The Last House

By Alex Paikada

The story is the cross section of the life and realities of Kerala State, South India, during the hoary and obfuscated years of internal emergency. The protagonists in the story are generally sad, and the sadness they are charged with makes them philosophical in various ways. Each one is gnawed by a nostalgia to reach out to a state of being and also to a state of mind they seem to have forfeited somewhere beyond the time-space capsule they are shut into. The story largely covers the life of Christian Syrian settlers who settled in the virgin forests of northeastern hill tracts of Kerala, destroying the forests that were there for thousands of years, supporting a community of aborigines who survived in the woods quite unobtrusively and sustainably. The relation between man and nature has degraded to be that of hunter and prey, from that of child and mother, and the socio-environmental ramifications thereof are far-reaching. Also, the story examines the relation between the rulers and the ruled from an elemental angle. The story is basically centered on a man who undergoes a spiritual, as well as political, evolution through the rigorous course of life. The desolation, poverty, political opportunism, and the poetic suffering of the rural masses of the hill tracts of Kerala State, South India, offer the fecund canvass for the development of the story. It explores the possibility of man reaching a solemn level of inner maturity across the trials and tribulations. Particularly in the backdrop of the Communist party spreading its mass base and then declining through decadence and avarice. The faces, places, and events elaborated in the story are very near to me and very dear to me. The plot is very realistic, and my own life is spread thin in the story.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Mar 13, 2013
• ISBN: 9781481786492

Alex Paikada

I am a village farmer and live a silent rural life. But for many years after my graduation, I had been wandering across the country, living the life of a vagabond. So I have seen and experienced the country from the bottom and identified myself with the country’s inherent spirituality.

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© 2013 by Alex Paikada. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 3/7/2013

ISBN: 978-1-4817-8648-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4817-8649-2 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

Chapter 1 The Way of the River

Chapter 2 The Little Guide

Chapter 3 A Worried Man

Chapter 4 Raju

Chapter 5 Veeran

Chapter 6 Under the Casuarina Tree

Chapter 7 Anne and Appachan

Chapter 8 Appachen’s Abode

Chapter 9 Joy with a Difference

Chapter 10 Schools are for the Fools

Chapter 11 The Return

Chapter 12 Return of the native

Chapter 13 Raman Namboothiry

Chapter 14 Real Politick

Chapter 15 Kurien

Chapter 16 The Consumptive has God with Her

Chapter 17 The over Aged has Certain Doubts

Chapter 18 The Act of Treason

Chapter 19 Where We Phantom Figures Come and Go

Chapter 20 Interview

Chapter 21 The Mind Reader

Chapter 22 Between the Cup and the Lip

Chapter 23 Rolling Stones Gather Souls

Chapter 24 An Unseen Hand

Chapter 25 Bother Not your Father

Chapter 26 Reconciliation

Chapter 27 A Frozen Letter

Chapter 28 The Last Bus

Chapter 1

The Way of the River

Every change negative or positive provokes our curiosity. In a world where every day is a drab edition of its predecessors, thirst for change is palpably intense. Scores of villagers had gathered on either side of the mountain river to witness the spectacle of a life time. Most of the villagers were making a beeline to the bridge. They were gathering there inadvertently defying the orders of the government. Internal emergency had been imposed on the country a few days back. Emergency was not a matter of concern to the villagers, nor were the villages a mater of concern to the ruling forces holed up in the distant cities.

The river, Kariamcode puzha, was rising at a steady rate. All the hollows and valleys in the region were already inundated. Still there was no let up in the rains. Rain raved with a sonorous timeless cadence. At this rate, the rugged villagers guessed, it is a matter of hours for the hanging bridge to be washed away. It was the fruit of their sweat blood and dreams of at least twenty five years. During the rainy months Palavayal and the surrounding sleepy villages are isolated from the rest of the world. Under the initiative of the parish priest, thousands of villagers had contributed in kind, cash and labor to make it happen. They built the hanging bridge supported on two girders and land abutments. Planks were fixed on three one inch steel ropes and a pair of steel ropes functioned as the railings. The cherished bridge became a reality in 1973 and thereafter the people could walk across to Pulingome to catch a bus to Payyannur and other urban centers of the country.

There were many sleepy hamlets across the river with Palavayal becoming the center of gravity of the far flung habitats. Life was awfully difficult and bleak in the hills bordering Mysore state. Snakes wild animals, pests, disease vectors and imperious forces of nature made life unpredictable and hazardous. But the settlers, who poured in from central Travancore were most willing to suffer it all as they were coming from still more miserable circumstances. They had come to the hills either to live or to die; there was no space in between. They were not pouring in, in search of an El Dorado, they sought only a platform, however dismal and lackadaisical it is, to stage the morose business of life. The Elysian staticity of existence was not on their agenda.

Like the Spaniards of 16th century, the priests also followed them to share their misery. Thus church came up stealing trees from Mysore, bribing the forest guards to look the other way. The church building became the school also during the week days. Mud roads were constructed to all parts from Palavayal. Thus an autonomous village republic evolved by and by. The river became a barrier and a possibility. It protected them from the rest of the world. The river was teaming with huge fish. Many thrived on fishing in the river, some others specialized as hunters. They shot wild animals and sold the meat.

The river played a psychological role in the lives of the people. It was a psychological boundary—once you cross it there is no return, there is no turning back. It is like the legendary Styx. You become part of a new world fraught with new challenges. Those who chose to cross the river will not be able to transplant their past in the new habitat. The exodus of the people from Kottayam district had economic, social and political reasons. Mostly it was the irresistible lure of virgin soil.

The bridge became a necessity when life progressed, when more people passed out from the high school and wanted to take on the world outside. The parish priest wielded tremendous hold on the laity. He had the vision and the determination to synchronize the savages to the rest of the world. It was not an easy task. The bridge construction work had indeed commenced in early 1970. But it was suspended in the beginning itself as the war came. The war of 1971 put the process off gear. For many months people waited for the news paper which had to come from Calicut to know what was happening on the north western and north eastern borders. After the war, once again the priest and the committee men wandered across the hills and collected donations.

There was one man who suffered tremendously when the construction work was impeded by political developments happening in the north. He patiently waited for the war to run out of steam, for the people to think about construction and hope. The war and its progress interested him little. He waited for its end, whatever its final historic result be.

A young man, Mukundan came from Calicut as the engineer. It was said that the priest appointed him. But he was a strange man who lived at the construction site. He had no other engagements, no other pleasures. Even at night he was seen at the site thoughtfully watching, thoughtfully surveying, thoughtfully imagining. Even when the bridge construction was decelerated for want of money he was undeterred. Mukundan borrowed money from far away places and proceeded with the work. Then in 1972 the locals lost interest in the bridge, it was a period of struggles. The students, teachers and the parishioners took part in the agitation against the government. The Christian belt was locked in a war against the education policy of the government.

Still the engineer patiently continued his work. The bridge became his passion, his dangerous obsession. It was more his obsessive impulsive necessity than a prospective physical facility to the locals. His obsessive creativity was pushing and thrusting to burst open on the fronts of reality. He was not an experienced engineer. But he had ideas, he had dreams. He was wet and fresh from the academic womb and was anxious to give vent to his creativity. But the villagers refused to share his enthusiasm and determination. The collective will of the people was not strong enough to forge the enterprise ahead against the odds. If bridge becomes a reality, it is certainly well and good, but their private interests were more important to them. The absence of a bridge is a common problem, suffered collectively. But the personal life is lived all alone and suffered all alone. The true life happens not on a common platform.

Some people took pity on him, some called him a fool. He lived in the make shift hut on the river and made plans. The priest also took pity on him and promised more money. The work dragged on for many more months. However in the year that followed a sudden spurt of enthusiasm swept past the parishioners. They decided to make the bridge a reality before the ensuing rainy season. The technicians, experts and local volunteers worked day and night to complete the bridge. And indeed it was completed.

After the completion of the bridge, Mukundan suddenly turned melancholy. He went back to his village and stayed to himself. He was very thoughtful. It appeared that he had nothing more to do. He felt run out and empty. For many more months he was seen thoughtfully moving about in the village as if the ghost of the bridge will not leave him alone. Then he was no more seen again. Some say he went mad, some others hold the view that he went north and became a sanyasi.

The people did not care who designed the bridge or what his inner crises were. They used the bridge that bridged the savage hamlets to the rest of the world.

But crossing the bridge posed certain risks. The bridge swayed to and fro when you marched. If you cannot synchronize your movements with the rhythm of the bridge you are in real trouble. Children easily mastered the art of crossing the bridge. It was a nightmare for the women and old aged people to cross the bridge. School children enjoyed themselves swaying the bridge at the maximum possible amplitude to scare the aged pedestrians and women. They immensely enjoyed the horror registered on the faces of the victims of their sport. The headmaster of the school had particularly warned the students not to indulge in such cruel and savage pastimes.

Still the bridge served the basic cherished purpose of keeping the villages connected to the rest of the world during the long six months of rain. By late December the river will humble itself into a shallow gentle flow. Then, once again jeeps having four wheel drive and lorries will wade across the river and land up on the dusty mud roads of Palavayal.

Now, within a couple of years of its opening, it was going to be washed away. There was palpable excitement in the air. All the shops were closed at Palavayal, all were on the river. The water level was just two feet from the sagging middle of the bridge. Water was still rising. It was like watching an action thriller. The people on either side of the river greeted each other in violent gestures anticipating a long spell of separation.

Then the people on the northern side of the river were treated by a spectacle. A stranger in a strange out fit stepped on to the bridge from the southern side and stoically marched to the other side. He was an alien and was apparently there for the first time. People on either side booed and roared out obscenities, some to encourage him, some to condemn him. The young men thought that it was a brazen affront upon their puffed up masculinity, the stranger was certainly showing off, that he alone was man enough among them. People watched with bated breath when he reached the middle of the bridge. There was perfect silence, except for the hissing fury of the river. When the river is in spate, it becomes notoriously silent, as it has no boulders to crash against. The rusty waters fleeted past in dizzying speed. Still more threatening is the floating trees and logs speeding down. If they hit the bridge the effect will be catastrophic. And huge trees were hurrying down from the virgin forests of Karnataka, often bewildered snakes, birds and animals riding them, vaguely remembering Noah’s Arc in their wordless language.

There was high voltage anxiety in the air. The moments were throbbing; people had no particular sympathy for the bridge. If it really withstands and holds out against the inordinate waters it would almost certainly disappoint the people though it was the fruit of their blood and sweat. They were all beaming with anticipation, they were thirsting to witness that event, their disaster instinct had been whetted and only a real disaster would satiate them. The unusual floods gave them promises, it is now the duty of the flood to rise up to the promises it unwittingly made.

In the meantime Lightning Ouseph came that way. He is a character that offers enough for the people to laugh light heartedly. His face itself had a comic touch, as if he was going to break into laughter any moment, going to laugh at the whole world. He puts on a lungy that is garish with strange designs and a towel is wound around his thick neck. His general untidiness and earthy language rendered him strangely dear to the rustics. Nobody knew where he was coming from. He would air drop into the villages suddenly from the blue, as if he condensed into human form from the air and would melt away in a dramatic way. Nobody was close enough to ask him where he was from and where he was going. But from his language and name it was evident that he was from Travancore. Many such people go north from the Christian belt of the south in order to escape many things, a lost love, a family disaster or an imputation.

Lightning Ouseph’s mode of life was quite simple. His long shoulder bag will have bundles of booklets, containing poems sired by him. He would write funny weird lines which he insisted to be poems and would try to market them where ever five or six people are assembled. He was not particular that the crowds should buy his booklets; he thoroughly enjoyed the effect he had on the people. On seeing him people would start laughing. He has a special gift to steal the thunder and also to barge in where his presence will be an obscenity and a nuisance. He is a man of the crowds; he will know where people are assembled.

But this time around the villagers could not make out how he crossed the river. He was not on their side of the river till morning; nobody had even seen him crossing the river. Still all of a sudden he was amidst them. In spite of the spectacle in front of them, the people could not help turning their attention to him as they knew what was in store for them.

‘Parish Priest gets pregnant ten paise only,’ he shouted. People began to smirk and even break into hearty laughter.

‘That chap has dropped in with his crap,’ the elders pretended to dislike his blasphemy. But the youngsters gathered around him. He comes far in between and each time he comes with weird themes.

Nobody bothered to spend ten paise. If the book is taken home, parents would blast them. The headmaster of the school also had issued specific directives not to purchase the cheap literature churned out by the eccentric vagabond. But he was very successful in blowing up the stiffness and tension mounting in the atmosphere. Ouseph himself laughed at the title of his booklet. He called himself Lightning Ouseph as he was capable of coughing up poetry with lightning speed; also he was capable of showing up at odd places at short notice.

He lived a shallow life. Ouseph never bothered to think deeper or to worry. He never worried about his future or about the anxious goal posts in life. He viciously shut all such trivialities from his daily existence. Life was simple, making people laugh and sharing their laughter. He had very little needs and his family with all its appendages had deserted him long back. And it was a mystery how he survived.

Other titles he comes out with include ‘emergency in hell ten paise, lady marries a rat ten piase’ etc. All his booklets are priced ten paise, very affordable.

‘I too inherit this earth

Its shadows sorrows and mirth

Its hollows valleys and wealth

Its morrows, worries and dearth’’ he sang out in his funny dry voice.

Strange indeed it was that the bridge did not sway the way it did during peaceful times. The bridge also was waiting in bated breath. When the utter stranger crossed the middle of the precarious bridge another one entered it again from the southern side. This time it was an old Mohammedan with a huge basket on his head. Him the villagers knew perfectly. He was the bread man from Payyannur who comes on and off to sell his eatables to the wretched hill-landers. The poor man chose to take the extreme risk of crossing the bridge as he could not afford to go back without selling his goods. It was his life. He knew that the poor Christian mothers will be anxious to treat their children with his delicacies. But primary economics sets the priorities in life, life, existence comes first luxuries come next. The children will be looking at him from the huts drooping peevishly in the non stop rain of June and July, gluing their eager miserable eyes on his large basket perched on his clean shaven head. They are not used to such delicacies, their staple food is dried and re boiled tapioca with the addition of dried sardines baked in the hearth. Rice is a luxury for most part of the year.

The stranger was oblivious of the attention he was getting. He had no stage fright and he did not care who watched him and who jeered him. He had only one mission. Crossing the river well before the inevitable disaster happened will be a great achievement. That opens the possibility of shutting himself out from the rest of the world.

He had apparently taken a stupendous decision—the decision of crossing the river. He will never more be what he used to be. It is like crossing the Rubicon. Hence it is an event in the life of every soul that crosses the river, the boundary between an ancient programmed society and a raw world where yesterdays and tomorrows find no room. Given the psychological significance of crossing the river, nature itself was catapulting it into an event of consequence. The river, he thought, marks a great divide between what was and what is. He was stepping into his eternal present, being bereft of the intimidating temporal delusions of past and future.

He walked carefully, concentrating on his action. He could see the shooting waters. It had the aroma of the violent earth, aroma of the sick man’s dreams. He had a strong intuition that the fragile bridge will stand until after he had made it. The tremors of the girders told him about the violence they were withstanding. One has to take chances. Life lies in the uncertainties. But who is the author of chances? The author is irrelevant, one has to act out the chance, he thought. He was aware that the strange villagers were watching him; they were feasting on his foolhardy enterprise. He was amusing them with his life. But that was not his concern. They were experiencing hi s experience without the trouble of entering the arena. If he is washed away somebody will tell somebody that somebody had been foolish enough to be washed away in the historic floods of 1975. This somebody will remain a part of the bridge disaster for many generations. It will mater little who that somebody was. This somebody will be a nobody to all of them.

It is a question of will that he is precariously placed on a hanging bridge. If he had willed otherwise, he also would have been a spectator; he would have gone back to some other place with a sigh. Now he is all alone, he is not part of the people. They have singled him out. He thought that he had no reason to melt into the people. He was not aware that another man was following him emboldened by his audacity. He had only one thing in his mind—the seemingly endless span of the bridge and the fleeting waters that were furious. He was capable of concentrating and the rest of the realities dwindled in his mind.

The old man, on the other hand, was very conscious of the world around. He ventured into that enterprise because his situation demanded it. He could not afford to go back with his wares. He was utterly disappointed when he reached Pulingome and was desperate to get across the river.

‘The old man doesn’t mind dying and that young chap is mad enough to be oblivious of the prospect of death,’ one commended.

‘He is hurrying to marry away his mother,’ another observed bitterly.

‘That mad cap is making a fool of all of us.’

When the young man crossed the girder on the northern side of the bridge, some people came forward to encourage him, ‘up, up brave fellow up.’

A semi naked man in his late thirties came forward to receive the stranger. ‘Welcome sar welcome, you are the man with a real prick.’

‘He may be from the government, don’t play the fool with him. It is emergency period you know,’ an old man cautioned.

‘The flood knows no emergency, the rain knows no Indira Gandhi’, another commended and laughed to himself.

‘Do not drag her into this and she will not drag you into the rat trap she piously keeps for the trouble makers. Once you are in the trap, no amount of enterprise will disentangle you from the tangles and tangled legal spaghetti which will close in on you when you struggle for freedom.’

‘There is no freedom, we are in a fiefdom of ignorance,’ one man said covering his mouth.

‘The fool knows no discretion,’ it was another anonymous comment.

‘What he fails to learn himself the river will punishingly teach him, but it will not be of any use to him as he will not be around.’

As soon as the stranger neared the shore the half naked drunkard with his lungy and a dagger tucked at the waist band, rushed to him and locked him in an embrace, ‘you are man, sar you are man.’

The stranger was not a bit impressed or disturbed by the reception he received. He stepped to the slushy fluid soil and not even turning back kept moving on. The awestricken villagers watched him closely for an instant. He appeared to be an important man with is rich black beard, rain coat and large rimmed hat. Above all he had his chappals indicating his sophistication. The savages of the villages generally chose to go bare feet. He was fairly tall, a little less than six feet and had an intelligent face with kind and considerate eyes. The fair complexion and glowing skin indicated that he belonged to the creamy layer of the society. The savage settlers of the hills are as a rule, very skeleton like and sun burnt.

Some of them had a feeling that they had met him somewhere. But his peculiar rain coat and hat made it difficult to place him with any familiar events or places. Nobody in the villages used rain coat or hat to walk in the rain. The Christian settlers from central Kerala used umbrellas and the aborigines in the hills used koramba, a large hood drooping down to the knees made of reed and wild arrow root leaves. It was warm and comfortable during long rainy days. They would pluck weeds or harvest rice with koramba protecting them from cold and rain like a shell, like the slanting back of a penguin. Some of them thought that he was a priest going to meet his fellow priest at the church. In any case it was obvious that he did not belong to them.

Shortly the old Mohammedan also landed up and moved on with his business. People once again turned to the bridge to witness the event of the century. Water level was just half a feet from the bridge. Then the drunkard thought that it was his turn to steal the show.

‘See for yourself sons of a bitch; see for yourself that there is a man among us Christians too.’ He marched to the bridge driven by his Dutch courage.

‘Don’t do it Mathappy, don’t. Your wife and three children are proof enough. Don’t do such a stupid thing, ‘somebody reasoned. Mathappy rushed to the first girder. He was dizzied by the speed of the shooting waters. He balanced his umbrella like a circus artist and waited. His reason told him that it was dangerous but his drunken pride insisted to prove what he was worth.

‘Ten paise only, ten paise,’ Lightning Ouseph reminded.

‘Mathappy, Mathappy you are man enough, come back, ‘his compatriots screamed. He moved a few more steps ahead falteringly and then realization dawned on him, the water was gracing the bottom of the bridge. He heard shouts and screams. He wanted to take a U turn, but he could not. The speed of the river was terrifying. He took a few steps backward. And then the inexorable flood rocked and twisted the bridge. In another instant it was twirled and shattered into splinters. Mathappy was flung deep into the maelstrom. The thunderous sound of the disaster lingered for a few minutes. The steel ropes snapped one by one with unimaginable violence. Splinters of planks floated down. But Mathappy was nowhere to be seen. Some saw him coming up once again fifty meters down. He sputtered and went down. The whole drama was over within minutes. Nobody uttered a word. Sporadic gasps could be heard. Rain rained on unfeelingly.

Mathappy had been enjoying the attention he was getting. When he is sober he would not appreciate attention. But in his inebriation he was craving for attention. As he had no means to attract the attention of the people, the best way to achieve that was to do foolhardy things.

A few meters ahead the stranger looked back and watched the spectacle. He paused for a minute or two and then walked ahead as if nothing had happened. In the meantime the Mohammedan hawker had over taken him. They plodded together.

When the shock and surprise died away people began to disperse. They were anxious to be the first one to break the news to the world outside. Some rushed to the church, one kilometer away, others darted to the distant villages after the hurried purchases. They shouted the news in excitement to all they happened to meet on the way

‘Did you know brother, the bridge is gone and drunkard Mathappy also is gone. The judgment day is not far.’

‘What Judgment day, it is all our own make. Look for Mathappy in the depths of Avullankayam,’ murderer Many observed, he was on his way to Palavayal to purchase the weekly ration of white un-boiled rice and kerosene.

The word Avullankayam invoked dread and mortal fear in every mortal in the region. It is a mysterious deep four kilometers downstream. A treacherous and unfathomed water column that is fraught with eerie mysteries.

‘Do you mean that you do not believe in Armageddon and final judgment?’

‘Look I do not approve of any judgment. No judgment is correct and no judgment is final. You do the things that your mind makes you do. Who is responsible for your mind having particular polarities and proclivities? Those who are judged and those who judge are both sick. No punishment is true unless you punish yourself. The punishing industry of the government goes above me and about me but never with me,’ Many insisted.

‘It is emergency time. Do not talk much. Talk less work more, she has told us’, the fellow villager cautioned Many, ‘very hard times are ahead, very hard times. Pakistan may attack us again for our domestic evils… .’

‘Bull shit, there is no Pakistan, and it is a decoy created by the government. I collected that much from the jail.’

‘But good indeed this emergency is our ration shop man does not any more hoard our rice. Our troublesome local leaders are back home busy with their puny little farm. Now we have no need of Pakistan.’ The fellow villager inferred.

People began to gather to look for Mathappy. The news spread very fast and young men gathered at the school to work out strategy to look for him.

‘With Avullankayam around, there is no need to look for him,’ Many admonished viciously and went his way. He used the word ‘Avullankayam’ time and again to irk the people. It is a very deep part of the river where many unnatural deaths have happened. Many people chose the inter locked woods on the banks of Avullankayam to commit suicide. The kayam itself exuded death. People swimming in the waters will occasionally be pulled down never to return. The deep waters are abounding with large fish. Explosives are blasted by the adventurous settlers to catch fish. But the deadly blue black color of the deep waters and the mysteries surrounding it made the people stay away from that part of the river after sun set.

People believed that there were under currents in the deeper parts which pulled down those who ventured into it. Some insisted that there are subterranean tunnels under water and the current reappears again many kilometers down stream. People who had to cross the river at night on their way to Chittarickal from Cherupuzha are usually scared to their bones as Avullankayam is just a few yards up stream. During the rainy season, bundles of long bamboos are used to cross the river and very often the ferry is along the periphery of Avullankayam.

Long back, nobody knows when, one Abdullah and his friend went to catch fish from the site. They both were perched on the branch of an ancient tree stretching right into the middle of the waters. Abdullah, an original inhabitant of the region ignited the explosive and hurled the same into the deep waters. At the same time, the friend of his kicked him into the waters for reasons not known. Abdullah died in the explosion along with large white specs of fish that appeared on the surface. Thereafter that segment of the river came to be known as Abdullah kayam which was later on corrupted as Avullankayam.

The kayam (very deep part of the water body) rather became an image, a symbol etched deep in the psyche of the people, A mysterious longing, a symbol of bitter fatalism. But there were many people who did not believe in the existence of such a mysterious deep. It was impossible for such a local level mini Bermuda triangle to exist, if it really does, one has no reason to go to it and provoke it. However many others wanted to have such a mystery to have the satisfaction of having something plainly irrational about them.

Having least concern for the legends slapped on it, the river went its way meandering, roaring and horrendous in the rapids, gracefully flowing in the valley, getting polluted in the plains and urban centers, then aged and dying to repeat it all over again—just like life.

Chapter 2

The Little Guide

Rain kept on tumbling and mumbling down in easy relaxed globules. It had a timeless cadence, the same cadence that the first man listened with a promising sadness. The earth had had enough of the heavens’ bounty and was spurting water everywhere. The mud roads were all washed out and huge gullies formed all along. Fresh water laughed and danced on its long march to the source. The stranger walked in a steady pace, walked as if there was an eternity before him, as if he had no promises to keep, as if he had no benefits to reap. He walked straight and erect as if the whole world belonged to him.

Long walks were not alien to him. He had marched across the villages and cities for weeks on end. His life itself was a long march, punctuated with struggles and speeches.

On the other hand the Muslim hawker lingered in front of isolated houses on the way to tempt the children. But business was not good, the time was not right. The villagers were struggling to earn their weekly rations, leave alone luxuries like baked bread. Even then children looked at him with coveting eyes, filling misery and helplessness in their wide eyes. Again the old man would walk fast to overcome the stranger. The stranger happened to be the indicator registering the average speed. When they walked up to the junction of the village chapel, it became clear that the road to Odakkolly was inundated. Naturally they turned west and crossing just two or three deserted shops they reached the school junction. It became clear that Enichal thodu, a stream to the west was on heavy spate and it was impossible to proceed further west. Then the next natural course was to proceed north to Malankadavu. There also in many parts the road and the streams merged into one. The school was closed, it was a Saturday. The roads were absolutely deserted, as the sky looked malevolently dark and heavy.

The stranger was not particularly aware of the roads he was following. It little mattered where he reached at the end of the day. He just wanted to be at the end of the world to be on his own. He had no deadline or time schedule. He had started at the previous mid night from Calicut. Now at this late afternoon he is somewhere near the end of the world, in the remote villages where the diktats of the government come to naught, where every form of power structure becomes ludicrous. There is no justice, no frowning jurists and no custodians of truth.

He followed the road in a dreamy relaxation, oblivious of the rain, oblivious of the strain. From the thatched huts women and children poked out to take a look at the stranger in rain coat and the peddler with his delicious wares. The rain walking exercise seemed invigorating and pleasant an experience to the stranger. One has to luxuriate in this bounty most often than not—he thought. In his childhood his mother would not let him into the rain. It was against his grain to be in the rain. He was a problem child once. Even a slight breeze before the rain rendered him sick and feverish. His mother was over protective of him. Now with the parental protection removed, he stands alone in the rain. Rain patted on his hat and swayed in the lingering breeze. Now his mother withers her shriveled evening and he weathers his blazing noontide. Rain drew small concentric circles in the waters. The rivulet on the side of the road flowed moodily.

The ascending mountain road had shrunk to a three feet path. Houses became sparse and far in between. There was rice and tapioca planted all along the road. They stood frozen in the endless rain.

It was getting late and the peddler was seriously thinking of returning. It was an unfortunate day. He had crossed the bridge in the hope that the flood would blow off after a few hours and by the time his business was over the bridge would be ready to take him back. Now he has no idea how to reach back home. Still it is dangerous to proceed further. And his potential clients were not in the mood for purchases. Then he decided to over take the stranger for the last time and then halt at the very first house on the way. Thereafter he would return, come what may.

The first house he came across was a typical mountain home. A small house thatched with elephant grass. It had a small verandah measuring three feet x six feet. Also it had a small kitchen and a savage bedroom. The floor was plastered with cow dung and the walls were made of raw mud bricks and flattened bamboo. Three children supporting themselves from the bamboo railing of the verandah eagerly watched the peddler. When he slowed down the boy in the middle shouted out, ‘bread brother, bread brother please give us bread.’

‘No boy, don’t say that, he cannot give us. We have no money,’ the elder girl admonished him. Still there was intense craving in her innocent eyes also. The old man could not betray his emotions. He has to be a peddler. He turned about to retrace his steps as he had promised himself. In the meantime the stranger caught up with him and stopped for an instant.

‘Why can’t he give us? He should give us because we are hungry and he has to give it to somebody,’ the boy reasoned.

‘When we have money we will get some for you naughty boy,’ the girl admonished.

‘But that can never happen, mother will always say we are poor,’ the boy was bitter.

‘God loves the poor,’ she consoled him.

‘Who needs God’s love when we are all hungry?’ he said with a blasphemous recklessness.

‘What do you have in the basket, elder brother?’ the stranger asked in his polite Malabari Malayalam. The Muslim old man congratulated himself that his assumption was correct. The stranger is a Malabari and not a Christian, his northern Malayalam revealed it. Also the old man deducted that he was a Hindu Nair. The old eyes subtly discern the difference.

‘Bread I sell boy, bread and murukku, biscuits and dry bread,’ the old man said encouragingly.

‘Come with me to that house’, the stranger requested formally with a tinge of authority and they went to the house to the great excitement and surprise of the children.

The stranger had an urge to be the wrong time Santa Claus to the children. The strange euphoria of giving energized his soul. But the final solution is not in giving, but in taking, he thought. As this earth is theirs too, they should come and take their cut of the cake.

The old man placed his large basket on the small verandah from his smooth tonsured pate.

‘Where is your mother?’ the stranger asked

‘Gone up the hill to weed the paddy plants,’ the elder girl said.

‘Your father?’ he asked.

‘Gone to Palavayal to purchase ration rice.’

‘Well now tell me your good names and all the bread in the basket is yours’, the stranger said.

‘I am Marykkutty,’ the elder girl said.

The boy was frightened to give an answer, the small prattler also refused to oblige.

The stranger asked the old man to open the plastic cover of the basket.

‘Take as many as you want,’ he invited.

They were frightened to do such a thing. Mother may scold them; she may even beat the girl for not behaving.

‘Come on, nobody will scold you. It is a gift from Jesus to the poor innocent kids whom He loves so much,’ he encouraged.

The girl was still unsure. At last the boy plunged in as greed had the better of him. Then others followed the suit. They grabbed up bread, biscuits and murukku.

They were tasting the biscuit for the first time. The younger children hugged the booty they amassed and wondered where to begin. The girl on the other hand settled on bread and looked at the stranger. She kept on looking at him with her wild innocent eyes.

‘Who are you big brother?’ she asked, she was somehow sure that he was different.

‘Who do you think I am?’ he teased.

‘I know who you are,’ she whispered standing up. Her eyes had an abnormal sheen.

‘Where do you study, Mary?’ he asked after having settled the business with the old man.

‘At St. John’s, in fifth standard,’ she said.

The old man packed up in a hurry and went back quite pleased with himself. The stranger is deranged but magnanimous, he thought.

‘Do you do well in your studies?’ he asked

‘I try to. But I cannot be regular at school.’

‘Why?’

‘I have to look after the children when father and mother are gone to work in the farm.’

‘Who is your father?’

‘Mathappy,’ she said proudly.

Then he looked at her closely and understood why he thought her face to be very familiar. He thought of the stranger who sacrificed himself in his drunken fury.

‘What will your father bring?’

‘Why, rice for the week. Some dry fish if he has money.’

‘What else?’

‘Nothing,’ she was confused.

‘Will he bring delicacies?’

‘We are poor,’ it was a ready made statement.

The stranger stood still for a moment, quite confused.

‘You are not poor my child. When your mother returns, tell her that you are not poor’, then he looked at the three kids one after the other. Whose fault is it that they should suffer from penury and poverty? He wondered. The child has an indelible consciousness that she is poor and that she deserves nothing better. She knows that she does not deserve better clothing better food and better abode. He had a dream of retaining the dream in the eyes of the kids even in the woods. Every revolution is a miscarriage unless it takes the most marginalized peasant also in its stride, he thought. Poverty is a pestilence and the cure is not easy. It happens with a will. There is no way to decide what you will. There is not a common will. Ups and downs crests and troughs, poverty and affluence are the essential essentialities of life. Socialist struggles are a tussle against the inexorable compulsions of nature. The affluent minority in India is more obscene than the affluent majority in the west. An invincible fortress of misery the socialist dreamers are pitted against. Even though it was impossible to make everybody equally happy he found it worth while to keep the struggle on. It is not important that you reach the goal; life is worth living if you are charged with a lofty selfless goal. The outcome is not important as long as