Flame Tree Road

by Shona Patel

  Biren watched Maya as she sat beautifully in a lotus pose, her spine tall and erect, accentuating her long lovely neck. The light from the open window cast a glow around her and made her hair shine. He tried to sit quietly, all the while wishing he could swat the mosquitoes that were making a meal of his toes. He wriggled his toes constantly without appearing to do so.

  One of the men counted out a wad of cash and handed it to Maya, who recounted it and jotted something in her notebook. She put the money inside a small metal box with a latch. The men got to their feet and Maya and the young girl accompanied them to the door.

  When they were gone, Biren walked over to her. “Maya,” he said, suddenly shy, wondering how he would explain what he was doing in the weavers’ village. But she seemed to have arrived at her own conclusions.

  “I am so happy you came to visit the weavers’ village,” she said. She was putting away her notebook and pencil inside a cloth bag embroidered with mirror work. “Did you come by boat?”

  “Yes,” he said, still feeling tongue-tied. She turned to the young girl who had reentered the room.

  “This is Chaya,” she said by way of introduction, “my assistant.”

  “Do you always have an assistant with a rhyming name?” Biren quipped. She made him feel gleeful and young, maybe because she was so composed and serious herself.

  Maya laughed. “Chaya is the head tanthi’s daughter. She is a gifted weaver herself. Her family have been weavers for...how many generations now, Chaya?”

  “I am the fifth generation,” the girl said, smiling shyly and covering her mouth with the end of her sari.

  “Five generations!” Maya said, turning to Biren. “All that collective expertise, know-how and patterning go into each exquisite sari. The temple-style weave is the signature pattern of this particular village. Not many weavers can accomplish this complicated design.” She handed the girl a sheet of paper. “Here is the order list for next month. Make sure Yosef sees the special instructions.”

  “Yes, didi,” said the girl, addressing Maya as her older sister.

  Maya lifted the hem of her sari and slipped her shapely feet into a pair of leather slippers with red tassels. Biren sat on the stoop to put on his shoes and she sat beside him. Her silky braid brushed his arm softly like a caress.

  She did not comment on his filthy feet, and he was glad he did not have to explain. How could he tell her he had been walking barefoot all over the village, shoes in hand, if not for the madness of looking for her?

  “Do you have a boat?” she asked.

  “I sent it back,” said Biren lamely.

  “Then, how will you get back? No boat will go toward town now. They are all returning to the villages this time of the day.”

  Biren felt a little foolish. All he had wanted was a one-way boat ride to Maya, and he did not care if he ever got back.

  “My boatman is waiting,” she said. “You can come with me if you like.”

  Biren smiled. “It will be my pleasure.”

  They walked toward the riverbank. She carried the embroidered tote easily on her shoulder and walked with quick, light steps. The sun caught the sparkle of a gold floret in her earlobe, and a single bangle with a clasp fashioned in the shape of two elephant heads sat easily on her slender wrist. She was almost too beautiful to be real.

  When they reached the boat, he climbed in and held out his hand, feeling the thrill of her fingers grasping his own. Once in the boat they sat like strangers at opposite ends, too far to talk, but Biren did not mind. He was content to just watch her.

  A gigantic sun dipped into the curve of the horizon. The oar broke the water into lilac ribbons. The boatman sang an old Bhatiyali song.

  “Oh, friend of my heart, you leave me afloat on a shoreless sea.”

  Maya’s face was turned toward the shore, her profile etched in the dying sun. Every feature on her face is perfect, marveled Biren. What made her so serene and self-assured? he wondered idly. It had to be the security of being deeply loved and cherished. It hit him with a sickening jolt. Of course, it was another man. The thought was just too painful to entertain.

  CHAPTER

  45

  It slowly dawned on Biren that courting Maya was going to be complicated. First there was the protocol. When he visited her house, he rarely got to speak to her alone. Jatin Nandi was broad-minded, but it was the old granny who set the rules. Granny had firm views on how respectable girls should conduct themselves. Loafing around and going for boat rides with a young man was out of the question. That was what common people did. Boys from good families looked for a chaste bride, not some gadabout they could have a good time with.

  Maya was allowed to go to the weavers’ village, but only with a trusted boatman known to the family. It was just as well nobody had seen Biren in the boat with her the other day; otherwise, Maya would have some explaining to do.

  All this put Biren in a bind. His only resort was to mentally keep tabs on Maya’s whereabouts and pretend to accidentally bump into her, so that he could legitimately walk a short distance with her and slip into a conversation. But the occasions were few, and each situation had to be strategically planned to make it all look natural. This caused Biren a great deal of frustration, and he felt increasingly irritable with the Indian community’s narrow-mindedness. His brother, Nitin, had been lucky. Calcutta was a big city and it was easy to remain anonymous. Also, Nitin had had an accomplice. Who did Biren have? He was lumped with the European community, where he did not belong, nor was he a part of the Indian community. There was nobody who could remotely act as a liaison between him and Maya.

  The only thing left for him to do was to meet Maya at the weavers’ village. The village was far from town and nobody knew him there. But that was only once a month. Once a month! If something at work came up that coincided with the second Tuesday of the month, Biren had to rack his brains for elaborate excuses. He was past caring if it raised suspicions at work. All he cared about was that it gave him four hours of uninterrupted time with Maya.

  When the day came and he visited the village, he observed her as she went about her work. The weavers came to accept him as her relative—a distant cousin, perhaps. Maya visited the different sheds, talked to the weavers, checked samples with her young helper, Chaya, always in tow, keenly observing and learning. She obviously hero-worshipped Maya. Biren learned a lot about the weaving and selling of hand-loom saris on those days, and some things came as a shock. For one, it seemed that the practices of the British government were aimed at wiping out the weaver community.

  “It’s true,” Maya asserted. “Earlier the British government used to send merchants from Calcutta to act as middlemen who paid the weavers very poorly. The weavers were forced to match the prices of mass-produced factory textiles imported from Britain. How could they? As a result they were starving to death.”

  She held up a delicate mauve sari with an inlay of intricate thread patterning in a subtle duotone. “Look at this exquisite weave,” she said passionately. “Centuries and centuries of craftsmanship passed down from one generation to the next have gone into this. All that history in a single piece of cloth. How can we lose this heritage?”

  As Biren felt the fineness of the cloth, their fingers touched.

  She smoothed out the sari before creasing it back into its folds, and patted it reassuringly.

  “I do what I can. I find buyers who will give them a fair price. I am always thinking of ways I can help them.”

  They walked back toward a small tea stall on the riverbank. She was beautiful both inside and out, Biren thought. She was quietly committed to doing good, without ever feeling the need to boast or even talk about it. She let her actions speak for her. Maya was so perfect she almost did not seem real.

  “Do you sometimes think of me?” Biren asked suddenly. He stopped walking
and looked at her wistfully. “Maya, tell me. Please.”

  She averted her face but she was smiling.

  “I want to marry you,” he said simply.

  She looked at him, her eyes clear and steady, but she did not say anything.

  “Will you?” he asked, his voice breaking a little. “Will you marry me, Maya?’

  “Yes,” she answered without hesitation.

  Her candid answer stunned him. The river, the sand, the sky blurred before his eyes. He found it difficult to breathe.

  They reached the tea stall and sat facing each other across a wooden table.

  “Two cups of tea,” Biren called to the tea shop owner. He felt like singing or breaking into a dance. Maybe both. “And make it extra special.”

  He turned to look at her, his eyes shining. “It’s all settled, then. I will come to your house tomorrow and ask your father for your hand.” He reached across the table and caressed the delicate pink nail of her little finger.

  She did not pull her hand away. “It is not my father but my grandmother you must ask,” she said in her soft, husky voice. “She is the one who will give the permission. The elders of your family must give the proposal on your behalf. You should not come yourself. It is not proper.”

  Biren drew a shaky puff of his cigarette. He knew nothing about these formalities. There appeared to be some social protocol he was expected to follow. He would have to consult Nitin and his mother about it. As luck would have it, just when he needed to talk to his mother and brother in person, there did not appear to be a single trip to Calcutta on his horizon. It would all have to be communicated through letters.

  CHAPTER

  46

  Chandanagore

  19th May 1896

  Dear Dada,

  Ma is overjoyed to hear about Maya. I think she had secretly given up hopes of you ever getting married. She is familiar with the Nandi family. They are a well-known family of the Shomapalli village of Sylhet. We have discussed the matter of your proposal in great depth. Normally it would be the duty of our uncle as the seniormost member of Baba’s family to represent you. But uncle is now completely incapable. He looks like a beggar and wanders around the fish market in a daze. The opium has finished him.

  Ma wrote to our father’s first cousin in the Tamarind Tree Village. His name is Johor Kaka. You may not remember him. His son Bapi studied in medical school with me, which is why I am in touch with the family. Johor Kaka has agreed to represent our side of the family for your proposal. There is a great deal of formality in these matters, especially since the grandmother of the girl, who is the head of her family, will give the consent, and from what you tell me she is very traditional.

  Since I myself did not have a proper Bengali wedding, I know little about these matters. But here is what I have gathered:

  Johor Kaka will come to Silchar to meet with Maya’s family and give the proposal. Typically a group of senior male members from the boy’s family approaches the girl’s side, and the first meeting is between the male members of both families—the prospective bride and groom are not included in this meeting. Maya’s family will ask questions about our clan’s origin, lineage, caste, etc. Even I don’t know much about all this but Johor Kaka will have all the details. They will also want to know about your job and financial standing. They already have a good idea about this, I would imagine. My feeling is you are probably the most eligible bachelor in Silchar right now.

  The only gray area is the matter of matching horoscopes. Maya’s grandmother—I get the feeling—will insist on consulting their family astrologer, as most traditional families do. I must warn you, Dada, many marriage proposals fall through if the horoscopes do not match. You should be aware of this risk if you agree to allow the astrologer to be consulted by her family.

  Johor Kaka may be too shy to tell you this, but it is customary for you to present him with a new set of silk dhoti-pajama to wear for the occasion. As he is representing the boy’s side he is also expected to carry gifts for the girl’s family, usually boxes of sweets, some fruit and a good-size freshly caught rohu fish.

  But more about these details when we meet in Calcutta next. Ma is eagerly awaiting your arrival to learn more about her future daughter-in-law. You must not forget to bring a photo.

  Your loving brother,

  Nitin

  Biren folded Nitin’s letter and looked at the dark clouds moving swiftly across the evening sky. He had a pounding headache. What he had imagined to be a simple formality of asking Jatin Nandi for his daughter’s hand was turning out to be a song and dance. If only he could speak to Jatin Nandi man-to-man and express his intentions, which were honorable in every respect, Biren was confident he could make a winning proposal, but to leave it up to an unknown uncle he had never met to propose on his behalf—how did that even make sense?

  It was disturbing to see his society still bound by such conservative customs. It was the business about matching the horoscopes that irked Biren most of all. It was one thing disclosing the family history, lineage, et cetera, but to be accepted or rejected based on which house the planets were lurking in at the time of his birth was both demeaning and insulting. It dismissed his education, his accolades and everything he had fought to achieve in his life as inconsequential. What was the point of his fine debate arguments and his grand vision for women’s reform when he himself was perpetuating the same rigid traditions he was fighting against?

  Jatin Nandi was an educated, forward-thinking man, and Biren could not imagine him consulting an astrologer for his daughter’s marriage, but he was also traditional in many respects and he would bow to his mother’s wishes.

  What if the horoscopes were incompatible? Biren would lose all chance of marrying Maya. Now that he was desperate to marry her, the very thought filled him with terror.

  The monsoons would break in a day or two, Biren thought. The river would rise and boats would cease to ply. Work at the weavers’ village would come to a standstill as it usually did during the rains. The looms in the open shed would get covered and all the yarn stored away.

  The question that tortured Biren’s mind was, how could he continue to see Maya? He wanted to share with her his worry about the horoscope and he needed to be comforted and reassured that everything would be all right. Now the monsoons were going to disrupt everything. A great big chasm was coming between them. Suddenly it felt as if they were standing on opposite banks of the river with no boat to row them across.

  * * *

  At long last, an official trip came up for Calcutta. Biren spent endless hours discussing the proposal with Shibani, Nitin and other family members and returned home more confused than ever. In his suitcase he carried the rolled-up parchment of his Vedic birth chart. The complicated diagrams and Sanskrit squiggles made little sense, but it could make or break his future. He learned for the first time that Maya had a “given” name. Her name on paper was Mandakini, and it was customary henceforth to refer to her by her formal name. The name Maya held an easy familiarity that in his new formal role as her suitor he was not entitled to call her by. In referring to Maya as Mandakini, half the time Biren had to remind himself whom they were talking about. It was finally decided that three senior male relatives from his father’s side would meet with Maya’s family. His uncle Johor Kaka would write the first formal letter of introduction to express their interest on Biren’s behalf and propose a date for the first meeting. All three relatives would have to be housed, clothed and armed with sweets and gifts. After the initial meeting, the family astrologer would be consulted to match horoscopes. Until then, the possibility of marrying Maya floated in limbo.

  CHAPTER

  47

  The office was quiet. Deathly quiet. The babus’ hall, usually noisy with the clatter of typewriters, was deserted. Biren climbed the stairs trying to remember what date it was
. Was it a public holiday? A roof leak in the passage outside Thompson’s office had resulted in an alarming water bulge on the burlap ceiling, which hung down like a distended belly and threatened to unleash a deluge. The water had started to drip down with a tuneful pip-pip sound into a bucket. The two Manipuri guards were not outside the door, which meant Thompson was not in the building. Only Griffiths was in his office, rocking against the wall reading a comic book.

  “Roy!” he cried, flinging the comic on his desk. “When did you get back, old chap?”

  “This morning,” said Biren. “Where is everyone? What’s going on? Today’s not a public holiday, is it?”

  “I wish,” grumbled Griffiths. “Thompson is out on an emergency call. I am holding the fort.”

  “Where are the babus?”

  “Oh, somebody just died. You know how the babus are. They use any old excuse to shirk work. It is either a puja or some relative dying. And since the whole town is related one way or the other, they have all taken off. So it’s just me in this cruddy old office.” He twirled a pencil around his middle finger. “Have a seat. How was Calcutta? I hear it’s all flooded.”

  “It was bad this year,” said Biren. He picked up the files from the chair and set them on the desk. The covers were curling with the humidity.

  “So tell me, what’s new and exciting in the big city?”

  “I didn’t get to do too much,” Biren said, sitting down. “Mostly high court and family. So who died? Must be somebody important. Is it a religious leader?”

  “An old lady, some schoolteacher’s mother. He runs an English girls’ school. I guess they are an old respected family in this town—hang on now, where are you running off to?”