Chapter 23

After Gobar and Jhuniya had gone, the house began to stand deserted. Again and again Dhaniya remembered little Chunnu. Jhuniya was the child's mother, but it was Dhaniya who reared him. It was she who rubbed him with the cleansing paste, applied kajal to his eyes, put him to sleep, and, whenever she got leisure from her work, fondled him. This very intoxication of motherly affection had kept making her forget her misfortunes. Looking at his innocent, butter-soft face, she would forget all her cares, and her heart would swell with loving pride. That support of her life was now gone. Seeing his empty little cot, she would burst into tears. The armour that had protected her from all anxieties and despairs had been snatched from her. Again and again she would think — what evil had she done to Jhuniya that she had given her this punishment? The witch had come and ground her golden house into the dust. Gobar had never even answered back her words. It was this widow who had inflamed him, and, taking him away there, who knows what kind of dance she would make him dance. Even here she had not cared much for the child. She got no respite from her missi and kajal, her parting and her braid. What would she do for the care of a child? The poor child must be lying alone on the ground, crying. The poor thing could not pass even one day in comfort. Now a cough, now loose motions, now this, now that. Thinking and thinking of this, she felt anger against Jhuniya. For Gobar she still had the same tenderness in her heart. It was this very witch who, by feeding him something or other, had brought him under her spell. Had she not been such a sorceress, how else could she have worked this magic? No one used to ask after her. She used to take kicks from her sisters-in-law. Once she got this gull, today she has become a queen.

Annoyed, Hori said — "Whenever one looks, it is Jhuniya you blame. You do not understand — if one's own gold is base, what is the fault of the goldsmith? Had Gobar not taken her away, would she have gone off of her own accord? With the grain and water of the city the boy's eyes have changed — why do you not understand it that way?"

Dhaniya thundered — "All right, hold your tongue. It was you yourself who let the widow climb onto your head, otherwise I would have driven her out with a broom on the very first day."

In the threshing-floor the cane-stalks had piled up. Hori was yoking the bullocks and going to thresh the grain. Turning his face back, he said — "Suppose the daughter-in-law has won Gobar over to herself — why do you fret so much over it? What the whole world does, Gobar too has done. Now he has his own wife and children. Why should he go to torment for the sake of my children, why put on his head the burden of our head!"

"You are the very root of the trouble."

"Then turn me out too. Take the bullocks, thresh the grain. I shall smoke the hookah."

"You go and grind the mill — I shall thresh the grain."

In banter the sorrow flew away. That was her medicine. Pleased, Dhaniya sat down to plait Rupa's hair, which had got quite tangled, and Hori went off to the threshing-floor. Joyous spring was scattering fragrance and delight and the riches of life, with both hands and open heart. The cuckoo, hidden in the mango boughs, went about with her sweet, mellow, soul-touching call, awakening hopes. On the mahua branches the mynahs sat as in a bridal procession. The neem and the siris and the karaunda were as if dissolving an intoxication in their fragrance. When Hori reached the mango grove, the trees were starred with blossom beneath. His afflicted, despairing heart too seemed to drown in this all-pervading beauty and vivacity. Coming into the mood, he began to sing —

"My breast burns day and night.

On the mango bough the cuckoo calls,

I get no peace at all."

From the front came Dulari the shopkeeper's wife, wearing a pink sari. On her feet were thick silver anklets, around her neck a thick gold necklace; her face was withered, but her heart was green. There had been a time when Hori used to tease her about the fields and threshing-floors. She was the bhabhi, Hori the devar; on that account there used to be banter between the two. Ever since her husband died, Dulari had given up coming out of the house. All day she sat at the shop, and from there she kept track of all the village news. If a quarrel broke out anywhere, the shopkeeper-wife would surely arrive to mediate. She would not lend money at less than an anna's interest per rupee. And although, in greed for interest, even the principal would not come back into her hands — whoever borrowed money would eat it and sit tight — yet her rate of interest remained just as it was. How was the poor woman to recover it? She could neither sue nor go to the police-station; she had only the strength of her tongue, but as, with her years, the sharpness of her tongue increased, its cutting power decreased. Now people would laugh at her abuse and say in jest — "What will you do, taking money, aunty? You will not be able to take even a cowrie with you. Whatever blessings you can get by feeding the poor, take them. Those will be of use in the next world." And Dulari burned at the very name of the next world.

Hori teased — "Today, bhabhi, you really do look young."

Delighted, the shopkeeper-wife said — "Today is Tuesday — do not put the evil eye on me. It is for this reason that I do not put on ornaments. The moment one steps out of the house everyone starts staring, as though they had never seen a woman before. Pateshwari Lala's old habit has still not left him."

Hori stopped short — a most entertaining topic had been broached. The bullocks went on ahead.

"Why, these days he has become a great devotee. Don't you see — every full-moon day he listens to the recital of the Satyanarayan story, and morning and evening he goes to the temple for darshan."

"All the lechers there are turn into devotees once they grow old! For misdeeds one must do penance, after all. Just ask — now that I have become an old woman, what jesting can he do with me?"

"How have you become an old woman so soon, bhabhi? To me even now you look….."

"All right, keep quiet, or I shall give you a hundred and fifty abuses. The son has begun to earn abroad, never once gave a feast, and is ready to make a bhabhi of me free of cost."

"Take an oath of me, bhabhi, that I have ever touched even a pie of his earnings. I do not even know what he brought or where he spent it. Just one pair of dhotis and one turban came into my hands."

"Well, he has begun to earn — sooner or later he will surely take charge of the household. May God keep him happy. Go on paying our money too, a little at a time. It is only the interest that keeps growing."

"I shall pay you every single pie, bhabhi — let some money come into my hands. And even if I do eat it up, you are no stranger; you are my own, after all."

By such mirthful flatteries the shopkeeper-wife was disarmed. Smiling, she went off on her way. Hori hurried to the bullocks and, putting them onto the threshing-bed, began to drive them round. This was the only threshing-floor for the whole village. Somewhere threshing was being done, someone was winnowing grain, someone was weighing produce. The barber, the carpenter, the blacksmith, the priest, the bard, the beggar — all had gathered to take their customary shares. Under one tree Jhinguri Singh sat on a cot collecting his interest dues. Several traders stood haggling over the grain rate. Over the whole threshing-floor there was the bustle of a market. A butcher-woman was selling ber and makoy fruit, and a hawker went about with sebs and jalebis fried in oil. Pandit Datadin too had come to have his share of the grain divided out by Hori, and was sitting on the cot with Jhinguri Singh.

Rubbing tobacco, Datadin said — "Have you heard — the Government too is telling the moneylenders to reduce the rate of interest, or they will get no decree."

Tossing a pinch of tobacco into his mouth, Jhinguri said — "Pandit, I know one thing. When you have need, you will come to us a hundred times to borrow money, and whatever interest we wish to charge, we shall charge. If the Government makes no arrangement to lend money to the tenants, this law will do nothing to us. We shall record the rate as low, but out of every hundred we shall cut twenty-five beforehand. What can the Government do about that?"

"That is true, but the Government too understands these things well. It will find some check for this too, you will see."

"There can be no check for this at all."

"All right — if it lays down the condition that the deed shall not be valid until the headman or agent of the village has signed the stamp, then what will you do?"

"The tenant will need it a hundred times over; he will bring the headman with hands and feet folded and get his signature. We shall cut a quarter all the same."

"And what if you get trapped? You write a false account, and off you go for fourteen years."

Jhinguri Singh laughed loudly — "What do you say, Pandit — will the world change then? Law and justice belong to whoever has money. The law indeed says that the moneylender shall not deal harshly with any tenant, that no landlord shall use force against any cultivator, but what really happens? You see it every day. The landlord has men bound and beaten, and the moneylender talks with kicks and shoes. With the cultivator who is sturdy, neither the landlord nor the moneylender speaks. With such men we make friends, and with their help we squeeze the necks of others. Five hundred rupees of Rai Sahib's are outstanding against you yourself, but has Nokheram the courage to say anything to you? He knows that his own interest lies in keeping on good terms with you. Which tenant has the strength to run to the courts every day? The whole business will go on just as it is going. The kachahri and the court are on the side of whoever has money. There is no cause for us to worry."

Saying this, he took a turn round the threshing-floor and then, coming back and sitting on the cot, said — "Yes — what came of Matai's marriage? Our advice is, get him married. Now there is a great deal of scandal."

It was as though a wasp had stung Datadin. He understood very well what this criticism was aimed at. Growing heated, he said — "Behind a man's back, anyone may say what he likes; but if anyone says anything to my face, I shall pull out his moustache. Let someone become as scrupulous as I am. I know how many there are who never perform their morning and evening worship, who have no concern with religion, with rites, with the recitals, with the Puranas. They too call themselves Brahmins. Who can laugh at me, who in his whole life has never missed a single Ekadashi, never put water in his mouth without bathing and worship? To keep one's observances is hard. Let someone show that I ever ate anything from the bazaar, or drank water from another man's hand, and I shall crawl out between his legs. Silia is not allowed to cross my threshold — threshold; touching vessels and pots is another matter. I do not say that Matai is doing a very good thing, but once the matter has gone so far, it is the act of a scoundrel to abandon the woman. I say it openly — there is nothing to hide in this. The female sex is sacred."

Datadin had himself been a great gallant in his youth, but he had never failed in his observances and religion. Matadin too, like a worthy son, was treading in his very footsteps. The root essence of religion is worship and recitation, ritual and fasting, and the kitchen-square and the hearth. When both father and son held fast to the root essence, who had the daring to call them fallen from the path?

Convinced, Jhinguri Singh said — "Brother, I have told you only what I had heard."

Datadin presented a long list, from the Mahabharata and the Puranas, of girls of other castes taken by Brahmins, and proved that the offspring born of them were called Brahmins, and that the Brahmins of today are the offspring of those very offspring. This custom had come down from the beginning of time, and there was nothing shameful in it.

Charmed by his learning, Jhinguri Singh said — "Then why do people nowadays go about as Vajpayees and Shuklas?"

"It is the custom of the times, and what else! Let someone have that much vigour. One must eat poison and digest it. That was a matter of the Satyug, and it went with the Satyug. Now our survival lies in living together with the brotherhood. But what am I to do — no one with a girl ever comes. I have told you, I have told others; no one listens — so am I to make a girl myself?"

Jhinguri Singh scolded — "Do not tell lies, Pandit. I lured and coaxed two men and brought them, but the moment you opened your mouth wide, both of them pricked up their ears and bolted. On what strength, after all, do you ask for five hundred or a thousand? Apart from ten bighas of land and the begging-bowl, what else have you got?"

Datadin's pride was struck. Stroking his beard, he said — "Even if I have nothing, even if I do live by begging — yet I gave five hundred apiece in the marriages of my daughters; then why should I not ask five hundred for my son? Had someone married my daughter free of cost, I too would have married my son free of cost. As for the matter of standing — you may regard the priestly calling as begging; I regard it as a zamindari, a bankhouse. Let the zamindar perish, let the bankhouse collapse, but the priestly calling will remain to the end. As long as the Hindu race lasts, the Brahmins too will last and the priestly calling too. In the wedding season I sit at ease at home and wheedle in a hundred or two. If fortune favours, I make four or five hundred. Clothes, vessels, food besides. Somewhere or other there is always some ceremony or function going on. Even if nothing comes, at least a tray or two and a few annas of offerings come in. Such ease is found neither in zamindari nor in moneylending. And then, the service I get out of Silia — what would I get from a Brahmin's daughter? She would sit there as the lady of the house. At most she would cook the bread. Here Silia alone does the work of three people. And what do I give her besides bread? At most, one dhoti a year."

Under another tree was Datadin's own threshing-bed. The threshing was being done with four bullocks. Dhanna the chamar was driving the bullocks, Silia was pulling the grain out of the heap and winnowing it, and Matadin was sitting on the other side rubbing oil into his lathi.

Silia was a dark, comely, slender girl who, without being beautiful, was attractive. In her laughter, in her glances, in the play of her limbs, there was an intoxication of joy that kept every fibre of her dancing. Smeared from head to foot with particles of chaff, drenched with sweat, the hair of her head half loose, she ran to and fro winnowing the grain, as though playing some game with body and soul.

Matadin said — "Today let no grain be left over till evening, Silia! If you have grown tired, shall I come?"

With a cheerful face Silia said — "Why should you come, Pandit! I shall winnow it all by evening."

"All right, then let me carry the grain away and store it. What can you do alone?"

"Why do you fret? I shall winnow it, and carry it away and store it too. By the first watch of night not even a grain will be left here."

Dulari the shopkeeper-wife was going about today recovering her dues. Silia had taken two paisa's worth of pink dye from her shop on the day of Holi. The money had not yet been paid. Coming up to Silia, she said — "Look here, Silia, it is a month since you took the dye, and you have not paid yet. When I ask, you flounce off. Today I shall not go without taking the money."

Matadin had quietly slipped away. Having taken Silia's body and mind both, he wished to give nothing in return. Silia was now in his eyes only a machine for working, nothing more. Her devotion he kept dancing about with great cunning. When Silia raised her eyes, Matadin was not there. She said — "Do not shout, shopkeeper-wife — here, take it — grain worth four paise instead of two. Will you take my life now? I was not running off, after all."

By guess she took out about a seer of grain from the heap and put it into the shopkeeper-wife's spread-out anchal. At that very moment Matadin emerged from behind the tree, fuming, and, catching the shopkeeper-wife's anchal, said — "Put the grain back straight, shopkeeper-wife — this is no plunder."

Then, with red eyes, he glared at Silia and scolded — "Why did you give the grain away? Whom did you ask before giving it? Who are you to be giving away my grain?"

The shopkeeper-wife dropped the grain back into the heap, and Silia, dumbfounded, stood looking at Matadin's face. It seemed as though the branch on which she had been sitting carefree had snapped, and now she was falling, with no support, down to the ground. With a downcast face, her eyes filled with tears, she said to the shopkeeper-wife — "I shall pay your money again, shopkeeper-wife! Have mercy on me today."

The shopkeeper-wife looked at her with eyes full of pity and, casting a glance of reproach at Matadin, went away.

Then Silia, winnowing the grain, asked with wounded pride — "Have I no right at all over your things?"

His eyes bulging, Matadin said — "No, you have no right. You work, you eat. If you wish to eat and also to give away and squander, that will not happen here. If you do not find it worth your while here, go and work somewhere else; there is no shortage of labourers. We do not take work for nothing — we give food and clothes."

Silia looked at Matadin like a bird whose master has clipped its wings and turned it out of the cage. Whether there was more pain in that glance or more reproach, it is hard to say. But like that very bird her mind fluttered, and, finding no strength to fly to a high branch in the free open air, it wished to go back and sit in that same cage, even though it should die there beating its head against the bars, without grain, without water. Silia was thinking — where else now was there a place for her? Though not wedded, she was, in samskara and in conduct and in feeling, a wedded wife, and now, whether Matadin beat her or cut her to pieces, she had no other refuge, no other support. She remembered those days — and it was not even two years yet — when this same Matadin used to massage the soles of her feet, when, taking the sacred thread in his hand, he had said, "Silia, as long as there is breath in my body, I shall keep you like a wedded wife"; when, lovesick, he used to follow her about like a madman through the fields and the gardens and along the river bank. And today this pitiless behaviour of his! For a fistful of grain he had stripped her of her dignity.

She gave no answer. Feeling as though a lump of salt were lodged in her throat, with wounded heart and slackened hands, she began her work again.

At that very moment her mother, father, both brothers and several other chamars, coming from who knows where, surrounded Matadin. The moment Silia's mother came, she snatched the basket of grain from her hand and flung it away, and, abusing her, said — "You widow, when you had to do labour anyway, why did you leave your home's labour and come here to do this? When you live with a Brahmin, live like a Brahmin. After bringing shame on the nose of the whole brotherhood, if you still had to be a chamar-woman, what — did you come here to get a lump of ghee? Why do you not drown yourself dead in a handful of water?"

Both Jhinguri Singh and Datadin ran up and, seeing the changed temper of the chamars, began trying to calm them. Jhinguri Singh asked Silia's father — "What is the matter, chaudhari, what is the quarrel about?"

Silia's father, Harkhu, was an old man of sixty, black, lean, shrivelled like a dried chilli, but just as sharp. He said — "There is no quarrel, Thakur; today we shall either make a chamar of Matadin and leave him so, or mix his blood with ours. Silia is of the female sex; she is bound to go to someone's house. About that we have nothing to say, but whoever keeps her, let him belong to us. You cannot make us Brahmins, but we can make you chamars. Make us Brahmins — our whole brotherhood is ready to become Brahmins. When that is not possible, then you too become a chamar. Eat with us, drink with us, sit and rise with us. You take our honour, then give us your religion."

Brandishing his lathi, Datadin said — "Speak with a guarded mouth, Harkhua! There stands your daughter — take her wherever you wish. We have not kept her bound. She worked, she took her wages. There is no shortage of labourers here."

Silia's mother, flashing her finger, said — "Bravo, bravo, Pandit! You dispense fine justice. Had your daughter run off with some chamar, and were you talking like this, then I would have seen. We are chamars, so we have no honour at all. We shall not take Silia away alone; we shall take Matadin too along with her, who has spoiled her honour. You are such a great keeper of observances and religion. You will sleep with her, but you will not drink water from her hand! It is that very witch, that she bears all this. I would give such a man poison."

Harkhu called out to his companions — "Have you heard these people's talk or not! Why do you stand staring now?"

That was all they heard — two chamars sprang forward and seized Matadin's hands; a third leapt and tore off his sacred thread, and before Datadin and Jhinguri Singh could take up their lathis, two chamars thrust a large piece of bone into Matadin's mouth. Matadin clenched his teeth. Even so, the loathsome thing touched his lips. He felt nausea, and his mouth opened of itself, and the bone reached his throat. By this time all the men of the threshing-floor had gathered, but the wonder was that no one opposed these robbers of religion. Everyone disliked Matadin's conduct. He used to stare at the village's married women and daughters, so in their hearts all were pleased at his disgrace. Yes, with their outer minds people were affecting indignation at the chamars.

Hori said — "All right, that is enough now, Harkhu! If you wish your own good, go away from here."

Fearlessly Harkhu replied — "There are girls in your house, Hori Mahto — understand that much. If the village's honour gets spoiled in this way, no one's modesty will be safe."

Having in a moment won full victory over the enemy, the attackers thought it best to slip away. It does not take long for public opinion to turn. It is best to stay clear of it.

Matadin was vomiting. Stroking his back, Datadin said — "If I do not get each one of them sent up for five years apiece, then say so. For five whole years I shall have them grinding the mill."

With swagger Harkhu replied — "We have no grief over that. Who sits at ease enjoying himself like you? Wherever we work, there at least half a belly of grain will be had."

When Matadin had finished vomiting, he lay down on the ground lifeless, as though his back were broken, as though searching for a handful of water to drown himself in. The dignity on whose strength his gallantry and pride and self-assertion had gone about swaggering had been destroyed. That piece of bone had defiled not only his mouth but his very soul. His religion rested on this very matter of food and drink, of touch and avoidance. Today the root of that religion had been cut. Now though he do a lakh of penances, eat a lakh of cow-dung and drink Ganges water, perform a lakh of charities and merits and pilgrimages and fasts, his dead religion could not come back to life. Had it been a matter for himself alone, it could have been hushed up. Here his religion had been plundered before everyone's eyes. Now his head was lowered forever. From today he would be reckoned an untouchable in his own house. Even his loving mother would loathe him. And religion had so vanished from the world that so many men had merely stood looking on at the spectacle. No one had even uttered a sound. The very men who, a moment before, on seeing him, used to make obeisance, would now turn away their faces at the sight of him. He would not be able to go into any temple, nor touch anyone's vessels and pots. And all this had happened on account of that unlucky Silia.

Where Silia had been winnowing the grain, she stood there with head bowed, as though it were her own disgrace being enacted. Suddenly her mother came and scolded her — "What are you standing and staring at? Walk straight home, or I shall cut you fibre from fibre. You have made your father's and grandfather's name shine brightly enough; what are you bent on doing now?"

Silia stood still as an image. She felt anger against her mother and father and brothers. Why did these people thrust themselves in between her affairs? She lived as she wished; what business was it of others? They said her honour was being insulted here — but then would any Brahmin eat what she had cooked? Would he drink water from her hand? Only a short while before, her mind had been distressed by Matadin's pitiless behaviour, but this tyranny of her own family and brotherhood gave that aversion the form of a fierce attachment.

With a rebellious heart she said — "I shall not go anywhere. Will you not let me live even here?"

In a harsh voice the old woman said — "You will not come?"

"No."

"Walk, straight."

"I am not going."

At once both brothers seized her hands and began dragging her off. Silia sat down on the ground. Even at this the brothers did not let her go. They kept on dragging. Her sari tore, the skin of her back and waist was scraped off, but she would not agree to go.

Then Harkhu said to the boys — "All right, let her go now. We shall consider her dead, but now, if she ever comes to my door, I shall drink her blood."

Risking her life, Silia said — "Yes, when I come to your door, then drink it."

In the madness of anger the old woman dealt Silia several kicks, and had Harkhu not pushed her away, she would perhaps not have left until she had taken her very life.

When the old woman lunged again, Harkhu shoved her back and said — "You are a great murderess, Kalia! Will you actually kill her?"

Clinging to her father's feet, Silia wept — "Kill me, father, all of you together kill me! O mother, you are so cruel — was it for this that you suckled me and reared me? Why did you not strangle me in the very birth-room? Alas! On my account you have defiled the Pandit too. What did you gain by taking his religion? Now he too will not ask after me. But whether he asks after me or not, I shall stay with him. Let him keep me starving, let him kill me, but having put him to such ruin, how can I just leave him? I shall die, but I shall not become a wanton. Once a man has held my arm, I shall belong to him alone."

Biting her lip, Kalia said — "Let the widow go. She thinks he will keep her on, but if he does not beat her and drive her off this very day, let me never show my face again."

The brothers too were moved to pity. Leaving Silia there, they all went away. Then she slowly got up and, limping and groaning, came and sat in the threshing-floor, and, covering her face with her anchal, began to weep. Datadin took out the weaver's anger on his beard — "Why did you not go with them, Silia! What are you bent on having done now? Even after ruining me, has your belly not been filled?"

Silia raised her tear-filled eyes. There was a flash of fire in them.

"Why should I go with them? With him who has held my arm, with him I shall stay."

The Panditji threatened — "If you set foot in my house, I shall talk with kicks."

Defiantly Silia said — "Wherever he keeps me, there I shall stay. Whether he keeps me under a tree, or keeps me in a palace."

Matadin sat as though senseless. It was nearing noon. The sunlight, filtering through the leaves, fell on his face. Sweat dripped from his forehead. But he sat silent, motionless.

Suddenly, as though coming to his senses, he said — "What do you say about me now, father?"

Placing his hand on his son's head and consoling him, Datadin said — "What can I say about you just yet, son? Come, bathe, eat; then whatever arrangement the Pandits make, that will be done. Yes, there is one thing — you will have to give up Silia."

Matadin looked at Silia with blood-filled eyes — "I shall never look at her face again, but once the penance is done, then there will be no further blame?"

"Once the penance is done, no blame, no sin remains."

"Then go to the Pandits this very day."

"This very day I shall go, son!"

"But if the Pandits say her penance cannot be done — then?"

"As they wish."

"Then you will turn me out of the house?"

Overcome with a father's affection, Datadin said — "Can such a thing ever happen, son! Let wealth go, let religion go, let worldly honour go, but I cannot give you up."

Matadin took up his stick and walked home behind his father. Silia too got up and, limping, followed behind him.

Turning back, Matadin said in a pitiless voice — "Do not come with me. I have no connection with you. Even after putting me to such ruin, your belly is not filled."

With audacity Silia caught his hand and said — "How is there no connection? In this very village there are men richer than you, handsomer than you, more honourable than you. Why do I not catch their hands? Why has this calamity of yours befallen you today? The rope that has fallen round your neck, you cannot break, however much you wish. Nor shall I go anywhere, leaving you. I shall do labour, I shall beg, but I shall not give you up."

Saying this, she let go of Matadin's hand and went back to the threshing-floor and began winnowing the grain. Hori was still threshing grain there. Dhaniya had come to call him for his meal. Hori took the bullocks out of the threshing-bed and tied them to a tree, and said to Silia — "You too go, eat and drink, Silia! Dhaniya is sitting here. The sari on your back is dyed with blood! Beware lest the wound fester. Your family are very cruel people."

Silia looked at him with piteous eyes — "Who here is not cruel, father! I have found no one merciful."

"What did the Pandit say?"

"He says he has no connection with me."

"Indeed! Says so!"

"He must think that in this way he will keep the redness of his face, but a thing the world knows, how can it be hidden? My bread is too heavy a burden — let him not give it. What of it for me? I do labour now, I shall do it then too. For an arm's space to sleep in, I shall ask you yourself, then — will you not give it?"

Moved to pity, Dhaniya said — "Where is the shortage of space, daughter — come, stay in my house."

In a piteous voice Hori said — "She invites you, but do you not know the Pandit?"

In a fearless voice Dhaniya said — "If he gets angry, he will eat one extra bread, what else can he do? Am I his bondswoman? He took her honour, had her cast out of the brotherhood, and now he says he has no connection with her. Is he a man or a butcher! Today he has got the fruit of his intentions. Why did he not think of it before? Then he went on having his pleasure. Now he says he has no connection with me!"

In Hori's opinion Dhaniya was doing wrong. The way Silia's family had stripped Matai of his religion, that was no good deed at all. They could have taken Silia away by beating her, or by coaxing her. She was their daughter. Why did they strip Matai of his religion?

Dhaniya reproved him — "All right, leave off, you are becoming a great judge. Men, men — all are one. When Matai stripped her of her honour, then no one found it bad. Now that Matai has been stripped of his religion, why does it seem bad? Is Silia's religion not religion at all? He keeps a chamar-woman, and on top of that he poses as a man of observance and religion. Harkhu Chaudhari did very well. This is the proper punishment for such bullies. You come along, Silia, to my house. Who knows what kind of heartless parents they are, that they have made the poor girl's whole back bloody. You go and send Sona over. I shall bring her along."

Hori went home, and Silia, falling at Dhaniya's feet, began to weep.