The Village by the Sea (9 page)

‘Ours! Ours! Ours!' called the people, all raising their arms into the air and waving them like so many palms on the land, so many sails on the sea.

When Hari finally reached the shop that sometimes had a consignment of ice from the ice factory in Alibagh to sell to the fishermen, he was told it had not arrived yet, there was a delay, traffic was being held up on the highway by a massive procession of farmers and fishermen agitating against the fertilizer factory.

Hari nodded. He knew all about that. But he needed the ice. He had nothing else to do with his day, so he sat down in the dust by a hibiscus bush near the shop to wait for the ice. He was glad of the shade and the quiet around the empty shop. He needed to be alone and to think things over by himself.

Since he had left his home in the morning – and indeed earlier than that, since last night when his sisters had seemed to be asking something of him without actually speaking – he had felt buffeted by the crowds, shoved now in this direction and
now in that, and did not know which way he should choose.

Down on the beach earlier that morning, he had been prevented from asking Biju for a job by the dialogue between the city man and Biju. Listening to it, he had felt that the sarcastic, knowing watchman from the city was cleverer, shrewder and more in the right than old, bad-tempered Biju and all those clownish workmen on the boat and the idle boys who dropped out of school and had nothing to do but stand around and joke and laugh. He had given up the idea of asking Biju for work and felt like crossing over to the city man's side, not to the side of the idle, lazy, clumsy village boys. He could see the sense and reason in the man's words although his way of speaking had hurt him and made him turn against him as the older villagers did.

Then, listening to the forceful speech of the young man from Alibagh – someone told him his name was Adarkar and that he was a member of the Maharashtra State Legislative Assembly whom they themselves had elected in the last elections – he had felt he must stand beside his fellow villagers and fight for the right of the farmers and fishermen to earn their living by the
traditional ways, even if he had neither land nor boat to fight for.

What should he do? Should he join the villagers and march to Bombay and take part in the protest against this taking over of their land and occupations? Or should he take the part of the government and the factory and try to find work there in the new, strange manner brought to them from the distant city? As he turned over these questions in his mind, he found it was the idea of going to Bombay that excited him most. That was partly because he was attracted to the thought of fighting for his land along with the other villagers and partly because of the thought of going to Bombay at last. Here was the chance to go that he had been waiting for all along. Did he dare to take it – a young, penniless boy who had never been anywhere?

He sat in the shade with his head bowed, drawing lines in the dust with a twig, till at last the lorry arrived with a block of ice wrapped in a gunny sack along with some other provisions – kerosene, sugar, molasses and wheat. Hari got up hastily to stand close to the block of ice while the shopkeeper chipped at it so as to make it fit into his ice box. He collected the chips in a piece of
cloth he had with him, then bought a small piece for money so as not to anger the shopkeeper, and hurried back down the beach to get it home before it melted. He felt a certain happiness in having something to take to his mother and to Lila which dispelled his worries for a little while.

As soon as he came up the path by the creek, he realized there was something wrong. He heard the wails of his sisters, loud and clear in the still house, and broke into a run, thinking it was his mother, his mother who had –

‘Lila!' he shouted. ‘Lila! What's happened?'

She was standing at the doorpost, leaning her head against it, and crying, not loudly like her sisters, but quietly and heartbrokenly. He rushed up to catch her by the arm and shout, ‘Mother? Is it Mother? Here, I've got the ice for her – here's the ice –'

She shook her head and, shutting her eyes, pointed to a corner of the hut. He went in, his knees shaking, to see, and found it was Pinto she pointed at – Pinto stretched out on the ground, stiff like a piece of board found on the beach, his
hair matted, his eyes open and sightless. He went and knelt by the dog, staring but not daring to touch.

Then Bela and Kamal came and flung themselves at him, burrowing their weeping faces into his shoulder and pulling at his arm.

‘What happened?' he asked in a whisper. ‘He was quite all right this morning.'

LiIa had come to stand behind them, crying. ‘He has been poisoned,' she wept. ‘He suddenly fell ill – started vomiting here in front of the house – blood – there was blood in the vomit – and then he fell down and died. It is poison, I know – I know,' she wailed, both in sorrow and in fear.

‘Who would poison Pinto?' Hari asked, bewildered, flinging down the piece of ice in order to touch the dog's wet, matted fur and try to feel some breath, some life left in the body.

‘I know who it was,' shrieked Kamal. ‘It was that – that horrible old man – that drunkard who lives over there,' she shouted, pointing at their neighbour's land.

‘Yes, it was he who threatened us,' said Lila sadly. ‘He did say he would punish us – that he would kill Pinto.'

‘Why?' shouted Hari, in a rage, beginning to cry a little bit himself. ‘Why should he kill our Pinto?'

‘He hates us,' Bela and Kamal wailed.

‘He said he would punish us,' Lila remembered, ‘because Father had not paid him for some toddy. He said Father owed him some money, Father was in debt.'

‘Debt, debt, debt,' Hari gnashed his teeth. ‘Father's always in debt because of toddy.' He got up and turned away from the dead dog and his wailing sisters, and walked out of the house. He would get away. He would go to Rewas. To Bombay. And never come back to this sad house, his frightened sisters, his ill mother, his drunken father. He would leave them and run, run as far away as he could go.

He did not know that next morning Biju's boat was to be launched as the tide came up with the sun. Villagers came pouring out of their huts hidden in the greenery on to the shining white beach to watch. Biju's wife had hoisted a whole cluster of flags and banners on the deck – old saris of hers cut and stitched into long banners, pink and green and violet, and flags that were a patchwork of several saris, patterned and flowered and checked in saffrons, maroons and blues. The newly painted signboard was up on the cabin wall, bright blue and pink. Biju sat resplendent on his folding chair, his arms folded across his chest which swelled with pride.

Last evening the boatbuilders had sunk two winches in the sand, attached by strong ropes to the boat. Now, in the morning, palm tree trunks were laid across the sand from the boat to the edge of the sea. A man carrying a tin full of black oil was painting the trunks with it to make the boat slide easily. Biju's wife and daughter stood ready with trays of sweets to pass around as the boat flew down into the sea. Now the wife stepped forward to break a coconut open on its prow where a pair of eyes had been painted, black and white. The coconut cracked and spattered to shouts and cheers from all.

Now the boat was heaved up and lifted on to the oiled tree trunks. The bamboo poles that stuck out of the winches like so many arms were seized by the sweating, muscular workmen who began to wrap them round and round, unwinding the ropes with such enthusiasm that the boat, which was not held back with any other ropes, lurched wildly across the greased logs and tilted dangerously, listing to one side and making everyone abandon ropes and run for their lives. There it tilted, drunkenly, nearly toppling on to its side and falling on the sand.

The happy beam was wiped off old Biju's face and a cloud as black as thunder crossed it. He got
off his folding chair and came waddling down to see what had happened. His wife and daughter stood clutching their trays of sweets in silent dismay. The young boys who had gathered to stare all hooted and laughed. The boatbuilders stood about, grinning foolishly. No one knew what to do next.

Biju cursed the workers, lashing them with abuse. ‘Should have brought my men from Alibagh to do it – you pumpkins from the fields, what do you know about boats?'

‘Where are they today, your men from Alibagh?' asked a man with casually folded arms.

‘They've all gone to Rewas today, to catch the boat to Bombay,' answered one of the young boys, laughing. ‘They're going to try and stop the government from building the fertilizer factory here. They want to go on being farmers and fishermen and fools all their lives,' he hooted, waving at the confused scene around the hopelessly toppled boat. ‘All our lives we're supposed to go on building tubs like this one here, and go to sea in them to drown.'

‘Oh, is that so?' Biju turned upon him. ‘You don't know how to build boats, how to fish, how to sail – you know nothing – you young jackass. What you need is a good thrashing.'

‘We know better than that, old Biju,' answered the young boy coolly – it was Hari's friend, Ramu. ‘We will get jobs in the factory. We will have good, safe jobs and money in our pockets while you go out fighting the sea to catch a few stinking fish. Then we'll see who knows better, you or we.' All the boys who stood around him, listening admiringly to his speech, began to laugh at the old man and his boat, calling it ‘pumpkin-shell' and ‘empty coconut' till he raised his heavy-muscled arms in the air and roared at them, ‘Get out, get away from here before I get my stick and lay it across your backs.'

They turned away laughing and one of them asked, ‘Where's Hari? He hasn't come to watch the fun.'

‘Dunno,' replied Ramu. ‘D'you think he's gone to Rewas with the men from Alibagh?'

‘He'd be a fool if he has,' said another.

They drifted off, kicking up sand as they went. Some stayed back and stood about while the workmen tried to pull the ropes and right the boat, then gave up. ‘Let's wait till the tide comes up,' they said, wiping the sweat from their faces. ‘The tide will set the boat right and it'll launch itself,' they explained to Biju and
also drifted away, saying they were tired and wanted tea.

Only Biju, his wife and daughter, all in their new clothes, were left on the beach, helpless. After a while the heat of the sun drove them away too.

The tide did not come up high enough to lift the boat. Next day the men tried again to upright it and launch it, but so dispiritedly, so without will or enthusiasm, that they failed. They had to try again and again, for many days – angry with Biju for forcing them to do it, and Biju angry with them for failing – and finally they inched it down the beach to the tide line where it was put to sea quietly and ignominiously in the dark of the night.

By then Hari was so far away from Thul, he had forgotten all about the boat
Jal Pari
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