One Part Woman

by Murugan, Perumal

  He got into the bizarre habit of intercepting Ponna when she went alone to the fields, and grinning at her ingratiatingly. He even started coming to Kali’s house in the middle of the day with his friends to play dice. Ponna became his waitress, bringing him water, matchbox, and so on. Kali would come back from the barnyard in the middle of the night and knock on the door. But Ponna was not sure any more that it could only be Kali. Fearing gossip, she decided to spend one night in the barnyard. Holding him in her embrace, she poured her heart out. His chest, wet with her tears, heaved in anger.

  ‘Isn’t it because I have no children that people look at me this way?’ she cried. ‘If I had that blessing, would I have to suffer this disgrace? Every dog thinks I am just a stone standing at the street corner that it can rub itself against.’

  The next day, Kali encountered Karuppannan. As usual, the latter’s talk was loaded with innuendoes.

  ‘Kali, my brother, you have two coconut trees. Can’t you water them properly? Look at the new blossoms. They are dried and shrivelled up.’

  Kali decided there was no point in beating around the bush. He charged in head-on.

  ‘Karuppannan, you have no idea how I go about watering things. Haven’t you married off your sister Lacchi to Pudhupalayam? Ask her, she will tell you! Why do you think she keeps coming back here? Do you think she comes to see you, her brother? You poor thing! Your wife is lamenting to everyone that you are jobless and sitting around the town square. Ask her and find out what job you are good for. Don’t worry about my coconut trees. Keep your game of dice to the town square.’

  A dark shadow fell over Karuppannan’s face. Though Kali had mixed a good deal of lies with the truth, the conviction with which he spoke rattled Karuppannan and chased him away from the square. He tightened his loincloth and changed his haunt to a shaded spot in the field. After this, Ponna did not have to speak to any random man. If she had to, she hurled words that stung like an ant in the crotch. Her circle grew smaller. She stayed away from people, and kept them away.

  Kali was absolutely sure that Ponna would not agree to go to the fourteenth day of the festival.

  FIFTEEN

  Uncle Nallupayyan’s arrival at the barnyard that day was like a balm to Kali’s aching heart. Kali had not seen him for a week. Perhaps he had gone on one of his spontaneous trips.

  ‘What, Chittappa? You vanished for so long,’ Kali said to him.

  ‘Oh, I was very much in town. The farm boy and I together thought we could turn our barnyard to look just like yours. Hence there was a lot of work to do.’

  ‘What kind of work?’

  ‘We had been just pushing aside all the cow dung to one side, and it had collected into a mound. We carried it all out. Then we wiped the floor clean. Then we killed a chicken and ate well.’

  ‘Has it turned into a good-looking barnyard?’ Kali asked.

  ‘You manage to stay put in this place like a rock. I can’t work like that. If I feel like it, I spend the whole week in the market. Then I suddenly remember I was actually born a farmer. That’s how it goes.’

  ‘But, Uncle, why would you spend the entire week in the market?’

  ‘Well, I go to the Erode market on Monday, Tiruchengode market on Tuesday, then to the Wednesday market, and so on. You too should try going to these places. That’s when you will get a sense of how the world works. Where do you think I found that white-saried woman? It was in our own Tuesday market.’

  ‘How does it work, Uncle?’

  ‘Just like there are men who deal in cattle, there are men for this too. I asked one of them if he could send the woman in the white sari to me for a month. He checked with her. We agreed on food and clothes for her and also twenty-five rupees in hand. I gave him five rupees. Everything went well. But that whore was not content with just a man in her life. She needed a husband.’

  ‘But if you had married her and had children, it could’ve helped you with your property. You would also be able to hold your head high in the village. Don’t you agree, Uncle?’

  ‘Why? For whom do I hang my head low now? It is only you who is relentlessly talking about having children. All right, go ahead and have a child. But do you know how you should live? Like that crow that has built a nest on that palm tree. When it knows it is going to lay eggs, it builds its nest. Then it incubates the eggs and hatches them. It finds food for the little ones and takes care of them until they grow their own wings. Once that happens, what do you think is the relationship between the baby crow and its mother? They go their separate ways. “You got your wings, now get out of here, and fend for yourself.” That’s the way to live. Instead, we give birth, raise them, get them married, save money and struggle. Is this any way to live? If we were more like crows and cuckoos, I’d also like to have children.’

  He followed that up with many other things. But nothing registered in Kali’s mind. What he had said had told him that he needn’t care what the village said, that he didn’t need a child. After all, Uncle didn’t give a hoot what anyone thought, and he wanted for nothing. How happy he was! He was the first one to introduce soap to the village. When he bathed with soap, the entire well smelled wonderful. When he travelled out of town, he wore a lovely tunic. He had cut off his topknot long ago. If one was constantly worried about not having a child, could one be this happy? These people are asking me to send my wife to another man just for the sake of a child. What if I decide I don’t need a child at all?

  If you are always worried about what others are going to say, you will always be in trouble. When Uncle Nallupayyan cropped off his head-knot and came back into town, it created such a ruckus. They held a community meeting and condemned him. Everyone spoke against him. They argued that now that someone had dared to do away with his topknot, it wouldn’t rain any more in the village; that no one would want to stay within bounds any more. They ruled that he should not fetch water from the common well, the washerman Nasuvan should not go to his house, no one in the village should speak to him, and no one should accept money from him for the temple festivals. Some people even opined that they should shave his head completely, put red and black marks on him and parade him around the village in punishment.

  Finally, the village head called Uncle Nallupayyan aside and said, ‘Just own up to your mistake. Tell them you will grow the hair again. We will just fine you and let you go.’

  But Uncle wouldn’t budge. ‘If the village’s honour resides in my bloody hair, I will grow it,’ he said. ‘I don’t even mind growing a beard and a moustache. I will grow them and sit around like you all, plucking lice from it. But add another thing to it. It was only yesterday that I shaved off my pubic hair, because it was itching too much. Now if your village’s honour is also dependent on my pubic hair, let me know right away. I will grow that too.’

  The crowd roared in laughter at Uncle Nallupayyan’s speech. The village head and the others did not know what to say. As they dispersed they said, ‘Is he even a farmer? Why did we even think of dropping all our work and getting together to discuss this? Let’s just think of him as a lunatic walking around in our village. From now on, don’t bring any of his matters to the council.’

  Uncle said, ‘In all the big towns, people have done away with these long topknots a long time ago. It is only you who are combing it for lice even now. Why should I subject myself to that?’ and he roamed around with his cropped hair.

  Kali had often thought that he lacked his uncle’s courage. He was fuming on the inside at his inability to communicate his decision on the matter of sending Ponna to the fourteenth day of the festival. He decided that he should find an opportunity to tell Ponna very firmly that he did not want children. It was much better than losing one’s honour. And he also wanted to know what was on her mind.

  Her plan was to somehow make him accept the previous year’s invite to the chariot festival from her parents. When she brought it up gently, he realized he couldn’t delay it any more.

  ‘Do you remember how y
our mother and mine were whispering all night to each other last year when she had come to invite us? Do you know what they were talking about?’

  She had been curious about it then. But when nothing unravelled for over a week, she had concluded it must have been something to do with old age and their reminiscences of the past. She even forgot about it. Now when she realized he had known about it for a year and had kept it from her, she was angry.

  ‘I didn’t tell you only because I wasn’t sure how you would take it,’ he started and told her about the fourteenth day of the festival when the gods returned to the hill. She didn’t know about it. He was surprised that this open secret had still not spread like wildfire.

  ‘Ah! You and my brother used to be delighted to go see the gods. I now realize what it was all about,’ she snapped.

  ‘No! We truly went to see the gods. Why are you accusing us now?’ he said.

  In his mind, he was looking for words to console her. She seemed to fill the darkness of the barnyard. He embraced her from behind. This was the embrace that cured him of all worries. He murmured into her ear.

  ‘Don’t you know I hung around with your brother only to get to you? Would these eyes that had had a taste of you even look at another woman? Even when I was fourteen or fifteen, I decided you were mine. And it has stayed that way,’ he pleaded and buried his face in her neck. But he could not tell if her anger was gone. Then, still in his arms, she turned to face him. He felt emboldened by her hand gently caressing his back.

  ‘Will you listen to your mother and mine and go on the day when the gods retreat?’ he continued. His heart was thumping, waiting for her reply.

  She murmured: ‘If you want me to go for the sake of this wretched child, I will.’

  His hold around her relaxed. This was not the answer he had expected.

  He moved away from her. For a moment he wondered if this was her way of getting back at him for his exploits before their marriage. He lay on the cot facing the sky. She realized that she had failed to give him the reply he had wanted to hear. She rushed to him in panic and spread herself upon him. Laying her head against his cheek, she looked for words of consolation. After all, the core of this relationship consisted in using consoling words.

  ‘Maama,’ she said, melting, ‘I thought you wanted me to, for the sake of a child. Will I ever do anything you do not like? You are everything to me. Despite everyone’s pressuring you for a second marriage, you have said no to it. That’s why I said I would do what you want me to do. Please don’t be angry …’

  But the sex they had that night was the worst they had ever had.

  SIXTEEN

  He did not say anything about going to her parents’ place. Nor did she bring it up again. But they made peace enough to go together to watch the chariot.

  It looked like things were back to normal. She felt her response to him had been terribly wrong. Was it her desperation that she should have a child by any means that had led her to say what she did? Did it even sound like he wanted her to? She had failed to see that he was merely testing the waters. Usually, it was not difficult for her to say exactly what he wanted to hear. After all, she had been doing it all these years. But she blundered on that one day. Anger had clouded her eyes.

  But then again, what was so terrible about what she had said? All she had implied was that if he was fine with the idea, she didn’t mind. She genuinely thought it was a way out of being insulted and ridiculed by everyone. Didn’t he remember the humiliation they suffered at the puberty ceremony of Chellama’s daughter’s? Chellama was like an older sister to him. So, as an uncle to her daughter, there was no way he could not have gone for the ceremony. She invited them lovingly. By then, Ponna had stopped going anywhere, but Kali insisted that she accompany him.

  Her mother-in-law kept ranting, ‘How can a man go alone and stand in a girl’s puberty ceremony? Don’t you have any brains? The girl is the granddaughter of our close relatives. And how can an uncle’s wife not go to the function? When I am dead and gone, don’t you want some people to still keep some contact, visit now and then? Or do you think you would send me away and be done with it?’

  Unable to bear all this, Ponna went along. There were nine plates of gifts at the ceremony. Ponna carried one of these plates in the procession. It was only later that she came to know that they had grudgingly given her a plate to carry, because it was the convention for the uncles’ wives to do so. There was also a custom meant to ward off the evil eye, wherein all the aunts were called to spin red balls of rice in a large circle around the girl’s body and then toss them away. Ponna was standing to a side with Kali. He nudged her to go forward to be part of that ritual. Another woman had also said, ‘If you are her uncle’s wife, you too should do it.’

  But when she tucked in her pallu and went forward, Chellama’s brother’s wife dragged her aside and said, ‘You stay away.’ If a childless woman did the ritual, would it make the girl barren? Was she that inauspicious? She pulled Kali by the arm and brought him outside. While he kept imploring, ‘Let it go, let it go,’ she kept walking in the dark. And he ran after her.

  Didn’t he take that insult personally? Even for death ceremonies in the village, no one asked him to fetch water in the cremation ground. If a child is so important to establish oneself as a human being in this world, why shouldn’t she dare to do what it takes to accomplish that? After all, she was not the kind who went in secret and slept with other men in the fields, was she? All she said was that if he approved, she was fine with the idea. What could she do if that upset him? When the fourteenth day of the festival arrived, her mother-in-law started giving her meaningful glances. It looked like if Ponna nodded just a little, her mother-in-law would herself take her to the festival. If it was a lazy, adamant bull, you could make it budge by biting its tail. You could shock it into action by staging a little fire. But what could she do with this obstinate man?

  The humiliations she had had to suffer because of this one problem were endless. She could not even go to their own fields during the sowing season for fear that others would broach the topic. So she would lock herself inside the house. Couldn’t he understand these things? He responded to the moment by cajoling and consoling her, and then forgot all about it the very next minute.

  In the months of Vaigasi or Aadi, depending on when the rains arrived, they would sow groundnuts. There was only one plough to each field. And it took two or three days to plough a field with one. It could get tiresome. But if four or five of them got together to work on each field, not only was it fun, they could also finish ploughing each field in a day. Sometimes, they would even take five ploughs at once to a field and be done in half a day. They first ploughed those fields which had loose topsoil that didn’t hold water for long. Next, it was the elevated fields with red soil. Low-lying ones were ploughed last. The order of preference was based on the soil and its moisture content. Women went to sprinkle manure water in the ploughed furrow and to lift and give seed baskets to the men.

  Then one year, something happened. That year too, they ploughed in a specific order, working together in everyone’s fields. On the last day, they focused on Thangavel’s field. He was from Vadamankaadu. There had been no rain for five days, not even a drop. So the land was not very wet. They reasoned that it was all right if it was not wet on top. As long as the soil was wet underneath, there was no big problem. So, they went ahead and sowed the seeds. On that day, Ponna helped by lifting the baskets of seeds. Originally, her task had been to sprinkle seed-water, but Thangavel’s wife, Karuvachi, who was supposed to do it, came down with severe leg pain and couldn’t be part of the work. Sprinkling only involved walking behind whoever ploughed. But lifting the seed baskets also involved running back and forth. The seeds were all kept amassed in one corner of the field. They would have to keep replenishing the baskets with the seeds and be ready. The moment the sprinklers signalled, the lifters would have to run carrying the baskets. If any one of them delayed, even for a bit
, it would halt the work of all five ploughs. Also, they had to walk along with the sprinklers and drop the seeds evenly. Ponna had to do all these tasks that day. Her legs were exhausted from all the running. She could sleep only after she massaged them with some hot water. But what came of all that suffering?

  The following year, they did not include Kali in their sowing team. He worked alone in his field and Ponna did the sprinkling. They didn’t know the reason. Then they heard that Thangavel did not get a good yield the year before, and whatever he got was of poor quality.

  Someone had said, ‘That barren woman ran up and down carrying seeds. How do you expect them to grow once she has touched them?’

  They never found out who said it. Everyone kept pointing to someone else. They could not even find out if it was a man who said it or a woman. But this much was clear: everyone seemed to agree with it. Ponna’s father and brother had always asked her to fill and carry the seed baskets whenever they had sowed. Their yield had never suffered because of this. After marrying Kali, it was she who did those tasks in the field. Only when they needed extra help did Kali hire someone. And nothing went wrong.

  Ponna confronted Thangavel’s wife on the way and gave her a piece of her mind: ‘You said you were in severe leg pain and begged me to go. That’s why I carried the seeds. Do you think I am obliged to go and work in your field? I might be barren, but nothing I have touched has ever withered. The plant I planted is flowering now, the tree I planted is bearing fruit, the calf I brought has grown and birthed many of its own, and the egg that I helped incubate has hatched a beautiful chick … There is nothing I have touched that has not flourished. Anything sowed in a dry land will go waste, no matter who helps in carrying the seeds. If you—wife and husband—had taken better care of the land, maybe it would have all grown.’