The Peacock Spring

by Rumer Godden

  ‘I have seen the Old City.’

  ‘As a curio. Suppose you had to live in one of those “interesting” alleys where the houses vomit garbage and the gutters are choked with faeces.’

  ‘Don’t,’ Una shrank.

  ‘Don’t! But they are. That’s why Indian backstreets are a hotbed of flies and disease. When you have no water to wash with, or you wash with too little, you pass on dysentery. How would you like that?’

  ‘I wouldn’t, but …’ Una stumbled, ‘I love the Indian simplicity, and they don’t grab.’

  Hem began to laugh. ‘My little Una! Don’t you know we are the best in the world at “grab” – also at graft? Don’t you see that you fool Westerners, boys and girls, are trying to live as Indians are trying not to live?’

  ‘Hem, don’t be crosspatch,’ said Ravi, who was bored but, ‘Where is the sense,’ Hem had stormed, ‘if you have been given brains and the luck to be trained to use them, why don’t you try to do something that will truly help – serve like Una’s father?’

  ‘Like Edward?’ Una had been dazed.

  ‘Yes, he and his kind.’

  ‘In all this – panoply?’

  ‘The panoply is not his.’ That, Una knew, was true, ‘and it is a pinch in the ocean,’ said Hem. ‘It doesn’t matter. What do you think they do with their brains and time and money?’

  ‘Buy brown diamonds – you don’t know everything,’ Una could have said but would not give Edward away. Instead, ‘This “serving”, I suppose, is why you have started all over again in medical school,’ she had asked.

  ‘That is my business.’ Hem had been suddenly gruff.

  ‘I still don’t want to have what other people haven’t.’

  ‘A lofty wish,’ Hem had mocked, and before three hours had passed in the train it began to feel far too lofty.

  It was partly the smell coming out of the carriage: of food; of biris; of bodies pressed too tightly together; dust, fumes from the engine – sitting close to the window Una caught those; of cess from the latrine at the end of the coach. ‘I couldn’t go in there,’ she said when need arose.

  ‘You must,’ said Ravi, ‘or to the women’s latrine at the next station, but that will be as bad.’

  ‘There’s only a place for your feet – no pan – I can’t squat down.’

  ‘Other women do.’

  Una came back, pale, clammy. ‘Ravi, there’s … no paper.’

  ‘What did you expect? There’s a tap and your hands.’

  ‘Ouh!’

  ‘Wait. I’ll find you a piece of newspaper.’

  As the train had started to rock across the plain, twilight fell and melancholy had settled on Una – a sadness that was to come on her at twilight for years; ‘cow-dust time’ Ravi had told her it was called in Bengal and here, too, in the north, cattle were being driven home to villages in the fields that lay along the track. The cattle raised humble clouds of dust; she could see the twinkling of lights among the trees, smoke going up from fires where the evening meal was cooking. Cattle, men, children were going home and Una, curled on the narrow wooden seat beside the window, knew she had no home; nor, by choice, had Ravi. His hut in Shiraz Road was an expedient, as much as Edward’s great house was for Edward. Will we, Ravi and I, ever have a home, Una had thought? It suddenly seemed unlikely and the hut in Kulu a dream; this train, hurting and rocking them along, was taking them – where?

  It was better at the stations, when it slid into a babel and swarm of life. Leaning from her window, Una watched the people and the barrows pushing along the train; she wished she had a palm-leaf fan, but would not ask Ravi. He took her tumbler and brought her some tea; she had thought she could not drink it, but it was unexpectedly good and took the stale taste of Edward’s wedding champagne out of her mouth. It was amazing, too, what a comfort to her was Hem’s small brass tumbler; it lessened the feeling of forlornness, but why should she feel forlorn when she was with Ravi? Una sat up straight, smiled, but the loneliness came back and, as night came down and she saw the train as a tiny lit caterpillar crawling across the plain, an infinitesimal dare to the uncaring stars above, the loneliness, the sense of abandonment grew. Una slid her fingers into Ravi’s hand but he would not hold them; it was too bold for an Indian wife.

  Una knew she was terribly tired, yet she could not sleep. It was partly the food that kept her awake: the samosas Ravi had bought in a cup of dried leaves sewn together, were spicier, hotter than any she had tasted, the chapattis heavier and the little pot of rabbri – milk and sugar simmered in pannikins to a thick cream – rich and sickly. ‘Couldn’t you get any fruit?’ she whispered longingly, but, ‘Don’t fuss,’ said Ravi.

  If only, she thought, the other travellers would put out the lights; if, for one minute, they would stop talking, or stop the transistor that whined so loudly they had to shout and shrill over it. ‘You don’t understand,’ Ravi whispered. ‘You are so spoiled. To them, to travel is like a party.’ Some of them were pilgrims – one couple, Ravi told her, had come from the delta of the Ganges, far away in Bengal. A pilgrimage, made perhaps once in a lifetime was for a holy day – and a holiday. ‘To them this train is a luxury. They might have had to walk,’ but, I am too thin to sit all night on a hard wooden bench; my bones stick out, thought Una, yet many were thinner than she. ‘You have been fed on butter and sugar,’ they would have said. ‘Overfed.’ She had not their zest for life; ants or not, they brimmed with it and in the compartment the talk, chatter, laughter, repartee, eating and smoking went on. Ravi, of course, was questioned and parried each fresh one with good humour, often bringing laughter, but it was most suitable that his small bride should be silent, shrouded in her veil, her face resolutely turned to the window. Perhaps they were disappointed she did not steal glances at them from under her veil so that they could guess at her prettiness, or plainness; did not make sly whisperings to Ravi to set them agog. ‘But the shy ones are often best,’ they would have said.

  ‘We go to pay our respect on our wedding to my grandmother,’ Ravi told them.

  ‘An exemplary young couple,’ said a portly Punjabi.

  ‘Yes, when you think of young people nowadays,’ said a large lady and, as she fought her way out of the compartment to go to the latrine, she bent and spoke kindly to Una who could only shake her head. ‘Is she weeping?’

  ‘She has left her mother.’ Ravi said it with such mock seriousness that Una had to giggle. The woman saw her shoulders shaking. ‘Tut, tut. Poor batchi – she is weeping.’ She gave Una a motherly pat and when she came back passed out some sweets. ‘Eat … eat.’ Una hid them in her bundle.

  Water melon … water melon. Pale green coolness dripping juice; the green became a flock of parakeets that flew into Una’s face, hard as the wooden toys sold on the platform barrows; her head had knocked against the window – for a moment she had slept. At last the compartment was hushed, the transistor turned off. Bundled and huddled on one another the travellers slept – a deep sleep of exhaustion. If only I could lie down, thought Una. I shall die if I don’t lie down. She had pretended her back ached so that she need not ride Mouse; its ache was excruciating now. She thought of the second-class carriage Ravi had eschewed where at least they had padded seats. If only I could lie down.

  In the early hours of the morning a family got out, leaving an empty bench. The other travellers did not stir but at once Ravi slipped in, lay down full length and was asleep. Ravi, without a thought for me! When I’m so tired. I, sick with his child! Una could not believe it, but Hem would have laughed. ‘You will have to get used to the ways of the Indian male.’ At least, though, Una was able to curl down on her bench and relieve her aching back.

  It seemed hours after sunrise when they came to a station for breakfast. Ravi brought her tea and sweets. She was hungry but, ‘Sweets! Sweets for breakfast!’

  ‘That is our custom.’ He was in a huff. ‘To ask for toasts would be suspicious. Look, this is your favourite luddoo. I bought it especia
lly for you,’ but Una was starting to heave. ‘Take them away or I shall be sick.’

  ‘Sick! Sick! That’s what you say all the time.’ Ravi was tired too. ‘I am sick of you.’ Then he softened. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Water melon,’ but now Una saw it out on the stalls it was buzzing with flies. ‘Not water melon. Oranges,’ and Ravi bought a few dried-up oranges. In a hand-machine on the platform a boy was crushing sugar cane; Ravi took Hem’s tumbler and brought it back filled. It was a peace offering and, though the juice was unbearably sweet – and full of dysentery germs, I expect, thought Una – she drank it.

  As the morning went on the heat in the carriage grew burning. She could feel sweat running down her back from her hair. Would the dye run too? Then she saw that on the inside of her arms a rash of bright red spots had come out; she thought, by the tingling, they were on her neck, too, down her back and under her hair. ‘Keep your arms in your veil,’ murmured Ravi. ‘The rash shows you are English. My God, are you going to be ill?’

  ‘I think it’s only prickly heat.’ In the diary of William Hickey, one of his loves had died of prickly heat, but Una was learning the guiding principle of a good Indian wife, self-effacement, and, ‘It’s nothing,’ she assured Ravi.

  ‘We shan’t go all the way to Varanasi,’ Ravi had said. ‘They may be checking all trains.’

  Una thought it unlikely. ‘Edward and Alix will only just be back from the bird sanctuary.’

  ‘You never know.’ Ravi was determinedly dramatic. ‘We shall leave the train at Sevapuri, slip into the crowd,’ and, just after noon, Una found herself standing with her bundle on a platform that seemed to be in the middle of nowhere, the surahi in her other hand, while Ravi found the tickets. No one in the sleepy little station looked at them, or stopped them, and in a moment they were out on the road that wound away from the shambling town.

  ‘Wait, I must get some more water.’

  ‘Is it drinking water?’ Una was dubious but in many Indian towns, rich men, to gain merit, install shelters with filtered water, free for the public. There was one near the station. ‘Seva puri – seva means “to take care”. See, I am taking care of you,’ said Ravi.

  ‘Isn’t it, rather, the rich man?’

  By the water shelter was a milestone. Varanasi 22kms.’ Shall we find a bus?’ asked Una.

  ‘They may be checking buses. It is safest that we walk.’

  ‘I can’t walk twenty-two kilometres.’

  ‘It is only fifteen miles. Come.’

  ‘In the middle of the day, in this heat, an English girl and pregnant!’ Hem would have exploded, but Ravi put the rose-painted trunk on his shoulder and blithely led the way to the dust track beside the road.

  ‘Come along,’ Ravi had to order every half-hour.

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘You must. Come along.’

  Una held her veil across her mouth and nostrils to keep out the dust that swirled every time a car, lorry, bus or tonga passed, swerving off the hard surface of the road, or when Ravi caught up with a bullock cart; her eyelashes were stiff with dust and her eyes smarted and stung with it and tiredness. Her skirt was white up to her knees, her skin burned, but worst of all were her feet; they were not supple yet, hard-skinned as were most Indian women’s, and the chappals had blistered them. Una was certain she had plodded for miles behind Ravi, watching a damp patch spread wide on the back of his kurta as the sweat ran down from his neck.

  ‘How far have we come?’

  ‘Perhaps ten kilometres.’

  ‘Only ten!’

  ‘Come along.’

  ‘I can’t,’ but this time Una managed not to say it.

  They had paused in a village where Ravi, with sudden thoughtfulness, had taken Una’s veil, his own chuddar – shoulder cloth – too, and run them under the village tap; the cool wetness was grateful but the veil soon dried; Ravi’s chuddar, wound on his head, stayed wet far longer.

  ‘Isn’t there another village?’

  ‘No. Come along.’

  The fields each side of the road had been harvested and bullocks or buffaloes were working, trampling the cut wheat with a heavy wooden beam that they drew in a slow circle; women with flat wicker scoops were sifting the grain into huge jars; as they sifted the chaff rose in golden puffs. They would stay in the fields all day, sometimes singing, often chattering, though the heat shimmered from the stubble. At evening, when the jars were filled and the slow carts creaked home with them to the village, the women would gather up the straw and carry it in mountainous heaps on their heads – probably carry a baby too. They drew in their buttocks so that they walked erect and lightly. ‘You don’t know how to walk,’ Ravi told Una.

  If she stepped on to the asphalt it was so hot it scorched through her chappals and was sticky, and now they came to a stretch along the dust track where the mahowa trees had dropped their yellow flowers in heaps which were fermenting in the sun; they gave off a heavy sickly smell that made Una feel dizzy. ‘No wonder,’ said Ravi. ‘The villagers make them into wine; children come out and gather them in the early morning. You can eat the flowers too, fresh or cooked.’

  ‘Don’t,’ said Una. She could not get the smell out of her nostrils. ‘How far now?’

  ‘We have only done another kilometre. We haven’t gone halfway,’ but Una was forced to gasp, ‘Couldn’t we have a rest? Go on when it’s cooler?’

  ‘Arré! Sust!’ which was hardly fair, but reluctantly Ravi led the way off the road to where, in a field, there was a patch of shade from a mango tree. The field was empty except for a donkey, hobbled and thin, pulling hopefully at a few stalks left among the stubble; a hawk circling, circling in the glare of sky made Una’s eyes ache still more as she watched it. ‘This is a horrible place,’ said Ravi.

  ‘I know, but I can’t go on yet.’ Una took the tormenting chappals off her feet.

  ‘It will be your fault if they catch us,’ Ravi scolded.

  ‘Why should they look for us here?’

  ‘There may be police all along the road.’

  ‘Then they will catch us anyhow.’

  Ravi spread his chuddar, dry now, on the ground, poured water from the surahi into Una’s tumbler – ‘Not too much – it will make it harder to go on,’ – drank himself and spread the remains of their food. Una shook her head.

  ‘You must eat.’

  ‘I can’t. It’s those flowers.’

  ‘Can’t, can’t, can’t,’ Ravi mocked again. ‘Una, how you fuss!’

  ‘It isn’t me. It’s him.’ She patted her stomach and Ravi was repentant.

  ‘I forget. I still can’t believe it.’

  ‘You will believe it by and by,’ and, for all the discomfort and the heat, the bone hardness of the ground, its dust, her prickly heat, blisters, headache and nausea, Una was content. She lay down on Ravi’s chuddar, put her bundle under her head. The sound of the traffic, bus horns, wheels, the shouts and thwacks of the carters, the shuffling feet, grew dimmer. Una was asleep.

  She was woken by a cry, discordant yet, she was sure, part of this Indian landscape turned by the sinking sun to a mist of pink-gold like the cinema clouds she had seen in Indian films of Krishna’s heaven. Still drugged with sleep, she raised herself on an elbow to look and thought she was back in one of the parade-ground rides or at Fatehpur Sikri, because a peacock was standing not twenty yards away from her, a peacock with three hens. Her patch of shade was lost in the slanting rays that lit the stubble, haloed even the donkey and caught the blue lustre of the peacock’s neck, the delicate crown of feathers on his head, his train spread in all its glory as he displayed it before his hens, fanning it backwards and forwards around him as he posed. The cry did not come again; instead, he began to dance. The train fanned, the legs strutted, trod for a moment and then came a paroxysm of quivering from his feet to the crown of feathers, sending a dazzle of colours into Una’s eyes and the eyes of his hens. It was meant to dazzle; he gave a dart towards the chosen hen a
nd returned to his quivering.

  Ravi was still asleep; no one on the road had glanced or paused; it was only she, Una, who had been chosen – yes, chosen, thought Una – to see the peacock love dance; she, Una, and the half-starved donkey who was watching as gravely as she. This was not imperial Fatehpur Sikri; in this peasant field the air smelled of petrol and dust, not bougainvillaea and roses; there was a continual noise of traffic but cock and hen were oblivious of anything but their mating and, That is how it should be, thought Una.

  The peacock was like Ravi – or Ravi like the peacock – regal with his colours, crown and train that was not a tail, as people supposed, but made by the wing feathers, while she, Una, was the hen, drab with only a glint of colour – but a necessary hen; the chosen one was getting ready to crouch, the other two standing by like handmaidens; the peahen crouched low and Una had felt this abasement herself, almost a worship of Ravi’s act of love. Not that I should ever tell him so, thought Una. Of course not; it was private of privates – like the ‘womb house’ in some of those temples she had seen with Edward, the innermost sanctuary where, meeting the God it enshrines, the worshipper is born again.

  ‘I can’t appear before your grandmother like this.’

  ‘Of course you can. I tell you – she will not even see your clothes.’

  ‘She will smell them. Ravi, I’m reeking.’

  ‘Your fault for jumping into that puddle.’

  ‘I didn’t jump. I fell.’

  ‘I told you not to lean against the door.’

  For the last eight kilometres, Ravi had flagged down a lorry and made a bargain with the driver. ‘You slept so long that, as it is, we shan’t get to Varanasi till midnight.’

  ‘You slept longer.’ Una had not woken him until the peacock had had his way.

  ‘I did not want to sleep at all. It was you who insisted.’

  ‘You slept on the train.’

  Una sat against the lorry door; she had been so tottering with exhaustion that it seemed to her the kindest vehicle she had ever met. No wonder its driver had decorated it with jewellery – the lorry wore a long black tassel, bound with beads that hung from the windscreen to the bonnet. Do lorries wear jewellery? Are jewels on lorries? ‘Am I delirious?’ asked Una.