The Lowland

The narrative flashes back to Udayan and Gauri’s elopement in 1970. After spending a week in the city, they move into Udayan’s parents’ house, as he doesn’t have the money to rent his own place. She immediately misses her home in the city. While Udayan is out during the day teaching, she is helping to cook and clean at home. She still makes time to travel to the library and listen to lectures at the university.

Udayan starts to ask Gauri to help him with tasks—to deliver a note or make observations of people’s comings and goings: “These missions were small joints in a larger structure” (292).

As Udayan asks Gauri for more help, her tasks become slightly more involved. Her last task is to take a tutoring job, where she will sit by a specific window in the house and make notes on when a police officer walks by. She alerts Udayan to the fact that on Thursdays the police officer is off duty and picks up his son from school.

During the time when Udayan was killed and Gauri was headed to America, she traveled back to the street where she had tutored, looking for a specific house with the name “Nirmal Dey” (294). Police questioned her about this name after her husband’s death, but she told them she didn’t know who that was. As she peers through the window of the house, we learn that Nirmal Dey was the police officer who Gauri had been watching; she sees his son and widow: “[S]he’d had a hand in something they would mourn all their lives” (294).

Visiting a roadside farm stand, Bela meets a divorced farmer named Drew. Drew makes a strong effort to talk with Bela’s daughter, Meghna. When Drew asks Meghna what her name means, Bela explains, “It was one of the rivers that flowed through into the Bay of Bengal” (297). His efforts pay off and Bela and Drew start to date. They quickly became serious despite Bela’s hesitations to have a serious relationship.

Bela originally told Drew that her mother had died; when she becomes closer to Drew, she tells him the truth about Gauri abandoning the family. Bela also reveals the truth about Udayan: “Drew held her as he listened. I’m not going anywhere, he said” (300).

Shaken by the request for a divorce, Gauri flies to Boston without telling Subhash. She wants to see him and hear about how Bela is doing: “Even apart, even now, she felt yoked to him, in unspoken collusion with him” (301).

After checking into her bed and breakfast, Gauri drives around town, reminiscing about her time in Providence. She drives past Subhash’s house, wondering whose cars are in the driveway. The next morning, she drives to the house and stops. She almost leaves the divorce papers in the mailbox: “[T]he shame that had flooded her veins was permanent” (306), but instead walks up to the house and rings the doorbell.  

Bela opens the front door to see her mother for the first time since she abandoned her in her childhood. With Meghna in the room, Bela tries to remain calm. She lets Gauri in despite the rage Bela feels. Gauri learns from Meghna that Meghna doesn’t have a father and that Subhash is getting remarried.

Bela sends Meghna outside to pick flowers and starts to confront Gauri. Bela tells Gauri that she is dead to her, and that she knows about Udayan: “Bela’s words were like bullets. Putting an end to Udayan, silencing Gauri now” (312).

When Gauri leaves, she opens the divorce papers to make sure that they have been signed. Gauri’s visit shakes Bela to her core, bringing back intense feelings of abandonment and hatred. 

After her stopover in Boston, Gauri was supposed to travel to a conference in London; instead, she changes her itinerary and goes back to India. Back in her hometown, Gauri goes to Manash’s house for a visit, but Manash is out of town. She visits his wife and family, and they call him on speakerphone. After the visit, Gauri asks her driver to take her to Tollygunge.

She walks through her old neighborhood and finds things have changed dramatically. Houses replace the lowland so that it no longer exists. Gauri still feels guilty about her role in the police officer’s death and her inability to be a mother.

The narrative flashes back to an intimate conversation between Gauri and Udayan, in which he tells her that because of what he did, he never wants to be a father. Udayan displays regret for not meeting Gauri sooner and being a better person.

The next morning, as Gauri is on the balcony overlooking the city, she contemplates suicide. She had come back to die: “Her time would end, it was simple as that” (323). Despite her desperation, Gauri doesn’t jump.

Months later, Gauri receives a letter from Bela that also includes a drawing from Meghna. Bela tells her mother that she doesn’t want a relationship with her, but that in the future, she is willing to let Meghna meet Gauri.