“My dear boy… however long I am meant to live is God’s will. You must live a long and good life.” She gently touched his forehead in blessing.
After everyone left, Sugandhi sank into the loneliness of the empty house without her husband. The voices coming from the little wall next door continued to tell her what was happening there. Selvi was suffering in one way or another.
Selvi had now been away from her home for two weeks. The neighbours had exhausted themselves gossiping about her.
Suddenly, commotion arose on the other side of the little wall.
“Rajan is dead. He is lying in the middle of the house. Flies had gathered on him. They say ants had eaten his mouth.”
He had lain there as a rotting corpse in the unattended house, no one knowing exactly when he had died. He was Selvi’s husband.
Somehow the news reached Selvi. She had gone to her mother’s house after informing her father-in-law about matters concerning her mother’s home and property. She rushed back in panic. When she saw her husband in that condition, she cried out and collapsed in grief. Perhaps the pure love in her heart for him had still remained. After Rajan’s death, her father-in-law and younger brother-in-law, unwilling to leave Selvi alone, moved back into the house. Several months passed.
For some reason, Selvi’s father-in-law decided to leave his ancestral village. Over the next few months, they sold all their property, gave Selvi the share that was rightfully hers, and left the village with his younger son.
After he left, Selvi was allowed to remain in her own house. Her money was safely deposited in a bank, a means of livelihood was arranged for her, and Sugandhi’s heart was filled with satisfaction when a suitable man was found and Selvi was married again.
In the meantime, Jona visited his grandmother once or twice.
Selvi, who had built a new life in a neighbouring town, now had a child. Along with Sugandhi’s daughter, she would sometimes come and visit Sugandhi, like another daughter.
A few more years passed. When Sugandhi learned that the family who had bought Selvi’s former father-in-law’s house was moving in, she sat beside the little wall that day, filled with a strange anticipation.
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