Home To India by Jacquelin Singh

Author:Jacquelin Singh
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media

12

When the rains finally wore themselves out toward the end of August, work on the five hundred acres of farmland belonging to the family claimed everyone’s attention and energy. The swing in the neem tree was taken down for another year and another bride. It was just about the time my pregnancy was making it a queasy way to spend time anyway. Meanwhile the family had received the news of the expected child with the kind of joy and enthusiasm known only in lands where babies are always welcome gifts of the gods.

With Hari still away in Bikaner, the workload for Tej was doubled. Everyone had a job to do, except me. Or if I had one, I didn’t know what it was. Whenever I offered to pitch in, I was told I should not exert myself. Was it because I was pregnant? Because I was not capable of doing the task? Because I couldn’t even learn? The message wasn’t clear. I couldn’t settle down. A character in search of a part, I wondered what would become of our baby if one day I found I could no longer settle for this wandering about on a busy stage without being part of the action. If I simply bolted. Even my walk-on part in the kitchen appeared to be dwindling as Dilraj Kaur resumed stewardship of that vital department. Whenever I asked Udmi Ram or Chotu or Ram Piari to do something for me, they always looked to her first to see if my request should be carried out. She was “Bhabiji” to everyone, while I was simply “Bhabi,” minus the respectful suffix. To my alarm, I found myself wallowing in such concerns.

“Bhabiji says that the woman Uncle sees all the time is using black magic on him,” Rano said to me late one morning. “As if there was such a thing.”

We were taking out some lassi to Tej who was sitting in for the tractor driver that day. The man had suddenly quit over an issue that was never made clear to me: he had been caught fornicating in the sugarcane fields with the wife of another worker, or had been cheating on the diesel bill. Whatever the case, Tej was stuck with the plowing and was already waiting for the buttermilk, just out of the churn, that we were bringing him.

“Don’t you believe in black magic?” I asked Rano as we turned into the broad, tractor-furrowed path leading out to the fields.

“Of course not,” she said.

Rano is a no-nonsense type. She has gone to good schools all during Pitaji’s military career, and has had the sense to make use of a convent education as far as she’s gone.

“But the others do?” I asked.

“I suppose so. Mataji says she doesn’t give any importance to such things, but then sometimes she gets influenced. And Goodi thinks anything Bhabiji says is right.”

“How would a person use black magic, Rano?” I asked. “What would that woman in Uncle’s village be doing?”

“There’s usually some old woman in a village to go to who would tell you what to do, give you some advice,” Rano said.

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