‘Are you happy?’ asked Govindan Nair.
The girl threw a bit of her sari over her body.
‘Are you?’ she asked.
‘Can’t you see I am happy?’
‘Where does it come from?’
‘Where does water come from?’
‘From the tap?’
‘And the water in the tap?’
‘From the lake?’
‘And the water in the lake?’
‘From the sky.’
‘And the water in the sky?’
‘From the ocean?’
‘And the water in the ocean?’
‘From the rivers.’
‘And the river waters?’
‘They make the lakes.’
‘And the tap water?’
‘Is river water.’
‘And so?’
‘Water comes from water,’ she said.
‘I am a kitten,’ he said.
She seemed frightened. She covered her pubic parts with her sari.
‘What?’ she asked.
‘I let the mother cat carry me.’
‘And so?’
‘And the river flows.’
‘And then?’
‘The lakes give water to taps.’
‘Then?’
‘Man is happy — because he knows he lives in a house three storeys high. When his woman is going to have a child, he will build a house two storeys high. He will marry her and build his child a house. The child, the child, he cries as if in tragic tenderness, the child will have a house to grow in. Oh, children need houses. And women need husbands.’
‘I had a husband,’ she said. ‘Yes,’ she insisted.
‘What happened to him?’
‘He died in the wars.’
‘Who killed him?’
‘The British.’ ‘Why?’
‘Because he would not shoot at the Germans.’
‘And how did you come here?’ he asked.
‘And how did you come here?’ she replied.
‘I came because I work in a ration office. I distribute physical happiness to him that wants.’
‘And not to her that wants?’
‘I have a she — and she wants it, and I pour it into her. To speak the truth, nobody can give. Only the mother cat can give.’
‘Give me!’ she cried.
‘Come tomorrow to Ration Office No. 66. I will give you a card, a family card. Between ten and five we are always there.’
She sank back on the bed. Govindan Nair observed that she had flowers in her hair. She was gazing at the ceiling. Just a tear or two was dropping, marking her face with collyrium. She looked lovely with her well-knit limbs, her sorrow which heaved her breasts — there was such ovular pain where the centre of her body lay. He put his hand there and said, ‘Forgive.’
His touch seemed magical. She flung up and put her arms around him, her breasts against his face. He bowed low, made a namaskar, and stood up. How can man make a woman suffer? How can anyone touch a body so smooth, a face so gentle, so helpless, the Seth’s necklace speaking a strange tongue against her imbibing navel? Her hair was so perfect.
‘The British did it?’ he said.
‘Yes. Man did it,’ she said.
‘May I go? he asked.
‘Yes,’ she said, like a wife to a husband. Tenderly she rose, covered herself, and stood up like a daughter before a father. He turned as if to hide his emotions. Of course pen and paper were there. Everything was typed and ready. He signed the paper. Ration Shop Licence No. 9181 in the District of Ummathur. In the village of Udasekarapuram. Name of the holder: Prabhakar Pillai. Address: Main Street, Murtarakara. Valid up to August 11, 1944. Signed: B. Govindan Nair. The signature was clear and round as the eyes of a child. Lakshmi was dressed by now. She looked so clean, so like a Brahmin lady near the temple streets.
‘Your husband will come back,’ he said.
‘They shot him,’ she said.
‘No, they did not. I have the ration cards of all the soldiers. I have his name, I am sure, in the office. Our working hours are between ten and five.’
‘Bless me, as if I were your daughter,’ she said.
‘My sister,’ he said.
And when she lifted up her face, her whole being was lucent. She was going to find her husband. Life is like that. You get what you want. But do you know what you want? ‘Do you really know? Mister, that is the problem,’ said Govindan Nair that evening to me. ‘You do not want to build this house. I really want to. Shantha will have a child. She is your wife. A wife must have a house. You have a son. I prophesy,’ he said, and jumped across the wall as if carried away like a kitten.
I want to take you to London, will you come? I want to take you to Paris, Delhi, New York, will you come? Will you truly come? Don’t you hear the koel sing on the coconut tree, don’t you hear the anguish that wants to eat your heart, cut it and pickle it, and savour it, and say: Look what a good heart I have. I am a woman. And I have such a good heart. What will you give me in return, my lord? I should give you, woman, a house three-storeys high. Lord, may that rise. And do not forget the windows that go running along the wall towards the sea. I must have eleven windows on the sea. A window on the sea is a window on God. Buy me a plot and build me a house eight directions wide, and that will have a tamarind tree in the backyard for the baby’s hammock, a row of dahlias (like Europeans have) in a bed to the right, and a mango tree that will stretch and burden itself with such riches that, when the koel sings, we know its song will make the fruit ripen. For the woman with a womb that has grown round, what one needs is ripe, rich rasapuri mangoes. Cut them, peel the skins off and, Mother, give them to me on a silver plate. And one cup of milk immediately after.
Oh, Shantha, how beautiful you look in your pregnancy. You look like Panchali herself.
I am no Panchali or Damayanthi, Mother. I am just a woman. Lord, may I just be woman. Let me bear womanhood. He has given me his manhood that my womanhood be. If I were a queen I would build a wall of wattle round the garden and I would then hear the sea. The sea knows me.
White is the foam that goes gathering along the sea, white as the skin of snake, with ripples and soughs, and the last song of despair. The sea lurches and tears from inside. O Sea, where will you take me? Will you take me to the nether world of the Nagas, and tie me a chignon wound into a big bun? I shall wear a large kumkum and my ear lobes will touch my shoulders. I want to hold my child so round he would kick ten distances long. I want to love. I want to kiss my child. Lord bear me and build me a house.
Like a pirate on the high seas (at the time of the Dutch, so to say) is Govindan Nair. He can command a crew of ten Mophlas and in any language you like. He could put a bark on to the sea and say: Sea, take it, and the sea would heave and bear you to where the isles are. Truth goes over the sea, for the isles are to be blessed. The seagulls know that truth is a breath of Antarctica. Did you know, for example, that if you stand at the southern tip of Travancore and look down against your nose, straight down lies Antarctica, rich in its fissures of fishes? The fishes of Antarctica are made of gold. Gold is dug there. They discovered a tablet there some years ago which showed they probably wrote in the Dravidic tongue. Antarctica is our home. They used to grow pineapples there. You can find congealed seeds of the lotus in Antarctica. The bones of its people are all long and thin, un-Aryan — their heroes lie beside coconut shields made on tropical seas. I know whence they came. They came from Malabar. Malabar is Truth. Antarctica is only a name for Malabar. So we’ll go in catamarans and down the seas to where the isles lie. Let us go and quarry there. You’ll see stone there like ice frozen for a million years. It has the colour of human eyes. What a fine thing to build a house of eyes — of kittens’ eyes! Lord, the isle is far and I am a man. But, look, look, at the silver bark that stands. Truth goes on a ride. We’ll ride with Truth. Ancient temples lie there. Nobody worships there. The seas meet in Antarctica. Lord, help me build a house.