Jasoda

  ‘Gauri, I think.’

  ‘Will you vouch for it that the child is mine?’

  ‘To whom shall I vouch?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ The grocer looked puzzled. ‘To whoever. To the villagers. To the world.’

  ‘But you won’t even be here.’

  ‘Even then. Besides, I’ll be back when the drought’s over.’

  ‘Do you think you could let me have a bit more of the bajra and lentils?’

  The grocer poured an extra kilo of bajra and lentils into the bag.

  ‘And may I have some salt, chilli and turmeric powder, please?’

  ‘Don’t overdo it, Jasoda. You are getting greedy.’

  ‘It’s a fine image of the Lord. Vishnuji always brings luck.’

  ‘A fat lot of luck he’s brought you.’

  The grocer spooned out the turmeric, salt and chilli onto separate pages of an old, used notebook and folded them into little packets. ‘Will you?’

  ‘Yes, I’ll tell them it’s your baby and not the tailor’s.’

  Four days had passed and the water tanker had still not come. Jasoda had been frugal with the food but more than a third of the grocer’s munificence was already gone. There was no question of going back to him, as she was well aware that his moment of weakness was past. Besides, the grocer had already got rid of most of his stocks of grains, oils and spices since he was leaving Kantagiri very soon. She had sent Himmat all by himself to Jalta that morning to find out if they had any news of the tanker. She was relieved to hear that it hadn’t already come and gone but nobody in Jalta had any idea about when, or if, it would turn up.

  It was a couple of days since she had kept everything ready for departure. The axle of the cart was not evenly balanced and kept dragging to the left. She had planed it down a little at a time for fear of overcompensating and by merely switching the weight and the drag pattern. The wheel and axle joint had been oiled and she had laid a plank and a thin mattress for her mother-in-law to lie on. She had little choice but to be ruthless about what to take. The condition of Lakhan, the remaining ox, was precarious. He was gaunt and for months now had had a suppurating skin infection that would not go away. Malnutrition had killed his appetite and he looked ready to die. But he could still stand and that was what mattered. Most of the livestock, barring the cows, within a radius of fifty miles, had either been eaten by their owners or had died of starvation. No one spoke of it but it was generally known that some of the cows too had been converted into meals.

  Jasoda had to make sure that if Lakhan died on the way, the children would be able to carry the utensils and the water while she carried the old lady. The cow, which had not given milk for years now, she would leave behind with the priest. Let him decide what to do with her.

  The tanker arrived three days later. She filled up seven pots. But there was hardly any food left.

  It wasn’t clear if the constable had spent the night in His Highness’s Palace or walked all the way from Jalta at night to be knocking so early on Siyaram’s door.

  ‘This is the police, Siyaram. Open the door.’

  Sangram Singh and the grocer had joined the constable by now.

  ‘He won’t open the door, take my word for it,’ the grocer told the constable.

  ‘Why don’t you keep your word to yourself and let me do my job?’

  Himmat, Pawan and the rest of their friends stood a little to the side, hoping to avoid the wrath of the adults and yet get a clear view of things.

  The constable was pounding the door with the butt of his ancient rifle. ‘Open the door, Siyaram.’

  ‘Is the gun loaded?’ Himmat asked.

  ‘It sure is and if you children don’t leave this instant, the bullets are going to fly and there’s no telling who is going to get hit.’

  The children weren’t quite sure whether the constable was trying to scare them away or meant what he said. Most of the village, whatever was left of it, had arrived too. Now the priest, naked to the waist, was hurrying towards them, his sacred thread flapping above his protruding navel.

  ‘What are you planning to do, constable,’ the priest tapped the policeman on his shoulder and waited till he had his full attention, ‘if Siyaram does not respond?’

  ‘Do I tell you how to pray, priest, or when to do it? Why don’t you all get back to your work and let me go about mine?’

  ‘Because this concerns all of us. That man Siyaram poses a serious threat to the whole village.’

  ‘Are you listening to me, Siyaram?’ The policeman knocked again. ‘I do not want to break down your door but I will if you don’t cooperate.’

  ‘On whose authority will you take such an extreme measure?’ Siyaram’s sudden voice was like a bomb lobbed amongst the villagers. They drew back and huddled closer to each other. Even the policeman retreated a few steps.

  ‘There’s a complaint lodged against you. They say you are storing dangerous materials, some say smuggled explosives, in your house, and if there’s a fire, the whole village could blow up.’

  ‘I’ll wager the complaint has been lodged by Prince Parbat Singh and his gang of three – the grocer, the priest and the Prince’s toady, Sangram Singh. Surely you don’t believe these trumped-up charges?’

  ‘You have nothing to fear if they are trumped up. I represent the law. Justice, I assure you, will be done.’

  ‘Then why don’t you spend your time usefully and probe the conspiracy of silence amongst the few villagers who are still left in Kantagiri? Ask them who is the father of the grocer’s child?’

  ‘Are you going to let that lunatic make such outrageous allegations against the people of this village?’ The grocer was beside himself. ‘This will have serious consequences. The whole village will go up in flames if you do not shut that man up right away.’

  ‘Ask Sangram Singh what happened to Dulare instead. I guess he’ll tell you there was no such untouchable in our village. Is that your official version too? Ask him why his wife is the sole breadwinner while he spends the whole day in the Palace arse-licking His Highness who can’t stand the sight of him.’

  Sangram Singh did not wait to listen to the grocer’s tirade. He pushed past the constable and dashed home.

  ‘I’m going to take you into custody, Siyaram, for slandering His Highness, not to mention the good citizens of Kantagiri, lest they lynch you. Open the door. I have a warrant for you.’

  ‘The vultures in the sky wait for a beast to die,’ Siyaram would have his say today, ‘but the grocer and his brethren are cannibals. They like to eat their victims alive.’

  Sangram Singh was back with an axe.

  ‘Don’t take the law into your hands,’ the constable warned him. ‘Give me the axe.’

  Sangram Singh had raised the axe high and was swinging it down with force. He was hitting out in an unfocussed rage and his aim was not very good. He seemed bent on tearing down not just the door but Siyaram’s whole house. Chips and sharp bits of wood flew all over and one struck Pawan on the forehead. The boy yelped in pain and the other children cowered and took cover behind the adults. Jasoda heard Pawan’s cries and came looking for him. The blood from the wound was running into his left eye and he was convinced that his father had deliberately targeted the wooden missile at him. Jasoda picked him up without looking at her husband and took him home.

  The blade of the axe got stuck deep in the wood a few times and the effort of disengaging it made Siyaram’s house vibrate. Within minutes the door was in shreds. But Siyaram had reinforced his house like a fortress. There were still three more doors of solidly nailed planks Sangram Singh’s axe would have to work its way through.

  ‘That’s enough, Sangram Singh. Or else I’ll have to put you behind bars too.’

  ‘Whose side are you on, constable?’ Sangram Singh threw down his axe. ‘That senile man dishonours His Highness and all of us and you take his side?’

  Siyaram opened the door. ‘Let me see the warrant, constable.’

&nb
sp; ‘I have it, that’s all that matters.’

  ‘No, that’s not enough. Because if you arrest me without a valid warrant, you’ll lose your job and be convicted.’

  The policeman laughed. ‘Who is to say whether I have a warrant or not?’

  Siyaram shook his head. ‘Too many witnesses, some of them children who will slip up in the witness box. You should have come in the dead of night if you wanted to rig up an arrest.’

  ‘Don’t provoke me, Siyaram. I make a bad enemy.’

  ‘The warrant, let’s see your warrant.’

  ‘So be it.’ The policeman dipped into his pocket and produced a piece of paper. ‘You thought I was bluffing, didn’t you?’

  Siyaram went over the piece of paper carefully, folded it and returned it to the policeman.

  ‘It’s not your signature that’s required, you fool. You need a magistrate’s signature and the stamp of the court. Until then you can’t touch me.’

  ‘That’s what you think?’ But there wasn’t much conviction in the policeman’s voice.

  ‘You almost pulled it off. Unfortunately for you my father made the mistake of sending me to school and my wife’s brother was the district court clerk’s peon.’

  ‘Forget the warrant.’ Sangram Singh took charge of the proceedings. ‘The people of Kantagiri will be the judges and put this old bastard behind bars.’

  But Siyaram had already slammed the door shut and bolted the triple latches.

  ‘Tell the Prince, his sycophants and the head constable,’ Siyaram shouted from inside, ‘that even if they get a warrant from the President of the country, they’ll never be able to enter my house. Nobody, nobody can steal my wood now.’

  There was an eerie silence.

  ‘What the hell is the old man up to now?’ the constable asked in a whisper. He didn’t have to wait for an answer. You could smell the kerosene as the flames tore through the roof of the house and shot up like a geyser.

  It took a day and a half for the fire to die.

  Jasoda had decided there was no point travelling in the daytime. The children would be cranky in the heat and the sun. They would be thirsty all the time, and so too Lakhan the ox, and the water would not last more than two days.

  She had packed forty rotis and a whole lot of dry red chilli chutney. That was going to be their breakfast, lunch and dinner.

  ‘I’m not coming.’ Pawan refused to get into the cart.

  ‘Don’t make it more difficult than it is,’ Jasoda told him. ‘Get in.’

  ‘Why do we have to leave our home?’

  ‘Because it hasn’t rained for years and there’s nothing to eat in our village.’

  ‘What’s rain?’

  ‘What do you mean, what’s rain?’ Himmat asked his brother irritably.

  ‘He’s never seen rain, Himmat. How would he know what it is? In the good years before the drought began, the sky would become dark and buckets of water would fall from it.’

  ‘Who was pouring the buckets?’

  ‘They say God makes rain.’

  ‘So why has He stopped?’

  ‘I wish I could ask him.’

  ‘Look Maa,’ Himmat yelled. ‘Look, a star’s falling.’

  Jasoda and Pawan looked up. A meteor was racing down towards the Palace.

  ‘You think if we were standing on His Highness’s terrace, I could catch it?’

  ‘Wouldn’t that be lovely? Will you give it to me to put in my nose ring, Himmat?’

  ‘Yes, next time I’ll run and catch it.’

  There was hardly any sky left. It was jammed with stars, almost every inch of it. Some of them throbbed as if there was a heart pulsing within them while the others threw a steady beam of light.

  ‘What are stars, Maa?’

  ‘How come you are asking so many questions, Pawan, instead of climbing into the cart?’

  ‘They are holes,’ Himmat explained, ‘through which rain falls.’

  ‘Is that true, Maa?’

  ‘Yes. If you go close enough, you can see what’s on the other side of the sky. Look up. It’s the second day of the new moon. Can you see it?’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘There, to your right.’ Jasoda pointed out the thin sliver of moon to her children. ‘Quick, close your eyes and make a wish.’

  The two older boys closed their eyes.

  ‘What should I wish for?’ Pawan asked his mother.

  ‘Whatever you want. What did you wish for, Himmat?’

  ‘I asked for maalpohe to eat at every meal every day.’

  ‘And you, Pawan?’

  ‘A rainbow-coloured top which will never stop spinning.’

  ‘And you, Daadi?’ Himmat asked, but his grandmother was already asleep in the cart.

  ‘Will I get my top tomorrow?’

  ‘And the maalpohe?’

  ‘Not tomorrow but soon.’

  ‘Come, get into the cart. We must leave.’

  It was three o’clock at night when Pawan, Himmat and their grandmother were woken up with a jolt that nearly threw them out of the cart. They had been travelling for nine nights and Lakhan had finally collapsed. He hadn’t had time to fold his knees and lower himself to the ground and the yoke had broken the vertebrae in his neck. There were multiple fractures in his front leg too.

  The children and the grandmother were shaken but unhurt. When they got down, Jasoda undid the yoke and pushed the cart back. She tried to give Lakhan water but he was in too much pain to care. She pulled out the mattress from the cart and laid it by the side of the road. She helped her mother-in-law lie down and asked the children to sit with her. The two older boys were distraught. Himmat kept kissing Lakhan and telling him that he was going to look after him and he was going to be all right, while Pawan patted his forehead and told him he loved him.

  ‘I think we should leave Lakhan alone now because he’s very tired and would like to rest. The two of you should lie down next to your grandmother and go to sleep. Maybe if we are lucky, he will recover by the morning.’

  Jasoda got up when the children finally fell asleep and took out the gun she had carried with her. It belonged to her husband’s grandfather who had been a soldier and had fought in the big war in a foreign land. She had brought it along just in case she needed it in a confrontation with some stranger. There were three vultures already in the sky. A few more had taken positions on the ground. Jasoda loaded the bullets in the chamber and clicked not once but again and again. It was an old gun that had not been used or cleaned for decades. Jasoda figured the gun was as useful now as Lakhan.

  Himmat was staring at her. ‘What are you going to do, Maa?’

  ‘Nothing.’ Jasoda tried to hide the ancient gun under her odhani.

  ‘Are you going to kill Lakhan? And then us?’ he asked softly. ‘Is that why you wanted us to close our eyes?’

  ‘Look at me.’ Jasoda held Himmat’s shoulders with her hands. ‘I’m your mother. I’ll kill to protect you.’

  ‘You are hurting me, Maa.’

  Jasoda let go of his shoulders.

  ‘Now close your eyes and sleep. We have a long journey ahead.’

  Sameer had begun to scream.

  ‘You too,’ Jasoda snapped at him and for once he listened to her.

  ‘I’m not going any further,’ the old lady said. ‘This is the end of the journey for Lakhan and me.’

  ‘We’ll see about that.’

  ‘No, there’s nothing to see. This is where we part company.’

  ‘You’ll wake up the children.’

  ‘Don’t change the subject.’

  ‘The answer’s no. We must stick together.’

  ‘You listen to me now. I’m your mother-in-law.’

  ‘I never forget that.’

  ‘You’ve hated me all these years and yet, not once have you disobeyed me. Why do it now?’

  ‘I don’t hate you.’

  ‘Not even when I told you I would throw you out if you didn’t deliver sons and heirs?
’

  ‘My mother would have said the same thing to her daughter-in-law.’

  The first grey streak of the day appeared in the sky. Lakhan was still breathing but Jasoda knew that it was a matter of minutes. It was time to wake up Himmat and Pawan.

  ‘I’m going to the village across the road to see if I can get some help to bury Lakhan. Are you listening, Pawan? This is important.’

  ‘I want to go back to sleep.’

  ‘See those vultures on the boughs of the tree? There are four of them. Any moment now some more will join them. They’ll keep wheeling around and suddenly attack Lakhan.’

  ‘I won’t allow them to touch Lakhan,’ Himmat told her.

  ‘What will you do?’

  ‘I’ll wave them away.’

  ‘Take out your catapults, both of you. If any of the vultures comes within six feet of Lakhan, take aim and let him have it.’

  ‘I’ll kill them all.’

  ‘No, you won’t. Another hundred will take their place. Wait till they make a move. If you take a lazy aim and miss, poor Lakhan will pay the price and die before his time.’

  PART TWO

  By the time the different groups of stragglers reached Sharana railway junction, there were over two hundred of them. Jasoda was worried that whatever little money she had would not be enough to get her and her family to a big city. But it appeared that none of the others were thinking of buying tickets so she didn’t either. Instead she propelled and pushed her mother-in-law and children into a compartment in the first train that came along.

  It took Jasoda a fortnight to realize that it was not a good idea to set up home in one of the side streets behind the Mumbai Central Railway Terminus if she was to support her family. A man who had turned up three days earlier had told her this was his territory and like other beggars she would have to hand over her earnings to him. He would gauge how good she was at eliciting money from passers-by and then decide what percentage he would give her.

  ‘Let me settle down’, she told him, ‘and then we can haggle about money.’