‘we must make a man of him, husband, no babying for him.’ ‘Then damn it to hell,’ the Babasaheb exploded, ‘why do you do it to me?’ Mrs Mhatre burst into tears. ‘But you are everything to me,’ she wept, ‘you are my father, my lover, my baby too. You are my lord and my suckling child. If I displease you then I have no life.’ Babasaheb Mhatre, accepting defeat, swallowed the tablespoon of malt.
