The Elephanta Suite

by Paul Theroux

  "A young man's life is in your hands."

  She wanted to say, "Fuck him," but instead she said, "Not in my hands, unfortunately. In the hands of the law. I demand justice."

  A trait she deplored in herself was lapsing into pomposity when trying to control her anger. But that was preferable to the obscenity, which she was inclined to scream into the man's face.

  "This charge is like death in India. I assure you the family will fight it passionately. You may regret that you pushed so hard for justice, young lady."

  "You're threatening me," Alice said, rising from her chair, a shriek entering her voice. "In this holy place!"

  The man stood up then and, with a frown of regret, thanked her. He walked to the gate, where his car was waiting.

  Priyanka found her, dried tears staining her face, and spoke to her as though to soothe her, yet Alice heard what she said as scolding.

  More people visited, offering conciliation, mediation, money; also making solemn promises, pleading with her to drop the case. One of them, a man in a homespun cotton jacket and a Nehru cap, left an envelope behind, a plane ticket to Delhi inside it. There was no return address on the envelope, so she couldn't send it back. She tucked it into her journal. She had done no writing since the day of the incident. She did not have the words to describe what had happened to her.

  After the first wave of people, begging and pleading, after a visit from another lawyer—this one also had a document he wanted her to sign—there ensued several more waves of visitors, each less friendly than the last. Apart from the lawyers, the imploring people had come in shuffling groups, women mostly, weepers and grovelers. The darker, unpleasant ones came singly. They were younger and tougher. They claimed to know all about her.

  "We've been in touch with your friends," one man said.

  Alice said nothing. Was he talking about Stella, or was he fishing?

  "We've taken statements from them."

  This was a young man in a blue shirt and brown slacks and sandals, with dangerous-looking hands. "I think you're trying to frighten me."

  "If you're smart you will be frightened. Take my advice. Drop this and go home."

  Alice was thinking how well these people spoke English, with diabolical accuracy, always with a rejoinder, and all of them were on Amitabh's side.

  The young man left glowering because Alice had fallen silent. Another man came the next day, trying to wear her down. He was older, better dressed, a gold chain around his neck, a gold bracelet on his wrist, an expensive watch.

  "You're way out of your depth. You're lucky nothing has happened to you so far. Some of these blighters want to make a move. I don't know how long I can keep them away."

  His manner was so persuasive it roused her. She said, "What do you mean?"

  "I mean, maybe prevent you from testifying at a trial. Maybe prevent you from going anywhere."

  This was a direct threat to her life. Yet, like the others, he left her abruptly, first handing over his business card.

  Some days passed, days of peace; she had almost forgotten the earlier visits. And then two men came. They said they had a message. They looked fierce. The hot weather, the humidity, their sweating faces made them look villainous.

  "You should be afraid," one of them said.

  He was nudged aside by his friend, who said, "I am going to put this very plainly. Amitabh is betrothed. A match has been found. It's a good arrangement. But if this trial goes forward he is ruined. The other family will withdraw—no marriage."

  "Your fault," the first man said.

  Alice said, "You want me to drop the charges so that Amitabh can go ahead with his arranged marriage?"

  "That's the idea."

  "Does this woman know he's a rapist?"

  "The charge will never be proven, so why waste your time?"

  "That poor woman," Alice said. And without her being conscious of their leaving, the men simply disappeared.

  Priyanka was waiting for her at the far side of the pavilion, near the statue of Saraswati balancing her sitar. She took Alice's damp and anxious hands in hers and said, "We're concerned that you have so many visitors."

  "I can't help it. I don't invite them."

  Priyanka released Alice's hands and took a step back, a self-conscious move, like a formal dance step, as though she'd rehearsed this.

  "The committee has met and decided"—she tilted her head, another affectation—"with regret, that you'll have to leave."

  "When?"

  "Forthwith. Oh, we can suggest some other places where you'd be comfortable."

  Alice had begun to walk away. Without turning, she said, "I don't want you to know where I'm going."

  Her rucksack that had been such an awkward burden months ago was now much smaller. She'd given away all her cold-weather clothes. She had her saris, some T-shirts, the shawls. Since the assault, she had become obsessed with covering herself.

  There was one place for her to go—in a sense, the only place, but logical: the last place.

  8

  From her tiny room above the stable she could hear the snorting of the elephant. And she saw the gateway leading to the lane where she had stood the previous day, her pack on her back, a plastic bag in her hand—carrots for the elephant. The elephant had seen her first, had trumpeted, then nodded and tugged at his leg chain. He rocked to and fro on his great cylindrical legs. Hearing him, the mahout had appeared, and smiled when he saw Alice, and approached her. He grasped her predicament in an instant. He didn't need language or explanation. He worked with animals. He did not need to be told when one was lost.

  He gestured decisively with his hand, clawing the air, saying "Come" with it, using his head, too, to be emphatic.

  Alice smiled to show him she understood, and when she shrugged, seeming helpless, the mahout became active, began talking in his own language, and called to an open window. A woman stuck her head out, probably his wife, and she listened to what the mahout was saying.

  Wiping her hands on a blue towel, the woman swept out of the ground floor door, her legs working quickly but invisibly under her sari, and went straight to Alice. She did not offer a namaste. She took Alice in her arms, enfolded her, and Alice began to sob.

  She also thought, Is it so obvious that I look pathetic? How friendless I must seem.

  She valued her own strength, she believed she was tough—too tough, she often thought—and here she was, weeping in the arms of a stranger.

  That was what the assault had done to her—turned her into a wreck. People say, You'll be stronger for it, but I will never be strong again.

  He has broken me, she thought. She had not dared to think it in the ashram, where they'd seen her as a tough American—tough enough to be turned into the street. But here, among these kind people, in the presence of the nodding elephant, she could admit to being what she had become, a weakling, in tears.

  The woman took her to a sink and put a piece of soap into her hand and urged her to wash her face. Then she sat Alice at a wobbly table and brought her a dish of rice, a bowl of dhal, some okra, some yogurt, a sweetish paste, a lump of glistening pickle.

  "I hadn't realized how hungry I was," Alice said.

  The woman was smiling, as though at her daughter. She understood Alice's gratitude. She brought out a framed photograph, a young woman in a cap and gown, a graduation picture.

  "Mysore," the mahout said.

  Their daughter, obviously, looking proud, holding a rolled-up diploma. Working in Mysore, probably Alice's age. Their own daughter's absence made them sympathetic.

  The mahout stood at a little distance, bandy-legged, in torn trousers and sandals, a turban knotted on his head, watching Alice eat.

  Afterward, the woman brought a bowl of warm water for Alice to wash her hands, a small towel, a broken piece of soap.

  All this ritual, shuffling and serving, and then, snatching air with her hand, the woman gestured for Alice to follow her. When Alice bent to pick up her rucksack, the
woman waved her away. The mahout called out the window, and a young girl hurried into the room, hoisted the rucksack, and unsteadily mounted the stairs behind them.

  Up the flight of stone stairs there was a small room overlooking the courtyard, where the elephant was chained. The bed was on a low frame, near the wall sat a table and chair, and above them hung a colored picture of a seated god—perhaps Shiva, with a cobra hovering over him. On the floor a pale pink rug, at the far wall a bookshelf: most of the books in English, biology, organic chemistry, physics textbooks. Of course, the daughter's room, the daughter's books. She was studying—what?—medicine? nursing? dentistry?

  The old couple had no language to explain any of this, but no explanation was necessary. They had between them summed up Alice's predicament, and they knew when to leave her alone in the room. Alice showed them some money, a purse of rupees, but they made motions of refusal and backed away.

  So she lay for a while on the hard bed, the clean sheet, her head empty, feeling stunned. Time did not advance, it rotated, twisting around her, defying her to name the day or month, as though she were in suspension. She may have dozed, for when she next looked at the window, night had fallen. The elephant stood still, his broad back and the dome of his head gleaming in the moonlight.

  Alice went downstairs to thank the woman. She was offered another meal, some of which she ate. Then she went to bed again and slept until dawn, when she became conscious of the warm animal odors, which were like freshly baked bread—the elephant under her window.

  In the crowded, traffic-ridden city of frenzied millions, this courtyard and stable was hidden and peaceful, smelling sweetly of new straw and elephant dung.

  I'm so lucky, Alice thought. In this enormous hostile city, where her life had been threatened, she had found rescuers—well, she'd seen the elephant first, and after that, the people. At breakfast, she gave the woman an envelope of rupees, about four hundred, not even ten dollars. The woman made a show of refusing it, a ritual of indignation, but Alice insisted she take it, and when she did, Alice felt better, for now there was a kind of contract. She would have time to think. It was easier among strangers.

  The days that followed were dream-like and wonderful. She spent the mornings spraying the elephant with the hose—directing the nozzle into his mouth, into the pink nose holes in his trunk, and watched him spray himself, blowing water onto his back. She fed him, using the hayfork to make a stack of fodder, and she marveled at his eating. He could eat all day, shifting his weight from foot to foot, occasionally kicking the chain.

  I have found friends, Alice thought. Once again she lost the sense of time passing, and she realized this was so because she was content. India was not the huge country and the crowded streets and the stinks and the racket; it was this stable yard, and this food, and these kind people, and this elephant.

  She could tell that the mahout liked her from the way he cheerfully involved her in the work of caring for the elephant, finding ways to please her.

  She said, "You have no idea who I am, and yet you're being good to me. Bless you, bless you."

  The mahout laughed, hearing this stream of English.

  One day she took an auto-rickshaw to the ashram. The gatekeeper looked apprehensive.

  "Just visiting," she said.

  "Swami at Puttaparthi," the man said.

  She asked to see Priyanka, whose face fell when she saw her.

  "I'm just here for my mail," Alice said.

  "We're trying to get over the hoo-hah," Priyanka said.

  "By hoo-hah, do you mean the fact that I was assaulted and raped?"

  "We are bitterly sorry," Priyanka said.

  "Never mind. You have more important things to deal with. But would you mind holding my mail for me?"

  "Of course. Not to worry. Have you found lodgings?"

  "I'll let you know," Alice said.

  That day there was no mail of any consequence, but a few days later there was a large buff-colored envelope from the court in Chennai, with a stamp and many signatures, explaining formally that the date of the hearing had been deferred, "pending further enquiries." So much for fast track.

  Someone had sent her a prayer printed on one sheet of paper, another envelope included a religious card, the scary-faced goddess Kali, the size of a playing card. The second lawyer who had visited sent a form to sign—the same form, a letter with her name typed at the bottom, stating that she wished to drop all charges. Even Amitabh wrote, suggesting that they meet to discuss "this matter." The nerve!

  She began to hate picking up her mail. And what had become of Stella? She thought of her now—probably she had left India; perhaps she was traveling with Zack or living with him. Stella was safe. I am safe too, Alice told herself; safe but in suspense.

  Sleeping in the small fragrant room, rising early, tending to the elephant, beginning to make notes in her journal—about the elephant, not herself—and eating with the mahout and his wife became her routine. These days her accumulated letters were left at the front desk of the ashram. With Swami at his other ashram, there were few devotees around. Alice did not see Priyanka and Prithi. They were obviously miffed that she had not revealed to them anything of her whereabouts.

  At night in the dark, she told herself that she had a mission: she could not leave India until her case was heard and Amitabh was punished.

  As if she'd sensed Alice's disdain, Stella wrote to her, care of the ashram. She'd read the story, she said. Zack was in preproduction for his Bollywood film. They were living in Mumbai. Zack says that his father might be able to help.

  Alice wrote various replies in her head, all of them on the theme of I-refuse-to-be-patronized. But she did not send anything; she did not want Stella to know she'd received the letter. She did not want anyone to know where she was. It was a great plus to her that the mahout and his wife had no idea who she was.

  More weeks passed, more delays, more ambiguous legal letters. It was a pettifogging culture. Instead of justice there was combat and an elaborate confrontation that was a form of evasion. The ancient quality of India, its ruinous look, was the result of delay. You would die before any promise was kept, but denial was another way of doing business. The legal system was based on creating obstacles.

  In this mood, Alice became indecisive herself and was saddened to think that she had surrendered to this Indian lack of urgency. So she was surprised one morning when she went to the storeroom for the hayfork and saw the mahout blocking her way. He would not allow her to go near the elephant. Shooing her away, he indicated a door in the corner of the stable yard, which led to the street. She understood what he was saying—it was an escape route. Should she find herself cornered, she could slip out and avoid the elephant's wrath.

  She saw why. The tear stain dripped from the lower part of his eye, brownish on the rough gray skin. And the eye itself looked troubled, the great animal agitated, yanking its chain.

  "Musth?"

  "Musth. Musth." The mahout made a gesture of helplessness. The frenzy had come at last; it had possessed the elephant.

  From her room, unable to feed the elephant, she looked down at the restless creature, trumpeting, snorting, twisting his head, flapping his ears. Alice put her chin on her hands, resting her arms on the windowsill, and saw how the poor thing was much like herself, hobbled, trapped by the chain. She watched for most of the day, and saw the mahout leave by the concealed door. He had no role to play with the elephant so restless—more than restless, the poor thing was suffering.

  She remembered how, months before, when she'd misunderstood the mahout and imagined the elephant as half demented with frustrated desire, chained against venting it, lust and anger mingled in his big body and leaking out of his eye. She'd written it in her journal. Now she was not imagining it.

  In her meditative posture, listening to the moaning of the elephant, Alice made a decision.

  The phone card that she'd bought months before, and used once, was still valid. She went out
the way the mahout had gone, into the lane and a street of shops. She found one with a pay phone, and, reading from a business card, she dialed a number.

  "This is Shan."

  "It's Alice." She took a breath and told him exactly where she was and how to get there; where the gate was latched, that he must secure it as soon as he entered the stable yard; that she would meet him.

  He was relieved—she heard it in his expression of thanks—but she shuddered in disgust and hung up. She could not bear to listen to his gratitude in his strangled American voice, that hideous accent.

  She was squatting in the stable yard, behind the elephant's post, in the darkness there, where the animal's odor brimmed and stung her eyes. She was so still the elephant was not aware of her presence. She listened hard—was that a car in the side lane? Yes, the latch on the gate was lifted. The elephant heard, and he snorted and swayed. He began to roar. She was glad for that sound—it drowned out every other noise.

  She did not act until she saw, by the light of the streetlamp in the lane, the gate being shut, the brace slipped into the slots, the door secured.

  The elephant was straining forward. Alice saw Amitabh, greenish in the bad light, much fatter now, trying to judge the limit of the elephant's reaching trunk, and he was skirting the animal, believing himself to be safe, when he saw Alice and called out softly, "Hey, you."

  Then she pulled the long pin from the ring on the post, releasing the chain, releasing the elephant, releasing herself. And just before she slipped through the small door to the lane, which led to the world, she lingered. She saw Amitabh tumble to the cobbles of the stable yard under the pounding feet of the ramping elephant, twisted in the posture of a helpless victim, bellowing in terror in his own voice.

  It was day again, just after dawn, in the Ladies Only coach on the Mumbai Express. The noise of the clattering train made for a kind of drama, like a soundtrack to the image in the compartment window: her face, with the Indian landscape passing behind her pale features. The bang of the wheels on the rails, like rough music, filled her head with the insistent reassurance of the train speeding her to safety. She began to chant: