by Amitav Ghosh
Kanai pinched the bridge of his nose, as if he were hoping the gesture would help him find the words he wanted. “I won’t lie to you, Piya — I don’t know what I have in mind. It’s just that I want to see you again. And I want you to see me — on my own ground, in the place where I live.”
She tried to think of his life in New Delhi, and she imagined a house filled with employees — a cook, a driver, people to fetch and carry. It seemed as remote from her own life as something she might see in a movie or on television. It was impossible for her to take it seriously — and she knew that no purpose would be served by pretending otherwise.
She reached over to touch his arm. “Listen, Kanai,” she said. “I hear what you’re saying. And believe me, I appreciate it; I appreciate everything you’ve done and I wish you the best. I’m sure one day you’ll meet the woman who’s right for you. But I don’t think I’m the one.”
He nodded resignedly to indicate that this was more or less what he had expected to hear. “There’s so much I want to tell you, Piya,” he said, “and maybe it would be easier to put it into words if I didn’t want to so much. It’s like Moyna says.”
Piya was jolted by the sound of that name. “What does she say?”
“That words are like the winds that blow ripples on the water’s surface. The river itself flows beneath, unseen and unheard.”
“What did she mean?”
“She was talking about how she feels about Fokir,” Kanai said.
“And?”
“He means everything to her, you know, although you wouldn’t think it. She’s terrified he’s going to leave her.”
“And why would he do that?”
Kanai’s voice fell. “Because of you, maybe?”
“Kanai, that’s absurd,” Piya protested. “There’s no reason why she or anyone else should think that.”
“None at all?”
Piya could feel her annoyance growing and she tried to calm her voice. “Kanai — what are you getting at?”
“I’ll tell you what Moyna thinks,” he said softly. “She believes you’re in love with Fokir.”
“And what about you?” Piya shot back. “Do you believe that too?”
“Well are you?”
There was an edge to his voice now and she chafed against its rasp. “Are you asking on her behalf, or are you asking for yourself ?”
“Does it matter?”
“I don’t know, Kanai. I don’t know what to tell you — any more than I know what to tell her. I don’t know the answers to any of these questions you’re asking.” Raising her hands, Piya clamped them on her ears as if to shut out the sound of his voice. “Look, I’m sorry — I just can’t talk about this anymore.”
The moon had risen over Garjontola now and in its waxing light the island’s glowing sparks had faded and become almost invisible. Piya stared at the dimming lights, trying to remember how magical they had seemed just a few minutes before. “It was beautiful while it lasted, wasn’t it?”
When Kanai answered, his voice sounded just as constricted as her own. “My uncle would have said that it was like a tide country mirage.”
A SEARCH
AT DAWN, when Piya stepped out of her cabin, the Megha was so thickly shrouded in fog that she could see neither its stern nor its bow. On her way to the foredeck she all but fell over Kanai, who was sitting in a chair with a pad on his knees and a lantern by his side.
“Up already?”
“Yes.” He gave her a tired smile. “Actually, I’ve been up for hours.”
“How come?”
“I’ve been working on something,” he said.
“So early?” She could not conceal her surprise. “It must be important to get you out of bed at that hour of night.”
“It is important,” he said. “In fact, it’s for you — a present. I wanted to have it done before we each went our own way.”
“A present for me?” she said. “Can you tell me what it is?”
He gave her a deprecatory smile and made a face. “You’ll see when it’s finished.”
“So it’s not done yet?”
“No,” he said. “But it will be by the time we’re ready to be off.”
“OK, I’ll be back.” She went to her cabin to change, and by the time she had brushed her teeth and had a quick breakfast of bananas and Ovaltine, Horen was already in the wheelhouse and Fokir was in his boat, preparing to cast off its mooring. She handed Fokir the backpack in which she had placed her equipment, a couple of bottles of water and a few nutrition bars. Then she went to the foredeck and found Kanai still seated in his chair.
“So is it done yet?” she said.
“Yes.” Rising to his feet, he handed her a large manila envelope. “Here it is.”
She took it from him and turned it over in her hands. “You still won’t tell me what it is?”
“I’d like it to be a surprise.” He looked down at the deck and shuffled his feet. “And if you should want to let me know what you think of it, you’ll find my address on the back of the envelope. I hope you’ll write.”
“Of course I’ll write, Kanai,” she said. “We’re friends, aren’t we?”
“I hope so.”
She would have given him a peck on the cheek if she hadn’t known that Horen’s eyes were boring into her back. “Take care,” she said.
“And you too, Piya — take care and good luck.”
THE FOG HUNG so heavy on the water that it seemed to slow the currents with its weight. When Fokir dipped in his oars, the boat slipped easily forward, with the fog frothing around its bow like whipped milk. A few strokes of the oars was all it took to carry the boat out of sight of the Megha: the vessel vanished into the mist within minutes.
As the boat headed downriver, Piya glanced at the envelope Kanai had given her — she could tell from its size that there were several sheets of paper inside. She decided against opening the letter right away; instead, reaching into her backpack, she tucked the envelope inside and pulled out her GPS receiver. After taking a reading of the boat’s position, she allowed herself to succumb to the dreamy quiet of the fog.
Over the past couple of days her body had become attuned to the shuddering and noise of the diesel-powered bhotbhoti: this boat’s silence was a comforting contrast. Now, as she looked around herself, examining the texture of the boat’s wood and the ashen color of its thatch, it seemed to Piya that she was seeing these things properly for the first time. She ran her fingers over the plywood strips that covered the boat’s deck and tried to decipher the smudged lettering stamped on some of them; she looked at the speckled gray sheet of plastic that had once been a U.S. mailbag and remembered how much it had startled her when she first recognized it for what it was. It was strange that these ordinary things had seemed almost magical at that moment, when she was lying on this deck, trying to recover from the experience of almost drowning. Looking at these discarded odds and ends in the light of another day, she saw it was not the boat but her own eyes that had infused them with that element of enchantment. Now they looked as plain and as reassuringly familiar as anything she had ever thought of as belonging in a home.
Piya shook her head to clear it of daydreams. Rising to a crouch, she signaled to Fokir to pass her the other pair of oars. She had no definite idea of where he was taking her, but she guessed he was going to explore one of the routes the dolphins took when they went to forage. The flood tide had peaked an hour or so before and the Garjontola pool was still empty of dolphins. Fokir seemed to know where to find them.
The currents were in their favor and, with two pairs of oars between them, they made short work of the rowing. It was not long before Fokir motioned to Piya to let her know they had reached their destination. For a couple of minutes he allowed the boat to drift and then, leaning over the side, he threw out his anchor and paid out the line.
The fog had thinned now and Piya saw that the boat was positioned so as to command a view of the entrance to a broad creek. Fok
ir pointed several times to the creek’s mouth, as if to assure her that the dolphins would soon be coming toward them from that direction. Piya took another GPS reading before raising her binoculars to her eyes. She found they had come some five miles since they had parted from the Megha at Garjontola.
At the start Fokir watched the creek in a casual, almost negligent way — he seemed to have no doubt in his mind that the dolphins would soon come at them from this direction. But when two hours had passed without a sighting, he seemed less certain of his ground, and his attitude began to change, confidence yielding slowly to a bemused doubt.
They stayed on watch in the same place for another couple of hours, but again, despite the near-perfect visibility, there was no sign of the dolphins. Meanwhile, the tide had ebbed and the day had grown steadily hotter with the sun’s ascent. Piya’s shirt was damp with sweat. Thinking back, Piya could not remember any other time since her arrival when the temperature had been so high so early in the day.
Shortly after midday, with the tide running low, Fokir pulled in the anchor, a signal that they were about to move on. At first Piya thought he had given up the watch and was planning to head back to Garjontola. But when she reached for her oars, Fokir shook his head. He pointed to the mouth of the creek they had been watching all morning and motioned to her to stay on alert with her binoculars. He turned the boat into the creek and, after a couple of hundred yards, made another turn, into a still narrower channel.
It was only after they had spent an hour winding between creeks and gullies that Fokir stopped to take stock of the stretch of water ahead: there was still no trace of a dolphin. With an impatient click of his tongue, he reached for his oars again and turned the boat in a new direction.
In a while, as the boat continued its passage, Piya took another GPS reading and discovered that they were still heading away from Garjontola. They had covered a distance of a little more than nine miles since the morning. Their progress, however, had been anything but direct: on the monitor, the line that traced their route looked like a strand of wool that had come unraveled from an old scarf.
The air was stagnant and heavy and the water’s surface was like glass, unscarred by the faintest touch of wind. Fokir was drenched in sweat, and the look of puzzlement on his face had been replaced by an expression of concern: after seven hours of watching the water they had seen nothing of any interest. Piya gestured to Fokir, urging him to stop and rest, but he paid no attention: he seemed to be intent on penetrating ever deeper into the tidal labyrinth.
THE INITIAL PART of the journey to Lusibari led through a part of the tide country that was little frequented, and for the first few hours after its departure from Garjontola, the Megha encountered no other vessels, large or small. But then its route brought the bhotbhoti in view of a major seaward channel, the Jahajphoron River, and suddenly the waterways were as inexplicably busy as they had been empty before. With the river’s width lying athwart the bow, it became evident, even from a distance, that there were a great many boats out on the water. This would not have seemed untoward if it were not for the fact that the boats were all heading in the same direction — inland, and away from the sea.
Having had little rest the night before, Kanai had fallen asleep soon after the Megha left Garjontola. He was woken by the sound of Horen’s voice, summoning his grandson from the deck below.
Sitting up in his bunk, Kanai found his clothes and sheets soaked in sweat. He had shut the door at dawn, when the air was still chilly, but now, with hours to go before noon, the cabin’s bulwarks were already radiating heat. Kanai stepped out to find Horen standing at the bow, peering at the broad river ahead while Nogen tended the wheel.
“What’s the matter, Horen-da?” Kanai said as he made his way forward to the bow. “What do you see?”
“Look over there,” Horen answered, raising a hand to point ahead.
Kanai shaded his eyes as he considered the sight. Unused though he was to these waterways, he sensed there was something odd about the traffic in front of them. But the exact nature of the problem eluded him. “All I see is a lot of boats,” he said.
“Don’t you see, they’re all heading in the same direction?” Horen said gruffly. “They seem to be going back to their villages.”
Glancing at his watch, Kanai saw that it was a little after ten in the morning. It struck him that it was early in the day for fishermen to be bringing home their catch. “Why’re they heading back at this hour?” he said. “Isn’t it the wrong time?”
“Yes,” said Horen. “You wouldn’t normally see them going that way until quite late in the evening.”
“So what could the matter be?”
“At this time of year,” Horen said, “it’s usually only one thing.”
“And what’s that?”
Horen shrugged, and his eyes seemed to disappear into the enigmatic folds of his face. “We’ll find out soon enough.” He turned away and went back to the wheelhouse to take over the steering.
It took another ten minutes to cover the distance to the river ahead. Once Horen had executed the turn into the main channel of the Raimangal, he cut the engine so that the Megha drifted almost to a standstill. Then, with Nogen handling the wheel, Horen went to the stern and waited for a fishing boat to draw abreast. Soon a whole cluster of boats gathered there and shouts rang back and forth as the returning fishermen exchanged questions and answers with Horen. Then the boats sailed on and Horen came hurrying back to the wheelhouse, grim-faced and glowering. A muttered command sent Nogen racing down to start the engine while Horen took hold of the wheel.
Kanai was aware of a stab of apprehension as he looked at the set cast of Horen’s profile. “So, Horen-da,” he said, “what is it? What did you find out?”
Horen answered brusquely, “It’s just what I thought. What else would it be at this time of year?”
There was a storm on its way, Horen explained. A jhor. The weather office in New Delhi had put out warnings since the day before that it might even be a cyclone. The coast guard had been out on the Bay of Bengal since dawn, turning back the fishing fleet: that was why the boats were heading home.
“But what about —?” Kanai’s first thought was for Piya and Fokir, out on their boat at Garjontola.
Horen cut him short. “Don’t worry. The storm won’t be on us until midday tomorrow. This gives us plenty of time. We’ll go back to Garjontola to wait for them to get back. Even if they don’t return until late in the evening, we’ll be fine. If we set off early enough tomorrow morning, we’ll be back in Lusibari before the storm hits.”
The engine sprang back to life and Horen used his shoulders to hold the wheel to a tight turn. Within a few minutes, the Megha was heading back the way it had come, retracing the morning’s journey.
It was one o’clock when they reached Garjontola, and neither Kanai nor Horen was surprised to find no one there. Only seven hours had passed since they had waved the boat off that morning. They knew that Piya and Fokir were probably planning to come back to Garjontola much later — in time to meet the Megha on its return from Lusibari, which was scheduled for the end of the day.
One thing puzzled Kanai: the boat was anchored well within sight of the Garjontola pool, yet, although it was low tide, there were no dolphins in the water. He recalled that the dolphins usually gathered there when the tide ebbed, and it was clear even to his unpracticed eye that the water was running low. He went to Horen to confirm this, and was told that this was indeed the ebb tide, the bhata — the jowar would not set in for another two or three hours.
“But Horen-da, look,” said Kanai, pointing toward Garjontola. “If it’s the bhata, then why is the water empty?”
Horen frowned as he took this in. “What can I tell you?” he said at last. “The world isn’t like a clock. Everything doesn’t always happen on time.”
There was no arguing with this, yet in the pit of Kanai’s stomach was a gnawing sensation that told him something was wrong. “Horen-da
,” he said, “instead of waiting here, why don’t we set out to look for Fokir’s boat?”
There was an amused grunt from Horen. “To look for a boat here would be like trying to find a grain of grit in a sack full of rice.”
“It won’t do any harm,” Kanai insisted. “Not if we’re back by sunset. If all’s well, the boat will be here then and we’ll meet up with them.”
“It’ll serve no purpose,” Horen grumbled. “There are hundreds of little khals crisscrossing these islands. Most of them are too shallow for a bhotbhoti.”
Kanai could sense his resistance lessening and said lightly, “We’re not doing anything else, after all — so why not?”
“All right, then.” Bending over the gunwale, Horen shouted to Nogen to start the engine and draw anchor.
Kanai stood leaning on the wheelhouse as the bhotbhoti pulled away from Garjontola and headed downriver. There was not a cloud in the sky and the landscape seemed tranquil in the soporific heat of the afternoon sun. It needed some stretching of the mind to imagine that bad weather could be on its way.
CASUALTIES
THE TIDE WAS TURNING when at last Piya caught sight of a dorsal fin: it was half a mile or so ahead of the boat, very close to the shore. A quick read of the dolphin’s position showed it to be almost twelve miles southeast of Garjontola. When she put the binoculars back to her eyes she made another discovery — the dolphin she had spotted earlier was not alone; it was accompanied by several others. They seemed to be circling in the same place, much as they did in the Garjontola pool.
She saw that the water was still at midlevel, and a look at her watch told her that it was three in the afternoon. She was conscious now of an excitement similar to that which she had felt when Fokir first led her to the dolphins at Garjontola. If several dolphins had congregated here at low tide, surely it could only mean that this was yet another pool and these dolphins were from another pod? This seemed like the best news she could have had, but a glance at Fokir’s face was enough to indicate that something was not quite right — there was a cautionary look in his eyes that put her on guard.
