‘Natun Bouthan!’ A small head appeared from behind the door. It was Robi’s. Seeing that Barna wasn’t there, he came running in and sat close to Kadambari. The advent of the new bride in Jorasanko had affected Robi in a strange sort of way. His head was filled with fantasies. He saw her as a beautiful princess, with sad eyes, who had drifted into his home and his life to the plaintive strains of the shehnai that had played all day long for three whole days. A web of enchantment surrounded her. He longed to tear it apart; to get close to her. But Barna was constantly shooing him away. ‘What are you doing here?’ she would snap. ‘No boys allowed here.’ She would even try to shame him for his preference for their company. ‘Are you a girl,’ she would say, ‘that you hang around with us? Run away and play with Som and Satyaprasad. But Robi didn’t like playing with Som and Satya. Their games were too rough. He would much rather sit with the new bride and talk to her. She listened so intently to whatever he said. And when she spoke her voice was so soft and husky it sent a shiver down Robi’s spine. And what a lovely lemony fragrance rose from her! Was it from the perfumed oil Kal Dai rubbed into her long black hair each morning? Or was it her own scent? The scent of an alien princess from a distant land?
‘Why are you sitting here alone?’ he asked her now. ‘I can see your eyes are sad. Why are you sad, Natun Bouthan? Are you missing your mother?’
Kadambari smiled and shook her head but the effort was in vain. Her lower lip trembled and the tears started to flow again.
Robi’s own eyes grew moist. ‘Don’t cry, Natun Bouthan,’ he said. Taking her hand, a delicate brown hand with fine, gold, arrowhead bangles hanging from the wrist, he stroked it gently. ‘Shall I tell you a story?’ he asked. ‘Do you know the story of the beautiful princess who was locked up in a tower?’ Kadambari shook her head. ‘Then dry your eyes and sit up,’ Robi, all of seven and a half, spoke to his nine-year-old sister-in-law in the voice of a mentor. He felt himself to be infinitely older and stronger than this frail, forlorn girl sitting next to him. A wave of responsibility washed over him. Something told him that he had to be her protector. He had to take care of her and keep her happy and smiling.
Crossing his legs and nodding his head solemnly, he began in the high singsong voice that Subhankari used when telling him stories. ‘Once upon a time, long, long ago, in a far away kingdom beyond the Tepantar, there lived a king called… called…’ He fumbled for a moment, then a burst of inspiration came to him. ‘His name was Brajaraj Chandrabhan.’ In his mind’s eye, he saw the king in the image of the Bhojpuri darwan, Chandrabhan, who guarded the great gates of Jorasanko – a tall hefty man, in his prime, with long pepper-coloured hair with a wooden comb stuck to it, and protuberant eyes flaming from the effects of ganja. ‘The king had a beautiful daughter. As beautiful… as beautiful… as you.’ Kadambari sat up. The beginning of the story pleased her very much. She pushed back her ghumta and looked eagerly at her brother-in-law. ‘Her eyes were like lotus buds sprinkled with morning dew,’ Robi went on eloquently. ‘And her hair…’ He shot a glance at the long wet strands that fell to Kadambari’s hips. ‘Her hair was as long… as… a river. And as soft and black as night.’
‘Robi!’ Kadambari was charmed. ‘You tell stories very well.’
‘But the princess’s heart was full of grief.’
‘Why?’
‘Because a wicked demon had carried her away and kept her locked up in a tower. She wept all day and all night. She missed her mother s-o-o-o much.’
‘It’s a very sad story. It is making me cry again.’
‘It has a happy ending,’ Robi said quickly. ‘Listen na.’ And now Robi sprang into his saga of the handsome prince, who was himself of course, with enthusiasm, spinning amazing twists and turns of the plot as his hero crossed the Tepantar on his white horse Bidyut, braving innumerable, incredible dangers – lions, tigers, hissing serpents, fierce wolves and laughing hyenas, storms, earthquakes, landslides and volcanoes – the list was endless and the story a distinct improvement, or so Robi thought, on Subhankari’s tale.
Kadambari sighed and wiped her eyes when, at long last, the prince managed to kill the wicked demon, release the princess, and take her back, seated behind him on Bidyut who galloped through the night as though on wings, to her parents. Robi’s story did not end with the mandatory wedding and ‘living happily ever after’ of fairy tales. He couldn’t quite visualize what that meant. To him it was enough for a hero to brave tremendous hazards, rescue a fair damsel in distress and take her back to her parents.
‘It’s a lovely story,’ Kadambari murmured.
‘Then why are you still crying?’ Robi asked puzzled.
‘These are tears of happiness.’ Kadambari’s very white, slightly long teeth flashed in a radiant smile, transforming her features completely. Her grief over the imminent loss of her doll had receded into the background.
‘O ma! O ma! O ma!’ Barna stood at the door, a plump hand on her cheek. ‘Here I’m running around like a headless hen, preparing for the wedding and you are sitting here wasting your time with Robi! Don’t you have any sense, Natun Bouthan? Ma go! It’s her daughter who is to be wed and she’s not bothered in the least! Now let me make this quite clear. If the arrangements are not in order, if there are complaints from the guests, it will be your fault, Natun Bouthan. The wedding is your responsibility. The badhu baran and floral bed are mine. There won’t be any mismanagement where my events are concerned. But yours…’
‘Don’t worry, Natun Bouthan,’ Robi glanced at Kadambari’s scared, anxious face and hastened to reassure her. ‘Nothing will go wrong. I’ll do all your work. Just tell me what you want.’
‘Hunh!’ Barna gave a scornful laugh. ‘What do you know of weddings? You’re only a little boy. And a very silly boy at that.’
But the wedding went off without a hitch. Barna’s enthusiasm fired the other women of the house and they came to Kadambari’s rescue. Neepmayi and Prafullamayi were good at needlework and, between them, they got Kusum Kumari’s dowry ready. Jnanadanandini procured for them all that they needed. She had come to attend Jyotirindra’s wedding but had had to stay on after Satyendra’s leave expired, for her mother-in-law discovered that she was pregnant. Sarada was taking no chances this time. Keeping her mejo bouma firmly ensconced in the abarodh, she besieged her with lists of dos and don’ts that grew longer by the hour and drove the poor girl up the wall. None of these instructions made any sense to her.
‘Don’t step across the threshold. Put your foot firmly on it.’
‘Never go into a room where paan is being washed. A drop may fall on you.’
‘Don’t look at a fish head. The eyes will cast a spell on you.’
‘Never keep your hair open. Tie a knot at the end. And, above all, remember to stick a tiny sliver of wood in your braid after dusk. All sorts of evil spirits hover around pregnant women at night.’
Jnanada wrote long, tearful letters to her husband but they availed her nothing. Satyendra wrote back to say that his mother was an experienced woman who had borne many children and knew what was good for her daughter-in-law. Jnanada should stay where she was and concentrate on keeping herself fit and cheerful so that, when the time came, she could give birth to a sound, healthy child.
The doll’s wedding proved to be a welcome diversion. Jnanada, always ready to take any initiative that came her way, pitched in to help Neepmayi and Prafullamayi. Her initial annoyance with Birendra’s wife had melted away over the years. She realized that the girl had been too young, only eight, and a pawn in her mother-in-law’s hands. She was still very young and acutely unhappy. Her husband suffered from some kind of mental ailment which made him jealous and suspicious and which, strange to say, no one in the house seemed to recognize as serious, not even her father-in-law. Jnanada’s heart went out to the young Prafulla. She sent for her often, listened to her accounts of her husband’s indifference and neglect, and offered comfort and advice. And, thus, the two women, who had hated each
other once, grew as close as sisters.
Jnanada obtained scraps of brightly coloured silks, muslin, velvet and brocade from Niyamat, the old, half-blind tailor who sat in a corner of the ground-floor veranda, all year round, stitching vests, jobbas, caps, sheets, pillowcases, mosquito nets and everything else that was needed by the family. The women had taken to wearing jackets and chemises, but since there was no question of their giving any measurements, Niyamat stitched them in two standard sizes – one for the young girls and one for the older women. Consequently, they wore these garments either flapping on their forms like wings or squeezing them in so tight they could scarcely breathe.
Next Jnanada sent Ishwar to saheb para to buy yards of white cambric and tulle, lace and ribbon and piles of beads, spangles, tinsel, tiny combs and clips. He also made a special trip to the toy market of Dakshineswar to bring sets of kitchen vessels in wood, stone and brass. Needless to say, the wily old man enriched himself, considerably, on both expeditions, at her expense. Now, with Neepmayi’s and Prafullamayi’s help, Jnanada cut the fabric into miniature sari lengths and dyed them with stems of shiuli flowers, indigo, turmeric, lamp black and alta. A range of shades were obtained from her clever combinations. Lamp black and alta mixed together provided a luscious purple, like the outside of a jaam berry; shades of green from judicious blends of turmeric and indigo. Embroidered with gold thread and sequins, they made exquisite saris, each with a matching jacket of velvet or brocade. The women of Jorasanko were very artistic and some of them came up with wonderful ideas. Tinsel and beads, strung and twisted skilfully together replicated the most ostentatious of jewellery.
Then came the biggest surprise of all. Sending Abdul, the coachman, to the mint, Jnanada procured one hundred shining four-anna bits which she covered with gold paper to resemble guineas. Twenty tiny pouches of red velvet were stitched and five coins put in each. The children of the family, and this included the children of Baithak Khana Bari, were given a pouch each, with which to bless the couple, for were they not revered aunts and uncles and the most important guests?
On the evening before the wedding, when the girls of the house had gone to the pond for the jal sowa and the bride’s mother was sitting in her room, her daughter in her lap and a dejected look on her face, her husband came in. Jyotirindra, generally indifferent to the goings-on of the women of the house, smiled at his wife and handed her a cardboard box wrapped in waxed paper. ‘For your Kusum Kumari,’ he said, ‘to go for rides in the park with Deb Kumar. Come, give me a smile. Your face looks quite different when you smile.’ Kadambari tore away the paper with impatient hands, opened the box and gasped with delight. Inside was a tiny metal carriage drawn by four horses. It had red velvet seats and the horses had real leather saddles. A cunning little coachman in splendid livery sat on the box.
It was a fine wedding. No other doll in Jorasanko had had a more lavish one. The groom’s mother was the most efficient of planners and every ritual, from the crushing of the turmeric to the decorating of the bridal bed, was observed with a meticulous eye for detail. Lamps flickered from the gates and cornices on the wedding night and the smallest girls of the house, dressed in colourful saris, received the guests, sprinkled rosewater on them and offered them garlands of jasmine and tuberose to twine about their hair and wrists. On the terrace adjoining Jyotirindranath’s apartment, rows of banana leaves, piled with hot luchis, mutton curry, fried vegetables and sweets, stood ready and waiting for the eighty-odd children who had come from the various branches of the extended family. The bride’s mother, suitably attired in a red-bordered garad sari, ran here and there on her little feet, seeing to the comfort of her guests.
By eleven o’clock the next morning, everything was over. Kusum Kumari, flashing a streak of sindoor on her parting, had thrown the mandatory rice and coins into her mother’s anchal and told her that she had paid back everything she owed her. Then she had gone off with her husband and mother-in-law to Sarada’s apartment where Barna slept at night and kept her dolls. Everything went with her. The saris, jewels, linen, kitchen vessels and other household goods Kadambari’s sisters-in-law had got together with so much love, over so many months, were all, all gone! And, what hurt most, Barna even took away the pouches of coins Jnanada had prepared and the darling little carriage Jyoti had given her.
Neepmayi tried to intervene. ‘Don’t take everything,’ she told Barna. ‘Leave some for Natun Bou.’
‘Why?’ Barna turned belligerently on her sister-in-law. ‘You’ve been married six years. Don’t you know that everything the bride gets for her wedding belongs to the groom’s family?’
‘That may be true. But this isn’t a real wedding. It’s a doll’s wedding…’
‘Don’t say that.’ Barna’s eyes turned big and tearful. ‘It’s a real wedding. Real! Real! Real!’
‘Even if it is,’ Neepmayi answered in a placating voice, ‘we, Tagores, keep our sons-in-law with us. Your sisters stay in this house and so will you when you get married. Why can’t Deb Kumar and Kusum Kumari stay with Natun Bou?’
Barna’s face grew red with anger and embarrassment and she sought about desperately, in her mind, for a suitable answer. Suddenly it came to her. ‘Because Kusum has come from outside, like the rest of you. She wasn’t born in this house. She was born in Harh Katar Gali.’ She flashed a triumphant look at her Neepmayi.
‘Natun Bou is a little girl,’ Neepmayi said gently. ‘Two years younger than you. Leave her some things. What will she play with otherwise?’
‘She has two more daughters. She can play with them.’
Bereft of her darling, Kadambari went about her usual tasks with a calm and composure that deceived everyone in the house. She neither wept nor complained. She remembered something her mother had told her aunt when the latter’s daughter was going away to her husband’s home. ‘Swallow your grief,’ she had said. ‘Don’t let a tear escape your eyes. A mother’s tears bring bad luck to a girl.’ Kadambari was determined to follow that advice. She wouldn’t weep. Even if her heart broke from the pain she wouldn’t weep. She wouldn’t bring bad luck to Kusum.
Kadambari was not the only one who had to mourn the parting from a child that year. Three and a half months after the wedding, Jnanada suffered a greater loss. On a spring morning, bright with yellow sunshine and fragrant with madhavi and mango blossoms, Jnanada delivered a stillborn son. She had undergone labour for twenty-two hours but all her pain and agony were wasted.
Sarada was aghast. What could have gone wrong? There was no way she could fault her daughter-in-law for this disaster. The girl had, albeit unwillingly, obeyed her instructions to the letter. An element of embarrassment was mixed with Sarada’s genuine grief. How would she face Sotu? It was at her insistence that he had left his pregnant wife in Jorasanko. ‘Khuri,’ she moved closer to Subhankari and whispered, ‘I’m sure there is some venereal disease in Mejo Bouma’s family. What do you think?’
Subhankari pursed her mouth. ‘It’s possible,’ she said in the neutral voice she always adopted when asked for her opinion on problematic issues. ‘But not necessary. Many women lose one or two children in the beginning. You yourself…’
‘I lost my first because I was too young. The womb wasn’t fully formed. Mejo Bouma is nearly twenty. At her age I was the mother of five.’
Subhankari sighed. ‘Let’s hope all goes well next time. All we can do is wait and watch.’
II
The only person missing from the festivities of the wedding was Barna’s sister Swarnakumari, who was in the throes of a first pregnancy which had hit her hard. Unlike her mother, who moved from one birth to another with a minimum of discomfort, Swarna was having a tough time. She was throwing up everything she ate and drank, even water. And her mouth felt sour and her head heavy all day and all night.
Swarnakumari did not live in Jorasanko like the other married girls of the house. Her husband Janakinath was an independent young man who, though charmed by her beauty and intelligence, and e
ager to marry her, had refused to yield to the conditions Debendranath foisted on all his sons-inlaw. One, that they get initiated into the Brahmo faith. Two, that they make their father-in-law’s house their future home. The two religions, in Janakinath’s opinion, were not mutually exclusive. Hinduism accommodated the worship of One, Formless, Supreme Presence as well as that of a host of deities. It was perfectly possible to cast out idolatry and remain a Hindu at the same time. As for the second condition, he informed Debendranath, politely but firmly, that depending on his father-in-law for support went against his principles. It would mar his self respect. He was an adult male and would take full responsibility for his family. And so, after the wedding, Janakinath took his wife away with him and the young couple set up an independent establishment in Shimle.
Swarnakumari was Debendranath’s favourite daughter. Just as Jyotirindra was deemed to be the brightest and most talented of his sons, so Swarna was universally acclaimed as the finest of his flock of girls. Unlike Soudamini and Sukumari, she had never been sent to school. She had received her education at home, first from Hemendranath, then from the acharya of the Brahmo mandir, Ayodhyanath Pakrasi who, after Keshab Sen, was the second male to be granted entry into the abarodh of Jorasanko. He gave the little girls in his charge a basic grounding in Sanskrit, arithmetic, history and geography. The medium of instruction was Bangla but, textbooks in the last two subjects being available only in English, the pupils received a smattering of the language of the rulers as well. This mode of instruction lasted only a few years after which the girls were expected to improve themselves, each according to her own drive and intellectual capacity.
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