The Home and the World, Rabindranath Tagore [robert munsch read aloud txt] 📗

the house occupies a place of specially

tender affection in a Bengali household (perhaps in Hindu

households all over India) because, by dictate of custom, she

must be given away in marriage so early. She thus takes

corresponding memories with her to her husband's home, where she

has to begin as a stranger before she can get into her place.

The resulting feeling, of the mistress of her new home for the

one she has left, has taken ceremonial form as the Brothers' Day,

on which the brothers are invited to the married sisters' houses.

Where the sister is the elder, she offers her blessing and

receives the brother's reverence, and vice versa. Presents,

called the offerings of reverence (or blessing), are exchanged.

[Trans.].

Chapter Nine

Bimala's Story

XV

FOR a time I was utterly at a loss to think of any way of getting

that money. Then, the other day, in the light of intense

excitement, suddenly the whole picture stood out clear before me.

Every year my husband makes a reverence-offering of six thousand

rupees to my sister-in-law at the time of the Durga Puja. Every

year it is deposited in her account at the bank in Calcutta.

This year the offering was made as usual, but it has not yet been

sent to the bank, being kept meanwhile in an iron safe, in a

corner of the little dressing-room attached to our bedroom.

Every year my husband takes the money to the bank himself. This

year he has not yet had an opportunity of going to town. How

could I fail to see the hand of Providence in this? The money

has been held up because the country wants it--who could have the

power to take it away from her to the bank? And how can I have

the power to refuse to take the money? The goddess revelling in

destruction holds out her blood-cup crying: "Give me drink. I am

thirsty." I will give her my own heart's blood with that five

thousand rupees. Mother, the loser of that money will scarcely

feel the loss, but me you will utterly ruin!

Many a time, in the old days, have I inwardly called the Senior

Rani a thief, for I charged her with wheedling money out of my

trusting husband. After her husband's death, she often used to

make away with things belonging to the estate for her own use.

This I used to point out to my husband, but he remained silent.

I would get angry and say: "If you feel generous, make gifts by

all means, but why allow yourself to be robbed?" Providence must

have smiled, then, at these complaints of mine, for tonight I am

on the way to rob my husband's safe of my sister-in-law's money.

My husband's custom was to let his keys remain in his pockets

when he took off his clothes for the night, leaving them in the

dressing-room. I picked out the key of the safe and opened it.

The slight sound it made seemed to wake the whole world! A

sudden chill turned my hands and feet icy cold, and I shivered

all over.

There was a drawer inside the safe. On opening this I found the

money, not in currency notes, but in gold rolled up in paper. I

had no time to count out what I wanted. There were twenty rolls,

all of which I took and tied up in a corner of my sari.

What a weight it was. The burden of the theft crushed my heart

to the dust. Perhaps notes would have made it seem less like

thieving, but this was all gold.

After I had stolen into my room like a thief, it felt like my own

room no longer. All the most precious rights which I had over it

vanished at the touch of my theft. I began to mutter to myself,

as though telling mantrams: Bande Mataram, Bande Mataram,

my Country, my golden Country, all this gold is for you, for none

else!

But in the night the mind is weak. I came back into the bedroom

where my husband was asleep, closing my eyes as I passed through,

and went off to the open terrace beyond, on which I lay prone,

clasping to my breast the end of the sari tied over the

gold. And each one of the rolls gave me a shock of pain.

The silent night stood there with forefinger upraised. I could

not think of my house as separate from my country: I had robbed

my house, I had robbed my country. For this sin my house had

ceased to be mine, my country also was estranged from me. Had I

died begging for my country, even unsuccessfully, that would have

been worship, acceptable to the gods. But theft is never

worship--how then can I offer this gold? Ah me! I am doomed to

death myself, must I desecrate my country with my impious touch?

The way to put the money back is closed to me. I have not

the strength to return to the room, take again that key, open

once more that safe--I should swoon on the threshold of my

husband's door. The only road left now is the road in front.

Neither have I the strength deliberately to sit down and count

the coins. Let them remain behind their coverings: I cannot

calculate.

There was no mist in the winter sky. The stars were shining

brightly. If, thought I to myself, as I lay out there, I had to

steal these stars one by one, like golden coins, for my country--

these stars so carefully stored up in the bosom of the darkness--

then the sky would be blinded, the night widowed for ever, and my

theft would rob the whole world. But was not also this very

thing I had done a robbing of the whole world--not only of money,

but of trust, of righteousness?

I spent the night lying on the terrace. When at last it was

morning, and I was sure that my husband had risen and left the

room, then only with my shawl pulled over my head, could I

retrace my steps towards the bedroom.

My sister-in-law was about, with her brass pot, watering her

plants. When she saw me passing in the distance she cried: "Have

you heard the news, Chota Rani?"

I stopped in silence, all in a tremor. It seemed to me that the

rolls of sovereigns were bulging through the shawl. I feared

they would burst and scatter in a ringing shower, exposing to all

the servants of the house the thief who had made herself

destitute by robbing her own wealth.

"Your band of robbers," she went on, "have sent an anonymous

message threatening to loot the treasury."

I remained as silent as a thief.

"I was advising Brother Nikhil to seek your protection," she

continued banteringly. "Call off your minions, Robber Queen! We

will offer sacrifices to your Bande Mataram if you will

but save us. What doings there are these days!--but for the

Lord's sake, spare our house at least from burglary."

I hastened into my room without reply. I had put my foot on

quicksand, and could not now withdraw it. Struggling would only

send me down deeper.

If only the time would arrive when I could hand over the money to

Sandip! I could bear it no longer, its weight was breaking

through my very ribs.

It was still early when I got word that Sandip was awaiting me.

Today I had no thought of adornment. Wrapped as I was in my

shawl, I went off to the outer apartments. As I entered the

sitting-room I saw Sandip and Amulya there, together. All my

dignity, all my honour, seemed to run tingling through my body

from head to foot and vanish into the ground. I should have to

lay bare a woman's uttermost shame in sight of this boy! Could

they have been discussing my deed in their meeting place? Had

any vestige of a veil of decency been left for me?

We women shall never understand men. When they are bent on

making a road for some achievement, they think nothing of

breaking the heart of the world into pieces to pave it for the

progress of their chariot. When they are mad with the

intoxication of creating, they rejoice in destroying the creation

of the Creator. This heart-breaking shame of mine will not

attract even a glance from their eyes. They have no feeling for

life itself--all their eagerness is for their object. What am I

to them but a meadow flower in the path of a torrent in flood?

What good will this extinction of me be to Sandip? Only five

thousand rupees? Was not I good for something more than only

five thousand rupees? Yes, indeed! Did I not learn that from

Sandip himself, and was I not able in the light of this knowledge

to despise all else in my world? I was the giver of light, of

life, of Shakti, of immortality--in that belief, in that

joy, I had burst all my bounds and come into the open. Had

anyone then fulfilled for me that joy, I should have lived in my

death. I should have lost nothing in the loss of my all.

Do they want to tell me now that all this was false? The psalm

of my praise which was sung so devotedly, did it bring me down

from my heaven, not to make heaven of earth, but only to level

heaven itself with the dust?

XVI

"The money, Queen?" said Sandip with his keen glance full on my

face.

Amulya also fixed his gaze on me. Though not my own mother's

child, yet the dear lad is brother to me; for mother is mother

all the world over. With his guileless face, his gentle eyes,

his innocent youth, he looked at me. And I, a woman--of his

mother's sex--how could I hand him poison, just because he asked

for it?

"The money, Queen!" Sandip's insolent demand rang in my ears.

For very shame and vexation I felt I wanted to fling that gold at

Sandip's head. I could hardly undo the knot of my sari,

my fingers trembled so. At last the paper rolls dropped on the

table.

Sandip's face grew black ... He must have thought that the rolls

were of silver ... What contempt was in his looks. What utter

disgust at incapacity. It was almost as if he could have struck

me! He must have suspected that I had come to parley with him,

to offer to compound his claim for five thousand rupees with a

few hundreds. There was a moment when I thought he would snatch

up the rolls and throw them out of the window, declaring that he

was no beggar, but a king claiming tribute.

"Is that all?" asked Amulya with such pity welling up in his

voice that I wanted to sob out aloud. I kept my heart tightly

pressed down, and merely nodded my head. Sandip was speechless.

He neither touched the rolls, nor uttered a sound.

My humiliation went straight to the boy's heart. With a sudden,

feigned enthusiasm he exclaimed: "It's plenty. It will do

splendidly. You have saved us." With which he tore open the

covering of one of the rolls.

The sovereigns