Meanwhile my sister came in, bringing the coffee. ‘Ramu,’ she whispered, standing by me, ‘Ramu, my child, are you awake or asleep?’
‘Awake,’ I said, turning my head towards the door, which creaked once more and shut itself completely.
‘Sita,’ I whispered, ‘there was somebody at the door.’
‘When?’ she demanded loudly.
‘Now! Only a moment ago.’
She went to the door and, opening it, looked towards the street. After a while she smiled and called, ‘Javni! You monkey! Why don’t you come in? Who do you think is here, Javni? My brother — my brother.’ She smiled broadly, and a few tears rolled down her cheeks.
‘Really, Mother!’ said a timid voice. ‘Really! I wanted to come in. But, seeing Ramappa fast asleep, I thought I’d better wait out here.’ She spoke the peasant Kannada, drawling the vowels interminably.
‘So,’ I said to myself, ‘she already knows my name.’
‘Come in!’ commanded my sister.
Javni slowly approached the threshold, but still stood outside, gazing as if I were a saint or the holy elephant.
‘Don’t be shy, come in,’ commanded my sister again.
Javni entered and, walking as if in a temple, went and sat by a sack of rice.
My sister sat by me, proud and affectionate. I was everything to her — her strength and wealth. She touched my head and said, ‘Ramu, Javni is our new servant.’ I turned towards Javni. She seemed to hide her face.
She was past forty, a little wrinkled beneath the lips and with strange, rapturous eyes. Her hair was turning white, her breasts were fallen and her bare, broad forehead showed pain and widowhood. ‘Come near, Javni,’ I said.
‘No, Ramappa,’ she whispered.
‘No, come along,’ I insisted. She came forward a few steps and sat by the pillar,
‘Oh, come nearer, Javni, and see what a beautiful brother I have,’ cried Sita.
I was not flattered. Only my big, tap-like nose and my thick underlip seemed more monstrous than ever.
Javni crawled along till she was a few steps nearer.
‘Oh! Come nearer, you monkey,’ cried my sister again.
Javni advanced a few feet further and, turning her face towards the floor, sat like a bride beside the bridegroom.
‘He looks a prince, Javni!’ cried my sister.
‘A god!’ mumbled Javni.
I laughed and drank my coffee.
‘The whole town is mad about him,’ whispered Javni.
‘How do you know?’ asked Sita.
‘How! I have been standing at the market-place, the whole afternoon, to see when Ramappa would come. You told me he looked like a prince. You said he rode a bicycle. And, when I saw him come by the pipal tree where-the-fisherman-Kodihanged-himself-the-other-day, I ran towards the town and I observed how people gazed and gazed at him. And they asked me who it was. ‘Of course, the Revenue Inspector’s brother-in-law,’ I replied. ‘How beautiful he is!’ said fat Nanjundah of the coconut shop. ‘How like a prince he is!’ said the concubine Chowdy. ‘Oh, a very god!’ said my neighbour, barber Venka’s wife Kenchi.
‘Well, Ramu, so you see, the whole of Malkad is dazzled with your beauty,’ interrupted my sister. ‘Take care, my child. They say, in this town they practise magic, and I have heard many a beautiful boy has been killed by jealousy.’
I laughed.
‘Don’t laugh, Ramappa. With these very eyes, with these very two eyes, I have seen the ghosts of more than a hundred young men and women — all killed by magic, by magic, Ramappa,’ assured Javni, for the first time looking towards me. ‘My learned Ramappa, Ramappa, never go out after sunset; for there are spirits of all sorts walking in the dark. Especially never once go by the canal after the cows are come home. It is a haunted place, Ramappa.’
‘How do you know?’ I asked, curious.
‘How! With these very eyes, I have seen, Ramappa, I have seen it all. The potter’s wife Rangi was unhappy. Poor thing! Poor thing! And one night she had such heavy, heavy sorrow, she ran and jumped into the canal. The other day, when I was coming home in the deadly dark with my little lamb, whom should I see but Rangi — Rangi in a white, broad sari, her hair all floating. She stood in front of me. I shivered and wept. She ran and stood by a tree, yelling in a strange voice! “Away! Away!” I cried. Then suddenly I saw her standing on the bridge, and she jumped into the canal, moaning: “My girl is gone, my child is gone, and I am gone too!”’
My sister trembled. She had a horror of devils. ‘Why don’t you shut up, you donkey’s widow, and not pour out all your Vedantic knowledge?’
‘Pardon me, Mother, pardon me,’ she begged.
‘I have pardoned you again and again, and yet it is the same old story. Always the same Ramayana. Why don’t you fall into the well like Rangi and turn devil?’ My sister was furious.
Javni smiled and hid her face between her knees, timidly. ‘How beautiful your brother is!’ she murmured after a moment, ecstatic.
‘Did I not say he was like a prince? Who knows what incarnation of a god he may be? Who knows?’ my sister whispered, patting me, proudly, religiously.
‘Sita!’ I replied, and touched her lap with tenderness.
‘Without Javni I could never have lived in this damned place!’ said my sister after a moment’s silence.
‘And without you, I could not have lived either, Mother!’ Her voice was so calm and rich that she seemed to sing.
‘In this damned place everything is so difficult,’ cursed Sita. ‘He is always struggling with the collections. The villages are few, but placed at great distances from one another. Sometimes he has been away for more than a week, and I should have died of fright had not Javni been with me. And,’ she whispered, a little sadly, ‘Javni, I am sure, understands my fears, my beliefs. Men, Ramu, can never understand us.’
‘Why?’ I asked.
‘Why? I cannot say. You are too practical and too irreligious. To us everything is mysterious. Our gods are not your gods, your gods not our gods. It is a simple affair.’ She seemed sadder still.
‘But yet, I have always tried to understand you,’ I managed to whisper.
‘Of course! Of course!’ cried my sister, reassured.
‘Mother,’ muttered Javni, trembling, ‘Mother! Will you permit me to say one thing?’ She seemed to plead.
‘Yes!’ answered my sister.
‘Ramappa, your sister loves you,’ said Javni. ‘She loves you as though you were her own child. Oh! I wish I had seen her two children! They must have been angels! Perhaps they are in Heaven now — in Heaven! Children go to Heaven! But, Ramappa, what I wanted to say was this. Your sister loves you, talks of you all the time, and says, “If my brother did not live, I should have died long ago.”’
‘How long have you been with Sita?’ I asked Javni, trying to change the subject.
‘How long? How long have I been with this family? What do I know? But let me see. The harvest was over and we were husking the grains when they came.’
‘How did you happen to find her?’ I asked my sister.
‘Why, Ramappa,’ cried Javni, proud for the first time, ‘there is nobody who can work for a Revenue Inspector’s family as I. You can go and ask everybody in the town, including every pariah if you like, and they will tell you, “Javni, she is good like a cow,” and they will also add that there is no one who can serve a big man like the Revenue Inspector as Javni — as I.’ She beat her breast with satisfaction.
‘So you are the most faithful servant among the servants here!’ I added a little awkwardly.
‘Of course!’ she cried proudly, her hands folded upon her knees. ‘Of course!’
‘How many Revenue Inspectors have you served?’
‘How many? Now let me see.’ Here she counted upon her fingers, one by one, remembering them by how many children they had, what sort of views they had, their caste, their native place, or even how good they had been in giving her two saris, a four-anna tip or a sack of rice.