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A little girl comes to leave a bowl of puffed rice with a blob of jaggery and fried potatoes. Sripati puts down his flute and picks up the bowl. For Srishti is insistent.
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A married woman with covered head comes out of the kitchen, a glass of tea in her hand. As she bends to place the glass, Sripati's hand stops before his mouth. The lamplight cannot entirely hide her veiled face. The musician sees clearly a tiny star glittering on Manasha's nostril. She had vermilion in her parting and her hair made a neat, wavy fringe above her eyes.
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Sripati is still. He tries to say something and cannot. Manasha seems to put down the glass with much grace and diffidence. But where is the screen of hair scented with the Sal wood and the wide dreaming plain? And the trill of cascading laughter, the percussion of the pathless wind? Is she the same girl who could never tell whose mind went which way? Srishtidhar speaks up. "It's good wishes from all you good people, master, that Manasha is cured. There was a pledge to Baba Mahadeva as well."
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The Musician slowly lowers his head. His flute lies on his lap, resting. "And yes," Mahadeb adds, "her man's back."
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From the front row a dark skinny character offers Sripati a beedi and smirks, "I don't play instruments, ustad. I smoke."
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The crowd hugely enjoys this clowning. Sripati mumbles, "But this is not what I came to see." Srishti says, "Did you say something, master?"
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Sripati says in a lowered voice, "Who can tell whose mind goes which way?"
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Dry leaves fly in the dust raised by the frenzied wind of Baisakh. The breeze in the palms by the waterhole strikes up the high tumult of the monsoons. A squall snuffs out the lantern. And the spirit of Waylosing covers the universe.
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In the dark, the musician sits facing the Sal wood and plays: "Too hard, my friend, your heart..."
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A stinging wind chafes the stony soil. All ways are lost in the blinding dust storm. Nature is burning in the flames of a fiery Baisakh. The locks of an enraged sun seem to hurl and crash. With such a blistering noon over his head, the musician sets off on the journey back. The russet dust, like sparks of fire, flecks him in red, as red as the sky above. At such a time, the most desperate search will not reveal the Wayloser's Star.
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Translated by
Bhaswati Chakravorty and Swapan Chakravorty
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