Once upon a time there was a zamindar, a
landlord, in Bunglistan who had a son about whom he was very worried.
The son’s name was
Shubhrolochon Chottopadhyay, and so naturally everyone called him Babai. And though
his father had brought him up from birth to take over the feudal zamindari, he
showed absolutely no interest in it at all. Instead, he grew up strong-willed
and headstrong, and spent his time in the fields and wrestling pits during the
day and the shops of the village market when night fell.
In vain did his mother
try and plead with him. “Babai,” she said, “you really must take some interest
in the zamindari. You’ll have to take it over one day, you know.”
“I’m not interested in
being a zamindar,” the incorrigible young man retorted. “I’m interested in
wrestling, and playing dice in the shops in the market in the evening, and
watching the girls go by on their way to the pond in the palm tree grove to
bathe.”
“But...” the poor
woman protested. “What will happen to the zamindari if you don’t take it over?”
“I couldn’t care
less,” Babai told her. “It can go get eaten by a rakkhosh for all I care.”
This was of course not
something that reassured the poor lady, and she went to report to her husband,
who, predictably, erupted with fury.
“I’ll have him
whipped!” he yelled. “I’ll have my men thrash him till he doesn’t know what his
name is! Where is he?”
“Wait!” his wife begged. “I have an idea. Why
not get him married? Once he has a wife to care for, and later children, he’ll
calm right down.” She looked discreetly away from her husband’s bulging eyes
and tomato-coloured face. “I’ve never known it to fail.”
“All right,” the lord
and master of the house said in disgust. “I leave it to you. Find a wife for
the brat if you can. After all, it was you who spoilt him, who stopped me from
beating him when he was a kid. A few good thrashings then and we’d never be in
this state now. I kept telling you, but you...”
Finally getting him to
simmer down, Babai’s mother went to her room to think. “There’s no point asking
Babai whether he’d agree,” she decided. “He’s as stubborn as his father. The
only thing to do is find a few eligible girls, and ask him to choose one of
them. I heard that the Mukhopadhyays’ daughter is of age to get married, and it’s
possible that they’re looking for a suitable match. I’ll start there.”
So she asked her
friend Shondhya, who knew the Mukhopadhyay family well, about the daughter.
“Yes,” Shondhya admitted, “I heard that they’re looking for a match. However, I
also know a couple of other girls who are prettier and more religious, and more
obedient to their parents’ orders than she is. I heard...” she leaned close to
her friend’s ear and lowered her voice to a mere stentorian shout. “I heard
that the Mukhopadhyay girl was seen last Pujo festival stepping out of her house alone.”
“Really?” Babai’s mum gave a delighted gasp of horror.
“Yes,” Shondhya
confirmed. “What’s more, she didn’t have her head covered and had shoes on.”
The description of
such depraved behaviour was extremely delightful to Babai’s mum, of course, but
it failed to solve the problem of what to do about finding a wife for him. “You
said you know a couple of other girls,” she said. “Please send the word round.”
“I’ll do that,” the
response came. “I’ll find your son a wife, or my name isn’t Shondhya
Bondopadhyay.”
Within a week, she was
back with a list of names. “This one’s of best birth,” she said, “but that
one’s family is richer. This one here’s the prettiest, with eyes just like a cow’s,
but that one can sing best. And she’s also the best cook. But this other one
can dance, and also does alpona decorations very well.”
“I’ll show Babai the
list and make him choose one,” the zamindar’s wife said with great
satisfaction. “He’ll choose one of them, I’m sure.”
So she showed the list
to Babai, and he snatched it out of her hand and tore it to pieces. “I’d rather
marry a...a ghost...than one of those
stupid girls,” he said.
“Go then,” his mother
shouted right back, consumed with anger at the prospect of all her hard work
going up in smoke. “Go and marry a ghost. See if I care.”
“Fine, I will,” Babai
said, and stormed out.
Now, as everyone
knows, Bunglistan is overrun with ghosts, and one can’t even whisper in a
corner without the risk that a ghost might be eavesdropping. And since both
Babai and his mum were screaming at the tops of their not inconsiderable
voices, it wasn’t long before the word was out among the ghosts that there was
a human out to marry one.
“Maybe some pretty
young ghost should try her luck,” the ghosts laughed. “A nice young petni or
shakchunni could land the husband of her dreams!”
Now, among the ghosts
there was a young petni, whose name was Kadombini, and whom everyone called
Kadu. She was also a real embarrassment to her parents, whose status was very
high among the ghosts, because she absolutely refused to behave as a nice young
petni of high birth and good breeding should.
One time, for
instance, she’d found a Brahmin conducting a ritual in the yard of a house on
the outskirts of the village. While any other ghost would have either made
himself scarce, unable to stand the noxious clouds of eye-watering smoke rising
from the ritual fire, or at the best stayed at a safe distance to watch, Kadu
had no such inhibition. And she noticed that, next to the fire, there was a
huge mango tree, laden with unripe fruit. Sneaking into the branches, she
watched with great interest.
The Brahmin had poured
another spoon of ghee into the fire, and while it hissed and sputtered, he’d
turned to the house owner. “Another handful of cowrie shells, if you please,”
he’d said.
The house owner, who’d
been growing paler and paler as the ritual had gone on and on, had turned white
to the lips. “Again? I’ve already paid you nine times!”
“What can I do?” the
Brahmin had replied, pointing to the palm leaf manuscript from which he’d been
reading his prayers. “It says right here that the priest has to be paid now.”
“But I’m almost out of
cowries,” the house owner had protested. “I can’t...”
“Shut up and pay,” his
wife had hissed, digging her elbow into his side. “Otherwise you won’t get
merit to get into heaven.”
“It’s not heaven I’m worried about,” the
unfortunate man had whined. “It’s getting into debt. And don’t forget that this
whole ritual is to get us out of debt.”
He’d turned to the priest. “Can I pay in...” (casting a desperate glance up at
the tree) “...mangoes?”
“Please don’t joke,”
the priest had replied severely. “The manuscript says you have to pay in cowrie
shells, or...” His eyes had roamed speculatively towards the wife’s wrists. “In
gold. If you have no cowrie shells you could pay in gold. It says so right
here, as you could see for yourself if only you could read Sanskrit. Since you
can’t...”
A small mango had hit
him at that moment, right on his shaved head. Hard.
“What...” the Brahmin
had begun. “Who dares...”
Another mango plonked
itself down, bang in the middle of the ritual fire. The indescribable odour of
charred unripe mango had filled the air.
“Take the payment in mangoes,”
a voice had said from the tree. “If you know what’s good for you, that is.”
The Brahmin had turned
a shade of green not unlike an unripe mango that has been suffering from
anaemia. “I think I just remembered a shloka that allows payment in mangoes
after all,” he’d said hurriedly.
This was the kind of
petni who, sitting on her favourite branch of the tamarind tree behind the
village temple, heard that a human had pledged to marry a ghost. And she
shivered with such glee that the entire branch shook hard enough for all the
crows sharing it with her to take off, cawing.
“Wants to marry a
ghost, does he?” she said. “Well, we
shall see, we shall see.”
Now, Babai, having
stormed out of the house, had gone to his favourite spot in the fields, from
which he could watch the girls go by on the way to the pond to bathe. Today,
though, there were no girls to watch, because it was already well past the hour
when they went to bathe. Feeling cheated and disgusted, and with the idea that
the whole world was conspiring against him, Babai finally stalked off to the
pond itself, hoping to see some latecomer village maiden immerse herself in its
scummy waters and emerge, sari clinging transparently to her wet body, with
nothing left to the imagination. His thoughts went back to the unforgettable
occasion he’d caught a glimpse of Snigdhokumari Mukhopadhyay, her red-bordered
white sari almost as transparent as air, as she’d disported herself in the
water. But that had been several weeks ago and he’d never even seen her again,
in dry clothes or otherwise.
As it happened, Kadu
had had the sudden idea that she should clean herself up a bit before going to
stalk this stupid human who had the unbelievable audacity to talk of marrying a
ghost. Being a total tomboy petni, she’d never had a particular interest in
hygiene, and her hair was covered with dried leaves, twigs, and crawling with
all manner of ghostly lice, while as for her finger- and toenails...even she was embarrassed about her finger-
and toenails.
“If I’m to have some
proper fun with this man,” she decided, “I’d better go and clean myself up a
bit, or he’ll be scared off right away. I’ll have to...”she shuddered at the
thought. “I’ll have to bathe and wash
my hair, and file my nails short on some rock. Still, it’s a price worth paying
if it means that I can have some fun. I’ve never really had much fun since that
time with the Brahmin and the mangoes.”
So she went off to the
pond, which was, as she’d anticipated, deserted at this hour. Even the fisher
ghosts were sleeping in their holes in the banks, and the ghosts in the palm
trees were hanging head down among the coconuts, waiting out the day, so she
was assured of privacy. With one quick look around, she stripped and washed her
clothes, which were as dirty as she was. Then she spread them out to dry on the
bank, and immersed herself in the water, thrashing around as quickly as she
could to get it over with. And it was exactly as she emerged, freshly washed,
that Babai appeared on the scene.
The zamindar’s son had
hoped, at the best, to catch a glimpse of a turned back or the bulge of a
breast. What he saw instead was a female form standing knee-deep in the pond,
and – if he could believe his eyes, which were goggling as much as his father’s
in a rage – without a stitch of clothing on.
Kadu, who was relieved
that she’d got the disagreeable bath over with, had found a piece of rough
stone and was industriously filing her nails on it. So intent was she on this
task that she quite failed to notice the young man who was standing on the
pond’s bank with his mouth hanging open and his eyes popping halfway out of his
skull. And she’d just finished with her last toe that she heard a kind of
gurgling noise and looked up.
Now, Babai – whatever
his other faults – was a very good looking young man. And Kadu, for a petni,
was strikingly beautiful, and her tomboy unlifestyle had kept her figure in
excellent shape.
“What a handsome man,”
the young petni thought, “even if he has that imbecilic look on his face. What
a pity that he’ll probably scream and run away any moment, as soon as he
realises I’m a petni.”
“What a lovely girl,”
part of Babai’s mind thought, while the rest of it was far too occupied in
goggling at Kadu’s exposed charms. “What a lovely, lovely girl.”
There is no telling
how long the two of them might have stood gaping at each other if there hadn’t
been an interruption at that point. And it was about the rudest kind of
interruption there could possibly have been.
As everyone knows,
apart from ghosts, the other thing Bunglistan is famous for is bandits. In fact, just as ghosts lurk in
each tamarind tree and curl up in the crevices of every ruined temple, each
forest track and back road is ceaselessly roamed by gangs of vicious bandits
looking for plunder and women. And at that precise moment a gang of bandits
arrived at the pond.
The bandits were
tired, and had been travelling a long way. Their initial plan had been to rest
a while by the side of the pond, quench their thirst from the scummy water, and
try and catch a few fish for their supper. Business had not been great in a
while, because the countryside was so oversupplied with bandit groups that the
competition was murder. So the robbers had been trying to find some village
which was still an unexploited resource, but had met with no success
whatsoever, and their supplies of both loot and morale were almost exhausted.
At the head of the
bandit gang was the dreaded Ya Borogöf. Actually, Ya Borogöf wasn’t all that
dreaded. In fact, among the hierarchy of bandits he was strictly small fry. But
he wanted to be dreaded, and was
always looking for an opportunity to be dreaded. And the first thing he saw was
the young man standing by the pond side, staring at something with his mouth
open.
“Get him!” Ya Borogöf
shouted. “He’s well dressed and looks as though he’s from a rich family. We can
get a good ransom for him.”
At the shout, Kadu –
whom the bandits couldn’t yet see because she was hidden behind palm trees – snatched
up her clothes and quickly put them on. By the time Ya Borogöf saw her, she was
almost modestly dressed, with the hood of her sari pulled low down over her
features.
“Two of them,” the
bandit chief hooted in delight. “One can fetch us a good ransom, and the other
will do us well as a maid to cook and clean for us. Get them both.” Rushing
forwards, the bandits seized Babai first, because he was closer, and tied him
up with ropes before he could even start struggling. Then they turned to her.
Now, of course, if
Kadu had wanted, she could have escaped at once. But she was worried about the
handsome young man the bandits had captured, who was now crying out piteously
and uselessly for help. And also, her sense of adventure was aroused. This
promised to be the most fun she’d had
in a long, long time.
“You don’t need to tie
me up,” she said, trying to keep her voice in as low a bass note as she could,
so that she sounded like a high-pitched human female. “I’m just a weak woman, as
you can see. What could I do to all of you big, strong men?”
The bandits looked for
instruction to Ya Borogöf, who nodded. “Don’t tie her up. In any case, she can’t
cook and clean for us if she’s tied up. You,” he turned to her. “You go and
gather firewood, and then you can cook a meal for us.”
“A meal, is it?” Kadu
thought to herself, inwardly grinning. “Oh, you’ll have a meal, all right.”
“And don’t think of
running,” Ya Borogöf added, as he and his men luxuriously sprawled on the pond
bank. “Or we’ll just cut the throat of your friend here.”
Babai made some
inarticulate noises and started to struggle, so the bandits decided to gag him.
Since they hadn’t any spare cloth to gag him with, they ripped off his tunic
and tore it up to use as a gag. Kadu’s eyes bugged out at the sight of his
chiselled muscles, honed at the wrestling pit.
“He’s got as good a
body as he’s handsome,” she thought. “I wish it were he who wanted to marry a
ghost, not whichever twerp I cleaned myself up for. He wouldn’t have to look
any further.”
“What are you wasting
time staring for?” Ya Borogöf demanded. “Firewood, and then food. Quickly, now.”
So Kadu went off among
the trees, until she was out of sight of the bandits. “Wood ghosts,” she
called, in her normal voice. “Ghosts of all the dead wood here, gather the broken
sticks and dried leaves together and bring them to me.” And the ghosts pushed
all the dead branches and broken wood together, so that in only moments she had
such a huge bundle to carry back that if she was a human, she couldn’t have
done it in one trip.
Ya Borogöf and his men
didn’t seem to find anything surprising in how quickly she was back. “Learnt
your lesson quickly, did you?” the bandit chief said. “All right, make a fire
and get to cooking.”
“What can I cook?”
Kadu asked. “I don’t have any food.”
“Catch some fish then,”
Ya Borogöf said lazily. “We don’t have any food either.”
“All right,” Kadu
said, hiding a grin in the hood of her sari. “I’ll be back soon.” Walking along
the bank of the pond, she reached the far side, where the men couldn’t see her
properly, and waded into the water.
“Fish ghosts,” she
called, knowing that she was quite safe to do it at this hour, because the fisher ghosts were all asleep in their
holes in the pond banks. “Ghosts of all the fish who died in this pond, bring
fish to me. You know which fish I mean.”
And so, even as Ya
Borogöf yawned and began to think about oiling his gigantic moustache, the
young petni returned, staggering under an armful of fish. “I’ll start cooking
right away, shall I?”
“Yes, of course. You’ll
make a good maid, if you keep working as hard as this. Today’s our lucky day.”
Without saying a word,
pausing just long enough to dart another admiring look at Babai’s bulging muscles,
Kadu put down the fish and started making the fire. Meanwhile, Ya Borogöf
decided to interrogate his captive and took off his gag. Babai instantly burst
into a torrent of infuriated speech.
“One more word,” Ya
Borogöf said, once he could get a syllable in edgewise. “Just one more word out
of you, and I’ll cut your tongue out. You will only answer my questions, and
nothing else.”
“If you cut my tongue
out,” Babai pointed out, “you won’t get any answer to your questions anyway.”
“In that case,” Ya
Borogöf snapped, “I’ll punish the woman, your lady friend there. You won’t get
into trouble, she will.”
Babai thought of the
girl’s lovely body, and ached to be able to see it again. “Don’t hurt her,” he
said. “I’ll tell you what you want to know.”
“He’s honourable as
well as handsome,” Kadu thought, and her heart shivered with delight. “I do
believe I’m falling in love. What a pity I’m going to have to let him go
afterwards.” Sighing with regret for what might have been, she prepared the
fire.
“The zamindar’s son,
are you?” Ya Borogöf was saying meanwhile, his heart leaping with joy. “We’ve really struck it lucky, then. Just
imagine the ransom we’ll get for you.”
“You’ll get nothing, I’ll
bet,” Babai retorted. “My father thinks I’m useless.”
“Does he?” the bandit
inquired. “Why?”
Babai shrugged as well
as the ropes would let him. “I’m not interested in being a zamindar,” he said. “I’m
not interested in gouging rents out of the peasants’ labours. I’m not
interested in sitting in an office all day looking to see how I can cheat on
the taxes I owe to the king. I’m interested in wrestling pits and girls.”
“And does your father
gouge rents and pay taxes?”
“Does he?” Babai repeated,
scornfully. “You think you’re
robbers? He probably loots more in a month than you’ve done in all your lives.”
“That’s good,” Ya
Borogöf said, his eyes gleaming. “It’s very
good. That means all the more for us. Whatever your father thinks, I’ll bet he’ll
be more than glad to pay up if we send him...one of your ears, for example.”
Babai was just drawing
breath to say what he thought about this, when Ya Borogöf picked up his huge
hooked sword and reached for his ear. With
a sigh, Babai – who wasn’t fond of knives, let alone swords – fainted dead
away.
And at that very
moment, Kadu called from the fire. “Here, Sir Bandit Chief, I have a problem.”
“What problem?” the
robber chief asked, turning.
“You told me to cook
the fish, right? But I don’t have the special salt to cook them with.”
“What special salt are you talking about,
woman?” Ya Borogöf moved towards her threateningly, ear-cutting temporarily
forgotten. “Whoever heard of fishes needing special salt?”
“The fishes themselves
did, of course,” Kadu said, and poked the nearest fish. “Here, tell him.”
The fish lifted its
head and stared at the robber chief. “We’re the best fish,” it said. “We refuse
to be cooked with anything but the very best salt, from the mines of the King
of the World Above. Heaven, in other words.”
“That’s right,”
another fish said. “Who do you think you are, trying to have us cooked with
anything but that precious salt?”
“But...but...” Ya
Borogöf began, his mind boggling too far to form words properly. “But...”
“I know where to get
this salt,” Kadu said cheerfully. “I’ll just fetch it, shall I?”
And she began to grow.
And she grew. And she grew. In moments she towered as high as one of the palm
trees around, and then she reached out a hand into the sky. And reached out,
and out, and out.
“Oops,” she said,
looking down at the bandits, who were staring up at her, paralysed. “I’m just unable to reach the salt. But if
one of you gentlemen could climb on my hand, I’m sure you could fetch it for
me. So...” And she bent towards them, grinning. “So, just which one of you shall it be?”
A few moments later,
Babai reluctantly regained consciousness as pond water was splashed in his
face. Forgetting that his hands were supposed to be bound, he tried to rub his
face dry, and discovered that he could
rub it dry, because his hands were no longer bound. And his head seemed to be
cradled against someone’s soft bosom.
Opening his eyes, he
looked up into Kadu’s grinning face.
Now, Kadu had two
grins. One was the one which had just sent the bandits rushing away, screaming
with terror. The other...the other was the one she was now bestowing on Babai.
“My hero!” she said. “You
saved me!”
“What?” Babai shook
his head and sat up. “What do you mean? Where are those horrible robbers?”
“Don’t you know?” Kadu
asked. “Just as they were going to punish me for not having their fish cooked,
you burst your bonds, and beat them up so badly that they all ran away. Have
you really forgotten all that, or are you just being modest?”
Babai expanded his
chest proudly at the thought, and then deflated it again. “It can’t be,” he
said. “It must have been you who chased them away.”
The petni nodded reluctantly.
“You’re right. You’re honest as well as handsome, I see. But, yes, you’re
right. I did chase them away. Never mind how.” Getting up, she started walking
away as quickly as she could, so that the wonderful young man couldn’t see the
misery in her ghostly eyes. “Well, it was nice knowing you.”
“Wait!” Babai called,
scrambling to his feet. “Don’t go. You’re as capable as you’re beautiful. It’s
such a pity that you aren’t a ghost.”
Kadu frowned over her
shoulder. “What on earth are you talking about?”
“I vowed to my mother
that I’d marry a ghost,” Babai confessed. “If I hadn’t made that vow, I swear you’re
the one I’d marry.”
Kadu turned, her
ghostly heart thumping. “My love,” she said. “There’s something I have to tell
you...”
*******************************************
All the ghosts said it was the best wedding they’d
ever seen.
The humans, even Babai’s
mother’s friend Shondhya, said nothing at all. They too busy trying not to
gibber.
The final comment came
from Kadu, as she snuggled up to her new husband afterwards.
“That was the best fun I’ve ever had,” she said.
Copyright B Purkayastha 2017
Another outstanding story. I have no idea how stories get published. If you're an American with a Harvard degree and you submit, the editors will fix, it will get published, promoted, and will probably be a best seller. If you're not from an Ivy League school, you'll probably get a 'Does not fit our needs at this time' pre-printed note.
ReplyDeleteThis is an outstanding story. It has just enough foreignness, but not too much. Someone who is not an Hindoo can understand (most) of it.
One tiny problem: "After all, it was you who spoilt him, who stopped from beating him when he was a kid." Something is either missing or is unnecessary from this sentence.
But a great story.
MichaelWme
Fixed! Great.
DeleteMichaelWme
I like the Bunglistan stories. The ghosts are always pretty great.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, although I realize they are based on some genre I'm not familair with, I don't even have to understand the genre. The ghosts in the trees just really enterain me.
Very nice story Bill. You are so inventive with your stories. Thank you for sharing them with us.
ReplyDelete