8

Once this dam had broken, the fresh flood within Binoy’s heart seemed to surge even more freely and without restraint. Coming out of Anandamayi’s house and walking down the street, he felt as though he were flying — his feet scarcely seemed to touch the ground; and he longed to lift his face and proclaim aloud to the whole world that thought which had been tormenting him with its suppressed weight these past few days.

The very moment Binoy reached the doorway of number seventy-eight, Paresh arrived there from the opposite direction.

“Come in, come in, Binoybabu — I am very glad” — saying this, Paresh led Binoy into the sitting room that faced the street and bade him be seated. There was a small table, a bench with a back-rest on one side of it, and a wooden and cane chair on the other; on one wall hung a coloured picture of Jesus Christ, and on the other a photograph of Keshavbabu. On the table lay a few days’ newspapers folded up, with a lead paper-weight on top. In one corner stood a small bookcase, and on its upper shelf could be seen rows of Theodore Parker’s works, neatly arranged. On top of the bookcase rested a globe covered with a cloth.

Binoy sat down; his heart within him began to beat in agitation; and it seemed to him that if someone were to come in through the open door behind his back and enter the room—

Paresh said, “On Mondays Sucharita goes to teach the daughter of a friend of mine, and there is a boy there of the same age as Satish, so Satish has gone along with her. I am on my way back from dropping them there. Had I been a little later, I should have missed you.”

On hearing this, Binoy felt at once a pang of disappointed hope and a sense of relief. His conversation with Paresh flowed on quite easily and naturally.

As they talked, Paresh learnt, one by one, all about Binoy’s circumstances. Binoy’s parents were dead; his uncle lived in the country with his aunt, attending to the estate. Two of his cousins had lived with him in the same lodgings while studying — the elder had become a lawyer and was practising at their district court; the younger had died of cholera while still in Calcutta. His uncle wished Binoy to seek a position as a deputy magistrate, but Binoy had made no such effort and was occupied instead with various other pursuits that his uncle considered idle.

In this manner nearly an hour passed. To stay much longer without any business would be impolite, and so Binoy rose to leave; he said, “I am sorry not to have seen my friend Satish — give him word that I came.”

Pareshbabu said, “Had you sat a little longer you would have met them. They cannot be much longer in returning.”

Binoy felt too shy to sit down again on the strength of those few words alone. Had Paresh pressed him a little more, he might have stayed — but Paresh was not a man for pressing or urging at length, and so he had to take his leave. Paresh said, “I shall be pleased if you come occasionally.”

Going out into the street, Binoy felt no inclination to turn back towards his own rooms. There was nothing for him there. Binoy wrote for the papers — his English essays were greatly admired by everyone — but these past few days, whenever he sat down to write, nothing came to his head. It was a burden to sit long at the table — his mind grew restless and fidgety. And so today, without any particular reason, Binoy walked in the opposite direction.

He had gone only a step or two when he heard a boy’s voice shouting shrilly, “Binoybabu! Binoybabu!”

He looked up and saw Satish leaning out of the door of a hired carriage, calling out to him. Inside the carriage, on the seat, there was just visible a part of a sari and a white sleeve of a jacket — and from so much as could be seen, there was no doubt whatever as to who the passenger was.

In accordance with the proprieties of Bengali society, it became difficult for Binoy to keep his gaze directed towards the carriage. Meanwhile, Satish had already climbed down from the carriage right there and come up to take his hand; he said, “Come along to our house.”

Binoy said, “But I have only just come from your house.”

Satish: Come now — we were not there, were we. Come again.

Binoy could not resist Satish’s insistence. The boy led his captive inside the house and at once called out loudly, “Baba, I have brought Binoybabu!”

The old gentleman came out from his room and said with a faint smile, “You have been caught in a firm grip — you will not be let go easily. Satish, go and call your sister.”

Binoy came in and sat down; his heart beat rapidly within him. He felt as though — behind his back, through the open door — someone might step into the room. Paresh said, “You seem quite breathless! Satish is a great handful of a boy.”

When Satish entered the room with his elder sister, Binoy first became aware of a faint sweet fragrance — and then heard Pareshbabu saying, “Radhe, Binoybabu has come. You already know him, of course.”

Binoy looked up with a start and saw Sucharita bow to him in greeting as she took her seat in the chair opposite — this time he did not forget to return the salutation.

Sucharita said, “He was passing by in the street. The moment Satish caught sight of him there was no holding the boy back — he jumped straight down from the carriage and dragged him here. You were perhaps on your way somewhere — I hope it has caused you no inconvenience?”

Binoy had not expected Sucharita to address him directly at all. He grew flustered and embarrassed, and blurted out in a broken rush, “No, no — I had nowhere in particular to go — it is no inconvenience whatsoever.”

Satish tugged at his elder sister’s sari and said, “Didi, give me the key, won’t you? Let me fetch the hurdy-gurdy and show it to Binoybabu.”

Sucharita laughed and said, “So it begins! Whoever strikes up a friendship with Baktiyar is done for — the hurdy-gurdy is the least of it, there is far greater suffering in store. Binoybabu, this little friend of yours is young, but the obligations of his friendship are very heavy indeed — whether you can bear them, I cannot say.”

Binoy could not for the life of him think how to join in Sucharita’s easy, unguarded conversation with any natural ease of his own. He had firmly resolved not to be shy, yet even so he managed only a disjointed, stumbling reply: “No, not at all — you — that is — I — I rather enjoy it, actually.”

Satish extracted the key from his sister and presently returned with the hurdy-gurdy. Inside a square glass case, a toy ship rested upon cloth painted blue in imitation of a rippling sea. Satish wound the key, and to the tune and rhythm of the hurdy-gurdy the little ship began to sway; and Satish, glancing alternately at the ship and at Binoy’s face, could not contain his excitement.

In this manner, with Satish acting as intermediary between them, Binoy’s constraint gradually dissolved, and before long it was no longer impossible for him to look up now and again and speak directly with Sucharita.

At one point Satish, quite without context, suddenly burst out, “Won’t you bring your friend to visit us one day?”

This led to questions about Binoy’s friend. Pareshbabu’s family had come to Calcutta only recently and knew nothing at all of Gora. As Binoy began to speak of his friend he grew animated. He could find no words sufficient to convey the extraordinary genius of Gora, the breadth of his heart, the unyielding strength of his spirit. That Gora would one day blaze over all of India like the midday sun at its zenith — “Of that,” said Binoy, “I have not the smallest doubt.”

As he spoke, a kind of radiance came upon Binoy’s face and all his reserve fell away entirely. He even entered into a brief argument with Pareshbabu about Gora’s views. Binoy said, “The reason Gora can accept every aspect of Hindu society without hesitation is that he sees India from a very high vantage point. To him all of India — great and small alike — appears whole and complete within a grand unity, within a vast and encompassing harmony. Because seeing it thus is beyond most of us, we break India into fragments, measure her against foreign ideals, and do her nothing but injustice.”

Sucharita said, “Do you then hold that the caste system is a good thing?”

She said it in a tone that admitted of no argument on the matter.

Binoy said, “The caste system is neither good nor bad in itself — that is to say, it is good in some respects and bad in others. If you ask me whether the hand is a good thing, I will say: considered in relation to the whole body, yes. If you ask whether it is good for flying, I will say no. Equally, a wing is of no use for grasping.”

Sucharita said with some heat, “I cannot follow all that. What I am asking is whether you accept the caste system.”

With anyone else, Binoy would have said firmly, “Yes, I do.” Today, however, he felt a reluctance to say it with such firmness — whether it was timidity on his part, or whether his mind on this occasion refused to go as far as a plain declaration of faith in the caste system would carry him, it was impossible to say with certainty. Paresh, fearing the argument might go too far, interposed at this point and said, “Radhe, go and call your mother and the others — let me introduce them to our guest.”

The moment Sucharita left the room, Satish went chattering and skipping along after her.

A little while later Sucharita came back into the room and said, “Baba, Mother has asked you all to come up to the terrace veranda.”