Saheb laughed, a quick small laugh.
‘Your Ramola Madam, Rajbala, has lived her life in her own morok, a shell…her shell of privilege and arrogance, and ordinariness. What is she? What would she be, if not for Bharat Talkies? If not Shankar Chattopadhyay? But you, you are not ordinary Rajbala. I knew it, that very day when I saw you first, at the studio. I knew you to be the one. The one that could break out of that morok… of samaj and sansar, society and its bindings.’ His voice trailed as he ran his hands again over the old Benarasi.
‘You know, Rajbala, my mother,’ he paused. ‘She was no ordinary woman. She lived a very ordinary life, doing her ordinary chores, surrounded by small people with their little mean heads. But in her mind…in her mind, she proved to be…’ he paused again, then laughed. ‘Much more than that morok of hers, the skin that she showed to the world. She was a true artiste, my mother. Teasing and toying with this, her only son, sometimes telling him things that were not real, and not ever tied down by anyone. Not my father, nor he that married her, nor her son, the only one that ever loved her so truly. Rajbala, my mother, she was naked, free of bonding. You too, must relinquish your bonds…your false shame. Your spirit that is now tied, give it mukti…make it free. You are my kamana…my desire. Will you Rajbala…will you give me your all?’
She was crying again, now fallen at his feet. Head on his knees, her arms clutching his legs, his hand gentle on her head again.
‘Go now, drape it on yourself, my mother’s Benarasi. Like how you would wrap yourself, as a girl, when you first stood there…before a bioscope camera. And do as they would tell you then. Let it fall…when you walk before me…remember, as you would, for those, your first bioscope pictures. Remember them, for that was the real Rajbala, not this made-up one with her false pretences, who is now heroine at Ramola Devi’s Bharat Talkies. You must return…to the real Rajbala, the one that I desire.’
The real Rajbala. After all of this time, and so many hit pictures to her name, and still…still…that was the real Rajbala? She, of those naked pictures. Her face stung, ‘And, these photographs?’
‘Ah yes, the photographs, they will be true art. For so many months I did not lay finger on it…this very dear camera of mine. I did not feel the urge. It was my first one. My first ever instrument…for my art, I had ordered it from London. I had wanted to take a photograph of my mother. She was beautiful, still bountiful then…her wet hair about her waist. But she denied me, her only son.’ He sighed and smoothed her dishevelled head. ‘But no matter, it is ready now, see…for you Rajbala. Will you not make me happy?’
VI
Ramola shook Raju hard.
‘What have you been up to, Raju? Speak up, or… or…’ She clenched her teeth behind pursed lips, her eyes narrowing as they searched Raju’s face. Her heart sounded like a drum in her own ears and she gasped as she gave the girl another thrust.
‘Raju, if you do not tell me I will stop this picture here and now. And I do not care if I do not make another picture, ever again.’ She heard her own voice tremble and blinked back the tears. This girl would be her death, few things ever moved her to such a state. And Raju, she seemed to have turned to stone. Not a word had she been able to draw from her, since they had discovered… it first bewildering, and then frightening her, she did not know why.
Manna, their hairdresser, had appeared on the set in a state of disquiet. Raju had still not emerged from the dressing room.
‘Madam, one minute, this way,’ he had signalled.
‘What is it? What is taking her so long, Manna?’ Ramola had crossly followed him to where Raju sat.
‘See here Madam. How am I to do her up? Take a look here…never seen such a thing in all my years in the line.’ He had pointed to the parting on her head.
‘Whatever is the matter now, Raju?’ She had peered impatiently. ‘Why, what…e ki! Raju, what have you done to your hair?’
Manna had his hands on his hips. ‘Think my state then, Madam, my state when I first saw! And this girl, she tells me, it’s nothing dada, don’t tell Madam…cover it up, take the hair from the side.’
Manna had puckered his face. ‘No baba, not me, not Nemai Manna’s job this. Will not the camera catch it? Then, what answer will I give? Not me, baba, I will call Madam, I said straight to her…so I went to call you, Madam.’
Raju hadn’t dropped an eye-lid, she might not have been there, like she wasn’t even hearing.
Ramola had felt disbelief turn to anger. How indeed were they to take the last song, the climax, what everybody outside was waiting to record? With Raju’s hair gone in those clumps. They might have to get a wig now. But it was what she had not wanted with this picture, from the start. Not for Mira. It was to be all natural, no wigs, very little make-up, a spirit of plainness and simplicity. That was Mira…If even they did manage to cover it up, how in heaven’s name could it have happened? Had Raju taken complete leave of her senses?
Ramola shook herself, Manna’s harangue in her ears. ‘What kind of girl this is! Chopping off her own hair. That too heroine of such a big picture. Whole head’s a mess Madam! All up and down, how will it look, in close-up? It’s a trick Madam, ask her, some other studio must have paid her…to spoil the picture. This Manna has seen enough trouble in this line.’
‘Manna, go tell Bimal Babu to break for lunch.’ She had tried to sound calm. It wouldn’t be any use telling him to not speak about the whole thing. If she knew it, Manna would spread it to the whole studio para by the end of that afternoon. She had waited for Manna to depart before turning on Raju, fire in her eyes.
‘Is that what it is Raju, what Manna was saying? Are you really trying to spoil this picture, now that we are at the end of it…now…with this, your half-bald head! Good god, Raju, what have you done?’
She had run her eyes again over the shorn patches in the midst of the long locks, her blood rising inside her. What the girl needed was a walloping, and if she had been her mother…Ramola had quite forgotten that she so hated the corporeal punishment of girls.
The shaking had done her no good, Raju hadn’t opened her mouth. She just isn’t herself, thought Ramola, a cold sweat beading her brow. What has she been up to? No girl in her right mind would do this to herself. And still less Raju. Why, she was always so full of her own self…why ever would she spoil her own looks, her beautiful long hair? Avinash Babu had laughed at her, but perhaps…perhaps, she had not been wrong, not that she had ever had any faith in such things herself. But people did say things…and one couldn’t help but wonder. Could the girl be under some kind of spell, some malice that was eating her? Or was someone making her do things… things that she herself had no power to battle? She had not worried about the girl for nothing these last few days. She had heard of girls in the villages chopping off their long locks when taken by evil spirits. Maiming their own bodies, giving up food and drink…even shedding their shame and wandering naked at the behest of petnis and nishis, those that called out those girls in the dead of night, in the voices of people that they knew. Calling out to take them to where they wanted them to go…to be how they wanted them to be.
Ramola felt her legs tremble and sat down slowly. Raju had not moved. She put a hand on the girl’s head, feeling the unevenness of the cropped hair against the smoothness of the open tresses.
‘Raju, look at me, lakhiti…look this way, my dear…’ A tear rolled down her face. She hadn’t cried in the studio even on the day that Shankar had died. Raju sat stone-faced, her eyes on the wall in front, like those words had fallen on dead ears…though…Ramola peered and blinked. All of a sudden…all at once…her lips twitched on one side and nostrils opened just a little bit, like they would when she had something that she wanted to say.
‘Raju, do you not want to be the top heroine? Tell me, do you not want this picture to see the light of day?’ Still not a word.
Ramola leant forward and pulled the girl into her arms.
‘Raju, tell me, should it all be wast
ed? Getting you here, to Bharat Talkies. Holding your hand, moulding… making you anew, for something that people will remember you by. And poor Nishith Babu, will you not think of him, the hours and days that he has given to you, to turn you from what you were into what you are now? Possibly, he will not direct another picture, you know that he has not been well. He had come to me, to ask that he be released by the studio. I told him to stay, until this picture is made, for you…because Raju, you will not have another teacher like him, even though he is old-fashioned and often out of sorts. You know, don’t you, how much some people want this picture to fail?’ She bit her lip.
‘Even some of them here, inside of Bharat Talkies, so they can say I made a big mistake. That I had lost my head, getting a two penny heroine to appear in a high-class picture. That I played with the name of Bharat Talkies, what Shankar had taken all of these years to build…that a girl like you is good only to get the shouts, and the coins thrown at her. Is that what you want them to say? After everything that you have given to this picture…and I…letting you do Mira your way, so different from how I had thought it. How I myself would do it…but still, I let you, Raju. I must say, I had felt a very deep mistrust of you and your kind, studio girls like you. But I grew to understand, how you and I were of two worlds, and yet, perhaps not so very different…in some ways. How our world puts up these walls between us, of good and bad picture, high-class heroine versus studio girl. But it is really about making your own mark, isn’t it Raju? Your very own mark, something that nobody else can match, no matter what. That is what makes you a star, and that Raju, I saw that in you, like how they would write and say about me…what Shankar would tell me, you have it in you or you don’t, Ramola, nobody can put it inside you.’
‘Madam, you and I…’ Raju laughed. Her eyes still fixed on the wall in front.
‘What do you mean Raju, you and I?’ Ramola frowned.
Raju raised her eyes and forced a smile, a bitter smile.
‘What tulana, Madam, what match, between you and me? You are Ramola Devi…and I, Rajbala Dasi, not fit even to stand by you, or speak two words with you. You and me are alike…no Madam.’
‘Don’t talk like that, Raju. Whatever is the matter with you?’ Ramola glared at Raju.
‘Na Madam, it’s the truth.’ Raju stood up and smoothed her sari, then bundled her hair in a loose knot at the nape of her neck. She spoke, not looking up.
‘You Madam, your kind, the big people, you are the stars. It is like your zamindari…your right. And we, girls like me that have to earn their own keep, for them…’ Raju smirked, ‘to be a star is like a joke Madam.’
Ramola was shaking her head in disbelief. ‘How you have changed, Raju, over the last few days! You hardly know what you are saying. Wherever did you learn to speak this way? This me and you, high-low, boro-choto. When you would come knocking at the office for the cream biscuits, when you so gladly wore my pink silk, you did not think then that I was Ramola Devi and you Rajbala Dasi? That you Raju, and you here now, speaking like this with me…I could not have believed it.’
Raju smiled. ‘Those things, then Madam…I was like a little girl still. I had not started to think.’
‘Started to think what, Raju?’ Ramola felt the anger return.
Raju waited for some moments before she spoke. Like she was thinking her words through rather carefully.
‘That, this Rajbala is no star, Madam. Because that Rajbala, of the hit pictures is not the real Rajbala. That is all false, pretence…only her morok, like this skin.’ She touched her bare arm. ‘The real Rajbala, she is an artiste, and for the sake of art she can give her all.’ She ran her hand over her head. ‘What are some locks, Madam, Raju can give the hair off her head, the skin on her body…lajlajja, her shame, her everything.’ Raju’s voice softened, to almost a whimper. ‘If he asks it of me, if that is his wish.’
‘And who, may I ask, Raju, is this he? To whom do you wish to give your all?’ Ramola’s eyes narrowed under knit brows.
Raju smiled again.
‘He…his name is not becoming on my lips. He is high up, and I, not even worth the dust of his feet. I am atmasamarpit, surrendered at his feet.’
‘That is enough Raju, I have heard enough, of your balderdash. This talk…this, what you have so newly learnt. These words are not yours, Raju. Atma-samarpit, indeed, like in the pictures…’ Ramola had snapped out of her stillness. Brusquely, she gathered her sari and pushed back her chair. ‘And from now on, remember Raju that you are a contracted artiste of Bharat Talkies and I will not, simply not have you, under any circumstance, spoiling this picture. We will think of something, to tackle this,’ she pointed to Raju’s head. ‘Manna will cover it up if I tell him, and I will speak with Bimal Babu about the shots, so it doesn’t show.’ She turned to leave, then spun back.
‘And you Raju, are coming to live with me, today, to the house, and there you will stay, until this picture is finished. Raju, I cannot any longer put my faith in you, that you will not foolishly harm this picture and the studio’s name. I should have known, before, with how you have been…but not again, not anymore. No more of your foolhardiness while we finish this picture…and of that let me warn you.’
VII
He had made up his mind. He would have to tell Madam, then and there, he had realised, when he had heard. They had all heard. That the heroine had lost her mind, gone full mad that girl, he had heard Manna say. Started to cut the hair off her head…next she’ll try to cut her own head, you mark my words, sirs, he had said to those that had gathered around him on the set. Some tantric or pishach sadhak, worshipper of evil has got her, Manna had nodded knowingly.
Anil had stood at a little distance, not joining that audience, his heart pounding inside him like a dynamo. Raju hadn’t spoken to him all of these days, though he had tried to accost her several times. He had been afraid she would make a scene, if he got in her way too much… there was no knowing Raju, she might just let the cat out of the bag. And that he simply could not have had.
Yet, that was just what he had done, right there, in the moments that had passed him by ever so tardily, when he had said everything to Madam. Her face had not changed, but her eyes…he had had to look away, so fierce was the anger in them. Still, he had to tell her, the rest of it, all of it, there and then.
‘We met…alone, even after she came here, to Bharat Talkies. She was not so different, at first, but then she changed, like she became another girl. Not her anger, that was there before, but how she started to talk. No cursing…and she became proud, Madam. She would talk about being a bigger star than anyone…even you. And then, she stopped seeing me, or even speaking. I thought…that…that it was something that I had done. I had scolded her for making ishara, signs to me in front of everybody. But no, it was not that, not really, it was something else, something more…but what it was I could not fathom. I still do not know.’
‘Anil, why do you choose to tell me this now, today, at this time?’ Ramola spoke so quietly that Anil had to lean forward to catch the words.
‘Because Madam, I am afraid, now, after what I have heard today. That she has been spoiling herself. Raju… how can I ever believe it of her? Raju…who used to love herself more than anything, or anyone in this world. Something is not right Madam. Something has happened to her. She’s been up to something, that girl. Something behind our backs.’ He paused to catch his breath. His voice had risen.
Ramola’s face was like a thundercloud. ‘Others too, Anil, even others have been up to things behind my back, wouldn’t you agree with that, Kedar Babu?’ Her eyes came back to rest on him.
Kedar Gupta had sat stone still through Anil’s confession. Though his lips had twitched a few times. Anger, was it, Ramola had thought, anger at being waylaid, and not being able to say no. Or shame? For what he had done to her, after everything that Shankar had done for him, and for them all. He had put Bharat Talkies on the path of ruin. And then hidden away, like a coward. They were cowards,
both of them. How different from Shankar, who had always faced up to things, no matter what they were, no matter how difficult. No wonder then that they had all sucked up to him.
‘Madam, Kedar Da had no fault, he…he tried to tell me, but I wouldn’t listen. Even today, I pleaded with him to come here with me, to speak to you…so you would not disbelieve me.’ Anil ran his hand through his hair, then shook his head.
‘I know what you are thinking Madam, of me, about my charitra, my character. But I wanted to marry Raju. Yes, Madam, a bioscope girl who does not even know the name of her father. I wanted her to leave it all… this…this world of bioscope pictures. But she did not want it. Not yet. Yes, she had wanted to leave Modak’s Unique Films…the Raju Darling pictures, she was fed up of them. Her Lily Madam would tell her she was nothing, that Unique Pictures had made her a star. She had wanted to show them, she wanted to show the whole world what she could do. I could not bear it, that pain in her heart. I wanted her to have one chance, just one chance. And Madam, you yourself had said it, that Raju has pratibha…talent in her. You changed your mind, after the first few days, you told me so, that you would not have thought it possible for a girl like her…that she had astonished you.’
‘Anil…you are right.’ Ramola sighed, her crumpled brows easing as she looked away, out of the open window of that office at the flowerbeds outside. Like how she would always look away in her moments of discontent with Shankar. They seemed so slight now, so unimportant, her tiffs with him, when at the end of it all he had been there to shoulder the worries and keep her happy. And removed from the callousness of it all. Perhaps, she wasn’t so very angry after all, just dismayed at how things had turned out. How they had hidden things from her…Anil…Kedar Babu. How Raju had turned out, not so very different from the others, the other girls of her ilk. How could she ever have expected it? That a girl of that class would return her kindness with gratitude or love. She was starting to feel again the way she had those very first days after Shankar had died. Like she wanted to give it all up, there and then. How she had mistaken Raju! She looked Anil in the eyes. ‘Yes…I was rather surprised, taken aback almost by her qualities, that so few have in them, and those that have them are fated for great things. But…’ she turned again to Kedar Gupta.
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