This is an English translation of "ஆற்றாமை," a short story written by Ku.Pa. Raja Gopalan.
Translated from Tamil by Saravanan Karmegam.
****
“Please have a seat. You may
leave after some time. Why are you in a hurry?” Savithri told as she was
rolling on her bed.
“No...It’s time up for him to
come. If only I start heating up the water now for making coffee, I'd be able
to serve it right on his arrival” Kamala said, rose.
“It's easy making it. Isn't
it? How long would it take to prepare a simple coffee? You can very well leave
after he came. Sit down. It has been tough for me to while away my time. You
know!”
That time, Raghavan reached
there and called out to his wife, “Kamala.”
“Haven't I just told you a
moment ago? See, he has come now,” Kamala told her and ran towards her room.
Savithri lifted her head and glanced at them while still lying on the bed.
Raghavan entered the house and smiled at his wife. “You are too early."
Kamala said, and followed him. Even though their room was at a brief distance
away, it wasn't lying too far off a safe distance for anyone to receive the
sound of some random conversation. The young couple sometimes would not realise
the presence of neighbourhood.
"What's
this! What a childish play it is. Leave me. Someone might come"—Kamala's words, filled with delight, fell into
Savithri's ears, half inaudibly though. The air of pleasure that sprang up from
their room reached Savithri and made her stifled.
As the pain of carnal craving
engulfed her mind and body, she grew restive lying on the bed on her stomach.
Savithri’s husband was working in the army somewhere in North India. He stayed
with her for only three days after their marriage was consummated, that too
because of some ritualistic obligations, and then immediately left her on
an emergency duty. It had been two years since he left. She received letters
from him regularly. But he didn’t come to meet her. The people around would
start chewing upon the couple's personal affairs if Shanti Muhoortham was
not arranged for them. In order to keep their mouth shut, the parents of the
couples arranged a First Night for them. After that, nothing would be
considered wrong, no matter how long the man was separated from his wife. And
no one would open their mouth to critique it. But it was the very Shanti
Muhoortham that had been tormenting Savithri as the God of Death.
While she could succeed in taming her mind like earlier, her body refused to
budge on its demands. It instigated the tamed mind too. Her body couldn't
forget the sexual pleasure it had received during those three days of their
being together. It bawled, fully exasperated.
Savithri was a woman gifted
with a fully endowed physique. Her body was effusively voluptuous with
youthfulness. She was unable to take on the incessant craving of her body. ‘
Look at this, Kamala! Does she have to jump like this if she has a nice time
with her husband? What is the need for boasting about their intimacy to me? I
am staying here like a destitute. What is the need of romping in front of me?
She is doing it deliberately. It appears that she is doing all these just to
make me feel the pain of watching her happiness. All the time she has been
talking about what her husband told her. Is it something marvellous or what?
She seems to be the one who gave birth to her husband. Doesn’t she? She does
have all the reasons to walk upside down anyway. Doesn’t she? She is proud of
her happy life with her husband after seeing another woman of her age dying in
loneliness. If it occurs, even a bit, in her heart that I am living in such a
deplorable condition or I would feel pathetic about myself—will she behave like
this? If only personally affected, she could feel my pain. With her heart
full of grouches, Savithri was lying on the bed. “Adiye! Can’t you bring some
water from the tap? Have coffee,” her mother came to her.
“You get all done in such a
manner. Don’t you? You gave me birth only for such things. I will do it. First,
get out of my sight.” She yelled at her mother.
“Coffee is here. I got to go
there, that street. I don’t know whether I would come back tonight.”
“What are you going to do by
coming here? Please stay only at your brother’s home.”
“Be safe with the door
locked…”
“I know… I know…you get lost.”
Her mother adjusted her linen
sari, applied Viboothi on her forehead, and left for that street.
The coffee kept near Savithri became cold. Yet, the heat in her heart didn’t
get diminished. Once her husband left for the office, Kamala came to meet
Savithri. “Ammami! Had your coffee?” Savithri looked at her spitefully and told
her. “It has become cold. That is why I am not drinking it.
“May I bring you coffee? I
have kept it in the flask for him as he needs it in the evening. You have it
now. I will make it later for him.”
“No… I don’t need it as I have
chest burns.
“I asked him if we could go for
a movie. He said tomorrow. You can also accompany us, Ammami.
“It won’t look good. When you
guys go out together for having fun, what is the need of me in between…”
“You always tease me, Ammami!”
Kamala told her shyly.
Kamala’s delight sounded like
a poisonous potion for Savithri.
“What, Ammami! You don’t look
well. Are you alright?”
“Nothing happened to me.
Nothing. I am alright.”
“He brought a novel,
‘Karukiya Mottu’ (Burnt Buds). Can we read it together?” She went in,
came with a book, and sat beside her. The cover of the book carried a picture.
Kamala showed that picture to Savithri shyly with an innocent grin on her face.
- A man is sitting on a chair, delved into a deep thought. The book from his
hand is found lying on the floor. His wife is standing behind him with a smile
without his knowledge. “What could be its meaning, Ammami?” Kamala asked
Savithri.
“The husband is thinking about
something very seriously. Without understanding that it is an inappropriate
time, she comes to him, smiling foolishly.”
The gleeful grin, hitherto
found in Kamala’s face, disappeared. “Is that so?” she asked her.
“What else then will it be?”
Savithri told her with an uncouth smile.
“I don’t think that way,
Ammami!”
“Then, how will that be?”
“It means…that is… the husband
is reading the book, thinking about her. As he forgets himself, the book falls
out off his hands. She doesn't come there for long. At last…”
“I know what would be that
thing ‘at last’. Don’t I?”
“Can I continue reading it?”
“You can.”
Kamala was reading that book
for a long time. How much of it went inside Savithri’s ears, she only knew.
Suddenly Kamala remembered, “O! God! It is already late. Forgot the time as I
kept reading. I need to go.” Kamala left Savithri only at five in the evening.
Savithri didn’t get up. The
housekeeping maid came. “I can clean the house myself. You may leave now,” she
told the maid. The flower-selling woman came. “I don’t want flowers today,” she
told her too. It was getting dusk. It had been so long since the darkness set in.
She couldn't bear the nightlong mirth Kamala and Raghavan were orchestrating in
their room. 'They don’t even think about their neighbours. Do they?' She
got up and switched on the electric light irritably. Came again to the bed and
lay down there.
“I have kept your meals ready.
Please come soon,” Kamala called him.
“Why this early? After having
food, then we”…
“I feel sleepy today,” Kamala
told him.
“You do feel sleepy. Don’t
you?” Raghavan teased her.
Savithri heard all they were
talking teasingly. Kamala came to the doorway, threw the banana leaf out, and
locked the grill door and hall door. As she happened to see the opposite hall
while returning, she saw Savithri half asleep as if she were semi-conscious in
the inner hall. “Ammami! Is your dinner over? over?”she asked Savithri.
“Yes. It’s over.”
Kamala went inside and locked
the door from inside. The house was having a roof like marriage halls. There
were families staying on both sides. There were doors for the inner halls and
outer halls of the houses. It was only eight at night. Even the bustling of the
town had not yet receded. But the sound from Kamala’s house had stopped. Only
Savithri found herself immobile on the bed.
“Raghavan,” a low voice was
heard at the doorway. Savithri was quite first. As it seemed that she might
have become curious about something, she opened the outer hall door slowly and
went near to the veranda. A young man of Raghavan’s age was standing there. “Is
Raghavan there? Is he there?”
“Yes…he is there,” Savithri
replied. She opened the grill door and turned back. The young man came to the
outer hall and stood hesitantly. Savithri lowered her voice and told him,
“Knock that outer hall door,” gesturing to him.
The young man stood a while,
hesitantly.
“Just give it a plain knock.
He will open.” She told him with a sort of crooked pleasure she had drawn, went
to her room, and eagerly awaited the events that were to follow.
The young man knocked on the
door again, slowly, and called out, “Raghavan.”
A minute later, the door
opened. “Who is that?” - A roaring question came out.
“It’s me.”
“What does it mean it’s me?
Who's that?” Raghavan opened the door furiously and looked up outside, sitting
inside.
“It’s me… Seenu from Madurai.”
“O! Please come in…” Seemingly
irritated with confusions thrown over his mind, Raghavan left the door open,
entered the outer hall, and took Seenu with him to the doorway. For a flash of
a second, Seenu could see something inside. The electric light was kept on. He
saw Kamala lying on the cot just opposite to the doorway with her dress partly
removed, jumping out and running towards the wall. Within a fraction of a
second, Raghavan opened the door and left that place. Savithri could see her
further clearly. A bunch of flowers was hanging from Kamala’s head. A heavy
fragrance of jasmine and incense was wafting through their room. She could not
continue looking at that room, which bore the semblance of a privacy that had
been torn open. The light, which was resembling solitude, standing stripped of
its clothes, dazzled her eyes. She closed the door without making noise.
Suddenly she was overwhelmed by a sorrow and a deep self-pity. “What a sin I
have committed! I don’t know if it is the sin I have committed or the sin of
separating anyone; I have been cursed to lead this wretched life. Aiyo.”
The two hearts, which were
grasping each other with an irresistible passion, had now gotten shattered and
thrown away afar as fragments.
Controlling her welling up
tears from falling down, Kamala, with massive anger, adjusted her dress, turned
off the light, and lay on the bed. Raghavan came inside after sending off
Seenu. He climbed onto the cot and tried coaxing Kamala again, slowly. She
pushed his hands away violently. “It would have been better had you kept the
other door also open. Wouldn’t it?” she yelled at him.
“O! Sorry. I forgot to close
it, Kamala.”
“How will you remember that?
Will you?”
“Why are you making
unnecessary fuss out of nothing?”
“Nothing…is it nothing? All my
dignity is gone at once.”
Raghavan got annoyed at the
developments that had happened. Irked, he asked her, “How much is it gone?”
“Enough of it!. Will you
please shut up? Don’t you remember there are neighbours around us?” She also
retorted in the same tone.
These words of hers also fell
into Savithri’s ears.
She lay on her stomach and
started weeping with heavy bouts of breaths. “This sinner deserves any damn
punishment. Doesn’t she?’ She was cursing herself.
She heard Kamala clearing her
nose.
“You demon!
You are satisfied now. Aren't you?” Savithri
asked herself aloud.
***End**
