Strangely, the only one in the family who could rouse her from the stupor into which she had fallen was Prafullamayi’s son Balendra. Bolu was three and a half now and a beautiful boy. But his legs were still weak and he dragged them along the floor when he walked. Sarada sat up whenever she saw him and, taking him in her lap, massaged his legs and feet with her one good hand, and listened to his childish prattle with nods of encouragement. Bolu also formed a bridge between his mother and grandmother and, gradually, Sarada regained the love she had once cherished, then lost, for Prafullamayi.
Dr Partridge was puzzled. His patient had recovered fully, from the medical point of view, but why wasn’t she getting back her health and strength? He proposed a change of scene. ‘Take her to a place where she can get some pure air,’ he told her sons. ‘A river cruise would be ideal. She needs doses of oxygen to perk her up and stimulate the appetite.’
Jyotirindra offered to take her to Shilaidaha. ‘Natun Bou could accompany us,’ he said. ‘She’s a good nurse and Ma will be looked after well.’
But Dwijendra was against taking her too far away from Kolkata where the best doctors were on call if an emergency arose.
‘What about the house in Palta?’ Hemendra suggested. ‘She’ll get plenty of fresh air. The garden slopes right down to the river. She’ll also get all the comforts she’s accustomed to. She could spend her days in a boat anchored near the estate and the nights, snug and warm, within the house.’
But even Palta, Dwijendranath felt, was too far away. After some more consultation the brothers decided to hire a boat for three months and keep it anchored in the Ganga, in the stretch just below the Company’s Garden. They would fit it up with all the luxuries their mother needed and Jyotirindra and Kadambari would go with her.
A few days before the party was to leave, Prafullamayi expressed a desire to accompany them and Kadambari, glad to have some company, persuaded Jyotirindra to take her along. But neither the river air nor the change of scene nor the ministrations of her daughters-in-law helped to improve Sarada’s condition. Her appetite flagged steadily and she remained as dull and listless as ever. What was worse, a new affliction came over her. She started developing bed sores. It began with a small patch just below the nape of the neck, then, within a couple of weeks, her back and rump were covered with large sores that oozed blood and pus and gave off a foul stench. The cabin in which she lay reeked of putrid air so strong that all the joss sticks and incense her daughters-in-law lit couldn’t dispel it. Even the maids covered up their noses when approaching her.
Kadambari, excessively sensitive in temperament and weakened in body by malaria, found it difficult to bear the sight of so much suffering. Assailed by repeated attacks of migraine, she took to her bed. But Prafulla was as steady as the northern star. She devoted herself to her mother-in-law in a way no daughter of hers could have done. She changed her clothes and bed linen several times a day and applied powders and ointments with her own hands. She coaxed her to eat, feeding her in tiny spoonfuls for hours together. And, in all she did, she didn’t betray a trace of distaste or revulsion.
‘I’ve wronged you grievously, my child,’ Sarada said to her one day, with tears in her eyes. ‘I’ve been hard and cruel. I blamed you for Biru’s condition when you were actually the victim. Your father-in-law was against the marriage but I insisted. You were so pretty and I was so tempted.’
‘Don’t think of the past, Ma,’ Prafulla answered. ‘What’s done is done.’
‘I’ve ruined your life. I’m totally to blame.’
‘Why do you say that? I may have been unfortunate in my husband but I have had my compensations. How many women have the good fortune of being a daughter-in-law of the Tagores of Jorasanko? And, now that I have my Bolu, all my sorrows have been wiped away. I am content.’
Sarada died four months later in her own bed, after touching the dust of her husband’s feet to her brow, as she had so earnestly desired.
A third telegram had gone to Debendranath, the text of which carried urgency enough to induce him to give up his sojourn in the mountains and descend to the plains. But, even then, he didn’t come straight to Kolkata. He broke journey at Bolpur, spent a few days meditating under the chhatim tree in his abode of peace, then came home late one night to hear that his wife was dying.
Sarada smiled weakly when she opened her eyes the next morning and saw her husband standing by her bedside. Turning to Dwijendra, she said, ‘Didn’t I tell you, Dwiju, that I wouldn’t go till your babamoshai came home?’ Her weak, quavering voice held a tinge of triumph. It was true. For the last few days, when her children were agonizing over her deteriorating condition and the continued absence of their father, she had said to them several times, ‘Why do you worry? I give you my word. I won’t die before taking the dust of your father’s feet.’
Debendranath stood immobile for a few minutes, his gaze fixed on the dying woman. But, before his eyes, he saw another scene. He saw a vast courtyard, full of women. He saw a palki being lowered at its arched entrance and his mother, the beautiful and stately Digambari Debi, walking up to it and lifting out a tiny bundle wrapped in red silk and weighed down with jewels. With the sound of blowing conches and the ululation of women still echoing in his ears, he said, ‘I brought you to this house when you were a child, Bado Bou. We have spent forty-three years together, sharing all the joys and sorrows our all-merciful Param Brahma thought fit to send us. We have never been apart in our thoughts. Why do you abandon me now?’
Sarada fixed her dying gaze on her husband. ‘My time has come,’ she said gently. ‘You have held me captive for a long, long while. Give me your blessing and set me free.’
Around three o’clock that night, Kal Dai came hobbling into the room where Robi, Som and Satya were sleeping, wailing and beating her breast. ‘Hai! Hai!’ she shrieked. ‘A curse has fallen on this house! What will become of us? How will my little ones bear such a great loss?’
The boys, startled out of their sleep, sat up in their beds. ‘What… what… who?’ they stammered fearfully, seeing only a dim shape and hearing a disembodied voice.
‘Oh my poor children!’ Kal Dai rushed to the bed in which Robi and Som slept together, and gathered them in her arms. ‘Ginni Ma has gone!’ she wailed. ‘Our chaste and holy mistress has left us! The house of Jorasanko is orphaned! Her body failed her but her spirit clung to the earth. Great sati that she was, she wouldn’t go before taking the dust of her husband’s feet. Has anyone seen a woman like her since the days of Savitri?’
‘Who… who has gone, Kal Dai Ma?’ Som was able to string a few words, at last, but his eyes were still half shut and his brain fuddled with sleep. ‘Gone where?’
Suddenly Kadambari was at the door. ‘Stop your clamour, Kal Dai Ma,’ she ordered sternly. ‘And leave the room.’ Then, approaching the bed, she disengaged the old woman’s arms and pushed her gently towards the door.
‘What has happened, Natun Mami?’ Satya asked.
‘Nothing. Go back to sleep.’
It was ten o’clock in the morning and the balmy light of the sun poured into the courtyard. The gates of the mansion had been flung wide open, as befitted a house of death, and groups of men and women huddled near it, talking in hushed whispers. Within the courtyard the members of the family stood around the bedstead of polished mahogany on which Sarada Sundari lay, hands folded on her chest, as white and still as a marble statue. Everything about her was a dazzling white. Her hair, her skin, the flowers with which the bed was covered and the silk of her garad sari. But there was red too. The sindoor on her brow and in the parting of her hair, the sari’s broad border and the line of alta on her feet were a triumphant proclamation to the world that she was a saubhagyavati, a woman who had died leaving her husband and sons behind her. That she had once been a great beauty was manifest. The marks of suffering that had been etched so deeply on her face had disappeared and a dozen years had fallen away. Peace and tranquillity, such as she had never known i
n life, was hers in death.
The weeping had subsided and a deep silence, broken by Debendranath’s booming voice reciting from the Upanishads, pervaded the house. Kadambari had taken her turn, with the other women, in applying sindoor in her mother-in-law’s parting and alta on her feet. And now she stood, at a little distance, her eyes fixed on the bed on which she lay. And, slowly, inexplicably, the scene shifted and altered. The place was the same and so were the people. But the light had become stronger and all that bright clarity was playing tricks with her eyes. The men and women she saw were the same yet not the same. And, strangest of all, the woman on the bed was changing contours and becoming another. A younger, darker, slimmer woman with bruised, blue lips and stark staring eyes…
Only a few seconds, then the vision vanished. All was the same as before. She saw her husband and his brothers approach the bedstead and haul it to their shoulders. Then, amidst a clamour of wails and lamentations, they carried their mother from the courtyard, through the baar mahal, and out of the gates. The face that even the sun hadn’t been allowed to see was now bared before the world.
That night, Kadambari had a strange dream. She was in a room, dark and full of shadows, the only light coming from a lamp burning feebly from a table by the wall. A figure, vast and shapeless, sat hunched over it, writing something on a piece of paper. She couldn’t see his face, he had his back to her, but she knew he was a man from the hand that held the quill – a large, fleshy, male hand, dazzlingly fair. She inched her body closer to his and looked over his shoulder. The quill moved slowly, etching thin, black, spiky letters on a yellowing sheet. At first she couldn’t read what was being written, the light was too dim. Then, suddenly, the flame of the lamp leaped up, tall and strong, and the letters stood out crystal clear. Dear Shyamlal Babu, she read, I regret to communicate to you some sad tidings. Your third daughter, whom we were fortunate to receive as our natun bouma, died… died… night of… night of… of…. The lamplight blinked and flickered and the letters danced, changed form. Kadambari strained her eyes to read the rest, her breath coming in painful gasps, but now the paper shivered as though a gust of wind was passing over it, and she couldn’t read anymore. The flame gave one last quiver and died out. The sheet rose into the air and flew about the room, knocked from one wall to another like a huge, blind moth. The shadows grew deeper and swallowed everything – the lamp, the table and the massive, swaying figure – leaving her standing in a vault of impenetrable darkness. She couldn’t see it, but she heard the fluttering of her death warrant, around her, above her. She felt it brush past her cheek and caress her lips. A terrible fear such as she had never known in her life took hold of her. Then, suddenly, light blazed into the room, a light so dazzling that it nearly blinded her. She was looking at the wall. But it wasn’t a wall. It was a giant mirror in which she was seeing herself…
She stared at her reflection and was flummoxed. Who was this woman? Was it she, Kadambari, fifth daughter-in-law of the house of the Tagores of Jorasanko? If so why did she look so different? So strange and exotic? So unfamiliar? As though… as though… she was really someone else pretending to be her. A scream formed in Kadambari’s lungs but her throat was frozen and nothing came out except a gurgle. And then, to her horror, a cobweb of cracks formed on the mirror. The glass trembled and broke and the woman in it fell in shards to the floor.
Kadambari shrieked. Again and again, the sounds ripping out of a jagged, painful throat. And suddenly she shuddered awake.
‘What is it, Natun Bou?’ Kadambari saw her husband’s face above hers, his eyes looking vague and lost without his glasses. ‘You cried out in your sleep. Did you have a bad dream?’
Kadambari was shivering violently. Her teeth were chattering. Jyotirindra put a hand on her brow. It was burning with fever. ‘Tck! Tck!’ he clicked his tongue and shook his head worriedly. The malaria had struck again.
II
The verdict was out in the Debendranath Tagore versus Tripura Sundari Tagore case. The fate of the one-third of Dwarkanath’s residential properties, which he had left in his will to his youngest son Nagendranath, was decided at last. This one-third constituted the entire land lying west of the ancestral mansion together with twenty thousand rupees with which he could build a house on it. After his youngest brother’s death, Debendranath had hoped that it would be divided, equally, between him and Girindra’s sons. But Nagendra’s widow, Tripura, had not only claimed a right to it, she had even insisted on adopting Girindra’s younger son Gunendra and leaving him her share. Debendranath had appealed to the Supreme Court of Kolkata both against the adoption and the right of his sister-in-law to inherit her late husband’s share. The first part of the petition had been upheld but the latter kept in abeyance. Now, fifteen years later, Nagendranath’s share was granted to his widow but not absolutely. She could use it for her support during her lifetime but, on her death, it would pass to the other two branches.
Debendranath felt vexed and humiliated at having lost to a junior member of his own family. That too a woman. He liked to see himself in the role of a patriarch who wielded absolute power but benevolently. He couldn’t understand Tripura’s compulsion to inherit. She was a widow and her needs were few. She didn’t even have children whose future might have been a concern. What she required were security and support. She was getting them and would continue to get them. Hadn’t he always taken care of everyone’s needs? Wasn’t he supervising the estates on behalf of his brother’s sons despite the rift between the two families? He filed an appeal for a review of the judgment with apparent calm but, inwardly, he seethed with annoyance and apprehension. Who knew how long the court would take! And what the result of the review would be! What if his petition was rejected? What a loss of face that would be for him before the family and before the world!
Debendranath held a consultation with his lawyers. They shared his anxieties and advised him to settle the matter out of court. ‘Talk to your sister-in-law,’ they said. ‘Persuade her to make over her one-third share to you in return for a one-time settlement and an annual subsidy. A childless widow! What will she do with a plot of land? A large sum in the bank and an annual grant will be more useful to her. From what we understand, she’s a spirited woman who wants her own independent means of living. Make the offer. She’ll jump at it.’
Debendranath sighed. ‘I don’t understand…’ He shook his head dejectedly. ‘Why does she need money? Even if a sum is given to her, can she take care of it? Make it grow? Someone or other will coax and cajole it out of her. It is so much better for a woman to be free from financial worries. I would have taken care of her, all her life, exactly as I’m doing now. I’m ready to give her anything she wants. She has only to ask.’
Debendra mulled over the advice given by his lawyers, then decided to follow it. One morning, he sent for Jogmaya’s elder son Ganendra. After enquiring after the health of his mother, who had recently returned from a pilgrimage, he broached the subject of the verdict. ‘It isn’t proper for two members of the same family to be locked in a protracted legal battle,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t do either any good and it brings a bad name to the house. Do you agree with me, Ganendra?’
‘Of course,’ Ganendra nodded, ‘we all do. No one from our side of the family wants the case to continue.’
Debendra cleared his throat. ‘I understand that your chhoto kakima would like some financial independence,’ he said evenly. ‘I have a proposal which you must convey to her. I would like her to make over her share of the property in my name in exchange for a one-time settlement of five thousand rupees and another six hundred to be paid to her annually on the first day of the year. She can go on living in Baithak Khana Bari as she is doing at present. Her day-to-day expenses will be met from the proceeds of the estate as they are being done now. What do you say? Is it a fair offer?’
‘Very fair,’ Ganendra agreed instantly. He was an unworldly man and had little knowledge of financial affairs. His uncle looked after the estates
on his behalf and that of his brother. They respected him and trusted him implicitly. He felt this was a very good proposal. Tripura would have an independent income as well as all the comforts she had been getting all these years. ‘I’m sure she’ll have no objection,’ he ended.
‘Very well then,’ Debendranath concluded the meeting. ‘I’m depending on you to obtain her consent.’
But, as it turned out, that was easier said than done. Tripura rejected Debendranath’s offer outright. ‘You’re asking me to surrender my husband’s share of his father’s property?’ she asked, fixing Ganendra with a steely glance. ‘And for what? A pittance! Why should I? The court has given a judgment in my favour. It’s mine.’
‘Only during your lifetime,’ Ganendra mumbled, awed by his aunt’s determination. ‘After that it will pass to Jethamoshai, Guno and me. We are just the two brothers and our father’s inheritance is enough for us. Jethamoshai has many sons.’
‘That’s his concern. Not mine.’
‘You will do as you think best of course,’ Ganendra said hastily. ‘But consider this. Guno and I won’t claim our share of Chhoto Kaka’s property. It will pass to Jethamoshai anyway. Or, if he goes before you, to his sons. Why not give it to him now, as he so earnestly wishes? After all, he’s the eldest member of our family. The patriarch’
‘He can take it over my dead body.’ Tripura’s eyes flashed angrily. ‘I won’t give up an inch of my land while I live. Is there no end to the man’s greed?’
‘That’s not fair, Chhoto Kaki.’ Ganendra was shocked at his aunt’s attitude. ‘Jethamoshai is not greedy. He’s just and far sighted. He’s thinking of his sons. Is that a crime?’
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