Homeless Bird: Chapters 7–8

He was carried on his charpoy to an empty place in one of the fields to be cremated.

The house with its melting mud walls and skimpy square of land brought little.

Never before had my sass spoken of temples. She seldom started her day with a puja to the household shrine.

“I’ll find a place,” she said. “For now we’ll leave our things at the parcel office so we won’t have to carry them about.”

After we checked our baskets and bedrolls, Sass handed me my claim check and hurried me into the street, where she hailed a bicycle rickshaw.

His hair was badly cut and stood up in odd tufts.

There was an insolent look on his face.

Sass gave him a push. “Don’t be rude with me, boy. Just take us to a temple. Any temple.” She gave the boy a shrewd look. “One close by. I’m not going to pay a big fare.”

The boy ran after us complaining so loudly that Sass grudgingly gave him the other two rupees.

She looked at my white widow’s sari. I thought I saw in her look pity, and something more frightening—a look of kinship.

In the line I saw a rickshaw with small flags, and next to it stood the boy with the wayward hair.

I understood now why she had entrusted me with so much money. It was to ease her conscience.

I understood now why she had entrusted me with so much money. It was to ease her conscience.

I walked aimlessly. One street looked like another, and I could not tell if I had been down them before.

“I am a servant of the Lord Krishna. Like the other widows I go each day to a temple and chant for four hours. The monks in the temple feed us, and there is the pittance of my widow’s pension. I had a room I shared with other widows, but the landlord wanted it back for his family, so we were all turned out. Now I must find a new room.”

I visited the temples: the Govindji, with its great hall and its row of columns like tree trunks and its high ceilings where neat rows of bats hung like small furry pennants.

I went to the Banke Bihari, where there was a darshan each day—the curtains were opened for a moment to give a glimpse of the deity, which is a great blessing.

I admired their piety and envied the food the monks gave them in return for their devotions, but try as I might, after only a half hour of chanting, my mind wandered.

I admired their piety and envied the food the monks gave them in return for their devotions, but try as I might, after only a half hour of chanting, my mind wandered.

I admired their piety and envied the food the monks gave them in return for their devotions, but try as I might, after only a half hour of chanting, my mind wandered.

I could hardly breathe for the smell of incense and the mustard oil burning in the hundreds of little lamps.

He gave me a quizzical look. I guessed how untidy and dirty I must appear after a week of sleeping on the doorstop.

He looked at me. “Don’t blubber. I’ll show you a place to go. You have to wait until I have finished work. Sit over there, and I’ll come back for you.”

He called to a family who had just left an incoming train. After bartering with him, they climbed onto his rickshaw, and he pedaled away.

I huddled into a corner of the station, trying to make myself as inconspicuous as possible.

Bristly hair stuck out of his cheeks and chin. When he smiled at me, I saw that most of his teeth were missing.

“A refined girl like you,” he said, “should not have to sleep in the streets. If you come with me, I will find a proper place for you where there is plenty of food.”

“I own land,” he said. A smile grew on his face. “It was left to me by my father. My uncle cares for it. When I have enough money for seeds and irrigation, I’m going back to my village. I hate this city.”

“Come along, Koly,” she said in a brisk voice. “I’ll introduce you to the others. Then we must put aside that widow’s sari. Here you are not a widow but a young woman with a life ahead of you.”

Tanu led me into a small room off the courtyard. She was eighteen, a year older than I was, and much more sophisticated.

Her hands had a strange orange color and she had a distinct smell, not unpleasant but very strong.

She threw open a chest and pulled out some clothes, flinging a pair of trousers and a tunic at me.

I slipped the trousers on under my sari, and then, as my sari came off, I hastily pulled on the tunic.

I felt now as I imagined the snake felt after it rid itself of its old, confining skin.

At last Maa Kamala threw up her arms and ordered us to stop. “Enough of your miserable tales,” she said. “You wallow like pigs in mud. That is all in the past. Now, Koly, we must find you a job. Nearby in the bazaar is a man who furnishes all that is needed for ceremonies. Tanu works there stringing marigold garlands. The man is looking for another girl. I warn you, the hours are long and you have to be fast. What do you say?”