Parvathi sat in meditation that Shiva open his eye.
Make way, make way, ye auspicious strangers.
Even the barren woman could have a child if
Shiva willeth.
And all the Benares crowd looked back, and then looked forward as the palanquin bearers rushed down the lanes, and looking in, people could see a husk-skinned, aged woman in a white sari, white hair spread sparse over her forehead, with a fixed stare, and saying her beads. She seemed unconcerned as to what she saw or heard — for her the world was made this way since the day of Brahma’s creation, and it would go on thus until the final dissolution and flood — and that takes, you know, a million million man-years. Nothing in Benares has ever changed since Shiva decided to come down and emerge here for the benefit of mankind, on this crescent curve where the two streams Varuna and Asi meet, and the stalls and the lanes, even the dustbins and the curs were for Rani Rasomani, primordial creations. She did not feel so, she knew so. Where the truth is, nothing changes.
In fact Rani Rasomani was herself born a widow. That she had a husband is true.
Hé, hé ye auspicious strangers,
Make way as the palanquin moves forth.
But that was so long ago that one forgets him, as it were, although, of course, he was ever present in the household. How could he not be? The truth about the dead is just this. They are dead and forgotten, but they seem to hide behind rice-sacks, in broomstick corners, by the shade of the tamarind tree, in the courtyard, under bedsteads, in the eyes of servants’ children, in between two bamboo-tassellated fans of the attendants — the dead man sat by you at meals but did not eat — you could almost hear the gluglutonating sounds of his digestion, as he rubs his belly, and yet he was all somewhat smoke and air. That was why it seemed so long ago — thus now, now. And for Rani Rasomani, her husband, His Highness Raja Protapachandra Mozumdar, Raja of Bankipur, was like a temple tank or a mountain you’ve visited on pilgrimage, as a child. It is always there and yet it is not here. You understand. This made the stare so steady, and the prayer so easy.
Make way ye God-hunters
Make way and rush to your chase
The deer has much ear
The panther much limb
The neel-gai has no courage
For God made it such
You hunt only Him
Him only you hunt.
Rani Rasomani still remembers her husband. It was just like the other day, Lord Curzon gave parties every evening — every other evening, so to say, and Raja Protapachandra rejoiced in drink. He loved the Europeans for that sake. He would go, would the Raja, with turban and achkan and all, and come back without turban and achkan, Mohan Singh, the Sikh driver, almost carrying him in his arms. The Raja was a delicate man. He had been to England when young for a holiday, and came back so full of European manners. He was presented to Edward VII. And since then he wore cufflinks with the pictures of Edward VII engraved on them. The Raja of Bankipur, Rani Rasomani remembers, was also learned in music. Who in Calcutta society did not love music? The Raja was no exception. Only he loved the Parsi-theatre songs. He went to every play of the Parsi-theatre, and he shed many a tear for Bilva Mangal.1 His father, the great Sir Apurvachandra Nityanand Mozumdar, kcsi, cie was still alive, and once in a while the father-inlaw would ask the third son, for that was what Protapachandra was, to go to Bankipur by boat — Bankipur was on the Maha Ganga— and check accounts, examine the cattle, one and all, or simply go and see if the peasants were keeping the canal cleared properly and if their kids were looked after hygienically. The old Raja was a man of ideas. He had been a Brahmo since he was born (his father knew Keshub) and so the house was filled with the songs of enlightenment. The Brahmin was strictly not allowed in the drawing room. He would go through the side door, to the lady’s quarters, but, here among men, God has neither hands nor feet.
Make way, make way, ye strangers
The waterpot does not get filled without help,
The village tank not overflow without rain,
The baby does not come before the ninth-month
And God cometh not till the puzzle be solved
Left nor right, man nor woman, object nor Brahman.
Make way make way ye strangers.
But the God of the women’s quarters lives on astrological readings, on delicious food offered to Him which He does not eat but the Brahmins gulp with relish—‘and, oh, some more khir, Rani Saheba, it’s so very grand’—etc., etc.
The Elder Raja Sahib has his long hookah and offers it even to Europeans when they come on a visit — he does not mind their smoking with his own pipe. Strange the way men are made. I suppose they are made that way. They talk of other women before you as if you were but just the mother of the heir, or a goddess for worship. They’ll buy you pearl necklaces. The trouble however starts when the child does not come. For every chit and slave a child is born, as if it grew on the backyard banana plant, but for Rani Rasomani (brought up with such care in Darbhanga — her father was the younger Raja there) this lack of child within the year was sin. Yes, it was sin. And she consulted astrologers, and they gave her talismans. This too brought no result. She started visiting sadhus and they gave her sanctified rice and asked her to fast every Monday and go to Mathura, Prayag, Benares. But before the young couple could start on a pilgrimage he died. He fell from a horse visiting a rice-field and died in Bankipur. In those days it took a night for a telegram to come. It took ten hours for the train. The Brahmins brought his ashes, and she went with these to Benares, and she never returned.
The peculiarity of the situation however was just this. In Benares she discovered she was going to have the baby. A posthumous child is no child some said: it had not known the touch of its father. But the father-in-law was a Brahmo, and all that. He behaved like what the Europeans did. He gave her an estate, a mansion in Benares—
Hé, make way, ye strangers,
The yoke is meant for the bull,
The womb is meant for the baby,
The string is meant for the lute,
And the string is meant for the lute—
The palanquin bearers now rest the palanquin on its supports, fan themselves with their turbans and shout: Hé Shambho!
The string is meant for the lute
And man is meant for worship,
Hé Shambho Shankara.
and the crowd joins with the palanquin bearers and cries out,
Hé Shambho.
Yes, a daughter was born. ‘O you high-chatterer,’ shouts one of the palanquin bearers, as he sees a huge monkey on a roof wanting to find the precise moment to jump down and steal the bananas and coconuts, on the silver ritual tray before the Rani Sahiba, and the monkey grins.
The daughter was called Himavathi2 Devi because she was born in cold January. The astrologers of course declared her to be endowed with the eight riches of earth and heaven and she would marry a great man who would go overseas. Now that meant something. When you go overseas, for Rani Rasomani, you learn to drink and you are received by Edward VII. That this jolly emperor of India was dead long ago never occurred to her. To her nothing changed. Edward VII still ruled India. ‘How are things at home?’ she would ask and the courtiers who came from Calcutta, knowing her, said: ‘The elder Raja by the grace of the great gods is in good health and the younger ones are enjoying life’s multiple riches and have many children.’ This ended all inquiry.
Make way, make way, ye strangers
Rani Rasomani is coming.
The truth is she’d forgotten even that she was called Rani Rasomani. When she heard her name it was as if she always knew it but did not know where properly to hang it. She had no teeth and her eyes were whitey dim. Yet her limbs were so firm she could almost leap out of the palanquin and step on the carpet laid for her before the temple. ‘The Rani Sahiba is come, the Rani Sahiba,’ the door-drummers would shout, and in a minute Pandit Shivanth would be at the temple steps with kumkum, flowers and camphor. She would rush up, would the old, old lady, to have a darshan of the Lord silently and people would even there, where Shiva was so gloriously present, never deceiving in life or in death, they too, the worshippers, make way for her — the Rani looked so lost and so imperious — the worship would be quickly over. Her Brahmin servant Shanker Deo would then lay her carpet behind the temple yard, and you should see how she sits in meditation. She sits as if the thought was but one, and one only — a thought is a thought, so there is no thought. When she thought of Lord Shiva he was present to her, with the serpent garland, the tiger skin, the Ganges crown, his third eye filled with compassion. For her Shiva was real. More real she would say than this hand, and she will beat her exquisite hands against the marble of the temple floor to prove Shiva was Shiva. Her Bengali was not very superior — she had never gone to school. She could read letters, and sometimes when the Pandit was not there, she read some Purana or the other; in translation. She was not wise or kind or foolish or ignorant: She was she. And even that she did not always understand. Her palanquin bearers she knew, and sometimes she remembered her daughter. Well, well, her daughter was no great problem for Rani Rasomani. Hima just did not exist. When letters came, for Hima and her husband were in England now. Bijoy had some job in the embassy there — he was a close relation of Lord Sinha’s, and he had been in the army first, and now in the diplomatic service. Though he was not a bad boy his wife seemed to have taken to her father’s ways: they say she drinks and she smokes. Now this does not matter you know: that’s the way with posthumous children. They take after their unknown fathers. And the grandchildren are worse. They speak no Bengali. And when you do not speak Bengali you are about as civilized as a Paksar monkey. The English language is all right when you’ve to read newspapers or to say yes and no to Edward VII, but this invasion of an untouchable tongue everywhere was desecration. You don’t say your beads in English, do you? Or can you say your mantra in that guttural, awkward tongue?