17
Nandé Dhakal’s youngest son had just returned home, having completed his government office examinations. From an early age he had had a tyrannical nature, and he had been brought up with great indulgence, so that once he came home there was always some quarrel or other going on in the village. He would assemble a gang of youths, usually plowmen or servants from his home, and visit the village at night. There he would steal a goat from someone’s pen, or beat up a village lad, or harass one of the girls. He was happy when he made other people miserable, and it was his nature to tease and humiliate those who were weaker or poorer than himself. The villagers cursed him behind his back, but they could not say anything to his face because he was the Sahu’s son. Nandé had noticed his son getting into bad habits and had sent him down to the valley on the pretext that his son could look after his affairs there. So these days the son lived in the valley, and his principal tasks were walking around the field terraces killing doves with a catapult, riding into the nearby forest on horseback and hunting with a loaded gun, and so on. He had spent this day chasing doves around the fields and had returned to the hut in the evening. It was he who had ordered Sané Gharti to divert the water into the fields that night and to guard the channel.
As the night entered its second quarter, the Sahu’s son had already finished one nap and was beginning to doze again. Sané Gharti came sniveling into the hut. His sobs woke the young Sahu, who scolded him. “Oh, what’s happened to this stupid corpse now? Why is he crying, has someone beaten him up, or what is it?”
The question made Sané snivel all the more. “Dhané Basnet didn’t just dishonor me, he beat me, too. And he called the Sahus all sorts of rude names. He dammed the channel to our fields and left no water for us at all. He shut all the water off and made it flow into his own fields.”
The young Sahu’s ears burned when he heard this. “Who does that serf think he is? Doesn’t he know who I am?” For a moment he ground his teeth angrily in silence. Perhaps he was wondering what he might do to take his revenge. Then he told Sané, “First thing in the morning, take a buffalo to that serf’s seedbed and let it loose. Then how will he plant his fields?”
Dhané set out for the fields with his hoe in the early morning light. His plan was to prepare the four or five terraces on the marshier side where the oxen could not work and to have the job done before the women arrived from home to begin the planting. As he arrived at the top of the fields the expression of joy, vigor, and eagerness that had been on his face changed to a look of despair, remorse, and frustration. His eyes moved over the seedbed, where the Sahu’s buffalo was grazing happily on his six-inch seedlings, with Sané Gharti sitting to one side enjoying the show. Dhané’s misery and fury turned him into a madman. He was shocked to see the wheel of his fortune cheating him time after time. He had dreamed up such a future for himself on the basis of these fields, he had poured out his labor on these fields with such joy, but now …
Unable to control himself any longer, he raised his hoe in both hands with the blade turned upward and charged at the buffalo like a lunatic. The ground was wet, so the buffalo’s hooves had sunk into the mud, and it could not move quickly. Dhané caught up with it and dealt it six or seven blows with the back of his hoe: in his anger and pain, he had even forgotten his fondness for animals. Not until a few moments later did he feel regret and realize that his attack had been futile because the buffalo was not at fault. The buffalo reached the far side of the field and lay down on the slope. Sané Gharti ran in terror to the hut to inform his master. “Lau!” he yelled. “Basnet’s killed the pregnant buffalo!”
18
Soon after Sané had gone, Dhané’s anger and excitement subsided, and fear and dread took their place. “If the Sahu’s pregnant buffalo has come to any harm at all, we’ll be wiped out of the village. Very soon the whole affair is going to reach his ears, and then these fields I got with such difficulty will be taken away from me. Oh Lord, what will become of me now?”
Dhané went down to the fields, thinking about all the calamities the future held for him. He shook all over as he went to the buffalo’s side and tried to raise it to its feet. But it was badly injured, and he could do nothing on his own. Hopelessly, he went back to the hut. In his mind he repeated the same prayer over and over again: “Oh Lord, do not let anything happen to the buffalo; deliver me from this crisis. In my ignorance I destroyed her; forgive me, Lord.”
The Sahu’s men came and managed somehow to raise the buffalo and take it away. Dhané sat inside his hut, nursing his grief. Maina arrived with their hired laborers, but when they heard about the incident the laborers realized there would be no planting that day, and they went back home. But a fire was kindled in Maina’s heart. If anything happened to the buffalo as a result of the beating, what would become of her husband? She could not think beyond this. Deep in her heart she promised the goddess’s temple a pair of doves so that no evil would befall her husband.
The man and the woman both sat in the hut for one whole day, sad and exhausted. Neither had the strength to raise the other’s spirits. The buffalo had destroyed every seedling. And who would give them new seeds, now that the planting was in full swing? Without seeds it would be impossible to plant the fields this year. In the evening, they simply locked up their hut and went home.
A terrible sense of foreboding tormented Dhané and Maina night and day. Eventually, what they feared became reality. One evening three days after the incident, Nandé’s herdsman Chimsé came to tell them that the Sahu’s buffalo had died that morning. When he learned that the Sahu had decided to call a meeting of the village council, Dhané lost all hope. Before he left, Chimsé conveyed an order from Nandé and the subba: “You must present yourself before the council tomorrow.”
Dhané lay on his bed with an empty heart. “What judgment will the council make tomorrow?” Maina asked miserably. He had already more or less guessed what the judgment would be. But after they had judged him, what punishment would they impose? This was the question that hounded him now. He suppressed his anxiety and got up to wipe the tears from Maina’s face. “They’ll make whatever judgment they make,” he said. “Can worrying put off what must be?” Dhané’s kindness broke Maina’s self-control, and she hid her face in his lap and sobbed. Dhané stroked her hair in an attempt to console her and said, “Oh, why do you cry like this? Your husband has not died! Why worry when I am still with you? And what can really happen to us anyway? We certainly won’t lose our lives: it’s just that our debts will increase. One day the good times will come back, eh? Do you think I’ll die without paying those serfs what I owe them?” Dhané tried to console Maina like this, then he sent her off to bed. He lay down as well, but sleep was too afraid to approach either of them.
When Dhané reached Nandé’s yard the next morning, a large gathering had assembled—the mukhiya, the subba, the baidar, and the good gentlemen of the council. He sat down to one side of them, and they began to consider his case. He was asked many questions, and the gentlemen exchanged opinions. Then with one voice they decided that Dhané was guilty. No one took Dhané’s side, except for the mukhiya. Just so “the scales of justice are not out of balance,” the mukhiya declared, “Let me say in this regard that it is not fitting to state only one side of things. Now, it is agreed that the Sahu’s buffalo did eat Dhané’s seedlings, and so he should repay Dhané an equivalent amount of grain. As far as the value of the buffalo is concerned, that is something that Dhané must pay back. Isn’t that how it should be?”
But an elderly gentleman disagreed. “How can it be right just to do it in terms of market prices?” he said. “If we just ask him for the price of the buffalo, then again and again people will kill a pregnant buffalo and then pay to replace it, and that will be that! Dhané should pay the full penalty for killing a pregnant buffalo. These are straightforward matters!”
From a corner at the back a low voice was heard to say, “If that’s so, a penalty should also be pai
d by the person who knowingly let a buffalo loose on someone else’s seedbed in the middle of the planting. It’s not a bull, this buffalo, is it?”
It is not certain that all the councilors heard these words, but Nandé immediately turned his red eyes in the direction from which the voice had come and said, “Hey, serf, be quiet! Who told you to open your mouth in the presence of these gentlemen?” And that person did not dare to speak again.
The decision was announced. Dhané was to pay 150 rupees, the value of the buffalo, plus a 75-rupee fine for killing a pregnant buffalo. He was given a warning that if he ever killed any livestock in the same way again he would be expelled from the village. Because his buffalo had destroyed Dhané’s seedlings, the Sahu was to give Dhané 15 pathi of rice.
As soon as the judgment had been announced, Nandé declared before the gentlemen of the council that Dhané could not have the fields anymore. It was decided that Dhané owed the Sahu a total of 575 rupees, because the money the Sahu had given him earlier to buy the oxen and to meet household expenses, plus interest, had to be added to the fine of 225 rupees. Because he could not pay this immediately, Dhané asked to be allowed to make a bond. So he was given two and a half months to pay, and a new agreement was drawn up. This stated that if Dhané did not pay the whole sum with interest within two and a half months the Sahu could have Dhané’s house and livestock valued and raise the money from their sale. Once Dhané had affixed his mark to the agreement, the council meeting was over.
19
Today, Maina has risen after two days of fever, and she sits on a mat on the verandah stripping the kernels from some maize cobs. Her hands are busily engaged in the task, while through her mind there flows a rapid stream of thoughts. She is aghast to see crisis piling on crisis in her life. Human life is considered to be the best in all of God’s creation, but she has begun to wonder whether the lives of the poor and the sorrowful are any better than those of animals. Those who resort to oppressing, mistreating, and dishonoring the truthful honest poor live lives of pleasure in palaces of gold, but the poor who live at the very limits of exertion cannot find a way to put their hands to their mouths. Is this the script of fortune that the Creator has written out? There is no answer to any of her questions. And so to console herself she says, “Perhaps this is something we earned in a previous life.”
For many days the rain has not allowed her to lay the grain out to dry in the sun. Today she has decided to put her trust in the sun, which is playing hide-and-seek among the clouds, and she takes the maize she has removed from the cobs, puts it into a basket, and takes it out to the yard to spread it on a bamboo mat. Sometimes Surya disappears behind the clouds, then after a moment he appears again,60 and so it goes on.
Maina had just gone back to sit down on the mat and deal with the remaining maize when Thuli came down the hill.
“Has the fever gone, Bhaujyu?” Thuli asked.
“Yes, for the time being it has, but perhaps it will be back this evening. What trust can you put in this corpse of a fever! Sit down now, child, where are you off to?”
“Nowhere at all. I have been sleeping and sleeping, and now I have come down here. I was going to weed the maize, but the field is muddy, so I just gave up for the time being. It’s been raining so much these past few days it’s hardly let me open my eyes.” Thuli sat down on the mat.
“That’s right, child, this rain has finished us off, hasn’t it! I expect Kanchi has gone to Sahinla Gharti’s place, thinking it might be sunny today. Did she say she was hoeing their maize?”61
“Oh really? Is Kanchi Didi doing exchange labor at Gharti’s place today?”62
“Yes, I think it was her turn the day before yesterday, but the rain kept her in.” The conversation paused for a moment. Both women began to pick off maize kernels. After a while Thuli said hesitantly, “Bhaujyu, I’ve been meaning to ask you something for days, but various jobs keep getting in the way and making me forget.”
“What is it, then? Ask away!” Maina glanced at Thuli.
“Should I ask you, I wonder? Will you be angry?”
“Oh no, do come on now, mori, would I get angry with you simply for asking a question? Don’t chew on it, tell me what it is.” Maina tried to laugh.
“Well, Bhaujyu, I don’t know why, but nowadays Kanchi Didi looks different to me. She doesn’t talk very much, and she walks around looking sad.” Thuli paused in her work.
“Well, I don’t know either. Perhaps she isn’t feeling well. She doesn’t tell us much.”
“I am worried, Bhaujyu.” Thuli became grave.
“What are you worried about, what do you mean, mori?” Maina was alarmed, and she looked quizzically at Thuli.
“Bhaujyu, you are so simple. You are with her night and day, so how can you not understand even a little? Very soon the whole village will find out.”
“Stop embroidering it with flowers, just tell me straight, what is the matter?” The color had drained from Maina’s face.
“Well, I believe that Jhuma is pregnant. Have you no inkling of this?”
Maina looked as if she had fallen off a roof. Now she understood what had been puzzling her: why Jhuma had lost her taste for spicy food, why her gait was less sprightly than before. And she remembered that once Jhuma had mentioned that her monthly dharma had stopped. But at the time Maina had just assumed that it was late and had paid no further attention to it. She had not had the faintest idea.
In despair, Maina asked, “Who has she been going around with, Nani, do you know? You are her friend after all, whatever might happen.”
“Well, who knows? For a few days I thought she was going around with a stranger, but that was a long time ago. When she comes home this evening you will have to ask her properly. If you ask her about it while there is still time, some solution will turn up.”
“I’ll have to ask her,” Maina said briefly.
Soon after that Thuli left. Maina was at her wits’ end. She decided that she would think about it a lot, and then when Jhuma came home in the evening they would make the right decisions. She stood up and saw that the sky was full of clouds. She was afraid that the cold wind would dampen the grain, so she began to pick it all up again.
20
At this point it would be best for us to go back to an incident that occurred some months earlier. After they parted company by the swing at Dasain, Jhuma and the soldier did not meet again for months. It is not possible to say whether the soldier thought about Jhuma, but each day Jhuma’s heart sought him out at least once. For the first month Jhuma was very distraught that she had not seen him again, but even this kind of distress lessens with the passing of time. In her heart there remained only a small remnant of her memory of him.
One day in the middle of Magh, Jhuma had gone into the forest to cut some fodder. All around her there were bare rugged mountains that made her feel alone and cut off, and there was no greenness anywhere. The whole of nature had dried up. All through the forest the fallen leaves lay dry and withered. Even the steep tumbling stream had dried up, and its melancholy sound came from deep down below. Here and there white flowers bloomed, peaceful like oases in a desert. Beside the stream two sheaves of foliage grew from a gagun bush, and Jhuma gathered them up. By the time she had cut another bundle of thatch grass, she felt melancholy, too.
She sat down on a flat rock and rested for a while. She did not enjoy seeing nature all around her so lacking in beauty. She began to remember many things from the past, and then she recalled the soldier. “He hasn’t visited for many days. Might he have forgotten me? He won’t be as loving as I am, will he now! But then, why shouldn’t he be? Poor thing, he spoke of marriage that day, and he must be upset now because I seemed unwilling.”
A flood of emotion had washed her far away, and to push it back again she sang a song that echoed through the forest:
ukali jyanko cipleto dhungo
dui jiu naran basaunla
bandhana maya thyammai.
yo man ja
sto tyo man bhae
mayako dhago ni kasaaunla
bandhana maya thyammai.
On a flat rock on the steep hill of life
Our two bodies, Lord, will sit.
Pledge your love forever.
If his heart feels the same as mine
We will tie the thread of love.
Pledge your love forever.
She had just finished her song and was thinking of going down the hillside to cut two more bundles of foliage when someone suddenly spoke behind her.
“Hello, Jhuma, have you come to cut fodder?”
“Aabui, it’s you!63 What are you doing in the forest?” The words sprang from her mouth, filled with joy and delight.
“I was on my way up the hill by the main path up there. Your voice drew me here.” The soldier sat down beside her.
“I thought you might have forgotten me.” Jhuma lowered her head as she spoke.
“I think about you night and day…. If only you felt the same!”
“And how do you know that I don’t? How do you know my feelings aren’t even stronger than yours?”
“Is that the truth then?” The soldier took hold of her hand.
“Chi! If someone saw us, what would they say?” Jhuma pulled her hand away.
“Oh, who would be watching us out here in the forest? Have you gathered enough fodder yet?”
“I was going to stop when I’d made three bundles. I’d carry on cutting if there were enough foliage.”
“Do the animals eat dudilo?”64
“Yes, but where can they get it? They’d love it if I could get
some for them!”
“I’ll climb up that tree. You collect it down here, all right?”
“Aabui! Can men who’ve been in the army climb trees as well?” Jhuma was surprised and amused.
“Oh! We’ve been trained to do everything!”
The soldier went up to the dudilo tree, and Jhuma followed him. By the time he had finished throwing down the foliage and had climbed down again, Jhuma had collected it into sheaves and was bundling them together. The soldier stood nearby and looked all around him. After a few moments Jhuma came back and sat down on the rock. He sat down right beside her, and said very gently, “Jhuma, will you come to Mugalan? I am going in Asar.”65
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