“Siamese lady no like work. Love play. Love sleep. Why you no love play?”
She assured him that she did like play very well when she was in the humor for play, but that at present she was not disposed to it. She was weary of her idle life in the palace and sick of Siam altogether. He received her candor with his characteristic smile and a good-humored “Good-by, sir.”
Next morning ten Siamese boys and one girl filed into her room, marshaled by a harem duenna. Gracefully they knelt. Solemnly they raised their small hands and salaamed her. Her first school in Siam! Most of them were half-brothers and nephews of the Kralahome. A few were dependents, selected for seeming promise. The little girl was a half-sister. Anna began her work gratefully. It was a comfort and a wholesome discipline.
And so June passed and July began.
Anna realized as the days went on that she had given up the unequal struggle with the King and abandoned her expectation of having a home. The acknowledgment of defeat brought no feeling of resignation, however. She felt thwarted by her inability to exact fulfillment of her contract, and wrote Francis Cobb that she might return to Singapore after all. He did not press her, but he did write to say that he was having a picture of Avis painted on ivory for her from a photograph that Mr. Heritage had made before Avis sailed, and that he would hold the miniature until he heard what she had decided to do.
She had come to Bangkok full of high hopes and great plans. After the two difficult years in Singapore since Leon’s death, she had welcomed the thought of regular paid employment. She had anticipated life in new surroundings, for familiar ones kept alive the aching pain of her loss. And above all she had craved hard work. She loved to teach. She had imagined herself helping an enlightened monarch found a model school that would set the pattern of education for a country just emerging from medievalism. She had looked forward eagerly to influencing a nation through its royal family. She believed so passionately in human freedom, in human dignity, in the inviolability of the human spirit, that she had thought when the chance came to penetrate the harem, the very heart of the Siamese system of feudalism and slavery, that God had meant her for a liberator. Perhaps—she had dreamed—she would teach some future king, shaping his child mind for a new and better world.
Thus she had left Singapore with a sense of mission that was strong enough to resist the objections of her friends who considered the whole venture wild and dangerous. She was a woman, slight, almost frail in appearance; not someone who could fight with guns to free the slaves, as in the United States, but someone who could fight with knowledge in the corner of the world where she found herself. But now all her multi-colored bubbles of hope were gone, shivered to fragments on the floor of two squalid rooms at the end of a Bangkok fish market.
Nor could she rouse herself from the apathy that had overtaken her. She found the children in the Kralahome’s palace responsive and interesting. But she continued to feel despondent. Every morning she whipped up her energies anew to begin the day’s lesson. And the very effort of will wearied her. She wished to make the most of the opportunity, and fought the engulfing discouragement, only to realize that day by day she was growing more and more dispirited. Go or stay—did it matter?
Then one morning as school was about to commence Khun Ying Phan walked into Anna’s room unannounced.
“Mem cha,” she said, “I have found a house for you.”
Anna sprang up with such an influx of joy that her heart almost burst.
Lady Phan smiled at her radiant face and begged her not to expect too much. “But it is on the river and has a small garden. And you may have it if you like. Do you want to go and see it now?”
Anna was amazed to discover that she could be happy again. Listlessness and depression vanished. She thanked the Khun Ying for her kindness with such enthusiasm that the Siamese woman laughed, protesting that Anna must not thank her until she knew whether there was any reason for gratitude. But Anna’s excitement could not be dampened. She snatched Louis from his chair and covered his small face with kisses until he protested.
School was dismissed before it began. Anna hurriedly dressed for the street and collected a few things to take with her. A young brother of the Kralahome was appointed guide to the new home.
“Come, Boy,” Moonshee said in Malay, “we’ll go, too. The house must be a paradise since the Great Vizier bestows it upon the Mem sahib, whom he delights to honor.”
Since the house was not far from the palace, the little procession started out on foot. They passed through several narrow streets and came at last to a walled enclosure, which they entered. At first glance it was not promising. The yard was covered with a rubble of broken stone, bricks, lime, mortar, as if from some demolished building. A tall dingy storehouse occupied one side of the compound. The opposite side was a wall with a low door opening on the river. At the far end of the yard stood the house itself, shaded by several fine trees that drooped over the piazza and made it almost picturesque. This was a thousand times better than the fish market!
When they entered the house, however, their enthusiasm faltered. They were in the presence of overpowering filth. Rotten matting covered the floors. Gory expectorations of betel stained the walls. Moonshee began to curse in a low monotone, and Anna did not rebuke him for he expressed the sharp disappointment they all felt. Out of his extensive vocabulary he execrated his own fate, damned in vivid detail this land of infidels, and reviled all viziers. Anna grew conscious that so superlative a performance implied an audience, and turned to see to whom the old Persian’s lamentations were addressed. There, seated on the floor in the corner, was a second Mohammedan. No one seemed to know how he had got there. Apparently he had materialized from a crack in answer to Moonshee’s need for a sympathetic listener! Many times Anna and Louis had seen Moonshee pontificating to just such an appreciative fellow-Moslem when things had gone wrong. The familiar drama in this unfamiliar scene brought back sharply other years and other places, and they both burst out laughing. Filth or not, home was beginning to fall into a familiar pattern.
With renewed courage they explored further. The house had nine rooms, including bathrooms and a kitchen. Some of the rooms were pleasant and airy. There were two stories. In Oriental style the bathrooms, kitchen, and storehouses were separated from the main body of the house by a court—open to the sky, but walled in on the ends. In this bank of rooms were quarters for servants.
Except for the dirt the house was livable, and soap and water would remedy that. Beebe and Boy were very optimistic. They hurried back to the front room and put an end to Moonshee’s rhetoric by ordering him to enlist the services of his audience and some Chinese coolies, if he could find them, in fetching water and scrubbing. He protested that there were no buckets. But Anna gave him a few dollars and packed him off to buy some. With the philosophical resignation of the good Moslem he stopped his discourse and set out, his new friend in tow. Louis was tied into a pinafore by Beebe. He had announced that he would help clean while Beebe returned to the palace to pack their belongings. Almost without discussion they had decided to stay.
In this interim of quiet Anna sat down on the only chair in the house, a broken one of Chinese design, to plan the attack. The first question was where to begin. There was so much filth, and it was so monstrous in quantity and kind. The Kralahome’s brother, who had settled himself negligently on the railing of the piazza, wandered into the room and stared at Anna with interest. She stood up and shook her head at him firmly until he retreated outside. Then she marched through a broken door into an inner room. She hung her bonnet and mantle on a rusty nail in the wall and slipped out of her neat half-mourning. She had brought an old wrapper and this she put on. Then she flung open the door and dashed at the matting, tearing it up fiercely. After months of boredom there was sheer joy in the use of physical energy.
In due time Moonshee and his new friend returned with half a dozen buckets, but no coolies! Furthermore, Moonshee had been beguiled into assuaging
his grief with a cheap variety of the wine of Shiraz. He sat maudlin on the steps, weeping piteously for his beautiful home in Singapore. But Anna refused to be discouraged.
“Get up, Moonshee!” she said unfeelingly. “Go and fetch Beebe. And you can bring the bedsteads and boxes yourself while she helps me. Ask some of the Kralahome’s slaves to help you if the boxes are too heavy. We’re going to clean at least two rooms, and we’re going to stay. So hurry along. Come on, now, get up!” The old man looked at her sadly. He stood up uncertainly and shuffled off sniveling.
As Anna stood on the piazza rearranging her plans in annoyance, Mrs. Hunter arrived. She was neat and pleasant as always. Her husband had told her of Anna’s contemplated move. She had brought with her a half-dozen slaves, buckets of whitewash, and rolls of sweet China matting for the floors. In an hour the house had been swept throughout. Three of Mrs. Hunter’s slaves were busy whitewashing the walls. The rest were down on their hands and knees scrubbing the floors with half coconut shells. Mrs. Hunter moved unhurriedly about, seeing that water was emptied often, that plenty of soap was used, that every floor was scrubbed twice.
By late afternoon the house was immaculate. The matting, which smelled like new-mown hay, was laid and the furniture carried in and set in place. There was not much of it for so big a house, but there was a table and two armchairs. There were some candlesticks, and many books. Anna thought with pleasure that they came out of their boxes like old friends. There was a piano with remembered songs pent up in it. And in the bedroom Louis’ cot had been spread with white sheets and set next to Anna’s bed. Snowy white nets were ready to be lowered against the mosquitoes. On the table beside the bed Anna set a picture of Avis. That was the final touch. Anna and Louis were at home.
Mrs. Hunter smiled at the picture and at them. Then she said good-by and set off with her slaves, loaded with Anna’s gratitude and a promise that Anna would visit her often and write letters for her in English to her boys who were being sent to England. As she went out Beebe came in through the gate with soup and dainties, prepared with the help of a “Bombay man” she had somehow managed to find.
It was quiet. There was only the lap of the river against the bank and the sound of some children splashing and swimming in it. Boy? Where was Boy? Anna and Beebe found him asleep in one of the empty rooms, dirty but with a look of content on his face. Anna carried him to his bed and laid him on it. Then she washed and put on her muslin, combed her hair, and prepared to queen it at the first meal in her own palace.
All at once it seemed a very solemn moment. As she stood smiling into the mirror memories crowded thick about her. She was home again! The very word was an organ singing through her mind in perfect chords. She did not know why her request for a home had been suddenly granted. It was as mysterious and quixotic as the original refusal. But the wall was down. She had entered her Jericho to the fanfare of unseen trumpets. And that was enough! Whatever the future, she could face it now. The strictures that had bound her heart were gone.
She had her home, her refuge, her integral being. Home! The word kept re-echoing in her mind. It carried her to other places where she had known the same deep peace, back to her mother, and the lap in which she had rested her head when she was a little girl, looking up into eyes whose deep and quiet light had never sparkled with unkindness or anger. She thought of her mother’s lips and how they had loved to croon the songs of a far-off and happy Wales, of the comfort and hope and strength and courage and victory and peace that there had been in her mother’s presence.
The tide of emotion rising in her heart overcame her. She dropped on her knees beside Louis and threw her arms around him. He awoke as she covered his grimy face with kisses, unable to understand why there were tears in his mother’s eyes and why she vowed so passionately that he, too, would have a home to remember, and a mother.
“I’m hungry,” he said.
13
THE SCHOOL IN THE PALACE
The next morning Beebe had a good breakfast ready for Anna and Louis as soon as they were bathed and dressed. It was luxury to be free of the bustle of the great house. They sat down to their leisurely meal with ceremony and mock solemnity, for it was a feast of their glorious independence.
They were not allowed to finish uninterrupted. A vacant chuckle—mere sound unrelated to mirth—announced a presence on the piazza. It was none other than Gabriel of the fish market, in his shabby red coat with the yellow facings. He had an order from the King. Mrs. Leonowens was to present herself at court immediately. This was Thursday, the day of the week sacred to the god of wisdom, Brihaspati, and therefore suitable for the formal opening of the school in the Grand Palace.
“Well,” Anna said with some asperity, “it does seem as if I might have been told in advance!”
She had again the sense of being a pawn moved about on a chessboard by unseen giant players. The pattern of the game eluded her, but that there was a pattern she did not doubt.
Nothing must spoil this first breakfast in their own home, however. Boy and she lingered over it until there was no further excuse to dally. Then they prepared to follow their ancient guide. Boy hugged Bessy fondly by way of good-by. Anna left money with Beebe for food, charcoal braziers and other kitchen equipment, and told her that someone was to remain in the house all the time. “If you go to market yourself, Beebe, Moonshee must stay to watch things,” she called as she waved good-by.
The same long, narrow, and very crank boat that had taken them to the fish market received them once again. Although it was still early the sun was hot. The oarsmen tugged grunting against the strong current while rivers of sweat ran down their bare backs. At the ornate river landing Gabriel turned Anna and Louis over to slave girls, who conducted them to the Palace through the gate known among the common people as “The Gate of Knowledge.” A company of Amazons, smartly dressed in green and gold, then conveyed them to the entrance of the “Inside” where other slave girls waited to take them to the pavilion that had been designated as the new school.
The approach to the pavilion was through a grove of orange and palm trees so thick that Anna and Boy moved in sun-flecked twilight. The slave girls signaled them to wait at the outer portico of what seemed on closer view to be a temple. While the slaves went in to announce their arrival, Anna stood wondering among the tall golden pillars that reached up through shadowy distance to the roof. The mysticism of the place descended upon her like a blanket of tranquillity.
At a sign from one of the slaves Anna took Boy by the hand and moved on a little hesitantly into the temple itself, not knowing what was expected of her, nor what to expect. A colossal golden image of the Buddha dominated the great chamber. And in the center of the tessellated floor stood a long table, finely carved, and some carved and gilded chairs. The King and most of the noble ladies of the court were present, with a few priests. A flutter of interest stirred the richly dressed women as Anna and Boy entered, but the priests in their simple yellow robes, barefoot and with shaven heads, continued their silent contemplation of infinity.
The King received Anna and Louis very kindly, with no hint of the ill-temper of their previous meeting. He pointed to two seats that had been prepared for them. An interval of silence followed. Then the King clapped his hands lightly and the lower part of the hall filled with female slaves. A word or two from the King and every head bowed in assent as the group dispersed. When they returned crawling expertly across the floor they were carrying boxes of slates, pencils, ink, pens, and the familiar Webster’s blue-backed speller, which they shoved up onto the long carved table. Other women entered, also creeping, with burning tapers and vases of white lotus, which they set on the table in front of each of the twenty or more gilded chairs. Everything seemed to have been prepared in great detail. The formality and perfection of the arrangements were impressive.
At another indication from the King the priests took up a chant. During the calm half hour that the religious service afforded, Anna looked around her.
On one side of her and in front of the Buddha was an altar enriched with the most curious and precious offerings of the goldsmith’s and jeweler’s craftsmanship that she had seen in her travels in the Far East. Beyond this was a gilded rostrum on which the chief of the priests sat, a vigorous man of about fifty. She recognized him as His Lordship, Chao Khun Sa. The anonymity of shaven head and yellow robe could not conceal the strength of intellect and personality for which he was famous. She had already heard much of this man, who had been a follower of the King during the twenty-seven years that the King had been in exile from the throne in the priesthood. She had been told that His Majesty required the priest’s attendance on all occasions of importance.
Near the preaching chair on which the learned abbot sat cross-legged was the strangely carved trunk of an old bo tree, and on the tree an image of Indian design, the god Brihaspati, deity of mind and wisdom. Anna wondered with amusement what the silent impressive Buddha high above the altar thought of this interloper from the Hindu pantheon.
The floor was a mosaic of marble and semi-precious stones, so rich in color as to seem almost gaudy. The golden pillars, the friezes above them, and the remote vaulted roof of gilt arabesques, however, served to tone down the whole to their own chaste harmony of design. Anna thought the effect of the temple indescribably beautiful.
When the chant was ended there was a ruffle of music from an unseen orchestra. This announced the entrance of the princes and princesses who were to be her pupils. They advanced in the order of their age. First in line was a girl of about ten. Anna was struck with the rich satin of her skin, the delicacy of her form, and the subdued luster of her dreamy eyes. The King took her gently by the hand and presented her to Anna, saying simply, “The English school mistress. Princess Ying Yaowalak, first-born among women.” The child’s greeting was quiet and self-possessed. Taking both of Anna’s hands between her own small ones she bowed, touching them to her forehead. Then at a word from the King she retired to her place on the right. One by one, in like manner, all the royal children were presented and so saluted Anna. As the last child inched away along the floor to his place in the kneeling line the music ceased its tinkling and plaintive melody.
Anna and the King of Siam Page 12
