Acme

(A Short Story)

(1)

Shall I describe the cottage first? Rather not. I would leave it to emerge as I proceed. I was sitting on the little, spotlessly clean but crumpled up bed just near the window looking out of it. It was early morning and the cool breeze that caressed and rustled the tree-tops out of sleep wafted in an exhilarating freshness, and as it touched the bare skin of my body allover, it sent a sweet sensation, a mild thrill through it, which was reflected in the blitheness of my countenance. The varying shades of green leaves were absorbing a new liveliness from the glimmering orange yellow of the twilight. The inarticulate twitter of the birds had already begun, and the morning felt their rapturous awakening and understood the meaning of their choral hymn without knowing its language. From a long distance came the faint sound of cowbells tinkling, and as it approached nearer and nearer you could hear the mingling strains from the milkman’s day-dream-world while he led his cows for milking. I sat watching this morning life for I know not how long. I was not attending to anyone particular object; rather, the whole spectacle had that indefinable charm that holds one spellbound without knowing why. And in contemplating it gleefully and in smiling silence, I had so completely forgotten myself that–

‘I say, Ravi,’ I exclaimed, ‘look at that girl. How exactly like your picture!’

Ravindra who was arranging the flowers in the vase came to the window and I looked out of it. The resemblance between the picture he was then working on and that girl there was simply startling and he was as astonished as myself, if not more. She was wearing a sari of pale orange and rose and a white silk blouse. Her face was oval rather than round, and from underneath her pencilled eyebrows and dark eyelashes quivered her bright and beautiful, wandering eyes as if, although they would no longer linger over the fast vanishing fields of childhood and innocence, they were timid, almost afraid, to roam freely over the blossoms in the Garden of Youth that was stretching before them. There was a pink rose with two green leaves on its stalk in her stamen-like hair. Swinging playfully the net in her left hand which held her books, she appeared to be going tip-toe to the morning school and one could have fancied Dawn herself had stepped down from the horizon.

‘Ah,–yes, Subha,–how like,’ came the words slowly. There was a note of bitterness and slight dejection in his voice. But I was in no mood to recognise it. That close likeness was convincing me that Ravindra must have seen that girl before and managed to procure her photograph. And that he should never have told me! Of course there could be no other explanation. Every detail agreed so perfectly. That charm which Ravindra was imparting to the figure on the canvas was there tint for tint in that other figure that was moving towards us. Having achieved in a divine moment of supreme creative inspiration one perfect human form and sent it down to this earth, and then despairing of his power to recreate that vision of loveliness but once more, yet in love with it, had the great Creator appeared as Ravindra to copy his own creation? At another time, I might have amused Ravi and myself with that and similar conceits. But now I was feeling hurt a bit.

‘You could have told me who she was. But you don’t know, I suppose.’

‘No.’

‘I see. All right.’

We were, at least I was, all this time watching that girl from the window. Suddenly she turned the corner and disappeared.–Slowly I was turning round–

Gracious! Man! How could you!’ I simply blurted out in utter despair. The picture, that was, had come down from the board and lying on the floor, a bundle of coloured rags!

He was not listening to me. Almost mechanically, he washed his palette and his brushes and put them away. He put the towel on the rack and with heavy steps came near me and sat down on the bed. In his dark gazelle eyes there shone a heart-rending light of complete frustration–

The jasmine creeper that hung in uncertain festoons at the three sides of the window which were gently shaken by the light breeze, had winded its leafy way in the cottage. One little white jasmine flower was peeping down from the green leaves. For a long time Ravindra sat there, his eyes fixed on that suspended flower and his long fingers slowly pushing through his silken hair as if to keep time to his thoughts.

Then he closed his eyes.–Yet his whole face expressed a silent but deep yearning for something unseen, unattainable, only felt–ever so faintly!

And how fascinating he looked in that trance of moveless meditation–!

Something stirred deeply within me–. I forgot my early resentment, forgot the girl, forgot the picture and only thought of him. I would not disturb him–. And I murmured lovingly–‘Goodbye.’

‘Goodbye.’

I closed the door of the cottage behind me, quietly, noiselessly.–Yet the cuckoo on the mango tree flew away up in the sky and rose higher and higher–.

(2)

‘Did you see that cottage? Isn’t it a dream? I wonder who lives there.’

‘Where?’

‘Just there, beyond that causeway on the left, under that mango tree. See it?’

‘Oh, that one–yes–don’t know whose it is, though.’

‘Isn’t it lovely! Charu, look–that deer–and the jasmine’s in flower too! Really, but who could be living there!’

‘Would you like to go and see? I can take you there, if you care to come. I am in fact going there myself and whoever is in the cottage would be only too pleased to have such guests. Besides, that cottage isn’t merely a picture from outside. It’s got lovely pictures inside.’

I ventured to make this offer as I remarked the particular curiosity of one of the two persons in the above dialogue. It was after nearly a year that I was going to see Ravindra again. All the year I was in North India. . . . And now, at the sight of that old, familiar dwelling, what a host of thoughts filled my mind, what a medley of feelings. It had not changed a great deal in appearance, perhaps. But I could see new beauty in that warm red roof: it almost seemed ready, even impatient, to hold me in an affectionate embrace. The golden rays of the evening sun lingered upon the slanting roof reluctant to withdraw. Under that roof must be Ravi. What could he be doing, I mused. He couldn’t be expecting me. How jolly to surprise him like this–!

From this reverie I was roused by the talk of two persons, strangers evidently, for they did not seem to know much about the place. They were three in all–an elderly gentleman accompanied by a lady who appeared to be his daughter, and her son. The young lady was of middle height inclining rather towards tall. The sportive smile on her face and her diverting conversation betrayed a genuine culture and an innocence that was not afraid of spontaneous expression. She almost invited you to be frank without fear, and gay without constraint.

‘Can’t we go, Dada?We could see those pictures inside,’ she said to her father and turning to me inquired, ‘Who’s living there? An artist? Friend, I believe?’

‘Yes. Would you come with me?’

They agreed, of course, and crossing the causeway we proceeded towards the cottage. Even by the time we neared it we had become friends. Her outward formal charm blended with an exquisite inward grace to impart a merry tone to the conversation. When Beauty knows how to talk–

Here was the cottage and stepping before them I opened the wicket gate of the garden. The flowers which had smiled the day out on their stalks were closing in their places one by one. But the tiny jasmines were frail and drooped, soon to lie faded on the green leaves. The westering sun tried to lift their faces but succeeded only in spreading a thin veil of golden hope over them. At the end of the gravel walk was the door. The deer that was grazing raised its neck and stared at us with its full, dark eyes. I entered first–.

‘Dear me’–Suddenly but very softly exclaimed the young lady and quickly bending her head down, tried to protect her beautiful hair with per right hand from getting entangled in the jasmine creeper that hung from the trellis-arch before the door. Two tiny flowers were caught in her hair and remained there unknown to the wearer.

I pushed the door slowly and peeped in. Ravindra was washing his palette and brushes and relieving that work with furtive glances in a direction where apparently hung a newly finished picture. It was amusing to watch him do it, lingering over the brushes with the fondness of a mother, as if he would prolong his association with the creative effort by protracting this last link with it. We could not see the picture but we could see him. He was, however, so lost in the joy of achievement that he did not notice my intrusion.

‘Ravi–.’

He started–then saw me, and leaving his brushes where they were, came shouting almost hilariously,

‘Hallo, Subha! You didn’t fall out of heaven, you–!

Well, here’s something–’

Then suddenly he became aware that I was accompanied by strangers, and as he saw that young lady smiling at him with mingled amusement and tenderness, he blushed–was taken a–and for the briefest instant felt his warm blood freeze. But only for the briefest instant; in the twinkling of an eye and before anyone could perceive, he recovered his self-possession and serenity and welcomed his guests with courteous cordiality.

‘I am so sorry I didn’t see you.–Wont’ you come in? he said apologetically and moved three chairs near the table.

‘Oh, it’s all right, don’t worry. After all we are really intruders,’ replied the elderly gentleman rather reassuringly.

‘Take a seat, please.’ Ravindra addressed these words to the young lady. She obeyed him and smiling one of her bewitching smiles, remarked,

‘Aren’t we lucky to catch an artist in a rapture like this.’

Ravindra did not meet her eyes again.

‘Excuse me,’ he said, ‘I won’t be a minute.–Would you have some tea?’

‘No, thank you.’

Then he quietly removed his newly finished picture to the next apartment an joined us in conversation.

We sat like that talking about all sorts of things, but mostly about art. There were many of Ravindra’s paintings on the walls and some he fetched from the other room. The guests were quite obviously delighted. Such a lover of art as the young lady, come to such a shrine of the Beautiful, where, in the stillness of an embowered cottage, worshipped a young artist with the spirit of a missionary to capture the abiding loveliness of the universe and transfer it, if he could, to the canvas. . . . And she knew the art of provoking him to wax eloquent. Innocently flippant and wisely gay, she subtly broke the barriers of reserve and diffused an atmosphere of charm and fun. If she made a witty observation, Ravi would perhaps be thinking of the gentle wind that played wantonly with the sari in his picture. If she spoke of the subdued revelation of beauty in works of art, he would probably be remembering how he had made the soft fluffy hair in his picture half conceal the delicate curves of the ear. If she happened to dwell on the loveliness that resides in all things in this universe and on love that alone can reveal it, love that transcends individuality and embraces all creation, he would be reminded of the high forehead in his picture. And when at last she expressed, a little shyly but most charmingly, how happy they had been that evening to meet him and how thankful to him for showing them his pictures, he could almost have felt that he was ‘retouching’ the soft dimple in the rosy cheeks of his picture.

It was dark. The elderly gentleman reminded,

‘But we haven’t seen your new picture–’

‘No, but it’s–I mean there’s no light now. It’s better seen in daylight.’

‘Well, I think that would give us an excuse to call again,–that is, if Mr. Artist wouldn’t mind.’

‘Not at all. On the contrary, it would be a joy. And surely you wouldn’t need an excuse to come.’

They rose to go. Ravindra offered them each a bunch of Queens of the Night. We followed them to the wicket gate.

‘Come along, Charu, leave that deer alone,’ called the lady.

‘Goodbye,’ said the father.

‘Goodbye,’ repeated the daughter. ‘Charu, say Goodbye.’

A little voice whispered, ‘Goodbye.’

‘Goodbye,’ we replied.

–I was helping myself to a glass of water and airily asked where the new picture was. Ravindra who had preceded me in the cottage dryly replied, ‘There.’

What was there? Coloured rags scattered about!

I looked at Ravi. What was there? The poignant despair of futile inspiration! The piercing forlornness of a soul that felt it saw and knew it was blind. It would be filled but remained empty. It cried and called and felt it heard–it was an echo, not an answer. . . .

‘Good night, Ravi, it’s dark–I’m–’

‘Will be morning–’

(3)

I was disgusted, but never spoke a word.

Ravindra was filling in the colours with a sure and a light hand. Every new tint added unforeseen beauty, so it seemed to him! He would stop for a minute or two and gaze at the picture,–then, suddenly, his eyes would light up with a strange lustre and with inspiration welling up, brimming over his heart, he would give it a brush or two. Didn’t it work a miracle! He seemed to be under the spell of some compelling magic power and obeyed the mysterious impulse which illuminated for him a new vision of beauty and moved his hand to transfix it on the canvas. As if he was at last capturing the vision that had so far eluded him; as if the whole world was yielding up its secret of colours, lines and masses; as if he was swimming in the harmony that throbbed through the universe and was touching his whole being into song!–

And it was, or appeared to be, the portrait of an old emaciated woman, low browed wrinkled, her breasts hanging down, her ribs and all the bones showing, cross-eyed, with more than one nose, and ears that were as big as the palm of a hand,–dead as a corpse!

Gradually, it was nearing completion. Thank God, I said, he would finish it today. But Ravindra had stopped. He had only to put one little red mark on the forehead. He could have done it that day, but apparently he didn’t want to.

We came out in the garden and sat on a bench. There was a white moon in the western sky and the pale, white, jasmine flowers were nestling in the green leaves round us. In front of me was Ravi in his thin white muslin shirt and the moonlight lay on the ground as white as snow new fallen.

‘Since how long have you taken to ugly old women, Ravi,’ I remarked, more to tease him than to express my opinion which, however, would not have been different.

‘I am bl–d if I can see what there is to get so excited about in a dirty old hag of a creature that–’

He stared at me bewildered and surprised. I became silent. Then he smiled a tender smile of quiet contentment in a sort of perfumed ecstacy. As I started to go, I heard,

‘Come early in the morning. I’ll have finished it before you come, though.’

‘Still, you can leave the brushes and the colours–.’

(4)

The early morning came rather late next day. I was neither curious nor very eager. I took my time over the morning tea. Then starting leisurely I walked a few paces. There came upon me a curious feeling. . . . I felt heavy in my feet. Once near the door of the familiar cottage, I felt better and I knocked–so late and still in bed–I called aloud...there was no answer, so I pushed the door–. It was open!

Ravindra was sitting on a chair in front of that portrait, staring at it, the brush that had put the last red mark still in his hand.

‘Couldn’t you answer a fellow, man?’

Still he did not stir. I was wild, and going to him placed my hands on his shoulders– ‘God!’–it was cold as ice!

(5)

At an international exhibition held in P–, there hung in one corner of the Indian section a portrait of an old woman entitled, ‘Meaningless Beauty.’

Some were attracted by it, others were repelled; all were arrested and challenged; every one went away either richer or poorer for the experience; none would ever forget it!

‘Ah, well, what a beauty!’ whispered some one in French.

‘Rather interesting.’ ‘What!–I can’t see what it is.’

‘The artist was struggling–but he failed,’ sounded a profound remark in feeble German accents.

And, so on…….

A perfect Babel, for they all knew–.

Only in the opposite corner sat an old man with long hair and a flowing beard. Day after day he would come and sit there gazing at the portrait while the crowd would pass by. And sometimes his eyes would be dim and perhaps a tear would glide down his furrowed cheek. And if anyone asked him the reason of his grief, he would murmur inaudibly, in Italian: ‘There was an artist. . . And they tell me he was very young. . . and he died of . . .’