PROSE

• Why did Shankar have no objection to going to Bundi?

  ~ Having read Tagore's poem 'The Fort of Bundi', he was certainly familiar with the name of the place and felt a pleasurable excitement at the prospect of actually seeing the fort.

  ~ From the point of view of a historian, Udaipur, Jodhpur and Chittor had a lot more to offer; but simply as a beautiful place, Bundi was perfect.
• Jayanto's father, Animesh Das Gupta, had worked in the Archaeological department. His work sometimes took him to historical places, and Jayanto had as a child come to to Bundi. He had always wanted to return after growing up, just to see how much the modern Bundi compared to the image he had in his mind.
• The circuit house was really rather splendid. Built during the time of the British, it must have been at least a hundred years old. It was a single-storeyed building with a sloping tiled roof. The rooms had high ceilings and the skylights had long, dangling ropes which could be pulled to open and shut them. The veranda faced the east. Right opposite it was a huge garden with a large number of roses in full bloom. Behind these were a lot of trees which obviously housed a vast section of local birds. Parrots could be seen everywhere; and peacocks could be heard, but only outside the compound.
• Description of Bundi

  ~ The famous Fort of Bundi was placed amidst the hills.

  ~ The only reminders of modern times were the electric poles. Otherwise it seemed as though we were back in the old Rajputana.

  ~ The streets were cobbled, the houses had balconies jutting out of the first floor.

  ~ The carvings done on these and the wooden doors bore evidence of the work of master craftsmen.

  ~ It was difficult to believe we were living in the age of machines.
• Description of Fritz.

  It was not the usual kind of doll little girls play with. One of Jayanto's uncles had brought for him from Switzerland a twelve inch-long figure of an old man, dressed in traditional Swiss style. Apparently, it was very lifelike. Although it was not mechanised it was possible to bend and twist its limbs. Its face had a smile on it, and on its head, it wore a Swiss cap with a little yellow feather sticking out from it. Its clothes, especially in their little details, were perfect - belt, buttons, pockets, collars and socks. There were even little buckles on the shoes.
• How would you describe Jayanto's reaction to the doll 'unusual'?

  ~ He had a lot of toys when I was small.

  ~ But once he had Fritz, he forgot the others.

  ~ He began to spend hours just talking to him.

  ~Fritz had such a funny smile on his lips and such a look in his eyes, that it seemed to him as though he could understand every word. Sometimes he wondered if he would actually converse with him if he could speak to him in German.

  ~ My parents warned him not to overdo things, but he listened to no one. He had not yet been put in school, so he had all the time in the world for Fritz.
• How did Fritz 'die'?

  ~ Sitting on the lawn having tea, kept the doll by his side.

  ~ Not really old enough to have tea, but insisted and, in the process, the cup tilted and some of the hot tea fell on his pants - ran inside to change and came back to find that Fritz had disappeared.

  ~ Couple of stray dogs were having a nice tug-or-war with Fritz.

  ~ Although he didn't actually come apart, his face was battered beyond recognition and clothes were torn.

  ~ Fritz did not exist to him anymore.
• How did Jayanto draw the conclusion that Fritz had visited the room?

  1. Slight noise woke him a little later - turned on his side and found Jayanto sitting up on his bed.
  2. Do you think the circuit house has small animals? I mean, things like cats and mice?
  3. Second time he'd woken up - first time he heard a shuffling noise near the window but when he switched the light on, there was nothing to be seen.
  4. Searched under the bed, behind the suitcases, everywhere else in the room. Bent over cloth and saw tiny, brown circular marks.
  5. Felt whatever was walking on his chest has 2 feet, not 4.
• Occurrences that made Fritz a horror story.

  1. Skylights had long, dangling ropes which could be pulled to open and shut them.
  2. Jayanto suddenly stopped walking and said, 'Deodar'.
  3. They had a good cook in the circuit house. The cook they had in those days was called Dilawar - had a scar on his left cheek, eyes were always red - but an excellent cook.
  4. Doll was very lifelike.
  5. Buried him under that deodar tree. Could not find a little box - buried him just like that.
  6. Tiny, brown circular marks on the quilt.
  7. Covered in dust, lying on its back, a twelve inch-long, white, human skeleton.
• Throughout the story, Jayanto remains disturbed and preoccupied.

  ~ From the moment they reached - spirits were low.

  ~ Thought of the Deodar tree - had done something there.

  ~ Described Fritz, went into deep thought.

  ~ Sitting on his bed with look of deep anxiety - circular marks.

  ~ Enthusiasm began to wane at the fort - on the terrace.

  ~ Anxious to leave.

  ~ Refused the cigarette, veiled excitement in the movement of his hands, kept biting his nails.

  ~ Ate very less at lunch.

  ~ Did not find the gardener's small talk amusing.

  ~ Shirt soaked in sweat despite cold.

  ~ Pointed to hole in ground.
• There lay at our feet, covered in dust, lying flat on its back, a twelve-inch-long, pure white, perfect little human skeleton.
• It was her sister Josephine who told her, in broken sentences; veiled hints that revealed in half concealing. Her husband's friend Richards was there, too, near her. It was he who had been in the newspaper office when the intelligence of the railroad disaster was received, with Brently Mallard's name leading the list of 'killed'. He had only taken time to assure himself of its truth by a second telegram, and had hastened to forestall any less careful, less tender friend in bearing the sad message.
• She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a paralysed inability to accept its significance. She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister's arms. When the storm of grief had spent itself she went away to her room alone. She would have no one follow her.
• She could see in the open square before her house the tops of trees that were all aquiver with the new spring life. The delicious breath of rain was in the air. In the street below, a peddler was crying his wares. The notes of a distant song which someone was singing reached her faintly, and countless sparrows were twittering in the eaves. There were patches of blue sky showing here and there through the clouds that had met and piled one above the other in the west facing her window.
• She was young, with a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke a certain strength. But now there was a dull stare in her eyes, whose gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky. It was not a glance of reflection, but rather indicated a suspension of intelligent thought.
• She was beginning to recognise this thing that was approaching to possess her, and she was striving to beat it back with her will - as powerless as her two white slender hands would have been. When she abandoned herself a little whispered word escaped her slightly parted lips. She said it over and over under her breath: "free, free, free!" The vacant stare and the look of terror that had followed it went from her eyes. They stayed keen and bright. Her pulses beat fast, and the coursing blood warmed and relaxed every inch of her body.
• She knew that she would weep again when she saw the kind, tender hands folded in death; the face that never looked save with love upon her, fixed and gray and dead.
• But she saw beyond that bitter moment a long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely. And she opened and spread her arms out to them in welcome. There would be no one to live for her during those coming years; she would live for herself. There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which man and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature. A kind intention or a cruel intention made the act seem no less a crime as she looked upon it in that brief moment of illumination.
• Her actions, from now on, would be her own. In her husband's death, she would gain her own identity rather than simply existing as an extension of the man she married.
• Her fancy was running riot along those days ahead of her. Spring days, and summer days and all sorts of days which would be her own. She breathed a quick prayer that life might be long. It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long.
• She arose at her length and opened the door to her sister's opportunities. There was a feverish triumph in her eyes, and she carried herself unwittingly like a goddess of Victory.
• When the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease - of joy that kills.
• Miss Meadows, hugging the knife, stared in hatred at the Science Mistress. Everything about her was so sweet, pale, like honey. You would not have been surprised to see a bee caught in the tangles of that yellow hair.
• Miss Meadows, her hands thrust in her sleeves, the baton under her arm, strode down the centre aisle, mounted the steps, turned sharply, seize the brass music stand, planted it in front of her, and gave two sharp taps with her baton for silence.
• Her eyelids quivered; she tossed her head, defying them. What could the thoughts of those creatures matter to some one who stood there bleeding to death, pierced to the heart, to the heart, by such a letter -
• "I feel more and more strongly that our marriage would be a mistake. Not that I do not love you, I love you as much as it is possible to love any woman, but, truth to tell, I have come to the conclusion that I am not a marrying man, and the idea of settling down with nothing but-" and the word 'disgust' was scratched out lightly and "regret" written over the top.
• This little ritual of the flower had been gone through for ages and ages, quite a term and a half. It was as much part of the lesson as opening the piano. But this morning, instead of taking it up, instead of tucking it into her belt while she leant over Mary and said "Thank you, Mary. How very nice! Turn to page thirty-two."
• Fast! Ah, too Fast Fade the Ro-o-ses of Pleasure;

  Soon Autumn yields unto Wi-i-nter Drear.

  Fleetly! Ah, Fleetly Mu-u-sic's Gay Measure

  Passes away from the Listening Ear.
• It came out of nothing. His last letter had been all about a fumed-oak bookcase he had bought for "our" books, and a "natty little hall-stand" he had seen, "a very neat affair with a carved owl on a bracket, holding three hat-brushes in its claws."
• Last time he had come to see her, Basil had worn a rose in his buttonhole. How handsome he had looked in that bright blue suit, with that dark red rose! And he had knew it too. He couldn't help knowing it. First he stroked his hair, then his moustache; his teeth gleamed when he smiled.
• People had been surprised enough that she had got engaged. The Science Mistress would not believe it at first. But nobody had been as surprised as she. She was thirty. Basil was twenty-five. It had been a miracle, simply a miracle, to hear him say, as they walked home from church on that very dark night, "You know, somehow or other, I've got fond of you." And he had taken hold of the end of her ostrich feather boa.
• "But darling, if you love me," thought Miss Meadows, "I don't mind how much it is. Love me as little as you like." But she knew he didn't love her. Not to have cared enough to scratch out the word "disgust", so that she couldn't read it!
• "Pay no attention to letter, must have been mad, bought hat-stand to-day - Basil."
• "I must say I don't approve of my teachers having telegrams sent to them in school hours, unless in case of very bad news, such as death," explained Miss Wyatt, "or a very serious accident, or something to that effect. Good news, Miss Meadows, will always keep, you know."
• With despair - cold, sharp despair - buried deep in her heart like a wicked knife, Miss Meadows, in cap and gown and carrying a little baton, trod the cold corridors that led to the music hall. Girls of all ages, rosy from the air, and bubbling over with that gleeful excitement that comes from running to school on a fine autumn morning, hurried, skipped, fluttered by.