No, Balaram protested. It was just the truth. It was Vanity, precisely where it ought to be, outside the obelion.
But, at the time, even truth was no consolation.
The morning after the ceremony Toru-debi went down to their pond for her morning bath and found it covered with poisoned fish. At almost exactly the same time, Alu, who was eating in the kitchen, heard screams in the bamboo forest behind their house. He pushed away his brass thala and ran out of the house by the back door.
A path ran from the back door past the well, through dense stands of bamboo to three solitary huts nestled in a dip, a long way off. Those were the huts in which Maya Debnath lived with her father and her brother. She walked down that path every morning, on her way to Balaram’s house.
Alu raced down the path trying to make as little noise as he could. He heard the voices again. One of them was Maya’s, shrill with fear. Alu left the path and circled round, through the bamboo, towards the sound.
Then he saw them: Maya was standing in the middle of the path, surrounded by Bhudeb Roy’s five sons. The youngest, barely six, was clinging to his oldest brother’s shorts.
Maya was eleven then, a few months younger than Alu, but a good head taller and sturdily built. She had a red sari wound around her, covering her budding breasts. It was an old shrunken piece of cloth, and it fell well short of her ankles and left her shoulders bare. She had a six-foot length of bamboo in her hands. Her firm, rounded face and her gently slanting eyes were dark with anger. She had the pole steady in her hands, pointed at the eldest boy. But he could see that she was afraid: sweat glistened on her chin and her bare shoulders.
Bhudeb Roy’s eldest son, circling outside the range of the pole, said, threatening her with his bunched fists: Don’t make trouble. Listen to me. Don’t go to that house again. If you do, there’ll be trouble for you and your father.
Maya spat back: Why don’t you try to stop me? All you’ll have is a hole in your babu shorts where it hurts.
Alu stopped only for a moment. Then he ran, throwing himself through the bamboo thickets, towards the three huts where Maya lived.
Maya’s family were weavers. Her brother, Rakhal, was only sixteen, but already among the tallest in the village, and known everywhere for his skill with the bamboo pole. He had a special one for serious fights, studded with nails. He had made it himself, after a fight in which his cheek had been opened with a knife. He still bore the scar. Usually it was hardly visible, for Rakhal was by nature a gentle, dreamy boy. But when he was angry the scar would open up and glow an unearthly bloody crimson.
Alu found him sitting at his loom, tugging at the strings of the shuttle in mechanical boredom. Alu pulled him up and pointed to his fighting-pole beside the loom. He tried to speak but, panting, couldn’t find his breath. Rakhal looked at his wild eyes and he needed no telling. He leapt up, gathering his lungi around his waist, threw his fighting-pole over his shoulder and ran, with Alu close on his heels.
From a distance they saw Bhudeb Roy’s eldest son snatching at one end of Maya’s pole. They saw the other boys throw themselves on Maya and they saw her go down, struggling under their weight. Then Rakhal roared and his pole flailed in the air, whistling like a kite-string in a gale. The boys looked up and they saw him, bearing down on them with his pole in his hands and his livid scar shining like a pennant, and the next moment they were running and Maya was picking herself slowly off the dust.
Rakhal, balked, stood looking after them as they crashed through the thickets of bamboo, and spat into the dust. He glanced at Maya to make sure that she was unhurt and turned back towards their huts, leaving Alu alone with her.
Alu, suddenly overcome with embarrassment, dug his hands into his shorts and began walking quickly towards their house. Maya followed close behind. When she was a step behind him, she laughed: Why did you have to call him? Were you afraid? Alu’s steps quickened, but she was right behind him. Were you afraid? Why don’t you say, little babu? Alu, walking stiff-legged, almost running, could not bear it any more. He broke into a run and disappeared into the house.
When Maya reached the house, Toru-debi, only just returned from the pond and its carpet of dead fish, was standing in the courtyard listening to Nonder-ma. She saw Maya dishevelled and covered with dust and beckoned to her.
After she had heard the whole story, Toru-debi went to the well and bathed. She oiled and combed her hair and dressed herself in a new sari. And then, armed with all the powers of cleanliness, she marched into Balaram’s study.
Without a word to Balaram she began tipping his books out of the bookshelves. Balaram did not even try to stop her. He stalked silently out of the study and shut himself up in his bedroom.
Even with Maya and Nonder-ma’s help, it took Toru-debi a long time to carry the books out into the courtyard. But she did a thorough job. At the end of it the study was as empty as a dry eggshell. Not a leaf of paper nor a scrap of binding remained to remind Balaram of his library.
Then, after sprinkling kerosene over the huge mound of books in the courtyard, Toru-debi struck a match and set them alight. Alu, standing behind a door, watched the crackling flames dance around the mound. Then he spotted something and darted forward. Toru-debi saw him, and shouted: What have you got in your hands?
Alu backed away, his hands behind his back, as she bore down on him. She lunged, but he managed to sway out of her reach. Then he heard Maya’s voice, close to his ear: Give it to me. A sari rustled and he felt the warm, sweet firmness of her breasts against his shoulder.
When Toru-debi caught up with him his hands were empty. Maya had disappeared.
That night, when all that was left of Balaram’s books was a pile of ashes and a few charred bindings scattered around the courtyard, Alu crept into Balaram’s room. Balaram was sitting crumpled in his easy chair, his fingers in his hair. Alu climbed on to the arm of his easy chair and slipped a book out of his shorts into Balaram’s lap. Then he put his arms around his neck.
It was the Life of Pasteur.
This time the tears were Balaram’s.
Chapter Two. A Pasteurized Cosmos
Eventually, Assistant Superintendent of Police Jyoti Das heard about it all. Bhudeb Roy told him about Balaram’s doings at the Saraswati Puja in the course of a rambling and slightly nostalgic account of Balaram’s life in Lalpukur. Though ten years had passed, he remembered the incident graphically.
It was the first sign, Bhudeb Roy said, of Balaram’s deterioration. He said it a little regretfully, for even then, after all that had happened, he could never speak of Balaram without respect. But he remembered that he was talking to an AS of Police and why, so he added: But he was always like that — confused. A confused extremist. It took me many years to find out, and by that time it was too late. He was set in his dangerous ways. An extremist; no respect for order. A terribly confused extremist.
ASP Das was tired and a little bewildered after all that had happened that day. It was the first time, as he told his mother afterwards, that he had drawn his gun in earnest, meaning to kill. Of course, they had all been trained to deal with situations like that at the Police Academy. But it was different somehow when it actually happened. With un-officerly embarrassment he had noticed his wrists shaking long before he had fired a shot, and despite himself he couldn’t help being glad that he had not actually had to use the gun. He had hardly expected that one flare would do the whole job for him. He noticed Bhudeb Roy’s huge face again with a start and sat up. But, Bhudeb-babu, he said, if you thought so then, why didn’t you do something? Why didn’t you make him leave the village?