‘I did,’ Khelu Chowdhury had snapped. ‘I don’t any more. He himself was a class enemy, which was why he led the party in the wrong direction.’
Ruhiton had already known that there were cracks in their old world. He was aware of the loathing and anger they felt for one another. He felt a deep anguish. Who was a class enemy? Just who? Khelu babu’s father had fat shares in many tea estates. He didn’t know what these young comrades owned. Leading the party in the wrong direction? Did no one realize it earlier? Or was Diba babu’s corpse under fire today because his leadership had not been successful? Ruhiton could never consider Diba Bagchi a class enemy as long as he lived. ‘But Khelu babu, Diba babu was our leader. I will grieve for him forever, I cannot deny this,’ he had said in a hoarse, distressed voice.
Khelu Chowdhury had been silent for a moment. He looked at everyone. With a smile he said, ‘I won’t blame you, Ruhiton bhai, it’s not your fault. You’ll understand things gradually. With time you’ll understand everything.’
Ruhiton had barely been listening to Khelu Chowdhury. Diba Bagchi’s face was still vivid in his mind’s eye. The news of his arrest and death had driven every other thought from his mind. Was that when everyone’s faces began to change when they looked at him?
‘But where will I go?’ Ruhiton almost screamed. ‘I have not been told.’
Khelu Chowdhury spoke at last, looking at him. ‘You’ll stay in the downstairs ward from now on. The doctor has said you should be separated from everyone else.’
‘Separated?’ Beneath the unhappiness, there was a distraught note in Ruhiton’s response.
‘Yes, separated,’ Khelu Chowdhury answered.
‘Why?’ Ruhiton asked in the same voice.
Khelu Chowdhury’s lips curved like a dagger. ‘Haven’t you looked at yourself?’ he said. ‘What are those sores on your hands and feet and face? Can’t you make out from your nose and your ears? But I don’t blame you for this.’
Blame? Ruhiton asked himself in surprise. He knew of the dried sores on his hands and feet and face. He knew of his flaming eyelids, his flared nostrils, the collapsed bridge of his nose, the gradual thickening of the skin on his face. Even the tips of his fingers and toes were inflamed and withering. He was using the oily ointment given by the doctor at the previous jail. He knew he was ill. He had a fever every now and then. His voice had become hoarse. He couldn’t hear clearly. His nose often ran without his realizing it. His fingers would neither straighten, nor bend. Only the edges remained curved and stiff. They looked like the hairless paws of a bear. But blame for what? And why did he have to leave his friends? The doctor here had neither been to see him, nor told him anything.
‘I haven’t done anything wrong, Khelu babu,’ Ruhiton said in surprise. ‘Why should you blame me?’
‘You weren’t always the Ruhiton Kurmi you are now. That’s why I don’t blame you,’ Khelu Chowdhury said. ‘Only you can tell whether you’ve inherited the illness or acquired it yourself. You had a lot of fun with Mohan Chhetri’s son Barka Chhetri once upon a time. You wandered around fairs, listening to all kinds of music, gambling. Didn’t you?’
‘I did,’ Ruhiton admitted in a flat, surprised voice.
‘Try to recall the other kinds of pleasure there. You drank hooch and spent Barka Chhetri’s money to buy the company of young whores. Now those whores are bursting out through your blood.’
‘Oy Khelu babu, what do you think you’re accusing me of?’ Ruhiton didn’t shout, didn’t snarl. He emitted an agonized scream, sounding as if an axe had plunged into his chest. ‘Are these their marks?’ He spread his hands out before his eyes. All of this seemed to be the demon’s tricks from his earlier life. All these things Khelu babu was saying! This sickness in his body. Tepri’s face suddenly floated up before his eyes. Tepri, the daughter of Shuku Pongani, a small landowner in Chunilal village. His girlfriend at sixteen.
Why had Tepri become his girlfriend? He didn’t remember. When he was sixteen, Ruhiton used to till Shuku Pongani’s land. How old had Tepri been at the time? The same age as Ruhiton, or a little younger. Tepri was married by then. There was no reason not to have been, given her age. Ruhiton could not fathom why Tepri used to roll her eyes, why she used to curve her lips in a smile, why she used to undulate her hips as she walked by, so close that he could actually feel a breeze. Even if he could fathom, he didn’t dare. The landowner’s daughter! But he liked her. His blood would tingle. Tepri’s swinging breasts would make her sari drop off them. The bow in Ruhiton’s heart would be drawn taut. Everything about Tepri excited him. The way she walked, the way she talked, the way she flirted, the way she smiled sweetly. But she had ringworm on her skin. She couldn’t have avoided it. Everyone in Shuku Pongani’s family had ringworm. Even their cows had sores, probably from ringworm.
Ruhiton looked at his arm. The red bulbous marks were everywhere, starting with the elbows. His palm was like a hairless bear’s paw, the tips of his fingers were withered. Had he got these marks from Tepri’s ringworm? He had slept with her in the jungle. Such intense pleasure. He hadn’t remembered the ringworm. From Tepri’s skin, the ringworm had also passed to his skin. How many families were there without ringworm sores? Ringworm ointment sold no less than snacks at all the fairs. Ruhiton had bought ringworm ointment from the Behubari fair. But Tepri was not a female crab he had paid to sleep with. He had been accused of getting these sores from whores at the fairs he used to frequent with Barka Chhetri.
‘But I don’t blame you, Ruhiton,’ Khelu Chowdhury repeated. Your forefathers were porters on tea estates. You were a landless…’
‘Quiet! Be quiet now,’ Ruhiton roared. Distorted with rage, his voice rang loudly in the upstairs ward. His raw eyelids were flaming red. His entire body flushed red.
Khelu Chowdhury and the other prisoners were dumb-struck. They looked both fearful and curious at this sudden outburst. Ruhiton came forward, one step at a time. But his flaming, bloodshot eyes were now trained on the staircase. Khelu Chowdhury and the other prisoners reared back, expecting an attack.
Ruhiton stopped in the middle of the room. He threw a glance at Khelu Chowdhury. And then looked at the staircase again. Meanwhile, the convicts had taken his iron bedstead downstairs. Ruhiton walked to the head of the stairs. Holding on to the wall with his right hand, he lowered his head and began to descend, one step at a time. A song he had heard his mother sing when he was a child came back to him. He chanted the lines in his head:
Clouds gather in the north
It’s raining in the west
All the fine clothes are soaked.
Was this how life was? Clouds gathered in the north but it rained in the west? And one’s beloved clothes, full of colour, became drenched? A fire raged in his heart. Its flames burnt him more than any anger could. A dam seemed to burst in his heart. Mucus trickled out of his nose. He wiped it with the back of his hand.
At the bottom of the stairs, he stopped abruptly.
His bedstead had been laid out in the ward downstairs, next to a window looking out on the field. One of the warders was looking at it. The two convicts stood close by. All of them turned to look at Ruhiton. Ruhiton could still see his mother’s face. He could still hear her sing, ‘Clouds gather in the north, it’s raining in the west…’
Chapter Eleven
‘BRING THE TRUNK downstairs and put it next to the bed,’ the warder ordered the convicts.
The convicts looked at the staircase. Ruhiton was still standing at the bottom of the stairs. The convicts looked at him apprehensively. Ruhiton decided not to raise his head. The sight of several shadows on the floor told him that Khelu babu and the rest were leaning over the banister to watch him.
Whores. On Barka Chhetri’s money? Fun at the fair! He was reminded again of all the things they had said. After Tepri there was Mangala. His father had himself paid a dowry to Mangala’s father for her marriage with Ruhiton. Ruhiton had told Mangala about Tepri after they were married. But not by choice
. He had confessed his adventures after an overdose of deyong. After the hangover had passed, he had become aware of Mangala’s rage. Which other girl had he known besides Mangala? Yes, he had never forgotten Tepri. But he had never seen Tepri after his marriage to Mangala.
Tepri belonged to the Rajvanshi tribe. They could not marry Mahatos, Kurmis, or Santhals. But she could have married Ruhiton if she had been a Mahato or a Santhal. It would have been called a baha samha wedding. That was what they called it when a widow or a married woman married another man. Ruhiton had heard this from his mother.
He did not know the rules of marriage among Rajvanshi Kshatriyas. Tepri had never spoken to him of marriage. She only wanted to run off into the jungle, shaking her hips. Besides, her father was a small landowner. Ruhiton was his hired tiller. But what if Tepri had been a Mahato or Kurmi or Santhal, what if she hadn’t been married?
Lying beside Tepri in the dense shadow under a wistful breeze, deep inside the forest, if he happened to ask why she didn’t want to go to her husband’s home, she would hum a song:
‘Shon baahe dewanir chhaowa
Mui kambakti kapal pora
Shoshur hoia mayeo khaowailen mokey
Shashur hoia dilen kannya
Mairley golam dupurbela
Mairley golam maatit phyaleya.’
(Listen to me O minister’s son, I am an unfortunate fool. My father-in-law had me beaten up. My father-in-law instructed the servant. He threw me down on the ground in the afternoon and beat me up.)
Tepri seemed to be sobbing along with the wind in the forest.
Without looking around, Ruhiton went outside the ward. The prisoners who were already downstairs looked at him. Ruhiton didn’t look at any of them. He walked off towards the shade beneath the tree. He had forgotten where he was.
He could have had a nir bolok bapla with Tepri, he mused. He had learnt of all this from his mother. A nir bolok bapla was the kind of wedding where the bride forced herself on the groom and his family. Tepri was the kind who would force a man to marry her. This force was the sweet honey of her existence. But Poshpat Kurmi had been alive then. Having observed Tepri for a couple of days on Shuku Pongani’s farm, he had realized what his son was up to. Before the year was out he had arranged Ruhiton’s marriage. Kirin baha bapla. A straightforward wedding. He had chosen the bride himself, borrowing the money for the dowry. And he had made Ruhiton give up his job on Shuku Pongani’s farm.
Still, had Ruhiton really managed to forget Tepri? He had not thought of her at all for some time. That’s what human hearts are like. Mangala had made him forget everything. Tepri and Mangala were different. Mangala was younger too. A simple, straightforward Mahato girl. She was not yet a woman. She didn’t roll her eyes the way Tepri did. She had not learnt to smile bewitchingly. She ran away if Ruhiton tugged at her hand. There were no ringworm sores on her skin. Her dark complexion was so fine it seemed soaked in oil. Her eyes were as deep as the black waters of the Chandmani Mai lake.
Yes, when the torrents from a waterfall filled up the bottomless pit of a lake, it was called a mani. Mani was also a synonym for a woman’s senses. The lake was a symbol of the mother’s womb. And people worshipped this symbol. They prayed for plentiful water. Actually, the Terai was a natural reservoir for potable water. Water was available round the year.
Ruhiton used to feel as though his seventeen years of existence had been submerged in Mangala’s eyes, which were like the deep, black water of the lake. But could it stay submerged forever? Why then had he gone off in search of Tepri after all those years of being married? Was it like a tiger stalking the kill it had left behind? Like the tiger who couldn’t help revisiting his kill?
No, Ruhiton had not run into Tepri again. Mangala had been the only one in his life after that. Just the one wife. But so many different personalities in the same form. Many in one. Why talk of Tepri alone? He had discovered every woman in the world within Mangala. What an experience it had been.
But whores? He had been accused of bringing this disease on himself by sleeping with whores at fairs, financed by Barka Chhetri? As these thoughts ran through his mind, he raised his hands to look at them. The very next moment he flashed a look over his shoulder at the ward on the first floor with his flaming red eyes, the wounds festering on the eyelids. He gritted his teeth so hard that his jaw trembled. He didn’t see Khelu Chowdhury by the window.
The agony was greater than the anger in Ruhiton’s heart. How could an old-timer, a leader of men, hurt him so much? Was their long relationship a lie? Whores? Paid for by Barka Chhetri? Oh! You were right, Ma. Clouds gather in the north, it’s raining in the west…
He leant against a tree, putting his weight on it. There was no one near him now. The roar of a passing heavy motor vehicle could be heard close by. He shut his eyes. And still the colour of stale raw meat floated before his eyes. Against this background wriggled the familiar reddish-brown snake with the red welts on its skin.
Ruhiton started, opening his eyes. He felt as though the snake was wriggling around inside his body. Was that why he saw it every time he shut his eyes? An image of Barka with his gun appeared before his eyes.
‘Here you are.’ A Bengali warder stood before him, his baton dangling from a thong around his wrist. The look in his eyes made Ruhiton’s skin prickle. Although he had a smile on his face. ‘This is where Gandhiji used to pray,’ he said, ‘when he was in this jail.’
This was the spot! But unlike that man, Ruhiton didn’t know any prayers. How did praying help? Did the oppressed become free? Did the landless get land? Did workers run the country? Was this agony, this burning rage and humiliation, abated?
Turning away from the warder, Ruhiton set off towards the shaded part of the field near the western wall. ‘Come with me,’ said the warder. ‘I came here to fetch you. The doctor is here to see you, he’s waiting in the downstairs ward.’
Ruhiton stopped abruptly. Turning back, he set off towards the ward after a glance at the warder. So Khelu Chowdhury had got them to send for a doctor?
Chapter Twelve
AS SOON AS he set foot inside the ward, Ruhiton saw a young man in shirt and trousers, dark and slight of build, standing near the window and looking out at the field. A convict stood near the iron bedstead. It was the hospital boy, holding a bag. After a quick glance at Ruhiton, he moved away from the bed and looked at the man near the window.
‘He’s here, sir,’ said the Bengali warder behind Ruhiton.
The man in shirt and trousers turned around quickly from the window. He looked keenly at Ruhiton. Stepping forward he asked, ‘Is your name Ruhiton Kurmi?’
Ruhiton Kurmi nodded in assent. Although he couldn’t hear him clearly, he had read his lips. Astonishment flashed across the man’s young eyes. Not only surprise, but also something akin to reverence spread across his face. His voice echoed the same feeling. ‘I’m the doctor here, I’ve come to examine you.’
This was not the doctor who had accompanied the superintendent on his first day in this jail. This one was much younger. His slight build made him look very young. He didn’t appear to be a doctor at all. ‘Come near the window, please, sit here on the bed,’ the doctor continued. ‘There’s more light here. It’ll be easier to examine you.’
Ruhiton took a look at the staircase on the left. Then he walked up to the window and sat down on the bed. The doctor took a position near him. He scanned Ruhiton from head to toe with great concentration. Without a word, he seemed to size up Ruhiton’s entire body with his eyes. At times he frowned, at other times his face tightened, his expression becoming serious. He even stood on tiptoe to examine the top of Ruhiton’s head.
Ruhiton braced himself. This young lad would undoubtedly bring up whores too, just as Khelu Chowdhury had.
‘This is quite an old condition. You’ve been suffering for a long time, haven’t you?’ the doctor asked.
‘Yes.’ Ruhiton nodded.
‘How strange!’ the doctor said. ‘Didn’t t
he doctor at the previous jail examine you?’
‘He did,’ Ruhiton answered half indifferently. ‘I use the ointment he gave me on my hands and feet.’
The young doctor’s face was suffused with irritation and rage. He beckoned to the convict acting as the hospital boy, taking the bag from him. Opening the bag, the doctor took out a shining piece of iron resembling a long nail and some cotton. ‘Have you ever had your blood tested?’ he asked.
‘No.’ Ruhiton shook his head.
‘How long has it been since your fingers began to rot away like this?’ the doctor enquired.
Ruhiton tried to remember, knitting his hairless eyebrows. He grew confused, unable to do so.
Touching Ruhiton’s palm and fingers with the piece of iron, the doctor asked, ‘Can you remember since when your fingers have been bent this way?’
‘No.’ Ruhiton shook his head again.
‘Strange!’ exclaimed the young doctor. ‘No pain or burning sensation?’
‘I don’t feel any pain or anything.’ Ruhiton shook his head. ‘But I feel as though I have a fever at times.’
‘Feel as though you have a fever? It isn’t actually a fever?’ the doctor asked in surprise.
‘It might be,’ Ruhiton said.
‘You have fever now,’ said the doctor. Looking at Ruhiton’s feet, he asked, ‘And two or three of your nails are gone, doesn’t it hurt?’
‘No.’ Ruhiton shook his head.
The doctor was stunned into silence.
‘I didn’t even feel it when I lost the nails, I don’t know when or how it happened,’ Ruhiton said indifferently.
‘Didn’t even feel it?’ Tapping his nails with the piece of iron, the doctor asked him, ‘Can you feel this?’
‘I don’t feel anything even if I plunge my fingers into boiling rice. How will I feel this?’ Ruhiton said in some surprise.
‘You don’t feel anything if you plunge your fingers into boiling rice?’ The doctor stared at him in astonishment. ‘What about cold water?’
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