Some strange premonition of what is going to happen is haunting Chikthayi, but she quells it and goes to the headman’s house. Putti must have run into the house and into the room where the women of the household sleep, Chikthayi thinks. She goes through the old stone corridor and sees that the wooden door is shut. She bangs on the door a couple of times, rattles the latch and shouts, Putti, Putti!

There is no response. Finally, with a sinking feeling in her stomach, Chikthayi sits with Ningamma and plays with the seven-month-old baby Byregowda, who has a deformed leg and has to be handled very carefully. Putti does not come for dinner, though Ningamma and Chikthayi repeatedly call her. They have to do this in secret, for if Doddegowda gets to know that Putti is being difficult about things like this, he will break her door open and give her a thrashing.

Doddegowda and Sannegowda sit down to eat. Chikthayi looks around anxiously for Annaiah. He is not here either. Catching her look, Ningamma gives a knowing smile and says, he has eaten and gone out somewhere, he didn’t tell me where. Chikthayi blushes and looks away, even as Ningamma grins.

Chikthayi’s worries, however, are bigger. She is increasingly anxious about what has happened and why Putti is not coming down. She wonders if she should tell Ningamma about Putti going over the wall and getting the flowers. Oh, she just doesn’t know what to do! After all, she should not get Putti into certain trouble just because both of them want the same thing.

She helps serve the food to the men and tells everyone that Putti is not feeling well. No one worries about this. Doddegowda eats his ragi mudde and koli saaru, looks around for Annaiah, and on not finding him, goes off to bed. Sannegowda is in the middle of giving a sermon about swarajya and ekikarna. He uses both words at least twice in each sentence: Chikthayi, to divert herself from her worry, actually counts. And he does not care that his listeners are not in the slightest bit interested. When Doddegowda goes off to bed, Sannegowda sulks, finishes the rest of his meal and also leaves in silence.

Chikthayi is now too worried about Putti to go back home. Besides, she has not had a glimpse of Annaiah, which is one of her main reasons for coming here and staying so long. After dinner with Ningamma, Chikthayi tells her that she will also stay the night, then runs all the way to her house on the next lane to get permission.

Joy rushes through her as she returns. Annaiah is walking gracefully along in the moonlight towards the headman’s house. He is holding a goatskin pouch in one hand and singing a song in his alien language, snatches of which float to Chikthayi.

She feels a frisson of fear and excitement. Maddened by an impulse to speak to him, she slows down and stops, holding her breath, desperately thinking about how to approach him. She has never spoken to him alone before. How to tell him what she is feeling, what are the words to express this depth of torturing, squeezing longing for she knows not what … will he understand?