Children of India

by Janet Harvey Kelman

The woman started back from the little brown figure with the tattered clothes and the shaven head. “Widow!” she said. Then she cursed Sita and told her that she had done her harm by letting her shadow fall on her, and that she would have to take a bath before she could eat; and then she cursed her again.

The child looked up in surprise. She did not know what all this meant. The tears were in her eyes, and the woman, with a touch of pity, stopped a moment, when she was safely out of reach of Sita’s shadow, and asked:—

“Why should I help you when the gods have cursed you? See, you are a widow.” But Sita only gazed at her.

“Don’t you understand? Did you not have a husband once?” “Yes, I think so, the old bad man who used to shake me.” “You call him bad?” “No wonder the gods hate you. You must have been very bad once. So now you are a widow, and by and bye you will be a toad or a snake.” Then the woman lifted her water-pots and hurried away.

Sita hastened too for she knew she had stayed too long, and when she reached the house she was so tired that she nearly fell, but instead of a cool drink or kind words her sister-in-law burned her arms and hands with a hot poker because she did not go to work quickly enough and the little one had to labour on through all her pain.

So the days passed one by one. Some were worse and some were better. But Sita was always hungry for since her head was shaved she was only allowed to eat once a day and that only of the least pleasant kind of food. She was lonely too, for most of the children fled from her. But there was one girl called Tungi, who used to manage to speak to her sometimes. Tungi was a little wife, but she had not yet gone to stay with her husband. He was in school, and he had sent word that his wife must go to school too, till they were both older, because he wished her to be able to sing and to read books and be happy with him when he spoke of the things he cared about.

Tungi’s mother did not like this at all. She thought as very many people in India think that it is a bad thing for women to read and write; but Tungi was married, and, just as her mother would not have thought it right to save her from her husband if he had been ill-using her, so she did not think it right to refuse to let her go to school.

Tungi was a bright girl and she quickly took in many of the lessons that were taught at school. One of these was that it would do her no harm to talk to a widow, so though she dared not let her mother see her talk to Sita, she used to sit by her whenever she could get a chance to do it without being seen.

It was not a great thing for Tungi to do, for she loved to see the light steal into the frightened eyes; but if it was only another joy in Tungi’s full life it was like the gate of heaven to Sita. Even to catch a passing sight of Tungi made a day a red letter day for the little widow.

Sita told Tungi all about what the woman at the well had said to her, and Tungi told her that many of those who were at school did not believe such things about widows. She told her too, that there was a better God than the ones who would treat a child as she was treated, and so she tried to comfort her little friend.