68

Wearing a tussar silk China coat, a shawl wrapped around his waist, and carrying a canvas bag in his hand — Kailas himself had come and bowed before Harimohini. He was somewhere near thirty-five years of age, short and compact of build, solidly put together; his shaved moustache and beard had, for want of the barber’s attention these past several days, sprouted up like the sharp tips of kusa grass.

Overjoyed to see a kinsman from her late husband’s family after so long, Harimohini exclaimed, “Why, it is Thakurpo! Sit down, sit down.”

And with that she hurriedly spread out a mat. She asked, “Will you wash your hands and feet?”

Kailas said, “No, there is no need. Well — you do seem to be keeping quite well.”

Taking good health as a kind of reproach, Harimohini said, “Well, indeed! Where is there any good health!” — and proceeded to enumerate a variety of ailments, adding, “Oh, this wretched body — if only it would go and be done with it; death simply will not come.”

Kailas expressed objection to this disregard for life, and by way of demonstrating what a great support Harimohini was to them — even though their brother was no more — he said, “Look here — it was only because you are here that the journey to Calcutta was made at all; at least one has found a place to stand.”

Having recounted all the news of relatives and village folk from beginning to end, Kailas suddenly glanced around on all sides and asked, “This house — it belongs to her, does it?”

Harimohini said, “Yes.”

Kailas said, “A solid structure, I see!”

Rousing his enthusiasm, Harimohini said, “Solid, without a doubt! Every bit of it is solid.”

He noted that the beams of the room were of good, sturdy sal wood, and that the doors and windows were not of mango-wood but of something finer. The thickness of the walls — whether a brick and a half or a full two bricks in the laying — did not escape his eye either. He inquired and learned the total number of rooms above and below. On the whole, the thing struck him as quite satisfactory. How much the house had cost to build was difficult for him to estimate, as he did not know the exact prices of such materials hereabouts — he thought it over, tapping his foot, and said to himself inwardly, “Ten to fifteen thousand rupees, at the very least.” Aloud he named a slightly lower figure: “What would you say, Bou-thakrun — seven or eight thousand rupees, perhaps?”

Harimohini expressed astonishment at Kailas’s provincial ignorance and said, “What are you saying, Thakurpo — seven or eight thousand rupees! It will not be a single paisa under twenty thousand.”

Kailas set himself to examining the things around him with great intentness and in silence. He reflected upon the fact that a single nod of assent on his part, and this solid structure — with its sal-wood beams, its teak-wood windows and doors — could become his sole and undisputed domain; and at the thought he felt a deep satisfaction. He asked, “All that is very well, but the girl?”

Harimohini said quickly, “She has suddenly been invited to her aunt’s house and has gone there — it may be a matter of two or four days’ delay.”

Kailas said, “But then what will come of seeing her? I have a court case, you see — I must go back tomorrow.”

Harimohini said, “Never mind your court case for now. You cannot go until this business here is settled.”

Kailas thought the matter over for some time and finally resolved that, well, the case might go to an ex parte decree — let it be damned. He cast one more measuring glance about the room, calculating what recompense awaited him here. His eye fell suddenly upon some water that had collected in a corner of Harimohini’s prayer room. There was no drainage in this room, and yet Harimohini was forever washing it with water — which was why some always gathered in that corner and remained there. Kailas said with some concern, “Bou-thakrun, that is not quite right.”

Harimohini said, “Why, what is the matter?”

Kailas said, “Look there — water is pooling in that spot; that simply will not do.”

Harimohini said, “What am I to do, brother-in-law!”

Kailas said, “No, no — this will not work at all. The ceiling will be ruined entirely. I am telling you, sister-in-law, this splashing about of water cannot go on in this room.”

Harimohini had no choice but to hold her tongue. Kailas then expressed his curiosity regarding the girl’s appearance.

Harimohini said, “You will know well enough when you see her for yourself. What I can tell you this much — a bride like her has never come into your household before.”

Kailas said, “You don’t say! Our Mejo-bou —”

Harimohini burst out, “How can the two even be compared! Can your Mejo-bou hold a candle to her!”

That the Mejo-bou should be cited as the very standard of beauty in their household had given Harimohini no little displeasure — “Whatever you people may say, for my part I have always preferred the Nobou far more than the Mejo-bou.”

Kailas felt not the slightest enthusiasm for comparisons between the Mejo-bou and the Nobou. In his mind he was busy joining a flute-like nose to a pair of lotus-petal eyes upon some hitherto unseen face, and losing his imagination altogether in cascades of hair tumbling down to the ankle.

Harimohini perceived that the prospects on this side were entirely favourable. Indeed, it seemed to her that even those grave social deficiencies belonging to the bride’s party might not necessarily be reckoned as insuperable obstacles.