Before We Visit the Goddess by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

Author:Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

The situation was worse next month. The tenant did not pay. Now he wasn’t answering their phone calls. One day, Bela saw the woman in the grocery. She wondered if she should say something. When the woman caught sight of her, however, she turned and moved quickly away, her small heels skittering on the Dur-A-Flex. Finally, one evening, Sanjay and Bishu went to the house in an attempt to talk to the tenant. When they rang the bell, no one opened the door, although Bishu was sure he caught a movement at an upstairs window. Sanjay tried their extra key, but the lock had been changed. Bishu shouted and banged on the door. It was no use. After a while a burly man came out of a neighboring house and told them to quit making such a racket and leave. Otherwise he would call the police.

Sanjay told Bela all this, pacing up and down the dining area, while Bishu sat at the table, holding his head in his hands. Bela had never seen him this way, and it frightened her.

“Can’t we go to the police ourselves?” she whispered. “Surely there’s some procedure to evict people for not paying rent?”

Bishu stared down at the table. He’d been ebullient the last time he came to the house, bringing expensive, out-of-season mangoes because Bela loved them. “You need to eat special things at this time,” he had said. “If there’s anything else you want, tell me and I’ll get it. That’s the uncle’s job.” Now his lips moved soundlessly and he dug at the tabletop with a fingernail.

Sanjay said, “Eviction is a messy process. I looked into it. First we’ll have to serve a notice, then go to court to get a judgment. Just that much would take another month. Then we’ll have to serve the judgment to the tenant, then go to the police for . . .”

Bishu shook his head. When he spoke, Bela had to lean in to hear him. “No police,” he rasped. Was it just his natural distrust of American institutions? Or had he been in some kind of trouble in the past? Did he have a record he couldn’t afford to have scrutinized?

“But Bishu-da,” Sanjay said, “I don’t have enough money in the bank for my share of next month’s mortgage. Neither do you.”

When Bela turned eighteen, Sabitri had given her a gold chain, fastening it around her neck with her cool, skillful fingers. It was a thin chain, nothing special, and Bela hadn’t cared for it much in India. But here she wore it every day because it bore her mother’s touch. Apart from her wedding ring, it was her only piece of jewelry. Now, hiding the pang she felt, she took it off and slid it along the table toward the men.

“No!” Sanjay whispered. There was a broken look in his eyes. But it was Bishu who pushed the chain back toward her.

“What kind of men would we be if we sold our women’s jewelry?” he said roughly.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.