Dollar and The Other Thing

(A Story)

By Suresh Chandra Chakravarty
(Rendered by the Author from his original Bengali)

MOHON was in perpetual disgrace.

For, the two things that old Gokul, his uncle, detested the most were the flute and the fiddle and these were the very two things which Mohon hugged, as it were, to his heart with a fanatic’s zeal and a pagan’s adoration. In the domain of money-making activity of Gokul, the old Croesus!–in the realm of gold and silver, debit and credit, pawning and mortgaging, stock-taking and share-selling, youthful Mohon with his flute and fiddle was like an abomination personified. The tunes played by the flute and the fiddle are so different to the tunes played by gold and silver! In the music of these latter two Gokul’s huge residential palace has reared its head, his garage has been filled with the speediest and cosiest of cars, and his credit has spread throughout the land. But the music played by the flute and the fiddle, phew! It did not bring into existence even a single fruit in Gokul’s extensive orchard. Yet Gokul could not cast off this orphaned relation of his with impunity. So he had to suffer, poor man, Mohon’s existence in the universe and presence in the house. How hard indeed is some fellow’s lot in life, thought Gokul in self-commiseration.

But there is a limit to everything, even to Gokul’s patience and goodness.

So it happened that one night, after the day’s business was over, when Gokul went through his account he found that there was a deficit of a pie in the cash. Yet it could not be. He must have made some mistake in his calculation, Gokul thought. So he did the account all over again, but he could not detect the mistake. He went through the account a third time, a fourth time and a fifth, sixth, and seventh but always there was that deficit of a pie staring in the face like an exasperating mischievous imp.

The night was advancing. The whole nature was hushed into a mysterious silence. A full moon flooding the earth with a bright mystic light made it appear like a fairyland. The air seemed to be filled with soft whisperings and vague yearlings. Only the far-off occasional muffled barkings of a dog reminded one that it was the land of the mortals.

When exasperated but indefatigable and resolute Gokul, after giving a vigorous rub to the lenses of his spectacles and regaling himself with a biggish pinch of snuff, was preparing himself to go through the account for the eleventh time, a clear and sharp note from a violin- string came rolling in and like a sharp razor-blade slashed the atmosphere of his office-room. Gokul started as if shot. He puckered his eye-brows in deep displeasure, his forehead corrugated, and there were twitchings as if of agony and anger at the corners of his mouth. He
dropped the pen, shut the account book with a bang, pushed his spectacles up to his brow and putting on the slippers pattered out of the room.

Meanwhile Mohon had started to play on his violin a song in behag.¹ In the deep silence of the night the sad sweet notes of behag spread all over the place a sweet sadness and a yearning for the un-known and unattainable. The song in behag seemed to say:

The tears that drop from the eyes, the pearls that are born of the tears, the garland that is strung of the pearls–to whom shall I give it, oh, to whom! I cannot give it to the rich, lest it be neglected, I cannot leave it with the poor, lest it be coveted; oh, to whom shall I give it! To whom!

The tears that drop from the eyes, the pearls that are born of the tears, the garland that is strung of the pearls–to whom shall I give it, oh, to whom! I cannot give it to a beauty, lest it be disdained, I cannot leave it with plainness, lest it be grabbed with avidity; oh, to  whom shall I give it! To whom!

The tears that drop from the eyes, the pearls that are born of the tears, the garland that is strung of the pearls–to whom shall I give it, to whom shall I leave it, oh, to whom! I do not feel happy to keep it with me, I do hot feel easy in leaving it with another; oh, what shall I do with this garland, my garland, my pearls, my tears!

A small girl, as fresh as the first showers after the hottest summer months, burst into Mohon’s room breathlessly and in a warning whisper said: “Mohon-da,² uncle is coming!”

Immediately the bow in Mohon’s hand stopped, and the angry pattering sound of Gokul’s slippers was heard on the verandah.

At once Mohon dropped the violin and the boy on his cot as if they were live coals and before one could say knife disappeared into the adjoining apartment.

Gokul came in like a fiery comet in a star-spangled sky. He found the small girl standing near Mohon’s cot and angrily asked: “Where is Mohon?”

“He was here uncle, now he is gone.”

“Where is he gone?” exploded Gokul.

“I don’t know,” said the girl meekly, with scanty regard for truthfulness.”

Gokul’s eye fell on the violin lying on the cot, its heart still vibrating with the happiness of a song. He seized it venomously and with a vandal’s fury dashed it against the hard marble floor. The violin broke its belly cracked, its strings-snapped, the bridge flew away, and the pegs shot out of their holes. Somewhat appeased Gokul said: “Let me know when that good-for-nothing boy comes .”

“Yes, uncle.”

Suddenly from somewhere, not very far away, a song from a flute burst forth. The little girl bounced in ecstasy and clapping her two tiny hands exclaimed: “There uncle, Mohon-da is playing his flute!”

The strains of the song coming out from the heart of the flute were spreading in the moonlit sky like, as it were, the sweetest honey. The song seemed to say:

Music, only music, nothing but music; it is music that the moon-beams play, it is in the music of the moonbeams that the fairies are born, in music they open their eyes, in music they smile their smiles; music, only music, nothing but the music, nothing.

Old Gokul’s wrinkled face became ominously grave. Turning to the girl, he sepulchrally said: “Hereafter that boy has no place here. Tell everybody.”

The household heard the news. What they feared had happened at last.

Mohon was turned out of the house.

But Gokul could not square up his account that night.

And the flute went on with its song, music, only music, nothing but music, nothing, nothing, nothing.

Gokul is absolutely tranquil now. No disturbance anywhere, no annoyance from any quarter. No trifling talks, no unprofitable puerility. Every minute was bulging with solid usefulness. There was only the sweet and soul-enchanting music of gold and silver, the highly edifying conversation of the tradesmen, the poetry of speculation of jute-brokers, and the fairy tales of imports and exports.

Gokul is absolutely tranquil now.

But–

There is always a ‘but’ that butts in somehow.

But somewhere something seems to have gone awry.

Gokul’s account was always going wrong now. The deficit of one pie had increased to a pice, a pice to an anna, an anna to a rupee, and a rupee to several rupees. Something somewhere had gone wrong. But one did not know what and where.

Gokul’s deficit went on increasing. The deeper region in a man where the sounds of gold and silver do not and cannot reach, where tradesmen’s haggling, brokers’ bickerings, and stock-market’s garrulity are all hushed into silence, in that region of Gokul, a doubt, a suspicion, slowly raised its head. A distantly vague idea seemed to be trying to formulate itself in his mind. A big question mark–an insistent unashamed question mark–persistently floated before his eyes.

Suddenly one day he asked: “Where is Mohon?”

Nobody knew.

He ordered: “Find him out.”

A search was made for him from village to village, from one town to another, in all the relations’ houses but he could hot be found.

The trading boats arrive but their cargoes are not disembarked, the jute-brokers come with their accounts but there is none to attend to them, there is none to check figures of imports and exports.

Gokul proclaimed a reward of five thousand rupees for any information of Mohon.

Gokul’s old cronies of mammon street decided that Gokul had at last lost his head.

But none came to claim the reward.

At length Gokul said: “I myself shall go in search of the boy.”

Next day he left home.

At the end of a week, nobody knew after what itinerary and peregrination, Gokul came sad and depressed, with more wrinkles on his face, the few hairs that still remained black had all turned completely white. He could not discover Mohon.

In his hand was a brand new violin-case.

The little girl ran to Gokul and asked: “For whom is this violin, uncle?”

“For Mohon,” answered the sad old man.

“Uncle, our nurse-mother, who tells the fairy tales, the stories of the prince and the princess, of the king and his seven queens, of the wicked queen and her dream, knows where Mohon-da is,” volunteered the girl with devastating satisfaction.

The nurse-mother was the ninety-year-old maidservant who had nursed several generations of Gokul’s family, including Gokul himself.

Gokul said: “Take me to her.”

The girl took Gokul to her.

Gokul asked the reservoir of fairy tales: “Where is Mohon?”

The answer came: “He is hiding.”

“That I know, but where?”

“In the attic.”

“Of this house?”

“Sure, of this house,” assured the nonagenarian nurse-mother.

Gokul laughed, old Gokul, gold-greedy Gokul, money-grabbing Gokul, mammon worshipping Gokul actually laughed. His face brightened up, in his eyes shone a strange light which was never seen there before, several years seemed to have been taken off his . He said: “And we were scouring the whole country for him!”

And he laughed again, a boyish laugh of mirth and mystery.

Then he turned to the little girl and giving her, the violin-case said: “Give this to Mohon and tell him that he need not hide any longer.”

“Yes, uncle,’” said the girl in suppressed excitement.

Then with the violin-case she flew to the attic.

The night was rushed into silence. The digit moon drowned everything in a silvery sea. The earth appeared like a fairyland. The air seemed to be filled with strange whisperings and vague yearnings. Only the far-off occasional muffled barkings of a dog reminded one that it was the land of the mortals.

After many days Gokul has sat with his account book in his office-room and is deeply engrossed in the delights of arithmetical facts and figures.

Somebody started to play a violin. Melodies caressed out of the strings by a soft and deft hand and imploring fingers wafted into the room where Gokul was working. The old man listened to the melodies for a while. They seemed to be like a cooling balm soothing his old and jaded nerves. A suspicion of a shy smile seemed to hover round his lips. The melodies seemed to say:

Music, nothing but music, the whole universe is filled with music; nothing but that; there is music in flowers, music in colours, music in fragrance; the worlds are created in music, they live in music, they fade away in music, nothing but that…

Music, nothing but music, there is music in the maiden, music in the lover, music in their glances, music in their smiles, music in their longings, their delights, their sufferings; music, only music, nothing but that, nothing, nothing….

The violin stopped. Gokul’s footsteps, were heard outside. The little girl with a smile of triumph whispered to Mohon: “There’s uncle coming!”

The next moment old Gokul entered into Mohon’s room softly, reverentially, as into a temple, then with a bashfulness, not unworthy of a newly wedded bride, said: “My dear boy, what has become of your flute?”

“I have it, uncle,” the boy replied.

There is no deficit in Gokul’s account now.

¹ An Indian tune.
² Short for Dada which means elder brother or cousin. D is pronounced as in French.