Mango Chutney: An Anthology of Tasteful Short Fiction. (27 page)
Read Mango Chutney: An Anthology of Tasteful Short Fiction. Online
Authors: Gabbar Singh,Anuj Gosalia,Sakshi Nanda,Rohit Gore
“What kind of disease you have afflicted me with, Manojwa? Arun Babu
gave you a letter addressed to me yesterday and you are coming to deliver
it to me today. If the letter had gotten lost, I would be robbed off my
world. I would have never gotten to know that someone loves me too;
that in the life of a simple halwai, flowers can bloom and
ras
8
can dissolve.
You are very cruel, Manojwa.”
Manoj had finished the milk-cake by then. He gulped a glass of water
and got up to leave for the bank. He had to sweep the floor and dust the
furniture before the bank opened. Watching him go, Lachhuman said,
“Keep a watch, Manoj. If you find a letter fallen here and there, do not
throw it without checking if it’s for me.”
This time, Manoj replied very patiently, “Don’t worry. Whenever I find a
letter, I’ll deliver. The next time she comes, I’ll run and call you immedi-
ately. I also want to have a glimpse of her.”
8 Nectar
Why should Manoj have a glimpse of her? No, he doesn’t have the right to look at her.
Why should he interfere in between the two of us? He handed me a letter; I treated
him with sweets. Task done. Now, he should care about his life.
ed reading it line by line.
Respected,
No. Dearest is the only right word to address you.
So dearest,
I don’t know your name, so I am not writing that. While going to Sasaram yesterday,
I had the privilege of eating milk-cakes at your shop. I had never had such good
milk-cakes in my life. The bus had halted just for two minutes, that’s why I couldn’t
meet and congratulate you in person. I was fortunate that I was sitting on the window
seat that faced your shop. When I saw you at the counter, I realized that such good
milk-cakes could only be made by hands as beautiful as yours. While returning from
Sasaram a few days later, I shall definitely buy milk-cakes, a kilo of them, I promise.
Please value my admiration for you and cover the platter containing sweets with a layer
of polythene or a dish. Would you want your Lakshmi to fall sick because of eating
milk-cakes infested with flies? No, right?
Lachhuman read the letter many times. For a second, he thought it might
be a prank played on him by Manoj. Manoj’s notoriety was quite famous
in the town. Once, a drama-group had arrived in Bikramganj. A lot of
locals had assembled to attend it. The organizer had tried every measure
to shush the crowd so that the drama could start but nothing worked.
Manoj, had gotten up from his seat, walked up to the dais, grabbed the
mike and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, before the programme begins, I’m
going to make animal voices. First of the lot is an ant. Listen carefully…”
and within a minute, the entire hall had turned as silent as a grave.
After carefully studying the handwriting and the language of the letter,
Lachhuman thought, “No, Manoj cannot write this. He has no issues
with sweets put out in the open. He has been eating sweets kept like
this for years. Nobody in Bikramganj has had any complaints. For sure,
she is from some nearby village who has become aware of hygiene after
going to a city like Patna. Her demand is fair enough. What’s the prob-
lem if I cover sweets? Nothing. Next time she passes by, she shall be so
happy. Yes, Lakshmi, I’ll fulfill your wishes. You called me ‘dearest’. It’s
my duty to take care of your wishes. And religion, too, my dearest Lachhi.
And yes, the next time, do write my name. Lachhuman is my name. Full
name Lachhuman Kumar Yadav. If you wish, you can call me Lachhu,
too. Lachhu and Lachhi. Manoj was right, we are made for each other,
indeed!”
Lachhuman looked to his left and right and embraced the letter. “Yours,
Lakshmi,” the words seemed to cuddle him. With utmost caution, he
preserved it inside the wooden box that kept all his money, under a small
wad of hundred-rupee notes.
Lachhuman’s food, ungenerosity and foul mood had become history now.
Throughout the day, he imagined Lachhi’s face in front of him, scanning
each and every face among the passengers, trying to find the woman who
had claimed to stare at his beautiful hands. Bholu was bemused to find his
otherwise irate boss smiling often. At noon, Lachhuman called Bholu and
handed him a ten-rupee note from his prized wooden box, saying, “Go
watch a
filum
at the Ganga Theater. I heard it is Amitabh Bachchan’s.”
“Are you alright?” asked Bholu, staring at his master’s smiling face. Lach
-
human needed time by himself. Whenever there were no buses, he busied
himself in carving Lachhi’s face and outlines in his mind, re-reading the
letter and replaying the scenes. Somehow, he managed to pass the day. At
night, when his wife served him food, he got up after just a couple of
mouthfulls. His wife, assuming he was tired, didn’t bother him. But when
she found him staring relentlessly at the ceiling, she was understandably
frightened.
Aaj badhiya khoa nahin mila kya jo khoye khoye lag
rahe ho
?” Didn’t you find good
khoa
today that you are so lost?
“Nothing like that.”
“Then?”
“Nothing.”
“There must be something. I have never seen you like this.”
“You won’t understand. Go to sleep.”
The second day, Manoj dropped at his shop at 6.30 a.m. to have his free
cup of tea. Lachhuman, for the first time, felt outrageously happy upon
seeing him. This time, without being prompted, Lachhuman offered him
a plate of milk-cakes along with chai. Manoj was surprised to notice a
thin polythene sheet draping the gargantuan platter containing a lump
of milk-cake. The flies that had asphyxiated themselves by diving into
the wad of the fluffy milk-cake had been removed; their slimy corpses
huddled together outside, near the shutter, making a small hill on which
ants noiselessly feasted. Manoj analyzed the milk-cake in his hand, like
always. It appeared clean, edible.
“How did this miracle take place?”
“Your
kripa
9
.”
“
Matlab
? What does that mean? I didn’t do anything!”
“Yes, you haven’t done anything. It’s Lachhi’s blessings.”
“Lachhi? Who is Lachhi?”
“The same woman, whose letter you delivered yesterday. Lachhi. She’s
going to return on the same path a couple of days later. If she sees it, she
will be so happy.”
Manoj couldn’t believe his ears. Lakshmi had done something that no
-
body in Bikramganj could. When the previous bank manager, Verma
sahib, had given Lachhuman a long plastic wrapper to cover his sweets
from flies, he had indifferently passed it on to Bholu to use it as a bedsheet cum blanket. Arun Babu didn’t even try since Verma sahib had
already warned him of Lachhuman’s incorrigibility.
couldn’t address me by my name.”
Manoj promised Lachhuman that he’d find out which village she be
-
longed to, where her maternal and in-laws house was, what her husband
did for a living, or if she still was a spinster, and where she travels to every
weekend.
“Do try to find out if she’s unmarried,” Lachhuman said.
“Don’t you worry. If God wishes, she will never get married.”
“What if she turns out to be married?”
“I pledge to your milk-cake, if I don’t go to her
sasural
10
and break off
her marriage, I will change my name from Manoj Paswan to … Manoj
Fail-wan.”
Both broke into giggles and Manoj got up to leave. He removed the thin
layer of polythene, shoveled out a spoon of milk-cake without Lachhu-
man’s permission and departed. Lachhuman mumbled curses as usual
but soon his thoughts converged onto the single-minded pursuit of his
newfound love.
A week passed after Lachhuman first received the letter. In that one
week, Lachhuman had let his beard grow , “What if Lakshmi comes and
goes when I’m shaving my beard at home? I cannot take this risk.” Like a
soldier, he steadfastly stood at the same counter of his shop where Lak-
shmi would have first seen him. He went home only to sleep. Keeping all
his sweets covered in the past week had won him some more customers,
increasing his sales and popularity. The drivers and the conductors of the
buses were astonished to see the change in him. They recommended his
shop to the passengers, “Hurry up! Go and buy sweets for friends and
family. You won’t get such a clean shop anywhere else hereon.”
The following week, Arun Babu summoned Manoj and passed a letter
over to him. Lakshmi’s letter. Manoj was dumbstruck. How could he have
missed her? He who could mimic the voice of an ant’s won’t be able to
mimic the voice that Lachhu so desperately wanted to hear. Manoj wrung
his hands in anger. Lachhuman would gnaw through his brain like a rat,
not forgiving him for missing the opportunity to make him meet Lachhi.
letter carefully and asked Arun Babu, “Sir, when did she come?”
“When you had gone to meet Bada Babu five minutes ago.”
“Why didn’t you stop her sir?”
“She was in a hurry.”
“Didn’t you ask for the name of her village?”
“Most probably, it was Mohanpur.”
every household there. I will soon find her out.”
Arun Babu whined, “No need to waste your time needlessly. Why should
we care? We are doing this just to fulfill someone’s wishes. Go and deliver
the letter quietly. Next time, I will make it clear to her that we are not
postmen.”
“When is she going to come next? I had to tell her Lachhuman’s name.”
“How would I know? By the way, Lakshmi knows Lachhuman’s name.”
“Sir…Lachhi, not Lakshmi. Lachhuman was saying.”
“Wah. I didn’t know love could captivate him so soon.”
As if an ant had bitten at Manoj’s sleepy brains, he was confused and
restless. How did Arun Babu know Lachhi’s name? He recalled how
Arun Babu had fallen severely ill last month. Several bottles of antibiot-
ics had to be dripped into his veins to save his life. The doctor had said,
“It’s an acute stomach infection, food poisoning. It seems as if he has
eaten something stale and moldy.” Arun Babu returned to duty after one
month, so thin and malnourished that Manoj couldn’t recognize him in
the beginning. It was cholera, he’d mentioned. The day after, Arun Babu
had handed over Lakshmi’s first letter to Manoj.
that you were such a great
kalakaar
11
. You surpassed me as well.” Arun
“Now tell me, how to handle Lachumanwa.
Saala
, he has become a Dev-
das longing for Lakshmi. He is counting days, repeating when Lachhi
would return and show him her face.”
Arun Babu took the letter from Manoj’s hand. Adding a line to it, he said,
“Now, go give this to him. After the working hours end, we will think of
a solution.”
Manoj hopped, flew and jumped across the road towards Lachhuman’s
shop. For a second, he unblinkingly adored Lachhuman. Gullible, naïve,
adrift in his own world. He was busy slicing milk-cakes after milk-cakes
from the giant plate, lovingly decorating the steel tray with them. The
next minute, he who was feeding his fantasy, felt bad for Lachhuman, but
the fragrance of the fresh milk-cakes soon numbed his conscience. He
passed the letter to Lachhuman.
Delirious with joy, Lachhuman behaved as if he had found a hidden
treasure. He took out two large pieces of the milk-cake and fed Manoj
with his own hands. Manoj explained, to Lachchuman’s utter dismay, how
he couldn’t get a glimpse of Lachhi once again. “Next time, pucca,” he
promised. Swallowing his guilt along with the milk-cake, Manoj decided
to wait for Arun Babu’s master plan and took leave of Lachhuman. Lach-
human sneaked back into the makeshift toilet and opened the letter.
I’m very happy to notice that you have started to keep the sweets covered. My admiration for you has now become twofold. That you cared about my wish, it makes me feel
so blessed. As I’d promised, yesterday while returning, I bought one-kilo of milk-cake
from your shop. While handing over some change, your finger touched my hand. A
shiver ran through my body. Even now, I can feel a slight quiver. For once, I saw
you through the veil too. Your beard suits you. Within a couple of days, I’m going to
return, again.
With a promise of meeting enclosed.
Yours,
Lakshmi.
After reading the letter a dozen of times, Lachhuman started to shake
his head. “When did she come? When did she buy the milk-cake? Where
did she go? I didnt even notice. Like God, she went without giving me a
darshan
.” He looked at his fingers intently. The sheer sight of them made
him tremble. He decided not to wash that finger until he met Lachhi. He
did recall that the previous night at eight, there had been a veiled woman
who bought one kg of milk-cake. Shaking his head once again, he opened
his wooden box and placed the second letter along with the first. Before
shutting it, he compared both letters. The same handwriting; the same
fountain pen. Lakshmi had poured her heart into the letter. Lachhuman
swayed with joy and passed on sweets to the customers waiting for him
at the counter.
ning on becoming a saint? Heading for a long beard!”
12
.
Jogi.
”
This jogi was sure that two days later he’d meet his dearest and feed
her milk-cakes, the best ones of the lot, with his own hands much like
Shabari fed
ber
to Rama. But this jogi’s wife’s days and nights had become
harrowing. Her thoughts pictured different explanations for the behavior
of her husband. She contemplated on calling an
ojha
, a tantric from a vil-
lage nearby who specialized in shunning ghosts out of those possessed.
But the sudden hike in the sales of the shop kept her content. Whenever
Lachhuman put his daily earnings on her palm, she would say, “May God
keep you sane. I don’t want anything else,” and put the money in the
locker.