Ratansingh asked, ‘Should we go straight home?’
Gaura said, ‘No, go past the cantonment.’
‘The bazaar was so festive,’ said Ratan.
Gaura said, ‘Build a permanent bazaar on this land. There should be shops for locally made clothes and no one should have to pay rent.’
‘It’ll cost a lot.’
‘Sell the house, then there’ll be no dearth of money.’
‘And where would we live, under a tree?’
‘No, in the village house.’
‘I’ll think about it.’
After a while Gaura said, ‘Get plenty of cotton cultivated in the whole estate and those who plant it should not have to go unpaid.’
‘Yes, it’s a good plan, there’ll be a double benefit.’
Gaura thought some more and said, ‘How would it be if you gave away the wood for free? Whoever wants to can cut it down to make spindles.’
‘People will loot us.’
‘Nobody’s so dishonest.’
As she got off the vehicle and stepped into the house, she was suffused with good feelings. It was as if, having escaped its stake, a lamb had started to gambol.
Translated from the Hindi by Anjum Hasan
Witchcraft1
Doctor Jaypal had received a first rank certificate but thanks to destiny or ignorance of professional principles he had never achieved prosperity in his career. His house was in a narrow alley but it didn’t occur to him to get a house in an open area. The cupboards, jars and medical instruments in his pharmacy were quite grubby. In domestic matters, too, he was determinedly frugal.
His son had come of age but the question of his education had not yet arisen. What great wealth have I gained banging my head against books for so long that I should waste thousands of rupees on his education, he would think. His wife Ahalya was a patient lady but Doctor Sahib had put such a burden on these virtues of hers that her back too was bent. His mother was alive and would yearn for a chance to bathe in the Ganga; as for visiting other sacred sites, the subject never arose. Because of this severe thriftiness, there wasn’t the least joy or peace to be found in the house. The happy odd man out was the old servant woman, Jagiya. She had nursed the infant Doctor Sahib and come to love the family so much that she withstood all manner of hardship but never considered going away.2
To make up for the shortage of income from his practice, the doctor had shares in cloth and sugar factories. The Bombay factory had by chance that day sent him his annual dividend of seven hundred and fifty rupees. Doctor Sahib opened the insured parcel, counted the notes, and said goodbye to the postman. But the postman had too many rupee coins; he was sinking under the weight.
He said, ‘Huzoor, I’d be much obliged if you took the coins and gave me the notes, it would lighten my load.’
Doctor Sahib used to keep the postmen happy and would give them free medicines. He thought, Well, I’ll anyway have to call a tonga to get to the bank, why don’t I make a virtue of a necessity.
He counted the rupee coins, put them in a purse and was just thinking that he should go deposit them in the bank when a patient sent for him. Occasions like these rarely arose. The doctor had no faith in the storage box but was helpless. He put the purse in it and went to see the patient. It was three o’clock when he returned and the bank had closed. There was no way the money could be deposited that day. Like every other day he took his place in the pharmacy.
At eight when he was about to go into the house, he brought out the purse to take with him and it felt somewhat lighter. He immediately weighed it on the scales he used for medicines and was stunned. It was a whole five hundred rupees less. He couldn’t believe it. He opened the purse and counted the money. It did turn out to be five hundred rupees short. He agitatedly felt around the other compartment of the box but it was useless. Dejected, he sat down, closed his eyes in order to focus his power of recall, and started thinking. Did I put part of the money elsewhere? Did the postman give me less? Did I make an error in counting it? I’d laid out piles of twenty-five rupees each and there were exactly thirty piles, I remember that well. I counted each pile and put it into the purse, my memory isn’t fooling me. I remember everything clearly. I’d locked the box too but . . . oh . . . now I know, I left the keys on the table, in my hurry I forget to take them. They’re still on the table. That’s it—it slipped my mind to put the keys in my pocket. But who took them, the outside door was closed. No one touches money that’s lying in the house; nothing like this has ever happened before. For sure this is the work of some outsider. It could be that one of the doors was left open, someone came in to get medicine, saw the keys on the table, and opened the box to lift out money.
This is why I don’t take rupees. Who knows, perhaps it’s the postman’s doing. It’s very likely. He saw me putting the purse in the box. If I’d deposited the money I’d have a whole thousand rupees, it would have been easy to calculate the interest. What should I do? Should I inform the police? It’ll be a needless complication. The people of the whole quarter will crowd at the door. Five or ten people will have to suffer abuses and there’ll be no result. So then, should I stay put and keep calm? How to stay calm! This was no wealth I’d
