On Sal Mal Lane (11 page)

“But not like the Roman tales, the seventh of July matter is one of our own beliefs. Mustn’t ignore those, no? Even we aren’t superstitious. We go to church. But we are very conscious of these stories. Everyone I know has at least one story about someone who has come to a bad end because of that terrible birth date. Can’t be too careful.” She felt her mother’s glare and quickly added, “Beautiful girl after all.”

“Kala can give them piano lessons,” Mrs. Niles said, firmly, outraged by her daughter’s defiance. She sat down heavily in one of the blue single chairs, which sagged beneath her weight, and continued. “She has time every afternoon after school. After one thirty, you name the time, and you can send the kids. Half price.”

“I don’t have time—” Kala Niles began.

“Every afternoon she’s free. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. What days can you send the children?”

“Suren and Nihil can come on Tuesdays, and Rashmi and Devi can come on Fridays,” Mrs. Herath said quickly, not wanting to test this bit of good fortune.

What else could Nihil do, in the wake of such a conversation as had just taken place, one steeped in references to Devi’s luckless birth date and the many undefinable threats that were waiting for her? He said: “I want to come when Devi comes.” He said this very slowly, his child voice seeming especially fragile as it made its way through the tumult of the adult ones all around him. His mother’s head turned just as slowly to look at him, transforming her misgivings about Kala Niles into something less destructive and possibly more reparable toward her younger son.

“I will decide when you can and cannot come, Nihil,” she said.

He laced his fingers together and squeezed them. “I won’t come unless I can come with Devi.”

“That can’t be done. You have cricket practice on Friday.”

“I can stop playing cricket. I don’t like cricket.”

Mrs. Herath raised her eyebrows and waited to see if Nihil would change his mind, and when it was quite obvious, by his steadfast return of her glare, that he wasn’t going to, she decided that dropping out of cricket would be punishment enough and, knowing his passion for the game, one far more severe than any she could dream up. She turned away from him and picked the crumbs that had fallen into her lap and placed them carefully in her saucer.

Speaking the Truth

Nihil listened as the arrangements were made for their lessons, feeling tearful inside, a desire made more palpable by the fact that distress, more than any other emotion, must be kept secret in the face of threat and, to Nihil, Kala Niles was a threat. He sat back against the hard press of the settee and regarded the backs of his siblings, now no longer in harmony with his. Sitting there he discovered the weight of fear and distrust when complicated by the tenderness of love. Devi looked particularly vulnerable, more so when she peered over her shoulder to look at him, and he saw the flecks of lemon puff crumbs on her chin. He dusted at his own chin to alert her, and she grinned as she wiped her face clean.

How long, how long would he have to keep her safe? Now he would have to give up cricket and he would never grow up to make the first eleven, something he had felt he was specially meant to do, even though it was the dream of every boy in grade 4A and probably every boy in every class in every grade in his school. Now he would never hear the crack of his bat against the bright new red leather ball, never feel the stitches of that ball in his hand as he changed his grip to make it spin in different ways, and that perfect green, it would be lost to him forever. He stared at the radiant orange flowers on Rashmi’s dress and the orange bow tied around her waist. Tears would not do. Someone had to protect Devi from the ogre who took such pleasure in reminding them of his sister’s cursed birth date, and he trusted himself alone to do that work.

“Well then, I suppose we are all settled here,” Mrs. Herath said, concluding a long negotiation about dates and times and potential conflicts, not to mention a review of their musical training to date. “Do you take fees at the beginning or the end, Kala?” she asked.

“The beginning,” Kala Niles said. “That way no misunderstandings. If the children skip then it’s their fault. No refunds. If you have to reschedule, must do at the beginning of each month so I can plan my activities properly.”

In the silence that followed, Mrs. Herath listened to the sound of the bread man making his way up the lane, ringing his bicycle bell with his particular song,
ring pause ring ring pause ring ring.
She wondered, absently, what activities, for a woman of Kala Niles’s upbringing and circumstances, might take precedence over securing either income or permanent male company. Knitting, perhaps Kala Niles was part of a knitting group. At the convent, or the church, or—

“I belong to the Women’s Music Federation,” Kala Niles said, reading Mrs. Herath’s thoughts with a precision that startled her. “I am the secretary. Also, I play tennis at the Women’s Club. Very full life I have. Very full.”

“Women’s Federation is just the teachers from St. Margaret’s,” Mrs. Niles informed Mrs. Herath. “And tennis Kala just started. She’s taking lessons now with a Mr. Knower who lives in Barnes Place. Two weeks so far.”

“Mama, you don’t know everything,” Kala Niles snapped and rose to her feet. The Heraths followed suit. “Then we’ll see you next week,” she said to Mrs. Herath, moving a few steps toward the door.

“Thank you very much for the tea and everything, Mrs. Niles,” Mrs. Herath said, taking the liberty of squeezing Mrs. Niles’s shoulder in camaraderie that had more than a little sympathy attached to it.

“I am glad you moved into that house,” Mrs. Niles said. “All that sad business . . .” She tipped forward and scooped up Devi, squeezing her own eyes shut almost as hard as she squeezed the child in her arms. “You are a good girl,” she said. When she put Devi down and looked up, she was rewarded by three broad smiles from Devi’s brothers and sister.

Nihil was almost persuaded to retract his offer to quit cricket, so affectionate was that embrace from Mrs. Niles; Devi had looked not merely safe but untouchable in her arms. Then, just as they were about to step outside, there was a moan from the corner of the veranda. All the Heraths turned toward the noise. At the end of the enclosure—the Niles household having been at the forefront of the move to hide their open veranda, leaving peepholes on one side by design—they saw an unnaturally tall man dressed in a white
verti
of a very high quality and a white linen shirt. To the children he seemed formidable, though he lay on his back in an armchair whose leg rests had been pulled out to accommodate his feet in a manner that suggested that this was his normal state of being in the world. Nihil realized that the particular scent he had noted when he first arrived came from the old man; it was the smell of sedentary old age overlaid with a men’s perfume. His great-grandfather had smelled that way in the years before he passed, and for a moment, before Mrs. Niles spoke, Nihil was transported back in time.

“No need to be scared, darling,” Mrs. Niles said to Devi, who had shrunk back into her embrace. “Come, I’ll take you to say hello to Uncle.” She took Devi by the hand and led her toward the old man. Nihil stepped forward and joined her, Suren and Rashmi a step behind.

Mrs. Niles addressed the man in a loud voice. “These are the new children from across.” She turned to the children. “This uncle is Kala Akki’s father. You can see how she looks just like him, right?”

Suren and Rashmi said hello almost together, but Nihil and Devi stared wordlessly at Mr. Niles. His hair, which clearly had been white for so long it was yellowing with age, still looked soft and lustrous above severe brows that met over eyes that kept tearing up, and ears sprouting a mass of hair in a non-matching dark. He had long arms, one flung behind his head, the other dragging along the floor, the fingers hovering near a neat pile of white handkerchiefs. For his eyes, Rashmi thought, her own moving from the pile to the fluid escaping slowly down a well-worn path along Mr. Niles’s cheek.

“Why is Uncle crying?” Devi asked.

“He’s not crying. He had a cataract,” Mrs. Niles said, “and something didn’t go right with the operation. The doctors are still trying to figure it out.” This she addressed to Mrs. Herath, who had left Kala Niles by the ornate front door and joined them.

Devi, her hands behind her back, let her eyes wash over the entirety of the old man, from his head to his toes. “Why doesn’t he talk to us?”

“He is probably feeling tired right now, darling,” Mrs. Niles replied.

“I talk when there is something to say,” said Mr. Niles in a deep voice, looking at Devi. “But it seems Kala has already talked too much and all I can say is that I hope you enjoy playing the piano because you won’t enjoy spending time with her when she is in that type of mood.”

Nihil grinned at Mr. Niles. Now he was certain he would not have to give up cricket for, surely, between the concern and perception of the old couple, Devi would be quite safe. Right then, Mr. Niles turned his eyes toward Nihil and the thought froze in between remorse that he had made the offer and relief that he could rescind it.

“I heard you singing the first day you were here, and I found myself wondering why your voice sounded different from the other ones,” Mr. Niles said. “Now, I know.” He spoke deliberately, quite as though he had been mulling the thought over for a long time. “There are very few things in life that are worth the price of giving up on your own dreams, son. Find something to keep for yourself, because in the end, that’s all you will have. What you keep for yourself. Come and talk to me when you have found something to keep. You can’t keep your little sister to yourself. She won’t stay.”

Nihil felt a foreboding pierce its way into the soles of his feet and take root there. It inched its way up through his legs, his stomach, and settled somewhere around his chest. He took Devi’s hand and turned away.

“It’s a kindness to speak the truth,” Mr. Niles said behind him, then he added softly, “especially to children.”

“We’ll go and come,” Rashmi said to Mrs. Niles.

Suren nodded his good-bye to Mr. Niles, then said, “I’ll tell my brother to come and visit you.”

Mr. Niles smiled and nodded. “That will be important for him to do.”

Nihil marched out as quickly as he could, tugging Devi along, not even stopping when Devi’s skirt caught in a thorny flowering plant placed beside the Nileses’ front door and making her cry out
Wait! Nihil! Stop dragging me!
After the gate had shut behind them, his mother admonished him for a multitude of sins: for his inability to conceal what he thought of Kala Niles and thereby almost jeopardizing the musical careers of his siblings, for his brazen and undiscussed decision to stop cricket, at which he was currently excelling, and for forcing his mother to leave the house without a proper conversation with Mr. Niles, who was clearly very sick and in need of companionship.

Listening to their mother as they walked in a wide row behind her, past the long hedges and under the spreading branches of the sal mal trees that hung over the lane, Suren took Nihil’s free hand in his. Rashmi took Devi’s. Nihil felt vindicated by this clear, if silent, defense of his actions, and by the added security he felt in their combined mass. Suren’s quiet fortitude and Rashmi’s sensible oversight formed a protective support to the role he, Nihil, had taken on, no questions asked, as Devi’s primary guardian. No serpent-tongued piano teacher could do her harm when they walked together like this, he thought, with a measure of pride. It was a feeling that would only last until he had to go to sleep, the time of day Nihil disliked the most, for it meant that Devi had to be given over entirely to Rashmi, who, he felt, though she certainly cared, did not display the same intensity of concern for their sister.

It would have helped Nihil greatly to know that he was mistaken in this belief, that the same fears rested equally within the minds of his older siblings, but it was the kind of information that older siblings did not share, believing it wiser to keep concern to themselves lest it lessen their vigilance. They, too, had taken the information about the fragility of Devi’s life, information that was simple superstition and conjecture, but that in their minds carried the authority of the past—when, they were sure, other children had found their lives in jeopardy thanks to a twist of fate that caused their birth to coincide with that unfortunate date—and turned it into their life’s responsibility. In fact, Rashmi woke up on most nights to ensure, with the placement of her fingers underneath her sister’s nose and the sensation of warm moisture on her skin, that Devi was still alive, and Suren put himself to sleep each night only after a recitation of a self-made prayer uttered softly but aloud in the direction of Devi’s bed. Nihil, however, had no such tricks of self-assurance. Nihil had only responsibility and fear, which made his nights fretful and his dreams unerringly morbid.

But this night, the night of meeting Mr. Niles, when time had settled his initial doubts, Nihil felt a small easing in his heart. If he could find something to keep for himself, as the old man had suggested, perhaps it would help him wear his burden with more serenity. But what was it that he could keep? He lay in his bed and pondered the question. Cricket had now been sacrificed. Chess he would willingly give up had he been of an age to demonstrate any prowess. His home-style theatrical productions were an ordinary endeavor. What else was left? Nothing, he thought, nothing at all but this sister who was a sweet-sour blessing, full of need and giving. Just as Nihil’s eyes began to well up at the particular misfortune of his birth order, the way her arrival had turned him from being a baby to being an older brother, a care giver, Suren’s voice broke in.

“What about your backwards poems?” he asked, prescient.

“What poems?”

“The ones you recite backwards for our performances,” Suren said.

Nihil watched his older brother put on a crimson sarong and remove his khaki shorts from beneath. Suren’s induction into the world of sarongs was recent, and the knot untied and the sarong fell down a few times as he executed this adult maneuver. Ordinarily, Nihil would have laughed at the sight or uttered some words about when he might be given a sarong, too, but not this time. This time he simply continued to watch as Suren straightened up and took off his shirt in preparation for bed.