The Fifth Man (16 page)

Esha shut the door, not opening it the rest of the night, as though she was trying to leave no sign of herself behind the silent door. At dinner Mahanam said, ‘What’s this? Isn’t she eating?’ Aritra had tried in vain to talk to her from outside her door. ‘She won’t eat,’ he said.

Mahanam said, ‘Well then, it’s just the two of us flickering in this huge dining hall. But I’m famished, and they do a delicious daal-bhaji here. Let’s eat.’

In his bed at night, Aritra Chowdhury felt a menacing wind from the direction of Ajanta. A terrible, revengeful wind. His heart began to ache and swell in his chest, to a point where he felt it would burst out of his body. So this was how Esha had taken revenge? Arousing him in body, mind, and memory, making him clutch her feet in passion, and then throwing him away with skilful indifference. It was for this that she had come back eighteen years later. Wonderful! Lying in bed, Aritra could see his own humiliated face in the mirror. A mendicant Shiva with matted locks. Pounding and crushing him with her feet, the goddess Kali had hung dozens of heads of a dead Aritra around her neck, Esha was staring at her, stupefied.

Mahanam was not as much of a detached sage as Aritra had thought. When Esha didn’t come down to dinner, and when he saw her door irrevocably shut while passing her room through the corridor, Mahanam had realized that something was wrong. And that Aritra was probably the cause. Coming out of his room very early in the morning, he found Esha walking down the stairs with her suitcase. She had bathed already, and tied her hair up. Dressed in a grey chiffon sari with floral prints, she was ready for the day. Startled by Mahanam, she came up to him quickly and said as though offering an explanation, ‘I’m not going up to Ajanta, Mahanam-da. I stayed the night, that’s all. I’m going to leave my suitcase at the counter and look around a little by myself.’ After some hesitation, she added, ‘I won’t go back to Pune with the two of you either. I’ll go to Bombay directly from Aurangabad. Then we’ll see.’

‘Sudden change of plans?’ said Mahanam. ‘What’s the matter, Esha?’

‘Things get complicated wherever I go, Mahanam-da, that’s just my luck.’

Mahanam said gravely, ‘You ran away back then, this time too you’re running away. Must Aritra Chowdhury win every time?’

Esha said regretfully, ‘He’s created a situation where Neelam will be very upset unless I go away. Didn’t you see how she left yesterday? As though leaving the field clear for me, her condemnation written all over her face. But I’m not here to play. If Neelam doesn’t understand this, how will Ari? Neelam has been deeply hurt by his behaviour. And it’s all because of me.’

Mahanam said, ‘No one can tell when sadness can prove useful to someone. And if Neelam suffers a bit because of you, that will settle accounts. What’s the use of letting the poor woman be in your debt forever?’

Now Esha’s heart broke, the tears welling up in her breast. She lowered her face in a desperate effort to stop them at her throat. Mahanam said, ‘At that time you didn’t dare come to me Esha, I had acquired a terrible reputation. If you can trust me this time, I’ll be at your side. Join battle with Aritra. Don’t run away from the battlefield. Unless you can break him once and for all you will not find release from one another.’

Esha stood with her back to him. Mahanam could make out that she was weeping in silence. Love had died. But its wounds were still fresh in some places. Mahanam had brought fresh pain to the raw welts. Esha was a young woman of nineteen now. Who had been used and discarded. Samiddha. The tilt of the flawless pearl-coloured neck, the stray wisps of hair near her ears. An infinitely gentle, infinitely suffering thing. Mahanam felt his hands trembling with sympathy. But she was also an independent spirited woman. He could not belittle her with consolation. She had to be given courage. More courage. When his own hands would no longer shake with hesitation, when they could be steady but be backed by his heart, then, only then would he have the right to offer her comfort in the form of courage.

‘What was your original plan?’ asked Mahanam.

‘Go back to Pune, spend two days there, then go to Bombay, take the ship to Goa, return to Bombay and take the Geetanjali Express back to Calcutta. That’s to say, I was supposed to. I bought my return ticket accordingly.’

‘All right,’ said Mahanam, ‘I’m going to maintain your itinerary. I’m going to accompany you throughout, all the way back to Calcutta. I’m here. But it is you who’ll have to fight the battle and win it, Esha.’

Having stayed up most of the night, Aritra could not stave off sleep at dawn. He had overslept. Getting dressed and going downstairs for breakfast, he found Mahanam drawn up to his full height near the door, smoking a long cigarette. White shirtsleeves rolled up, black-and-white checked trousers. Bathed, neat and clean, hair and beard perfectly in place. Aritra looked scruffy in comparison with his sleepless reddened eyes and a greenish stubble on his face. It was Neelam who kept him well-groomed, for Aritra’s age-old habit was to crumple up his clothes and throw them away. Even when he was not in a hurry to go to office, Neelam went hoarse urging him to shave and bathe.

Mahanam sat down at the breakfast table with Aritra. Unfolding his newspaper, he said very casually, ‘Oh yes, Ari, Esha was saying she won’t go back to Priyalkarnagar. It seems she can make out you’re finding it difficult with her there. Not enough space. I’d better make arrangements for her to stay at Chandrashekhar’s house.’

Startled, Aritra said anxiously, ‘What! Our plans are all worked out. Besides, Neelam will be terribly disappointed if she doesn’t come back to our place. Please explain to her, Mahanam-da. Chandrashekhar’s house is a bachelor’s, how can she stay there?’

‘So what? I don’t think Esha cares for all that. And I’m there too. There won’t be any problems. Chandrashekhar has enough space.’

‘No, that’s impossible. Esha, Esha!’ Aritra leapt to his feet and went towards her room. He was knocking on the door. Mahanam smiled gently at his impatience.

Esha opened the door. Bowing his head, Aritra said, ‘Forgive me this time, Esha. What explanation will I give Neelam if you go away somewhere else?’

It was nine at night by the time they got back to Pune via Aurangabad. Accompanying them to their doorstep, Mahanam left, refusing to go in.

Giving up things is easy to promise, hard to achieve. Besides, deviating from routine increases the possibility of mistakes. Impulses don’t last. Neelam returned to 233, Block B, Priyalkarnagar, and unlocked the door, fresh air filled the rooms soon after the windows were opened. The Marathi lady upstairs whom they had left the keys with had had the house cleaned every day. Neelam sprayed a freshener in every corner, switched the lights on, lit incense sticks. The surface of the table, the top of the chairs, the photograph of Goa on the wall all brightened. Neelam felt that she had had a delusional lapse of memory, for how else could she have considered this home, which she had built bit by bit herself with so much love, impure? She had come close to having her consciousness distorted by this distortion of memory,
smritibhrangsad buddhinasa
, saved only by remembering that a person perishes in that case,
buddhinasat pranasyati
. Pupu at eighteen was untainted, pure, sacred, how could she have considered introducing the poison of complications to her life? The first thing that Pupu had said when she had phoned was, ‘Is Baba all right? He’s not limping, is he?’ ‘Yes, come home, I’m back.’ ‘Why did you come alone Ma? Baba isn’t fully fit yet, and besides, you know he’s a bit cranky these days.’ Neelam felt like asking, ‘Doesn’t your mother mean anything to you, Pupu?’ But the question trembled on her lips and stopped. As it is Pupu would say, ‘You’re too sentimental, both of you.’

This time she was also on the verge of revealing the secret. ‘You know, Pupu, your father isn’t really your father. I was married earlier, you’re my daughter from that marriage.’ If she put it this way the impurity of the whole thing would go, but the hurt? The hurt would probably stay forever. Neelam could not gauge Pupu’s possible reaction. But her paternal assets were so valuable that she should be informed. Actually Neelam’s need was greater than Pupu’s. The burden of the truth was so heavy that Neelam could not bear it alone anymore.

That’s why Neelam breathed a sigh of relief when Esha and the rest of them returned. Aritra’s first words on entering was, ‘Where’s Pupe?’ Pupu came out of her room at once.

‘You’ve lost so much weight in just two days, Baba. So sunburnt too.’ Ari smiled, ‘This is known as a peachesand-cream complexion. Gets tanned easily. When was your father a white-skinned Englishman, Pupu? How did your exams go?’ Meanwhile, Esha was telling Neelam, ‘Dr Roy went back from the doorstep. I pleaded with him to come in for a cup of tea at least, but he refused.’

Pupu said, ‘Won’t you invite him home once more before he goes back, Ma? Don’t make too many items, else there’s no time to talk.’

Esha saw that Neelam was looking stricken. And Neelam saw that Esha looked exhausted, dispirited. It had been very important to inform Neelam that Mahanam had been with them all the time, right up to the front door. Having discharged her duty Esha did not pause a moment longer. She went in for a bath. A shower. Let all the fatigue, filth, regret, be washed away by a clean stream of water.

Esha came out of the bathroom with wet hair. Pulling her hair-dryer out quickly, Pupu said, ‘Do you wet your hair often when bathing, Esha Mashi? Dry your hair.’ Making Esha sit down at her own desk, she stood behind her and ran the dryer herself.

‘Do you use the dryer a lot?’ asked Esha. ‘It’ll turn your hair grey quickly. That’s why fashionable women grey early these days.’

‘Oh, how I would love it,’ said Pupu.

‘Is everything about you upside down?’ laughed Esha.

‘Don’t you see, Mashi?’ said Pupu. ‘It would make me look like Dr Mahanam Roy.’

Neelam started so violently that both Esha and Pupu turned towards her. Esha looked at Pupu, and then said, ‘That’s true, you do resemble Mahanam-da.’

‘I must have been his daughter in some other life,’ said Pupu. ‘Although I don’t believe in reincarnation.’

‘Don’t become too rigid about your beliefs so early in life, Pupu,’ said Esha. ‘You have no idea how many complex problems of life could be solved if there were such a thing as rebirth.’

Neelam was sitting as still as a corpse. Throwing a quick glance at her, Esha said:

I am at least thirty-five today
You are barely fifteen, and yet
The secret wound oozes the poison of memory
When I look at your young face

Neelam raised her eyes to look at them. They were brimming with tears. Pupu was listening closely to the poem, which Esha had recited in Bengali. ‘The rhythm is lovely,’ she said, ‘but I understand Bengali poems only in translation. You used the word “gurho”, what does it mean?’

‘Secret.’

‘The secret wound oozes the poison of memory. How lovely! You make beautiful poetry, Esha Mashi.’

‘What I recite is always the work of others. This was Sudhindranath Dutta’s translation of Heine’s poetry.’

Neelam realized that Esha had come to know. Mahanam had never even considered staking a claim, but Pupu was bound to learn the truth some day or the other. It was best to let her find out for herself.

Esha didn’t sit at the table to eat. Pupu took a glass of milk to her in the room. The three of them were having a family dinner after a long time. Aritra went to bed as soon as he had eaten. And fell asleep at once. Before going to bed, Neelam went into Pupu’s room to find Esha missing. Searching for her, she finally located her on the fifth floor roof. The floor of the terrace was tiled. The sky appeared very near. The end of Esha’s sari was fluttering in the gentle breeze.

‘What is it Esha, you didn’t go to bed?’

‘I can’t sleep. I’ve troubled all of you a lot, Neelam. Forgive me.’

‘What do you mean? I should be thanking you. You’ve given us so much. Beautiful experiences, wonderful company, love, so many truths would have remained piled up had you not come. It’s you who must forgive me if you can. I’ve only taken. When I try to give now, I don’t find anything valuable enough.’ Neelam was weeping.

Esha felt as though what Aritra should have told her was being channelled through Neelam. Because she needed to hear this. ‘There’s no need to suffer for the past, Neelam,’ she said. ‘It’s a new day.’

Neelam said, ‘The thing about Pupu made you sad all over again, didn’t it?’ Even as she said this, Neelam realized that despite her shame and sorrow, she felt a sense of pride. She had always got what she wanted. Her hands were filled with all she had got. Only Esha’s hands were empty.

‘It wasn’t very unexpected,’ Esha told her. ‘We knew, all the students in our group knew, that you were Mahanamda’s. Everyone was surprised when things turned out differently.’

Neelam looked away. ‘Now you know how terrible I am, Esha. You must hate me.’

Esha said, ‘Would you make the whole thing clearer to me, if you don’t mind? Was it your choice? Aritra instead of Mahanam-da? Or was it Mahanam-da who didn’t want to accept you and his child?’

‘Mahanam-da has come to know about his child today, eighteen years later. I decided not to let him know, lest he stop me. The choice was mine. The responsibility was entirely mine. Ari had told me many things about Mahanam-da, which turned me away from him. And besides, you know his irresistible ways of making love. He can win over any woman of any age. If he wants to.’

After a long pause Esha said, ‘He cannot win me over anymore, Neelam, you must trust me about this.’

‘I know he can’t. But that he wants to is my humiliation, don’t you see?’

‘No, it’s not your humiliation,’ said Esha. ‘You’ve given him too much importance. Ignore him a little, deprive him. Fight. Don’t let him win every time. For that’s when it will be a resounding defeat for him.’

Neelam said, ‘The one who wanted to deprive him has done it already. I have no womb, no eggs, I am a woman without womanhood.’

‘I’ve heard,’ said Esha. ‘Why are you agonizing over this medical, this physiological fact? I’m saying you’re still a woman. And, over and above that, a human being. Neelam, you must deprive him of what one person cannot do without from another. Don’t let your charity be so unrestricted.’

‘I’m not doing it anymore. I won’t. I understand many of my mistakes now, which I hadn’t earlier. That’s why I was thanking you. But what do I give you, Esha? My heart is parched.’

Esha said emotionally, ‘This is my biggest gift from you. However far I go away, your bounteous feet will always walk with me.’ It was a new vow beneath the starlit night.

Aritra did not know. But the battle had begun. All the cannons were trained on him. They were concealed behind the trees. Hidden eyes kept him under surveillance. The cavalry patrolled from a distance. You don’t know, Aritra Chowdhury, that you are in serious trouble.

Neelam said, ‘Bikram and Seema have requested us again and again. We’re staying at their house in Bombay.’

Agitated, Aritra said, ‘Phone them immediately and cancel it. I’ve made arrangements at the company guest house.’

Neelam said, ‘They’re waiting for us. I cannot hurt them. Why don’t you stay at the guest house? I’ll stay with the others at their house.’

‘So you’ve made up your mind.’

‘There’s nothing to make up my mind about. They’ve invited us. They’ll have made arrangements. Why should I turn them down?’

‘You’ll turn them down because Bikram’s vulgarity crosses all limits sometimes.’

‘I’m the vulgar type too, I can handle it.’

‘You can’t handle anything. The truth is that you like vulgarity. You’ve been indulging Bikram for a long time now.’

‘I don’t know whether I like vulgarity, but I do like a warm welcome. I admit it. The way Seema takes care of us when we go, the way Bikram is always ready to help, is not to be dismissed. And maybe I’m indulging Bikram, but who’s indulging you?’

‘Does my behaviour also reveal a vulgarity like Bikram’s?’

‘You’ve probably gone one better than him.’

Aritra was on his feet. Extremely agitated. About to say something offensive, he stopped. Had Esha said anything to Neelam? His face turned blue.

Pupu said, ‘I was in Goa just the other day. I’m not going again. I’ll stay back at Bikram Kaku’s house.’ Neelam decided that she would too, but there was no need to tell Aritra right now. She had to give him a lot of rope.