Gill said, ‘Nayyar is a lawyer. He will think of arguments to support whatever he wants to say to you. The divorce law is a complicated business.
It’d be better if Puri started divorce proceedings.’ Until now Gill took comfort from the fact that Puri wanted to divorce Kanak, but now there was a cause for concern. Kanak was going to Jalandhar to decide on her next move.
Since Kanak didn’t know the exact date of her travel, she’d written to Kanta that she’d try to reach Jalandhar by the next Sunday. She could foresee having hectic discussions with her sister and jija, and had decided to leave Jaya behind despite Kanta’s repeated asking to bring her along; besides, Panditji will worry and brood even more in Jaya’s absence.
When Kanak got off the train at Jalandhar station, the June sun was dazzlingly bright. Kanak kept her eyes downcast as she came out of the railway station to avoid meeting anyone she knew, and took a rickshaw to Nayyar’s house near the law courts. As fate would have it, someone called, ‘Bibiji, namaste,’ when the rickshaw was going past the intersection of Chahar Bagh.
It was Chaila. He got off his bicycle when he saw Kanak, with a beaming smile on his face. Then he got back on and began to cycle next to the rickshaw as he explained that Puri had asked him to take a letter to Mehraji’s house. He was surprised that Babli was not with her mother, to which Kanak had no answer.
When Kanak’s rickshaw took the road to Nayyar’s house, Chaila warned the driver, ‘Where’re you going? Go to Model Town. ‘
Kanak had to explain, ‘I’ll go first to my sister’s house.’
Chaila thought that Kanak had brought something for Kanta from Delhi, and that she would go to her own home after meeting her sister. He pedalled rapidly towards Model Town to give the news to Puri.
Kanak was meeting her jija, Nano and Dheeru after two years. She hugged and kissed the children, had a light-hearted banter with Nayyar and filled her sister in on news about Jaya and pitaji. The excitement of Kanak’s arrival was not yet over when the telephone rang. Nano ran into an inner room to answer it. She called out to her daddy.
Nayyar returned after answering the phone with a worried expression on his face, ‘How did Puri come to know that you were here?’
‘I met that idiot Chaila on the way.’
‘Really? That means the approach I had in mind to talk to him has gone completely haywire. Puri asked why he was not told about your coming here. I had to say that you had not told us either, and that you had arrived this morning.’
‘I don’t want to talk to him,’ Kanak said, eyes downcast.
‘But who am I to tell him that he can’t meet his wife or he can’t talk with her. You don’t understand the legal implications of saying that. He’s coming to see you right now.’
‘You should’ve asked me first.’
‘How’s that possible? How could I tell him that I’ll have to take his wife’s permission?’
Kanta, standing close by, said, ‘It’d have been better if we’d first discussed the matter among ourselves.’
‘That’s what I’d planned,’ Nayyar admitted, ‘but how could I say no to him? He’d have thought that I was being difficult.’ He turned towards Kanak, ‘Listen, Kanni, we both would like to ask you not to spoil everything.’
‘What do you mean by spoil? Everything’s been decided. Pitaji already wrote to you about that.’
Nayyar tried to soothe her, ‘Yes, pitaji did write about that, but Puri does not want to divorce you. He’ll think that pitaji and we are pushing you to divorce him. You should broach the subject yourself. Ask him to give reasons for his decision, and tell him yours. He should at least have some chance to have his say. You decide once you’ve heard his side of the story. He’ll probably arrive in a few minutes. He’s got a car. Whatever other shortcomings Puri might have, he really loves you. It’s also the question of Jaya’s future. Talk to him with restraint, don’t shoo him away. Kanni, we both request you that whatever you want to say to him, say it politely.’
‘Kanni, we want a compromise …’ Kanta was saying when they heard footsteps in the stairs. She kept quiet.
Puri came in without knocking. He was dressed in clothes of snow-white khadi.
‘Come! Come!’ Nayyar welcomed him warmly. ‘You gave us no time to telephone and tell you. We hadn’t recovered from the surprise of her showing up unexpectedly when you rang.’
‘It came as a surprise to us, why should he be surprised?’ Kanta said lightly. ‘Her heart must have telegraphed his heart that she was arriving. And for all we know, she sent him the news and came here first so that he may come with the car to take her home.’
Puri gave her a thin smile.
Kanak sat with her head bowed.
‘Let’s have tea now. Kanni told us to wait for you,’ Nayyar said, giving
Puri’s shoulder a playful whack. ‘What’s new?’ He could not think of anything appropriate to say.
Puri wiped the sweat off his brow with a handkerchief, ‘The sun gets scorching so early in the morning.’
Nayyar replied that at night it was so hot they could not sleep on their roof without an electric fan.
Kanta left the room, grumbling Nano would be late for school. Nayyar sat for a couple of more minutes, ‘The hot spell will last for another two weeks. The monsoon clouds have only reached Bombay. The communists will now complain that the Americans have unsettled the weather by testing hydrogen bombs.’
Nayyar said when the servant brought tea, ‘You both sit in my room. The servant will next dust this room. Mine’s been dusted.’
Puri rose to his feet, but Kanak remained seated, her head bowed. Nayyar gave Kanak a pat on her back, ‘Come on. Get up. After only six months at your parent’s home you’ve begun to behave shyly just like a new bride.’
Kanak had to get up when Nayyar pulled her by her arm.
Nayyar took them both to his room. He took Kanak’s arm and sat her on the bed. ‘You both have a cup of tea. I’ll have tea after I’ve had a wash.’ He switched the fan on and smiled as he closed the doors, ‘No one will disturb you.’
The room had a bedstead, a chair and a low stool. The servant boy put the tea tray on the stool.
Puri sat beside Kanak. Every nerve in his body was jangling on being alone with Kanak after such a long time. He said in a choked voice, ‘You didn’t even tell that you were coming.’
Kanak sat with her arms crossed and eyes downcast. She kept silent.
‘Kanni!’ He said in a soft, low voice and put his arm round her shoulder.
Kanak got up from the bed and sat on the chair.
Puri’s ardour cooled and turned sour. He took a moment to gather his wits, and said, ‘Kanni, I feel the same for you today as I did before and after our marriage. Come, let’s go home.’
Kanak shook her head.
Puri said after a brief silence, ‘Our house belongs to you, not me. I bought the house because you wanted me to. You should live there. Throw me out when you don’t want me. I promise that I won’t ever do anything against your wishes.’
Kanak again shook her head.
‘Any particular reason why you don’t want to live with me?’
Kanak said, ‘It’s not possible.’
‘Why is it not possible?’
‘It isn’t.’
‘I promise that the thing you disliked,’ Puri said in pleading voice, ‘it won’t happen again. I’ll never insist on a husband’s right over his wife or that we have a relationship. It’s your home and you live there.’
Kanak said ‘no’.
‘Why it’s not possible when I am prepared to accept all your conditions?’
‘There’s no sense in doing that if there’s no relationship between us.’
‘You mean no other relationship is possible except physical?’
Kanak realized that Puri was trying to put her on the defensive and make her feel embarrassed by being deliberately obnoxious. She replied, ‘That relationship is the most important between husband and wife.’
‘I think there can be much more besides.’
‘The much more part is also possible in other relationships.’
Puri had to shut up. He said after a brief pause, ‘Do you really have that much loathing for me?’
‘What’s the point of such talk?’ Kanak said, her gaze lowered.
‘But why can’t we live together when I am ready to accept anything you say?’
‘There’s no point in living together when there’s no relationship.’
‘You have no relationship with me?’
Kanak shook her head.
‘I am the father of your daughter. I have a right over her.’
‘You have no such right.’
‘How can you say that?’ Puri said, thinking that he had found a strong argument in his favour.
‘She’s my daughter.’
‘She’s your daughter, but I too am her father. She’s also my child. A father has his rights and moral obligations to his children.’
‘You suspected Urmila was pregnant when you threw her out. You had cried for that reason. What about your rights and obligations to that child?’ Kanak looked at him waiting for an answer.
Puri said after a slight hesitation, ‘I was guilty of not meeting my obligations because of the circumstances or my own weakness. But now I
am willing to meet my obligations and I do have a right.’
‘Mother’s rights come first. I am not asking for a provider or a shelter for my daughter. I don’t need it.’
‘Kanni, what will we do in the future?’
‘What we are doing now.’
‘Is this the ruination of our marriage?’
‘It was you who wrote to pitaji that you had lost your patience and wanted a divorce. I want the same thing and pitaji also thinks that it’d be the right thing to do.’
‘I never wrote those words. I can’t even think of divorce.’
‘But I want it.’
‘Kanni, what’s happened to you?’ Puri said, with a catch in his voice. ‘We won’t be able to face the world.’
‘Why should we live in a world of make-believe? It’s a matter of fact, we don’t need to shout about it from the rooftops.’
Puri was silent.
Kanak also sat quietly with her eyes fixed on the floor. She heard what sounded like Puri attempting to hold back his tears. It’s nothing but theatrics, she thought. She turned away her eyes and said, ‘Can I go?’
Puri took a deep breath, ‘Our relationship will not be broken no matter where you are and what you do. You won’t get a divorce.’
‘But I want it.’
‘Why must we keep up appearances for the sake of people?’
‘Pretending that we are together is keeping up appearances. Why should I hang on to the moulted skin of a dead snake?’
‘You want freedom? You want to get married again?’ Puri asked in a cold, hard voice.
‘I’ll do what I want.’
‘Who do you want to marry?’
‘It’s none of your business.’
‘Gill?’
‘Mind your own business.’
‘It
is
my business. You are my wife.’
‘I am not. You yourself said that you wanted to give up your right to be my husband.’
‘I said that because I felt sympathy for you. But you deceived me and you betrayed my trust.’
‘I never deceived you,’ Kanak said firmly. ‘The day it became impossible for me to go on with the relationship, I told you plainly. Neither did I deceive you, nor do I intend to.’
‘I’m not going to divorce you. I won’t end our relationship so that you can be promiscuous.’
‘You won’t end the relationship because you want to take your revenge on me and to ruin my life!’
‘I’ve never been revengeful or cruel to anyone. Urmila had to leave only because of you. It’s you who has caused all this trouble.’
‘I know how cruel you’ve been to Urmila, to your parents and to Tara. Whom have you not deceived and betrayed?’
‘I’ve been cruel to Tara?’
‘I know all about it.’
‘Fine if you do,’ Puri said, gnashing his teeth.
After a brief silence, Puri again said, ‘You didn’t say anything about divorce when you went away, or I would have thought along that line.’
‘I had no such idea in my mind at that time.’
‘Someone coached you in Delhi?’
‘No one coaches me.’
‘The person who coached Sheelo could have also coached you.’
‘That’s not true. It’s a false accusation.’
Seeing that Puri was leaving, Kanak said, ‘If you don’t divorce me, I’ll divorce you.’
Puri was going towards the stairs when Nayyar called out to him and took him into his office. Placing his hand on Puri’s shoulder he asked, ‘How did it go? Did you talk some sense into her?’ Puri’s face was flushed with anger. He was unable to speak. After a few moments he expressed his surprise, ‘You told me not to think about divorce, but she’s insistent on getting a divorce. She says that pitaji also wants the same thing.’
‘That must be a recent development. She must have insisted and pitaji would have agreed with her. The whole idea sounds absolutely preposterous! What do you want, because she can’t go against the family’s wishes. Are you willing to be patient?’
Puri took a deep breath, ‘I don’t mind. You yourself said that it was a preposterous idea.’
‘All right, then.’ Nayyar said by way of reassurance, ‘She can’t do everything as she wishes. Let her stay in Delhi for now.’
Nayyar and Kanta wanted Kanak to give up her idea of divorce, but she did not relent. All three had long discussions and Kanak was told ‘You live in Delhi, away from the problem of staying with Puri. Why do you want to break off your relations with him? Why can’t everything stay as it is, for the sake of appearances? How will that restrict your freedom?’
‘Why must I keep up appearances?’ Kanak persisted.
‘You said that the relationship was dead,’ Nayyar reasoned with her. ‘Since Puri doesn’t run your life, what’s your problem?’
‘There are several problems to overcome,’ Kanak replied, looking at her nails. ‘By law, I am still his wife.’
‘Why, are you thinking of getting married again?’ Nayyar asked.
‘The question is why should I hang on to a relationship that is dead.’
‘You want to be free to marry a second time?’
‘Maybe,’ Kanak said, dropping her eyes.
Kanta was really angry, ‘Damn you! Is that the real reason? Is it why you can’t stand Puri any more?’
Kanak had to raise her head, ‘That is totally untrue. I had no such idea when I left Jalandhar. Last time when you went back from Delhi, pitaji said to me that there was no point in continuing a meaningless relationship. Until then I hadn’t even imagined that it could be possible.’