Ajji blinks and tries to focus on the figure. Is he holding that awful goatskin thing that he keeps drinking saraayi out of? No. Annaiah is holding a garland for Gangi. Ajji draws in her breath in wonder … the flowers in that garland! She has never seen them before, but they had to be the swetasanchari and suryavamsi from the wild garden beyond the wall – nothing else could let out such radiance.

Gangi looks at him, transfixed, and Ajji leaves, unnoticed by either. The heady smell of the garland that Annaiah puts around her neck goes to Gangi’s head. Her face reflects the glow of the flowers as he leads her into the temple, to his makeshift shelter inside and tenderly loosens her hair, taking out each mallige bud unhurriedly.

He looks at the young face in front of him. I will make her happy, he vows to himself. I will make sure that, unlike Putti or Chikthayi, she will not suffer or want for anything because of me.

Gangi no longer sees the middle-aged man to whom she has been serving food every day. Or the storyteller who opened up a world for her with his fascinating tales. Now she sees a man who suddenly and strangely stirs her blood and who is looking at her with great intensity. She sees a man as profound as the night sky glittering with stars. A swirling ocean of a man who is trembling and asking her for something that must come from inside her. Gangi melts in the sensation, seeking to assuage his need, cradling his head on her breast, soothing away the sudden tears which are flowing down his cheeks.

Seeing Gangi so obviously in thrall to Annaiah in the initial days, Ajji quells her misgivings and decides that she has done the right thing. Two days after Gangi went to the Kamadeva temple, Bhagyakka fixes another girl for Kumaraswamy, who is away studying at the market town and has no idea of what is happening in the village. It is all water under the bridge now … Still, Gangi is all right. Annaiah is keeping her happy. Gangi’s cheeks are hot, her lips are red. Her eyes flash with power. So what if she is looking dizzy and flushed? She is fine, Ajji convinces herself.

The sight of Dasegowda fuming impotently pleases her. He tries everything he knows to stop this turn of events. He demands Gangi as his right, says Ooramma has priority and more power than Kamadeva. Doddegowda firmly turns this away and says that Gangi is at the Kamadeva temple by her own wish. That is that. She is dedicated to God, as Dasegowda decreed, so Sannegowda should become okay.

The priest is stumped. He still desires Gangi. No one knows, including Dasegowda himself, whether it was necessary to please the gods like this for Sannegowda to be cured. Perhaps the herbal remedies that he has been using at the hut will cure him. But Gangi has escaped.