ARUNDHATI

(A short story)

SHIVA PRASAD SINGH

Translated from the original in Hindi by Shri RAM SEVAK SINGH,

Lecturer in English, Gujarat University, Ahmedabad

The courtyard was even now quite hot, as though beneath the crust of earth was there kept hidden an oven with burning coals. If the coals are visible, one may try to protect oneself from the red flames or the pungent smoke, but what could Badi Bahu (the first daughter-in-law) do? Not that she did not want to avoid getting scorched by the heat but is it not true that sometimes we like heat? Well, the heat may not be liked, but the effort to avoid it may mean disturbing others. Badi Bahu was not in a position to cast herself in the role of a stumbling block and fulfil her instinct as she knew what it all would mean. She would hear words of reproach and humiliation. It was on this account that though the courtyard was hot she had continued to be there: she had come to like it.

Beside her was her mother-in-law and next to her was her sister-in-law. Both were fast asleep. To get sound sleep after such a big incident! For a moment Badi Bahu felt envious.

She herself had been watching the water of the pond on whose surface the bird had drawn a curved line with its thin beak. The surface had become again smooth, but she was still wide-eyed looking at it, lost and dazed. All on a sudden she felt the tremors of an earthquake and found the pond with its skirting walls turned into an open vessel, its troubled water in its entire expanse making and unmaking half circles….

“Leave it there, Bahuji,” Heera had said while throwing a mouthful of water towards the shining moon in the pool….“leave it there, Bahuji, I will wash the sari for you.”

The white sari had spread on the wrinkled surface of water a layer of moonlight, and Heera had giggled while drawing its folds nearer to him by his hands. As a matter of fact the waves had folded the sari for him. He had only squeezed it and stood before her. He had gripped the upper end and waved it in the air to remove the shrinks, and while handing it over to Badi Bahu he had suddenly burst into laughter. His white teeth had flashed moonlight and the red wet lips of Badi Bahu had curved in a bashful smile. Heera had felt immensely satisfied, and Badi Bahu experienced for the first time in her life that she was not as despicable and small as she had taken herself to be, though she had been reduced to nursing and serving the family. She was tickled by reverberations of a gay and tender thought that she had subdued a slender, attractive and innocent young man through some unknown power of hers even though her life was apparently meaningless and dull. Like a curly wave it was a hidden, suppressed, desire that had found expression and brought about a change in her.

She had come back home, light-hearted and gay, but she had let a spark lose itself in the jungle of bamboos. For a moment the white smoke might have remained undetected underneath the dusky layers of memories, but the wild flames did not take long to break them through, and the result was that the exploded ripe and unripe fruits had started getting scattered all around. Definitely there was something serious in it. No doubt he was a servant, but who could deny that he was a fast-growing youth. He was no more a child. And what a woman she was!...pooh, she was having her sari washed by a man...

Badi Bahu knew for certain that it was a hiss of the hurt ego consequent on her helplessness to win Heera over. More than this she was sure that she had brought somebody under her spell through some secret force within, rather than herself been subdued by some power.

And was it something so significant that she had become an obsession with every one? Out of the four walls of her house, what a world to see, but how hazy and impervious to her! Had she ever experienced unison with it? That world was a big wavy expanse of water on which floated lustily the heavy two-storey barge. What if the waters were turbulent; they could only caress the barge. Badi Bahu thought she was quite happy sitting on the barge–if not happy at least quite satiated. The body and the mind both were fast asleep like a child under her care. She liked actually when the barge swung to and fro. At least for some time she had felt the excitement run through her backbone to find the water restless and disturbed. When the body swings softly the earth and the heaven seem to be embracing each other.

“Badi Bahu! You did not take Chhoti Bahu (the younger daughter-in-law) with you.” When she had just kept the sari on the cot and was squeezing out water from her dishevelled hair, her mother-in-law who was lying on the cot in the courtyard had spoken: “She also should have taken a dip in the pond. It is so hot these days.” The whole body is sticky from sweat.”

Badi Bahu had not said anything. She had gathered the hair near her forehead and tied it into a knot like a mountain peak.

She went to her room and poured some ghee in the mud saucer. She dipped the thicker side of the wick in the ghee, put the mud saucer near the tulasi plant and she lighted up the wick. A thin flame rose up smokeless and fragrant. The mud saucer looked quite safe as if the very purpose of its existence was to illumine the tulasi plant, and that is all. Her hands folded. When she had bowed to it her mother-in-law had drawn nearer and looked fixedly on her and the mud saucer.

“Like this flame only a son…..Badi Bahu….” She had only mumbled but it was loud enough to be heard if it were not there. Badi Bahu had looked for a moment at her mother-in-law from the corners of her eyes, and when she had stood up she had found the moon quite high in the sky–so high that its beams met her white smile to lose their identity in them. Badi Bahu felt strongly urged to bow once more to the tulasi plant. Who knows why that night had seemed so fragrant that her heart had fluttered to spread over the entire sky. Everything in a heap was placed at her feet. O God, how strong would be the heart which would embrace all that and yet keep the tide at an arm’s length.

The barge was rocking on the surface of water in the same way. She had slept a sleep of unalloyed happiness. The night had worn out. The dim light of the rising sun was giving the impression of shrinks on the sheet of darkness. In that darkness was blossoming a plant–the plant of tender morning light–and Badi Bahu was pleased to imagine that she would see intently the aura of this plant in the sunshine, but alas the poor soul, she could never guess that the plant would fade at the very news of the arrival of sun. Inside her heart the layer of blackness had thickened into a crust of rough surface which had started to prick her like a multipointed needle.

Never a dawn had been so suspicious, but what have I done, what actually have I done? Badi Bahu pulled her slackening nerves up and was just trying to tighten the knots when Heera came in to collect gram kept in water for cattle. With a jerk Badi Bahu sprang out of the bed to her feet the moment she heard his footfall in the outer exit gallery as if she would find answers to all suspicions in the face of the entrant. Heera did not speak anything. Silently he collected the earthen pot of gram and went out. Neither was there anything new about his gait nor was it sluggish, nor did it seem to be dragging a dead body. But she was now sure to mark from his gait that the meteor that had broken loose that night from the sky was the soul of a ghost, which, capable of transforming itself into any shape, was hovering around the walls of the house.

In the beginning her mother-in-law had not found much in her to like her. As her hair was long she used to call her a Bengalin but Badi Bahu till then was unable to understand the implications of this epithet. Whether it was the long hair or something else that had roused her into this epithet she did not know. She had not liked nor approved of the style of her anchal, she had not accepted her habit of leaving curling tresses loose near her forehead. But Badi Bahu had won her mother-in-law’s heart soon by her affection and devoted services. Sometimes, as if charmed, her mother-in-law would hold the smooth, long hair in her hand and while caressing it would mutter, “Bahu, a beautiful child...” At this remark usually Badi Bahu’s soft red cheeks would turn red like hibiscus and she would by and by go away. After washing her face when she saw her image in the mirror she was not sure if she was doing her hair with her own hands. So round, so lovely. They were borrowed hands that were running smooth through her shining hair. Her eyes gazed into the two eyes of her reflected figure; and saw a reddish flicker poised there in the same way as a shadow of the setting sun lingers in a blue stream current, with the difference that here in the eyes there was something dead, like a coral-rag which showed itself again and again through the wavy waters.

The whole day she looked lost. As she was afraid something untoward might happen, every moment was a suspicious moment and how secretly she had wished these moments of suspicion could nestle in the beats of her heart and get its identity lost in it! But it was a pity that she, like a fascinated mother, was unable to keep these fearful moments of her lap. Somehow evening set in, and when darkness had gathered she suddenly felt that he fear was baseless. She imagined she was now safe, out on the bank of the unfathomable waters of deceptive fears. When again he took her folded sari from the peg and made for the pond she found to her surprise that there was no change in her. It was so perhaps because the imaginary pleasures of a cool bath had relaxed her taut nerves.

Nobody was there near the pond also to find in her a stranger. The place being lonely and she being the solitary bather she could relax fully and regain her poise. She quietly stepped into the pond. She felt the touch of mud at the bottom but this touch was also cool and pleasant. There is a pleasure in getting sunk in mud, she experienced for the first time, but suddenly she found she disliked it and she moved towards another ghat where pebbles kept the bottom dry. That day also a wavy pillar of moonlight was swimming within whose gambit were forming circles within circles, big and small, dashing one another into new ones. For a minute the small circles seemed determined to erase the very existence of that pillar. She had kept her body up to the neck in water and had been watching the fun of the beams of moon which had just risen. By and by a couple of women came to the pond. She was not aware of the presence till they had started whispering into each other’s ears. She turned her eyes towards them, and could stay there no longer. With both hands pushing the water back she came to the bank. While still wrapping herself in Sari she heard one of them telling the other “It seems she is alone today. Who will Wash her sari?” The other one gave a jerk to her neck and weighing morality on her shoulders pouted with contempt “Pooh, how do people dare to do such things?….You’ll see, it would not remain secret for long….”

Badi Bahu dipped the sari in water and left the spot, at once in a disturbed hurry.

Within ,a few days the flames had started licking the walls of the big house. The trembling flames had not yet cast their shadows inside the house; but Badi Bahu could see every nook and corner of the house emitting smoke of smouldering fire.

That night as usual when she took her sari and set out for the pond, her mother-in-law, who till then had lain on the loose cot, sat up suddenly and without any questioning said with scorn in her voice, “Aren’t you satisfied with this...selling your honour in the open market?…..It had never happened in this proud family of Digha...” The mother-in-law continued grudging: “I warned again and again my son against marrying any educated girl of inverted mind, but God knows what spell this Bengalin had cast on him that... Well, see the result...”

The raised feet of Badi Bahu remained suspended in the air for a moment. She gazed with fixed eyes at the face of the mother-in-law. For a moment her mother-in-law had fumbled as if the quivering of her fish like eyes was a living symbol of baseless torture. But then, the hag pulled her nerves again and decided not to be deluded by Badi Bahu’s innocent eyes. She had been fooled for sufficiently long. She would not allow herself to be charmed by this woman who was ready to compromise the pride and honour of the family. Irritated she spoke, “Go, go, show this woman’s art to the one who has turned deaf ears to everything...even though he knows the fact. Only he’ll caress you, and fondle you….”

Badi Bahu came back into her room. She folded the twisted sari again and hung it on the peg, but she did not know where to hang her twisted heart.

“So even he has come to know about it” she whispered to herself. On returning after bath when she had found her husband closeted with his mother, probably yesterday, it was then that they had talked about her. What is their attitude? Do they also subscribe to this gossip? All on a sudden she felt her existence shaken to the foundations and it became hard for her to breathe. She sank into the cot with a gasp.

That night both had slept in the same bed and had seen the stars in new contexts. physically she was relaxed–exhausted and dead dumb with fulfilment–but Psychically she was disturbed. Suddenly her husband whispered to her, “Do you recognise Arundati…?”

Badi Bahu had asked like an innocent child “Is it the name of a star?”

“Oh, so you do not know even Arundhati–the wife of Vasishtha, the great sage? Perhaps at the time of marriage you had repeated the sacred words without understanding them and their implications. Arundhati is remembered for her loyalty to her husband. She was a sati. Conjugal love blossoms only with their belssings….”

“Is it?”

“Look at those seven stars…..In the middle of those three stars is Vashishtha, and if you see carefully you will find another tiny star just near that–it is Arundhati.”

“But, I am told it is not auspicious to see the star!”

“What?”

“It is said, the one who can’t see this star dies within six months....

A strange inanity crept between their entwined bodies–as heavily oppressive as the presence of a dead, scorned snake. They remained silent for a moment. Badi Bahu continued thinking about Arundhati. She found his silence astonishing. “Are you asleep?” she asked.

“Oh, no.”

“May I ask …”

“Oh, yes.”

“Why is Arundhati so small?”

Her husband did not answer the question. Stars are either small or big. Can there be any explanation for their size?

Very soon in the atmosphere of Digha a strange strode imperceptibly and enveloped the whole village into its folds. All, men and women, young and old, now awaited the fall of evening right in the morning. Every evening they were overpowered by a peculiar agonising impulse, and were thus entrusted to the night. But in the early hours of dawn when they get extricated from the soothing lap of night they felt wrenched and started to wait excitedly for the evening again. Everyone of them saw it tainted the same colour. Lochan! This was the cursed name on the tip of everybody’s tongue. Lochan! He was a young man or some twenty-six years. His cheeks were round and red. His eyes were a bit smallish like rohu fish. And when he would sing out some folklore while beating the tabor to its rhythm with his palm, bells jingling around the wrist, these fishes will, as if in a blue lake, make brisk movements in the sockets of the eyes. His eyes were really charming. Every rise and fall of his voice would weave a world of rainbows drunk with whose beauty everyone of the audience would wink and wink till they were lost into memories. Other senses numbed except the ears in whose depth the jingling of bells aroused the same sensations as would be experienced if the pictures etched on the walls of a neglected old temple had come to life and were engaged in group dancing imperceptibly.

Yes, such was the charm of Lochan’s song!

“Will you never hear his songs?” asked Chhote Sarkar that day–

“Every night lots of people come to hear his song, and the wonder is, nobody leaves before the narrative ends. It’s so sad! Only after hearing him you’ll realise that even narratives can make one sad. At least I couldn’t sleep for nights…..”

Badi Bahu had only gazed at her husband. She had not spoken anything.

“Come tonight, will you, dear. He is going to narrate the story of Churula.” She looked at him and gave a serene smile.

“Why did you laugh?” Chhote Sarkar was yet under her charm.

“At nothing in particular.”

“No, tell me why did you laugh?”

“Because I wondered how a mere song could make even you sad.”

As he was going soon to be busy with the arrangements of the function, he left immediately in silence without making any comment on her statement.

When she peeped through the window of the cattle-shed she found a big crowd waiting for the narrative to begin. There was pindrop silence and everyone was lost, anxious. Really he had wonderful hands. The bells tied in a cluster around his wrist jingled rhythmically so that the jingling of each bell could be heard separately–each one to lend special charm to the total effect; though connected with others each one was free within its bound and was poised between right and utility.

Lochan recited the invocation and then suddenly the curtain was drawn on the lanes and roads of an old city–who is this Kamini Mohan! Yes, the flute was venomed to charm the three worlds into raptures. Everyone, man or woman, looked aghast. Who is he–Kamadeo or Indra, or somebody else? Who is he? The womenfolk who had gone to fetch water forgot their ways and followed him. Who is this man to charm the womenfolk of the cities? Who is he ultimately? Everywhere, everyone is talking about him; it seemed people had gone mad with the wine of his voice. Young women could not talk about him without feeling choked, tears rolling down their cheeks…..

And then the flute-player reached the palace. The queen saw him through the window, and said,

“O flute-player, come hither, come…..

“You have played on your flute in every lane, but in my city, O dear one, you have not recited the honey-sweet songs...”

“In other streets, O queen, I played on my flute, but I can’t in yours...In your street there are watchmen...”

And victim to his flute, one day she asked–“Shall I come to you?”

“No, no queen, for God’s sake don’t do this….The king will break my flute, order my skin to be peeled off...”

“The queen thought that the king was a hurdle between her and Churula, so she gave poison to the king...Suddenly the beat on the tabor became mild, and every beat was a groan now...The queen went away with Churula.

After a long time, a passenger asked a beautiful young woman grazing some pigs. “O queen, What is this? Did you poison the king for this? Did you renounce the pride and pleasure of a queen for this?”

The queen looked at him for a moment and then said, ‘Yes brother, yes, I am unhappy, very unhappy. But, when I return, after all this tedium and torture, and hear him play on his flute in the hut at night, I forget everything...swimming on the ocean of ecstasy...”

“So I was called to hear this story.” When Badi Bahu left for home she was boiling with rage. Till now she had believed somehow that Chhote Sarkar at least would not concede the rumour. He was not so narrow-minded...“But he, even he...” And suddenly two drops of tears rolled down her cheeks. She came back to her room. She felt a flame, till then closed tight in the heart-cage, was rising again and again to embrace the whole body. She knew not how long she stood there against the door. So she was driven out of that courtyard even. She had full faith in her safety in that house, though for a moment when her mother-in-law had spoken ill of her, she had felt that the courtyard had shrunken into the size of her body and that she was exposed to her own view. But after this event even she had found no change in Chhote Sarkar and had become complacent. As her husband looked faithful and she herself was confident of her charm over him, she had taken everything easy. At least there was a room in that big house, the witness of her true love to her husband, but now? How could she go even in that room? Such were the apprehensions of Badi Bahu when she was standing against the door.

The night was quite disturbed, but her fatigue proved to be a boon to her. She fell asleep tired and lost, after crying for quite some time. Next day when she got up it was already too late. After washing her face she had just come in the courtyard when she found Heera standing before her.

“Bahuji,” he said in the same easy tone, “will you give me a rupee?”

Badi Bahu fixed her gaze on his face for a moment. A shiver of jealousy ran through her, but the very next moment she felt relaxed. Why was she only the target of attack? She thought again and a deformed figure of Heera flashed before her eyes. But was he responsible for all this? A sudden impulse of affection tickled her and she asked him looking straight into his eyes–“Wha will you do with this money?”

“I’ll buy a flute.”

One knows not why she felt flushed. The lustre of her face disappeared. Then from the adjoining room Chhote Sarkar darted out and suddenly placed himself between the two, and pulled Heera by his hands. Completely nervous and feeble, he lay on the ground like a bundle and Chhote Sarkar was showering on him blows and slaps...

“Bloody….fool, I’ll…..buy you….a flute” He was stuttering in rage, and it was difficult to make out anything from his blubbering,

Badi Bahu stood there stunned, paralysed. She wanted to interfere, and ask her husband to stop beating him. She wanted to say that he was not at all guilty, but she could not say anything. Chhote Sarkar dragged him out of the house. Her mother-in-law and sister-in-law had been watching the event with interest standing near their rooms. It was death to look at them for Badi Bahu, so she returned to her room and flung herself on the floor in a corner.

Till then she had been tempest-torn inside her heart. Everything was there–cyclone, dust, branches breaking loose from the trees and the hissing wind–but all tight pressed in a box. Only that day the lid was taken off and its rage was felt outside. How could all this happen? One can ignore the hissing of wind on a heath, but is it possible to neglect the wind that dashes for nothing against the window panes? She could not make up her mind at once. She reviewed her actions and assured herself that she had done nothing to bring shame on her name. Her relation with Heera was not such that she would feel wretched even for a moment, but….who will hear her? As her heart ached and writhed, her limbs became more and more slack. She had no energy left in her to think any more. She was so much tossed and torn. The waves had washed off all her feelings of revenge. Her very existence was under somebody else’s control that day–something non-descript, neither animate nor visible, but whose tightening iron grip could be felt every moment.

The same evening another mishap...as if events had been pressing forward to this climax only. It was reported that a train had run over Heera. Everyone felt sympathetic towards him. He was run over while trying to save a virgin cow of his master. Yes, it was said so, but Chhote Sarkar knows, and even mother-in-law and sister-in-law know why Heera flung himself before the giant engine.

…..So Heera chose to die to save her from disgrace? Suddenly the seeds of pride sprouted up into life and she felt she had caught once more her meaningless existence floating on water, but will the raging fire around subside after his death? Will her existence be out apart and let regain its original and independent wholeness….Then a fear stung her, as if somebody had thrown a palmful of kerosene on smouldering fire...and a stinking flame rose to envelop her whole body. And the very next moment she visualised that thousands of hands, with tight fists were waving like a jungle. Every fist was strenuously tight as if to obviate the bite of poison flowing in their blood….the poison of hatred and scorn.. Flat hands tough from hard labour, hands with ugly fingers, hands with dirty and delicate wrists, small hands with exaggerated knots...hands and only hands.…and she knows not how a very heavy and hefty figure with diminishing strength is being driven back...Oh, help him withstand the onslaught….Oh help him…..Badi Bahu could see very clearly the helpless, innocent and parched up figure was Heera’s himself, nobody else’s. She herself wants to rise and defend him when she finds to her surprise that the figure has already fallen in fire and is being licked by formidable flames. The crowd of hands has become silent, the tight fists and the taut nerves slack.

Badi Bahu wished she had known all this a couple of days before and asked Heera about it. She would have told him, “Do you see those seven stars? The middle one is Vasishtha…..Just near that is a small star…..It is Arundhati….”

Heera would have rubbed his eyes and said in despair, “Where is Arundhati Bahuji, I can’t see anything…..”

But Badi Bahu could not ask any thing. Night had fallen and she had found the courtyard even at this time of the day hot like oven. Her mother-in-law and sister-in.law were sleeping beside her. Badi Bahu was wondering how one could sleep after such a big event!

Her eyes remained closed for a moment, but then she could not sleep. The darkness of the courtyard had frozen on the frame of her cot. As something had started boiling within her she got up and cast side-long glances in despair. A feeling of nausea over-whelmed her. She put her neck very gently on the wooden frame and vomitted intermittently three or four times. Even after this she felt some sort of smoky water there in the throat to make her uneasy. She waited for some time her throat to clear, but it was all in vain. Tired and dull she lay on the cot. Her mother-in-law and sister-in-law had been awake but they had not thought it desirable even to caress her head or give some water. It is natural perhaps that when the nerves slacken nausea also becomes less repugnant.

In the morning the doctor had come. She did not remember what he had said or done, but she knew for certain that Chhote Sarkar was there with him. After the doctor had left off, he had come back to his mother. Badi Bahu could overhear their talk. The mother-in-law had said, “But, my dear son, take it for granted people will always say it’s Heera’s.”

“Then it’s all right. Let abortion…..” and he went out of the house.

Even while asleep a smile played on her lips. So she had felt nausea because she was pregnant. Her cheeks were just to redden when an agonised enlightenment dashed at this rapture like a hawk. The pigeon had not yet spread its wings when the bloody jaws caught it by the neck...Do they intend to kill my child? One can withstand for hours the gush of water of a controlled drain, but who can dare stand with sick-nerves against the rumbling waters of a forceful current? Her decision to endure everything tight-lipped gave way and she screamed, “O no mother, do not do this, please, mother….”

This supplication enraged all the more her mother-in-law whose murderous eyes were ready to devour her all apiece as a lioness.

What should I not do? What am I going to do, ill-omened woman?” Her mother-in-law said with knives in her voice, “After having brought dishonour on three generations. You are shedding tears now!”

Badi Bahu somehow managed to come down from the cot and she took her mother-in-law’s legs in the crooks of her arms. Due to excessive weeping she was shaking, and supplicating, “Mother don’t be a stone. Don’t you remember how many times you made promises to gods and goddesses just for this child?...Now what has happened that you are becoming so heartless? Mother...”

“Leave my legs,” her mother-in-law shouted kicking at her but the very next moment she did not know why she also burst into tears taking Badi Bahu in her embrace. Through sobs ;he was heard saying, “I know not what to do. O God...”

Chhote Sarkar standing flabberghasted near the door said, “But mother, she has to swallow this….I would see the reputation of the family upheld rather than get the dishonoured child.” He handed over a small bottle of black medicine to his mother. She could not take her gaze off the bottle for a second. Badi Bahu sprang up to her feet and cast a strange look at her husband. She hesitated once, but on another impulse she snatched the bottle away from her mother-in-law’s hand. Her eyes were just to be brimful with tears once more when she forced the medicine down her throat. Throwing the bottle in a corner she flopped down on the cot like a hewn tree. Firmness was once more defeated and she was crying bitterly.

Till the next morning she remained unconscious. Her mother-in-law and Chhote Sarkar, quite relaxed and at ease, were giving her condescending smiles. Pregnancy had been disturbed.

“How weak she has become….” Her mother-in-law observed with affection, “as if she has been ill for months”

Chhote Sarkar did not say anything. Badi Bahu felt as if heaps of collyrium were falling on a slim, shining, golden serpent.

Somebody had pressed hard against her forehead a red fruit. In the twinkling of an eye she was ablaze with a strange brilliance and she was flying towards the sky cutting across those heaps of collyrium. Below were thousands of hands waving like millet plants. The whole atmosphere was resounding with cheers for her…..Arundhati! Arundhati! And she was incessantly moving farther and farther from the earth.

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