Devi

by Nag Mani

  Silence fell in the room.

  It was a flickering shadow.

  Unlike the many shadows in the room, this one did not dance to the tune of the flame. It had a definite shape, though there was no object in the vicinity that could cast it. Now that Aditi had said it, it did not take long for others to notice. They withdrew from the corner. The shadow seemed to have sensed it, for it began to grow. It stood erect, a thin, translucent something with hands and legs and head, taller than anyone else in the room. Aditi retreated, the back of her knees hit the bed and she sat on the edge.

  The shadow could have been passed as an illusion, for it stood still for a long time…

  Then, it detached itself from the corner.

  Onlookers shrieked and scampered. Laila froze.

  The shadow took a step. Then another. Zeba was trembling, her eyes wide at the shadow, or its actual form only she could see. Then, like lightning, it jumped over the bed and disappeared. Zeba went into a fit. Her eyes began to roll. Her body arched upward to an uncanny extent, as if her back would snap any moment. Women screamed. Some ran out. And in that chaos of shrieking women and creaking bed, something happened in a blink of the eye. The shadow leapt out of the bed again. The curtains of the nearest window flung apart and then peace prevailed.

  The forest watched them through the square window, shimmering under a crescent moon peeping through the clouds. Zeba was still now. Her skin all black. Her mouth wide open, as if screaming in pain. Her eyes gazing across the room, through the villagers crowded near the door, at a little girl sobbing and shaking. And somehow, Zoya knew what her sister couldn’t say. That she was next.

  Aditi felt bile rush up her throat. She made for the door, but retched on numerous feet as they scattered away. She wiped her mouth. Her head began to spin. Hands held her for support. Hands carried her down the stairs. Hands made her lie down on a rug on the floor. Then hands left her.

  She couldn’t tell if Bhagvati came straight away, or hours later. Her brain felt swollen. Weak. Dysfunctional. She didn’t feel the drizzle falling on her as she was being carried back to her house. She didn’t see Bachcha as he trotted in front of her. She didn’t see the dream she was dreaming of. She was in a trance, and there was only this humming that emanated from the ground, growing louder and louder and louder and louder…

  CHAPTER 14

  THE NIGHT OF

  Aditi first noticed the ceiling fan. It was dead. Then the bed-sheet around her. It was cold. Then the clock in front of her. It was alive. And ticking. And told her it was half past six in the morning.

  There was no one in the room. She listened for any sound. No one in the house as well. Only Bachcha scratching himself diligently. In the veranda? No. This time in the bedroom itself.

  She didn’t mind.

  She felt a bump under the mattress and remembered that she had put a knife under it the first time Salman had come knocking at her door. She adjusted her head and settled her eyes on the fan.

  Zeba was dead. Killed. Gone. And she could only watch, as helpless as a baby. Like she had been when This-Boy was gone. That happened in 1992, in the second year of her college. Her mother, sisters and brother had gone to Gaya to attend a marriage. She stayed back because of her exams and her father stayed back because of her.

  There was love in the air that day, that was the only excuse she could give for what happened, that made her do what she did, or rather, make her not do what she ought to have done. That was where her life fell apart. That was the day she allowed This-Boy to come home. She just had to hand over a book. She just had to explain him a topic, something that rarely happened. It was just a friend helping another friend. It was just a Dalit entering a Brahmin’s home.

  Her father should not have been there. He should not have been entering the campus gate. He should not have seen him coming out of her room. But he did. He dragged her to a room and locked her. He asked This-Boy first his caste, then his name, then his father’s name, then his occupation. Aditi heard him answer in his bold and confident voice. He had to be bold if he was to ask for her hand when he became an IAS officer. Her father let him go.

  While a group of rowdy men were burning down a line of Dalit jhuggis by the ghats of the Ganga that night, no one bothered to inform the police. A young man was pulled out of his house, thrashed and beaten in front of his mother, father and sister. Then his father threatened. Slapped. Abused. His sister and mother insulted. Molested. Rape threats made. They were asked to leave the city, and to make sure they didn’t have any option to return, their hut was set on fire. Fire spreads. And so it did that faithful night. The newspaper reported a fire that gutted down a couple of huts. It didn’t mention what happened to the families that lived in them. It didn’t report the men who branded swords and axes and told the Dalits to keep away from their women.

  The principal of Bhagalpur Women College, Mamata Madam, was most sympathetic towards Aditi. Aditi was not the first girl to fall in trap set by those hideous ghat boys. When her father refrained her from attending college for over a month, Mamata Madam allowed Aditi to appear for her examinations from her own room and had the questions papers sent home to her. The principal of the boys’ college was not so considerate. He struck off his name. No certificates or mark sheets were given. The burnt patches where the huts had once stood were filled with newer huts, except one. It remained dark and scorched till new life sprung up from the ground and the world moved on.

  A red rose plant withered somewhere along the ghat, but no one seemed to notice.

  All that remained of that night was a letter that was delivered to Aditi by his best friend, Neeraj Mishra.

  First Zeenat. Then Zeba. Aditi was quivering. Her thighs ached. Her head throbbed. She heard men yelling not far away. Women wailing. Then anger rushed out like the bile the previous night, without warning. What did she want? What the fuck did she want? A child. Was that wish worth two lives? Struggling against her dizziness, she marched out into the backyard. The hole Bachcha had dug had filled up a little.

  “You fucking bitch!” she shouted at the closed room. It looked back at her. “You are nothing but an old used up whore no matter what you think of yourself to be. All I wanted was a child. If even that was too much for you, why don’t you fucking go back to the shit-hole whorehouse you came from? Two girls! You killed two innocent girls! What had they done? No wonder they chopped off your head and then let a mule drag you. They should have raped you first. Dragged you out for the entire village to see. Let each one have his turn. Striped you naked and marched you round and round your temple. Would that have been enough, bitch? My bitch! My fucking bitch…”

  The shouting took its toll. Her vision began to blur. She thought the window opened. But it didn’t. She staggered back. One leg fell in the hole in the middle of the yard. She lost her balance and fell with a shriek. Her ankle twisted. Something snapped. Her face slammed against the wet mud. Cries of pain escaped her lips, and continued to come out with every breath she took. She raised her sari and examined her ankle. She tried to rotate her foot. In spite of the pain, a relief swept over her. Her ankle was not broken at least. It was one of the many dried twigs of the guava tree that had snapped. Sickness began to engulf her again. She managed to get into a proper position to throw up. Then she let herself lie down on the mud.

  It was Arvind who found her in the backyard by the pool of her vomit. Her ankle had swollen. Somehow, in spite of the state she was in, she found his intrusion annoying. She wanted to lie there, facing the sky, and not move. Just watch the stars appear and disappear as the sky changed colours until they grew cold and died. She even managed to ask herself how he dared to come inside without her permission. That sick bastard with his big battera and small motives! Then the feeling passed. She stopped caring. She let him carry her to her bed. She didn’t even notice when he went to inform Sir and Bhagvati.

  There was no Volini in the house, so Bhagvati applied Vicks Vaporub on her ankle and wrapped it with clot
h. “They have just the same effect,” she said. Then she massaged her feet and legs which had turned weirdly cold. Clouds were still camped in the sky. A mist was slowly descending upon the village. Aditi lay in her room and noticed the events unfold after the second death. Men were again seated in her veranda. They had shooed Bachcha away and discussed the deaths with each other. Their importance in the society was marked by the three chairs Arvind had brought out from her house. The more important ones were always offered the chairs by the less important ones, who would then sit on the floor, or the stairs, whichever suited them.

  Aditi had kept the window that opened in the veranda slightly ajar, so that she could herself see from time to time what was happening outside. The men had the courtesy not to peep inside. The tides were changing. The first death could have been overlooked, but not the second one. People were talking now. The old narrated the horrors they had witnessed. The young embraced themselves for the horrors to come, for someone had unleashed those horrors on them. Aditi sank lower into her bed. Her name often surfaced in their conversations. She, the exotic wife of the revered Manager Sahib, the City Woman who could beat her husband, the Educated One who prayed in the haunted temple and asked for a secret wish.

  Women who couldn’t find a place in Laila’s house or were too exhausted to console the grieving family came to find shelter in Aditi’s hall. They paid their visit to the host and expressed their concerns over her health. By evening, Aditi had vomited over four times and had been inflicted with fever. When one of the older women began to openly express her anger over Manoj’s lack of care, he kick-started his blue Rajdoot and called a doctor in Purnia from the telephone in his bank. He had earlier refrained from this extra effort in the hope that her condition would improve. He hoped. Or rather, over-hoped. The only medicine shop in the village was shut. Manoj returned empty handed and sat down with the men. It was the older woman again who made an announcement and the owner of the shop turned out to be in the crowd that had gathered outside their house. He himself went to his shop on his Hercules cycle and brought the medicines.

  Aditi’s condition deteriorated overnight. “What is happening in this family!” Bhagvati exclaimed when she came to see Aditi in the morning. Other that feeling as just as weak as she did the previous day, Aditi didn’t know what had happened that made Bhagvati say so. A mirror told her that her skin had turned pale. Her eyes had sunken in. Her sprained ankle had developed patches of purple. Apparently, Vicks Vaporub had no effect. Stinking of accumulated sweat and dirt, Aditi limped to the hand-pump and took a bath. She didn’t bother asking anyone to carry the buckets to the bathroom indoors.

  While scrubbing soap she saw that her plants had recovered from the flood. The pea climbers had climbed up the bamboo poles. A tiny yellow flower had blossomed in one of the tomato plants. The potential of a new life in times of dark clouds and darker power threatening to crack the earth under their feet, trying to pull them in an abyss from where there was no climbing back… But there it was, the yellow flower. It would struggle to survive, like everything else. Life would continue… no matter what.

  Police came to the village in the afternoon. Two constables stayed outside Laila’s house with their oiled lathis. Ranbir, the milkmaid, supplied them with tea. An officer was inside, asking questions, or rather, just quenching his curiosity.

  “Look at you, my son,” Bhagvati said as she served Aditi tea on her bed, “look at you! Bad times these are. It will pass, I know, but we need to take care of you. I think my daughter can help. Your little sister…”

  “You want to bring your daughter here?” Aditi asked passively.

  “It’s been a long time since I left my house. And I know for certain that she must have used up all the money I had left with her. But I can’t leave you like this. Not in this state! She can help with the household chores, you know. She is a good cook. She can cook for you… She won’t be long here, you know, just till you are better. That’s all. Just to take care…”

  “Oh! Of course,” Aditi said, slightly embarrassed that Bhagvati had to actually enumerate her daughter’s usefulness to bring her there, “she is always welcome here. But will it be safe to bring her… now?”

  “Don’t worry, my son, they are taking care of it.”

  Bhagvati went to the bank to use the telephone. A photocopy shop somewhere in Kishanganj received a call. Bhagvati, a neighbour of the shop owner, asked him to send someone for her daughter. She called back again after half an hour and spoke to her daughter, and then to the owner again. She explained to him why she couldn’t come all the way to Kishanganj and why she could not rely on her husband, the drunkard he was. The shopkeeper understood. It was decided that the shopkeeper’s brother would escort the girl to her mausi, her mother’s sister, in Deepnagar, and Bhagvati would meet them there. She thanked him, came home, packed a bag and left for her sister’s home. But before she did, she asked Ranbir, the milkmaid, to stay with Aditi all day long. The woman told Ranbir, her son, to hang around Aditi’s house with his siblings and friends and come running to her if Madam needed something. Villagers began to gather around Razzak’s house by evening. A small stage was being set up. And the children forgot their task and climbed trees to watch the whole event unfold.

  ‘They are taking care of it’ became clearer when the Mukhiya’s voice crackled from a loudspeaker. He talked about the two deaths in the village. He emphasized how sorry he was. He said that they all knew why it happened. He said they were going to fix it. He said they were going to ask forgiveness.

  He said they were going to sacrifice fifty and one goats to the Devi.

  *

  The following morning Manoj went to the bank early to update records. He had been doing most of the work from home so far, going to the bank only to carry out formalities. The staffs spent their work hours outside gossiping with passer-byes. A ‘Half-Day’ had been declared unofficially, because the sacrificial ceremony was to take place in the evening.

  When Manoj returned in the afternoon, he immediately went to the bedroom and started looking for a small bag. “I have to go to Purnia!” he declared, the words half in his mouth, half out.

  “Purnia? What for?” Aditi asked.

  “There is an urgent meeting. I have to leave. Now.”

  “What? Now?” A dread swept over her. She was in no condition to leave so hurriedly. She ankle hurt, she felt lethargic, sick… how was she going to… wait! “Are you leaving me here?”

  Manoj didn’t reply for a while. He packed a pair of clothes, his daily necessities and zipped the bag dramatically. “It’s urgent. There is a place up the river where it is wide, so less current. I can cross from there. You…”

  Aditi wanted to ask what was so urgent that he was required immediately. Did something happen in the bank? Did he do something? Rather she shouted, “How did you even think of leaving me here all alone, in this house, in this state?” If her ankle would have allowed, she would have even got up and slapped him.

  “I have asked the Mukhiya to take you in as his guest for a few days.”

  “You have what?”

  “He said he will take care of you. He has enough servants…”

  Before she could reply, there was a knock on the door, then a crude female voice, “Sahib?”

  It was Ranbir, the milkmaid. Manoj had called her to help Aditi pack. That was what the woman thought. She had actually been called so that Aditi would not throw tantrums in her presence. But Aditi did. She was past maintaining her dignity. She could have stayed back and waited for Bhagvati to return, but she had a feeling that Bhagvati would not be returning that day. Her daughter could not have reached Deepnagar any time before evening. Aditi shouted and abused her husband. Ranbir diligently did her duty and packed a few clothes and other essentials. She placed the bag on the floor and tried to pacify Aditi.

  Behind the two women, hidden under the mattress, was a knife.

  The chain of the bag unzipped on its own.

  The k
nife slid out and fell into the bag.

  An auto-rickshaw arrived half an hour later. Manoj had his mind set. He had to go to Purnia. And he just said it was an urgent meeting. No, it was not about the bank not operating for the last few days. No, he was not caught taking commissions. No, he had not made a blunder in his work. It was an internal meeting. Very urgent. And no matter how much she resisted, when Bachcha came home in the evening, he found the door locked.

  The Mukhiya was waiting for them with a big smile, big moustache and folded hands. “Welcome to my humble home, Madam!” Pleasantries were exchanged. She didn’t take part in it. She kept her eyes averted, looking at a distant herd of cows grazing in a field. “Is everything all right, Madam? She doesn’t look happy coming here, is it?”

  Aditi didn’t bother to respond.

  “Oh, sheee..aaa…” Manoj tried to think of something.

  “She doesn’t feel comfortable here, is it? She doesn’t feel safe? And that should be. But let me tell you Madam, think of this as your second home. There is no need to worry. Manager Sahib has some urgent business in Purnia. He will be back in a blink. And your mother, she will be back in a day or two, could have been earlier had it not been for this weather. The road to that side is treacherous these days. Till then, consider this your home. I, Om Prakash Singh, by the name of the Devi, promise you that I will lay down my head to keep you safe and sound. There is no need to worry. And, yes, please do come for the sacrificial ceremony, now that it is taking place just backdoors.”

  Gauri, his young wife, led her to one of the inner rooms along a dark corridor. The room was itself small, but clean and tidy. Light swarmed in through a window just above a narrow bed. An oil lamp and a match box were placed on a table by the door. Manoj came in to check once she had settled. She didn’t speak to him.

  “Rest, Didi,” Gauri came in once Manoj had left, “the ceremony will start in an hour or so.” Then she closed the door.