When the maid brought my afternoon tea I was surprised, for Rajlakshmi had always made it a point to serve me my meals herself. On asking for her I was told that she had left the house earlier in the afternoon and had not returned yet. I had no idea where she had gone or for what purpose. Yet an acute depression assailed me. Her laughing words about meeting her death in Kashi echoed and re-echoed in my ears. I decided to go for a walk. I wandered aimlessly about the streets for hours. When I reached home at ten o’clock I was informed that Pyari had still not returned. Panic seized me. I was about to call Ratan and question him when I heard the sound of approaching hooves. An enormous phaeton drawn by a pair of superb white horses rolled in and stopped by the porch. There was a murmur of male voices within as Pyari alighted. Suddenly, the moon sprang out of the clouds and rained its beams on her. Her bosom, swathed in glowing tissues, heaved like a sea of beaten gold. Jewels flashed regally from her ears, throat and arms and twinkled in the masses of her hair. Her eyes held mine as she stood moon-washed and still—an enigmatic smile on her lips.
Fifteen
WHEN RAJLAKSHMI ENTERED MY ROOM A LITTLE LATER I JUMPED UP from my chair and declaimed theatrically, ‘Cruel, cruel, Rohini! Have you forgotten Gobinda Lal? Oh! for a pistol or even a sword….’
‘What will you do with a pistol? Kill me?’ Rajlakshmi asked in a frightened voice.
‘No, Pyari dear. Why would I deprive my fellowmen of such a very excellent thing as you? Who would block a gold-mine with a piece of rock? On the contrary, my blessings are eternally with you, oh queen of dancing girls! May you live long and take the three worlds in your stride. May the strains of the divine lyre well out of your voice and your feet twinkle like the stars of the firmament, so that even Urvashi and Tilottama are put to shame.’
‘What is the meaning of all this?’
‘Don’t look too deep for meanings. Be satisfied with facts. I’m leaving tonight by the one o’clock train, first to Prayag then to that ultimate pilgrimage of the Bengali clerk—Burma. I’ll see you before I leave if I can.’
‘Won’t you ask me where I went?’
‘Certainly not.’
‘You mean you’ll make an issue of this and leave me forever?’
‘I am a weak and miserable sinner. I dare not make a permanent commitment. For the present I’ll be grateful to get out of the maze in which I am caught.’
‘You are really leaving tonight? Do you have the right to punish me for something I have not done?’
‘By no means. But I claim the right to go away if I like.’
‘You won’t let me tell you where I went?’ Rajlakshmi asked after a pause.
‘I see no reason to do so. You did not take my permission before you went. Besides, I don’t have the time or the inclination to listen to your story.’
‘Neither do I have the time or the inclination to tell it,’ Rajlakshmi lashed out like an angry snake. ‘I’m nobody’s bondwoman that I must take permission before I leave my own house. You may go wherever you like.’ And she walked away imperiously, leaving a trail of scent and colour in her wake.
An hour later, when the carriage I had ordered stopped at the door, Pyari re-entered my room and said, ‘Do you really think you can walk out on me like this? Why do you humiliate me before the servants?’
‘Your servants are your concern. Not mine.’
‘What about Banku? How can I explain your absence at the wedding?’
‘Tell him the truth. Tell him I’ve moved on to Prayag.’
‘Is my crime so great that I can’t be forgiven? If you show me no mercy, who will?’
‘Pyari,’ I said smiling, ‘You are using a bondwoman’s language. It isn’t fitting.’
A burning flush spread over Pyari’s countenance. She stood irresolute, biting her lip. As I put out a hand to pick up my bag she made a quick movement. ‘Don’t leave me. Not in this way,’ she pleaded. ‘Punish me if I have erred but don’t humiliate me before my entire household.’
I dropped my bag and sank into a chair. ‘The time has come,’ I said solemnly, ‘for a final reckoning. I forgive you for what you did tonight. But one thing is certain. Our relationship must end. I have thought it over carefully and I have arrived at this decision.’
‘Why?’ Pyari asked in a small voice.
‘Can you stand the truth?’
‘I can.’
Hurting a loved one is hard—even harder than being hurt. But, my mind was made up. I said, ‘Lakshmi, you are beautiful, wealthy and sought after. You have power over many men. This power is like a heady wine that you will never be able to resist fully. You love me and respect me—I know that. You can sacrifice a great deal for me. But the glamour of your old life will always colour your vision. You can never be totally free from it.’
‘You mean I’m liable to stray even when I’m with you?’
I was silent. So was she.
‘What then?’ she asked at last.
‘Then everything we’ve built together will fall apart. Save me from that fate. It is too miserable, too low. Set me free, I beg of you.’
Pyari sat, her face downcast, for a long long while. When she lifted it at last it was bathed in tears. She asked softly, ‘Are you afraid I’ll involve you in my degradation? Is that what you mean when you talk of a miserable fate?’
‘No. You are incapable of degrading yourself. Still less me. But people don’t know that. For them you are not the little Rajlakshmi of Manasa pandit’s pathshala, but the notorious Pyari Baiji of Patna. Don’t you see that?’
‘God can see me for what I really am.’
‘True. But since God is invisible, we must accept the vision of his created beings as reflecting his own. We cannot defy the society in which we live.’
Pyari lifted her head and said with a strange smile, ‘You are afraid of social disapproval. I can see that. Well, go if you must. I won’t stop you. But to put public opinion above me—the greatest friend you have ever had or will have—can never be right. I don’t accept it and never will.’
Pyari left the room. I glanced up at the clock. There was just enough time to catch the one o’clock train if I hurried. I crept stealthily out of the house and took my place in the carriage. The driver whipped his horses in a mad rush to the station. But it was useless. The train to Allahabad was already on its way out by the time I arrived, puffing and panting, on the platform. As I stood wondering what to do next, a wave of nostalgia for my native village came upon me. I boarded a Calcutta bound train and, instead of travelling west, set my face towards the east.
I reached my destination at dusk of the following day to find my ancestral home swarming with relatives—some so distant that I had never seen them in my life. I noticed that a number of faces turned pale in alarm even as they exclaimed at the merciful Providence that had brought me once again in their midst. The elderly among them exhorted me to give up my wandering ways, to marry and settle down in my native village.
‘That is exactly what I plan to do,’ I assured them. ‘But I need a rest first. Could I be accommodated in my mother’s room?’
But the lady who occupied it with her large family (I discovered later that she was my father’s second cousin) looked so woebegone at the prospect that I was forced to amend my proposal. ‘I’ll sleep in the outer room then,’ I said and regretted my generosity immediately afterwards. For, on opening the door, I found it was being used as a godown for building materials. There was nothing for me but to wedge my cot between a pile of stone-dust nearly touching the ceiling and some twenty or twenty-five sacks of lime.
I lay down but could not sleep. My head ached and my limbs felt as if they had turned into stone. Ever since the illness out of which Abhaya had nursed me back to health, I had suffered from periodic bouts of fever. So I wasn’t particularly worried or surprised.
‘It is heat fever,’ Ranga Didi diagnosed. ‘It will pass.’
After a week, when the fever did not pass but went on rising steadily, I had
my first moments of panic. Doctor Govinda was sent for. He lifted my eyelids, felt my chest, tapped my abdomen with zest and made me swallow quantities of bitter medicines, but to no avail. The fever defied all medical logic and rose higher and higher.
Thakurdada * was frightened. One day, he came to my bedside and said, ‘I’d better write a letter to your Pishima. What do you say?’ I shook my head violently and begged him not to do so.
Five days passed. On the sixth day I discovered that my wallet was missing. I turned my bag upside down and rummaged frenziedly among its contents, but the small black object was conspicuous by its absence. The doctor who stood by, waiting to be paid, said with a note of alarm in his voice, ‘What is the matter? Have you lost anything?’
‘No—nothing.’
But when I could not pay him, he understood. ‘You should have been more careful, son,’ he said. ‘But don’t worry. I won’t stop your treatment because you’ve lost your money. You can pay me later—after you’ve recovered.’
‘Please keep this to yourself,’ I begged.
There was no question of borrowing money for I had nothing to pledge. I was aware of the fact that not even a four-anna coin was lent without a collateral in the villages of Bengal. I decided to write to Abhaya but before I could do so the news of my loss spread within the household. The loving faces around me turned sullen and gloomy and the tender concern of yesterday gave way to indifference, even hostility. Burma was a long way off. I couldn’t afford the luxury of not stooping to Rajlakshmi any longer. I wrote two letters describing my plight and entreating her to send me some money. Addressing one to Patna and the other to Calcutta I lay waiting for the post feeling sick and miserable and utterly degraded.
I had no doubt at all that Rajlakshmi would send me the money, but when two days went by and nothing arrived I felt as though the ground had been cut from under my feet. I lay with my face to the wall trying hard to subdue the painful throbs of my heart.
Suddenly, I heard the sound of carriage wheels. They grew louder and then stopped by my door. I raised my head and saw Ratan on the box. I sat up in excitement. And then my eyes beheld something that was beyond my wildest imaginings. Rajlakshmi was stepping out of the carriage. She had come, in broad daylight, to the very village in which her mother had announced her death only a few years ago.
Rajlakshmi entered my room and, touching my forehead and chest, said with a composure I was far from feeling, ‘The fever has broken. Do you feel well enough to travel? We could leave by the seven o’clock train.’
‘Are you taking me away?’ I asked, my eyes fixed on her face. Then, before she could answer, I said, ‘Were you not afraid of coming here? Do you really think no one will recognize you?’
‘Why would I think that? I’m sure everyone will recognize me.’
‘Then …?’
‘One must follow one’s destiny. Why did you choose to fall ill here of all places?’
‘I didn’t ask you to come. You could have just sent the money.’
‘You know I couldn’t do that—not after hearing you were ill. I was distracted with worry.’
‘Well! Your worry is over. And mine has begun. How can I explain your presence here—to all these people?’
Rajlakshmi touched her forehead. ‘We only carry out God’s will,’ she said.
‘God’s will!’ I exclaimed, sitting up angrily. ‘What about shame? Don’t you have any? How did you dare to show your face here?’
‘From today I depend on you to cover my shame.’
What could I say after that? What could I do? I lay back exhausted. After a while I asked, ‘Where are you taking me?’
‘First to Calcutta, then to Patna.’
‘Why to Patna?’
‘Because the deeds of gift have been drawn up there.’
‘What deeds? What are you gifting and to whom?’
‘I’m giving the two houses in Patna to Banku and the one in Kashi to Gurudev. As for my jewels and company holdings—I have divided them up as fairly as I could. But the deeds will be registered only after you approve of them.’
‘What have you kept for yourself?’ I sat up, alarmed. ‘Suppose Banku doesn’t look after you?’
‘I don’t want him to look after me, I’m not giving up my possessions to become his ward.’
‘But why are you doing such a thing? Whom will you turn to in your old age?’
‘The one I’ll turn to, will not forsake me. Do not excite yourself. Go to sleep.’
I turned my face to the window. The sun had almost set. Earth and sky swam in a haze of misty gold and out of the blue and violet shadows of dusk the star of the evening rose—pure as a rain-washed pearl. Never had the world seemed more beautiful. Tears rolled down my cheeks and peace flooded my being. How long I lay in this state I cannot tell. The sound of approaching footsteps made me look up. Thakurdada and Doctor Babu walked in.
Thakurdada has always been a man of great sagacity. Glancing briefly in Rajlakshmi’s direction he asked, ‘Who is the girl, Srikanta? I think I’ve seen her before.’
‘So have I,’ his companion chimed in. ‘Her face is familiar.’
I let my eyes rest on Rajlakshmi’s face. It was suffused with a deathly pallor. Suddenly, a voice murmured within me, ‘Be kind to her, Srikanta. She has forsaken everything for your sake.’ To hell with the truth, I thought. I put out my hand and taking hers, said gently, ‘You have come to your husband, Rajlakshmi. You have nothing to be ashamed of. Go make your pronams * to Thakurdada and Doctor Babu.’
I saw the elderly gentlemen exchange glances as Rajlakshmi rose and pulled her veil over her face. Then, kneeling before them, she touched her brow to the ground at their feet.
Forbidden Fruit
One
ONCE AGAIN I DRAW BACK THE CURTAIN ON THE SCENE AS I LEFT IT so many years ago. I had thought of ending this narrative. I had thought that I would keep the look on Rajlakshmi’s face when my great-uncle hastily drew his feet away mumbling vaguely, ‘Good, good. Live long and be happy,’ to myself alone—not share it with others. But now I’m glad to unburden myself, glad to open up that chamber of my heart within which lie secret mysteries that cry out to be unravelled. For years I kept the door locked allowing doubts and suspicions to batter at it. Today, the lock has rusted away and all stands open to view.
Rajlakshmi looked at Thakurdada’s retreating back and said with a pained smile, ‘He was afraid I would touch him.’ Then, turning to me, she said sadly, ‘Why did you have to tell him that? It didn’t do us any good. It only—’
I agreed with her. The lie didn’t do either of us any good. I should have known that to any law-abiding Hindu, marrying a widow was no better than marrying a prostitute. I had pushed Rajlakshmi into a deeper humiliation and in doing so, had humiliated myself.
Rajlakshmi sat immobile as a statue. Then she rose suddenly with a jerk and said urgently, ‘We’d better leave at once or we’ll miss the train.’ And calling out to Ratan, she ordered him to prepare for our departure. Within ten minutes my bag was packed and stowed away, my bedding rolled up, and I found myself sitting in a corner of the carriage. Not a word passed between us.
I had entered my ancestral village only a few days ago. No one had welcomed me then and no one bade me a tearful farewell now. But it was the same twilight hour. Conch shells blew from little homesteads. Snatches of kirtan and a clashing of cymbals came from the mandir adjoining the mansion of the Basu Mullicks. Everything was the same—yet how different!
I had never attached any particular significance to the crumbling walls that my ancestors had raised in this remotest of remote Bengal villages. I had never thought of losing my place within them as a loss. Yet, that day, when the prospect of going back to it had become as distant as the northern star, this sodden, malaria-ridden, unhealthy village of Bengal drew me with a thousand arms.
As we clattered along the winding path I thought of my grandmother being borne along it—a child bride in a yellow palki.
I thought of the bridal bullock-cart that had carried my mother from her father’s village through the shadows of the very trees that spread its branches over our heads. And it was along this path that they had journeyed on the shoulders of their sons to be immersed in the Ganga to the chant of Vedic mantras. This path had not been so perilous then, so dark and depressingly choked with weeds and bainchi bushes. The air had been clean, the sun bright. Food there had been in plenty—food, life, warmth and kindness. Tears flooded my eyes.
I gathered the dust from the carriage wheel and touched it to my head. ‘I am your unworthy son. I have never loved you, never valued you. But, today, when I leave you, perhaps never to return, the image of your suffering motherhood trembles in my eyes. These are the first tears I shed for you but they are wrung out of my heart. I will never forget you.’ I looked up and saw Rajlakshmi sitting in her corner, eyes shut, head resting on the window. She seemed deep in thought. ‘Think hard, Rajlakshmi,’ I said to myself. ‘It is up to you to see us safely across the river over which we are floating. Avoid the whirlpools and find the shore as best as you can.’
I had studied my own mind often enough. I knew its qualities and its limitations. It couldn’t take too much of anything—not even health, happiness and well-being. Too much love disturbed me, it made me feel hemmed in. I felt suffocated and yearned for escape. Yet, I had voluntarily enslaved myself to Pyari. What pain there was in my surrender only my Maker knew.
I glanced out of the window at the sky now black with night and then at the dim form of Pyari. I folded my hands humbly—before whom I did not know. ‘I’ve tried to resist the tide of her love,’ I thought. ‘I’ve tried to escape it but all my separate paths, like an intricate maze, only led me back to her. Of what use is this struggle? Far better to surrender to one whose success in lifting herself out from a cesspool of vice and degradation will ensure my survival.’ Immersed in these thoughts, it took me some time to notice that Rajlakshmi hadn’t said a word since her command to Ratan to get ready for departure. Even after we reached the station she stood by a pillar, mute and expressionless, while Ratan, instead of rushing to the ticket office, proceeded to spread my bedding in a corner of the waiting-room. I understood, from his action, that we were not to catch the train to Calcutta for which we had hurried but the morning train. But what our destination was—Kashi or Patna—I did not know. Nor did anyone care to enlighten me.
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