It is as though they are living through a scourge, and when it is over, what lingers? Bad feelings that may persist through generations, Janaki thinks miserably, huddling with her husband and child at night, being exceedingly solicitous toward her parents-in-law by day. How can people not see-Vasantha, Swarna, Vairum-that even a family that fights is better than a broken one? Families belong under a single roof. She resolves that, after they move, she will make an extra effort to be friendly with them, and with Vairum. She must work, in every way possible, against estrangements.

It is mid-August when finally the two couples move into their own homes, the week India gains independence and Pakistan splits off: a country born, a country split, parturition and partition. Northern corridors run with blood-families abandon homes, families abandon families.

Janaki, who has no interest in politics and has lost track of the news, is felled by a fever that keeps her in bed, shivering, for three days. Baskaran goes in search of Palani veeboothi, which she takes in pinches and makes him and Thangajothi smear on their tongues and foreheads as a preventative until she is better.

THE FOLLOWING MARCH, she returns to Cholapatti, a month early because she is pregnant again, due in April. She has made one trip back in the meantime, in November, to visit Kamalam there, who just had her first baby. By the time Janaki gives birth to her twin boys-she and Baskaran compromised this time; the nurse was called but stayed in the courtyard, close at hand, until the babies were safely delivered-the house is full again with her siblings and their children. Laddu has so far refused to marry, but Sivakami has asked his sisters to convince him this summer. He is almost twenty-eight and, given how he has advanced through the ranks of Vairum’s concerns and how well he is now earning, a highly eligible bachelor. The women look forward to a little sport at his expense.

Only one concern mars the summer’s gaiety, and even that provides them with gossip: Mari has shown signs of increasing delusion and Vairum has been taking her for monthly treatments in Thiruchi. The young women of Sivakami’s household press Gayatri for details and she agrees to tell all of them but Radhai, the only one yet unmarried.

“Hysteria,” she says, looking at them meaningfully.

They look at her and one another, and then Sita makes a small sound of recollection. “I have heard of that.” She looks at her sisters suggestively. “Isn’t it… a complaint of a, you know, intimate nature?”

“Exactly. I don’t know exactly how long it has gone on, but it sounds like perhaps from the start of their marriage, Muchami and Mari never…”

She pauses and the young women lean in.

“Never had sexual congress.” Gayatri nods solemnly. “It’s a terrible thing. And now it has started to tell on her health.”

“Ayoh!” Saradha exclaims.

“It is terrible,” says Janaki, as Kamalam blushes, looking deeply reluctant to learn all this. “Poor thing.”

“So how is it treated?” Sita asks, with more curiosity than concern.

“A machine.” Gayatri uses the English word. “In the doctor’s office. My husband said he had seen advertisements for such things, in mail-order catalogues, way back. It does… it’s supposed to simulate what a husband should do.”

“Ayoh!” Saradha exclaims again, with greater feeling.

Janaki is silent now, full of pity for the both of them. Good old Muchami and his poor, striving wife. Whatever went wrong? Why did they never adopt? They should have had children. It might have saved Mari. She’s sure it would have, in fact. Maybe Vairum and Vani will give in and do that before Vani goes entirely the same way. If they don’t think of it themselves, though, she can’t think of anyone who would be brave enough to suggest it to them.

The treatments appear to be effective, Muchami admits. For a week or two after each one, Mari appears calmer, doesn’t drop things as much or fall down, and recognizes him as her husband. The effects ebb, though, and by the time she is due for another treatment, she once more cannot be trusted to cook or serve, and will call Muchami by odd names, sometimes male, sometimes female, and accuse him of histories and doings that are plainly not his.

He is so ashamed, and it is worse for not knowing how he is and is not to blame. He, who has always held duty above all, failed to perform this sacred duty for his wife. He tried, a couple of times, but she rejected him, saying they had agreed: theirs was a celibate marriage. He was grateful, because he had not been confident that he would succeed in satisfying her. He loves her, but much as he loves his younger sisters. He was frankly repulsed by the idea of intimate contact. Perhaps she rejected him because she sensed that.

Inasmuch as he is her husband, though, he is responsible for her health and care. He had taken her to see a number of healers before finally turning in desperation to Vairum. The doctor Vairum took them to see was the first who tried to probe the malady’s causes, instead of treating symptoms. Muchami had always feared that their lack of conjugal relations would in some way return to haunt him, and the diagnosis was both a relief and a deep humiliation. He returned feeling unmanned, a feeling that intensified with Mari’s first treatment. He waited in the small vestibule of the office-Vairum, mercifully, had dropped them off and said he would return in an hour-while Mari was inside on the doctor’s table. Muchami listened to the whir of the machine and then Mari’s cries, escalating. They reminded him of his childhood, when, a couple of times, he spied on neighbours at night. This was the first time since then that he had heard a woman orgasm.

He could feel Sivakami waiting, the next day, for his report on this latest effort. She had been among the first to witness Mari’s difficulties, and had been his confidant as he searched for a means to cure her. He had been mum on the results of the consultation with the doctor, except for telling her, when she served his morning meal, that he thought the doctor might have some idea what was wrong. Sivakami had not probed for details.

“That’s good,” she said gently, not incurious but trusting him to say what he could, looking at him with such compassion that he was almost tempted to confess.

It had made him feel strange about their relationship in a way he never had before. He has never thought their closeness odd; rather, it was the natural result of their shared life’s work. He is so grateful now, though, for the succour of her friendship, something none of his male friends can give him, nor, clearly, his wife. Unlike them, she knows nothing of his inclinations, and yet she feels what he feels, because their missions, their heartbreaks, their triumphs have so long been twinned.

He had nodded at her, and she smiled a little and went to fetch more rice for him as he sighed, exhausted from concern but now resting for a moment in their precious, private complicity.