The doctor left after giving me an injection. I looked at the dead ant. He was killed while singing a beautiful song. Just like my great uncle Indranath. He too used to sing classical songs, which I didn?t understand very well. One day he was playing the tanpura and singing when he suddenly died. When he was taken to the crematorium in a procession, a group of kirtan singers went along singing songs in praise of God Hari. I watched it and still remember it, although I was then very small.

And today a strange thing happened. I fell asleep after the injection and dreamed that, like the funeral of great uncle, Indranath, a dozen or so ants were bearing the dead ant on their shoulders while a line of ants followed singing a chorus.

I woke up in the afternoon when mother put her cool hand on my forehead.

I glanced at the window and found that the dead ant was no longer there.

This time the fever kept on for several days. No wonder, because everyone in the house had started killing ants. How can the fever go if you have to listen to the screaming of ants the whole day?

And there was another problem. While the ants were being killed in the pantry, hordes of ants turned up on my window sill and wept. I could see that they wanted me to do something for them ? either stop the killing or punish those who were doing the misdeed but since I was laid up with fever, I could do nothing about it. Even if I were well, how could a small boy like me stop the elders from what they were doing?

But one day, I was forced to do something about it. I don?t exactly remember what day it was, but I do remember that I had woken up at the crack of dawn and right away heard mother announcing that an ant had got into Phatik?s ear and bitten him.

I was tickled by the news but just then I heard the slapping of brooms on the floor and knew that they were killing ants.

Then something very strange happened. I heard thin voices shouting, ?Help us! Help us, please!? I looked at the window and found that a large group of ants had gathered on the sill and were running around wildly.

Hearing them cry out I could no longer keep calm. I forgot about my fever, jumped out of bed and ran out of the room. At first I didn?t know what to do. Then I took up a clay pot, which was lying on the floor and smashed it. Then I started to smash all the things I could find which would break. It was a clever ruse because it certainly stopped the killing of ants. But it made my parents, my aunts, my cousin Sabi all come out of their rooms, grab hold of me, put me back on my bed and lock the door of my room.

I had a good laugh, though, and the ants on my window kept saying, ?Thank you! Thank you!? and went back into the drainpipe again.

Soon after this I had to leave home. The doctor examined me one day and said I should be sent to hospital for treatment.

Now I am in a hospital room. I?ve been here these last four days.

The first day I felt very sad because the room was so clean that I knew there couldn?t be any ants in it. Being a new room, there were no cracks or holes in the walls. There wasn?t even a cupboard for ants to hide under or behind it. But there was a mango tree just outside the window, and one of its branches was within reach.

I thought if there was a place to find ants it would be on that branch.

But the first day I couldn?t get near the window. How could I since I was never alone? Either the nurse, or the doctor, or someone from my house was always in the room. The second day too was just as bad.

I was so upset that I threw a medicine bottle on the floor and broke it. It made the doctor quite angry. He was not a nice doctor, this new one. I could tell that from his bristling moustache and from the thick glasses he wore.

On the third day, something happened. There was only a nurse in my room then, and she was reading a book. I was in bed wondering what to do. I heard a thud and saw that the book had slipped from the nurse?s hand and fallen on the floor. The nurse had dozed off.

I got down from the bed and went to the window on tiptoe. Leaning out of the window and stretching my body as far as it would go, I grabbed hold of the mango branch and began to pull it towards me.

This made a noise which woke up the nurse, and then the fireworks started.

The nurse gave a scream, came rushing towards me and, wrapping her arms around me, dragged me to the bed and dumped me on it. Others, too, came into the room just then, so I could do nothing more.

The doctor promptly gave me an injection.

I could make out from what they were saying that they thought I had meant to throw myself out of the window. Silly people! If I had thrown myself from such a height, all my bones would have been crushed and I would have died.

To be continued

The Little World of Sadananda, translated from Bangla by the author, Satyajit Ray, first appeared in the children?s magazine, Target, edited by Rosalind Wilson. It was later published in the short story collection, The Carpenter?s Apprentice, by Katha, a non-profit organisation and publishing house based in New Delhi