Stage Play 3
Castle of Despair
Dramatis Personae:
Rajiv: Forty year old businessman.
Ramya: Rajiv’s thirty-five-year-old wife.
Deva: Rajiv’s thirty-five-year old businessman friend
Divya: Deva’s thirty year old wife and Ramya’s close friend.
Rau: Forty year old lawyer and Rajiv’s long lost friend.
Inspector Slesha: Rau’s thirty-year old wife.
Nayak: Fifty-year-old lawyer and Rajiv’s friend.
Raju: Forty-five year-old Bank Manager and a friend of Rajiv.
Dr. Aslam: The Rajivs’ fifty-five year old family physician.
Rangaiah: The sixty-five year old servant at the Rajivs’ house.
Scene – 1
[Curtains Up: The Rajivs’ well-furnished drawing room at the right side with an adjoining bedroom on the left side. A backside opening in the drawing room connects the rest of the backstage bungalow. Rangaiah is seen in the drawing room dusting the furniture.]
[Enter: Rajiv with briefcase in one hand and cell phone in the other tucked to the ear.]
Rajiv: Rangaiah, has Bank Manager Raju called on the landline?
Rangaiah: No, Rajiv babu.
Rajiv: Is Ramya at home?
Rangaiah: No babu, she has gone out with Divya beti.
[Rangaiah goes backstage and Rajiv continues to redial on the cell phone. Rangaiah returns with a glass of water that Rajiv takes.]
Rangaiah: You know you are more than my lost son to me.
Rajiv: Don’t I feel free with you than I was with my father? Why, you are a confident of sorts to me from childhood. But why do we need to vouch for all that now?
Rangaiah: If you don’t get angry I want to say something.
Rajiv: What’s holding you?
Rangaiah: I’m scared of the new Rajiv babu in you.
Rajiv: What do you mean?
Rangaiah: I see you are a changed man all charged up for the pipes project. What’s the need for you to bother about it being a landlord yourself? Moreover, you have a flourishing steel business as well. You know how uncomfortable Ramya beti is about your obsession.
Rajiv: Rangaiah, you are living in a world that time had left behind and Ramya is unable to step into the new one despite my pushing and prodding. Nowadays landlords are passé and businessmen still carry the shopkeeper tag. Industry is the in-thing but its dog- eats- the-dog out there. Realize that the gentleman of leisure your late master was is a dead species now.
[Enter: Raju with his briefcase.]
Raju: Sorry Rajiv.
Rajiv: Raju,I was really mad with you. Ask Rangaiah if you don’t believe me.
[Rangaiah greets Raju and goes backstage.]
Rajiv: You were not at the bank and your cell is ever engaged.
Raju: I couldn’t call you to tell about the summons from my zonal office. There was no way anyway. You know how a call from our zonal manager sends us into jitters. Oh, the way he hauls us over the coals right in front of our subordinates! What a nasty fellow!
Rajiv: Don’t we all know that its man’s frustration at home giving vent to itself at the workplace.
Raju: Seems so from what is rumoured about his wife. More to the point, even as he let me go after a good dressing down, my wife took over on my way here. Why, this damned cell phone could be the brainchild of a nagging wife. But as the Hyderabadi road sense is no less scary, self-driving is not a sensible option either.
Rajiv: Isn’t the bumper-to-bumper on the road as unending as the red tape in your bank. Won’t my year-old application for term loan prove that?
Raju: You know I’m only a clog in an inertial wheel.
[Enter: Rangaiah with elachi chai for them.]
Rajiv: Why not get a little momentum now.
[They both begin to sip the beverage.]
Raju: Wah Taj!
Rangaiah: Saab, its Ramya beti’s recipe as you know.
Raju [to Rajiv]: So, Ramya is a good teacher as well.
Rajiv: Besides being a strict wife that is.
Raju: Without wife for a jockey, a man can’t run life’s course. That’s for sure. Is she not at home now?
Rajiv: She went out with Divya for some shopping. What a compelling attraction shopping has for women, more so, window shopping.
Raju: Why a window-shopping wife is any day better than a nagging one.
[Rangaiah collects the tea cups and goes backstage.]
Rajiv: But why all this dodging. You know I’m dying to ground my project. You promised to get back to me by this evening, didn’t you?
Raju: To make the long story short, your pipes project might remain your pipedream forever.
Rajiv: But why?
Raju: They feel it’s like facilitating the delivery of a white elephant for my nursing.
Rajiv: Someone must be mad over there.
Raju: Well, to borrow from cricketer Mohinder Amarnath, they are a bunch of jokers anyway. Leave alone the mega term-loan for your proposed venture; they are dodgy about measly working capital to a profit-making unit!
Rajiv: How would that help me anyway?
Raju: Eureka! Why not I borrow from the prodding of the courts for out-of-court settlements?
Rajiv: Enough of borrowing my friend as the topic is about lending.
Raju: Oh, if only you are a little less impatient and our people have a little more alacrity. Of what avail is working capital once his unit becomes sick?
Rajiv: Is it your idea that I should wait to pick up that sick unit or what?
Raju: I’ve a much healthier mind than you may like to credit me with. What if you lay a pipeline to his oil unit with the margin money of your proposed venture for mutual benefit? Besides being sensible it sounds nice, doesn’t it?
Rajiv: You know I want to be an industrialist and not a money lender.
Raju: Be patient for once. What’s your problem if he takes you as a partner? Won’t that open the doors for some future projects of your own?
Rajiv: Instead, why not I take over the unit? Won’t your bank facilitate that?
Raju: But why should he sell it to you?
Rajiv: To follow suit, let me borrow from Casanova.
Raju: I suppose the topic is not about sexual exploits. Looks like you want to delve into it taking advantage of your wife’s absence.
Rajiv: Jokes apart, I tell you he had a better grasp of life being a playboy than you guys have of money being bankers.
Raju: Is it so?
Rajiv: During one of his sojourns, he had for co-lodgers a poor widow and her three daughters. Seeing him dole out money to all and sundry, when the hapless woman had gone to him to make up leeway, he sought as barter the charms of her eldest daughter.
Raju: What an indecent proposal!
Rajiv: Protest she did but to no avail. Why he was all logic, cold logic you may say. Whatever be his charity, he reasoned it out with her, it wouldn’t last forever and before long she would have to approach other men for succor. Well, their line would be no different from his and her response too could be the same. But for how long was the question. It was only time before she would lose hold on her daughters’ chastity. When push would come to shove at some future time, won’t she let them grant their final favour to someone or the other? That being the case, he said, why should he not be the lucky guy?
Raju: What an abominable fellow he was!
Rajiv: I don’t think so.
Raju: Well!
Rajiv: Lest she should mistake his character, he clarified that he wouldn’t have attached any strings if her daughters were plain looking.
Raju: Didn’t she spit on him thrice over in spite of that?
Rajiv: Well, she let him have her eldest one and he had the other two on his own.
Raju: Isn’t it an exploitation of the meanest kind!
Rajiv: Why, it’s life’s reality of the ironic kind. Logically seen, it’s very sound, but sentimentally approached, it’s all fury. Whatever, can’t you visualize the parallel?
Raju: I do see but as you know I won’t approve of it.
Rajiv: So be it. By the way, who’s the guy we were talking about?
Raju: He’s Sampath one of my valued clients.
Rajiv: What’s his background like?
Raju: Why bother about that when you are averse to my proposal?
Rajiv: How do you know he won’t be interested in my proposal?
Raju: Well who knows, ask Nayak who also happens to be his lawyer.
Rajiv: Whatever, don’t lose track of my application.
Raju: Don’t I owe it to my clients to pursue their cases. Now it’s time I attended to Rani’s errand. I will see your wife sometime later.
Ramya (voice over): Why don’t you come in Divya?
Divya (voice over): No, Ramya, Deva would have reached home by now. See you tomorrow, bye.
Ramya (voice over): Bye.
[Enter: Ramya.]
Ramya: Hi Raju garu, how is Rani?
Raju: She’s fine at my account and expense that is.
Ramya: Oh, all you men! Are you not worse for it when it comes to portraying the better-half as the worst-half?
Rajiv: But with the honourable exception of His Exalted Obedience.
Raju: Well, Her Exalted Eminence would be waiting for me, good night.
Ramya: Tell her Divya and I will soon catch up with her. Good night.
Rajiv: Good night.
[Exit: Raju as Rajiv sees him off. Ramya goes into the bedroom.]
[Curtains down.]
Scene – 2
[Curtains Up: The Rajivs’ drawing room and the adjacent bedroom.]
[Enter: An excited Rajiv into the drawing room yelling for Ramya. He drops his briefcase on the sofa and goes into the bedroom in search of her. Not finding her there, he goes backstage, yelling for her.]
Ramya (voice over): Why, what’s wrong with you?
Rajiv (voice over): That’s the problem with you middle-aged women.
Ramya (voice over): Okay baba, what has turned my old boy into a horny lad now? [Pause] Rajiv, don’t be mad.
[Rajiv, carrying a demure Ramya in his hands, comes out of the backstage and goes into the bedroom. He drops her in the bed and then draws her towards himself.]
Ramya: Wait until dark.
Rajiv: Is not sex the physical manifestation of emotional expression? Why, it’s the barrier-less bearer of man’s inner impulses.
[Lights are off as Rajiv cuddles with Ramya.]
[Lights are on as Ramya rearranges her dress.]
Ramya: If only we can turn the clock back?
Rajiv: What a thought when it’s time to leap frog in life.
Ramya: Beware of a fall dear.
Rajiv: Why not start a course in the art of pessimistic living. Just as Sri Sri Ravi Shankar has his following, you’re sure to have your share of fame. Never mind my predicament as a celebrity’s husband.
Ramya: Be serious, your obsession to advance has become a drag on my life.
Rajiv: Relax Ramya; I’ve got a grip on the lifeline to success, almost that is.
Ramya: Looks like you are riding a bigger horse than ever.
Rajiv: It could as well be a carriage of four for the empress of my heart.
Ramya: And our Ravi the heir apparent to your industrial empire in the making. Why not summon him back from the States leaving his course in M.S. mid-course. Oh, my dream merchant, you give me nightmares really.
Rajiv: Let Nayak come to set your mind at rest.
Ramya: Why talk in circles?
[Rajiv leads her into the drawing room, opens the briefcase and pulls out a document and gives it to her.]
Ramya: What’s this?
Rajiv: Game changer.
[Ramya goes through the document.]
Ramya: Who is this Mr. Sampath by the way?
Rajiv: He’s a technocrat, a good one I may say, but with very little business sense.
Ramya: So he has put his unit up for sale, is it?
Rajiv: Well, not yet. It’s my idea to make him do that.
Ramya: But how!
Rajiv [pointing to the document]: By signing on the dotted line.
Ramya: Why should he sell his hatta katta unit to you? What wishful thinking!
Rajiv: It was nothing short of a miracle that he came thus far, in spite of the banker’s lending hand that is. He’s hard up for funds to run the unit and the financial stress is bound to make him wind up the show any time now. Won’t I grab that and proceed.
Ramya: Enough of this wild goose chase, I long to go back to our laid back times. You know I’m getting sick of you and your devious ways for quick bucks. Haven’t you inherited enough to last our lifetime and more? You’re not doing any badly either at your business. What could be a better setting for leading a contented life? Why this urge for more and more of the moolah?
Rajiv: Don’t you see this could be the document of our destiny?
Ramya: Or a pathway for frustration.
Rajiv: Wonder why you always sing a sluggish tune forgetting there is a woman behind every successful man?
Ramya: Maybe, to push him into the cesspool of greed only to find him dragging her along.
Rajiv: Isn’t it silly to dub the hard-nosed as greedy?
Ramya: Why, eying what is not your due is plain greedy, isn’t it?
Rajiv: The world doesn’t care how you make your money but weighs you with the moolah you have. Well, it’s the credo of the dull to deride success one way or the other.
Ramya: God save you, if you have one.
Rajiv: Don’t you know God helps those who help themselves.
Ramya: Isn’t it also said that those whom Gods want to destroy they make mad.
Rajiv: Besides your beauty nothing makes me madder than your madness.
Ramya: Don’t you know I’m mad with you because I love you?
[Enter: Nayak ushered in by Rangaiah. Rangaiah goes backstage.]
[Nayak greets Rajiv and Ramya, they greet him in turn.]
Rajiv: I thought you would bring Mr. Samapath along with you.
Nayak: I’ll come to that later. I hope I haven’t kept you waiting for too long. Blame it upon the hazards of our haphazard traffic.
Ramya: Don’t we, Hyderabadies learn to live with the pregnant traffic ever?
Rajiv [winks at Ramya]: Of what avail is an ever pregnant wife, what do you say?
Ramya: Is it a plea for bigamy? [Turns to Nayak] What do you say lawyer garu?
Nayak: I recall a limerick about the trial of a man who had three wives. When the judge had asked him, why three, the guy said, one is impossible, bigamy, sir, is a crime.’
Ramya [to Nayak]: What about having on hand my plaint for divorce?
Nayak: Won’t my conflict of interest rule that out.
Ramya: That is in spite of the notorious double tongue.
Nayak: Isn’t it a professional hazard? But I can put you to Rau.
Rajiv: You mean my class fellow Rau! Is he still going round the courts in his worn-out black coat?
Nayak: Soon he’s going to be sworn in as a judge of the Delhi High Court.
Rajiv: What, Rau, a high court judge, are you joking.
Nayak: Why, even as he was growing intellectually all the while, you got stuck in your belief that you had outgrown him.
Rajiv: Why didn’t you tell me before?
Nayak: Is your role model of success a low profile lawyer on the right side of justice?
[Rangaiah brings some tea for them.]
Rajiv: If it’s all merit well and good but if it’s a case of political pull God help mother justice. Rangaiah, don’t you recall my friend Rau who was always in our house, now he’s going to be a high court judge.
Rangaiah: Don’t I know you were closest to each other. Oh how you used to gossip in the name of combined study. I’m sure he remembers me too. Why don’t you invite him home?
Rajiv: Who knows he might put on airs now. Well, we will see. [Turns to Nayak] Have you got Mr. Sampath around? I’ve readied the agreement to be signed and sealed.
[Rajiv shows the document to Nayak who keeps it aside without going through the same.]
Nayak: Honestly, I didn’t have the heart to tell him to sell his unit to you. Don’t I know what he had to endure to realize his dream? But why did you raise the bar?
Rajiv: To lower the risk.
Nayak: What risk do you run by the way?
Rajiv: I don’t see the partnership on offer working out for me in the long run.
Nayak: Why it’s a win win deal for you in the short as well as the long run. I wonder why you fail to see it that way and wish I had the money myself.
Ramya: Why any doubt! It’s all fair and square whichever way one may look at it.
Nayak: Rajiv, it pays for man to go by the wifely instincts, won’t it?
Rajiv: But its no romantic matter is it? Why talk about a distant future in an uncertain life. If it comes to bargaining, it’s ten percent over its fair market value and I’ll let him keep his job by doubling his salary. What can be a better incentive than that?
Nayak: No denying if it were to be a distress sale. But as he is desperate to run the show, I asked him to try his luck with Deva.
Rajiv: What a double-cross it is Nayak? Having sent Sampath to deal with Deva, you’ve come to see my defeat, isn’t it? But mind you, being my chela, Deva won’t fall for the bait. He knows how keen I am about this.
Nayak: Sorry, you got it all wrong Rajiv. I could have conveyed Sampath’s mind to you over phone itself. But I’ve come here only to make your disappointment less hard to digest. Well, if my memory serves me right its Musil who said that life becomes unimaginably confused when we think of ourselves but it becomes very simple when we think in terms of helping others.
Rajiv: Maybe that’s the philosophy for philanthropists but do realize businessmen are made of a sterner stuff. I hope you would agree that I will find it hard to forgive you.
[Rajiv goes into the bedroom and lies on the bed.]
[Exit: Nayak leaving a perplexed Ramya.]
Ramya: Life becomes unimaginably confused when we think of ourselves but it becomes very simple when we think in terms of helping others. Oh, how beautifully said. Well, would Rajiv ever realize that?
[Curtains down.]
Scene – 3
[Curtains Up: A morose Rajiv and a concerned Ramya in their drawing room.]
Ramya: Since there is no word from Deva, maybe all is not lost.
Rajiv: My worry is not about Deva. I’m only wondering how to bring Sampath around.
Ramya: After all, it’s another day. Won’t a little give and take sort this out?
Rajiv: Do you want me to walk the halfway street all my life.
Ramya: What can be done when life bars one from its highways?
Rajiv: Why not take a detour to destiny?
Ramya: Its better that you stick to the road of contentment.
Rajiv: I’m sick and tired of you and your sermons. Won’t the so-called contented deride success from their rooftops of inadequacy. What hypocrisy, sour grapes. Scratch their surface and you will find layers of limitations. That’s why contentment is nothing but conceding ones’ limitations.
[Ramya answers an incoming call on her cell phone.]
Ramya: Hi Divya?
Divya (voice over): Are you at home.
Ramya: Very much, what’s the matter?
Divya (voice over): We’ve something to tell you.
Ramya: Missed your periods or what?
Divya (voice over): You know its no more do ya teen but ek ya do.
Ramya: After gems of twins, you don’t need any more, do you?
[Switching off the phone, Ramya turns to Rajiv.]
Rajiv: So, my chela has snubbed Sampath. It would serve Nayak as well.
Ramya: Chela or not, Deva is a gem.
Rajiv: Why, you always side with him.
Ramya: Because I find him sensible.
Rajiv: Why not say he’s your contented classmate?
Ramya: So be it but why forget Divya. Are they any losers?
[Enter: Deva and Divya.]
Rajiv: Don’t you look buoyed?
Divya: Is it so? I thought I’ve taken it in my stride.
Rajiv: What’s up your sleeve anyway?
Deva: So to say, it’s no more than your leavings.
Rajiv: Why talk in circles?
Deva: It’s about Sampath’s offer.
Rajiv: Don’t you know I am not yet through with it?
Deva: But Nayak said you were not for it!
Rajiv: Why didn’t you check up with me?
Deva: Nayak is your own man, isn’t he?
Rajiv: So are you, aren’t you?
Deva: Why doubt?
Rajiv: But still you undermine me, don’t you?
Deva: No. I just want to sail on a deserted ship.
Rajiv: You thought I’m naïve to miss the voyage myself.
Deva: Maybe you’ve a different agenda.
Rajiv: Why don’t you say I’m a grabber?
Ramya: What happened to you Rajiv? Won’t you stop now?
Rajiv: Didn’t you hear me tell Nayak that Deva wouldn’t go against me. Won’t he have the last laugh? Oh what would he think of me now? A boastful bastard at the very least, isn’t it? [Turns to Deva] You know I always believed you are my own man. How could you let me down?
Deva: Had you told me, I would’ve dropped the deal like a hot brick.
Rajiv: don’t you know loyalty is not begged.
Ramya: Is it his fault that you took him for granted.
Deva [to Rajiv]: I will stand by you if you get right back into the act.
Rajiv: Unless you tell him you are out of it, he’s no fool to come around to me.
Deva: Why not go by his terms. I think he’s more than reasonable.
Rajiv: So you think I’m unreasonable, don’t you?
Deva: Rajiv for God’s sake why not sort it out with him and be done with it.
Rajiv: Is it that you don’t want to let it go on your own?
Deva: Why don’t you understand? Won’t I lose my face if I backtrack now?
Rajiv: Don’t you owe it to me to save my face, though late?
Deva: Yes my friend, but not at the cost of my credibility.
Rajiv: Why don’t you say you don’t want to lose the bonanza?
Deva: If it were the case, why didn’t you grab it in the first place?
Rajiv: Because I couldn’t foresee you stabbing in my back.
Divya: Oh, how could you be so unkind to him!
Ramya: Rajiv, you’re being petty really.
Rajiv: Et tu, Ramya. What an unkindly cut from my wife in support of another man.
Deva: Divya, let’s go before we make it worse for her.
Ramya: What is left for him to shame me more?
Rajiv: You would know after they leave. [Turns to Deva] If only you had shown half the concern to your friend as you bear to his wife, things wouldn’t have come to this pass.
[Exit: Deva and Divya followed by Ramya.]
[Rajiv goes to the backstage.]
Ramya (voice over): Sorry Deva, it’s just his pique at work and it would pass.
Deva (voice over): Ramya, let’s leave it at that. Good night.
Ramya (voice over): Good night Deva.
[Rajiv reappears with a Whisky bottle, a water bottle and a glass tumbler.]
[Rajiv begins to mix his drink.]
Divya (voice over): Ramya, see you tomorrow. Good night.
Ramya (voice over): Bye Divya.
[Enter: Ramya and walks past Rajiv.]
Rajiv: Isn’t it strange that you’re less concerned about your husband than about his friend?
Ramya: You don’t seem to know how insane you’ve become.
[Ramya goes into the bedroom and Rajiv continues to drink in the drawing room.]
[Curtains down.]
Scene – 4
[Curtains up: Rajiv and Ramya are in deep sleep in their bedroom.]
[The alarm clock strikes twelve times, Ramya gets up languidly and goes backstage. Shortly thereafter, she returns with a cup of coffee and goes up to Rajiv.]
Ramya [at the entrance to the bedroom]: Bed coffee, hot coffee for a hothead.
[As Rajiv doesn’t stir, Ramya keeps the coffee cup on a side table. She sits on the cot beside Rajiv.]
Ramya: Get up man.
[Rajiv doesn’t respond. Ramya prods at him and realizes he is dead.]
Ramya: Oh, how sad he has died before he could find his lost soul. But could he have redeemed it had he lived any longer? Unlikely, isn’t it? Its better he died than lived on to abuse my life more than ever.
[Ramya makes a few calls on her cell phone (mime). Then she clings on to Rajiv’s body and yells for Rangaiah.]
[Enter: Rangaiah.]
Ramya: See how he has orphaned me!
[Rangaiah feels Rajiv’s body and breaks down.]
Rangaiah: How sad, babu has died so young.
Ramya: Am I not worse off being widowed so young?
Rangaiah: Why so beti, won’t Deva babu take care of you?
Ramya: We’ll come to that later but let’s move the body out of my bedroom.
[Ramya and Rangaiah manage to lay the body in the drawing room. Rangaiah spreads a white bedspread over it.]
Rangaiah: Oh the poor master has lost his life and he won’t be raising from the dead either.
Ramya: Get lost; do you expect me to do a sati with him or what?
[Enter: Deva and Divya.]
[They rush towards Ramya. Divya takes Ramya into her arms. Ramya sinks into Divya’s lap and Deva caresses Ramya.]
Deva [to Ramya]: Oh the way he was cut up with both of us.
Divya: But how did the end come?
Deva: Dr. Aslam would be able to tell us. Has anyone informed him?
Ramya: Why, I called him. Don’t we need a death certificate now? I told Nayak to come as well to find out if Rajiv had left any will.
[Enter: Dr. Aslam and Nayak one after the other.]
[Dr. Aslam examines Rajiv’s body and closes its eyes.]
Divya: What went wrong with him Doctor saab?
Dr. Aslam: Looks like it’s a stroke.
Deva: Without a warning that is!
Dr. Aslam: Why I had been warning him not to pump himself with his faulty success pump all the time. But sadly he wouldn’t listen. Why, the mantra of our time is to fast-fruit life before age ripens it. In a way, he lost his way in life much before death has snatched it away from him.
Divya: Maybe it’s true with every life, doctor.
Nayak: More or less, yes, but it’s truer with people like Rajiv who place success above all else. Why they even shut out all that is associated with their early life believing they had outgrown their humble beginnings. Losing their life’s moorings thus, they allow themselves to marooned by bogus characters. But there are honourable exceptions. Why, didn’t bandit Valmiki become sage Valmiki?
Dr. Aslam: How come?
Nayak: It’s a cultural question that’s understandable. When the bandit accosted some saintly soul who it was I don’t know, well it’s a cultural dilution of the day, the good man asked the bad guy to ascertain from his family members whether they were prepared to share his sins. To the bandit’s shock and dismay, everyone of his family, including his wife, refused to share the sins of his banditry, the source of their livelihood! And that turned the bandit into a sage poet who bestowed Ramayana to the world of letters.
Dr. Aslam: Nothing surprising about it really as intellectual growth makes man ever humbler. The problem with man is he mistakes his bulging bank balances as a sign of his outgrowing his humble friends.
Ramya: Sadly Rajiv was a victim of that myopic of success.
[Exit: Nayak, Dr. Aslam and Rangaiah.]
Divya: Had he lived, maybe he would have repented.
Ramya: Do you honestly believe that he could have?
Divya: I’m not sure but what if he had died out of remorse.
Ramya: It’s unlikely the way he had behaved only yesterday.
Divya: Well, of what use it is talking about the dead.
Ramya [to Divya]: That’s true. Won’t you make some coffee for us?
[Divya goes backstage.]
Ramya: You know he died believing I’m in love with you?
Deva: But is it so?
Ramya: [clutching at Deva’s arm]: Don’t you know?
Deva: Maybe, but I didn’t believe I could be so fortunate.
Ramya [sinking into his arms]: And now?
Deva [hugging her]: I can’t rejoice more.
Ramya: Don’t we owe it to him for making our dreams come true?
[Deva reaches out to her lips.]
[Curtains down.]
Scene – 5
[Curtains up: Ramya in the bedroom and Rajiv in the drawing room sofa both lay asleep.]
[Rajiv wakes up in a trance seemingly perturbed. He looks up at the wall clock.]
Rajiv: Oh God, it’s nearing six! Don’t they say early morning dreams come true?
[He goes into the bedroom to wake up Ramya.]
Ramya [drowsily]: What’s the matter?
Rajiv: What a dreadful dream!
Ramya: What’s new about it?
Rajiv: It’s a bad omen.
Ramya: O ho, damn superstitions.
[Ramya fails to get up, Rajiv moves into the drawing room after a good stare at her even as Rangaiah enters with a broom.]
Rangaiah: What’s wrong Rajiv babu?
Rajiv: I had a dreadful dream.
Rangaiah: Rajiv babu, are you not upset at the unexpected developments.
Rajiv: What happened to my life Rangaiah? It’s as if it has turned on its head all of a sudden. Oh, how I started snubbing Rau after our graduation and gave him enough hints that I had outgrown him? And imagine, he’s going to be a high court judge now! Still I would have held my industrial head high enough for him had I got my project grounded or took hold of Sampath’s unit. Since it’s not the case and as Nayak is bound to carry my failure to Rau, won’t he have a hearty laugh at my expense?
Rangaiah: Rajiv babu, are you not stretching things too far. Who knows, Rau babu may not be a fishing- in-the-troubled waters type.
Rajiv: Rangaiah, because you are a simpleton you think everyone is like you. Oh, how I’ve lost my face with Nayak and allowed Rau to have his last laugh. Why, is it not owing to Deva’s betrayal? Oh, how he had shamed me. Won’t I pay him back in the same coin? But how is the question. [He pauses to think] Why not hurt him where it hurts most.
Rangaiah: Don’t get carried away by your hurt Rajiv babu. I’m really worried as I recall that incident when you were at Rau babu’s throat for befriending Ravi whom you used to hate no end. It was only by chance that I could save him in the nick of time.
Rajiv: Now it’s worse than that, isn’t it?
[The bedroom alarm clock rings six times. Ramya gets up and goes into the drawing room.]
Rangaiah: I’m worried more for that.
[Exit: Rangaiah as Ramya walks up to Rajiv.]
Ramya: What’s troubling you? Is that your dream or what?
Rajiv: Hasn’t my life become a joke for you?
Ramya: Why do you hurt yourself?
Rajiv: Why should I when you are at it anyway.
Ramya: How am I hurting you?
Rajiv: Maybe, that dream has only portrayed my premonition.
Rajiv: What’s that?
[Rajiv keeps mum though Ramya repeatedly asks him to tell her what was bothering him.]
Ramya: Why it can’t be a delirium born out of your failed dream?
Rajiv: Can a wife be more insensitive than that to her husband’s concerns?
Ramya: Why not I fetch some coffee to ease your nerves a little.
[Ramya goes backstage.]
Rajiv: Oh, how I loved her? What an artful bitch she has turned out to be. What a devoted ass of a husband I am! And what a cheating whore of a wife she is? Oh God, why this to me! What I’ve been missing being faithful to her? Well, dames by their dozen. What a tragedy really!
[Ramya returns with some coffee for them. She offers him one cup but he doesn’t take it. Keeping the cups on the teapoy, she sits beside him to soothe him. But he gets up and she catches him by his arm.]
Ramya: Why are you being so childish?
[Rajiv keeps mum.]
Ramya: Be a man and be done with it.
Rajiv: Don’t you see you disgust me?
Ramya: But why?
Rajiv: Don’t act innocent.
Ramya: What do you mean by that?
Rajiv: Why, are you not churlish?
Ramya: Me, churlish!
Rajiv: Why doubt.
Ramya: Mind it; I’m no mirror image of yours.
Rajiv: Enough of your high-mindedness.
Ramya: What madness!
Rajiv: Is it any worse than artfulness?
Ramya: Me, artful. Any more compliments?
Rajiv: If only you drop your veil I’ll tell you more about you.
[Ramya pauses being perplexed.]
Rajiv: You don’t want me to see your ugly moles and hideous warts, do you?
Ramya: What is there for me to hide from you?
Rajiv: You should know that better, don’t you?
Ramya: Oh me, what are you aiming at?
Rajiv: That which you’ve been hiding from me all along.
Ramya: What is that?
Rajiv: Don’t you know it yourself?
Ramya: Why beat around the bush?
Rajiv: It’s better than carrying-on behind my back, isn’t it?
Ramya: What did you say! me carrying-on behind your back?
Rajiv: Is it news to you?
Ramya: So, our life has come to this pass.
Rajiv: Because I was naïve to your ways with that Deva fellow.
Ramya: I knew you are a big dreamer and a bad loser but never could I imagine you are such a nasty character. Perhaps I should have guessed. Oh! how I wasted my life with you.
Rajiv: Why waste more of it?
Ramya: Maybe you are right for once.
Rajiv: Having been wronged for long that is.
[Exit: Ramya in a huff.]
Rajiv: She didn’t look guilty, did she? But can she deny that she has a soft spot for Deva? Oh how he has become the bane of my life by first charming my wife and then hijacking my agenda. What if in her fit of anger she turns to Rau for legal counsel. Won’t that double the ridicule? What an accursed fate that had brought him into my life! Don’t I owe it to me to avenge myself upon him?
[Enter: Divya seeking Ramya.]
Divya [to Rajiv]: Hi.
Rajiv: Hi.
[Divya goes backstage.]
[Rajiv hails for Rangaiah.]
[Enter: Rangaiah as Divya returns.]
Divya: Where is Ramya?
Rajiv: Wait, I’ll tell you. [Turns to Rangaiah] Go and fetch her.
Rangaiah: Babu she didn’t tell me where she was going.
Rajiv: Why, she must be with one of the women in the colony. [Turns to Divya] Can’t you make a guess?
[Rangaiah lingers on at the exit.]
Divya: Why spoil her party; I’ll come later.
Rajiv: But I want to detain you for a while. [Turns to Rangaiah] What’s holding you up?
[Exit: Rangaiah.]
Divya: What’s the matter?
Rajiv: You first tell me what you thought about me the other day.
Divya: Why, you were so nasty with Deva, more so with Ramya.
Rajiv: Did you ever think why I behaved the way I behaved.
Divya: Why, I thought you couldn’t digest the prospect of Deva’s progress.
Rajiv: So you got it all wrong and I can’t fault you for that.
Divya: What else then?
Rajiv: It was only a trigger to vent my ire at both of them.
Divya: Why any ill-feeling at all!
Rajiv: Do you expect me to rejoice for being cuckolded.
Divya: What nonsense?
Rajiv: Right now they would be in each others’ arms, I don’t know where.
[Divya remains mum.]
Rajiv: Won’t that make some sense at least for them?
Divya: Do you want me to swallow that rubbish?
Rajiv: Don’t you see my misery unable to digest that?
Divya: Maybe you are imagining things. Don’t I know you are not well?
Rajiv: Do you think my grief itself is imaginary?
Divya: You surprise me really.
Rajiv: So was I when I caught them in the act.
Divya: But still…
Rajiv: If I let you catch your man with my wife, would that do?
Divya: Won’t I be shamed no end then?
Rajiv: Having endured the ordeal, I can tell you what it would be like. It would be worse than you can ever imagine what it might feel like.
Divya: I can understand [she takes his arm] I’m sorry really.
Rajiv [holding her arm]: What a relief your empathy gives me. [He rests his head on her shoulder] Won’t you give me you shoulder to cry over?
Divya [caressing his head]: Can’t I share your agony being in the same boat?
Rajiv [hugging her]: Dear, let us weather out the storm together.
[As Rajiv tries to take Divya into his arms, she smoothly withdraws from him.]
Rajiv: What a pity even a woman can’t hold her pity for a cuckold for long.
Divya [taking his hand]: Please don’t hurt yourself with self-pity.
Rajiv [holding her hand]: Divya please, I need your understanding to get over her deceit?
Divya: You can count on that.
Rajiv: When the tragedy sinks in you, don’t you crave for a lover’s solace?
Divya: I am too dazed to visualize that.
Rajiv: Why don’t’ you see the mirror image of your hurt soul in my wretched bosom?
[Divya stares at him long and hard. He gently forces her into the bedroom even as she protests.]
Divya: No Rajiv, no, please, leave me.
Rajiv: Believe me; I’ll die if you deny.
Divya: Oh, it’s not fair.
Rajiv: Is it fair to deny us our solace.
[Rajiv forces himself on Divya.]
[Lights go off to indicate the impending act as he forces himself upon her.]
[Enter: Ramya as lights are switched on.]
[Ramya goes straight into the bedroom as Rajiv was about to make it into the drawing room. Once in, Ramya finds a distraught Divya rearranging her dress. Divya sinks into Ramya’s arms.]
Ramya: Oh, how come?
Divya: Why, haven’t you brought it upon me?
Ramya: What do you mean?
Divya: Are you not carrying on with Deva?
Ramya: Don’t be crazy.
Divya: Don’t you know Rajiv is mad about it.
Ramya: He may be imagining things or worse still…
Divya: I tried to console him and he forced himself upon me.
Ramya: You must be a fool to have believed him.
Divya: Why is it not true?
Ramya: Never, I swear upon you.
Divya: But his manner made me believe him.
Ramya: Don’t I seem sincere to you?
[Divya looks into Ramya’s eyes.]
Divya: Oh, if only I’ve had more faith in you, I wouldn’t have allowed myself to be tricked by him.
Ramya: Aren’t we women, besides being human.
Divya: Oh what a cheat he turned out to be!
Ramya: I didn’t know he could play act too.
Divya: But for his wiles, I would’ve resisted him more vigorously than I did.
Ramya: Don’t I understand that?
Divya: What an irony that truth should deprive me of some solace though perverse. And now I am worse off for the reality, am I not?
Ramya: It’s one of those ironies of truth.
Divya: Oh, why did the devil enter into his head to ruin my life?
Ramya: Well, it was all along lurking behind his ambitious wings. What with his greed baring it, it came to the fore. Didn’t we all see that yesterday?
Divya: Damn the devil but how can I face Deva now?
Ramya: Dear, treat it as a bad dream and let life take over for time to dissipate the distress. I can understand how difficult it could be, but for Deva’s sake, you must put all this behind.
Divya: I’ll try, but whatever happens, promise you stand by me.
[Ramya hugs Divya.]
Ramya: I’m yours dear, more than ever.
Divya: Now I really feel easy.
[Ramya caresses and kisses Divya before she goes to Rajiv.]
Ramya: If you carry your villainy any farther, I myself will end your accursed life.
Rajiv: Ramya, please listen.
[Ramya goes behind the stage and comes out with two suitcases that she keeps in the drawing room. She goes into the bedroom and comes out with Divya.]
Rajiv [holds Divya’s hand]: I’m really sorry, forgive me if you can.
Ramya [pushes Rajiv]: Leave us alone.
[Ramya and Divya pick up a suitcase each.]
[Exit: Ramya and Divya leaving Rajiv.]
[Curtains down.]
Scene – 6
[Curtains Up: In the drawing room Rajiv looks lost.]
[Enter: Rangaiah with an envelope.]
Rangaiah: Rajiv babu someone gave it for you.
[Rajiv tears open the envelope and starts reading the letter aloud]
“Rajiv:
You would have realized by now that all is over between us bar divorcing. My new found advocate who happens to be your long lost friend would call on you to discuss the terms of separation. I hope he would find you sensible for once.
Once yours,
Ramya”
Rajiv: See Rangaiah, your Ramya beti wants to divorce me. What’s worse she has engaged Rau as her lawyer to rub some salt on my wounded psyche. Oh how gleefully he would have taken her vakalat to upstage me. So, the one I slighted once is going to put me in the dock now. Can life get more ironical than that!
Rangaiah: I can’t believe that babu. There is something that doesn’t meet the eye here.
Rajiv: Whatever, didn’t I bring it upon myself? When did I lose my way in life? Could it be when I began to think I outgrew Rau? Oh how I took it for granted that he could be living somewhere in the wilderness of life suffering from an inferiority complex. How I was to know that fate would bring us together to let him catch me on the wrong foot! What a mess I’ve made of my life!
[Sound of the calling bell.]
[Exit: Rangaiah only to readily return.]
[Rangaiah talks to Rajiv (mime) and Rajiv’s colour changes.]
[Exit: Rangaiah as Rajiv goes to the entrance with apprehension.]
[Enter: Slesha in vardi with a baton in her hand. She pulls out her ID card from her shirt pocket and flashes it.]
Slesha: I’m Inspector Slesha.
Rajiv: What brings you here Inspector?
Slesha: Investigation into a rape case.
[Rajiv is shocked but he quickly recovers.]
Rajiv: How can I help you madam?
Slesha: By giving truthful answers to my questions.
Rajiv: Of course, you can count on that.
Slesha: Do you know Ms. Divya?
Rajiv: Why not, she’s my friend Deva’s wife.
Slesha: She has accused you of raping her.
Rajiv: Oh God. How could it be!
Slesha: That’s beside the point, isn’t it?
Rajiv: Don’t you see I’m shocked no end?
Slesha: Why it’s apparent from the beginning.
Rajiv: How it can be different when the police come knocking at the door.
Slesha: The alarm of the guilty and the anxiety of the accused don’t look alike, do they?
Rajiv: How am I to know that?
Slesha: You would know when I begin my interrogation.
Rajiv: I’m no expert in these matters but I hear I can have my lawyer on hand.
Slesha: Besides the law, I don’t mind suffering your lawyer’s presence.
[Rajiv tries to call Nayak on his cell phone but the line is ever engaged.]
Rajiv: Don’t you think in use phones measure the ongoing gossip in society.
Slesha: By any chance, is your wife a gossiping type?
Rajiv: One may say she’s a gospel type.
[Enter: Rangaiah]
[Rangaiah hands over a business card and tells Rajiv that Rau had come to see him (mime).]
Rajiv: Think of the devil and here it comes. Would you please excuse me for a moment?
[Slesha nods her assent.]
[Exit: Rajiv with Rangaiah.]
Rajiv (voice over): Congrats Rau my old boy! Let me take a hard look at the justice in the making. Why, you haven’t changed a wee bit really! Why, I would’ve recognized you in a crowd. Though I’m expecting you, it’s Godsend in a way. I’m in a soup right now, well, not the one your client is brewing for me. Won’t you help me for old-time’s sake?
Rau (voice over): Why, what’s the other bother?
Rajiv (voice over): I can be booked for rape anytime now.
Rau (voice over): Oh God, but how come!
Rajiv (voice over): I’ll tell you but first help me see the back of my tormentor.
[Enter: Rau (in lawyer’s suit) led by Rajiv.]
Rau [to Slesha]: You here!
Rajiv: Do you know her!
Rau: Well, as much as a man would know his wife, no more and no less.
Rajiv: Nothing is truer than fact being stranger than fiction, isn’t it?
Slesha: Maybe, but can I take it Mr. Rajiv, that you’ve engaged a lawyer in advance anticipating the complaint?
Rajiv: Come on Inspector, you know that’s not the case. Wouldn’t you know that your husband and I haven’t seen each other for ages?
Slesha: Lawyer garu, is it such a coincidence that you come to see your long lost friend when I’m acting on a complaint of rape against him!
Rau: So what?
Slesha: How does that answers my question?
Rau: What if it doesn’t?
Slesha: Don’t you know criminal investigation warrants citizens’ cooperation?
Rau: I came to see him at his wife’s behest.
Slesha: Is it for negotiating the terms of separation?
Rau: I can’t satisfy your curiosity as it’s a matter of client confidentiality.
Slesha: We will come to that later. [Turns to Rajiv] I would like to talk to your wife.
Rajiv: She’s not at home.
Slesha: Can’t I guess that much. Where is she now?
Rajiv: I don’t know about it myself.
Slesha: So, the plot thickens even more, isn’t it? Is it possible that after raping your friend’s wife, you had murdered yours to eliminate the witness to your crime?
Rau: Inspector, don’t let your imagination run amuck. Know she’s very much alive and kicking.
Slesha: Put her on the line then.
[Rau pulls out his cell phone and Slesha on a second thought stops him in his tracks.]
Slesha: I want Mr. Rajiv to talk to her on his cell.
Rau: What’s the hitch if I contact her myself?
Slesha: I’ve my reasons for wanting him to do that.
[Rajiv tries to contact Ramya on his cell phone but she doesn’t answer his calls.]
Slesha: Don’t I see, she’s not receiving your calls. Why this estrangement?
Rau: An unanswered telephone call is no proof of a marital discord.
Slesha: What if she’s cut up with him because of the alleged rape.
Rau: It’s for the police to find that out, isn’t it? But I expect you to respect my client’s right for silence on this issue.
Slesha: Dear lawyer garu, habits seem to die hard. Why put the cart before the horse. Don’t you know the matter is still under investigation and is yet to be committed to trial? [Turning to Rajiv] Is your wife estranged from you because you had raped Ms. Divya?
Rau: When he didn’t even admit to the alleged rape, your question doesn’t brook an answer, does it?
Slesha: Oh I see. But he can guess nevertheless?
Rau: But guesswork makes no evidence, does it?
Slesha [turns to Rajiv]: Do you admit to your estrangement?
Rajiv: It’s just a storm in our marital teacup.
Slesha: What was the cause of it?
[Rajiv contemplates for an answer.]
Rau: Why not elicit that from Ramya? I can ask her to come now.
Slesha [checking up with her wristwatch]: Ask her how long it would take her.
[Rau makes contact with Ramya and talks to her (mime).]
Rau: She said she would be here in half an hour.
Slesha [to Rajiv]: Meanwhile, I would like to go over the alleged crime scene. Do you insist on a search warrant?
Rajiv: Please, I’ve nothing to hide anyway.
[Slesha goes into the bedroom leaving Rajiv and Rau. While Slesha was at work in the bedroom Rajiv and Rau deliberate.]
Rajiv: If not for you, I wouldn’t have any respite from your wife.
Rau: It’s just a case of lawyer’s instincts at work and no more.
Rajiv: Maybe it’s a straw but it still carries hope, does it not?
Rau: I’m sorry I can’t be of much help to you. Don’t you see my wife hasn’t finished as yet and your wife too has some unfinished business with you?
Rajiv: I know I’ve no right to expect either.
Rau: But still, for old time’s sake, I’ll get you an ace lawyer to handle the rape case.
Rajiv: Don’t bother about that as I am seeing life in a fresh light. Why, the worst of fates cannot be worse than my wasted past. If only I could relive my past, I would never lose a friend like you at the threshold of life? I know it’s neither here nor there but whatever comes now, I’ll take it in my stride rather stoically.
[As Slesha joins them with a folded bedspread in her hand, Rau’s cell phone rings and he answers the call (mime).]
Rau: Ramya says she got stuck in a traffic jam.
Slesha: Oh damn it; I’ve only half an hour to spare.
Rau: What if she calls on you later?
Slesha: No, let her wait here for me.
Rau: My client may not prefer that.
Slesha: Is it okay if we meet here in two hours from now?
Rau: That gives me time to brief her about the developments.
Slesha: Oh the way you lawyers help your clients is nothing but unlawful.
Rau: Whatever, it’s permissible under the law, isn’t it?
Slesha: When was it a policewoman won an argument with a lawyer husband?
Rau: Well, on your cue, I’ll make it with my client.
Slesha: By the way, Mr. Rajiv, did you realize that you haven’t denied Ms. Divya’s accusation?
[Exit: Slesha and Rau leaving Rajiv in contemplation.]
[Curtains down.]
Scene – 7
[Curtains Up: Rajiv in disarray in the drawing room. After a short while Rangaiah brings some tea from the backstage.]
Rajiv: Rangaiah, what a quick fall after a slow raise! Or is it a slow fall from a stable life? Whatever, it was my ambition that has undone me. No, it was my greed that was the culprit. Well, aren’t ambition and greed the two sides of the coin of success? So what difference does that make anyway, either way? How my quest for success made me mean to bring about my ruin in the end? How Ramya used to caution me against it by counseling contentment. If only I paid heed to her ardent pleas, my life wouldn’t have come to this sorry pass. Didn’t Rau condescend to descend at my comeuppance? Or am I still wearing my blinkers for failing to see his empathy for me?
[Rajiv begins to sip from the cup.]
Rangaiah: Rajiv babu, my sixth sense tells me that all would end well
Rajiv: But is it not clear I’m going to end up in jail. How am I to live with my guilt and bear the shame as well? Maybe it could be different with Ramya’s support? Now that she has chosen to unyoke her life from mine, how am I to endure the terminal pains for the rest of my life?
Rangaiah: Once Ramya beti notices the change in you everything would change.
Rajiv: But sadly I’ve pushed her beyond the point of no return. More than my abominable offence, the deceitful way in which I had committed it might have broken her heart.
Rangaiah: I don’t know why but I’m still hopeful.
[Exit: Rangaiah.]
[Rajiv in contemplation paces up and down the room for a while and settles at the desk and pens a letter and reads it aloud.]
“Dear Divya
Oh how fate had contrived with my ambition to make you a victim of my pique. What irony that I should’ve felt robbed by Deva when I was myself trying to loot Sampath! What perversion to hurt you to redress my own hurt. That’s the ironic tragedy of my final fall!
It pains me even more that I failed to give a thought to what Nayak said only a few days back. Didn’t he tell someone had felt that life becomes unimaginably confused when we think of ourselves but it becomes very simple when we think in terms of helping others? Now that I missed out on life, what death would hold for me? Why wouldn’t it become simpler if I were to erase someone else’s shame through it? Won’t my end help the two women I had wronged begin life afresh? It would for sure. Isn’t the very thought impelling me to embrace death.
I suggest that you too should see the past in a fresh light. Why feel humiliated thinking about the old fiend who had hurt you. Why not let the pristine soul of the dead Rajiv elevate your life. Well, to begin with, it may seem hard to believe but if you dwell upon the difference, it would be easy to grasp the nuances of it.
Forget the old fiend and forgive the new soul for denying you.
Rajiv.”
[Rajiv hails for Rangaiah]
[Enter: Rangaiah. Rajiv wants him to deliver it to Divya (mime).]
[Exit: Rangaiah with the letter. Rajiv paces up and down and ensures that Rangaiah had left the place. He was about to enter the bedroom.]
[Enter: Ramya and Rau and Rajiv turns back.]
Rajiv: Ramya, you may relieve Rau as any way I’m going to release you. Well, my trial is over in my court of conscience and I need your pardon as I undergo the punishment.
Ramya: It’s easier asked than given. How is your change of heart going to redress my hurt and her shame? Whatever, I’m at a loss to react to your self-discovery after ruining three lives including yours. I wonder how I can help you rebuild your life when the next fourteen years of it is going to be behind the bars.
Rau: Not if you withdraw your plaint, I can take up his case to ensure that he walks out a free man at the first hearing itself. Why, his confession to Slesha is worthy of the court dustbin and no more. Any district court lawyer would make out a case of consensual sex given the familiarity the family friendship had bred.
Rajiv: Oh stop it my friend. I was mad to violate her chastity but I won’t be mean to slur her character to save my skin.
Rau: So be it if you are prepared to spend your life in jail losing your wife as well.
Rajiv: So what. If Ramya forgives me, won’t my penitence in jail make our reunion sublime in the end?
Ramya: That only means you want me to languish as your chaste wife all the while.
Rajiv: I’m sorry; I’ve failed to see it from your point of view.
[Rajiv goes into the bedroom and locks the door. Ramya and Rau suspecting the untoward frantically knock at the door and plead with him to come out (mime). Rajiv pulls out the revolver from underneath the bed.]
[Enter: Slesha.]
[She takes out the bullets from her shirt pocket and shows them to Ramya and Rau. Rajiv comes out of the bedroom and sees the bullets in Slesha’s hand.]
Rajiv: Oh what a life that won’t let me die even. Why am I not dying out of shame having been caught in the act?
Slesha: Why, from the look of you I knew you would push yourself over the precipice and so I had emptied the cartridge.
Rajiv: If only you could have visualized the impending joy of dying in my face as I clicked the revolver, I’m sure you wouldn’t have tried to stop me from dying.
Slesha: Can’t I feel your misery from the pain I see in you now.
Rajiv: Believe me, the pain you see is but the loss of that joy. If only you could grasp my soul, you would get the essence of my mind. The thought that my death would make it easier for the two women I had hurt made me rejoice at the threshold of death. But having stopped me from dying, you had only made life difficult for them and me as well. Aren’t you guilty on both the counts?
Slesha: Far from it. You would have died leaving your poor image for an obituary. Why not live to better that before death visits you on its own. As for Ramya, she would’ve lived in guilt for pushing you over the precipice. With you gone how would Divya have the joy of forgiving.
Rajiv: By losing Rau and by extension you, oh, how I’ve missed my life all these years.
Slesha: By striving to build the castle of despair for you and your spouse ending up in debasing your friend’s wife.
[Enter: Divya with the letter in her hand rushes in with Rangaiah. Rangaiah holds Rajiv’s hand as Divya leads Ramya and Slesha into the bedroom and shows them the letter. They talk to each other (mime).]
Rangaiah: I lost a son when I was still young and can I lose another when I am old. Why didn’t you think of me Rajiv babu?
Rajiv: Rangaiah, what do you expect from a man who couldn’t even think of himself. Thank our Rau’s wife that I’m still alive.
Rangaiah [to Rau]: Rau babu, I want to live in the old days during the last days of my life. I’m glad you’ve as good a wife as Rajiv babu has.
Rau: Thank you for your abiding affection and the good opinion about Slesha.
Rajiv I’m glad my wife made such a difference to your life.
Rajiv: Now it’s left for your client to remain a convict’s wife or not.
Rau: Let me talk to her.
[Rau joins Slesha, Ramya and Divya. Slesha talks to him (mime).]
Rau: Wonder how the play had developed beyond the script! Oh how life came up with a bigger plan than our little one to put sense into Rajiv’s wayward head.
[Rau accompanied by the three women rejoins Rajiv and Rangaiah.]
Ramya: Isn’t it said that to err is human but to forgive is divine.
[As Divya gives his hand to Rajiv, he embraces Ramya.]
Rajiv: Thank you both, it feels like beginning life afresh.
[Enter: Deva.]
[Rajiv turns sad all again and others too are surprised. In turn, Deva looks questioningly at Slesha in police uniform and Rau in his lawyer’s dress. Ramya begins introductions by holding Slesha.]
Ramya: Isn’t it ladies first? Meet Inspector Slesha Rau my childhood playmate [She
looks at a surprised Rajiv] and this is lawyer Rau, Slesha’s husband and Rajiv’s lost and found friend. And this is Deva our family friend.
Slesha [to Rajiv]: We met only the other day when she came seeking Rau’s counsel.
Rajiv: I take it that you are Godsend to help me pull down my castle of despair.
Deva [to Rajiv]: Don’t I smell the scent of enlightenment. What better time to say sorry to you.
Rajiv: Deva, you don’t know how ashamed I am. [He turns emotional.]
Ramya: Deva can understand, calm down dear.
[Ramya leads Rajiv into the bedroom.]
[Rau and Slesha engage Deva (mime) as Divya looks on.]
Ramya: Don’t make it worse for them with your confession. I’ve seen to it that
Divya has kept it to herself. All this drama is Rau’s idea to shake you up from your slumber of success.
Rajiv: Oh, how he made me even humbler than ever.
[Rajiv and Ramya join the others in the drawing room. Rajiv goes to Rau and Slesha to hold their hands in gratitude and then turns to Deva.]
Rajiv: Deva please help me treat the Sampath episode as a bad dream.
Deva: Let bygones be bygones. You may deal with him whichever way you choose.
Rajiv: No Deva, don’t I know now how treacherous success is? Oh, how it changes its goal post whenever one is at a striking distance from it. I envy you for wanting to quit the rat race before it could ruin your life.
Rau: Why blame success when the fault lies in the way we approach it. Haven’t you heard Emerson’s success quote that’s a hit on the net?
Rajiv: No, what is that?
Rau: Among other things, he feels that to know even one life has breathed easier because you’ve lived is to have succeeded.
Ramya: Oh, to hear it said itself feels so nice.
Slesha: I’m proud to say he has tasted success many times over.
Rau: Thank you for your high praise. But that’s beside the point I am making. I suggest that Rajiv and Deva join hands with Sampath to help build that fledgling unit to contribute to our country’s economy. It’s not about the generation of wealth that one should be skeptical about. It is the way the rich spend money that should bother the sane minded. For instance, it’s one thing to build bigger and better workplaces and another to do the same for personal ostentation.
Deva [to Rajiv]: What do you say now?
Rajiv: Still I would leave Mr. Sampath to your care. With Ramya, I would like to find our way for personal fulfillment through social enrichment.
Rau: Best of luck to all of you.
Ramya [to Rajiv]: I’m happy you’ve realized humility is the essence of life.
Rajiv: And that wife is the scent of it.
Rau: Why not, if a man is upright in this topsy-turvy world, much of the credit for that should go to his wife.
Rajiv: On that note, let it be my privilege to propose vote of thanks to the good Samaritans, my eminent friend Rau and his worthy spouse Slesha for the beneficial roles played by them in the drama of my chequered life.
[Rangaiah and others clap as the audience joins them with Rajiv.]
