‘Akkayya, Akkayya!’ I cried happily.
‘My child, my darling!’ she murmured and kissed me again. Not knowing how to show her my affection, I put my hand upon her shaven head and caressed it, though it was rough and prickly. She seemed uneasy and, pulling up her sari-fringe over her head, she took off my hand and held it in hers, tenderly. I was hurt and sad.
‘Akkayya!’ I called suddenly, ‘Akkayya, why is your head shaven, when all others like aunt Nagamma and aunt Kenchamma and aunt Ranganayaki have their long, long hair?’ It was dark and I could not see her face, but the silence that followed was heavy and sad.
‘Why, Akkayya?’ I repeated.
‘Because I am a widow, my child,’ she answered, dry as the shopkeeper I bought gram from.
‘A widow? What is that, Akkayya?’ I squeezed her breasts again, in affection.
‘A widow is a widow, my child.’ She was surely sad.
‘You are like aunt Nagamma and aunt Kenchamma, and you say you are a widow? No. You are one like us!’ I explained.
‘No, my child. Nagamma and Kenchamma have husbands. I have none.’
‘Oh no! You surely have, Akkayya. You have.’
‘I haven’t, my son. I haven’t!. .’ She was embarrassed and helpless. Her hands trembled.
‘Nagamma has uncle Shama, Kenchamma has uncle Subbu, cousin Sita has grandpa, and you. . and you. . I,’ I muttered with a shrill mischievous laugh. It relieved her. She pressed me again to her breasts and kissed me.
‘You naughty little imp!’ she cried, comforted.
She had to go to the kitchen and I sat there thinking over the things I had done and I wanted to do. The next morning the cows were being driven to the fields by Mada, and I would follow him. I would see how they grazed. Then, coming back, I would offer rice to the sparrows, when my grandfather sat reading big, big books to the neighbours. Then again, young Sundra would come to play marbles with me like today. How I would enjoy it! To play marbles. . Akkayya came back silent as ever and sitting down took me into her lap. She looked troubled, nervous. Uncle Shama came in, followed by the peasants, and my grandfather was howling inside against somebody. In that confusion, we were strangely near each other and we felt one. I knew when she kissed me more, she loved me more, and when I squeezed her breasts more, I loved her more.
‘Why are you sad, Akkayya?’ I asked, whispering with fear.
‘Oh!. . nothing,’ she answered, dull and disgusted.
‘And you do not put holy vermilion either,’ I said, trying to find out what a widow meant. At that moment, apart from men, I had only known there were giants called ‘thieves’. A widow! It must be something akin to that. But still — no, I knew Akkayya so well. After a moment she answered me in the same sad tone.
‘My child, I am a widow. . .’
‘But, Akkayya,’ I insisted, ‘it cannot be. You go to the temple like them, you are like them. . Why, Akkayya?’
‘I am a widow,’ she cried out in anger and looked towards the stars. I trembled and sat silent. Her hand touched mine. They were unfriendly to each other. And I remembered that they were bare, bare like a tree. Aunt Nagamma and aunt Kenchamma wore bangles that clinked and sang. And she had none. And she always wore the same dull sari; not the blue, beautiful, gold-bordered ones of my aunts. Was she different from them? Was she? They had children too, Ganga and Parvathi and Swami, and Leela and Susheela and all with whom I played. Whenever they fell down or were hurt in a game, they went back weeping like dogs to their mothers, full of such false complaints. I hated them. I only loved Akkayya. And she? No children?
‘Where are your children, Akkayya?’ I asked, sheltering myself under her breasts.
‘I have none,’ she answered angrily.
‘And I?’ I managed to say.
‘You. . You are Ranga’s son, not mine.’ She breathed hard.
‘Why have you no children, Akkayya?’ I asked again.
‘Because, because I have no husband,’ she answered indifferently.
‘What is a husband, Akkayya?’
‘Oh, shut up! and don’t bother me with all your Ramayana. A husband is a husband, a man. . ’
‘Am I a man, Akkayya?’
‘I don’t know!’ she wailed. I was silent again. I had been half-initiated into the secrets of a ‘widow’ and I would not leave it at that. I wanted to know more; I had to know more. A man, a man, I repeated to myself. Uncle Shama was a man. Uncle Subbu was a man. Yes! They were. They dressed in dhotis. They were not like aunt Kenchamma and aunt Nagamma.
‘But why have you not a man, Akkayya? Kenchamma has one, Nagamma has one. . ’
‘Oh! shut up, you pariah, or I’ll sew up your lips.’
I shut up and sat still. In a moment my father called me to go and have my dinner, and I sat amongst my aunts and uncles and my cousins as quiet as a cat. I was thinking: so widows don’t have children either. No. Why not? I looked round and saw my uncles and my aunts and my cousins. Aunt Nagamma had uncle Shama; aunt Kenchamma had uncle Subbu; aunt Nagamma and uncle Shama had Susheela and Swami sitting beside them; aunt Kenchamma and uncle Subbu had Ganga and Parvathi and Leela, who sat by them. And Akkayya?. . I ought to have sat by her. Suppose I asked her why she never dined? ‘Widow!’ again. ‘Shut up, you monkey!’ in her anger. No.
The dinner over, I went to the central hall where Akkayya had already spread her bedding and laid herself down. She called me affectionately, and asking me whether I had eaten well and what I had eaten, she kissed me and asked me to get into the bed. I was so happy to find her gentle that I forgot all about my researches into the mystery of ‘widowhood’ and hardly in bed, I slept like a prince.
After my father’s wife had gone to live with him and had started the new household, I had naturally to go back. Of course I wept and shrieked when they were taking me away from Akkayya. But they gave me a big, big piece of yellow sugar-candy and put me into a horse-cart, and I forgot about everything, everything, and not until I had arrived at my father’s did I discover that Akkayya was no more with me. Well, I did not weep very much, for my father gave me semolina sweets and a blue filigree cap, and my stepmother was as sweet as one could be. She not only played with me and put round my neck a gold chain with a shining diamond star, but. . but, if you do not tell anyone I will whisper in your ears that she even suckled me as though I were but a tiny little baby.
During holidays we often went back to Talassana, but never again had I the same affection for Akkayya. My aunt Ranganayaki having died, her two children were left under Akkayya’s care, and she seemed just as contented with them as she was with me. Only once, I remember, she was particularly affectionate towards me and gave me a pair of gold bangles. I was so happy with the present that I kissed her as usual. But, being grown-up now, I could not bear the smell of her mouth, and I never did it again.
During one of these holiday visits to my grandfather — I was about ten or eleven years old then — somehow it struck me that I should know more about Akkayya. I wanted to ask somebody, but going to one of my aunts or cousins I would be so overcome with fear that I would excuse myself and run away awkwardly. At last one day I got a very good chance. Uncle Shama loved me and he often called me to go and lie by him. That evening aunt Nagamma was busy in the kitchen, and being alone I took courage to ask who Akkayya was and why she lived with us. What uncle Shama told me I cannot quite remember, but it is something like what I am going to relate to you.