the blade of a spear that was planted in his belly. And the face—the face was that of his friend Bharat.

  A murderous rage came over Dwarika. The blood rushed to his head and the blue veins throbbed in his throat and temples. Rushing out of the shrine he came to the place where Basantamanjari still knelt in the mud and slush. Seizing her by the hair he screamed in an unnatural, high-pitched voice, ‘What are you? An enchantress? A witch? Answer me. Or I’ll … I’ll—’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Basantamanjari, who hadn’t stopped weeping, broke into loud piteous sobs. ‘Believe me I don’t know. I’m your wife. My only wish is to serve you.’

  ‘Y
ou dragged me out of bed! You brought me here. Why? Why?’ His voice broke. Tears ran down his cheeks and he babbled incoherently. ‘My friend … my poor friend! Such a violent death! Why did I have to see him? Why do you make me suffer so?’

  Now Basantamanjari wiped her tears and asked gently, ‘Is he dead?’

  ‘He must be. There’s so much blood … so much—’ His teeth clenched as he spoke and the muscles at one side of his mouth twisted as though he was having a fit. Yanking her to her feet he dragged her towards the shrine. ‘Haramzadi!’ he cried grinding his teeth. ‘Who is he to you? Why do you bring him into our lives over and over again? I must have an answer or, by God, this day will be your last.’

  ‘He’s nothing to me.’ Basantamanjari shook her head. Her eyes had an odd glazed look. ‘I’ve never even exchanged a word with him. I didn’t know he was in there, believe me. Only something; someone seemed to pull at me so hard … I tried to resist … but I couldn’t. I was dragged to this place. I didn’t come here on my own.’

  They had entered the temple as she spoke. Suddenly she wrenched herself free from Dwarika’s grasp with surprising strength and, rushing up to Bharat, sank to the floor and took his head in her lap. Then, muttering something to herself, she tried to prise his eyelids open. ‘What are you doing?’ Dwarika snarled at her. ‘Performing Tantric rites?’

  ‘No,’ Basantamanjari’s voice, though soft, was firm and compelling. ‘I know neither tantra nor mantra. But I think he’s still alive. Go and fetch some water.’

  Dwarika picked up a clay pot, cracked at the rim but whole, lying on the floor and dashed out of the room. He returned a few minutes later and handed it, brimming over with water, to her. Basantamanjari took up a palmful and threw it with great force aiming at Bharat’s eyes. Then another and another, on and on, her strokes getting harder and more frenzied with the passing minutes. It seemed as though she was willing him back to life with all her soul and all her strength. Dwarika felt uneasy. It was obvious that Bharat was dead. Why didn’t Basantamanjari accept the fact? And what was that strange expression on her face? He couldn’t fathom it. Then, just when he was about to command her to stop, Bharat’s eyelids flickered and sprang open. A tremor ran through his frame. ‘Ma,’ he murmured looking straight into Basantamanjari’s eyes. ‘Ma,’ he repeated. Bharat hadn’t seen his mother in his life. But, traversing the twilight zone that lay between death and life, it was to her that he spoke.

  A couple of weeks later two gentlemen came to Classic theatre and asked to see Amarendranath Datta. It was just after curtain call and Amar Datta was in his green room removing his make-up and taking swigs from a flask of whiskey. Convinced that they were creditors he snapped at the servant boy who had brought up the message. ‘I can’t see anyone just now. Tell them to get lost.’ But the boy hesitated. ‘One of them is a barrister,’ he said. ‘He says he knows you.’ Amar Datta’s brow furrowed in thought. What barrister had come to see him? And why? He wasn’t involved in any law suit! ‘Ask them to come in,’ he said after a while, ‘and bring a couple of chairs.’ Then, seating himself, he fortified himself with another draught from his flask.

  He recognized jadugopal instantly, rose to his feet and greeted him with folded hands. His companion, Amar observed, was tall, fair and portly with flecks of grey in his whiskers. He was dressed very nattily in a gold-bordered dhuti and silk baniyan, wore several rings and carried a silver-headed cane. It was easy to see that he was a gentleman of leisure. ‘We’ve come to see one of your actresses Amar Babu,’ the stranger began, ‘A girl called Bhumisuta.’

  ‘Bhumisuta!’ Amar Datta echoed frowning. There’s no such person here. In fact I haven’t heard such an outlandish name in all my life.’

  ‘Ohé Dwarika,’ Jadugopal smiled at his friend. ‘Perhaps you do not know that Bhumisuta’s stage name is Nayanmoni.’ Then, turning to Amar Datta, he added, ‘Nayanmoni is on your board isn’t she?’

  Amar Datta’s handsome features twisted in a grimace. ‘She was,’ he answered, ‘but not anymore. She left Classic some months ago. She’s an arrogant wench with no respect for her betters. I vowed to teach her a lesson. “Get out of my theatre,” I told her. “I can collect sluts like you in dozens with a sweep of my foot.” Tell me gentlemen—what call has a woman, who dances on the stage for a living, to act so prim and proper? Too pure and chaste to sleep with me! I threw her out and I swear—’

  ‘I’ve no desire to hear what passed between you,’ Dwarika interrupted his host’s drunken babble with a gesture of dismissal. ‘I need to see the young woman urgently. Perhaps you would give me her address.’

  ‘Are you gentlemen planning to open a theatre? Well, let me warn you. She’ll be a lot more trouble than good. And if you’re aiming to keep her as a mistress you may as well know—’

  ‘We’re interested in neither of those things,’ Dwarika broke in impatiently, ‘Now if you could just give us—’

  Suddenly Amar Datta burst into tears. Dropping his head into his hands he tore at his hair and cried frantically, ‘I’ve lost her. I’ve lost my Nayanmoni. She’s left me desolate. What shall I do? How shall I live? No one wants to see my plays anymore. My creditors bay at my heels, from dawn to dusk, like a pack of wolves. I’m doomed! All I can do is drown my sorrows in drink!’ Amar Datta’s voice had started slurring. His body shook with drunken sobs. Realizing that nothing more could be obtained from him, the two men rose to their feet. ‘We’ll come back another day Amar Babu,’ Jadugopal said and walked out of the room.

  The next evening the two friends went to see Girish Ghosh’s Siraj-ud-doulah at the Minerva. Girish, Dwarika thought, had the proverbial nine lives of the cat. He went on and on. Old age and sickness, reversal of fortune, deaths in the family—so much had happened in his long eventful life but he had withstood it all. Just when he seemed to be utterly down and under, he resurfaced to the top, roaring like a lion, in superb triumph. Of late be had come into his own again. His Balidaan had acted as a powerful shot in the arm for the dying Minerva. Now with Siraj-ud-doulah the house was full again. The play was doubly popular because it had appeared at a peculiar juncture in the history of the nation. By dividing Bengal the rulers had attempted to drive a wedge between the two communities. All right-thinking Bengalis, Hindu and Muslim, had seen through the ploy and were resisting it as best as they could. By depicting Siraj-ud-doulah, the last independent Nawab of Bengal, as a heroic figure who sacrificed his life for the independence of his country, Girish had touched the hearts of both Hindus and Muslims. Siraj-ud-doulah’s many vices—his vicious temper, his lack of foresight, his debauchery and arrogance—were conveniently forgotten. Only his extreme youth and his vulnerability remained. In Girish Ghosh’s play he emerged as a tragic protagonist—a victim of his age and time.

  Dwarika and Jadugopal were very impressed with the play. The stage sets and costumes were brilliant. Girish Ghosh’s son Dani, in the role of Siraj, gave a fine performance. But the two truly outstanding ones came from Ardhendushekhar Mustafi as Danasa Fakir and Girish Ghosh, himself, as Karim Chacha.

  At curtain call the two friends decided to go backstage and congratulate the playwright. They found him lying back in an easy chair, looking thoroughly spent. He was, indeed, too old and too afflicted with rheumatism to prance around on the stage. But once on it, he forgot everything—his age, his painful joints, his diseased liver—and internalized the character he was portraying with a rare fidelity. Now he listened, smiling, at Dwarika and Jadugopal’s extravagant compliments and remarked, ‘You are educated men. It is to be expected that you understand the subtle nuances of the play. But what about the common man? Do you think he’ll be able to appreciate its spirit?’

  The talk veered away from the play to politics and from thence to the subject of Nayanmoni’s whereabouts. ‘Yes of course I know Nayanmoni,’ Girish replied to their question. ‘She’s a handsome girl and very talented. But I hear she’s left the theatre. As far as I know she’s not on any board. As to where s
he lives—I haven’t the slightest idea. You’ll agree that I’m too old now to run after pretty women. I sleep best in my own bed and my bolster is all the companion I need.’ He laughed at his own joke and added. ‘Perhaps Saheb has some idea. Let me send for him.’

  When Ardhendushekhar came into the room, a few minutes later, Girish looked at him with an amused smile. ‘These gentlemen have come here looking for Nayanmoni. You were the one who brought her to the theatre. You must have some idea of where she is.’

  ‘She used to room with Gangamoni,’ Ardhendushekhar said slowly. ‘Gangamoni loved her as her own daughter and left her the house with everything in it when she died. But Nayanmoni didn’t stay there after her death. She sold up everything and went to live in a rented house—no one knows where. One of our actresses—a girl called Tagar—claims that she has seen her, several times, bathing in the Ganga at Kashi Mittir’s Ghat.’

  Around seven o’clock the next morning Dwarika and Jadugopal arrived at Kashi Mittir’s Ghat and took up their positions, under a tree, a little distance away from the area demarcated for women. The bathers would have to pass them on their way out and, if Tagar wasn’t a lying minx, they would catch Bhumisuta sooner or later. This third attempt proved lucky for them. After about half an hour’s waiting they noticed a ripple of excitement pass over the crowd of beggars hanging about the women’s ghat. It was obvious that someone was distributing alms on her way out. In a few minutes the crowd thinned, scattered and disappeared and the woman came up the steps. It was Bhumisuta.