Chapter 263

Chapter 342: The Battle on the Bridge

Late afternoon that very day, when the school for the day was concluded, the students strolled out with their slates and books for their homes.

The return trip was usually conducted thus: because it was dark, it was advised that all students (including the unwilling boys) use the bridge to cross into the Market path and not plod through the wet paddy field. Customarily, to keep the two warring families at a distance, Chandraki would lead the line followed by the rest of the girls after whom came the boys, at the end of the line of which would be the Malik boys.

Raoul usually stayed back a few minutes to help his teacher in rearranging the schoolroom for the night. The schoolmaster, busy tidying the schoolroom before departing, may have expected that day to be as ordinary as any other day and that protocol would be conducted as expected. But it was not to be so.

The girls had paused before the bridge waiting for Chandraki to step before them and walk first over the bridge. Chandraki had made way towards the bridge when, all of a sudden, Dev overtook her, his hand pulling along a reluctant PrakashPrakash after him who was terrified that Dev had broken the custom of the bridge crossing order.

All the girls gasped and Chandraki glared at the boy scampering over the bridge with his friend.

"Halt there, you nitwit!" she yelled and scampered after him.

Dev halted and turned around to face the approaching enemy. PrakashPrakash, noticing his hand was released, stepped away from the two, fearfully.

Chandraki came to a stop before him, her dark pigtails fiery in the golden sun.

Dev glared at her, feeling slightly annoyed by the fact that though they were of the same age she was a fraction taller than him.

"How dare you break the law-!" she began.

"I broke no law!" he interjected boldly, "Making you be the first to reach home was not made for law but for solution."

"Every problem demands a solution which ultimately becomes law!" reasoned Chandraki proudly, "Ofcourse, your idiot brain can't rationalize in that direction, can it?"

Dev scolwed. She had offended his body by abusing his brain. It was time to put heritage into the game.

Dev puffed up his chest proudly, "I am a Malik. A Malik has fine brains. That's why we got a business of gold and you lot got some measly pieces of land. What is land when compared to tons and tons of gold especially when attracts the eyes of the Englishmen?"

Chandraki huffed derisively, "Are you suggesting that it was your father's painted gold that brought the Englishmen to our country and not the spices grown in the lands of my father?!"

Dev fisted his hands, "My father's gold is true! It's your father who has painted things in his house!"

Chandraki chuckled, "My father is a collector of paintings because he is learned in the arts. Your father never went to school!"

"My father didn't have to go to school because we were rich enough to have school come to us!" yelled Dev at her face (though he didn't need to yell as she was standing right in front of her) and then continued boldly, "My father and my grandfather and his father before him were all taught by the greatest scholars in India in our own house!"

Chandraki was not to easily lose, "And I am certain those great scholars, after a day's tutoring in your house, would have returned to their homes only after bathing themselves well in the Ganges because the air in your house is that polluted!"

Dev leered, "Forget Ganges, I don't think any of the Varmas ever bathed in their life! In fact, I think your father stinks so much that the servants who bow to him are actually bending to secretly hold their noses from the putrid smell!"

Chandraki was enraged, "You foul-mouthed wreck! No one in this world stinks as much as you, do you know that! I need to be awarded for being able to stand and argue with you this long without having fainted from the smell coming from you!"

Dev's eyebrows furrowed, "Let me correct you there, Varma witch! What you smell is your own food which you threw at me, your mother's stale ghee and her fungus-infested roti!"

Chandraki stepped towards him, her hands trembling with growing anger, "Compared to what you eat! Berries that have worms in them and fruits that are licked by wandering animals of the woods who don't bath like you!"

"I'm going to bath first thing when I reach home to rid me of this disgusting smell of your filthy rotis!" he proclaimed, "But I am certain you won't bath without a cause necessitating it, so why don't I assist you find motivation for a bath!"

"I don't want any motiv-" Chandraki had begun but Dev broke her speech when he pushed her off by her shoulders, sending her hurtling down from the side of the bridge to the paddy field below.

Chandraki's astonished scream rent the air and the schoolmaster and Raoul came running out from the schoolroom, fearful of what may have ensued.

Raoul was the first to reach the spot and he waded into the field and stopped where Chandraki was sitting, deep in mud to her elbows and her pigtails, her skirt and face all muddy and dirtied. Her slate was floating beside her. Tears and mud had made a mess of her face.

"Ha! Ha!" Dev leered down at her, "How do you like that, Mudface!"

Raoul crouched down to her, his face looking into hers in worry, "Are you alright? Are you hurt?"

Chandraki looked up and on seeing him, her anger redoubled; there was mud in her mouth and she spat it right onto Raoul's expectant face.

Raoul flinched but didn't move away and gracefully received her following curse, "Filthy Maliks!"

Rising to her feet, she picked up her muddy slate and was immediately flanked by the worried schoolmaster who tried to appease her, "Child, the boy must not have meant it. Whatever happened-"

But there was no consoling Chandraki, who revealed to the perplexed assembly, "Whatever happened, will be dealt with."

However, when she reached home, she lied to her parents and told them she had tripped and had a fall, mentioning nothing about Dev and his little scene on the bridge.

There was good reason for this, ofcourse. She wanted revenge and she was not going to let any parent remove her from the school miss her the chance to get her claws on her enemy.