On the evening of the Kamanahabba, just before the rituals, Sundru comes down with a dull, dispiriting fever, that leaves him drained and disoriented. All day, the girls have been putting colours on him. He has drunk more than his share of paanaka, which this year seems to taste like saraayi. The hogesoppu he smokes this year is also stronger than usual and his head whirls. He lies on his bed, multicoloured, moaning and delirious.

The villagers are terrified: is he going to die? Just after Rajegowda’s unnatural death! Is this also the tent people’s doing? Or is it the Being that came on Dasegowda and demanded that Honni be burnt with Rajegowda??

Everyone is fretting, at their wits’ end about what to do, as time is just slipping away. The Kamanahabba play of Siva killing Kama should have been on by now. But Sundru is too unwell to do his role. The villagers scout around but no one is willing to stand in his stead. Already because of Rajegowda’s death, someone else has to play Siva. Cockroach, immensely interested in the proceedings, volunteers, but this is not even acknowledged by anyone. After much consideration, Annaiah pronounces that Ajji’s great-grandson – his own grandson, though everyone has forgotten that – Krishnegowda will play Siva. Krishnegowda initially scoffs at the idea, then agrees when they all press him to do the role. Now who will play Kamadeva?

It has to be Sundru. The villagers know it, without a doubt. Annaiah is doing all that he can for him and nothing is working. With anxiety gnawing at their insides, they even go to Dasegowda and plead with Krishnegowda and Bhaskaraiah, with their foreign knowledge, for help.

Dasegowda resents Annaiah and Kamanahabba. The villagers don’t celebrate Ooramma’s jathre with such fervour and nobody gives her credit for their crop. Why should he help them? Krishnegowda wishes Sundru dead anyway. Bhaskaraiah, still smarting at the villagers’ snub, grudgingly suggests his usual remedy of the allopathic doctor in the market town or the government medical attendant at the primary health centre in the next village. The villagers shake their heads. What do doctors know about Kamanahabba or an inauspicious fever preventing it?

All the men and the women who can be spared from household duties sip paanaka and go pray at the Kamadeva temple. Bangari, Ajji and Thimmakka, who has of course come bustling along to help, stay back to look after Sundru. Parvati, as the youngest in the house, is kept running around on errands. Honni is also there, but otherwise occupied.