The phone call...

A flowing stream of light streaked in from the little nick in the sturdy, wooden door. Strange patterns played on the wall opposite his study table as he sat at an angle, trapped within the wall and the door. Well, was it just a nick or several, created by the innumerable spats the door had had with the outside world, he mused.

The light trickling in and the interplay of moving images were a delight to watch. The dancing minuscule dust particles that seemed to be moving to an unheard rhapsody was fine on a cool day such as this, but in bone-chilling winters the same crevices played havoc in the room, freezing him to the core.

He stared for as long as he could at the play of light on the dappled wall, or was it the dappled light on the coarse wall that created the design?

He had never gotten down to repairing it, either because he couldn’t or because he shouldn’t? That was the only dilemma playing out in his mind day in and day out, perpetual, present and pertinent.

Well, was it the only dilemma, he laughed to himself and readjusted his otherwise fit and sprightly frame in the comfort of the armchair he had recently come to adore. An object as inanimate as the quaint wooden chair with its well defined angles seemed to catch the need of his strained or sometimes stressed-taut back. Settling in, he decided to finish the reading he had been postponing for a while.

Making the final fine tuning, reclining in the cool comfort of his room, he sank his nose into the thick tome, and before he knew it the light and air in the room had changed. From a soft, speckled one, with a trace of the quiet, to a sharp, high pitched one and the air turned just that tad bit annoying.

He put down his book and looked up, his helper who came into check on him from time to time stood mute in a corner but the high strung atmosphere in the room seemed to suggest she was upset too.

A not so young lady, with square working hands, an almost staid square frame that had perhaps bent before time, she was an otherwise very diligent, punctual and quiet worker. In the four years that he had taken refuge in the village, away from the hullabaloo of city life, she was perhaps the only connect with the so called outside world, apart from the village kids he encountered on his long meandering walks twice a day.

He liked it this way, she came in twice a day once to dust and clean the Spartan space and once to cook a measly meal, often soup or stew. If she insisted that he should eat better, he would ask her to make just what she felt like and take only a small portion, giving away all the rest to her to take home, for herself and her little daughter and old mother. She was a deserted woman he’d overheard, with no clue to the whereabouts of her husband, who was, according to village folk, a nice man.

The silence in the air seemed to get heavier and then her bangles, glass ones, bright pink, softly clinked. He swerved in his chair and immediately felt she needed to speak and was mustering the courage to do so, nervously rolling the end of her veil between her fingers, so he quipped, “I think I will have just soup for dinner, why don’t you make a nice stew for your mom and something sweet for daughter today, I may eat some too, there is enough time.” 

She seemed to be in a trance, not moving or reacting, except the strange back and forth of her square hands, she finally said in the softest, longest sentence he had heard from her, “Sahib, you are a nice and compassionate man, the village folk like you too, they are fine with my working here and you are even educating my daughter…” Yes, so, he trailed? Wondering what she was alluding to, he chose to keep his silence.

She continued, “I have often had questions about you, the life you lead, the simple uncomplicated routine you follow, where is your family? Don’t you have one?

Thank Heavens, he sighed, it was just a simple query, her ordinary curiosity or the need to strike up a friendship beyond the confines of her mundane life. “No point talking about these things, they are inconsequential, he retorted,  “I am off for my walk you make something really nice for your daughter and I will bring her some new books tomorrow, if I go into town.”

She didn’t seem upset by him not answering her questions and continued her work like always, while he stepped out into the cool evening just as the Sun rolled off the horizon. 
His walk was brisk, his steps even paced.  There was always an air of the unapproachable around him and the only ones who had managed to cross that line were the ones he had let into his space, which was almost negligible.

Another few months went by, he continued to read and write, there were no modern amenities in the little two room space; the only crowded area being his study, books, books and more books is what he surrounded himself with.

Even days held no importance for him, as his regimen was fixed and never changing, he didn’t have to be controlled by anyone’s calendar or clock but his own, but Sunday was special as he devoted three hours in the morning and sat under the dense canopy of an ancient tree, on a ramshackle charpoy and read out to her daughter or listened to her read.

She was just ten and by the standards of the village school was doing quite well. These were the most recreational and most fulfilling hours for him, only then had she seen him laugh with abandon and become a little boy with sparkling eyes as he unfolded stories of fairies and fighters, of brazenness and bravery, of travel and turmoil, of love and longing,  of distant lands and desperate plans.

She would scuttle through her work on Sunday, so she too could listen, as she hid behind the half open door watching the two.

This Sunday was no different, she sat, quiet, listening to the highs and lows of his voice as her daughter giggled or sometimes covered her ears with fear and shrieked, “Oh God Baba.” (she liked calling him that either because he was too old for her or because she saw in him her missing father’s reflection, no one could tell, but no one objected, least of all he himself as he quite liked the endearing term that also had a tinge of hurry to it).

The square lady was suddenly jolted out of her reverie-story listening stance as she heard a faint artificial sound, she had never heard before in the four years that she had cleaned, washed and cooked for this good man…she walked toward the sound emanating from behind the mini mountain of books that she had just dusted and rearranged yesterday. She gingerly peeked behind the pile and saw a shiny object and realized it was a mobile phone: couple of upwardly mobile people in the village owned one and she had hoped to acquire one soon too. Though she often wondered, who would she talk to!

She picked it up and clutching it in her hand ran out to where her daughter and Sahib as she addressed him sat, under the dense canopy of the beautiful tree, lost in a world he had woven for her with his tapestry of unending fables. “Sahib, sahib, this thing is trying to say something to you…” He looked at her confused and a bit agitated that she had the nerve to disturb their beautiful story telling session. “What, err…ummm… oh, where did you find this?” he almost yelled at her.

The little girl cowered and shrunk away as she had never seen Baba raise his voice ever, which was long, she was about five and a half when her mother had first started working for him. For the five year old, as well as the ten year old today, he was her Kabuliwala, her Mullah Nassruddin, Birbal and sometimes even Prithviraj Chauhan or a goblin or an elf and even a witch screeching across the sky on the proverbial broom. She knew by now that these were characters she would love to meet someday but her Baba was a soft and gentle person she felt most comfortable with, yet today he had lost control and yelled at her, as well as her mother.  

He took the phone and went into the room, gesticulating to both of them to go away for the day, muttering something incoherent under his breath. They had no option but to leave, unwillingly though and did so.     

He did not open the door for her the next day, stayed indoors and refrained from going for his short morning jaunt. No show in the evening either. She tried to peep through the same crack in the door, and put her ear to the door to listen to his voice, maybe he was still talking on the phone…but not a sound from within.

Three days passed and she began to get worried and finally reported the matter to the village head on day four. Just as they were deciding what step to take, as they sat huddled at the village center by the well, the village headman caught a glimpse of Baba walking very fast away from the village. They saw him simultaneously, he seemed more distant, sad and suddenly very frail, almost a shadow of himself. The village headman advised them, “He seems a little perturbed, let us leave him alone a little more, but we will all keep an eye, let us all call on him on Saturday evening.”

It was Friday, she was restless and concerned. She waited outside his hut for him to return from his evening walk, presuming that since they had all seen him get back to his routine perhaps today too would be no different. She waited till the chill began to get to her, but there was no sign of him. She was now numb with fear, bizarre ideas filling her overwrought mind about the stranger: the Sahib, who wasn’t really a stranger any more, but was certainly suddenly acting strange. That’s when her eye caught a flicker of light from the hut; a faint , dull yellow light that seemed to rise and fall like a wave from somewhere within. She walked to the hut and strained to look through the same crevice that he had once even told her about, saying that’s my only connect to the world, you know, so I don’t want to seal it, when she had informed him that the crack in the door seemed to be getting bigger by every passing day.

She stood rooted to the floor, eyes squinting through the opening to see a huddled form in the semi-darkness of the oil-lamp. What was he up to, why was he acting weird? She knocked softly while still remaining focused on him. There was no movement he seemed wracked in pain or comatose, her eyes hurt, her mind wandered. She banged the door and shouted, “Sahib, sahib, please open the door, I will go and throw the phone in the river, it is my mistake I gave it to you, Sahib, Sahib…” No response whatsoever…

She ran all the way, even forgetting to slip on the new slippers, she had bought for herself with the money she could spare, and had wanted to show to Sahib. She reached the village and told the village head that something was certainly wrong at the place she worked.

It took ten people maybe more to break open the door, only to find Sahib doubled over on the floor, clutching the phone in his near lifeless hand. They picked him up and took him down to the village hakim, who tended to him for nearly a fortnight, yet there was no change. They decided to keep him at the house of the village head as his condition seemed to be deteriorating.

With no clue as to what had lead to all of this, the little girl felt sad and forlorn, three Sundays in a row and Baba was not getting any better, wasn’t a magic spell possible she asked her mother innocently?   

She on her part, continued to dust and clean the house, one of the few that had the luxury of electricity unlike the others in her village.

Then one day she decided, when she could no longer bear to see Sahib in a state of shock and he seemed to be sinking deeper and deeper into a reckless quagmire, she decided to take the phone quietly to one young girl who was studying in college in town, one of the brighter lot from their tiny village. Someone she admired and hoped her own daughter would be like one day, someday…

The girl looked at the phone and quickly read all the messages that had been exchanged with just one person, one number. She noticed there were no outgoing calls only incoming calls from the same number, and she decided to call back the number…

It rang for a while and even without waiting for her to say hello, the voice at the other end, shrill and almost demonic ranted, “Why, how dare you call me after all I have written to you, after all I have said, why are you calling me ? I have told you once and will tell you the same again and again and again, I do not love you, never have, never will!  Also, just so you know, once and for all, I got you embroiled in the case at the college, of molesting your student; I tarnished your reputation myself, I forced the girl to give a false statement, that was the only way I could get rid of you, though in fact I wanted to kill you, but that would not have gotten me your money or the sympathy of the world, nor the freedom to live with my paramour, you boring old professor." There was a sudden static and the line fell silent.

The girl stood stunned but resolute, she didn’t say anything except,  “I  know what to do next, but I need to keep the phone with me for a day. Next day she went into town as usual but instead of attending classes reported the matter to her principal, who recalled the case from five years ago and how due to lack of evidence it had been closed but the professor had suddenly left town and no one knew where he had headed…

A year down the road , Baba as he was now fondly called by one and all, sat under the tree surrounded by children of all ages and temperament, some giggling others lost  in a faraway world and still others just gazing at him with rapt attention.

The square-handed woman, brought him a steaming cup of tea and some groundnuts and jaggery for the kids, and as she bent to hand him the glass, she whispered, “how could one phone call break you? It isn’t your fault, never was, you have been absolved long ago by the Almighty, this is your place and these little ones your world, forget the phone and the call, forget all the calls, this now is your call. She continued, just as it isn’t my fault that I am alone…

He began his tale again, the birds created a symphony of sorts, the squirrels flitted in and out from the bushes, the ants scurried around and just as the story spooled further, there was a serene calm on his face as he caught her eye, in equally focused attention, almost revering him, even though she had heard the same stories many times over in the last few years…This she decided was her call, a small smile creeping on her somber visage.

©Copyright Suverchala Kashyap