Nectar in a Sieve (22 page)

"I will stay and ask him," Nathan said stubbornly. "Maybe he will know," and he stood firmly.

The doctor meanwhile was approaching. Under the thin shirt I saw the figure of a woman and I whispered hastily to my husband: "Be careful -- it is a woman." Nathan turned bewildered eyes on me. "The trousers --" he began, but there was no time to say more and he stopped short confused and stammering.

"Who are you? What do you want?" A woman's voice, unmistakably.

"Our son came here to work some years ago," I said. "We have come to seek shelter with him."

"His name?"

" Murugan."

"Oh yes, he came through Kennington, did he not?"

"Yes," I said eagerly. " Kenny gave him the recommendation. He has been very good to me and mine."

"How is he?" she asked, forgetting we thirsted for news. "I have not seen him for a very long time."

"Well," I said, "and happy, since he is building this new hospital. My son works for him."

She looked at me thoughtfully and I could see she wanted to know more about the hospital, but she only said: "Of course, you are anxious about your son. I am afraid I cannot help you, he left here nearly two years ago."

Left two years ago. Where could he go? Why go with no word to us? We stood mute and miserable. At last I felt I must know. "Has anything happened -- I mean had he done some wrong --?"

"No; nothing like that. He was a very good servant and he went after higher wages."

Well, I thought. This at least is better hearing, and I licked my dry lips and said, "If you would tell us where he went -- we must go to him, there is no one else. . . ."

"I am not sure," she said with a hint of pity in her eyes, "but I have heard that he works for the Collector.

He lives on Chamundi Hill," she added. "Anyone will show you the house: it is big enough."

We were at the gate when she came after us. "You look faint -- have you not eaten?"

"We were fed at the temple," I said, not meeting those shrewd eyes.

"It is a long time since," she said. "You had better have a meal here before you go." She called to the servant and spoke to him rapidly, and he came, looking none too pleased, to lead us to where we had to go.

The servants' quarters lay behind the house and some distance away. They consisted of three godowns standing in a row, square rooms with brick walls and stone floors, each with a separate low doorway. At the first one the manservant, Das, stopped and beckoned us to enter. Inside it was half-dark, for there was only one window high up on the wall and a thick blue smoke was rising from a corner where a young woman was busy cooking.

"These people are to eat with us," Das said. "They are the parents of one Murugan who was before me."

The young woman rose and came to us cheerful and smiling, nursing a round, chubby baby. "You are more than welcome -- you seem very tired. . . ."

Her friendliness, her smile, were warming like the sun on old limbs, gentle as the rain on parched earth. I felt the stiffness that had collected in me departing, felt a new upsurge of hope. Nathan was visibly relaxed. "The rice is nearly cooked," the young woman was saying. "Perhaps you would like to wash before we eat -- the tap is outside, my husband will show you." Das was on his feet. "Ah yes, I had forgotten. Certainly a wash will do you good." He sounded more friendly.

We followed him out to the tap, which was about a furlong away. A cement floor had been built around the base of the tap, but the water which dripped constantly from the pipe ran off the cement so that the ground for some distance around was wet and muddy with scores of footprints leading to and from it.

Beyond it was the latrine. I had not used one before, and I entered with misgiving. There was no door, merely four walls built of tin which did not meet at one corner, thus leaving enough space for one person at a time. No roof; along one side a shallow trench from which rose a most foul stench; no covers; no kindly earth to hide what lay there open to the blue offended skies; no water to wash it away. I went out and stepped through the mud to the clear running water and when I had washed I felt better.

"You will have to get used to these things," Nathan said. "This is how life is lived in the city."

When we went back the young woman, still with the child at her hip, was straining the rice. Besides the baby there were now three other children in the room.

"Oh yes," she said in reply to my question. "All mine, and you can always find my brats here at mealtimes! I don't see them the rest of the day."

The children giggled delightedly, wriggling with pleasure. Their mother was peering into one of the pots on the fire, stirring and tasting. "Ready now," she said with satisfaction, wiping her streaming eyes with a corner of her sari. The smoke must have entered the baby's eyes too, for he began screaming.

"Let me hold him," I said. "You will be able to work better."

"It's a girl. She very seldom cries," she said, handing the baby to me, and as if to earn the compliment it immediately quietened down.

The young woman had several pieces of plantain leaf cut and ready. She laid these out and began serving the rice and dhal, generous portions such as we ate at harvest times and ours larger than theirs.

"You are very kind to feed us so well," I said.

"We are fed free," she replied. "The doctor is very good to us and gives us rice and dhal. Today she sent extra for you."

So we ate with easy conscience, for I would not like to have taken from the store of a family who were for all their kindness only strangers to us, and who moreover had enough mouths of their own to feed.

As evening wore on the mother brought out a striped mat, for she had persuaded us to stay the night, on which to sleep. And sleep we did, the deep sleep of those who being tired have fed well and rested well.

The next morning early we departed, after thanking the doctor who was a woman, and Das and his wife who had cared so well for us, and she came to see us go with her curious-eyed children about her, sunny and smiling as when we had first seen her and to this day I see her as she was then, young and kind, with a warm smile ever ready on her lips.

CHAPTER XXVI

THE Collector's house on Chamundi Hill was simple enough to find: the hill itself could be seen for miles around, and everyone had heard of the Collector and knew where he lived. It was as the doctor had said a very fine house, taller than the young casuarina trees that grew near it and so brilliantly white that it looked as if the painters had only just finished their work. Around the house and grounds, which stretched away on either side of the hill, ran a low compound wall. A number of peons were standing about, turbaned and belted, much more imposing than the tannery chowkidars had been.

When he saw us approaching, one of the peons came up to us.

"No beggars are allowed here."

"We are not beggars. We have come for our son Murugan, who works here."

The man's manner changed. He looked at us almost sympathetically and was about to say something but changed his mind, instead swinging the heavy gate open for us and indicating that we should follow him.

"I will take you to his wife. The servants' godowns are at the back of the house."

My son's wife, the girl we had never seen. My son, who had been gone so long. A queer excitement took hold of me, I felt myself trembling. Nathan beside me quickened his step: his excitement was a part of me too.

"This is Ammu's godown," the man said, pointing. "Make yourselves known to her . . . I cannot wait. . . ."

He was gone. The godown he had pointed to was much the same as the one we had left, a small square room set in a row, only here the row was much longer, there were some ten or twelve godowns. The door stood open, from within came the sound of a baby's fretful crying.

"Come," Nathan said in a cracked voice. "Let us go in."

But we could not, although the door stood open, for sudden shyness had set a stranglehold upon us and the sense of intrusion was strong . . . and in the end we stood by the open doorway and called.

A thin girl with untidy hair came out: the baby we had heard crying at her hip, a small boy clinging to her sari; stood staring at us with a slight frown.

"Who is it? What do you want?"

No smile, no welcome. Perhaps she thinks we are beggars, I thought. No wonder since we look it, and once more the humiliation of having nothing, not even a cooking pot, smote at me.

"We are Murugan's parents," Nathan said gently. "You must be his wife."

The girl nodded, then recollecting herself she drew aside so that we could enter, came after us and stood biting her lip as if uncertain what to say.

"These must be our grandchildren," I said, trying not to notice her attitude. "I have long wanted to see them."

"No doubt . . ." the girl said, her lips twisting a little. "No doubt you want to see your son, too. He is not here."

"Not here," Nathan repeated. "I was told he was here! When is he coming back?"

"I wish I knew," she replied. "I do not think he will ever come back."

"What do you mean? Are you not his wife? What makes you say he will never return?"

"He left me," she replied bitterly. "He has been gone nearly two years."

We had come a long way to meet bad news and now it seemed there was neither going back nor going forward. What we had saved had been taken from us, there was nothing more . . . nothing left to sell; neither youth nor strength left to barter.

I looked about the room in which my son's wife lived, and I knew that at any rate we could not stay here. Such resources as she had were not enough even for herself, they would certainly not stretch to cover our needs. Except for a small bowlful of rice there seemed to be no other food in the place. The little boy was thin and hollow-cheeked, his mother looked worn and haggard and was obviously hardly able to feed the baby who kept whimpering fitfully: the cry of hunger which is different from the other cries of infants.

"Is there no way of finding out where he has gone?" Nathan said at last. "Perhaps if we tried . . ."

"I have tried," Ammu said brusquely. "Do you think I haven't? He has left the city: nobody knows where he has gone."

There was about her a faint air of hostility, as if in some way she held us responsible for his defection. As indeed we are, I thought sadly. We gave him life, we should have taught him better. Yet looking back it was difficult to see how or where the mistake had been made.

We had been there about an hour, perhaps less, when Ammu rose. "I must go to my work . . . it is late already. I shall be back at midday to feed the children, stay till then."

"Do you go far?"

"No . . . only to the house. I sweep and clean."

"It must be hard work," I said. "You do not look very strong and the house is a large one."

She shrugged. "I am not the only one . . . besides one must live. It is not everywhere one can earn fifteen rupees a month and have a godown to live in free."

The baby was still astride her hip, now she arranged a few rags in a corner of the room and laid him down. Instantly he began to wail. "Let me take him," I said. "He may quieten down."

"As you wish," she said indifferently, picking him up and handing him to me. "Of course you realise he has nothing to do with you. . . . I mean he is not your grandchild."

"Of course."

"One must live," she repeated, defiant, challenging, sensing reproach where none could be; for it is very true, one must live.

At midday, as she had said, she came back. She had told us to wait, yet now her attitude said very clearly: You should not have taken me at my word, what I said was said in duty and for no other reason. In a sullen silence she began preparing the meal, lighting the fire, fetching the water, boiling the rice, the baby astride her hip as before and whimpering unheeded. She did not speak until we had eaten. Then she looked up.

"Where will you go? Can you return to your village?" And when? said her hostile questioning eyes. I cannot keep you here indefinitely, the sooner you go the better.

"We must return to our village," Nathan agreed. "There is nothing for us here. We came only because of our son, you understand."

She nodded. "Yes; he has let us all down."

"Maybe there were reasons," I said. Whatever claim this woman had on him, still he was my son; I could not let her heap all the blame on him. Her face darkened, anger bloated her lips and lit fires behind her black brooding eyes.