He called out. There was no answer. The stench had grown worse; the foul smell that forced one to empty one’s stomach. He climbed the steps in the dark, feeling his way along the familiar stairs, meaning to knock at the door upstairs. As he turned the corner, his bare foot pressed softly, coldly, against something yielding and slick. He recoiled in disgust, switched on his torch, and looked. Ugh! A rat. Its body limp, dead, sprawled across the floor. Flies, disturbed by the torchlight, rose buzzing from its carcass. He hurried up the stairs, switched on the torch again. Why was Narayanappa lying on the floor, wrapped up like that—perhaps he had covered his face with a cloth, he thought, smiling grimly as he pulled at the covering, calling, “Narayanappa, Narayanappa,” and shook him. Again, that cold touch, like when he had stepped on the rat—he withdrew his hand sharply and shone the torch. The sight that met his eyes: eyelids open, sightless, staring. In the circle of torchlight, flies, maggots, stench.

## Chapter Six

In the agrahara, the eldest woman, Lakshmi Devamma, who had passed seventy, flung open the heavy front door with a loud “Dharo!” and called out, “Hey!” She stepped into the street of the agrahara, stood at the crossroads, and again called, “Hey!” Whenever she could not sleep, or when her mind was troubled, she would come out night after night into the agrahara street, wandering three times up and down, from top to bottom and back again, finally stopping in front of Garudacharya’s house. There, she would summon his sons, grandsons, and ancestors, call upon all the gods and deities as witnesses, heap curses upon them with vehemence, then turn back to her house, pull shut the heavy wooden door with a “Dharo!” and lie down to sleep. Especially as new moon and full moon approached, her cursing habit would grow more intense.

The most talked-about subject in the agrahara: her threshold, her temper. Both are spoken of from one end to the other. Her reputation had spread to all the Brahmin agraharas in the four directions. Some called her Avalakshana Lakshmidevamma, the inauspicious Lakshmidevamma, for she was widowed in childhood. If she appeared, mischievous boys and Brahmins would step back four paces and resume their journey, and she would chase them away, waving her stick, cursing them. But no one took her words seriously. The boys called her Hulitegina Lakshmidevamma, Lakshmidevamma of the anthill. Yet she was most famously known as Half-mad Lakshmidevamma.

Her story was a legend: married at eight, widowed soon after. By fifteen, her mother-in-law and father-in-law had died. The agrahara declared her born under an inauspicious star. Before she turned twenty, her own father and mother too passed away, leaving her alone. What then? The little property and jewelry she had were taken over by Garudacharya’s father, who brought her grandmother to his own house and cared for her. All his dealings were of this kind. Narayanappa’s father, too, was not much wiser, and had managed his property in the same way. Thus, for twenty-five years, Lakshmidevamma spent her days. After Garudacharya’s father died, Garuda took charge. His wife was a miser who served half-filled plates. Quarrels broke out between Lakshmidevamma and her, and soon they were at each other’s throats. Husband and wife together threw Lakshmidevamma out. She was pushed to the ruined house of her dead husband. Since then, Lakshmidevamma had lived alone there, in that dwelling.

She went to Praneshacharya with her complaint. He summoned Garuda and admonished him. From then on, Garuda gave her a rupee every month. That money was of no use to her. Thus, she became venomous toward the one who had swallowed her jewels and coins. Occasionally, Praneshacharya...

Samskara

After scolding all the Brahmins of the agrahara and making them give her more rice than anyone else, Lakshmidevamma’s misanthropy only grew with age, rising within her like slow poison.

Lakshmidevamma, stick in hand, stopped before Garudacharya’s house and, as if compelled by fate, began her tirade:

“May your house be ruined; may your eyes go blind! You who have brought ruin to this village, you who cast a spell on Narayanappa’s father—bald-headed wretch! If you have any shame, come out! You have swallowed the poor man’s coins, haven’t you? Do you think you’ll get away with it? After I die, I’ll become a ghost and haunt your family—do you understand?”

Catching her breath, she started again:

“Because of your hypocrisy, the golden-hearted Narayanappa became a chandala. He took a whore as his wife. All of you who keep proclaiming, ‘We are Brahmins, we are Brahmins,’ now sit idle, refusing to touch his corpse. Where has your Brahminhood gone? Fall into the raurava hell of the chandalas and perish, do you hear? In all my years in this agrahara, have I ever seen a corpse left uncremated through the night? Rama, Rama! The times are evil, everything is ruined. Brahminhood is destroyed. Shave your heads and become Muslims! Why do you need Brahminhood?”

With that, she struck her stick on the ground, caught her breath, and shouted, “Hey!” before starting again.

* * *

“Aiyyo!” cried Shripati, forgetting even to throw his towel over his shoulder as he leapt from the veranda of Narayanappa’s house and ran into the street.

“Look, look, look—Narayanappa’s ghost, the ghost!” Lakshmidevamma, half-crazed, went from house to house, banging on doors, stick in hand, spreading the news.

Clutching his life in his hands, Shripati crossed the river and ran to Nagaraja’s house in Parijatapura.

If the one who had run away was known to be Shripati, then it was Chandri, lying on the jaguli of Praneshacharya’s house, who could not sleep from hunger. She was not one who had ever fasted in her life; nor one who had ever slept alone on a jaguli. Since leaving her house in Kundapura and joining Narayanappa, she had always slept in a room fragrant with incense, upon a soft mattress.