Heat and Dust (10 page)

When the Nawab said he had come to take Harry home, Douglas stiffened. The Nawab became more cordial, he said thank you very much for keeping him; and added, "Now all is quiet at Khatm, he need not be afraid any longer." He smiled at Harry who smiled back, bashfully.

Douglas clenched his jaws; there was a little muscle working in them. The Nawab said "You have probably heard that we had a little trouble."

Douglas stared straight ahead of him. He and the Nawab were both standing. They were the same height and almost the same build. Olivia and Harry, seated on sofas, looked up at them.

"It happens every year," the Nawab said. "It is nothing much. They get hot - they become cool again. It is like the weather in its season. "

"We saw your casualty lists," Douglas said in a strangled voice.

"But why are you standing!" Olivia cried. No one heard her.

"It happens every year," the Nawab repeated. "There is nothing to be done. "

Douglas turned aside his face. He had to be silent - the Nawab was an independent ruler, and the only person who could speak to him was Major Minnies. But Douglas' silence was eloquent of all he could have said, and of his thoughts.

The Nawab turned to Harry: "Get dressed. We are going. "

Harry got up at once but, before he could leave the room, Douglas said "I believe the Ross-Milbanks are expected tomorrow afternoon. "

Harry stopped by the door; the Nawab asked him in a casual way" Who are they? Are they your friends?"

"They leave on Thursday," Douglas said.

"Oh for Bombay?" the Nawab said. "Yes Harry has told me about that, but it is cancelled now. My dear fellow, please get dressed, you don't expect me to take you home in this state I hope." He turned and smiled at Olivia.

Douglas told Harry: "Mr. Crawford has heard from Bombay. It's all right about the berth. "

The Nawab now sat down in an armchair. He leaned back, crossed his legs. He told Douglas: "Harry and I have talked about it. It has all been a misunderstanding. I shall apologise to Mr. and Mrs. Crawford and thank them for their kind efforts on behalf of my guest. I shall also thank, " he added generously, "Mr. and Mrs. Ross-Milbank. "

Douglas made no bones about addressing only Harry:

"You wanted to go. Your mother's ill."

The Nawab said: " We have to be very thankful: Mother is better, she has recovered her health ... And now we are very much looking forward to her visit. My Mother has written to invite her - her letter is in Urdu, written in her own hand, and I myself have made a translation into English and also added: 'You now have not one son but two and both your sons are eager for your visit. ,,, He leaned back further in his chair and crossed his legs the other way, pleased with the correct way in which everything had been done.

Harry took a deep breath and told Douglas: "Thanks awfully for having me. It's true, you know - I do want to go back to the Palace. We talked it over' before you came, as he told you. I do want to. "

" You don't have to,” Douglas told him from the other side of the room.

"I want to," Harry said.

The Nawab burst out laughing,: "But don't you see, Mr. and Mrs. Rivers, he is like a child that doesn't know what it wants! We others have to decide everything for him. Just see," he said, "it is I who have to tell him get dressed, Harry, this is not the way to stand before a lady, go and get ready, comb your hair nicely." He gave a quick playful stroke at Harry's head and they both smiled as if it were an old joke between them. "Go," said the Nawab with tender strictness, and when Harry had gone, he turned to the other two: "Did you know," he asked them very seriously, "that Harry is a very selfish person?" Then he sighed and said" But what can I do - I have grown fond of him, he has his place here." He placed his hand on his heart.

Olivia looked quickly at Douglas. She was sorry to see that he remained as before. For herself, she had no doubt at all that the Nawab was utterly sincere: so that she was even somewhat envious of Harry for having inspired such a depth of love and friendship .

* * * *

25 April.
Chid and I have now both merged into the landscape: we are part of the town, part of people's lives here, and have been completely accepted. The town is used to accepting and merging all sorts of different elements - for instance, the grand old tombs of Mohammedan royalty on the one hand and the little grey suttee stones on the other. There are also the town's cripples, idiots, and resident beggars. They move around the streets and, whenever anything of interest is going on, they rush up and form part of the crowd. Like everyone else, I have got used to them now - as they have to me - but I must admit that in the beginning I couldn't help shrinking a bit. Some diseases, even when cured, leave people so unsightly that for the rest of their lives they have to move among their fellows as' living examples of all the terrible things that can happen to a man. One of the beggars is a cured leper - it burnt-out case whose nose, fingers, and toes have dropped off; he lives in a hut some distance out of town but is' allowed to come in and beg, provided he keeps at a proper distance. Then there is an old man who I think has St. Vitus's dance-his body is twisted around a long pole he carries and he hops along twitching and jigging like a puppet. It is not only the poor and the beggars who have afflictions. One of the most prosperous shopkeepers in town who is also a moneylender suffers from elephantiasis and can be seen sitting in his shop with his scrotum, swollen literally to the size of a football, resting on a special little cushion in front of him.

Dust storms have started blowing all day, all night. Hot winds whistle columns of dust out of the desert into the town; the air is choked with dust and so are all one's senses. Leaves that were once green are now ashen, and they toss around as in a dervish dance. Everyone is restless, irritable, on the edge of something. It is impossible to sit, stand, lie, every position is uncomfortable; and one's mind too is in turmoil.

Chid doesn't seem to be affected by the weather. He sits for hours together in the lotus pose, his lips moving on his mantra and his fingers on his beads: and this goes on and on and seems somehow so
mindless
that it drives me crazy. It is as if all reason and common sense are being drained out of the air. Every now and again he gets those monstrous erections of his and I have to fight him off (quite apart from anything else, it's just too
hot).
He is also dirty - bathing is one Hindu ritual he doesn't practise - and since he doesn't believe in possessions for himself he thinks other people shouldn't have any either. I have had to start hiding my money, but he is quite clever at finding it.

Today I got so exasperated with him, I threw him out. I just bundled up his belongings and flung them down the stairs. His brass mug bounced down the steps and was caught at the bottom of them by Ritu who had chosen that moment to come and visit me. Chid gathered up his things and, following her back upstairs, laid them out again in their former place.

"You can't stay," I told him.

But I couldn't say any more because of Ritu. She was in a strange state. She sat in a corner with her knees drawn up and didn't say one word. She looked frightened - she was like a little wild animal that had rushed in for protection. Although I did not feel in a fit condition to protect anyone, I tried to pull myself together and speak to her in a calm way. I don't think she even heard. Her eyes continued to dart around the room, but she seemed not to see anything either. Chid sat cross-legged in the corner opposite the one where she crouched. His eyes were shut, his beads slipped through his fingers, he chanted. He made me mad.

"You can't stay! " I shouted at him.

But his chanting had transported him elsewhere - perhaps into wider, cooler, brighter, more beautiful regions. He swayed lightly, his beads went on slipping, his lips moved; he was blissful. Ritu began to scream the way she had done that night. Chid opened his eyes, looked at her, then shut them again and went on chanting. They both got louder - like communicants of two rival sects, each trying to prove the superiority of his faith by outshouting the other.

30 April.
As the heat and dust storms continue, Ritu's condition has become worse. She has now to be kept locked up inside the room and sometimes terrible sounds come from out of there. The other people living around the courtyard seem to be quite used to them-and continue to move around their business undisturbed. Chid is also quite undisturbed. He says he has been in India long enough to have got used to everything. But I can't get used to these screams. I kept telling Chid "But she ought to have treatment. "

One day he said "She's going to have treatment today."

"What sort?" I asked.

"One of their people is coming to do it."

That day the screams broke out again, but in an entirely different way. Now they were bloodcurdling as of an animal in intense physical pain. Even the neighbours in the courtyard stopped to listen. Chid remained calm: "It's her treatment," he said. He went on to explain that she might be possessed by an evil spirit which had to be driven out by applying a red-hot iron to various parts of her body, such as her arms or the soles of her feet.

Next day I decided to speak to Inder Lal about psychiatric treatment. I waited for him outside his office, and as we walked home together, I tried to explain to him what it was. I said "It's a sort of science of the mind," which pleased him and made him attentive. He associates science with progress and everything else modern and up-to-date that he is eager to learn about; when anyone speaks about such things, his face takes on an expression of wistful desire.

But when I mentioned the" treatment" to which Ritu had been subjected, he changed again. He became both melancholy and embarrassed; he said "I don't believe in these things. "

"But you had it done. "

"Mother wanted it."

He went on to defend both himself and her. He said all her friends had advised it; they had cited many cases where it had effected a cure. At first his mother had also been reluctant, but then she said "Why not try," and in the end he too said "why not," for they had tried everything else but had not succeeded in relieving Ritu's suffering.

Just then one of his colleagues passed us and greeted me very politely. They have all got used to me now and often take the opportunity of having conversation in English. Of course I greeted him back again, but Inder Lal did not care for this exchange. He frowned, and when the man was out of earshot, said "Why does he pretend to be so friendly."

" He
is
friendly. "

Inder Lal's frown deepened. He wouldn't talk for a while but brooded in his thoughts.

"But what's he done?" I asked.

Inder Lal implored me not to speak so loudly. He looked over his shoulder which made me laugh.

"You don't know," he said then. His whole face had closed up with fear and suspicion. "You don't know what people are like or what is in their hearts even when they are smiling with friendly faces. Again yesterday there was an anonymous letter," he said, lowering his voice.

"Against you?"

He would not say. He walked beside me in brooding silence. I hate to see him like that, with all the brightness of his nature obscured by dark suspicions.

2 May.
Where I advised psychiatry, Maji - the holy woman and friend - has advised pilgrimage. Inder Lal's mother and Ritu are to leave in a few days time: best of all, Chid is going with them! Maji has persuaded him to do so; I almost feel she did it for my sake - not that I ever complained to her about Chid, but she seems to know most things by herself.

She told me yesterday when I had gone to pay her a visit.

At first we sat inside her hut, but it got so stifling in there that we crawled out again, even though the hot wind was still blowing. The dust swirled around the royal tombs and sat in a pall over the lake. Chid was with us too. He often visits Maji - he says he derives great benefit from her presence. They make a strange couple together. Maji is a very earthy looking peasant woman; she is quite fat and always jolly. Whenever she looks at Chid, she gives a shout of laughter; "Good boy!" she cries - in English, perhaps her only two words in it. He does look like a good boy when he is with her sitting very straight in his meditation pose and a spiritual if rather strained look on his face.

Maji explained to me about pilgrimages. She said "If someone is very unhappy and disturbed in their minds, or if they have some great wish to be fulfilled, or a terrible longing inside them, then they go. It is a long long journey, high up in the Himalayas. Very beautiful and holy. When she comes back, "she said about Ritu, "her heart will be at ease."

She patted my knee - she likes touching people - and asked "Would you like to go?" She pointed at Chid: "Oh how he will love it, this good boy!" She laughed loudly, then took his cheeks between her hands and squeezed them lovingly.

"Are you, going?" I asked him, but he shut his eyes and murmured"
Om.”

Maji said "All sorts of people go from all over India. They travel for weeks and months away from their homes in order to reach there. On the way they stop at temple rest-houses, and when they come to a river they bathe in it. They travel very slowly and if they like a place they stay there for a while and take their rest. At last they reach the mountains and begin to climb up. What shall I say of that place, those mountains!" cried Maji. "Yes it is climbing up into heaven. There is cool air and breezes, clouds, birds, and trees. Then there is only snow, everything is white and the sun also is shining white. Having bathed in the icy stream, they draw near the cave at last. Many faint and fall down with joy and none can restrain himself, they call out the Name at the top of their voices.
Jai Shiva Shankar!
" she called out at the top of her voice.

"Jai Shiva Shankar!"
Chid echoed at the top of his.

"Good boy! Good boy!" she cried and encouraged him to repeat it in chorus with her. It really sounded as if it were echoing through those snowy mountains she had mentioned, and I must say, sitting here in the dust storm under the yellow sky, I too would have liked to be up there.