That day, the dam of tears truly burst. Bimala called me in, but for a while, not a word escaped her lips; her eyes flashed and sparkled. I understood she had gained nothing from Nikhil. She had harbored the pride that, by whatever means, she would succeed—but I had no such hope. Where men are weak, women know them all too well; but where men are truly men, women cannot quite penetrate the mystery of that place. The real truth is, man is a mystery to woman, and woman is a mystery to man—if this were not so, then the distinction between these two kinds would be nothing but a pointless extravagance of nature!

Wounded pride! Why did what was necessary not happen—that, she does not remember; but what I asked for openly, why did that not come to pass—this alone is her grievance. Around this claim of “I am,” how many colors, how many gestures, how many tears, how much deceit, how many moods—there is no end to it; and in this lies their sweetness. They are far more patient than we are, each in their own way. When the Creator was fashioning us,

He had once been a schoolmaster, then his satchel held only books and theories; but for them, after leaving his teaching behind, he became an artist—then it was brush and paint-box! So, when Bimala, in the crimson flush of wounded pride and tears, stood silently at the horizon of sunset like a cloud ablaze with water and fire, she looked to me exceedingly sweet. I went very close and clasped her hand; she did not withdraw it, but it trembled violently. I said, “Makhi, we are companions, our goal is one. Sit down.”

Saying this, I seated Bimala on a chair.

Strange! All that momentum seemed to halt at just this point. The Padma in the monsoon, which swells and threatens to devour everything in its path, suddenly, for no apparent reason, abandons its straight line of destruction and veers from one bank to the other. What hidden obstacle lay beneath its surface, even the river itself does not know. I pressed Bimala’s hand in mine, and within me, every string of my bodily vina quivered and resonated; yet why did it stop at that unstable note, why did it not reach the refrain? I realized that the deepest bed of life’s current has been shaped by the flow of many years; when the flood of desire surges strong, then that...

The path below is broken in places, and elsewhere it comes to a halt! Somewhere inside, a certain hesitation remains—what is it? It is not just one thing, but entangled in many! That is why its form is not clearly discernible; I only sense that it is an obstacle. I realize that what I truly am can never be proved conclusively by the testimony of any court, sealed in any document. I am a mystery to myself; that is why I feel such a