Chikthayi wears the family heirloom green seere, her hair is plaited with mallige and the wedding takes place, with great festivity and pomp. All the neighbouring villages also attend. There is a veritable flood of sharey and the girls at the temple earn twice their annual income in that one night.

5

ANNAIAH RETURNS

t is the day of the seventh tithi oota for Putti. Upper-caste bommanru have to be invited to eat first and, since the village has none, some from the big village beyond the hills have come. They are getting ready to leave when a man with a long black beard and hair walks into the headman’s house. He sits down and eats the tithi oota with the family’s relatives, who whisper amongst themselves, wondering who he is. There is something disturbing about him.

Chikthayi, who is visiting from her distant village, comes into the hall with her two-year-old son clinging to her red silk seere. With a deftness born of long practice, she manages to chatter with the guests, control her son and serve the right quantity of rice in the correct order to all the people present. She reaches the stranger and is about to serve him the rice, saying the words of welcome that unknown guests are greeted with in that village.

The words don’t come out. She stands staring, unmindful of her son and the other guests, of the rice bowl that falls with a crash from her hand. As the man rises from his seat on the mat, Chikthayi faints.

Ajji, newly married to Sannegowda, has been learning the duties of being the youngest daughter-in-law of the headman’s house. She served the kosambri in the previous round and barely noticed the stranger. Now that Chikthayi has dropped rice all over him, she comes running to take her away and soothe matters a bit. She notices that Doddegowda has just come in and is staring queerly at the stranger. But she has more urgent concerns on her mind than to worry about her brother-in-law’s odd behaviour.

She takes Chikthayi straight into the women’s sleeping room, where Putti also once slept. Chikthayi is twitching and moaning, trying to tear the mallige flowers from her hair. Bewildered but helpful, Ajji pulls out her bamboo mat and lays Chikthayi down. Pushing Chikthayi’s scrambling hands away, Ajji slowly untwines every individual mallige and lets her hair loose.

Chikthayi moans: Annaiah! Ajji freezes. By the time she comes rushing out of the room, the news is all over the house: the handsome stranger is none other than Annaiah, the man the village thinks is responsible for Putti’s death.

Ajji goes running, hoping that Doddegowda and Sannegowda have not already killed Annaiah. The sight that meets her eyes is unbelievably peaceful. Annaiah is seated in the veranda of the house where he used to sleep all those years ago. All the menfolk, including Ajji’s smouldering husband and Chikthayi’s thoroughly confused one, are sitting around him, chewing betel leaves. The womenfolk are buzzing in and out of the veranda to keep their eyes on everyone.