A straggle of about a dozen-odd huts, with tightly packed mud walls and sloping roofs set with broken roof tiles of native make, lay scattered at the base of the hillock, standing guard over the eastern boundary of the village. A small settlement of weavers and tanners away from the centre of village life, it was known as vaas in common parlance. The afternoon sky looked forlorn and empty, if one didn’t count the single brahminy kite which had taken to deep skies as if to float in peace. Everybody in the vaas had been out on their daily drudgery – cutting stalks of grain, arranging them in neat stacks and so on in the farms of landlords – as the season of harvest had set in.
At the frilled gate of the lane sat Laliyo, a piebald dog of white and faded brown, legs tucked under its panting body and a slavering tongue lolling out. Suddenly, it jumped up on all fours and shook its head wildly, such that its swinging, languid ears produced a rattle-like effect akin to a damaru. Then, it stretched its forelegs out in the front, leaned down on its elbows, tautened and twisted its body to shake off sloth. With the sickle-shaped tail wagging, it cast a flitting look at the sky, felt like barking but didn’t and, at once, turned towards the vaas.
Trotting slowly into the lane, it stopped briefly at Gokal’s hut and began to sniff around. Then, as if tiring of the effort, it made straight for the hut across the lane and sat there peacefully, its legs tucked under its panting body. Down with terminal illness, Gokal’s ailing body – a bag of bones wrapped up in a grimy collarless, sleeveless shirt and a grungy dhoti – lay supine in a sagging coir-string cot. However hard he wished to, he couldn’t go along with others for daily-wage labour on account of his failing health. There was not a soul in the entire vaas except for Naniyo, his grandson, who was tasked with the job of looking after the old man.
Barely eight, Naniyo moved around without a stitch on except for a dirty sleeveless shirt that stopped short of his waist. With layers of dirt on this tiny frame and build-up of gunk in the corners of his eyes, he might come across as a shabby, lazy lad to a stranger, but when it came to different games, he was an ace player. He would have been of some help to his parents in tying the grain stalks into clumps and stacking them up had he not been forced into the care and service of his grandpa. Extremely understanding and innately compromising, he had set aside his grump and was immersed in playing with his toy cart, forged out of a sorghum stalk and mouths of broken earthen pots.
Gokal coughed and his phlegm-filled chest spoke up. He felt a tug of desire for a smoke. He strained hard to heave his frail frame out of the sagging cot, but all he could manage was to just sit up. On the other hand, the physical effort roused in him an urge to urinate; however, not an ounce of energy was left in him to try and get out of his cot. Suppressing his urge, he remained seated for a while and then called out for his grandson, his voice croaky and tired.
“Hey Naniyo, where are you?”
With no response forthcoming, he bawled out, irritated. “This bloody brat won’t stay put in the house even for a minute. Eh Naniyo, where the hell are you? Can he hear me?”
“What is it, bha? What has come over you that you are shouting like this?” Naniyo scuttled in from somewhere and spat out, an angry frown lining his little forehead.
“Bhai, be a sweetie and prepare the hookah for me. You are a good boy, aren’t you? See if there is a smouldering dung cake in the fireplace. Light it up.” Gokal tried to cajole the kid into doing his bedding, a broad, coaxing smile playing on his haggard face.
“Okay, bha,” Naniyo responded briefly and busied himself with the rather intricate task of setting up a hookah. First, he changed the water in the vase and emptied out the old ashes and bits of coals from the bowl at the mouth of the fireplace. Then, he reached for the pouch hanging on the makeshift peg – actually a bull’s horn – on the wall, took out a pinch of humid tobacco flakes from it and rolled them into a small ball. With the help of a twig, he dragged a smouldering dung cake out of the fireplace, placed bits of dry cakes over it and began to softly blow over it, exactly the way his mother did every morning. Once the cakes lit up, he loaded the bowl with the tobacco ball and then stuffed it to the brim with cinders from the live cakes. Realising that the hookah was good to go now, he started taking cautious, gentle drags. The hookah spoke up, letting out a pleasant gurgle. Startled by the sound, Gokal shouted a warning,
“What are you doing there, hanh? Puffing at the bloody thing on the sly, aren’t you? Come here, you fucker. The rascal can’t wash his arse properly and dreams of puffing at a hookah. Come here straight, do you hear me?”
Naniyo came up to him, out of breath from running and nervousness, handed over the hookah to Gokal and sneaked away under the pretext of playing with his toy cart. Just then, a voice, like gunshot, rang out at the gate of the lane.
“Ho, is anyone there in the vaas?”
Too tired to get up or even respond, Gokal kept sitting on his veranda, thinking that the man would go back if nobody responded. After a while, the hoarse callout, now slightly angry, rose from the direction of the mouth of the lane.
“Bloody, no one cares to respond even. What cheek! Is there anyone in the vaas, hey?”
Excerpted with permission from The Payback from Fear and Other Stories, Dalpat Chauhan, translated from the Gujarati by Hemang Ashwinkumar, Penguin India.
