RAMESH carried Kamala off to Sealdah Station at nine o’clock that night. Under his instructions the driver took a circuitous route by the Kalutola lanes, and Ramesh thrust his head eagerly out of the window as the carriage passed a certain house. He noticed no change in any of its familiar features.
He sighed so deeply that Kamala started out of her doze and asked what was the matter. “Nothing,” said Ramesh and subsided into his seat, where he remained till the carriage reached its destination. Kamala lay back in her corner and soon fell asleep again. Ramesh could not resist a momentary impulse of resentment at her very existence.
They arrived at the station in good time and were soon ensconced in the second-class compartment which Ramesh had engaged for the journey. Ramesh made a bed for Kamala on one of the lower bunks, lowered the light, closed the shutters, and remarked, “It’s long past your bed-time; you had better go to sleep now.”
“Mayn’t I sit here and look out till the train starts? I’ll go to sleep after that.” Ramesh assented, so Kamala drew her veil over her head and seated herself on the edge of the bunk by the window to watch the crowds, while Ramesh himself sat on the centre bunk gazing out absent-mindedly. The train had just begun to move when his eye fell on a belated passenger who was hurrying up the platform and whose features seemed vaguely familiar to him.
Next moment Kamala began to shriek with laughter. Ramesh put his head out and observed the late arrival struggling in the grasp of one of the station officials who tried to hold him back from the moving train. He succeeded, however, in boarding the train, though his shawl remained in the official’s hand. As the tardy one leaned forward out of the carriage window and reached for the shawl Ramesh recognised him as — Akshay.
It was some time before Kamala stopped laughing over the scuffle she had watched.
“It’s half-past ten and we’re off; you had better go to sleep now,” said Ramesh.
The girl went obediently to bed, but until she fell asleep she had frequent fits of giggling.
Ramesh, on his part, had failed to perceive the humour of the incident. Akshay, he knew, had no country home; his family had lived in Calcutta for generations. So why had he been in such a desperate hurry to catch that particular train? The only possible explanation was that he and Kamala were being shadowed.
The idea that Akshay would institute inquiries in his native village was most distasteful to Ramesh; his reputation would inevitably become the sport of contending factions there, and the whole business would appear unspeakably sordid.
He could imagine exactly what sort of scandal would be bruited about in the village. In a city like Calcutta one can always find unplumbed depths into which to dive, but the slightest impact sets the shallows of a small country place tossing with excitement. The more he reflected the more he shuddered at the prospect.
When the train stopped at Rarrackpore Ramesh put his head out but he did not see Akshay alight. At Naihati many passengers entered and left the train but Akshay was not among them. At Bogoola Ramesh looked out again but once more he was disappointed.
It was most unlikely that Akshay would leave the train at any of the other stations.
Fatigued though Ramesh was, it was late before he fell asleep. Early in the morning the train reached Goalundo — the terminus at which passengers embark for Eastern Bengal — and Ramesh caught sight of Akshay hurrying towards the river-steamers, with his head and face muffled in a shawl, carrying a hand-bag. The boat which was bound for Ramesh’s village would not start for some hours, but there was another at the landing-place, with steam up, whistling impatiently. “Where does this one go?” asked Ramesh.
“West,” was the reply.
“How far?”
“Up to Benares if there’s enough water in the river.”
Ramesh at once installed Kamala in one of the cabins and hurried ashore to lay in a stock of rice and pulse, milk and plantains, for the journey. Akshay, in the meantime, had embarked on the other steamer ahead of every one else and had taken up a position from which he could survey the whole crowd. The passengers who intended to embark on this vessel showed no particular haste, as she was not yet due to start; they spent the interim in washing or bathing, and some of them even cooked their food and ate it on the river-bank.
Akshay supposed that Ramesh had taken Kamala to some eating-house in the neighbourhood for breakfast, but as he did not know his way about in Goalundo he thought it safer to remain on board.
At last the whistle blew, but still there was no sign of Ramesh. The passengers began to stream on board across the swaying plank that served for a gangway. As the whistle became more insistent late-comers hurried on board, but still Ramesh was not to be seen either among the new arrivals or among those who had already embarked.
Every one was on board, the gang-plank had been withdrawn, and the skipper had given the order to weigh anchor when Akshay finally ejaculated, “I want to get off!” but the crew paid no attention to him. The steamer was quite close to the bank and he leaped off on to terra firma.
There was no trace of Ramesh ashore. The morning train to Calcutta had just steamed out and Akshay came to the conclusion that Ramesh had espied him when he struggled to enter the train, and that, supposing him to have some hostile intention, Ramesh had abandoned his journey to his native place and had doubled back to Calcutta by the morning train. It would be exceedingly difficult to unearth any one in a place the size of Calcutta.