Abdeen was saved by the old master in 1971, during the insurgency, when he was arrested by the police. He was innocent but he was then about to be shot. He owes his life to the old master. Now the old master is dead too. The man whom loku Mahathmaya wanted me to marry changed once he found that Abdeen’s sister Farina was rich and could send him money and gifts from Saudi.

I am getting on in years and I do not know what prospects of marriage I will have in the future. The men prefer money nowadays. But some of the women have grown more selfish; they have come back and built spacious houses. They do not want to marry and share their wealth with the men.

There is the other side too. Ratnayake’s wife has gone for the second time to the Middle East but she is very sick. Just before she left she was in hospital with asthma, being given saline. She is as thin as a katussa, one of those garden lizards. Hardly any flesh on her. All bones. Her mistress does not allow her to cook the food or come near the children. One day there was a big fight between the two of them; the mistress beat her and she, too, beat the mistress. She ran away but was caught by the police. She was considered the wrongdoer and was put into prison. Now they are trying to get her back but they have had no news. Sompala’s wife came back three months pregnant. The husband did not want someone else’s child, so she had an abortion that went wrong—it was performed by a quack. When she was taken to hospital it was too late and she died.