‘I get it, you did some mischief there. Actually that’s what you, or you people, wanted, isn’t it? So you made me your sacrificial lamb! Chhee, chhee! Sandip Da, damn the whole lot of you!’
Suman dropped the receiver abruptly. He knew that there would be a hefty call charge. He emerged from the telephone booth and, tearing the chit with the telephone number into bits, flung them into the distance. As if he was wiping off Sandip entirely from his life.
Suman walked aimlessly. He realized he had been awfully foolish to rely on Sandip. So, would he return to Sadnahati? How would the people there react? What if Suman converted to Islam? If he suddenly appeared in the mosque at Sadnahati? Surrendered himself to the Imam Saheb there? Suman knew that if he did that, he would be felicitated in Sadnahati. But one person would be displeased: that was Maruf. He wouldn’t be able to look Maruf in the eye. He had run away with Riziya. It wasn’t that Maruf would be angry simply because she was a Muslim girl. Rather, he would consider Suman guilty of wrongdoing, for acting in secret and deceiving everyone. Yet it was clear to Suman that under the present circumstances, it was only Maruf who could help him. If only he could speak to him! Suman kept wondering about how he could contact Maruf. But the very next moment he thought, no, he would not involve Maruf in this, no matter what.
Riziya did not know about Suman’s financial difficulty. He hadn’t let her know. He would feel terribly shameful if she realized the actual incapability of the person she had trusted and run away from home with, giving up her community and religion.
And now, in the middle of all this, Riziya was pregnant. That had left Suman in anxiety. Because that, too, involved a major expense. One didn’t have to tell womenfolk everything, perhaps they sensed things. Riziya had probably realized Suman’s situation. Or else why would she refuse when he mentioned visiting a doctor? Day before yesterday, Suman had said to her, ‘Let’s consult a gynaecologist. Ultrasonography might be needed.’
But Riziya did not agree to that. She laughed it off and said, ‘Rubbish! Nothing of that sort is required. There’s no need for any gynaecologist. It’ll just be an unnecessary expense for you.’
‘Hey, you need to be taking some medicines! If we don’t consult a doctor…’
‘Aren’t you feeding me! Our normal dal-bhat itself is full of vitamins, proteins and iodine. Don’t you know that?’
‘That’s right, but after all it’s your first pregnancy.’
‘I’m telling you, I don’t need any of that. I’m fit and strong.’
‘Hmm. All right.’
Riziya came and stood close to Suman. She put her hand on his shoulder. She looked directly into his face sweetly and said, ‘May I ask you something?’
‘Tell me. Let’s hear what you want to know.’
‘Are you unhappy about having a baby so soon?’
‘As long as you’re happy, I’m happy. But perhaps if it was later, it would have been…’
‘Listen, whatever Allah does is for the good. Isn’t it?’
As soon as Riziya said that, she bit her tongue. It didn’t miss Suman’s attention. Was Riziya ashamed to have uttered the name of Allah? Or was she afraid? But Suman did not react in any way. Were her Allah and his Bhagwan different entities?
Where was he to go? He thought for a long while, and then suddenly remembered Abinash Babu. He lived in Konnagar, in Hooghly district. When they had met, he had said, ‘Don’t hesitate to ask if you need any help, I am indebted to your Baba.’ He did, however, say that his flat in a housing estate in Konnagar was his second establishment. He could meet him there on Sundays. Suman had gathered from the way he mentioned it that there was something secretive about it. People who were writers had various strange ideas. He did not write in his own family house. He did his writing in rented premises in Konnagar. Sometimes he sat reading a book in one of the pavilions of the row of a dozen temples along the banks of the Ganga. Suman did not take it amiss. Rather, he was pleased to hear that.
Suman had met him in his own house in Jogipara. He had been his Baba’s colleague for a couple of years. They had both taught in the same school at one time. After that, his Baba was transferred to a school nearby. Suman’s Baba had a major role to play in Abinash Babu getting the job, and he had admitted that candidly. He had got the news of Suman’s Baba’s death much later. He had gone to Jogipara to offer his condolences after that.
Suman pondered over whether he could go and meet him. He had seemed an amiable man. Why not speak to him! Suman thought about it.
Riziya had just sat down to knead the wheat-flour dough after adding a certain amount of water to it. They had rutis at dinnertime. She kneaded the dough, and the glass bangles on her wrist clinked as they struck against the conch-shell bangle. Suman looked in her direction and said, ‘I don’t like it here any more, Reena. Come, let’s go back.’
‘Go back where?’
‘Wherever it may be, you needn’t worry. I’m not returning to Sadnahati. Nevertheless, let’s wind up our affairs here.’
‘But we’re doing fine here!’
‘I don’t know a single person here, I feel suffocated.’
‘But you were the one who wanted to go to a place where no one knew us!’
‘We’ll go to another place like that. Achchha, can you stay alone for a day, Reena? I need to go to Hooghly. In search of a new house.’
‘Sure I can! Go by all means. When do you plan to go?’
Suman seemed to turn a bit crestfallen when Riziya said that. Perhaps he had hoped that Riziya would lovingly tell him that she couldn’t stay away from him, that being separated for even a day from Suman was very painful for her. But instead of saying all that, when she simply said go and asked when he planned to leave, it took Suman by surprise. He felt a stab of anguish. Since he had to go, Suman decided right then. He said, ‘I’ll leave at dawn tomorrow. If I can’t return by evening, I’ll stay the night somewhere there and return the next morning.’
‘What do you mean “stay the night”? Forget it, then, you don’t have to go. Or why can’t both of us go tomorrow? I too have been cooped up here all these days.’
‘Why, my dear? Are you scared to be alone?’
‘Of course, I’m scared. But if you leave, I’ll also be terribly lonely. The house will look bare.’
There was tenderness in Riziya’s voice, but also a kind of helplessness springing out. Suman felt pleased now. After all, the two of them had not gone anywhere together after arriving here. They might as well go now. It wouldn’t be difficult to find Abinash Babu’s house. Suman had been to the famous writer’s ancestral house once with his Baba during his childhood. It was quite far away from the city, in a village in the interior. It was a reputed family of the locality. He remembered that he had been terribly frightened as soon as he entered the house. A woman with dishevelled hair was looking at him and cackling in laughter; she was waving at him. She was Abinash Babu’s wife. She had a psychological disorder of some kind. Abinash Babu had rushed to take her back inside. After that he had said to Suman’s Baba, ‘Please don’t mind, Sir, I’ve set up home with a lunatic. I’m really harried.’
Suman said to Riziya, ‘So that’s it then. Let’s both go for an outing. We need to catch the 6 a.m. bus. Get everything ready quickly. Fine!’
sixty-four
Konnagar was an old town that had come up on the banks of the Ganga. The railway station there was a busy one. Shops and markets. A highly populated place. That’s why the news of a new family setting up their household in the housing colony did not catch people’s attention, like it would have in a village hamlet. Thanks to Abinash Babu’s munificence, Suman and Riziya got a house on rent very easily.
There were rows and rows of single-room houses on rent in the housing colony. Almost all the units were of the same size. There was a kitchen with a bit of a tiled roof in front of the house, and some vacant space in front of that. There was a tiny veranda as well.
Riziya became acquainted with two or three families within about a month. Suraj Thakur, a Hindi-speaking Bihari, lived in the house on their right. He had a barber shop near the railway station. His wife was Sumitra. She was dark-skinned and slim. There was a thick daub of orange-coloured sindoor in the parting of her hair. She wore a printed silk sari which was raised up quite a bit from her ankles. She looked nice, the red alta lining the edges of her feet sparkled below her dark-skinned legs.
Sumitra had a daughter who was about five years old. Her name was Gudiya. She had started calling Riziya ‘Aunty’. Riziya could not speak in Hindi. Gudiya used to laugh when she spoke in Hindi. But when Sumitra spoke to Riziya in her broken Bengali, that pleased Riziya.
Another half-a-family lived in the house on the left side. But they were pure Bengalis. That was Abinash Babu’s house. It was he who had got Suman the house next to his, and he was the first person Suman and Riziya met in the colony. Abinash Babu was about sixty years old. His wife was a young woman. She was fair-skinned and plump. She had an extremely beautiful face. Everyone called her Aaduri. She lived all by herself the whole week. Abinash Babu was there for only a day and a half every week. He arrived on Saturday evening and stayed all of Sunday. Apparently Abinash Babu had a huge inheritance. But he had been a teacher in a government school.
