Our Favourite Indian Stories (6 page)

He answered his own questions, 'Because of ignorance and illusion these birds do not see pain.' But the answer put his thoughts in a turmoil. 'What is the cause of an animal's ignorance and illusion? Desire.... appetites? If so, then such desires and appetites must be part of its body and soul. If this were a part of God's design, how could it work against God's will? Is not man's nature a manifestation of God?'

Once again the ascetic's eyes turned to the fluttering wings and the cries of the birds on the peaks. The two were now lost in the processes of procreation. Needak felt an unfamiliar urge stir through his veins. The moment, however, was lost in a haze of confusion. Why was his mind so crowded with arguments and doubts? Could one look for happiness through self-denial? Drawing a deep breath he whispered to himself, 'Is the struggle for life opposed to the laws of life?'

The sun had dipped towards the West. It was the moment when Nature appeared to be flowing naturally towards its consummation. A sound in the river attracted Needak's attention. His gaze fell on a deer skin and an ablution bowl kept on the banks. Whose was it?

He stood transfixed at what he saw. Siddhi, the young nun was standing shoulder deep in water. In the gradually gathering dusk she dipped herself in the river again and again. Her movements agitated Needak's pulse as much as they did Narmada's water. He looked on, spellbound.

At last she waded through the river towards the bank. Needak looked unblinkingly at the gradually emerging figure. His breathing became hard. Strange feelings rose from his heart into his throat.

Apparently secure in this secluded spot, Siddhi stripped off her wet garments. Carefully, she wound the deerskin around her middle, and covered her breasts with the plantain bark. Then she filled her bowl with water and, making an obeisance to the sun, which was now concealed behind multicoloured clouds, she proceeded towards the hermitage.

A sudden movement made Siddhi look in his direction. Coming towards her with long strides was ascetic Needak. She greeted him with bowed head but her body trembled with apprehension.

She awaited the ascetic's command. Needak's gaze was upon her embarrassed figure. After a while he spoke in a trembling voice,

'Nun, what is the goal of life?'

'Life's goal is salvation from life's bondage,' she answered.

Looking at her intently he questioned, 'Is life's goal its own destruction? What is life, Sister?'

Eyes lowered, she said, 'According to the seers, life is a bondage of pain.'

Needak went on, 'Life is a bondage of pain and the same life has as its goal freedom from itself? Nun, forget what is said. Consider this. Does the life-giving Brahma, the creative life force, create life only to end it? Does it will its own destruction? Such an argument appears illogical!'

Pausing a little, Siddhi replied, 'This topic has never arisen in our Maharishi's discourses. How would the Enlightened One explain it?'

Ignoring her question Needak pursued, 'Which is life's deepest pain, Sister?'

Siddhi's answer was brief, 'Death.'

A faint smile appeared on Needak's lips. Siddhi looked away at the Narmada.

Needak exclaimed, 'Death! Nun, in life's progress death is inevitable. It is foolishness to fear death. Death is not the end of life; it is only the end of one link in life's chain. To continue life is life's main goal. To doubt this goal, to oppose this goal, to fear unhappiness and look for ways to end it - is that life's purpose? Nun, desire is life; love is life; life's demands are natural. Has life never beckoned you towards it?'

Siddhi answered tremblingly, 'O source of light, my penance and meditation are incomplete. My soul has not yet received the light.'

'Nun, I'm not thinking of the light that is arrived at with eyes closed. I'm thinking of the wisdom one gathers from the experience of life!'

Her voice faltered, 'I do not follow the Enlightened One's words correctly. Please enlighten me about life!'

Taking a deep breath Needak answered, 'Narmada's flow is Narmada's life. If you try to reverse its course the result will be unnatural. If this river, imagining its flow to be painful were to oppose it, what sort of salvation could it expect?'

Siddhi bowed down and pleaded with folded hands. 'Enlightened One, my soul is weak and full of ignorance.'

Needak replied, 'Nun, do you take the love of life itself as weakness? By calling life lust and appetite and pitting all of life's energy against it — you are only trying to forget what life really is all about.'

Siddhi remained unaware of Needak's fast pulse. What she could sense, however, was a sudden change in his tone. The ascetic who had given his morning discourse in a calm, majestic voice and the one who now spoke in a trembling, hoarse voice appeared to be two different persons. Meeting him in solitude, where she could well have expected to feel a certain hesitation only caused a strange sweetness to enter her soul. Looking down on the ground she said, 'Would the Enlightened One initiate me into Wisdom?' 'Wisdom!' Needak exclaimed and took a deep breath. His gaze fell once again on the peaks where the pair of kites was still busy creating new life. Their love play reached a climax and they broke away from each other, their cries echoing in the gathering dusk. The waters of the Narmada reverberated with the sound. 'Look - that way...' cried Needak, pointing upwards.

Siddhi looked up. She had watched such love transactions earlier. On all such occasions she had turned her eyes away and by controlling her mind and senses had striven to save her spirit from corruption. In the presence of the youthful ascetic, however, her body felt a sudden anguished restlessness. She lowered her eyes, her face reddening.

Needak's breathing became faster; his nerves were taut like the strings of a
sitar
. The nun's body pulled him like a magnet. He restrained himself with difficulty as he looked at the lowered eyes of the blushing girl. Coming a step nearer to her he whispered in a trembling voice, 'Is this corruption and sin? Is life the result of sin and corruption?'

Tremblingly, the nun answered, 'Lord, such conduct, according to the sages, is due to the ignorance of the soul; to be in lust is to stray from the true path of salvation. They say that life is an illusion and a mirage.'

Coming a step still closer to the nun, Needak said, 'Is this suffering, nun? Do you really believe that this pair of kites is crying because of the fear of life and death? Does it appear to them as mere illusion? Are they not involved with their entire being in the joyous task of creating life?'

'Is this life a delusion, nun?' He flung the words again at the silent figure of Siddhi. 'To deny the joy that one can get out of one's senses and to take the consequent happiness as pain-Is this right? Is it the truth? Are we really supporting Brahma by believing that all his Creation is a mirage and an illusion? Are we not taking truth as falsehood and falsehood as truth?'

Siddhi remained silent.

Pointing with his little finger, Needak exclaimed, 'Nun, do you not harbour in your heart the surge of this life-force? Don't you too feel this struggle, this assertion of life?'

The nun lifted her half-closed eyes for a moment, 'O Enlightened Master, your words are true. I'm a weak soul; I have not yet been able to master my senses completely!'

Needak put his hand on Siddhi's shoulder. He felt her body tremble. Supporting her with one arm, he tilted her chin up with the other and whispered, 'Is the touch of my harsh body painful to you, Siddhi?'

Leaning towards his body, Siddhi muttered in a broken voice, 'No, it is an unknown quantity, quite unfamiliar, quite... something dear, very dear....' Her voice became hoarser. The knot of her hair was now resting on Needak's broad chest. His lips touched her wet, sandy hair. Startled, Siddhi straightened herself and gasped, 'O Enlightened One, the darkness of ignorance overpowers me; please show me the light.'

'The light of knowledge!' His voice grew in power. 'Sharpen your senses; the way to wisdom is through sensibility. To repress and crush human nature is ignorance.' Feeling weak, Siddhi placed both her arms and her weight upon Needak's shoulders.

Making a double pair of footprints, they proceeded towards a deserted part of Narmada. The cool rays of the stars, piercing through the monsoon clouds seemed to express satisfaction at this earthly transaction; Nature seemed to be conspiring with the creation of life.

It rained in torrents the next morning. But the sages and inmates of the hermitage, who stuck to their rules without fail, gathered as usual beneath the giant banyan tree for meditation and sermons. The fragrant smoke from the holy fire, moved by the breeze, seemed to have become entangled amidst the trees and become strangely motionless.

The absence of Needak and Siddhi from the previous evening had become a cause of concern for all the hermits.

In his discourse that morning, Sage Deerghaloma pointed out, 'Lust is man's greatest foe. In the flames of lust, man's knowledge is reduced to ashes.'

At daybreak, in one of Narmada's caves, Needak stretched himself languidly, still drowsy with sleep. The movement woke Siddhi. Even before he could open his eyes, she covered her body with a deerskin. Looking outside the cave she exclaimed, 'The
Brahma-Muhurta
must have been on for quite sometime!'

'Yes,' Needak answered, 'the time for immersion in the
samadhi
has passed.'

Drawing Siddhi to himself, he held her by the nape of her neck, 'Tell me the truth. You have tried to be forgetful of the self for so many years. For so long, you have tried to forget the world through
samadhi
. But, truthfully, have you ever been as content, as self-forgetful as on this night?'

And he smiled into her sleepy eyes.

Once again, self-abandon took possession of Siddhi, 'Arya, you speak the truth!'

Translated by
Keshav Malik

Edited and condensed by
Ms. Neelam Kumar

Nirmal Verma

Bano had to cut across three goat-paths to reach our house. 'Any news?' She always fired the question at me immediately on entering the room. I was sorely tempted to lie to her and say, 'Yes, there is. It's all settled. We'll be leaving for Delhi soon.' But I refrained from doing so. Bano was too shrewd not to see through my lies. Instead, I lay silently, with my eyes closed.

As usual, she came over and felt my forehead. When her touch was cold, I knew that my fever had not gone down. But when it was warm I felt elated. Eagerly opening my eyes I would ask, 'Bano, don't you thing I am getting better?'

Looking disappointed, she would reply hopefully, 'But your temperature is bound to shoot up in the evening!'

She was unhappy whenever my temperature came down. She knew that as long as my fever lasted I could not leave her and would stay put in Simla. Sometimes when I heard her footsteps, I quickly applied a wet towel to my forehead.

'Feel my forehead.' I would reach for her hand and brush it against my brow.

'Cold, is it?' Without a word, Bano would start looking out of the window.

Outside, one could see the forests enveloped in a blue haze, and lofty mountains, range upon range. When the curtain fluttered in the breeze, the room was drenched with a dream-like fragrance, wafted from afar.

'Beyond those mountains, lies Delhi. You know that, of course,' I said.

Bano nodded. She had no interest in Delhi, had never been to that city. Her father's office remained in Simla all the year round. I pitied her.

'I have been to our house,' she said changing the subject.

The mention of "our house," which on other days swept me off my feet, today held no interest for me.

'Bano, you can keep my share of plums,' I said, without opening my eyes.

'Who would care to eat your rotten plums?' Bano said, peeved. 'Take them along when you go to Delhi — your precious cargo of rotten plums!' She went into the verandah.

It made me angry. But when one is ill, one cannot work himself up to a high pitch of anger. In illness, all feelings peter out without reaching the crescendo of passion. If one cries, no tears come — only the eyelids flutter. If one feels exhilarated, the heart does not beat faster — only the lips tremble.

The house, which Bano had referred to as "our house", was said to be haunted and lay deserted all the year. They said an English woman had committed suicide in this house. We would store our treasure trove of raw plums and apricots in one of the bathrooms. It was a closely guarded secret and no one was aware of our secret.

Bano kept swinging in the verandah for a long time. As the swing went up, her
salwar
puffed out like a balloon. The rhythmic creaking of the swing acted like a soporific; I dozed off and dreamt. I always remembered the dreams I had in the afternoons. I dreamed that the
chaprasi
had come from the office to fetch father's lunch. He laughed and told us that we would soon move down to Delhi. Then I saw Bano throwing apricots out of the window of the haunted house. Far away in the hills, I could see the English woman who had committed suicide, leaning out of the window of the Kalka-Simla train. With outstretched hands she grabbed at the apricots which Bano was casting to the winds.

When I woke up, Bano had been gone a long time.

In the evening when mother brought in the tea I asked her if the
chaprasi
had come in the afternoon.

'Yes, he did. Why?'

'Did he tell you anything?'

'No, nothing. What's the matter with you?'

I kept silent. Propping myself up against the pillow, I sipped my tea.

After some time mother took my temperature and immediately after, jerked down the column of mercury. Previously, I used to insist upon knowing my temperature. But she was reluctant to tell the truth and I stopped asking. I tried to guess it by watching the expression on her face. Sometimes when I became grave she would say, 'Now get well, and then we shall leave for Delhi.' She said it in a casual manner, as if it was entirely up to me to get well or remain ill; as if I was keeping ill out of sheer obstinacy and that I had to be cajoled into getting well. This would put me in a temper, and turning on my side I would lie facing the window. For a long time she would not realize that I was angry, till I stiffened my legs, clenched my fists, grit my teeth and started breathing heavily.