The Complete Short Stories

life. His wife was a notch or two above him. If her bahu were ever to be found standing in the doorway of her darkened room or having stepped foot on the terrace, floods would arrive, the heavens would fall. She was stricken with the malady of incessant nagging. A bit of extra salt in the dal was an excuse enough to nag all day. A huge, hefty woman, laden with jewellery, wearing a wide lehnga of chintz, she sat all day long on her string cot, her box of betel leaves beside her. Even a leaf dared not move against her wish. Observing her bahu’s new-fangled habits, she boiled with rage. Our reputation is at stake. Just look at the way she’s peering out from the balcony. If my daughter had such a roving eye, I would have throttled her. Who knows what kind of people live in her part of the world! She never wears any jewellery. Look at her; she couldn’t care less about dressing up. Do you think these are good signs? Not just Leela, Sitasaran too had to face her tongue-lashing. ‘Oh, so you also like sleeping in the moonlight, is it? You call yourself a man? What kind of a man is he whose wife does not listen to him? Home all day long, stuck to her. Don’t you have a tongue in your head? Why don’t you make her understand?’

Sitasaran would say,‘Amma, if only she would listen.’

‘Why won’t she listen, aren’t you man enough? A mere glance from a man should make a woman tremble.’

‘How far have you got trying to make her see reason?’

‘You think she cares? She must be thinking—this old woman will die sooner or later and then I will be mistress of this house.’

‘Well, what can I say in response to that? Can’t you see how weak she has become? She has lost her colour. Her condition is going from bad to worse, being in that room all day long.’

Whenever she heard these words from her son, the mother would smoulder and rage all day long, alternately cursing her luck and this time in her life.

Though he spoke like this in front of his mother, the moment he was with Leela, Sitasaran’s attitude would change. He would say what Leela liked to hear, to such an extent that both made fun of the old woman. Leela had no relief other than this. All through the day she had to do endless chores. She had never sat before a stove, but now she had to slap away at quintals of atta as rotis had to be made for both the workers as well as the errand boys. Sometimes she would sit and weep for hours over the stove. It wasn’t as if these people couldn’t afford a cook but an old family custom demanded that the bahu cook, and this tradition had to be maintained. It was only the sight of Sitasaran that calmed Leela’s tortured spirit momentarily.

One summer evening, a breeze blew outside, but inside it was unbearably stuffy. Leela was sitting and reading a book when Sitasaran came in and said, ‘It’s very hot in here, sit outside.’

‘It is far better to bear this heat than listen to the taunts one would start hearing the moment one steps outside.’

‘If she says anything today, I won’t be able to hold myself back.’

‘And it will then be impossible to even stay in this house.’

‘We’ll get away from this strife.’

‘I won’t leave even if it kills me. Whatever she says or does, in her eyes, it’s for my own good. It’s not as if she has any enmity towards me. Yes, we may not like what she says, but that’s a different matter. She herself has had to endure all the suffering that she now wants me to bear. Her suffering has not affected her health in any way. At sixty-five she is sprightlier than me. So how can she comprehend that such suffering might injure one’s health?’

Sitasaran looked at her wilted face with beseeching eyes and said, ‘You have had to bear much sorrow in this house. This family is not worthy of you. You must surely have committed some sin in your previous life.’

Playing with her husband’s hands, Leela said, ‘Then how would I have found your love?’3

Five years went by. Leela became a mother of two. A boy and a girl. The boy was named Jankisaran and the girl, Kamini. The children kept the house alive. The grandfather doted on the girl, while the grandmother doted on the boy. Both the children were boisterous and spoilt, and were given to cussing and making rude faces. Cussing and making rude faces was nothing to them. They would eat throughout the day and so often fall sick. Leela had tolerated all her own suffering but she could not bear to see these bad habits in her children, but who paid attention to her? Despite the fact that it was she who had given birth to these children, she was not considered significant; the children were everything. She had no right to even scold her own children; her mother-in-law would tear her apart.

The biggest trouble now was that her own health kept getting worse. During her pregnancy she had to undergo all the cruelties that ignorance, foolishness and superstition ordained for child-bearing women. In that hell hole where there was neither air nor light, nor any hygiene, and a foul smell pervaded the musty, filthy room, her delicate form shrivelled up. Whatever fight was left in her after the first childbirth was razed entirely after the second. She became pale and her eyes were sunken hollows. It seemed as if she was bloodless. Her appearance changed completely.

It was summer. There were not just ripe mangoes to eat, but also watermelons. There had never been such a good crop of both fruits. God only knew how they came to be so sweet that year. No one could stop eating them. Baskets laden