The Shroud

(A STORY)

(Translated by A. B. M. Habibullah from the original story in Urdu)

The fire was nearly out, but it threw a weird gleam on the haggard features of two men, father and son, who sat still, their dhoties drawn tightly over the ears, gazing impassively at the dying embers. Inside the hut lay Budhia, the young wife of Madho, on the cold bare earthen floor, writhing in pain at her first labour. As her groans occasionally pierced the chilly stillness of the night, their eyes met, and lips twitched in an uncontrollable, dumb agony.

A pitiless winter night; the village wrapped in a soulless black; an unearthly primeval silence.……

Ghisu spoke first: ‘Looks she’s going to die; been suffering the whole day; go and have a look.’

Madho’s voice was piteous: ‘Why the devil doesn’t she die quickly, if die she must?’

You heartless swine; and she is your wife, and you have been happy with her this whole year?’

‘I can’t stand it; it makes me sick to see her twisting about like a crushed worm. It’s dreadful–honest, it is.’

It was the cobblers’ quarter in the village. Both had an unenviable reputation; the father, a notorious do-nothing, and the son, a lazy insolent youngster, ever ready to smoke away the whole day if he could evade the employer’s eye. A handful of wheat was enough to turn their heads and make them contemptuous of the world’s riches. A couple of days’ starvation, however, would quickly soften their pride, and you would see Ghisu in the forest collecting firewood for the market. The money thus earned would then be enough for a few days’ loafing about. Work was not scarce, but no employer would approach them. They should really have been Sannyasis; it was amazing to see them contented and happy with so little in life. A few earthen-ware vessels were all they possessed; and a tattered dhoti with countless patches made up their sartorial equipment. Deep in debt, yet carefree, they were a strange lot: insulted, abused, mercilessly beaten, but yet without sorrow or shame. The very meanness of their lives would evoke pity, and people did lend them money, although they never hoped to see it . Most of their meals consisted of roasted potatoes stolen from the fields. A few sugar-canes, similarly obtained made a good dessert.

Ghisu was proud; he had spent sixty years of his life in this way. And Madho studiously followed his example.

They were roasting the potatoes and impatiently thrusting their hand into the still-burning ashes. Ghisu’s wife was dead long ago, but Madho had married last year. Budhia worked hard, and by her unceasing toil bought a certain amount of stability into the family. She ground the villagers’ corn, collected fodder for the market, tended the cattle, and in the evening brought enough wheat for the family meal. But this was a luxury for the men; their conceit increased, and they began to demand high wages and were glad they were refused. And Budhia lay dying in her labour-pains since early morning.

Peeling a hot potato Ghisu again said: ‘Go and see how she is,’ and then casually added, ‘The evil spirit will be hanging about here, and that worries me a bit. The magic man would charge a rupee, and I am damned if I know where that is to come from.’

Madho was unwilling to leave. He could not trust his father with the potatoes! ‘I am afraid,’ he replied.

‘What is there to be afraid of, you coward?’

‘Why don’t you go then?’

‘How can I, you silly ass? I have never looked at her face, and to see her body now in that condition! She is hardly in her senses.’

They turned silent. The embers flickered and died with a last glow; groans were feebler and less frequent.

‘But father, what shall we do if the baby is born?’ Madho suddenly asked, genuinely perturbed at the thought. ‘Ginger, oil, sugar–we have none of them here.’

‘Don’t you worry; we’ll get everything, if God gives us the baby. God gave me nine children, but I never had anything. I manage somehow.’

The ashes had cooled, and they busied themselves with their meal, their first for two days. They could hardly wait, and the hot, half-burnt potatoes brought tears trickling down the cheek as they hurriedly swallowed them to escape the unbearable heat inside. They were soon scouring the ashes for the last bit, and, with a hunger half-appeased, Ghisu fell into a reminiscent mood. He had only one happy recollection, the happiest in his life of sixty years: the memory of a hearty meal he had twenty years ago at a neighbour’s wedding feast. Never had he a full meal since then. ‘What a feed! Puri, chutney, raita, vegetable curry, curd, sweet and what not! And every one had plenty, every one, I tell you, rich and poor, young and old. No one to stop you: take whatever and as much as you like and eat as you never did before. And my word, how we all ate! Didn’t have room for water in our stomachs. And yet they would insist on your having more puris, hot, delicious, crunchy puris,’ his eyes glistened, and then pan at the end. But I was all in, couldn’t stand; I crawled somehow to my blanket and lay down.’

Madho was never tired of listening to it; it was a peculiar delight and almost a luxury to be able to talk about these feeds. ‘I wish some one gave us a feed like that,’ wistfully and timidly he remarked.

‘No such luck, my boy. Those were grand days. They are all saving now, these blokes are. No feasts, no entertainments, no parties. How the devil are you going to spend all that money, I ask? Nothing bad in hoarding but the economy in expenditure, damn it.’ His voice was indignant.

‘You must have had some twenty puris, I guess?’

‘Much more than that.’

‘I would have had at least fifty.’

‘It was not less than fifty, either. I was young and healthy then. You are not half as strong.’

The meal was long over. They drank water, drew the dhoti above the head and lay down to sleep, curled up like dogs round the fire.

When Madho entered the hut in the morning, Budhia was dead. Flies buzzed above the unbearably distorted face; glassy eyes fixed in a ghastly stare; the cold, stiff body soaked in bloody mud. The child had died in the womb.

Horrified, Madho ran to Ghisu, and they both raised a loud wailing. Neighbours assembled.

It was no time for mourning, however. A shroud had to be provided, and then wood for cremation.

Lamenting their bereavement, they ran to the village and within a few hours Ghisu had collected nearly five rupees for the funeral. Towards noon they started for the market, while neighbours tried to construct a bamboo stretcher.

Some one had covered the stiff, naked corpse; red ants had started their trail....

‘Well, we’ve got enough wood now, don’t you think?’ Ghisu enquired at the market.

‘Yes, and now for a shroud.’

‘We don’t need an expensive one, do we?’

‘Of course not; it will be quite dark by the time she is cremated and who is there to look at her shroud?’

‘How silly it all is! She didn’t have even a decent enough rag when alive, but now you must get her a new shroud!’

‘After all it is only going to perish with the corpse,’ Madho observed.

‘We could have given her some medicine if we had this money before.’

They understood each other perfectly well. As the twilight deepened they found themselves, as if by chance, in front of the drinking house, and in agreement, quite unnecessary to express in words, they walked in. In the centre of the courtyard they stood for a while hesitating and afraid to look at each other’s face. Then Ghisu approached the counter, bought a bottle, drank it quickly. A few shy glances, a little embarrassed smile, and soon father and son were sitting comfortably on the ground and drinking merrily.

A light carefree mood quickly came over them.

‘Why do people bother about a shroud? It would only get burnt after all: not that she could take it with her.’

Madho looked at the sky and said in a voice of utter innocence: ‘Such is the custom. People spend thousands on the Brahmins. What for? How do they know they get anything in return after death?’

‘Well, they have their money to throw away,’ Ghisu consoled. ‘What have we got to play with?’

‘But how would you answer the neighbours? Wouldn’t they ask about the shroud?’ Madho was puzzled.

Ghisu laughed. ‘O, we’ll find an excuse; tell them the money was stolen.’

Madho laughed too; he felt happy at this unexpectedly easy solution of the problem. His respect for his father increased. ‘Lucky to have such a clever father,’ he thought.

And then in his gratitude he remembered Budhia. ‘She was a sweet girl; honest, she was, to give us such a feed even after death.’

It was the fourth bottle and nothing on earth mattered. Ghisu sent for some snack supper, puri, hot and savoury meat, fried fish. Real delicacies....Only a few annas were left.

But they were happy, supremely happy. With the defiant ease of a lion at his meal, they devoured the food; too contented to feel shame or be worried about the future.

Ghisu philosophised: ‘She has brought happiness to our souls. Surely she will have her reward for that.’

The son bowed his head in deep reverence and agreed, ‘Most certainly.’ And then he addressed the high heavens: ‘You know our hearts, Bhagavan! Take her to Vaikunta! We bless her from the depth of our souls.’

They became silent. Suddenly Madho asked: ‘But father we also have to go there sometime.’

Ghisu became annoyed at this question and did not reply.

‘And what if she asked us why we didn’t give her a shroud?’

‘Nonsense.’

‘Ask she will, I am sure,’ Madho persisted.

His father grew indignant. ‘How do you know she won’t have a shroud? You take me for an ass? She will get a shroud and a better one for that!’

Madho was suspicious. ‘Where are you going to get it from? You spent all the money.’

‘I tell you, she’ll have it.’

‘Where from?’

‘The same people who gave this money; but we shan’t have the money to ourselves. If somehow we do get the money we shall be sitting here again, and you bet we get the shroud all the same.’

Within the courtyard every one was happy. From a dark corner came the sound of someone singing in a dull drunken voice.

Some puris were left and Madho beckoned to a beggar wistfully looking on. And for the first time in his life he felt an incomprehensible exuberance as he gave them away.

‘Eat your fill and pray for Budhia. It was her earning, and she is dead.’ He looked up at the sky. ‘She is in Vaikunta now. Queen of Vaikunta.’

Ghisu stood up and overflowing with sheer joy said, ‘Sure my son, she is in Vaikunta. She was so kind, never harmed a soul’; and then, as if reassuring himself. ‘Sure she is there. If not she, who else is? These fat-bellied blokes who rob the poor and then wash their sins in the Ganges?’

Then they became sad, and Madho remembered his dead wife. ‘How she suffered in life, poor kid. And how she died, Ye God.’ He wept.

Ghisu consoled him. ‘Don’t cry, Madho, but rejoice that she was able to leave this world of suffering so soon.’

A couple of gay youngsters rose, and as they went past, started singing. Before the entrance they stumbled and rolled to the ground. Ghisu stood up and danced; then Madho rose; and holding each other’s arm they started dancing, with indecent gestures, as they took up the unfinished song.