For Love of Audrey Rose (22 page)

Janice nodded, sensing Mehrotra waited for a reaction. The old woman rattled on.

“The rebellion was planned for the full moon. One group would attack the soldiers on the north road. One group would sneak into the company headquarters and kill the British. Naturally, as leader, Uncle Vinoba would go to the headquarters.”

Janice watched the children. Now they sat quietly in the room on the floor, as though eager to hear the story over again. Some of them anticipated, their mouths moving, as though they had nearly memorized it.

“Suspecting nothing, the men watched Uncle Vinoba walk to the headquarters building. But when he got inside, he told the British everything. A messenger sneaked out the back way to alert the soldiers. Guns were brought down from upstairs. Then Uncle Vinoba went back to the rebels.”

The old woman took a very deep breath and suddenly leaned forward.

“Well, Uncle Vinoba sweated like a pig. But exactly at midnight he led the men forward. They tiptoed up the red carpets—the British love red carpets—Uncle Vinoba in front. All at once, the British jumped out from the side of the stairwell, from the bottom floor, and down from the upstairs. An enormous roar of gunfire, and all the rebels were killed. Except Uncle Vinoba. It was said that the blood was found even on the ceiling.”

There was a long pause. The old woman fanned herself with a paper and bamboo fan.

“Uncle Vinoba became the foreman. He lived alone, never married, and always carried a knife with him, even though he never cut the rubber himself. After all, most of the workers were related to the dead men.”

Mehrotra patted Arun on the stomach. Arun giggled.

“One night, about a year later, the widows broke into his hut. They grabbed him, tied him up, and dragged him screaming out into the forest. There they secured him between two rubber trees. The elephants were brought in, and for each man who had died, an elephant was made to step on him. That was twenty-one times, because there were fifteen in the fields and six killed in the headquarters. Anyway, his screams echoed all over the plantations. The soldiers were too frightened to come, because they thought it was an unnatural sound, or maybe the wild dogs from the mountains. In the morning the British found a length of rope, broken ferns all around, and tangled-up pieces of broken, red bones. Poor Uncle Vinoba.”

The story went on, but Mehrotra ignored the old woman.

“Now, Mrs. Templeton. There are fifteen dead men in the fields. Six in the headquarters. How many is that?”

“Twenty-one.”

Mehrotra lifted Arun’s shirt. Spread across his back, in uneven double rows, were peculiar cherry red markings, like scallops in shape. Their shape fascinated Janice. They were almost delicate, not at all gruesome or disfiguring, and Arun smiled shyly.

“Have you ever seen an elephant’s footprint?” Mehrotra asked.

She looked at him, startled.

“Look, Mrs. Templeton. Here are the toes, the heavy weight at the back, where the marks are thicker.”

She found it difficult to believe.

“Twenty-one marks, Mrs. Templeton,” Mehrotra said measuredly. “Five years ago, when we visited our cousins where the rubber plantation used to be—it’s a shirt factory now—Arun became very frightened, and he did not know why. Now he will tell you what he said.”

Mehrotra whispered in the boy’s ear.

Arun turned to face Janice, closed his eyes, and with difficulty, formed the words, “I—hear—guns.”

“See?” Mehrotra demanded. “‘I hear guns.’ In English, Mrs. Templeton! And he never studied English, then or now!”

“I—hear—guns,” Arun repeated, pleased at the reaction.

Arun slid off his lap, and went to join the other children.

“Every village, every town, every quarter of every large city is filled with these stories. A girl has the markings of a dead aunt. Or a man suddenly acts strangely and speaks a different dialect. Or a child must visit a certain area where he has never been. Why? Because they are the living incarnations of the dead! That’s why! Believe, Mrs. Templeton!”

Janice followed Mehrotra back into the brilliant sunshine that poured upon the multitudes who pressed upon the sacred Ganges. He took her by the elbow and led her through waves of ascetics and urban faithful.

“About Elliot Hoover,” Janice stammered.

“I was afraid—I must confess—you had some romantic interest,” Mehrotra shouted above the prayerful cacophony. “I protect him.”

“Then you can tell me where he is?”

“Elliot Hoover is at an
ashram
on the Cauvery River.”

“Where is that?”

“In the State of Tamil Nadu.”

“Is there a telephone there?”

Mehrotra laughed. “Not at the
ashram.
And it will take at least a week, if you are lucky, for a letter to find its way into the mountains.”

Mehrotra pulled her gently toward him, just as an ox cart lumbered by, dropping loose sticks of firewood for the Ghats. He felt her trembling.

“I think you must go yourself,” he said quietly. “It is the quickest.”

Janice looked at the round, still-unshaven face, the owl glasses, and she saw the steadfast darkness of his eyes, the unwavering compassion. She knew now why he and Elliot Hoover were friends.

“I think I’d be afraid to,” she said weakly.

“Afraid? Of India? Don’t travel after dark, that’s all.”

The mere thought made Janice’s head dizzy. The South conjured up an unpleasant image, vague but festering with gross jungle growth, animals like baboons, villages with dysentery.

“Do you have money?” he asked.

“I can change some more.”

“Good. You can fly to Mysore City. I will show you what to do after that. I only wish I could go with you. Elliot and I have a firm friendship.”

Mehrotra led her into his shop. He shoved several volumes of Schopenhauer, Hume, and Tagore onto the floor. Several notebooks he pushed more gently onto his chair. From a drawer he extracted an ancient atlas printed in German, and paged through the faded color areas.

“This is the Cauvery River,” Mehrotra said matter-of-factly. “It is like the Ganges, a holy river.”

Janice watched, fascinated as the lean brown finger traced the path southeast from Mysore City into the mountains and then to the valley of the upper Cauvery.

“You see? Not so far,” he said smoothly. “From Mysore City there is a train. To Kotagiri. Then you must take a bus—I will write down its name—going east toward Erode, then it goes south. Right here”—he indicated an area where few village names were inscribed on the map—“is the
ashram.
”

The empty area on the old map looked intimidating. There were German phrases in parentheses which seemed to indicate the central mountains were poorly explored.

“How do I know when I get to the
ashram
?” she finally asked.

“It is a Hindu temple and it is dedicated to
Tejo Lingam
—the fire incarnation of God. I can write that down for you.”

Mehrotra sat at his desk and in a lovely calligraphy wrote out the name of the
ashram.
On a separate sheet of paper, he wrote a brief description of the
ashram’
s location, in various languages.

“In case nobody speaks English, just show them this,” he said, handing her the letter. “But pilgrims go there all the time. You will have no difficulty.”

Janice gingerly took the letter. She folded it and put it carefully into her handbag. For a long time, she looked at the gleaming brassware on curved trays, many hanging from silver chains over the shop.

“Please tell Elliot that I—” Mehrotra faltered. “That I have been unable to come this year, but that I look forward to seeing him again in Benares.”

Moved by the depth of his feeling, Janice agreed. She thanked him, they shook hands, then Janice stood up. Mehrotra looked very sad.

“You will have good luck. I will pray for you.”

She smiled, waved good-bye as she stepped away, and it was only when she reached the empty boulevards of the residential area that the anxiety returned. She stepped resolutely into the hotel.

12

I
need to fly to Mysore City,” she told the desk clerk. “Can you connect me with the proper airline?”

“Mysore City?” he asked, raising an eyebrow. “Of course.”

In fifteen minutes, all was set. At 9:55 in the morning, a plane would leave, stopping only once at Hyderabad. Trains for Kotagiri left only twice daily, but there seemed to be an hour for her to make the connection, provided she reserve a seat immediately. She did so, through the clerk, and he advised her to wait until they reached Kotagiri before attempting to locate the proper bus.

“Mrs. Templeton,” the desk clerk asked, in a changed tone of voice.

“Yes?”

“Excuse me, but why are you going to such a place?”

“To visit an
ashram.
”

“But there are plenty of
ashrams,
much more famous, much more beautiful.”

Janice looked at him quizzically. The desk clerk cleared his throat.

“What I mean to suggest, Mrs. Templeton, is that this area has been under attack.”

“Attack?”

“Not exactly attack. One should say, a small rebellion. Really, they are only bandits with a flag, but still, I would advise you…”

“Is the area unsafe?”

“Not exactly unsafe. Only there are no conveniences. The post offices are not reliable. There is no television. Even the telephones are a matter of good
karma.
”

He laughed feebly at his own witticism. Janice smiled.

“Thank you,” she said. “I’ll be very careful.”

“If I could advise you…?”

“Yes. Please do.”

“When you go south of Kotagiri, do not travel at night.”

“Thank you,” Janice said, smiling graciously. “Good night.”

She slept well, considering that she felt she had just walked off a gangplank. All decisions had been made. If not tomorrow night, then the night after, she would finally see Elliot Hoover. Surely he would know the trials she had gone through to see him. Kindness was the core of his being. That alone would force him to respond, to help them. And if he didn’t?

Mercifully, sleep came before an answer did.

This time the flight seemed to last days, not hours. It was late afternoon when she touched down at Mysore City. It was early evening by the time she secured her seat on the train. The night was sultry, and it smelled like stagnant water.

It was not until 10:45 that the train chugged unevenly into the dirty town of Kotagiri. Remembering what the desk clerk in Benares had recommended, and longing for a clean bath and some sleep, Janice went in search of a tourist office. It was closed. There were no taxis.

She carried her small suitcase down the street. A small “hotel” sign blinked on and off. No answer. She knocked again. A sound of muffled steps. A man in a dirty undershirt looked out at her, blinking in surprise.

“One night,” Janice said, holding up a single finger, gesturing sleep.

The man nodded. Janice entered the hotel and instantly regretted it. It smelled of stale beer and urine. Outside, Kotagiri looked even worse. The man closed the door. From his desk, he pulled out a battered ledger, turned on a small amber desk lamp and pulled out a black fountain pen, carefully shaking it three times. He wrote out the cost and handed it to her on a slip of paper.

Janice paid him the rupees. He seemed surprised that she did not argue. He beckoned her to follow, and they went up a narrow staircase. Her room was barely wide enough for the bed and standing room. The bathroom was down the hall.

As she undressed, she smelled the changed atmosphere in the South. It was impregnated with rain, and yet the rain remained in the clouds. Unwilling to bathe in the dirty bathroom, she washed standing up at the cracked basin. Mrs. Templeton, she thought wryly to herself, you have stayed in fleabag hotels in your time, but this one not even a self-respecting flea would come to.

On the street below, a police car drove by, and behind it a dark convoy truck with about ten soldiers bumping along in the back, rifles pointed up.

Janice felt reluctant to climb into the sheets. The smell of rain increased, and several times Janice looked out the window. Rain would have been lovely since it would have broken up the pressure in the atmosphere. But each time she looked, it was the identical dusty, caked iron railing that she saw. Perspiring in the hot night, she fell into an uncomfortable sleep. In the morning, she needed something to drink, but she refused to touch the water from the tap. At the bus station, not far from the train station, she bought a warm bottle of Coca-Cola.

The morning was overcast and even more humid. A bright, painful haze was scattered over Kotagiri, so that nobody cast shadows. It was all subsumed in the overcast heaviness of a rain-filled sky that did not rain. Janice waited in line behind short, round-limbed men who argued excitedly among themselves. She was reminded of Mexico, the relaxed pace of life that had something lethal in it.

She showed her note to the man behind the ticket cage. He wrote out the cost with a contemptuous air, and she paid. At 11:25 there was an announcement over the loudspeaker; the ticket seller waved to get her attention, then pointed to the bus coughing smoke outside. Janice emerged into the main yard, followed the dark-coated men into the bus, and sat down in the back. As the bus pulled away, a few spires rose into view, and some leafy streets, but Janice hoped she would never again see Kotagiri for the rest of her life.

As the bus continued east, then cut to the south, Janice saw mountain ranges to both the east and west. The land was rolling, green and gray where the boulders were stacked, and there were no fences. It looked unbounded, wild, and primitive. The villages the bus rumbled through were composed of mud-encrusted wood huts, many with thatch intertwined on the roof, and rusted iron which helped support the porch pillars. Children watched in amazement, a curious passivity on their lovely faces, as though the bus belonged to a different, and superior, solar system.

The road turned pink, then red. The villages were fewer and farther in between, smaller, and now no children came to gawk. Army soldiers watched, bored, at key crossroads.