Chapter 34

Silia's child was now growing two years old and ran races all over the village. He had brought with him a strange language, and spoke in it, whether anyone understood it or not. In his language there was an abundance of ṭ, l and gh, and letters such as s, r and so on were missing. In that language the name of bread was 'oṭi', of milk 'tūt', of clean 'chhāg' and of a cowrie 'taulī'. He mimicked the calls of animals so well that people's bellies would ache with laughter. Someone asked, "Ramu, how does a dog speak?" Ramu would say gravely, "Bhon-bhon," and run as if to bite. "How does a cat speak?"—and Ramu would say "miaow-miaow", goggle his eyes and stare, and scratch with his claws. He was a very carefree boy. Whenever you looked, he was absorbed in play; he had no thought of eating or of drinking. Being held in the lap he disliked. His happiest moments were those when, at the door under the neem tree, he would gather mounds of dust, roll in it, heap it on his head, make little piles of it, build little houses. With boys of his own age he could not get on a moment. Perhaps he did not consider them worthy of playing with him.

Someone would ask, "What is your name?"

He would say at once, "Lamu."

"What is your father's name?"

"Matadin."

"And your mother's?"

"Chhilia."

"And who is Datadin?"

"He is mother's father."

Who knows who had told him this relationship with Datadin.

Ramu and Rupa got on very well. He was Rupa's toy. She would rub him with cosmetic paste, apply kohl, bathe him, smooth his hair, make little morsels with her own hands and feed him, and sometimes she would take him in her lap and fall asleep at night. Dhaniya would scold her: you are making everything defiled by your touch—but she would listen to no one. Dolls of rags had taught her to be a mother. That maternal feeling, on getting a living, breathing child, could no longer be satisfied with dolls.

Behind Hori's house, where in some former time there had been his cattle-shed, in that very ruin Silia had set up a hut of thatch and begun to live. In Hori's house, after all, a whole lifetime could not be passed.

After spending several hundred rupees, at last the pandits of Kashi had made Matadin a Brahmin again. That day a great homa was held, many Brahmins ate the feast, and many mantras and verses were recited. Matadin had to eat and drink pure cow-dung and cow-urine. By the cow-dung his mind was purified. By the urine the germs of impurity in his soul were killed.

But in one way this penance truly did purify him. In the fierce fire-pit of the homa his humanity was refined, and by the light of the homa's flame he scrutinised the pillars of religion thoroughly. From that day religion became a thing of disgust to him. He flung off the sacred thread and drowned his priesthood in the Ganga. Now he was a thorough cultivator. He also saw that although the learned men had accepted his Brahminhood, the people still did not drink water from his hand; they asked him for auspicious moments, had him consider the auspicious time and the wedding hour, gave him gifts too on festival days, but did not have him touch their vessels.

On the day Silia's child was born, he drank a double measure of bhang, and his chest as it were swelled with pride and his fingers kept going again and again to his moustache. What would the child be like? Just like himself? How was he to see it? His heart was left wringing.

On the third day Rupa met him in the field. He asked, "Rupia, have you seen Silia's boy?"

Rupia said, "Why not! He is red and red, very plump, has big big eyes, has curly hair on his head, and he stares and stares."

In Matadin's heart it was as if that child came and sat, and was flinging out its hands and feet. A kind of intoxication spread over his eyes. He lifted the girl Rupa up in his lap, then set her on his shoulders, then took her down and kissed her cheeks.

Rupa, steadying her hair, said boldly, "Come, I'll show him to you from a distance. He's right there in the verandah. Sister Silia, I don't know why she keeps weeping all the time."

Matadin turned his face away. His eyes had grown moist, and his lips were trembling.

That night, when the whole village had gone to sleep and the trees were drowned in darkness, he came to Silia's door and with his whole soul listened to the child's crying, in which the music, the joy and the sweetness of the whole world was filled.

Silia would put the child to sleep on the cot in Hori's house and go off to do her labour. Matadin, on one pretext or another, would come to Hori's house and, looking at the child from the corner of his eye, would cool his heart and his eyes and his soul.

Dhaniya would say with a smile, "Why are you shy? Take him in your lap, love him; how is your heart of wood! He has come out exactly like you."

Matadin would fling down a rupee or two for Silia and come out. Along with the child, his soul too was growing, blossoming, shining. Now his life too had a purpose, a vow. Restraint came into him, gravity came, responsibility came.

One day Ramu was lying on the cot. Dhaniya had gone somewhere. Rupa too, hearing the noise of the boys, had gone off to play. The house was empty. At that very moment Matadin arrived. The child was looking up at the blue sky and flinging out his hands and feet, jerking about—with that joy of life which was still fresh in him. Seeing Matadin he laughed. Matadin was overcome with affection. He lifted the child up and clasped him to his breast. His whole body and heart and soul were thrilled, as though lines of light were trembling on the waves of water. In the child's deep, pure, unfathomable, joy-filled eyes he as it were found the truth of life. He felt a kind of fear, as though that gaze were piercing into his heart—how impure he was; how could he touch that grace of God? With an anxious mind he laid the child down again. At that very moment Rupa came in from outside, and he went out.

One day there was a heavy fall of hailstones. Silia had gone to the market with grass. Rupa was absorbed in her play. Ramu had now begun to sit up. He had begun to babble a little too. When he saw the cotton-seeds spread out in the courtyard, he thought sugar-drops were scattered about. He picked up several and ate them, and played a great deal in the courtyard. At night fever came on him. The next day it became pneumonia. On the evening of the third day the child's life left him in Silia's very lap.

But even after dying, the child remained the centre of Silia's life. Milk would as it were well up in her breast and the end of her sari would grow wet. At that moment tears would come from her eyes too. Earlier, when she had got off all her work, at night when she clasped Ramu to her bosom and put her breast in his mouth, the child's vigour would as it were fill her own soul. Then she would sing dear, dear songs, dream sweet, sweet dreams, and build new and new worlds, of which Ramu was the king. Now, when she got off all her work, she would weep in her empty hut, and her soul would writhe to fly away to that world where her darling would even now be playing. The whole village shared in her grief. How frolicsome Ramu had been; whoever called him, he would go into that one's lap. Having died and gone beyond reach, he had become dearer still; his shadow was more beautiful, more frolicsome, more enchanting than he himself.

That day Matadin broke loose. The veil is for the wind. In a storm the veils are taken up and put away, lest they fly off with the wind. He took up the body on his two palms and carried it alone to the riverbank, which, leaving a mile-wide bed, had shrunk into a thin stream. For eight days his arms could not be straightened. That day he was not the least bit ashamed, did not flinch the least bit.

And no one said anything; rather, everyone praised his courage and firmness.

Hori said, "This is a man's religion. Whose arm you have grasped, how can you let her go!"

Dhaniya, rolling her eyes, said, "Do not praise him, my heart burns. Is this a man? Such a man I call a non-man. When he grasped her arm, was he then sucking milk, that Silia had become a Brahmin's wife?"

A month passed. Silia had begun to do her labour again. Evening had come. The full-moon moon had come out as if smiling. Silia had picked the fallen barley-ears from the reaped field and put them in her basket and was about to go home when her glance fell on the moon, and the stream of pain-filled memories as it were opened. The end of her sari grew wet with milk and her face with tears. She let her head droop and as it were began to take pleasure in weeping.

Suddenly, hearing someone's footfall, she started. Matadin came from behind and stood in front of her and said, "How long will you go on weeping, Silia? With weeping he will not come back again."

And as he said this he himself broke into tears.

The words of reproach that had risen to Silia's throat melted away. Steadying her voice, she said, "How did you come this way today?"

Matadin said piteously, "I was passing this way. I saw you sitting and came over."

"You never even got to play with him."

"No, Silia, one day I had played with him."

"Truly?"

"Truly!"

"Where was I?"

"You had gone to the market."

"He did not cry in your lap?"

"No, Silia, he was laughing."

"Truly?"

"Truly!"

"So you played with him only one day?"

"Yes, one day only, but I used to come to see him every day. I used to watch him playing on the cot and go away holding my heart down."

"He had come out exactly like you."

"I feel remorse that I needlessly took him in my lap that day. This is the punishment for my sins."

In Silia's eyes forgiveness was glimmering. She set the basket on her head and walked home. Matadin too walked along beside her.

Silia said, "I now sleep in Dhaniya kaki's outer room. In my own house I do not feel good."

"Dhaniya kept advising me all along."

"Truly?"

"Yes, truly. Whenever she met me, she would begin to advise me."

Coming near the village, Silia said, "All right, go to your home by this way now. The pandits might see you."

Matadin lifted his neck and said, "I no longer fear anyone."

"If they turn you out of the house, where will you go?"

"I have made a house of my own."

"Truly?"

"Yes, truly."

"Where? I have not seen it."

"Come, then, I shall show you."

The two of them walked on further. Matadin was in front, Silia behind. Hori's house came. Matadin went to the back of it and stood at the door of Silia's hut and said, "This is my house."

Silia said in a voice full of disbelief, forgiveness, irony and grief, "But this is Silia the chamarin's house."

Matadin said, opening the wicker door, "This is the temple of my goddess."

Silia's eyes began to shine. She said, "If it is a temple, then you will pour out one lota of water and go away!"

Matadin, taking the basket down from her head, said in a trembling voice, "No, Silia, as long as there is life in me, I shall stay in your refuge. I shall worship you alone!"

"You speak falsely."

"No, I say it touching your feet. I heard that Bhunesari, the patwari's lad, was after you a great deal. You scolded him roundly."

"Who told you?"

"Bhunesari himself was saying it."

"Truly?"

"Yes, truly."

Silia lit the lamp with a matchstick. On one side was an earthen pot, on the other side was the hearth, where two or three brass and iron vessels stood, scoured and washed. In the middle, straw was spread. There lay Silia's bed. At the head of this bed Ramu's small cot was as it were weeping, and right beside it lay two or three clay elephants and horses in a state of broken limbs. When the master himself was no more, who was to look after them? Matadin sat down on the straw. In his heart a pang kept rising; his soul longed to weep his fill.

Silia, laying her hand on his back, asked, "Did you ever remember me?"

Matadin took her hand and, pressing it to his heart, said, "You kept circling before my eyes all the time. Did you too ever remember me?"

"My heart burned against you."

"And no pity came?"

"Never."

"Then Bhunesari?"

"All right, do not throw it in my face. I am afraid of what the village folk will say."

"Those who are decent will say, this was her religion. Of those who are bad, I have no care."

"And who will cook your food?"

"My queen, Silia."

"Then how will you remain a Brahmin?"

"I do not wish to remain a Brahmin; I wish to remain a chamar. Whoever keeps his religion, he is the Brahmin; whoever turns his face from religion, he is the chamar." Silia put her arms round his neck.