Devi

by Nag Mani

  He didn’t take her to his house. There was a piece of unused land behind the huts and across it, hidden from view by a cluster of trees, was a small hillock overlooking the Ganga. He led her all the way to the top. There lay a rose plant with one deep red flower, its roots covered in mud in the shape of a water drop and tied with straws. Together they dug a hole and lowered it inside. It was a symbol of their friendship, he said. And like their relationship, it would grow and blossom. She was worried that some stray animal might damage the plant, so they constructed a small fence around it. They promised that they would tell no one about the plant – for it was their secret and theirs to guard – and water it no matter what befell their lives.

  “Remember this place, Sonjuhi, we will meet here once a year, no matter where we are, no matter who we are.” He settled his old, worn out shirt and put his hands in his pockets as he admired the scenery. Aditi noticed that his shirt was torn. He saw her, and she quickly looked away. He smiled, his head held high. It’s only temporary, said his sparkling eyes, good things are yet to come.

  She held his little finger and followed him down the hillock.

  A cold breeze came in through the window and Aditi wanted to be next to it and not suffer the stench of sweat lying next to her husband. Just lying, that was all. It hadn’t been the same in the initial days, at least for her. She wanted him to not only to accept her, but also cherish her. She might not have known much, but she was willing to keep him happy and wanting more. He would enter the room looking tired and pretended to go to sleep, killing all the hope and excitement she had in store, then creep over her at night. The sessions were never long, at the end of which he would collapse beside her and go to sleep. Those were the initial days. Then he stopped pretending to go to sleep, he actually did. He would come in, actually tired and lethargic, and lie down beside her. She caressed his hair and massaged his shoulders as he complained about his work and his colleagues. She would listen to it all, hoping it would clear his mind and rejuvenate his body. She almost always managed to do so, for once he had done his talking, he would be snoring. Eventually, she just stopped trying. It could be a coincidence, but it was then that he started taking interest. Unlike a man, a woman’s no carries little weightage. She let him have his way when he felt like and how he felt like, hoping it would only take her one giant step forward towards motherhood.

  Her mind and soul were consumed with chaos when she couldn’t conceive. She blamed it entirely on him. She blamed him for everything wrong that had happened; and it went on till she actually began to believe that everything was his wrong doing. That every misery of her life could be linked to him. She taunted him and fought with him. He eventually agreed to go to a doctor. Turned out, he was all fit and span. It was she who couldn’t conceive. Whatever brittle thread the unborn baby was holding to keep them together snapped in the confinement of the clinic. This time, the loss of interest was mutual.

  A thunder shuddered her core. She turned around to find Manoj still sleeping peacefully. She was just thinking how he managed to sleep in spite of all the discomfort when a lightning cracked open the black sky and illuminated the shimmering maize field. Aditi went to the window and watched the rain. She had managed to encourage Zeenat to study, alright, but what next? How long would that work? Another thunder. The narrow path that led to the main road was submerged under water. The night was nothing but a frightening torrent of water and wind.

  Then all of a sudden, someone banged on the door. Aditi jumped back a step. Manoj sat upright with a gasp. The window to the veranda was shut. She inched towards it, hoping to catch a glimpse through the gaps. She had almost assumed that it might have been some broken branch carried astray by the wind, when it came again.

  Someone was knocking at the door. She was about to pull down the bolt of the window when Manoj sprang from his bed and caught her hand. Quietly, he shook his head.

  “Who is there?” Aditi shouted out, her voice weak and shaking.

  No answer.

  She went to the hall. Bhagvati was sitting on her bed, looking at the door with wide eyes. Bachcha was crouching under the cot, his tail between his legs. He didn’t usually cower. Manoj too came out in the hall, but made no move to open the door.

  The knocking came again. The door bulged with force.

  “Who is there?” Aditi demanded again. She knew the hinges wouldn’t hold the next time the person banged. She rushed to the kitchen and brought back a knife. “Answer me!”

  Nothing happened. She could hear the storm outside. A little water had managed to find its way inside from under the door. She adjusted the knife in one hand and went ahead…

  “Don’t,” whispered Bhagvati. “Don’t open it!”

  “Who is this? In the middle of the night, banging at my door,” Aditi whispered back. “And why can’t he speak?”

  “Don’t open the door,” Bhagvati repeated. “You are only giving it a chance to interfere.”

  “What? We have to find out, don’t we? It could be an emergency…”

  “You will not find anyone there.” Bhagvati rose from her bed and stood next to her. Her hands were shaking.

  They waited… and they waited.

  Nothing happened. Bachcha came out and began to circle them excitedly. Manoj went to the bedroom and lit an incense-stick. When Aditi came inside, she found him muttering silent prayers.

  “What was that?” she asked.

  He didn’t speak until he had finished with his prayers. “We’ll talk about it in the morning, not now…”

  Aditi sat on her bed and realised that she was still holding the knife. It had also dawned upon her by now that no one had come to see them out of urgency, neither were they any robbers, for they wouldn’t have knocked. Was it the Devi? But why would she knock at the house she claimed to be her own? And why now?

  Damn! The cursed house! She put the knife under the mattress. “I am not staying here anymore. I want to go back to Purnia.”

  Manoj didn’t say anything. Aditi knew he couldn’t just abandon his job. He had to make a formal request and that would take time. And even then, he had very bleak chances of being transferred. And as long as he was here, she too was stuck in the village.

  Bhagvati came in and the three of them sat quiet in the dim light. The rain was still lashing outside. They kept their ears strained. An hour passed. And then they heard someone running towards their house, splashing water that had accumulated on the path. Bachcha began to bark.

  “Sir? Sir?” shouted a man. Then there were impatient knocks.

  Aditi rose from her bed.

  “Sir? Are you awake? Sir, please open the door!”

  Bhagvati held her back. “Don’t!”

  “Sir? Please open the door. It’s urgent.”

  Manoj went to the hall, but didn’t dare take another step.

  “No matter what he says,” warned Bhagvati, “don’t open the door. You are just inviting him in.”

  “But it’s a man,” Aditi went to the window and tried to peep through the gaps. There was nothing but darkness beyond.

  “It’s a trick, to lure you there…” Bhagvati clenched her teeth.

  “Sir? Please. Zeenat is sick!”

  Bhagvati stood to stop her, but Aditi was already out in the hall. Bachcha was now at the door, sniffing and barking. She marched to the door and opened it.

  “Madam! Madam! Please come fast.” It was Salman. He was soaked to the skin. “Sir, please come. Zeenat is not well. Please help us.”

  Manoj sighed. Rubbed his eyes. Mumbled something about an umbrella to Bhagvati. But Aditi didn’t have time for all this air of self-importance. She ran out in the rain and up the path, half her shin in water. A young boy met her at Laila’s house and led her to the second floor. She could hear Laila wailing inside a room. Half a dozen children were crowding around the door, peeping inside. Among them was Zoya, tears rolling down her cheeks. “What is happening to…?”

  Aditi rushed into the room but stop
ped dead when she saw Zeenat lying on the bed.

  The skin around her eyes had turned black. She was gasping for air. Black streaks had sprouted all over her fair skin. Laila was leaning over her, trying to soothe her while she herself was crying. Another woman was placing a piece of soaked cloth over her forehead. Razzak stood by a window, lean and thin, looking more helpless than anyone else present in the room. Zeba was sobbing against a wall.

  “Ammi! Ammi!” Zeenat was screaming, “I don’t want to die.”

  “What happened?” Aditi ran to the bed and checked her temperature. She was burning. “Zeenat? Talk to me! What happened?”

  “Save me, Aunty. Please! I beg you! I don’t want to die!”

  “Nothing is going to happen to you. You will be all right…”

  “But he told me I will die, and then he will take me away. With him…”

  “Who?”

  “He is waiting for me!”

  “He, who?”

  Zeenat pointed towards an empty corner of the room. “He!”

  “There is no one there…” Just as she spoke, Aditi noticed that the black marks were spreading. “We need a doctor!” she said to the room.

  “There is no doctor here…” replied someone.

  “Then take her to a hospital.”

  “Aunty, please. He is coming for me…”

  “No, Zeenat. We are going to take you to a hospital…”

  “The nearest hospital is in Forbesganj,” said Razzak, his voice shaky and uncertain.

  “Then what are you waiting for? Get a damn boat and get her out!”

  “The river is flooded…”

  “Then bloody drown trying!”

  His face hardened. Maybe this was the support he needed, for he immediately ran out of the room, his brothers following him, only to return minutes later. He wrapped Zeenat in a blanket and lifted her.

  “Please Abba, he is coming… he is coming to take me.”

  “No doctor can save her,” whispered Laila, her voice quavering.

  “Shut up, you woman!” Razzak hissed.

  “Don’t you see you fools,” Laila rose from her seat, her voice stronger now, “the Devi has claimed her!”

  Zeba gasped. Razzak stared at her wife with murderous eyes. Zeenat kept whimpering and gasping, but every pair of eyes were on her mother.

  “Laila, what are you saying?” Aditi broke the silence. “They will get to a hospital and…”

  “You know very well, Madam, what I am saying! I had warned you, Madam! I HAD WARNED YOU!”

  Aditi shook her head in disbelief. Razzak was about to say something when they heard hurried footsteps up the stairs. Manoj came in first, his umbrella leaving a trail of water behind. He still had the air of importance with him, but when his eyes fell on Zeenat, he froze at his place. Bhagvati walked in next and gasped, backed against a wall and slithered to the floor, her mouth wide open.

  All of a sudden, Zeenat started screaming in pain. Aditi felt her insides melt. Razzak made for the door. Zeba broke down. She fell to her knees and started crying. A woman rushed to her – and in that moment, a lightning struck. Aditi caught a glimpse of a shadow in the empty corner Zeenat had pointed at. And right then, in that very moment, Zeenat stopped screaming. Razzak tried to rush out, but she was holding the door, not letting him move.

  She tilted her head back and looked at Zeba, her eyes yellow now, her skin black with patches of white, “You are next!”

  Then her eyes closed and her limbs collapsed.

  *

  The morning was cold and humid. Dark clouds still hung silently above the village, threatening rain at slightest provocation. Aditi sat on the steps to the backyard, looking at nothing in particular. She hadn’t been able to sleep. After Zeenat had fainted, Razzak and his brothers had taken her across the river to Forbesganj. There was nothing Aditi could do other than watch Laila beat her chest and howl. No matter what the other women said, Laila knew no doctor could save her daughter. “Take her to the temple, you fools! Take her there. Ask forgiveness! Ask for mercy!” It took three women to keep her from running to the temple herself.

  The tomato seeds Aditi had planted had now grown into small plants. On a square bed next to it, bright green pea climbers with broad beautiful leaves were struggling their way up thin bamboo sticks. Bhagvati was still with Laila. Aditi had returned somewhere three in the morning when other women insisted that she changed into dry clothes and slept for the night. As it was, she had suddenly begun to feel lethargic. For the first time, Manoj was not sticking to his schedule. He was still in his bed, wide awake, as villagers began to collect outside their houses, waiting for the men to return. The bank was open, but no one was in need of loan or money. The generator was up and running. The guard was not sleeping on the charpoy under the tree, but kept his eyes on the road that came from the river.

  The stories were true. Something had irked the Devi and she had claimed a life. Or someone… Aditi scolded herself for thinking like uneducated villagers. There had to be an explanation, a medical condition that explained it all… Her eyes fell on the closed room. The window was open. Darkness swirled out from inside. Was it too much of a coincidence?

  In a corner of the backyard, concealed by the coop, was a line of rose stems rising from the soil. Most of them were brown and dead, except one. She had retrieved the broken stems soon after Laila had left and planted them. There was still hope that they might grow roots. But then came Salman to build the coop and she had to hide them again. She replanted and looked after them day and night, hoping against hope that they would survive. Then one day, she noticed something red sprouting above the mark of a broken twig. And that something red had grown into a tiny branch with delicate red leaves and soft thorns. One had survived. A red rose was growing in her campus – something the village and the powers that resided in it didn’t approve of.

  But there was something else she had done that they disapproved of…

  The men returned in the afternoon, bringing along a drizzle and a body wrapped in a dirty, tattered sari. The crowd parted to give them way, some ran for shelter in nearby houses, some joined the progression; Razzak was in the rear, walking as if his legs had turned into lead. His brothers carried the body inside, while he slumped to the ground and began to cry, unwary of the rain and the eyes and the whispers.

  It was the general commotion that alerted Aditi. She hurried to the veranda to find several men under the shelter of her roof. She saw Razzak crying. Laila was right. The doctors couldn’t save her daughter. Aditi ran inside to put on her slippers and just as she was about to step out, Manoj emerged from the bedroom, “Don’t,” he said, himself going to the veranda to see the plight of their neighbours, “give them some time to mourn.”

  Aditi stayed there, in the veranda, as the rain intensified, listening to the growing sounds of people crying and wailing, watching the crowd disperse. On the other side of the puddle infected main brick-road, under the meagre protection of a thin tree, she saw a handsome boy in a school uniform. He stood there frozen in time, getting wet, as the world moved on. He was crying silently, oblivious to others, and the one he was crying for.

  When Bhagvati returned in the evening, she was nothing but hysterical. “That poor girl! What evil resides in the world? Her body. Black. Already smelling…” She went to the backyard to have a bath. Water had collected in the right half of the backward, around the closed room, and was slowly inching towards the hand-pump. She stomped into the water and began searching for clogged outlets at the base of the wall.

  Aditi could not hold herself any longer. With a heavy heart and a lump in her throat, she went to Razzak’s house. Though it was still raining, quite a few people were sitting outside, consoling the thin, frail man who wouldn’t go inside. A boy was standing with an umbrella over their heads and he said something and all the men turned to look at her. She quickened her pace and went inside. There, in the hall on the first floor, surrounded by crying women was a body covered in
a sari. There was nothing to be seen, except the tip of a black finger and stands of hair flowing out. The body had already begun to rot. A terrible stench filled the hall. She knelt down beside it and gently lifted the cloth over the face. What she saw was swollen black lips and cheeks. The eyes were open but the eyeballs had rolled all the way up.

  Aditi covered the face and turned away. She tried to stand, but her knees were wobbling. She suddenly felt weak… very weak. “Oh! Oh! Look out!” someone shouted. The world began to darken. She saw Zeba and Zoya hugging each other in one corner of the room, unattended, as everyone mourned their sister. The ground shook and Aditi fell flat on her face. “These city women… so weak,” someone whispered.

  There was a window in the hall that opened towards the forest, right behind the girls. The hall went dark and the last thing Aditi saw was a man’s face behind the window.

  He was staring unblinkingly at Zeba.

  CHAPTER 13

  AN INNOCENT WISH

  It was the sound of someone sipping tea that made her open her eyes. Two women were sitting on her bed with a cup in their hands. Bhagvati was by her side, massaging her palm with warm mustard oil. “There now,” she whispered and patted her forearm, “how are you feeling?”

  How was she feeling?

  She was weak. But more than that there was something else that was gnawing at her core. Was it fear? She managed a feeble smile. The women finished their tea. “I will go to Laila, all right, my son?” Bhagvati said as the women prepared to leave. “She needs us. Arvind is sitting right in the veranda. If you need anything, just ask him to call me.”

  Aditi heard men talking in the veranda. There were at least half a dozen of them, her husband included. And from the sound of it, they kept coming and going, talking solemnly about the death of the young girl.

  Night fell. And with it came the racket of thousands of insects. The clouds had taken a break to muster their strength, making everyone aware of their presence every now and then. Aditi counted the ticks of the clock.