Read Online Out of India by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala - Free Book Online Page B

her too, all full and plump, and when she was dressed nicely in one of her best saris with a low-cut blouse, then who would know that she wasn’t a young girl or at least a young woman in the very prime of her life? And she was good too, generous and good and ready to do everything, give everything for those she loved. Only who was there whom she could love with all the fervor of which her heart was capable? In her excitement she pushed against him so that he fell backward and sat down abruptly on her bed. At once she was sitting next to him, very close, her hand on his—if he knew, she said, what store of love there was in her, ready and bursting and brimming in her! Then it was his turn to cry, hesaid, “I want a motor scooter, that’s all,” in a hurt, grieved voice, trembling with tears like a child’s.
    That was the last time he came down to see her. Afterward he would hardly talk to her at all—even when she lay in wait for him by the stairs, he would brush hurriedly past her, silent and with averted face. Once she called after him, “Come in, we will talk about the motor scooter!” but all she got by way of reply was, “It is sold already,” tossed over his shoulder as he ran upstairs. She was in despair and wept often and bitterly; there was a pain right in her heart, such as she had never experienced before. She longed to die and yet at the same time she felt herself most burningly alive. She visited Mrs. Puri several times and stayed for some hours; during which Mrs. Puri, as usual, talked a lot, and in the usual strain, and kept pointing out how her children were Durga’s too, while the two daughters simpered. Evidently she knew nothing of what had happened, and assumed that everything was as it had been.
    But, so Durga soon learned, Mrs. Puri knew very well that everything was not as it had been. Not only did she know, but it was she herself who had brought about the change. It was she who, out of evil and spite, had stopped Govind from coming downstairs and had forbidden him ever to speak to Durga again. All this Durga learned from Bhuaji one hot afternoon as she lay tossing on her bed, alternately talking, weeping, and falling into silent fits of despair. She had no more secrets from Bhuaji. She needed someone before whom she could unburden herself, and who more fit for that purpose than the ever available, ever sympathetic Bhuaji? So she lay on her bed and cried: “A son, that is all I want, a son!” And Bhuaji was soothing and understood perfectly. Of course Durga wanted a son; it was only natural, for had not God set maternal feelings to flow sweetly in every woman’s breast? And now, said Bhuaji angrily, to have that God-given flow stopped in its course by the machinations of a mean-hearted, jealous, selfish woman—and so it all came out. It was a revelation to Durga. Her tears ceased and she sat up on her bed. She imagined Govind suffering under the restraint laid upon him and yearning for Durga and all her kindness as bitterly as she yearned for him. There was sorrow upstairs and sorrow downstairs. She sat very upright on the bed. After a while she turned her face toward Bhuaji, and her lips were tight and her eyes flashed. She said, “We will see whose son he is.”
    She waited for him by the stairs. He came late that night, but still she went on waiting. She was patient and almost calm. She could hear sounds from upstairs—a clatter of buckets, water running, Mrs. Puri scolding her daughters. At the sound of that voice, hatred swelled in Durga so that she was tempted to leave her post and run upstairs to confront her enemy. But she checked herself and remained standing downstairs, calm and resolute and waiting. She would not be angry. This was not the time for anger.
    She heard him before she saw him. He was humming a little tune to himself. Probably he had been to see a film with friends and now he was singing a lyric from it. He