by Ruskin Bond
‘I’ll probably come up in September, after the rains,’ he said. ‘If I live that long… I’m just living from day to day.’
‘So am I,’ I told him. ‘It’s the best way to live.’
A couple of days passed before Kailash came to see me. I was beginning to wonder if he’d come again. Apparently the teacher had at first proved elusive; but the deed was done, and Kailash passed with the marks he needed. Ironically, his uncle was so impressed that he is now urging the boy to remain with him and complete the Intermediate exam.
‘I must write a story about your uncle,’ I remark.
‘Don’t give him a story’, says Kailash. ‘A short note will do.’
Now that Prem is preoccupied with his wife, and the house is at the mercy of uninvited visitors, I stay out most of the time, and these days Kailash is my only companion. Yesterday we took Camel’s Back Road, past the cemetery. He chatters away, and I can listen if I want to, or think of other things if I don’t want to listen; apparently it makes no difference to him. He is a cheerful soul, with an infectious laugh. He walks with a slight swagger, or roll. He says he doesn’t mind staying here now that he has me for a friend; that he can put up with two sour uncles as long as he knows I’m around. I suspect he’s quite capable of pulling a fast one on his uncle; but all the same, I find myself liking him.
Moody. And when I’m moody I’m bad.
Prem says: ‘It is easier to please God than it is to please you.’
‘But God is easily pleased,’ I respond. ‘God makes absolutely no demands on us. We just imagine them.’
The eyes.
Prem’s eyes have great gentleness in them.
His wife’s eyes are round and mischievous and suggestive…
Suggestive enough to invite the attention of a mischievous or malignant spirit.
At about two in the morning I am awakened by Prem’s shouts, muffled by rain. Shouting back that I am on my way, for it is obviously an emergency, I leap out of bed, grab an umbrella, dash outside and then down the stairs to his room. His wife is sobbing in bed. Whatever had possessed her has now gone away, and the crying is due more to Prem’s ministrations—he exorcizes the ghost by thumping her on the head—than to the ‘possession’ itself. But there is no doubt that she is subject to hallucinatory or subconscious actions. It is not simply a hysterical fit. She walks in her sleep, moves restlessly from door to window, holds conversations with an invisible presence, and resists all efforts to bring her back to reality. When she comes out of the trance, she is quite normal.
This sort of thing is apparently quite common in the hills, where people believe it to be a ghost taking temporary possession of a human mind. It’s happened to Prem’s wife before, and it also happens to her brother, so it seems to run in families. It never happens to Prem, who deeply resents the interruption to his sleep.
I calm the girl and then make them bring their bedding upstairs. I give her a sleeping tablet and she is soon fast asleep.
During a lull in the rain, I hear a most hideous sound coming from the forest—a maniacal shrieking, followed by a mournful hooting. But Prem and his wife sleep through it all. The rain starts again, and the shrieking stops. Perhaps it’s a hyena. Perhaps something else.
A morning of bright sunshine, and the whistling thrush welcomes it with a burst of song. Where do the birds shelter when it rains? How does that frail butterfly survive the battering of strong winds and heavy raindrops? How do the snakes manage in their flooded holes?
I saw a bright green snake sunning itself on some rocks; no doubt waiting for its hole to dry out.
In my vagrant days, ten to fifteen years ago (long before the hippies made vagrancy a commonplace), I was a great frequenter of tea shops, those dingy little shacks with a table and three chairs, a grimy tea kettle, and a cracked gramophone. Tea shops haven’t changed much, and once again I find myself lingering in them, sometimes in company with Kailash, who, although he doesn’t eat much, drinks a lot of tea.
One can sit all day in a tea shop and watch the world go by. Amazing the number of people who actually do this! And not all of them unemployed. The tea shop near the clock tower is ideal for this purpose. It is a busy part of the bazaar but the tea shop, though small, is gloomy within, and one can loll about unseen, observing everyone who passes by a few feet away in the sunlit (or rain-spattered) street. The tea itself is indifferent, the buns are stale, the boiled eggs have been peppered too liberally. Kailash is unusually quiet; there is no one else in the shop. People who would stop me in the road pass by without glancing into the murky interior. This is the ideal place; not as noble as my window opening into the trees, but familiar, reminiscent of days gone by in Dehra, when cares sat lightly upon me simply because I did not care at all. And now perhaps I have begun to care too much.
I gave Bijju a cake. He licked all the icing off it, only then did he eat the rest.
It was a dark windy corner in Landour bazaar, but I always found the old man there, hunched up over the charcoal fire on which he roasted his peanuts. He’d been there for as long as I could remember, and he could be seen at almost any hour of the day or night. Summer or winter, he stayed close to his fire.
He was probably quite tall, but we never saw him standing up. One judged his height from his long, loose limbs. He was very thin, and the high cheekbones added to the tautness of his tightly stretched skin.
His peanuts were always fresh, crisp and hot. They were popular with the small boys who had a few paise to spend on their way to and from school, and with the patrons of the cinemas, many of whom made straight for the windy corner during intervals or when the show was over. On cold winter evenings, or misty monsoon days, there was always a demand for the old man’s peanuts.
No one knew his name. No one had ever thought of asking him for it. One just took him for granted. He was as fixed a landmark as the clock tower or the old cherry tree that grew crookedly from the hillside. The tree was always being lopped; the clock often stopped. The peanut vendor seemed less perishable than the tree, more dependable than the clock.
He had no family, but in a way all the world was his family, because he was in continuous contact with people. And yet he was a remote sort of being; always polite, even to children, but never familiar. There is a distinction to be made between aloneness and loneliness. The peanut vendor was seldom alone; but he must have been lonely.
Summer nights he rolled himself up in a thin blanket and slept on the ground, beside the dying embers of his fire. During the winter, he waited until the last show was over, before retiring to the rickshaw-coolies’ shed where there was some protection from the biting wind.
Did he enjoy being alive? I wonder now. He was not a joyful person; but then, neither was he miserable. I should think he was a genuine stoic, one of those who do not attach overmuch importance to themselves, who are emotionally uninvolved, content with their limitations, their dark corners. I wanted to get to know the old man better, to sound him out on the immense questions involved in roasting peanuts all his life; but it’s too late now. The last time I visited the bazaar the dark corner was deserted; the old man had vanished; the coolies had carried him down to the cremation ground.
‘He died in his sleep,’ said the tea-shop owner. ‘He was very old.’
Very old. Sufficient reason to die.
But that corner is very empty, very dark, and whenever I pass it I am haunted by visions of the old peanut vendor, troubled by the questions I failed to ask; and I wonder if he was really as indifferent to life as he appeared to be.
Prem brought his wife some of her favourite mangoes. This afternoon he took her into my room so that she could listen to the radio. They both fell asleep at opposite ends of the bed; are still asleep as I write this in the next room, at my window. If I curled up a little, I could fall asleep here on the window seat. Nothing would induce me to disturb those innocents; they look far too blissful in their slumbers.
Kailash and I are caught in a storm
and it’s by far the worst storm of the year. To make matters worse, there is absolutely no shelter for a mile along the main road from the town. It was fierce, lashing rain, quite cold, whipping along on the wind from all angles. The road was soon a torrent of muddy water, as earth and stones came rushing down the hillsides. Our one umbrella was useless and was very nearly blown away. The cardboard carton in which we were carrying vegetables was soon reduced to pulp. We broke into a run, although we could hardly see our way. There were blinding flashes of lightning—is an umbrella a good or a bad conductor of electricity? Kailash sees humour in these situations and was in peals of laughter all the way home, even when we slid into a ditch.
He takes my hand and holds it between his hands. He is happy. He has got his self-confidence back, and can now deal with his uncles and Sanskrit teachers.
In the morning I work on a story. There is a dove cooing in the garden. Now it is very quiet, the only sound is the distant tapping of a woodpecker. The trees are muffled in ferns and creepers. It is mid-monsoon.
Kailash, his hair falling in an untidy mop across his forehead, drags me out of the house and over the wet green grass on the hillside. I protest that I do not like leeches, so we make for the high rocks. He laughs, talks, chuckles, and when he grins his large front teeth make him look like a 1940s’ Mickey Rooney. When he looks sullen (this happens when he talks about his uncle), he looks Brando-ish. He has the gift of being able to convey his effervescence to me. Am I, at thirty-eight, too old to be gambolling about on the hill slopes like a young colt? (Am I, sobering thought, going to be a character of enforced youthfulness like the man on the boat in Death in Venice? Well, better that than the Gissing hero of New Grub Street who’s old at forty.) If I am fit enough to gambol, then I must gambol. If I can still climb a tree, then I must climb trees, instead of just watching them from my window. I was in such high spirits yesterday that I kept playing the clown, and I haven’t done this in years. To walk in the rain was fun, and to get wet was fun, and to fall down was fun, and to get hurt was fun.
‘Will it last?’ asks Kailash.
‘This feeling of love between us?’
‘This won’t last. Not in this way. But if something like it lasts, we should be happy.’
Prem is happy, laughing, giggling all the time. Sometimes it is a little annoying for me, because he is obviously unaware of what is happening around him—such as the fact that part of the roof blew away in the storm—but I am a good Taoist, I say nothing, I wait for the right moment! Besides, it’s a crime to interfere with anyone’s happiness.
Prem notices the roof is missing and scolds his wife for seeing too many pictures. ‘She’s seen ten pictures in two months. More than she’d seen in her whole life, before coming here.’ She pulls a face. Says Prem: ‘My grandfather will be here any day to take her home.’
‘Then she can see pictures with your grandfather,’ I venture. ‘While we repair the roof.’
‘I wouldn’t go anywhere with that old man,’ she says.
‘Don’t speak like that of my grandfather. Do you want a beating? Look at Binya’—we all look at Binya, who is perched very prettily on the wall—‘she hasn’t seen more than two pictures in her life!’
‘I’ll take her to the pictures,’ I offer.
Binya gives me a radiant smile. She’d love to go to the pictures, but her mother won’t allow it.
Prem relents and takes his wife to the pictures.
Binya’s mother has a bad attack of hiccups. Serves her right, for stealing my walnuts and not letting me take Binya to the pictures.
In the evening I find Prem teaching his wife the alphabet, using the kitchen door as a blackboard. It is covered with chalk marks. Love is teaching your wife to read and write!
♦
These entries were made in 1973, twenty years ago.
The following year I did not keep a journal, but these are some of the things that happened:
Sir E had a stroke and, like a stranded whale, finally heaved his last breath. According to his wishes, he was cremated on his farm near Dehra.
To Prem and Chandra was born a son, Rakesh, who immediately stole my heart—and gave me many a sleepless night, for as a baby he cried lustily.
Kailash went into the army and disappeared from my life, as well as from his uncle’s.
Bijju and Binya were to remain a part of the hillside for several years.
1This story was called ‘The Blue Umbrella’.
2Not Nelson’s song originally, but he sang it better than anyone else.
3This was before the advent of audiotapes.
4When The Room on the Roof was published (1956).
Night of the Leopard
1
IN THE ENTIRE village, Raki was the first to get up. even the dog, a large black mongrel called Raja, was asleep in a comer of the dark room, curled up near the embers of last night’s fire. Raki’s tousled head emerged from his blanket. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes and sat up. Then he crawled towards the loud ticking that came from the battered little clock which stood in a niche in the wall.
Bringing his face close to the clock, Raki could just make out the dial-hands. It was five o’clock. He had half an hour in which to get ready.
He got up, in undershirt and shorts, and moved quietly towards the door. The soft tread of his bare feet woke Raja, and the black dog rose silently and padded behind the boy. The door opened and closed, and boy and dog were outside in the chill dawn.
It was June, midsummer in the Himalayan valleys, but there was fresh dew on the grass. Raki felt the dew beneath his feet. He took a deep breath and began walking down to the stream.
The sound of the stream filled the small valley. At that early hour it was the only sound but Raki was hardly conscious of it. It was a sound he lived with and took for granted. Only when the stream was too far away to be heard did he really miss its sound.
He slipped out of his clothes, gazed for a few moments at the goose pimples rising on his flesh, and then dashed into the shallow stream. The cold mountain water made him gasp with shock and delight. He moved slowly with the current and swam across to a small pool, where he plunged beneath the water.
The dog disliked cold water at that early hour. So he contented himself with sitting on a smooth rock and watching Raki as he splashed about in the clear water.
When Raki ran back to the house, he found his mother up, making tea and chapatties. His sister, Puja, was still asleep. She was two years older than Raki, a pretty girl with large black eyes. During the day, she helped her mother in the house and in the fields. She did not go to school with Raki. But when he came home in the evenings, he would teach her some of the things he had learnt. Their father was dead. Raki, at twelve, considered himself the head of the family.
He ate two chapatties, after spreading butter-oil on them. He drank a glass of hot sweet tea. His mother gave two of the thick flour-cakes to Raja, who wolfed them down. Then she wrapped two chapatties and a gourd-curry in some big green leaves and handed them to Raki. This was his lunch. His mother and Puja would eat afterwards.
Wearing a white shirt and black shorts and a pair of worn white gym shoes, he was ready for his long walk to school, five miles up the mountain.
Puja woke up just as he was about to leave. She pushed the hair away from her face and gave Raki one of her rare smiles.
‘I hope you have not forgotten,’ she said.
‘Forgotten?’ said Raki, pretending to sound puzzled. ‘Is there something should remember?’
‘Don’t tease me. You promised to buy me a pair of bangles, remember? I hope you won’t spend the money on sweets, as you did last time.’
‘Oh yes, your bangles,’ said Raki. ‘Girls have nothing better to do than waste money on bangles. Now, don’t lose your temper! I’ll get them for you. Red and gold are the colours you want?’
‘Yes, brother,’ said Puja gently, pleased that Raki had remembered the colours. ‘And for your dinner tonight we’l
l make something special. Won’t we, mother?’
‘All right, but hurry up and dress. We have to cut grass for the cows.’
They spoke in their own hill dialect, although sometimes Raki, to be wordly, would use an English or Hindi word.
His mother was winding the old clock. The sun would be up any minute.
Raki shouldered his schoolbag, kissed his mother, pinched his sister’s cheeks, and left the house. Raja bounded ahead of him. He always went with Raki to school. Together they started climbing the steep path up the mountain.
Five miles to school. Every day except Sunday, Raki walked five miles to school; and in the evening, he walked home again. There was no school in his own small village of Koli, for the village consisted of only five families. The nearest school was in the small town of Chamoli. Raki’s village lay in the valley below Chamoli, and a steep footpath was the only link between the village and the town.
In Chamoli there was a school, a small hospital, a post office, and several shops. In Koli village there were none of these. If you were sick, you stayed at home until you got well. If you were very sick, you walked or were carried to the hospital, up the five-mile path. If you wanted something, you went without it. If you wanted it very badly, you could walk to Chamoli.
Koli was known as the Five Mile Village.
Twice a week the postman came to the village. Raki usually passed him on his way to and from school.
Leaving the village and the fields below him, Raki climbed steadily up the path. By the time the sun was up, he had entered the welcome shade of a forest of oaks and rhododendrons. Raja went bounding ahead, chasing squirrels and barking at monkeys.
Emerging from the trees, Raki stopped to drink the fresh, clean water of a spring. Here he met Beenu, a boy from a neighbouring village.
Beenu had two large milk cans slung over his shoulders. Every morning he carried his milk to town, selling some to the school and some to Dr Taylor, the lady doctor at the hospital.
They hailed each other and Beenu fell into step beside Raki. They often met near the spring, walking together to Chamoli.