After a few hurried rituals done by the great old aunt at the main gate, who Rajjo feared could die any minute, the little party escorted the new bride in.

The first thing Rajjo noticed was the dark and damp interior. Feeble lamps lit up the large rooms. The floors with yellowed marble, the walls painted a muddy cream. The house smelt of stale bread and moths. Despite its size the house was claustrophobic, with a maze of rooms and scattered furniture.

‘The house belonged to a professor. His wife was murdered, and then he went senile and left. Kullu bought it then.’ The great aunt made conversation with Rajjo. Rajjo wasn’t sure she had heard correctly. ‘He is a very sharp boy, my Kullu.’

Rajjo suspected the boy being referred to was her fifty-five-year old husband.

A servant walked in barefoot to take her bags. Rajjo followed him. The suitcases were kept in one of the larger rooms with a big bed occupying most of the room. A few pictures of Guru Nanak and other Hindu gods, along with a calendar sponsored by a gas agency, hung by the iron nails hammered inside the wall.

‘Oh why has she gone inside, that’s the wrong room and anyway she has to be outside, then you girls have to take her in, once Kullu comes! Bring her back, you idiots.’ Rajjo could hear the senile aunt. All this while her husband ‘Kullu’ was settling accounts outside with the bus driver and other vendors.

The ladies from the neighbourhood streamed into the house to glance at the new bride, just as they would when a neighbour got a new car, or electronics. It was a neighbour’s birthright in a small town to inspect anything new that was acquired by anyone on the street. Rajjo felt the intense scrutiny. Some hid back a smile or two, given the odd couple; a man old enough to be the beautiful bride’s father.

The great old aunt sat down with a sigh, asking the help to make sure a glass of milk was kept in the bedroom and for a bowl with water to be brought to her immediately. To Rajjo’s horror, she took off her dentures in the drawing room, placed them in a bowl held out by the servant and settled in comfortably. ‘What a menace, I feel like carrying a whole platoon of missiles in my mouth!’ And she continued in the same tone without pausing for breath.

‘Has someone kept the milk in the bedroom, where is that rascal boy, Kesar…’

A little boy emerged from the gathering. Kesar wore blue shorts and a pale yellow worn out bush shirt, silky floppy hair covered his forehead and kind eyes peeped out from behind. His face had a perpetual smile that warmed the heart.

A wave of nervous laughter followed. Rajjo’s face was flushed with anxiety as she sat in the living room with its sofa sets, lamps and stale smell. She could hear her husband walking in the main door, talking to someone.