Tiger Hills

by Sarita Mandanna

  Much as she had been looking forward to seeing her old friend again, Devi gradually grew irritated. His never-ending stories. From daybreak to sunset, all he did, it seemed, was seek her out and babble on. She began to avoid him, slipping away when she spotted him come whistling up the path to the Nachimanda house. “Iguthappa Swami, but he is here yet again. Tayi, tell him … just tell him I have gone to visit a friend,” she would whisper, ducking out the back door.

  “Cheh,” Tayi clucked, “is this any way to treat that poor boy? Making me lie to him … ” She would herd Devanna into her kitchen, baking him hot ottis, stuffing him with crab chutney and fried bamboo shoots until the blandness of hostel food was burned from his tongue, but it was poor consolation. The more he wanted to see her, the less time Devi seemed to have for him.

  She was going to the shanty and no, he could not come, there was simply too much work to be done there.

  She had to visit a friend.

  She had a headache and needed to rest.

  Once, despite her recriminations, he had stubbornly followed her. “Why can’t I come with you?” he argued. “Anyway, the fields are deserted, can’t you see? What is so urgent, what work so pressing that you must go there now, in the heat of the afternoon?”

  Unless, he added only half jokingly, as a thought suddenly struck him, unless she had arranged a secret tryst with someone?

  Devi burst into frustrated tears as he tried awkwardly to apologize. “Why can’t you let me be?” she cried. “There, I won’t go to the fields, are you happy now?”

  “Sorry, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that—”

  “Stop following me around! Everywhere I look, there you are, like a shadow. Leave me alone, I beg of you, let me be.”

  He left for the Kambeymada house soon after, much to Devi’s relief. They slaughtered two pigs there for a feast in his honor, and Devanna was allowed to drink for the first time in his life. The rice liquor burned a fiery path down his gullet, making his head swim until he seemed to see Devi everywhere, smiling at him from the rosewood-framed mirrors, reflected in the silver tumblers, dancing on the wooden-beamed ceiling.

  When Machu said casually that he was going to Mercara later that week to look for some guns, Devanna asked to accompany him. “You must love Pallada Nayak very much,” Machu probed along the way, “for you to want to return so soon.” Devanna flushed and mumbled something unintelligible.

  That afternoon, when Machu told her that Devanna had returned, Devi smiled. She had missed the silly fellow after he was gone.

  “The boy is in love with you,” Machu said. “You’re the reason he’s here.”

  Devi looked startled and then she burst out laughing. “Nothing like that,” she spluttered. “We’ve been the best of friends since we were little, that’s all.”

  “There’s no such thing as friendship between a grown man and a woman,” Machu said flatly. “Do you see it in the jungle, two elephants walking trunks entwined, just being friends? Or in the cattle shed perhaps, between a bullock and a cow? It’s simply not a thing of nature, for an adult male and female to be only friends.”

  “Huh,” said Devi mischievously, throwing a handful of grass at him. “If you are right, then perhaps I should take his suit seriously. Better a doctor than this rough-hewn hunter of mine … ”

  Machu was not amused. Devi, too, banter notwithstanding, was pensive that evening, thinking about what he had said. When Devanna came to visit, she was guarded and awkward, hating the hurt her stilted responses brought to Devanna’s face, but unable to help herself.

  Devanna slowly withdrew into himself as the holidays came to a close. The initial torrent of words that had burst from him, the animation that had marked his return, was replaced by a silent, simmering intent. He spent most of his time at the Nachimanda house, waiting doggedly for Devi to return from wherever she had disappeared to. The Reverend sent repeated messages asking him to visit until, doctor-to-be or not, Pallada Nayak lost his patience and shouted at Devanna, “Ayy, donkey boy, how many times must the Reverend send word for you, eh, dull-head?” Devanna went to the mission, but by late afternoon he was back at the Nachimanda house, swinging his legs slowly back and forth as he sat on the verandah with Tayi. Devi grew ever more short with him, but Devanna was beyond caring, drinking her in with his eyes until again she burst into tears, and Tayi had to tell him gently that perhaps it was best if he did not visit for some time.

  The days ticked by, and fear dead-weighted into Devanna’s heart as the hostel loomed large once more. Wild plans swam through his head. Devi and he would be engaged, and then next year they could be married. They could live together, in the married students’ quarters—he would not have to go to the hostel any longer. But then he would recall the look on Devi’s face, the expression of disgust as she had turned suddenly and caught him staring at her. Such disgust—or worse, had it been pity? The intensity began to seep from his demeanor, and Devanna grew drawn and unhappy again.

  The day he was to leave for Bangalore, Devi came to visit at the Pallada house. “What?” she demanded, “were you going to leave just like that, without saying bye?”

  “I was going to—”

  “Yes, yes, I’m sure you were. Here,” she said, “these are for you.”

  There were two jars of mango pickle, three of salted bitter limes, five more of pickled boar, and six parcels bursting with the coconut laddoos that Devanna loved. He stared, astonished, at the mountain of food. “How am I ever supposed to eat all of this?”

  “Huh,” she said, tossing her plait. “Your Bangalore might be fancy, but tell me, can you find pickle as wonderful as mine there?”

  He grinned.

  “Wait,” she said. “There is something more.” She placed a small squirming bundle into his arms. “Tukra found her in our fields. I thought … I thought you should have her to remind you of all of us.”

  Devanna looked down at the baby squirrel snuffling in his palm. “Pets are not allowed in the hostel,” he began, but stopped when he saw Devi’s disappointed expression. “No matter. I’ll keep her a secret.” He stroked the squirrel’s red fur gently with his thumb, and she looked up at him with bright, inquisitive eyes.

  “Devi,” he said in a rush, “I have to ask you … ”

  The squirrel began to butt her tiny nose against his thumb. “Oh, would you look at her,” Devi exclaimed. “The poor thing is obviously hungry!”

  Devanna hugged the squirrel close all through the journey back to Bangalore, unwilling to set her down for an instant, not even when she urinated all over his topcoat. He smiled to himself as he thought back to that morning. Devi and he had fed the squirrel together, squeezing twists of silk cotton soaked in diluted milk down her throat. The tension of the past weeks had magically evaporated as they laughed over the baby’s antics, trading silly jokes until things were just as they had always been between them.

  Next year, he promised himself. One more year and then, when he was back in Coorg for the holidays, he would propose.

  Chapter 15

  Devanna was determined to keep the squirrel. He did not yet know how he was going to hide her away from the rest of the hostel, but of this much he was certain: nothing would make him part with her.

  Things went smoothly at first. The other students paid him so little attention that he was able to smuggle the little thing in and keep her presence in his shoe box completely hidden for two whole days. On the third afternoon, however, they walked in on him as he was feeding her. “If you so much as—” Devanna began tensely, but they stared fascinated at the squirrel.

  “What is it?” one of them asked.

  He cradled the baby protectively to his chest. “A Malabar squirrel.”

  “A squirrel? Do they get this big?”

  “She’s still only a baby,” he said warily. He stroked the squirrel’s head, and she rubbed her cheek ruminatively against his fingers.

  “How large will she get?” “Johnson, come in here, you
have to see this.” “Its fur is so red.” “Does it bite?” “Here, can I hold it?” “What does she eat?” “Shut the door, ass, you don’t want the warden seeing her now, do you?”

  They crowded about him. The squirrel yawned, revealing tiny pink gums, and then, to whoops of appreciation from her audience, ambled up Devanna’s arm and wrapped herself about his neck. Devanna smiled.

  She became a mascot of sorts for his batch, their collective secret. They bribed the sweeper two rupees so he wouldn’t report her presence to the warden and took turns to smuggle in milk from the mess. They consulted the library for what to feed her and brought her little treats, monkey nuts, chopped-up fruit, bits of boiled egg. They christened her Nancy, after the proctor’s wife—same flaming red hair, they pointed out—and Nancy, in turn, did her utmost to charm the class off their feet. She roosted up on the curtain rods and as soon as the door to the dorm opened would drop chittering gently onto the entrant’s head. She ate from their palms, brushing her tail coquettishly over their arms, and when the morning bell rang she raced about the dorm, leaping from bed to bed until they were awake.

  Although she distributed her affections with impartiality, her love was reserved for Devanna alone. Scoffing at the cotton-lined shoe box he had prepared for her, she insisted on sleeping beside him instead, curled atop his pillow. Devanna eventually gave the pillow over to her altogether, sleeping flat on his back for fear he might turn over during the night and inadvertently crush her. She woke him each morning by nipping gently at his fingers, climbing into his shirt and padding back and forth over his stomach as he sat at his study desk. She would especially fawn over him when he returned from class, draping herself about his shoulders and nuzzling his neck with scolding chik chik sounds—Where have you been? How could you leave me alone?

  Devanna had always been surrounded by animals in Coorg. The cats that wound themselves around everyone’s legs, the dogs in the verandahs, the cow in the Nachimanda yard—a gentle, affectionate soul whose greatest pleasure lay in having her horns rubbed—the pigs who hoisted their hooves onto the wall of their sty to watch the various comings and goings in the yard. Never before, though, had Devanna owned a pet of his very own. He was soon entirely besotted.

  Still too wary of Martin to disregard completely his decree, the class gave Devanna a wide berth in the public spaces of the hostel—the mess, the library, the study rooms. Nonetheless, there was a change in their demeanor, and Martin watched, puzzled, as they—almost apologetically? guiltily?—walked past Devanna’s table. He shifted his gaze to Devanna, who was quietly eating his porridge. There was a change too, in the chokra. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but there was something different.

  When they were back in the dorm at night, his classmates would empty their pockets of treats for Nancy, handing them to Devanna as if trying to assuage their guilt. “Hey man, here … and this too. Did she eat today?” Devanna accepted their tokens without comment, watching proudly as she performed her little vaudeville routines, keeping his classmates in thrall.

  “Hey, Dev, tell her to come to me … ” and he would gently nudge Nancy from his shoulders.

  “You doing okay, man? Here, I got these for her … ”

  “Would you look at her? Where on earth did she learn to do that—almost a backflip, wasn’t it?”

  “Nancy, here, Nancy, there’s a good girl. What’s this?” someone exclaimed, looking at the papers in Devanna’s hands. “Have you already finished the assignment?”

  “Oh, it isn’t that difficult, once you … I can walk you through it, if you would like,” Devanna offered shyly, and his classmates began to take him up on it.

  Nancy’s presence made this term infinitely easier than the previous ones. He was still unable to look at Martin without revulsion, but at least he no longer had to endure the prickling hostility from his class. He was resigned to the fact that they would never stand up for him against Martin, but truth be told, he no longer cared. Whether they liked him or not, whether or not they respected him—it just wasn’t important any longer.

  And it was all Devi’s doing. He wrote her lengthy accounts of Nancy’s every escapade, thanking her repeatedly. “You cannot know what she means to me, Devi. Thank you, thank you a thousand times over for what must be the best gift anyone has ever received.”

  She never did respond. He had asked her once during the holidays why it was that she never wrote to him. He had tried to sound nonchalant, as her response did not matter. “Oh, I kept meaning to,” she replied blithely, “and then something or other would happen. You know me, I was never one for writing and such.”

  His retort had come out sharper than he intended. “A letter isn’t that difficult, you know, Devi. You don’t have to be a … a … quinologist to write one.”

  Her brow had furrowed over the word, as he had known it would, but stubbornly she did not ask him what it meant. “Well, you send me so many, one after the other and then another and then still more,” she countered tartly, “that where is the time to even read them, let alone reply?”

  “If you even knew how to read them … ,” he began, but then he had shaken his head. “Never mind.”

  “What’s this?” Tayi had asked, when he walked stiff-legged into the kitchen. “Why is your face as small as a mouse’s?”

  “Nothing … this Devi,” he had muttered, fiddling with the spoons. “She said I write her too many letters.”

  Tayi smiled. Later, after the dishes had been cleared, she brought out a box from inside the house and deposited it in his lap. It was a rosewood box, tooled with brass. He had opened it, puzzled, and there, among a jumble of bangles and such, were his letters, opened, every single one of them.

  “Look, monae,” Tayi said gently. “She saved them all.”

  So he continued to write to her diligently. He knew better now than to expect a reply, but every day when the post was delivered Devanna couldn’t help but wait anxiously for his name to be called. And when it was, it was hard to contain the surge of excitement, followed by the inevitable disappointment, no matter how unfair, when he would look at the envelope and recognize the Reverend’s precise copperplate. “She didn’t write,” he would tell Nancy unhappily, as he picked her up in his arms. “Nothing in the post, Nance, not today at least.”

  Nancy, as if sensing his distress, would begin her ambulatory sojourns over his shirt, nuzzling his ear and neck, curling up on his shoulder until at last Devanna would smile. “I know, I know, I’m being silly. She misses us, I know she does. Next year, just wait and see, just a few more months, Nance.” The squirrel would wrap herself about his neck in commiseration, and Devanna’s heart would lighten.

  The freshman class came in. Father Dunleavy expressly forbade Martin and his lot from having any, any hand in the ragging at all. His warning was redundant. For Devanna’s batch mates pounced upon the first years with glee, determined to extract revenge for all that they had endured the previous year. “This is for your own good,” they assured the first years, “you should be thankful to us, we are toughening you up for the real world.”

  Devanna stayed away from the ragging, but one evening, as he was returning from the library, a pile of books in his arms, his classmates called to him in the corridor. There was no danger of incurring Martin’s wrath. He was away with the rest of his classmates, traveling to a village deep in the interior of the state as part of the field training prescribed in the curriculum. “Come on, Dev,” his classmates cried, “join in.”

  Devanna hesitated. And then, loath to disregard their olive branch, he reluctantly joined the crowd around the apprehensive first years. “Off with your pants,” the second years cried, handing out wooden rulers. Devanna’s eyes fell upon one oversized boy, so obviously distressed by the exercise that even his jowly buttocks were flushed a vivid red. He bent trembling in front of a classmate, wiping the sweat from his eyes. “What’s the matter, fatty?” someone demanded. “Hurry up.”

  “I … I … ” His
hands were trembling. And then he set the ruler down on the floor. “I … I cannot. This is wrong, it is a sin … ”

  They pounced on the boy then, twisting his ear, hooting and jeering as they kicked that flabby bum. “You a saint or what, fatty? Get him, get him good.” “Fat crybaby!”

  Devanna stood silently by, a faint taste of bile on his tongue, watching as the fresher collapsed in a vast, blubbering pile. “Stop it,” he wanted to shout at the raggers. “Be a man,” he wanted to tell the boy, wanted to tell him to pick himself off the floor, but the words remained stuck in his throat.

  Nobody noticed when Devanna left. Heading straight for the deserted dormitories, he sat down heavily on his bed. The faint sound of laughter, traveling up through the floors. Devanna swallowed. The image of the boy, crying in a heap on the floor. “Be a man.” Again the sound of laughter. His heart started to race, sweat beading his forehead as memories of the past year came suddenly alive once more.

  Flora Sylvatica. Flora Indica. Spicilegium Neilgherrense. Icones Plantarum.

  With a small, choking sound, Devanna rose to his feet. Yanking open the drawer on his desk, he began scrabbling about for an inkpot and his fountain pen. Barely noticing Nancy as she raced into his lap, he tore out a sheet of foolscap and, breathing harshly through his mouth, began to write. “Devi.” No more, enough of his reticence, this waiting. He would tell her everything. The tangle of emotions within him. The revulsion he had felt at the freshman’s tears, the ghosts it had dredged up as he watched them crowd about the boy. He had stood by, watching. Despite all he had gone through himself, his own silence, his inability, his unwillingness to say anything, to stop the ragging. All he had done until now was to stay silent. With them. With her. No more.

  “Devi,” he wrote, the jeering from downstairs ringing in his ears. The nib of his pen scratching at the paper. “Devi. I miss you, how I MISS you. I am turned to shadow by with your absence. Coorg-Devanna, lost without you. Mission-Devanna, an empty, posturing shell. DeviDeviDevi.” He wrote with such vehemence that the nib ripped through the paper, depositing a copious blot of ink that began to spread through his words.