IT WAS AROUND nine in the evening. The black asphalt of the Grand Trunk Road was sheathed in darkness. The streetlights on the edge of the road were not working.
A jeep was heading at full speed towards the civil hospital. It came to a halt at the hospital’s gate and several passengers quickly dismounted from both sides—Satnam, Krishna, Baba ji, Rukman and Kesar Kaur. Munni was the only one from the family who wasn’t present with them. It was late and they had left her in Kanhaiya’s custody.
A light bulb at the gate was illuminating the way to the porch and five shadows walked silently around the building towards the entrance of ward no. 5. They crossed ward no. 4 and found themselves in a section that was pitch dark. The light outside the building wasn’t working and the area was also shielded from the limited illumination from inside the ward.
They were midway through this patch when a gun went off at close quarters, followed by a scream, ‘Hai! I’m dying!’ They stood frozen for a few seconds and heard Krishna’s body fall to the ground with a thud. ‘Hai! My child!’ the Baba cried as he cradled her in his arms.
‘Oh my God! Krishna’s been shot!’ Satnam yelled and turned to run towards a clump of bushes from where the footsteps of the fleeing assailant could be heard. But Kesar Kaur moved quickly to block his path and caught him in a vice-like embrace. ‘Stop right here, my son! The fellow will pump a bullet into you, too.’ He tried to free himself from his mother’s grip, but the assailant had already scooted over the boundary wall. Satnam had managed to catch a glimpse of his shadow and could make out from his silhouette that it was none other than Sudarshan.
‘Ah! Krishna!’ Satnam cried as he bent over her listless body. Kesar Kaur and Rukman were screaming their lungs out. Their screams and the sound of the gun had drawn a small crowd towards them, including a couple of men who were carrying lanterns. They could see that Krishna’s chest was soaked in blood. The bullet had struck the left side of her chest and had probably pierced her heart. Amidst the pandemonium, the Baba was silently bent over the girl as he caressed her head.
A doctor and some hospital staff also arrived at the scene. The doctor urged them to come with him and sit in his office, but Satnam would hear none of it. He lifted Krishna’s body in his arms and started to walk towards ward no. 5.
The distance wasn’t more than a hundred yards or so but for Satnam, each step was longer than a mile.
Behind him, he could hear several voices shouting out, ‘Catch the killer … that way, that way … it was a tall Sikh fellow … run, hurry up…’
As he approached the ward, he took advantage of a light bulb to take a closer look at Krishna. A glimmer of light—that light of life itself—was sparkling in her open eyes. He felt a momentary sense of relief, a feeling akin to that of a boatman whose boat has sunk but he can still see a part of the prow. There was a renewed firmness in his gait as he noticed that her eyes were fixed on his face and he saw a faint tremor in her lips.
‘Krishna! Krishna!’ he called. Her lips moved to form the letter ‘bha’ and the hand that was hanging behind her head rose gradually to rest on her bosom.
Satnam slowed down to observe her. Her hand was placed near the wound on her chest and her fingers were trying to reach for a small breast pocket inside her kameez. After some effort, they succeeded in retrieving a sheet of paper from the pocket and her hand once again rose painfully to hand the paper to him. Satnam peered at the paper and saw that it was from his own notepad. He winced on seeing his own handwriting on the paper. It was his second poem. The paper had been folded four times to fit into her pocket. The bullet had gone straight through the paper and a substantial part of it was stained with her blood.
The moment he took the paper from her fingers, her hand fell limply to the side. Her eyes froze even as her lips were trying to form the words ‘bha’ and ‘yu’. That was the last time Satnam heard her speak.
It turned out to be Krishna’s last act, her last sound. Satnam steadied his hands around Krishna’s body and ran inside ward no. 5. He was running because he didn’t have to worry that his movements might cause some pain to Krishna. She had found freedom from pain.
Satnam arrived at the door of ward no. 5 and entered its long hallway.
Yusuf was lying in his bed, sleeping or perhaps half asleep. His face suggested that he was enjoying some delicious dream when he heard the noise outside the ward. The dream ended abruptly as he opened his startled eyes. He had been advised against sitting up and the best he could do was to turn his face towards the entrance of the ward and try to figure out the reason for the commotion. His eyes gradually focused on Satnam as he strode through the ward, carrying Krishna’s limp frame in his arms. Her arms and legs were dangling awkwardly and her long braid was touching the floor. Blood was still oozing from her chest and spreading all across her kameez.
‘What! Naseem! My Na … Na …’ he stammered as he sprung up in his bed without worrying about his wounds. ‘Satnam! This … this …’
‘It’s a surprise, my friend,’ Satnam had a demented smile on his face. ‘Here! I’ve brought your bride. Let me set her on her nuptial bed,’ he said as he quickly placed Krishna’s body beside Yusuf.
Yusuf paid no attention to his words, nor did he burst into tears on seeing Krishna’s body. His face betrayed no emotion even as his eyes remained fixed on Krishna’s face and his hand gently caressed her blood-soaked corpse.
The relentless whirring of the ceiling fan was interrupted by a shriek from Kesar Kaur that pierced through the hallway. ‘Where’s Bapu ji gone? Oye Satnam! I can’t see Bapu ji anywhere. Go out and look for him.’
But no sooner had she finished speaking than the two attendants from the hospital could be seen propping him up as they brought him into the ward. They conveyed that the Baba had probably had some kind of epileptic attack and collapsed on the floor outside the ward. His turban had come off and was drooping around his neck and his snow white hair was fluttering under the breeze of the ceiling fan. He had tears in his eyes and his lips were softly murmuring:
Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudeva
Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudeva
Satnam moved away from Yusuf and was running towards the Baba when the loud bang of a gunshot reverberated across the ward.
He looked back and saw that Yusuf’s body was now lying beside Krishna’s. It convulsed a couple of times before becoming still forever.
‘Ah Yusuf!’ Satnam ran back to the bed. ‘You’ve killed yourself, you fool? You still couldn’t control your impetuous ways, could you?’
The left side of Yusuf’s chest had a gaping hole, almost at the same place where Krishna had hers. The butt of the revolver was still in his palm and its muzzle was nestled along his chest. The acrid smell of gunpowder and a band of smoke wafted across the ward.
That demented look returned to Satnam’s face. ‘What an amazing wedding night for my sister,’ he guffawed. His eyes moved around wildly, stopping briefly to gaze at Kesar Kaur as she sobbed uncontrollably before settling on the Baba. His chants of ‘Om Namo’ had now been drenched by his tears and echoed his anguish as they made their way out of his throat.
Satnam looked at both of them and exclaimed, ‘Bhabo! Bapu ji! You are crying? Of course, go ahead and cry all you want. It’s normal for parents to cry when their daughter leaves on her bridal doli.’
‘Oye Satnam! Oye what’s come over you?’ Kesar Kaur pulled her son close and brought his head to her bosom.
The Baba’s chants were now in full force, competing with the whirring of the ceiling fans as they echoed around the ward:
Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudeva
Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudeva