‘Suppose I am—what’s wrong with that?’
‘What’s wrong? It’s not honest, that’s what’s wrong. You’re doing what you don’t want to do in order to please others and pretending you actually enjoy it.’
I smiled and said, ‘Lots of children don’t like going to school. Should they not go to school then?’
‘That’s not the same thing at all. If children don’t go to school, they hurt themselves, but you’re not improving yourself by buttering up your mother-in-law. Besides, children have to be disciplined. You, however, are an adult.’
At first I couldn’t understand what he was trying to say. I’d be rather startled when he would call a younger cousin of his a ‘Lout!’ (just because he’d tell stupid jokes and loll about on people’s beds at any odd time of the day). And I would wonder what sort of language that is. The boy was a cousin, after all. Yet I couldn’t but admire Angshu, for his views were so clear and original. I still hadn’t got rid of the notion of being his student. The books he would read in bed were such that I couldn’t make head or tail of. I simply took it for granted that he was more intelligent than I was, but from the back of my mind another thought would push forward from time to time. I could see that Nayonangshu knew nothing about certain matters: absolutely nothing about my nature and my femininity—why I like to be in the kitchen with my sister-inlaw, why I like to learn how to cook from his mother once in a while, why I want to live with my in-laws as one of the family simply because I want to, not because I’m trying to be tactful. Nayonangshu didn’t understand these simple things at all, didn’t even try to. In marriage, he wanted a wife, just a wife, whole and complete, and I wanted not just a husband but a new life centred around him. I wanted to become a part of the Beleghata household, a member of it, even have some authority of my own eventually. But Angshu gradually taught me to think as he did. He convinced me that it was somehow inconvenient for us to live with all those people in that huge three-storeyed Beleghata house, that there was nothing as disgusting as a joint-family arrangement with everyone kneaded together into a lump giving no individual the scope to develop independently, beautifully. And after some time I began to share his dream of moving to our own apartment and beginning to lead our own, independent life.
‘Each adult is a separate person, an individual. You should develop your own personality, not be moulded in the image of others.’
Often I would hear this kind of talk from Nayonangshu, whenever I went out with my sisters-in-law to buy saris or watch a Hindi film, or when I sang during Lakshmi puja on Thursdays, or played carom with that foolish but harmless brother-in-law of mine. And another thing Nayonangshu always said was, ‘All this sari–jewellery–Hindi film business—why don’t you give up all this girlie stuff?’
And I’d answer, ‘But I happen to be a girl. What should I be if not girlie!’
‘It’s not the same thing to be a girl and to be girlie.’
‘Would you please explain the subtle distinction, sir?’
With that teasing, Angshu would grab me close and the argument would end. But then some other occasion would arise and he’d repeat the same thing, the essence of which was that something or the other, this action or that ‘didn’t please him’. Which meant, of course, that Nayonangshu wouldn’t let me be what others would have liked me to be, that he’d refashion me according to his liking. I was not to be moulded in someone else’s image, but only his—that was what my so-called ‘individuality’ amounted to. Of course, I didn’t figure that out then. It only struck me much later when I reflected back on those days, or perhaps it has struck me just now. At the time it just wasn’t possible for me to have a thought which would not be honourable to Angshu and to me as well. Even the fact that he wanted to possess me totally, I took as proof of his profound love. Until then I was infatuated with him.
Infatuated, but—because I do have some basic intelligence—it seemed to me, even before the fragrance of the wedding ceremony had faded from my body, that Angshu was a little too much of a book-lover and that he wanted to organize his life in accordance with what he’d liked in the books he’d read. For the last few months of college I was his student. That’s how we first met. A young teacher, fresh from getting his diploma, good-looking, polished in speech—there wasn’t one among the twenty-nine girls in our class who didn’t feel the southern breezes of spring rippling through her heart at the sight of him. Acting on a bet with the others, I went up to talk to him on some pretext concerning our studies. After that, he appeared unexpectedly at our house one day with a couple of books. They were supposed to be particularly important for the exam. I said to myself, ‘So, you have the same thing in mind!’ About a week or ten days later he came back for his books. When he heard I hadn’t finished reading them, he picked out a few passages, read them aloud to me and even provided explanations. I listened very intently but didn’t hear a thing. All that reached my ears was his voice, and I saw his facial expressions, the movement of his lips. And then, when we had come to a mutual understanding and everyone in my family understood the situation and started to get a little anxious about it (parents can’t help but get anxious when they see some young man becoming very friendly with their unmarried daughter; yet once she’s married they cease to worry for the rest of their lives, as if marriage were some sort of guaranteed charm against all fevers!)—even then, whatever Angshu said to me was interwoven with stuff from books. It was the same way even after we were married. He’d come into the room, say, after lunch on a Sunday, and read English poetry to me, love poetry. He was greatly taken with D.H. Lawrence at the time. But then, of course, we were no longer at the courtship stage when I was happy to have him near me no matter what the circumstance. It was only natural that I should expect a different sort of behaviour from him now. So I couldn’t keep my mind on anything else, and certainly couldn’t comprehend why a man who was free to make love should want to read or recite love poetry, or just talk about it. And when he finally drew me close to him, he did it so gently and so cautiously that it seemed to me at times that even during his lovemaking he was mentally translating from some book. Of course, I would often murmur, ‘Oh stop! It’s too much! You’re ravishing me!’—all the things that women have said from time immemorial to arouse the man still further. But even at the climax of his ‘ravishing’, I had a vague feeling that Angshu wasn’t exactly in love with me, but with the idea that he was making love to me. What long and weighty speeches he could give on the subject of this ‘love’.
Five months after our marriage an event occurred that at the time caused a big stir in Calcutta. A renowned barrister, fifty-five years old, ran off to Bombay with a married girl who had been studying for her MA. The matter went all the way to the courts. However, the case ultimately came to nothing. It was heard that the girl got a divorce and the barrister married her and signed over his house in Calcutta to his former wife, along with an allowance of five hundred rupees a month. People began to criticize both of them. A couple of newspapers, without mentioning any names, went so far as to make their stand very obvious, tearing the barrister to shreds. Our Beleghata household banded together on this issue. All were scandalized except Nayonangshu, who alone fought against the rest of us. One day I got mad and said, ‘I don’t care what you say, you can’t call that barrister anything but a dirty old lecher!’
‘What do you mean? You think there are no places to whore around in Calcutta, if that’s all he was interested in? And don’t you see the gentleman’s sacrifice? He’s losing a flourishing practice here in Calcutta, and look at the horrendous abuse heaped on him by the public!’
‘Sacrifice be hanged—a doddering old nitwit and, on top of that, the girl was already married. They should both be whipped till they’re red all over!’
Nayonangshu glowered at me. ‘You’re such a naïve little child. You don’t understand a thing.’
From then on Nayonangshu and I began to have arguments from time to time. ‘The real thing between hu
sband and wife, or in any relationship between man and woman for that matter, is love. No such thing as marriage exists in the eyes of God. There’s debauchery happening all around in the name of matrimony. Where there’s no love between husband and wife, it’s vile that they should live in a situation where the woman doesn’t have the opportunity to mix with any men except her husband and her relatives.Then her so-called fidelity becomes an utter farce!’ Such words of wisdom Nayonangshu would offer me, extensively, with many examples, as if he were lecturing in a classroom. ‘Love should be tested too, and without some sort of competition, that is impossible. One shouldn’t be obliged to spend his or her whole life with so-and-so just because the other person happens to be his wife or her husband. If the relationship is not a personal one, if it becomes something like reciting your multiplication tables from memory, or if the person remains trapped for lack of any recourse, this must be called sheer tyranny, and acquiescence to it, hypocrisy. And most people, especially in this enduring country of ours, mean precisely this when they speak of the conjugal state.’ All these speeches of Nayonangshu’s never triggered any apt retort from me right then and there, but as I listened I’d get angry. After all, I was a newly married bride then. I’d been promoted from hungry maidenhood to the state of maturity with my appetite even further whetted. The whole business of marriage quite appealed to me. I almost believed it was a relationship from out past lives.
One day I said, ‘Then in your opinion men should behave like dogs and cats? They should just roam about at will, is that it?’
‘Brute beasts cannot be compared with man. They do not love. They have only bodies, no minds.’
I burst out, ‘That’s all I hear from you—love! But can you say what this love is all about?’
He flashed a glance at me and answered, ‘If you don’t understand it yourself, no one will be able to help you.’
I had fallen in love with Nayonangshu before our marriage, but later I began to feel that falling in love was not so essential. Marriage was primary, something fixed and well ordered. Once you marry, you are set for the rest of your life, and for that reason—no matter what Nayonangshu says—there is no really valid argument against arranged marriages. I asked him once, ‘Suppose you’d received a proposal for marriage with me, wouldn’t you have agreed?’
‘Are you crazy? How can any man marry someone he doesn’t even know!’
‘But, for instance, say you are drawn to me now. What if at some other time you like another girl more?’
With a slight smile Nayonangshu answered, ‘That possibility is always there. Why live in fear of it?’
I didn’t appreciate his answer at all. My tone grew emphatic, and I added, ‘I, however, cannot even imagine that anyone but you could be my husband, or that anyone but me your wife.’
Again Nayonangshu smiled, saying in a patronizing tone, ‘You’re just a child.’
A few days after this conversation, we attended a music recital. My mother was with us. Muktipado Ghosh first sang a sombre classical malkos and then a lighter thumri in the Lucknow style—exquisite! Nayonangshu doesn’t care for music at all. He’d gone only because of me, and he sat there the whole time with a wooden expression on his face. When we came out, my mother asked him, ‘Nayonangshu, how did you enjoy it? Wasn’t he just marvellous?’ He answered dryly, ‘Marvellous.’ I was sort of dazed, with the music still echoing in my head. I could see the virtuoso’s eyes and lips, the gestures of his hands and so on, and suddenly I blurted out, ‘Muktipado Ghosh’s wife must be such a lucky woman!’ My mother immediately interjected, ‘Don’t say foolish things!’ The reason why that was foolish dawned on me long after we got home: ‘So-andso’s wife is a lucky woman’ means I am jealous of that woman, which means I want to be that man’s wife or lover. And even if one sometimes thinks this, no married woman should ever let such words slip out, especially if her husband is present. It was then that I realized what a truly amazing invention of man this institution of marriage is. For example: if I were still unmarried, what is the assurance that I, who am in love with Nayonangshu today, wouldn’t, after hearing Muktipado sing, fall in love with him tomorrow? But just because I’m already married, I shall not even think of it? Or, if I do, I’ll suppress the very thought and agree with my mother that one shouldn’t really entertain such an idea. And this is our ‘love’, Nayonangshu’s most exalted ‘love’. If we relied on this, wouldn’t everybody have been torn to pieces, so to say, unless they were securely bound in marriage?
It is raining again, the wind blowing in cool, wet gusts. What are you doing now, Jayanto? Are you asleep? Or are you just lying there, eyes closed, thinking of me? Or are you staring into the darkness? No, you’re not Nayonangshu, you’re Jayanto, a strong, robust man. You’re not a pale intellectual. You do not live through ideas. Whatever is, is good enough for you. If you’re hungry, you have to eat. When the urge comes upon you, you have to make love. For you, there’s nothing to be debated in all that. I know what you’re doing now. For so many nights you’ve been tossing and turning, imagining me in another bed, with Angshu. Jealousy has been biting at you like a swarm of mosquitoes. But tonight you had your Lotan. I rushed into your arms like blood into a doctor’s syringe. So now you’re sleeping soundly, like those who physically toil all day and then at night sleep the sleep of the dead. And your wife is lying beside you, a sack of dirty laundry. Tomorrow you’ll storm out to work with renewed energy. At the press you’ll dash off five columns for your next issue, tear around town collecting advertisements. No, Jayanto, you don’t spend your day sitting in an air-conditioned office. You’re out there all day getting scorched in the sun, drenched in the rain. You’re free, you’re bold, Jayanto, my life, my light! Now I thirst for you again. The sound of the rain has made me thirsty. Let’s go again into that tunnel with the cracked roof and water coming through. I’m thirsty, but the water is in the dining room. How do I get it? If Nayonangshu stirs, says something, or if he shows some sign that he, too, is not asleep, if I have to speak up, if Nayonangshu asks me directly—no, I don’t want that just now, I don’t want to get into a fight right now. I’m in love. Let me love, lying here. I love you, Jayanto. No, this is best, this pretence, lying here in dead silence, burning with thirst.
two
It doesn’t matter. What truly does matter is desire—whether it is fulfilled or not is purely a matter of luck. If an opportunity arises, the desire will be satisfied, otherwise not. It makes no difference, really. Our bodies are like chained dogs. The mind leads them around. No one can hinder the mind as it nimbly goes wherever it pleases, but the body, being a clumsy and cumbersome piece of matter, lags behind. Nothing new has happened—it’s just that your body has carried out an order from your mind. Maloti, don’t fret. To me it’s all the same. Nothing’s changed—it just doesn’t matter.
I turned on the lights and saw a beautiful picture. Maloti was sleeping. Her sari had ridden up past her knee to reveal a well-shaped leg. The loose end of the sari had gathered on one side, displaying the whole of one breast—full, round, fleshy, upturned. A dark-skinned Venus—not one of Botticelli’s slim adolescents, but someone from the school of Tiziano, a woman in the ripeness of her youth. It seemed as if in the entire sleeping form this one bared breast were the only thing wide awake and gazing out, aware and proud of its own beauty, expectant of people’s praise. I enjoyed looking at that sleeping figure, standing there with my body cold and dripping wet, as if I were gathering up its warmth with my very eyes. But it occurred to me that if she were to wake suddenly she’d be embarrassed, so I went up to her and without touching her body gently pulled her sari down past her ankle and covered her breast. I saw that her sheets were wrinkled, and she was asleep on one pillow, the other lying by her side had a visible depression in the middle. Then I noticed her blouse and bra on my bed, as though they’d been tossed over there carelessly.
As I went into the bathroom to change out of my wet clothes, it suddenly struck me that it had
been a long time since I’d seen Maloti’s body in the light. It seemed to me her body had become even more beautiful, or should I say more tempting, or was it beautiful, or perhaps both? Firm skin, rounded flesh, glossy with the sheen of natural oils, at the zenith of her youth one might say. Soon she’ll start to fade, either become thin or fat. Her skin will begin to sag or the fat will build up to such an extent that her figure will lose all its shape. But it’s not as though it’s inevitable, really. She could maintain more or less the same figure (if she watches her diet and takes care of herself as she does now) for another ten years, even twenty, maybe. I’ve seen a fifty-year-old woman who’s still quite attractive (of course, one can’t say how much of that is due to the magic of cosmetics). And then, of a sudden, I realized I wanted her beauty to wane—let her become plump and ugly or grotesquely skinny. I wanted it so that no man would give her a second look. But, for the time being I had to accept the fact of her body’s allure, the body which I had by accident seen in bright light just now, after a long time, unsheathed from the layers of clothing. That one breast floated in front of my eyes again. There wasn’t the slightest wrinkle anywhere. Perhaps the area around the nipple had become a little darker (her breasts had produced a lot of milk, but she started Bunni on Glaxo from the second month), like the fruit of the palmyra palm, slightly pink underneath the black, gazing out like a little child, like some innocent happy eye, as though saying, ‘I’m me, and I don’t know anything more.’ Why didn’t I stay and look a little longer? Why didn’t I touch it when covering her up? Why else? Me and my sense of honour, decorum, my puritanical Brahmo streak! Me and all my booklearnt garbage! I’m her husband, after all. I could have aroused her by squeezing that ball of flesh. I could have opened those sleeping eyes by pressing my fingers on that soft neck of hers. I could have swooped down upon her and held her in my arms as we rolled about on the floor. But no—that’s not possible for someone as lily-livered as me. But that doesn’t mean I don’t feel tempted or don’t have the desire to do all that. The desire is there, in full force, and I know the lady wouldn’t have disliked it either. And this is why I can’t really blame Jayanto. Ah, if only it were not Jayanto but somebody else from among my friends, somebody with whom it might at least have been possible to discuss Kandinsky.
It Rained All Night Page 2