CHAPTER 11
* * *
TARIQ
Ammi keeps stacks of steaming parathas coming and I devour them, scooping up the rogan josh, barely stopping to chew the chunks of lamb. I feel like I haven’t eaten in days, and I’m supposed to be back at the Darnsleys’ soon, but even if I weren’t in such a hurry, I don’t think I could slow down.
I had no idea how much I could miss Ammi’s cooking. The old Hindu woman who cooks at the Darnsleys’ is awful. She barely uses any meat, and when she does, it’s only chicken and it comes out all dry and stringy. Plus, she’s stingy with the portions she sets aside for me. I asked for seconds one time (even though the first helping wasn’t all that good). She ignored me and took the plate away.
Ammi’s curry is so good, and I can have as much as I want. The heat and flavor and oil almost make me forget work, forget Oxford, forget the way I can’t stop staring at Anu, forget the way Margaret won’t stop staring at me. I just eat.
“You are growing thin,” Ammi clucks. “Too much of this riding all over town on the bicycle for that man, too little good food to go with it.”
I grab another paratha, rip it in half, and wipe up what remains of the curry in my dish before I stuff it into my mouth.
“Has Abbu come home for lunch yet?” I ask.
Ammi shakes her head. “He and Arish pack tiffins to eat at the shop now. They stay busy these days as people prepare to move.” Muslim families with the wealth to move have been coming to Abbu to convert their money into gold and gems. Soon he’ll do the same with our savings.
I reach for the pitcher of milk and pour myself a glass. Even the milk is richer, somehow sweeter here than what I get at the Darnsleys’ house. Is this what it will be like when I go to England? No one there will make rogan josh like Ammi’s, no one will worry if I only eat half a dozen parathas. For the first time I have a strange thought: Will it be worth it?
Before, I thought about only one half of life in Oxford. Me in classes or the libraries or a pub talking about important things. But now, as the possibility becomes something more real, I’ve thought about the other half. How alone I’ll be. There will be no one who knows me. For the first time I’ve started to realize what it will mean to miss my family. There will be no one to feed me, no one to be with in the evening, no one to kneel next to during evening prayers, no home near enough to visit.
The knowing of it gapes wide inside me, hungrier than my empty belly did when I walked in the door.
I throw back the rest of the milk and pop to my feet.
But it will be worth it. When I come back, it will all be worth it.
“Shukriya, Ammi,” I say, leaning down and kissing the top of her head quickly. She reaches over her shoulder and grabs my hand, pats it once, and lets me go. I collect my bike at the gate and head off.
There is a parade on the main road. Something for one of the Hindu festivals. It’ll take longer to get back with the traffic, but I don’t care much. Darnsley won’t notice. He takes a long time to eat, and I should make it back before he finishes the pipe he smokes before going back up to his office to work.
So I ride slowly, my belly heavy with Ammi’s cooking, wondering about what else I will miss when I go.
I’ve heard England is quiet. People call it peaceful, but I can’t imagine it. I wonder what it will be like to live without the noises of home.
The sound of the vegetable wallah with his cart, hawking what he’s got for sale as he wheels up the row of houses.
Or the dohl beating out its rhythm a block over as the worshippers march in their parade.
A pack of dogs barking in the distance.
Another sound yanks me out of my trance as a horn blares, pulling me back to the crowded street.
I look up and stop the bicycle in time to avoid the rickshaw that nearly cuts me down. I wait for a gap in the flow of traffic and look across to the small market square.
The shops here are mostly run by Hindus and Sikhs, though the market itself sits at the crossing between a gurdwara and the mosque my family attends. For the moment, at least, everything is as it should be. The brass pots still hang from the rafters of the stalls, the piles of spices are undisturbed, the beaded jutis wait in neat rows.
Everything is in place except for the figure I see arguing with the keeper of the shoe stall.
Sameer.
I narrow my eyes as I wonder what business he has here. The jutis are mainly bridal shoes or fancy ones.
The shopkeeper looks mad. He jabs a finger at Sameer’s face. Sameer tilts his head to one side. But then the shopkeeper thrusts a fat wad of rupee notes into Sameer’s hand, takes a short, deep breath, chest rising and falling as he crosses his arms. Sameer gives a bit of a bow, and as he turns to go, I see he is grinning and scanning the street to see if anyone is watching.
The crowd around me begins to move as they make their way across the lane, but I stay rooted to the spot. And I don’t move until I see Sameer slip into a goldsmith’s shop a few doors away from the one he just left.
I know I should be going back. But I have to know what he’s up to.
I stow the bike next to a few others leaning against a brick wall and duck inside a bookseller’s stall. I hang back in the shadows and watch across the market as Sameer collects another wad of rupee notes from another shopkeeper. It only takes a moment this time before he walks slowly to the corner and then sprints away.
“Devil,” a voice says behind me.
I jump, turn, and find the bookseller leaning over his counter. At first I think he means me, but then he jabs at the window where I just watched Sameer run away.
“That one is an ibalisa,” he repeats.
Then he looks at me.
I have no turban on my head to match his.
He lifts his chin, squares his jaw.
I am a Muslim. He is a Sikh. He must think I have come to make trouble.
Like Sameer.
I panic. Part of me wants to run, but the other part wants to show him that I am not like Sameer. My eyes scan the books arranged in the window. I pick up the smallest one, the cheapest-looking one, and flip through the pages. It smells old. The book is in English, which isn’t surprising: probably half the books in the shop are. But I don’t care what it says, only what the price is. I don’t even notice the title or anything else about the book before I decide I can afford the few rupees. I hand the book to the merchant; one of his eyebrows shoots up, but he takes my money and hands the book back to me.
“Shukriya,” I say as I stumble back onto the street, feeling his eyes burning on the back of my head. I toss the book in the basket of the bike and notice the title.
Men and Women: Poems by Robert Browning.
Chutiyaa. I should have looked closer at the text. I might have at least gotten something useful instead of a biratha book of poetry.
I stroke down on the pedal, weave my way across the street, wondering what Sameer is playing at now, blaming him for the way I just wasted my money. He has a talent for driving me into trouble, even when he has no idea that he’s doing it.
Twenty minutes later I’m within view of Darnsley’s compound when I see Margaret and Anupreet leaving the market across the lane. I stop the bicycle and dismount. They are an odd pair, Margaret so tall, shoulders rounded forward, skin ghostly white, her yellow hair almost the same color as the walls. Next to her Anupreet, skin gleaming like a rare brown moonstone in one of Abbu’s cases, long black braid swaying as she walks. Anu turns, looks back at the market. She looks worried. As they reach the compound, a pack of beggar children surrounds them. Anu shoos them off, but Margaret looks torn. Then they reach the front gate of the compound and the porter lets them in, looking even more relieved than Anupreet that they are back inside the walls.
Though by now Darnsley is likely ready to get back to work, I wait for them to get inside before I follow.
It’s been awkward since that day at the camp with Margaret. I haven’t done anything abou
t her. I’ve just gotten better at avoiding her.
Part of me wonders what it would be like. And part of me wants to find out. I could never have Anu, but why can’t I have someone? And Margaret is Margaret. Pretty enough. And she’s like a lifeline thrown to me from England.
But what if I’m wrong? What if I reach for that lifeline, only to have it pull away? I’d have to let go of one rope—the one I’ve attached to Darnsley—to grab onto this one. I can’t please him and his daughter—whatever that looks like—at the same time. And if she rejects me, her father will hear about it, and I’ll have burned both bridges.
But if I do nothing, I may let my best chance to make an ally pass by.
I look at the book in my basket. Suddenly I have an idea.
Maybe it was more than chance that guided my hand to Mr. Browning.
CHAPTER 12
* * *
ANUPREET
I take the parcel from the delivery wallah at the front gate. The brown paper crinkles in my hands, the receipt pasted to the surface peeling away at the corners. I pretend it’s for me, that I live in this house, that I have clothing delivered rather than sewing my own with Biji. The urge to hug the package to my chest is so strong, but I know it might muss the clothes inside, and I want them to be perfect when I take them to her.
It’s been two days since we went shopping, but the feeling of being out in the market is still fresh on my skin.
I worried about going out, worried about what I would tell Manvir and Papaji, but I didn’t have a choice, did I? Mr. Darnsley is the head of this household, and his daughter is my mistress. It would have been wrong to refuse them.
But that isn’t the whole truth. I can tell myself I was only obeying my employer from here until forever, and Papaji might even be convinced. But honestly I was thrilled to have a chance to go out, unescorted, with Margaret.
We were like friends, she and I. Like when I used to roam the market with Neera, staring longingly at bangles, scraping together our few paisa to share some sweets from the confectioners’ stalls. All that was before, of course. Before the scar. And before Manvir did whatever it was he did. Being out with Margaret made me miss my friends, my life before even more, but I loved it all the same.
And the other truth is, I was proud, too, to be with her. Her golden hair drew every eye, and I liked the feeling of being important enough to lead her around the market, to haggle with the merchants for her. Though it was hard not to laugh when she tasted the imli. That afternoon I asked Shibani to make a chutney of it to go with the samosas, and Margaret clapped and shouted happily when she recognized the taste.
It is the kind of thing one friend would do for another.
But friends also tell each other their troubles. And I can’t bring myself to burden her with mine. So we are apart in that way, friends but not friends.
Also, no friend of mine has ever spent as much money as she did in the space of an hour. I worried what her father would say, but he took the remaining money and the news that she had also ordered a harmonium easily. Maybe Manvir is right. Maybe all the British are rich.
And even though I know it was wrong, even though I know Papaji would be very troubled to hear of even one outing, I hope we have another reason to go out soon.
I carry the parcel up the stairs, following the sound of Margaret playing the harmonium. Her first day with the instrument she was like a toddler learning to walk, but already she runs.
I love the harmonium, love that it’s given the house a voice. And Margaret seems so much happier, so I like that, too. Still, the songs she plays are as foreign to me as some of her language. Usually the harmonium sounds sort of sleepy, thrumming along under the words of our prayers at gurdwara or the songs at school. But how could Margaret know ragas or the folk songs? Instead she makes it do strange, wonderful things. The tune she plays as I carry the package into her room bounces and slides, lively.
“Look!” I call out over the music.
Margaret stops, turns from the window where she has set up the instrument to take advantage of the view.
“My clothes!” She climbs to her feet and pounces on the package, ripping it open before she’s even laid it on her bed. The two salwar-kameez sets are lovelier than I recall, somehow prettier here in her room without the chaos of the shop to compete with them. And the sari is beautiful, the deep purple blouse and petticoat of lightest cotton. I wish I had such fine things.
“Help me change!” she says.
I rush to shut the door of her bedroom and then cross to draw the curtain. I’m shocked when I turn and she’s already out of her blouse. Anyone could have looked up and seen, but she doesn’t mind.
“Which one, Anu?” she asks, crossing her arms and staring at her new wardrobe.
I reach out and touch the blue one. “Nilla.”
She snatches it up and flips it around, begins to pull it over her head. It’s fitted, and I have to help her pull it past her shoulders, but it finds its way into place. Perfect. Margaret sighs heavily.
“So much airier,” she says, fanning herself with her hands. “Now the trousers.”
She’s beaming as she lets her skirt and slip fall the floor, wrestles off the stockings. “Mother can’t make me wear these if I’m not wearing a skirt, now, can she?” Margaret smiles wickedly and pulls the salwar on, struggling a bit to get her feet through the bottoms. I help her with the tie at the waist, taking care to not make it too tight.
“Oh,” she moans. “It’s like a dream, Anu. They’re better than pajamas!”
“Very pretty, miss,” I say, smiling, reaching for the dupatta and casting it over her shoulders, letting it drape down her front the way I wear mine. She looks like me, I think. Or I look like her. Either way, I am happy at the thought.
“Watch this!” she gasps, leaping across the floor, pleased at how freely she moves. I clap and giggle.
She hurries back to her spot at the harmonium, sinks onto the cushion, sitting cross-legged. “So much easier,” she cries. Then she takes back up the jaunty tune she’d been playing when I came in with the package. The music slips around my ankles like water, inviting me to move. So I do. I begin to kick my feet back and forth in steps I’ve done a thousand times, swing my arms in wide arcs, bob my head. I do not sing as we normally do when dancing giddha, as I would with my friends, but the harmonium is almost its own chorus, filling in for the tabla and the chanting all at once.
Margaret laughs and shouts her encouragement, playing faster. I flick my wrists back and forth, cut my eyes at imaginary dance partners, grin. I’d forgotten how much I’d loved dancing. Almost forgotten how to dance at all.
A shriek from below stairs cuts off the playing and the music abruptly.
Margaret and I rush into the hallway to find Mrs. Darnsley flying up the stairs, breathless.
“They have come!” she whispers in panic, charging for her husband’s office like a speeding camel.
“Who, Mother?” Margaret asks as we trail along behind her.
Mr. Darnsley and Tariq are there as a car horn blares from the drive.
We rush to the window.
It’s a big machine, certainly beautiful—dark green body panels and a black hood, the windscreen fringed in a thick layer of dust where the wipers cannot reach. I cannot see into the backseat, but the driver is standing half out of the car, one foot on the drive, the other still inside, as he speaks to the guard at the gate. He wears a funny sort of uniform, like one of Mr. Darnsley’s suits.
“A Rolls-Royce,” Tariq murmurs, staring at the car from the other window.
His voice surprises me. It is gentler than when he speaks to the Darnsleys, trying so hard to sound grown up. Now it is soft, like wind in high branches. He seems surprised too, for he blushes. He hadn’t meant to speak, I realize. But he likes this car. Its silver figurine on the hood, the headlamps like buggy eyes.
“Go down and see who it is,” Mr. Darnsley orders Tariq. He hurries from the room.
“I know who it is!” Mrs. Darnsley cries as she does up the buttons at the top of her blouse. “The Mountbattens have come!”
I know who the Mountbattens are, knew it even before I began working in this house. They are the most important Britishers in India.
I look back outside. Tariq is in the courtyard now, jogging across the gravel path to help the porter with the gate. The car slides through the opening as Tariq eyes it hungrily.
“What?” Mr. Darnsley asks. “How can you know that?”
Mrs. Darnsley screeches something about that being the only car of its kind in India. We all peer out the windows as it slides to a stop in front of the house. In back sit an elegant, skinny woman and a girl who can only be her daughter.
“The viceroy is not with them,” Mrs. Darnsley sputters, sounding almost relieved, “but they have come. And paid us a call! Your note must have gotten their attention!”
“What are they doing all the way up here?” Mr. Darnsley asks. Now he’s fussing with his clothes, rummaging beneath the maps on his desk for the tie he earlier abandoned.
Mrs. Darnsley turns away from the window, starts to answer her husband, but when she catches sight of Margaret, her face pales.
“What on earth are you wearing?” she asks her daughter. She doesn’t sound pleased.
Margaret backs away from the window. “I picked it out from the market—it just arrived, it’s so much cooler—”
“Go and change at once,” her mother orders. “You look ridiculous. First that accordion-piano chimera and now this . . . ” She waves a hand at the Margaret’s outfit.
“But Mother—”
“We’ll discuss the worrisome way you’ve gone native later. Right now go and change.” She dismisses Margaret, then pulls me along behind her down the stairs, whispering orders about tea and refreshment, and warning not to serve those awful pickled things.
A Moment Comes Page 8
