She had followed her mother’s directions and obtained, from a trustee, the document stating the value of lands and gold that should be passed into Sivakami’s hands. Now she takes from her safe that yellowed parchment, written by a scribe, inscribed by a judge, stamped with a seal, listing the deeds to three plots of land, adjacent to one another, and a kaasu maalai, a necklace of coins weighing eighteen sovereigns. Accompanying the testament is a letter from her mother saying that the ownership of the land transfers to her daughter upon her death. The necklace had come to Sivakami upon her marriage and had been passed to Thangam at hers. The plots of land-large, fertile grounds with old tenants, midway between Sivakami’s native village and Cholapatti-are being managed by her brothers. All these years, the income from the plots of land has been going into the family coffers-her brothers’. Sivakami does not begrudge them the income so far. If she had continued to live with them, it would have in some way paid for her and her children.
Sivakami replaces the keys to the safe beneath the loose brick and sits on the floor by the door to the garden, in view of the back room where all her grandchildren have slipped and burst into the world. The light from the garden billows and waves like long gauzy curtains on her left. Before her is a floor desk, a foot high at the near end and sloping up to a height of sixteen inches. She pulls it toward her and smoothes the uneven yellowy paper against the jackwood surface.
Her mother and grandmother fought their battles against their brothers in British courts. Sivakami doesn’t know how their fore-mothers fought before the British; she knows only how she must wage her struggle.
She takes a slate from within the low desk and makes a few calculations based on her knowledge of crops and yields and the recent strengths and weaknesses of the regional agricultural economy. She regards these for a few moments, then lifts the lid of the desk once more and tucks the slate into a ledger within. She sends Muchami to fetch a scribe, the son of the man Hanumarathnam retained all those years ago.
Sivakami is not illiterate, but, with no formal schooling, writing is a labour for her, and her nibs are not really of a quality appropriate to matters of importance. Vairum can write fluently, and has good pens, with proper ink, not the powdered stuff, but it is some time before his next visit. In any case, this letter would take some explaining and this is her initiative alone for now.
Muchami escorts the scribe into the courtyard and enters the house to bring out the small desk. The scribe, seated on the cobblestones, pulls the desk to and arranges upon it his pen, ink and parchment. He confirms that Sivakami, who sits, almost out of view, in the kitchen, has her own wax and seal.
She begins dictating and he writes with terrific grace and fluency, in perfectly straight rows with many flourishes. Muchami watches from the side, his mouth slightly open. He is fascinated by letters and words, the ability to drop them from pen onto paper and pick them up again in recitation.
Twice the scribe makes suggestions as to wording, and Sivakami accepts his suggestions. Though young, he has a lot of experience with official correspondence. He meticulously blots the first copy and places it on the warm stones to dry while he bends to the task of preparing a duplicate.
Sivakami reads the first copy and places it in the safe along with the testament and her mother’s letter. She takes out a coin for Muchami to pay the scribe and tells him to pass on her regards to his father, who has inked letters for the town of Kulithalai for more than thirty years. She places the second copy, still slightly damp, at the feet of her gods, prostrates herself before them and sits back on her heels. After a few moments she rises and, by the light of the ghee lamps, readies the letter to go out in the morning mail. She folds it carefully into a homemade envelope and heats a stub of wax marbled with smoke. The wax liquefies and is about to drip when she notices some dusky gold motes on the paper. They must have been carried, clinging to the document, from the courtyard cobblestones. She tries to blow the motes off of the envelope, but it is too late. The wax drips and churns up the gold flecks. Taking up the brass seal engraved with her husband’s initials, she aims and presses.
The wax cools and hardens quickly. Sivakami runs her finger over the cold seal, and then presses her left thumb to it, so long and hard that her husband’s initials are depressed in the pad of her digit. She watches the impression fade by the buttery lamplight until her thumb is once again grooved only with that signature which is hers alone, flecked with the odd dot of gold, like the sign of her husband on the fateful letter.
Sivakami’s letter reads:
Safe.
My beloved elder brothers:
Greetings to You and my Sisters and Father. I trust this finds You all in the best of health. We are all well here. hairum is performing well at college and I see him every month or so on those weekends when he has no Saturday classes. On this Deepavali, he will go to his in-laws in Pandiyoor. We are eagerly anticipating that you, also, might come to witness the half-wedding. Thangam, with God’s blessings, has followed her two daughters with a son.
Now I must come to the reason for which I am writing. As You know, I have been managing my own fcnancial affairs since the death of my husband and am quite conversant in the same. This income is more than sufficient for me to run our household and educate my son. [Sivakami is careful not to overstate this, lest it seem jeering or immodest. But she does state it, because she was right.] I feel I am meeting my responsibility of maintaining the property here in Cholapatti, in safekeeping for him until he comes of age and can assume management. He also is taking an increasing interest. So, I have no concerns in that regard.
I am writing to You with a concern of another nature. As you know, my son-in-law holds a very responsible and demanding position. It requires of him that he leave his parents and settle for two-two years in all manner of places and circumstances. It is my observation that although He copes up well with this situation, it is a strain which is telling on Thangam, no less because she is weakened from childbearing, and must care for the children. In light of this, I have kept her eldest child here in Cholapatti, and am planning on keeping each eldest child as another is born.
Which decision brings me to the matter at hand: How to feed and clothe these children under my son’s roof? Clearly, I cannot, in good conscience, use Vairum’s money to support his sister’s children. Although I appreciate the nobility and breeding of the family which You chose so well for Thangam, I know, no less from things You have told me, of their financial instability. It worries me not only that they seem to have little capital but that they seem to be sliding into a worse and worse financial situation, selling offproperties below value because they need more money to live than they earn from their lands, but making less and less because they have less and less income property. Please forgive my frankness. I know You will treat this as a matter of confidence. I am not confident they will be able to provide for the children. My son-in-law’s salary, also, is still that of a young man, and he has many expenses of a professional nature. [That last had been Muchami’s suggestion. Sivakami didn’t know how her servant had the vocabulary, but expressed appreciation for it.] I expect You might suggest the income from the lands You have so astutely purchased and are managing on Thangam’s behalf, but those lands were always intended to provide for her children’s weddings and schoolings, and I still think they are best suited to that use.
In light of all this, I have decided it is time for me to make my claim to the manjakkani property which our mother intended to pass to me. I did promise our mother that I would do so at some point, even had I no need, in case Thangam or her daughters should someday require a cushion to fall back upon. I know You will understand and, in memory of our mother, make this easy for me.