One night, a couple of weeks later, Satyendra came tiptoeing into his bedroom. ‘Monomohan is waiting downstairs in Babamoshai’s office,’ he whispered. ‘Get into bed and lie down by the wall. Don’t make a sound. And, for God’s sake, don’t fall asleep. I’ll bring him up in a few minutes.’
Genu did as she was told. She lay on her side for what seemed hours. But it was only twenty minutes later that she saw two shadows on the opposite wall creeping towards her. She stiffened but not from fear. A bubble of laughter was forming deep inside her and she was afraid it would explode any moment. She pressed her lips together and waited.
Satyendra blew out the lamp and led Monomohan to the bed. ‘Raise the mosquito net and get in… quick,’ he whispered. Then, slipping in himself, he lay down between his wife and friend and said magnanimously, ‘Well, here we are. Make friends with my wife, Monomohan.’
Genu had sat up and pulled the border of her nayansukh sari to her breast. Monomohan, sitting precariously at the edge of the mattress, his back making a bulge in the mosquito net, tried to peer into her face but could see nothing. ‘Jah Baba!’ he exclaimed, ‘I hear so much about your beauty and fiery spirit. I brave so many dangers to come to your door and you hide your face from me like a mimosa from the sun. Are you vexed with me, Bouthan, for ruining your romantic night with Satyen?’
The bubble burst. Genu’s laughter rang out like a peal of bells. ‘Perhaps,’ she said, tossing her head archly. Now, it is not to be supposed that Genu, being only nine, didn’t know what a romantic night was. She was constantly overhearing the chitchat of the older girls of the house about what their husbands had said to them and the shameless things they had done. Besides, Hemendra gave his pupils extracts from Meghdootam and Abhijnanashakuntalam for paraphrasing and translating into Bangla. Genu found the narratives so engrossing, she would help herself to the books from Hemendra’s cupboard and read them on the sly.
‘Perhaps?’ Monomohan echoed, rolling his eyes at his friend. ‘You’ve got yourself some wife, Satyen! I’ve been told in the clearest possible terms that I’m a fly in the honey pot. But dear lady,’ he turned to Genu with exaggerated courtesy, ‘I still haven’t seen your face. Favour me with a glimpse of it before you banish me forever.’
His comical air made Genu rock with laughter. Then, controlling herself, she sat up straight, threw back her ghumta and looked at her husband’s friend with a frank, clear gaze. Genu had filled out a little in the last two years and her skin had acquired a sheen. Against the kingfisher blue of her sari, her face looked almost pretty.
The lamp had been extinguished but the room was full of light. There was a glorious spring moon trapped in the branches of the bakul tree that stood just outside the window. Its beams danced about in the unruly wind and formed patterns of light and shadow on the silken sheets…
‘The moon shines bright,’ Monomohan murmured, ‘in such a night as this / when the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees / and they did make no noise / in such a night Troilus methinks… methinks… what’s the next word, Satyen? Climbed? Clambered? I cross dangers worse than Troilus ever had to cross but I fumble for the right word in English!’
‘Troilus methinks mounted the Trojan walls,’ Satyendranath took over, ‘and sighed his soul towards the Grecian tent / where Cressid lay that night / In such a night did Thisbe… But Monomohan, we are wasting our time. Genu isn’t impressed in the least. She hasn’t learned enough English to understand Shakespeare.’
‘She hasn’t? I thought you had taught her enough to take her with us to England! I planned to hide behind her when the sahebs and mems spoke to me.’
‘Stop playing the fool. Genu may not be going with us this time. But she will eventually. Mark my words. You’ll see her strolling by the banks of the Thames before long.’
‘Sweet Thames run softly till I end my song…’ Monomohan sang in a high falsetto.
‘Do you want me to throw you out?’ Satyendra gave his friend a push. ‘Sing a Bangla song, Monomohan. Genu likes music.’
‘Shall I?’ Monomohan glanced bashfully at Genu.
‘Hunh.’
‘What would you like to hear?’
‘Sing Sridhar Kathak’s Je jaatana jatane,’ Satyendra prompted. ‘Or better still, Nidhu babu’s Tomari tulana tumi praan. But keep your voice down. We don’t want the servants rushing up here with sticks and stones.’
‘Sticks and stones! I bray like a donkey, do I?’ Monomohan moved forward on the bed, adjusted the fashionably twisted chador round his neck and cleared his throat. Fixing his eyes on Genu’s face in mock adoration, he put his right hand to his ear and, keeping the beat on his thigh with his left, began his song.
Monomohan’s voice was low and husky. And, though somewhat effeminate and lacking in timbre, it was pleasant and melodious. The pathos of Nidhu babu’s strains floated into Genu’s ears and she felt strange, new stirrings within her. Something sweet and poignant and bewildering pulled at her heart strings. Her eyes filled with tears. What was it she felt? An overwhelming happiness? Or unbearable pain?
From somewhere a bird called. And from the window the fragrance of newly opening bakul came drifting in…
Satyendra left for England soon after the tragic rift that divided the great house of Panchanan Thakur for the second time. But he couldn’t get over it easily. Though relations between the two branches remained cordial enough, the very notion of separation, of living in different establishments and following different faiths, was unbearable. But Satyendra was grown up enough to analyse and assess the situation. He couldn’t fault either his father or his aunt. He preferred to put the blame on other, distant relatives of the house. In a letter to Ganendra from England, he wrote: None of this would have happened if some members of our own household, men and women with evil intentions, hadn’t sown the seeds of doubt and distrust in the hearts of our parents.
Satyendra may have been partially right but not totally. A break was imminent and would have taken place sooner or later. The passing years had changed Jogmaya from a deeply religious but otherwise normal young woman who enjoyed her privileges and was proud of her beauty and accomplishments into a grave, austere widow who spent all her time in the puja room. Her head, from which masses of shining, rippling hair had fallen to her hips, was now a shell. Her slender throat with a skin so fine and translucent, her children swore they could see the food moving down it when she ate, was divested of all its ornaments. All she wore now was a string of basil. More and more, she was developing an uncanny resemblance to her mother-in-law.
Debendra, on the other hand, was throwing himself heart and soul into the new religion. The vast courtyard, in which innumerable Hindu festivals had been celebrated for the last fifty years, was turned into a congregational area for the Brahmo festivals of Maghotsav and Bhadrotsav. The first was a commemoration of the day the Brahmo mandir was consecrated and the first upasana, or collective prayer, held. The second marked the formation of Rammohun Roy’s Brahmo Sabha. Debendra also introduced a morning upasana at home, a daily prayer which everyone in the house had, compulsorily, to attend. A bell was rung half an hour before it commenced to ensure that shirkers and idlers reached the venue well in time. Debendra, who led the prayers whenever he was in Jorasanko – in his absence his eldest son Dwijendra took his place – hated disturbance or interruption of any kind and looked up with a frown if anyone came late, coughed, fidgeted or giggled. Another unwritten rule was that no food was to be eaten before the upasana. Even the children had to fast till it was concluded. However, Debendranath had given strict orders that a substantial breakfast of luchi, fried vegetables and milk was to be kept ready and waiting for them to eat immediately afterwards. Since Debendra had a habit of prolonging the upasana with discourse, explanations and advice, the bored and ravenously hungry young ones jumped up the moment he closed his book and ran to their respective servants and maids crying, ‘Luchi! Luchi! What else is there? Quick!’ Sarada, true to her nature, made an appearance only
when her husband was present. As for the relatives and dependents, many of them couldn’t stomach the new religion and its stringent conditions. In consequence, No. 6, which had been packed beyond capacity, saw a gradual lightening of its load.
V
Ganendra was not the only one with whom Satyendra corresponded. He wrote regular letters to his father and sent occasional missives to his ‘sweet little Genumoni’. Having come so far away from his wife, he found himself thinking of her often. What a strange amalgam of qualities made up her character! She was expressive and articulate, could almost be called a chatterbox, yet she was an excellent listener. She understood what he said and shared his thoughts in a way he hadn’t thought possible. She was, after all, a simple village girl with little education and no exposure, whatsoever, to the outside world. Yet her curiosity to know about it, her desire to be part of it was truly astonishing. She seemed self-centred and stubborn on the surface but she was, actually, very warm and generous. She loved life and wanted to live it according to her husband’s dreams which were to bring her over to England and make her a true partner in the education and progressive ideas he was receiving.
Satyendra realized, though he wouldn’t admit it, that his mother did not like Genu. She disapproved of her looks, being obsessed with the notion that beauty was synonymous with a fair complexion. She actively disliked her independent spirit, believing, as she did, that womanly grace lay in obedience and submission and the shedding of tears in private. But what she found most offensive was her son’s love and protection of his wife. In her eyes it was almost shameless the way Satyendra slipped stealthily into his bedroom soon after dusk and left it well after dawn. A certain aloofness and disregard of a wife, she felt, was good for a marital relationship. It kept a woman in her place and gave a man the status of an acknowledged master. She often conveyed these sentiments, indirectly, to her son but he pretended he didn’t understand her.
Satyendra remembered an incident that had occurred just before he left for England. One night he entered his apartment and found it empty. Where was Genu? He looked for her all over the house, then came up to the roof. He knew that she came here sometimes to play hide and seek and hopscotch with his sisters. But that was when the weather was pleasant and there was sufficient daylight. This was a winter night and bitterly cold. Still he looked around with anxious eyes. Suddenly he saw her. She was crouching in a corner by the parapet and her frail body was shaking like a leaf in a storm. Rushing to her he took her in his arms. ‘What is the matter Genu?’ he cried, rubbing her cold cheeks and fingers with his warm dry ones. ‘Are you sick? Has someone said something to hurt you?’
Genu clung to him and, between sobs and hiccups, poured out her story. Her parents were here in Kolkata. They had rented a house in Atabagan for a month and they meant to spend the time in bathing in the Ganga, meeting friends and relatives and visiting the famous temples of Thanthan and Kalighat. Her mother Nistarini, being uneducated, had made her husband write to Sarada Sundari on her behalf, begging her to send her daughter to her for a few days. She hadn’t seen her ‘little Genu’ for ages, as it seemed to her, and her ‘eyes ached to catch a glimpse of the child’s beloved face’. Sarada had sent for her daughter-in-law and shown her the letter. Then, very coldly and firmly, she had told her that women of the Tagore family did not live in rented houses – no, not even for a day. She would write to Genu’s mother and invite her to stay in Jorasanko. That way Nistarini could see as much of her daughter as she wished. But Genu knew her father. He would never accept hospitality from his son-in-law’s family.
Satyendra was shocked. What nonsense was this? Why couldn’t a daughter go to her mother? Rented house indeed! Hadn’t his grandfather lived in rented houses and hotels when he was in Europe? Didn’t his father do the same during his periodic sojourns in the mountains? ‘You’ll go to your mother,’ he said decisively, raising her to her feet. ‘I’ll have a word with Babamoshai.’
The outcome of Satyendra’s intervention was simple. Debendranath met his wife and told her, ‘A mother has every right to send for her daughter. It matters little whether she lives in a mansion or under a tree.’ Genu had gone to her mother and stayed a few days. But Sarada hadn’t forgiven her.
Satyendra smiled at the memory. Genu had been so happy. She had shown her gratitude by embroidering a set of handkerchiefs for him. They bore his initials ST in a corner within a circlet of red and pink roses. The circlets were of different sizes, some more elliptical than round, and the roses weren’t quite in alignment. But she had spent weeks on the task. Then, when all were done, she had washed them and scented them with attar and put them in his trunk. He had lifted her fingers, dotted with jabs from the needle, and kissed them tenderly. ‘Why did you take so much trouble, Genu?’ he had asked. ‘I was quite satisfied with the poem you wrote for me as a parting gift.’
‘Poem?’ She had looked up in alarm. ‘What poem?’
He had rummaged in his desk and brought out two sheets of paper, one of which he handed to Genu. It had two lines of poetry in her handwriting: ‘Kemone bidai debo…’ she read aloud, blushing to the roots of her hair. How shall I bid farewell while I still have life? / For you the going is joyous, with friends by your side.
‘Where did you get this?’ Genu giggled sheepishly.
‘Subhankari Didima gave it to me.’
Sitting with Subhankari, one afternoon, Genu had written these lines. Then Jyoti had called out to her to come and play ninepins and she had run out of the room, leaving the paper behind. Red-faced with embarrassment, she was about to tear it to pieces when Satyendra plucked it out of her hand and put it in his breast pocket.
‘This is for you,’ he said and handed her the second sheet. On it was a poem written in a bold masculine hand.
How shall I bid farewell while I still have life?
With how sore a heart shall I roam in the solitary dark?
How shall I part with her whom my soul forever seeks?
The fierce flames of estrangement – how long can I bear?
My body will sail to a bourne unknown
But my heart is your gift and will rest in your care
Shadows will glide away as day’s end draws near
And old roots will draw me in a loving embrace.
The light went out of Genu’s eyes as she read the poem. She bit her lip to keep it from trembling, and, folding the page carefully, she put it away in the wooden box in which her saris were kept. That look kept coming before Satyendra’s eyes. He feared for her. She was so young and vulnerable. Deprived of his protection she might be made desperately unhappy. Satyendra didn’t hear of it till his return from England, but something much worse than being prevented from visiting her parents happened to Genu in his absence from Jorasanko.
It was Sukumari’s wedding day. The Tagores, following a tradition dating from their earliest Pirali ancestors, didn’t send their daughters to their husbands’ homes after marriage. On the contrary, they kept their sons-in-law with them. Debendranath’s eldest daughter Soudamini lived with her husband in Jorasanko. Sukumari, the second, would do the same. In consequence, the occasion was a totally joyous one with no shadow of an imminent separation marring the happiness of the bride and her family. If anything, there was more excitement and anticipation than usual, for this wedding would be different from all the others that had taken place so far. It was to be the first Brahmo marriage and would be conducted by Debendranath himself. He had prepared for the task by donning the mantle of ‘acharya’ of the Brahmo mandir a day before. He had sat on the dais, led the prayers and formalized some of the rules. There would be an exchange of vows and rings, and singing of hymns similar to a Christian ceremony. The Shalagramshila and sacrificial fire would be conspicuous by their absence. But all the rest – the exchange of garlands, the feasting and presents, the games and jokes and all the nitty-gritty of the stree achaar or women’s rites – would be retained.
After a glaringly hot morning and afternoo
n, the July evening turned dark and sultry and the sky hung heavy with impending rain. Exhausted from the excitement of the innumerable rituals – the turmeric ceremony, the bathing of the bride and the arrival of the array of gifts from the bridegroom’s house – Genu had fallen asleep in the late afternoon. A couple of hours later, Sarada’s maid Kalo came and woke her up. Putting down the tray she was carrying on the bed, she said, ‘Get up quickly and get dressed. The bridegroom’s party will be here soon. Ginni Ma has sent these for you to wear.’
Genu sat up and rubbed her eyes. Pulling the tray towards her she saw that it contained her wedding sari, one set of bangles, a narrow gold necklace given to her by one of their relatives from Pathuriaghata, and a pair of eardrops.
‘Only these?’ she looked up, surprised. She had had several conversations with her sisters-in-law about what they would be wearing and each one had said that she would wear all or most of her heavy jewellery. ‘What about my waistband, armlets and tiara?’ She turned bewildered eyes on Kalo. ‘And the gold and ruby necklace Ma gave me for my badhu baran? And the diamond pins Mejo Kaki—’
‘I don’t know all that,’ Kalo interrupted but she looked shamefaced and her eyes shifted uneasily. ‘You’d better hurry if you want to see the arrival of the bridegroom. Everyone else is ready.’
After she left, Genu sat for a long time staring at the tray. What would she do now? What could she do? Had they been living together, she would have run to Jogmaya and told her of what had happened. Jogmaya would have accosted her mother-in-law. But that was no longer possible. Not after the court order.
About a year ago, the Supreme Court of Kolkata had delivered its verdict in the case filed by Debendranath against Tripura Sundari. The adoption had been disallowed on the grounds that the defendant was a widow. Not only that. The court had ruled that her husband’s property was to be split in three parts. The first part was to go to Debendranath, the second to the deceased Girindranath’s sons and the fate of the third was to be kept in abeyance for the present. Tripura was heartbroken at this double injustice. She was not only deprived of the satisfaction of adopting a child, her husband’s property was also denied her. Henceforth, thanks to her brother-in-law and the law of the land, she would have to live on the charity of others. Egged on by Jogmaya and her eldest son, Ganendra, Tripura appealed against the ruling. And thus Debendra and his sister-in-law got locked in a bitter legal battle.
Jorasanko Page 8