20

For a long time now, Apu had been on excellent terms with Narottam Das, the old Babaji of the village. Fair-skinned, divinely radiant, always serene, the old man lived in a simple thatched hut in the Ganguly neighbourhood. He had no love for tumult and commotion and preferred to be alone, though after sunset he would sometimes go and sit in the Gangulys’ Chandi Mandap. Ever since Apu was a little boy, Harihar had occasionally taken him along to see Narottam Das—and so from an early age the two had become fast friends. From time to time, Apu would show up at the old man’s door and call out, ‘Dadu, are you there?’

The old man would hurry out of his hut, unroll a palm-leaf mat on the veranda, and say, ‘Come, Dada-bhai, come. Sit, sit.’

Elsewhere, Apu was shy and tongue-tied, unable to utter a word. But with this simple, calm-faced old man he could be completely uninhibited. His conversations with him were as intimate, as unrestrained, as full of glee as the ones he had with his playmates! Narottam Das had no one; the old man lived by himself. A Vaishnav woman of his own caste came to do his chores and then left. Apu would often sit for a whole afternoon, listening to stories and telling them. He knew that Narottam Das Babaji was much older than his father, older even than Annada Ray, but it was precisely this great age that made Apu feel the old man was his peer. Whenever he came here, all his reserve, all his diffidence, would melt away on its own.

While they talked, Apu would laugh with an open heart. He would say things he was too afraid to say elsewhere, lest some elder scold him for being a ‘precocious little brat.’ Narottam Das would say, ‘Dadu, you are my Gour. When I see you, Dadu, I think of how my Gour was just as handsome, just as fine-featured, just as innocent at your age. He had those same expressive eyes.’

Elsewhere, Apu would perhaps have been embarrassed by such words. Here, he would just laugh and say, ‘In that case, Dadu, you have to show me the pictures in that book again.’

The old man would bring out his copy of Prembhakti-Chandrika from inside the hut. It was a book he dearly loved, and as he read it in solitude, he would be lost in a state of rapturous bliss. There were only two pictures in all. When he was done showing them, the old man would say, ‘I’ll give you this book when I die, Dadu. In your hands, it will not be dishonoured.’

One of his disciples would sometimes compose devotional songs and come to recite them for him. The old man would grow irritated and say, ‘So you’ve written some songs, good for you. But don’t you sing them to me, my boy. The great songwriters were Vidyapati and Chandidas. After them, it all just grates on my ears. Go and sing them somewhere else.’

Here, flowing along the course of a simple, modest, unadorned life, there was a kind of subterranean current of freedom, and Apu’s mind somehow managed to grasp it. To him it felt as intimate and joyful as the company of fresh earth, birds, and trees, which is why the pull to visit his Dadu was so strong.

On his way back, Apu would gather a heap of muchukunda-champa flowers from under the tree in Narottam Das’s courtyard. He would place them on his bed. Later, when the evening lamp was lit, he would have to sit down to study at his father’s command. He never had to read for more than an hour, but to Apu it felt as if the night had grown old! Afterwards, when he was finally dismissed, he would go to bed, lie down, and at once the scent of the muchukunda-champa blossoms kept on the bed, saturated with all the memories of the day’s play, all the day’s joys, would drift over him. It would overwhelm his tired body and mind, his boyish heart aching with longing for the bygone moments of play. He would lie on his stomach, bury his face in the mound of flowers, and inhale their fragrance for a long time.

One day, his sister whispered to him, ‘Want to have a picnic, Apu?’

Through their gate, all the women of the neighbourhood would pass on their way to the fields behind the village for the Kului Chandi festival feast, and his mother would go too. But she wouldn’t take him with her. There, everyone brought their own provisions. They didn’t have that much rice and dal. And at the feast, everyone would bring out such things—fine rice, dal, ghee, milk. His mother would bring out only coarse rice, a paste of matar dal, and a couple of eggplants. Sitting beside them, the children of Bhuvan Mukhopadhyay’s Sejthakrun would eat rice mashed with milk, bananas, and new date-palm jaggery, and his mother’s heart would ache for her own children.

Her Apu also loved to eat rice mashed with milk, bananas, and jaggery just like that!

As the crimson evening descended upon the woods at the edge of the tranquil field, as she walked back along the path through the bamboo grove, it was only her son’s face that came to mind.

Durga cleared a patch of jungle on the far side of Nilmoni Ray’s overgrown homestead, cutting it back with a billhook she held in her own hand, and said to her brother, ‘Go and see if Ma is coming from the tamarind tree. I’ll just get the rice out, quick.’

From the oil pot, she furtively took out two palas of oil in a fine coconut-shell cup. Bringing the stolen goods outside, she entrusted them to her brother, saying, ‘Take this, quick, run, Apu! Go leave it over there. And make sure the cows don’t get to it.’

Just then, Mato’s mother, her little son in tow, entered the yard through the back gate. Durga said, ‘What brings you here, brass-worker’s wife?’

Mato’s mother was not very old, and she wasn’t bad-looking either, but since her husband’s death she had fallen on hard times and had grown faded and gaunt. She said, ‘I’d gone to the field by the factory to gather firewood. Want a garland of buichi berries?’

Durga herself often foraged for plenty of buichi berries in the woods and gardens, so she shook her head and said she wouldn’t buy any.

Mato’s mother said, ‘Oh, go on, Didi Thakrun. They’re lovely sweet berries. I picked them myself from the banks of the Madhukhali marsh.’ She pulled a garland from the folds of her sari and showed it to them. ‘Look how big they are! If I go to the market to sell the firewood, it’ll be too late by the time I get any money. I wanted to buy Mato a paisa’s worth of puffed rice. Go on, I’ll give you two garlands for a paisa.’

Durga did not agree. She said, ‘Apu, there’s some roasted rice in the jar. Go fetch it and give it to Mato.’ After they had left again through the back gate, the two of them gathered their things and set off.

They were surrounded by forest. From the outside, you couldn’t see a thing. In a tiny clay pot, no bigger than one from a doll’s house, Durga set the rice to boil and said, ‘Look, Apu, look at the big wild yams I’ve brought from that place. There are lots of them on a bush at the Putis’ palm grove. I’ll put them in with the rice.’

…Apu, full of enthusiasm, gathered dry vines and twigs. This was their first picnic. Apu still couldn’t quite believe it—were they going to cook real rice and curry here, or was this going to be a play-picnic like the ones they had had so many times, with dust for rice, pot-sherds for fried potatoes, and jackfruit leaves for luchis?

But what a beautiful afternoon it was! What a beautiful spot for a picnic! All around were clumps of forest shrubs; over there, the sway of ivy gourd vines; in the jungle under the bel tree, clusters of flowers on a sheora tree. On the half-scorched patches of durba grass, wagtails danced and darted about. It was a private, secluded spot, hidden behind the quiet thickets. On this first day of spring, new tender leaves had sprouted on the bushes, and clumps of ghentu flowers bloomed, lighting up the derelict homestead. Though many of the blossoms on the pomelo tree had fallen in the recent fog, clusters of white flowers could still be seen on the upper branches.

Lately, it was as if Durga were clinging to these trees and plants, these paths and roads, every nook and cranny of this all-too-familiar village, with an extreme tenacity. What premonition of parting cast its shadow over this dearly loved path by the gab-tala, that bamboo grove behind their house, the shade-filled river ghat? Her Apu—her precious golden-boy brother, whom she couldn’t bear to be without even for half a day, her heart aching for him—how far would she have to go, leaving him behind!

And what if she didn’t come back? What if it was like what happened to Nitam Pishi?

Nitam Pishi had lived on this very homestead. She had been married off long ago and gone away somewhere, and never returned to her father’s home. It was an old story—one she had heard since childhood. Everyone said she had married into a family in Murshidabad district, but how far was that? Where was it? No one kept track of her anymore; no one knew if she was alive or dead. Nitam Pishi never saw her father again, never saw her mother, nor her brothers and sisters. They had all died, one by one. Mother of God, how could people be so cruel! Why had no one ever tried to find her? How many times had Durga shed tears in private, thinking of this Nitam Pishi! If she were to suddenly return today—what would she think, seeing her father’s homestead so deserted, so overgrown with dense jungle?

What if the same thing happened to her? To leave her father, her mother, her Apu—and never see them again? Never, ever again—this house of theirs, the gab-tala, the path to the ghat?

The thought made her shudder. No, she didn’t want to think about it. For some reason, she had been feeling lately that something was about to happen in her life. Something was coming soon, something that had never come before. In the midst of her playing, in the middle of her chores, day and night, this thought would often come to her… she couldn’t quite understand what it was, or how the thought of its coming arose, but still, she felt it, she felt it constantly, it was coming… coming… coming soon…

Midway through the picnic, a voice was heard calling from Apu and Durga’s courtyard. Durga said, ‘That sounds like Bini’s voice. Go call her over, Apu.’ A little later, a dark-skinned girl of Durga’s age appeared behind Apu. With a slight smile and a somewhat deferential air, she asked, ‘What are you doing, Durga-didi?’

Durga said, ‘Come on, Bini, we’re having a picnic. Sit.’

The girl was the daughter of Kalinath Chakrabarti from the other neighbourhood. She wore a slightly soiled sari, thin glass bangles on her arms; she was rather tall, with a plain, simple face. Her father was a priest to the Jugi caste, so they were not invited to social functions in the village and lived a very constrained life on its fringes. They were not well-off either. Bini eagerly set about running errands for Durga.

Having stumbled upon this profitable affair while out for a stroll, she now seemed to be in a state of delighted uncertainty—would they or wouldn’t they accept her as a participant in their feast? This blend of hesitation and glee was evident in her speech and manner. Durga said, ‘Bini, see if you can find a few more dry sticks. The fire isn’t burning well.’

Bini immediately ran off to fetch firewood and returned a moment later with a bundle of dry bel branches, saying, ‘Will this be enough, Dugga-didi? Or should I bring more?’ …When Durga said, ‘Bini’s here, she’ll eat with us too—go get some more rice, Apu,’ Bini’s face lit up with joy. A little while later, Bini brought water. She asked eagerly, ‘What curries are you making, Dugga-didi?’

After taking the rice off the fire, Durga added the oil to the pot and threw in the eggplant to fry. A moment later, she stared at the pot in amazement, calling to Apu, ‘Look, Apu, it’s turning the exact colour of real fried eggplant!’

Just like Ma’s fried eggplant, isn’t it?

Apu, too, found the whole affair astonishing.

Until that moment, even he hadn’t quite believed that their picnic could possibly produce real rice and real fried eggplant! After that, the three of them sat down in great delight to eat from banana leaves. There was only rice and fried eggplant, nothing else.

As Apu lifted a morsel to his mouth, Durga watched him and asked eagerly, ‘How’s the fried eggplant?’

Apu said, ‘It’s very good, Didi, but I don’t think there’s any salt.’

They had completely omitted salt from their list of cooking ingredients today; salt had not troubled them in the slightest. But in a state of high glee, the three of them sat down to their picnic feast of boiled wild yam, and bland, half-burnt fried eggplant with rice. This was Durga’s first time cooking, and she savoured her own handiwork with a mixture of wonder and delight! Here, in this thicket, amidst this pile of dry custard-apple leaves, sitting beside the fallen date-palm fronds under the date tree, eating real rice and curry.

As they ate, Durga looked at Apu and laughed a happy, giggling laugh. She was so happy it felt as if the lump of rice was getting stuck in her throat. While eating, Bini timidly asked, ‘Is there a little oil left, Dugga-di? I wanted to mash it with the boiled yam.’

Durga said, ‘Apu, run and get a little oil.’

Life, a storehouse of countless thrills, adorned by the light and moonlight of so many joyous moments—for them, this sweet journey had only just begun. On the endless path of life that snaked from the far distance to beyond the horizon, they were but a tiny band of travellers, and the path’s turns, with their flowers and fruits, their sorrows and joys, were an entirely new reception for them.

Joy! Joy! The joy of expansion, the joy of the path beyond the great, snow-capped mountain pass, unseen through the gaps in life! The joy of today! The joy of simple, simple, small, trivial things.

Apu said, ‘What will you tell Ma, Didi? Are you going to eat rice again this evening?’

‘Tell Ma? Never! You’ll see, I’ll be hungry again after sundown.’

Being a priest to the Jugis, when she asked for water in the village, people would pour it for her from a pot; and she would have to scrub the vessel clean afterwards. Bini hesitated once or twice, then pointing to Apu’s glass, she said, ‘Could you pour a little water into my cupped hands, Apu? I’m thirsty.’

Apu said, ‘No, Bini-di, just take it and drink from it yourself!’

But Bini still didn’t seem to have the courage. Durga said, ‘Go on, Bini, take the glass and drink.’

When the meal was over, Durga said, ‘We’re not throwing the pot away, mind you. We’ll have another picnic another day. What do you say? We’ll hang it up on that jujube tree.’

Apu said, ‘Yes, but will it be safe there? Mato’s mother comes here to gather firewood. If she sees it, she’ll take it, Didi. She’s a terrible thief.’

Durga tucked the little pot into a niche in a crumbling wall.

Apu’s heart was pounding. On the other side of that niche was another, smaller one, where Apu had hidden a box of cheroots. What if his sister went over there?

A while ago, Neda’s brother-in-law and a friend of his had come to visit Neda’s house. They lived somewhere near Calcutta. Very sophisticated, they smoked a lot of cheroots. One moment they were smoking, the next they were smoking again. Apu had felt an intense desire to try a cheroot himself, just once, to see what it was like. He had conspired with Neda and bought ten red-paper-wrapped cheroots for three paisa from Harish Jugi’s shop in the village.

One day, alone in this dense jungle, he had furtively lit one and smoked it. He hadn’t liked it—it was bitter, with a harshness to it. After two puffs, he couldn’t smoke any more. But he couldn’t bring himself to throw away his share of the remaining four cheroots either. He had hidden them in an empty cheroot box, procured from Neda’s brother-in-law, in a niche in the crumbling wall in the jungle of the ruined homestead.

The day he smoked his first cheroot, after he was done, his heart had pounded with fear that his mother would find out from the smell on his breath. He had eaten a great many ripe jujubes and cupped his hand over his mouth to check his breath many times before he had dared to re-enter human society that day. And now it seemed he was about to be caught red-handed!

But his sister had no need to go to the other side of the wall. Her work was done on this side.