Left from the Nameless Shop

by Adithi Rao

  And so it was that Rudrapura, rather suspicious of these sudden turn of events, witnessed the wedding of forty-two-year-old Shankarnarayana and twenty-one-year-old Maithili one warm summer’s day. The ceremony took place with great, almost defiant fanfare, thanks to the sizeable sum Shankarnarayana spent on it. Later, the couple climbed into an open-top car festooned with flowers, and were driven slowly down Kashi Chetty Street, the brass band and the wedding guests leading the way. They travelled at a leisurely pace, the car inching forward so that the speedometer just barely rose above the zero mark.

  On Wadiyar Street, two lanes away from the wedding hall, in one of the upper storeys of the Sheshadri household, Lakshmi was sitting upon her bed and reading. The sound of the band had reached her these past fifteen minutes. Early that morning at the breakfast table, Sheshadri had curtly forbidden all family members from venturing outside the gate, or even into the front yard, between 10.00 a.m. and 3.00 p.m. Nobody questioned him or argued. Had he not forbidden it, they would have refrained from doing so anyway.

  The conversation at the dining table had picked up as soon as Sheshadri left for work, and the topics remained studiously general. Lakshmi had been her calm self, only quieter than usual, and a little preoccupied. The sisters-in-law cast her quick, worried glances when they thought she was not looking, and Gopala put a hand on her arm and gave her a smile that was frankly affectionate before leaving for college. She smiled back at him the best she could. Only the old lady, Lakshmi’s mother, chewing laboriously on pieces of akki rotti with her near-toothless gums, offered nothing by way of advice or consolation.

  At two o’clock that afternoon, the car bearing Shankarnarayana and Maithili turned into Wadiyar Street and crawled along it. Shankarnarayana’s sister Sushila had not attended the marriage. Neither had close or distant cousins, aunts and uncles. The groom’s party was largely made up of his business associates and neighbours, people who were mostly indifferent to his well-being and fate. They were mere social spectators who had come out of politeness or mild respect for one of the town’s wealthier citizens; or else, to seize the opportunity to gape, with unconcealed curiosity, at the young girl this middle-aged man had managed to snare. The wedding feast might also have been a powerful attraction.

  There was only one person in this whole town (present or otherwise) who truly wished the bridegroom well. It was the woman standing at her bedroom window in Sheshadri Mansion, half-hidden by the curtains, watching Shankarnarayana pass on the street below with his new bride.

  The woman who hadn’t been invited to the wedding.

  At Shankarnarayana’s house, the old family servant Tayavva came hurrying out with a brass plate swimming with kumkuma water. She circled the plate before the newly-weds, stripping away the evil eye before moving aside to allow the bride to step over the threshold into her new home for the very first time. Maithili raised her eyes for a moment and looked about her in wonderment. Her gaze met her husband’s and he smiled down at her. Something tugged at her heart and she lowered her eyes, a slight smile touching her lips. Her father had been right, in part at least. It was not the need to preserve family honour. It was simply that Maithili was innocent and affectionate; it was this nature that carved out for her a rightful place in a home that was wrongfully hers.

  A few days after the wedding, Shankarnarayana was stretched out in his wood-and-cane armchair, reading. Maithili, dressed in a nine-yard silk sari and with flowers in her hair, emerged from the kitchen and handed her husband his mid-morning coffee. He took it without looking up from his book and she returned to the kitchen where Tayavva was chopping vegetables in preparation for the afternoon meal. Shankara poured the coffee from the tumbler into the steel receptacle below it. Blowing on the piping hot liquid caused the steam to rise and cloud his spectacles. He waited a few moments for the mist to clear before taking a sip.

  He had placed his empty cup under his chair and returned to his book when the gardener came in and announced a caller. Shankarnarayana had been expecting a visitor, one in particular, for some days now. He lowered his book and sat up with outward calm. Sheshadri Saab walked in and stood there looking at Shankarnarayana in silence. Shankara looked back at him, then indicated a chair with a curt nod. If Sheshadri took exception to this unenthusiastic reception, he did not show it. He sat down, and his eyes involuntarily wandered to the passage that led into the kitchen. He did not find what he was looking for, however, and forced his gaze back to the man sitting before him. The whole time, Shankara watched Sheshadri with amused eyes in an otherwise bland face.

  Then Shankara raised his voice and called, ‘Tayavva! Innondu lota coffee tagondu baa!’ He turned back to his guest.

  ‘It seems you have married,’ said Sheshadri coldly.

  ‘That is right,’ replied the other.

  ‘What is the meaning of this?’ demanded Sheshadri.

  ‘Meaning?’ asked Shankara, sounding politely puzzled. ‘Why should there be a meaning? I am a man of high standing in society. Is it not fitting that I should marry? For fifteen years now I have not been able to perform any rituals or homas because I didn’t have a wife by my side.’

  Tayavva came in with a cup of coffee on a steel tray, but Sheshadri didn’t spare her a glance. He addressed Shankarnarayana with a sarcastic smile. ‘So that is your reason for marrying. To perform rituals!’

  Shankarnarayana’s eyes darted to the maid. She hesitated awkwardly, then placed the tumbler beside Sheshadri’s chair and hurried out of the room.

  ‘A man gets lonely,’ said Shankara simply.

  ‘You had a wife and you threw her out unceremoniously,’ said Sheshadri, his voice beginning to rise.

  ‘I am not responsible for that!’ exclaimed Shankara. ‘It was the fault of her father! He should have been more respectful of his son-in-law. Did he really expect me to live with his daughter after he let me down so badly in my business?’

  ‘Once you married Lakshmi, she became your responsibility. You went through the wedding ceremony with her, vowed to be her husband. That is an unconditional vow!’ cried Sheshadri.

  The excitement went out of Shankara now. He looked at Sheshadri with narrowed eyes, remembering the reasons he had so disliked the man even all those years ago.

  ‘It has been fifteen years, Sheshadri,’ he said quietly. ‘You didn’t seem to mind when I threw Lakshmi out of this house at that time. You people were perfectly happy to use her as a pawn in our quarrel. So why have you come here now?’

  Sheshadri glared at Shankara. Abruptly, and because the anger threatened to overwhelm him, he jerked to his feet. Shankara said calmly from his chair, ‘You haven’t touched your coffee.’

  ‘It is not proper for me to eat or drink anything from my sister’s house.’

  Shankara laughed. ‘This is not your sister’s house.’

  For a moment, Sheshadri’s chest heaved. The hatred in his steel-grey eyes would have intimidated anyone. Anyone, that is, but Shankarnarayana, who had known this man too long, seen through him too clearly, watched him bully too many little boys in the school playground when they were growing up, to care much for his tantrums or his arrogance.

  ‘We’ll see,’ Sheshadri spat out, and the words were a warning and a threat. He left the house. In the kitchen, Maithili who had been grating coconut for some jaggery payasa, had overheard the whole conversation.

  After Sheshadri’s departure, Shankara remained where he was. He would have liked to go back to his book but he couldn’t. It was not the unpleasant exchange of words that disturbed him. That he had expected, even looked forward to. It was a vague feeling of guilt and something else that had arisen at the mention of Lakshmi’s name. It was unsettling, even after all these years.

  After all these years. Even now.

  Five days later, a lawyer’s notice arrived. Maithili signed for it and gave it to her husband when he came home for lunch. She was agitated but did her best to hide it, as she had managed to since Sheshadri had planted in her mi
nd all those terrible truths. The name ‘Lakshmi’ kept playing over and over in her head like a monotonous drumbeat, bringing with it a sinking feeling. But she did not broach the subject with her husband. He looked grim and distant these days, nothing like the man who had smiled at her when she stepped over the threshold on their wedding day. Shankara’s manner intimidated her now. He had a quick temper, and she didn’t want to chance rousing it against herself. She noticed too, that at night he had stopped approaching her in the way that a man approaches his wife. Not since Sheshadri’s visit.

  Shankara opened the legal notice with an expressionless face and sat down to read it. He could sense Maithili hovering somewhere in the background.

  ‘I have to get back to the office soon. I’m expecting an important client at one o’clock.’

  Maithili took the hint and hurried away into the kitchen to bring out his lunch. Shankara turned his attention back to the document in hand and read it thoroughly. He was aware that Maithili had heard the conversation between himself and Sheshadri. Even if he had hoped that their voices hadn’t carried to the kitchen, he had abandoned it the moment he saw his young wife’s downcast face. Still, she had asked for no explanations and he had given none.

  After lunch, Shankarnarayana headed directly for Vishwamohan Pandit’s office. Mr Pandit had handled all of Shankarnarayana’s legal affairs these past twelve years, first from Vasantpura and now, ever since he had shifted to Rudrapura, from his office on Karpagambal Street. This meant that he had entered the scene well after Lakshmi’s departure from the Shankarnarayana household and, like everybody else in Rudrapura, was under the impression that the separation had been legalized through a formal divorce. When Shankara handed him the notice, he read it over and looked up, startled.

  ‘But …’ he said, and again, ‘but …’ and then left it at that, because he didn’t know what else to say.

  In the ensuing silence, the lawyer’s quick brain tried to find some way out of this mess. But there really wasn’t anything to be done here. He did his best to hide the fact that he was quite aghast by the stupidity of the situation. Shankarnarayana was an educated man. How had he expected to get away with it? And that poor girl Maithili? To be caught in the middle of something like this! His mind went to his own daughter, Subhadra. How terrible he would feel if something of this nature happened to her! But his son-in-law Raghuvir was a good man, and knowing that his child’s happiness was in the keeping of such a person made him send up a quick prayer of thanks before turning his attention back to the situation at hand.

  Tapping the notice with his finger, he said faintly, ‘This states that you are still legally married to Mrs Lakshmi Shankarnarayana, and have entered into a state of matrimony for the second time without seeking either a divorce or the consent of your first wife. Hence, as per the law, your marriage to Maithili is null and void.’

  ‘I know,’ replied Shankara drily. ‘I read the document. That’s why I’ve come to you.’

  ‘But they are right, Shankarnarayana Saab. If no divorce was sought…’

  Shankara said nothing, just continued to watch the lawyer through dark, unwavering eyes, as if compelling him to come up with a viable solution. The lawyer experienced a wave of guilt for failing to do so. He quickly set his mind to work, and it wasn’t till after the other man had left half-an-hour later that he realized how unfair it was. Shankara should have been the one to feel guilty, not he. But the fellow had that disconcerting effect on people. This wasn’t the first time Vishwamohan had experienced it. Shankarnarayana was a difficult man to say no to.

  Now, in the privacy of his little office room, the lawyer played over in his mind the past half-hour’s conversation with his client (he didn’t dare think of Shankara as a friend even after twelve long years).

  ‘You’ve been separated from this woman for a very long time, Shankarnarayana Saab,’ he had said. ‘If she consents to a divorce by mutual agreement, you can get your marriage to Maithili registered in court. There might be a monetary component involved, of course …’ he had added delicately.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Your wife … I mean your former … er … that is Mrs Lakshmi Shankarnarayana, might ask for money at the time of the divorce. Alimony. She’s well within her rights to do so. I’m surprised she didn’t demand it sooner.’

  ‘But I didn’t divorce her before this,’ Shankarnarayana had stated (rather obviously, Vishwamohan thought).

  ‘There’s always interim maintenance, sir.’

  Shankara had frowned and opened his mouth, probably to enquire what that was, then quickly decided not to waste time over technicalities that had never actually arisen. He had lapsed into a thoughtful silence before asking, ‘What if she refuses?’

  ‘When a divorce is not filed through mutual consent in a single petition, it becomes acrimonious. If she decides to challenge it, she can make things difficult for you.’

  ‘Lakshmi would never do that!’ Shankara had blurted out without thinking.

  Vishwamohan had been genuinely surprised by the statement. Or rather, the conviction behind it. ‘How can you be so sure, sir?’

  Embarrassed by his outburst, Shankara had stammered, ‘Er … I don’t … I mean she … it’s just that she’s a gentle girl. Not the type to create trouble. Even when I asked her to leave, she left quietly. I think she understood my reasons…’

  Vishwamohan had watched the other man keenly, wondering if there was something more he wanted to say. But Shankara had said everything that could be expressed in words and turned away because now all that remained were those that could not be.

  ‘I don’t understand your reasons, Shankarnarayana Saab,’ the lawyer had said with a strange smile. ‘Then, as a wife, how would she?’ The moment’s silence hung heavily between them. ‘Anyway,’ the lawyer had continued briskly, ‘I must caution you that she might refuse to grant you a divorce. Still, I will prepare the papers and pay their family a visit. Let’s see how they respond.’

  Shankara had got up to leave, but turned around and said abruptly, ‘When you go to that house, Mr Pandit, please speak to Lakshmi. Not to her brothers or anyone else. To Lakshmi only.’

  ‘If she asks for alimony?’

  ‘Give her whatever she asks for. Anything.’ And Shankarnarayana had abruptly walked away. There was a gentleness in his voice that the lawyer had never heard before.

  ‘Anything?’ he had called out hurriedly, but Shankara had already passed though the office door and into the street beyond.

  Vishwamohan Pandit never expected to feel sorry for Shankarnarayana. Pity was not a word he associated with that self-assured, head-strong man. And yet, sitting there alone in his office thinking things over, he realized that it was exactly what he was feeling for his client at that moment.

  Over the next few weeks, Maithili became increasingly familiar with Rudrapura. Its sounds and smells were different from the place that she had grown up in. Rudrapura was greener and had a quaint charm that Channapatna lacked, largely owing to the Anglo-Indians who lived in this town and lent their culture to it. The landscape was one of raintrees and lakes and long winding roads that disappeared into nothingness. The place was dotted with stone cottages that had ivy and rose growing up their walls. And all of this was suddenly and inexorably punctuated by towering mineshafts, now defunct. Mine workers had once used these shafts to plunge into the depths of the earth to bring up gold. The British had started the mines, but ownership had changed hands when they left the country after Independence. Years of mismanagement thereafter had brought about their closure. Now, all that was left were these metal goliaths, looming silently over the little town like ghostly sentinels.

  The sight of them never failed to cause the breath to catch in Maithili’s throat. They seemed to call out to the sadness inside her, a sadness that stemmed from a loneliness made lonelier by a world that passed outside her front gate laughing, talking and loving, as if she didn’t exist. It seemed that everybody here k
new everybody else and addressed each other with affectionate familiarity. The fact that she was married to a man set apart from the rest of the town by his money and his moodiness meant that nobody visited her. Nobody came over to chat or share a cup of coffee, and nobody invited her to their homes either. In creature comforts, Maithili was now rich. But this brought little consolation. Poverty she could handle, for she had grown up in it. Indeed, she had never known a time when life had not been a struggle. But here, isolated by her new-found wealth and her position as Shankarnarayana’s wife, she realized that she had been wrong in the past to think that she was happy despite her poverty. She knew now that she had been happy because of it.

  Walking in the marketplace, walking to and back from it, helped a little. The sheer size of the house she lived in – Shankarnarayana’s ancestral home – brought no comfort. It only made her feel emptier inside. She yearned for the sound of her aunts calling to one another in the kitchen, her cousins’ perpetual bickering, her uncles’ rich, low laughter, and the sound of her father’s voice reading out the newspaper to her mother and aunts as they cooked the afternoon meal. Most of all, she yearned for the feel of her mother’s hands in her hair – gentle, caressing – when she oiled, combed and braided it each morning. There had been love in that little house. In this mansion, there was silence. Silence, and that one smile from her husband when she had stepped over the threshold on their wedding day.

  Maithili made it a point to go to the market every day. It was not just a reason to get out. There was a refrigerator in the Shankarnarayana household, but Maithili kept away from it, it being an appliance she was neither accustomed to nor approved of. To her, it was unthinkable to serve anything other than freshly-cooked meals to her husband, prepared with vegetables that had arrived so recently from the fields that often the dew still lingered on them. To this end, she set off to the market each morning with a basket, accompanied by Tayavva. With the leftover money, she always bought two strings of jasmines, one for her braid and one for Tayavva’s.