Flames of Desire

by Vanessa Royall

  Slowly, the vile little man inspected the women, squeezing, pinching, taking his time.

  “Goddamn it, Haruppa,” Jack complained, after a time, “if you didn’t have purchasers waiting, you wouldn’t even be here. Now, you’ve had your entertainment with these girls, and you know as well as I that they’re meant for better than you.”

  Haruppa bowed in apology, all but sweeping the deck with his tongue.

  “Thankee, thankee, great sir,” he oozed. “Yes, yes, bring ladies like last time to Damanhaya, house outside city…”

  He actually called these acres of hovels a city!

  “…and there wait many buyers, even Ku-Fel.”

  “Ku-Fel?” Jack exclaimed, in recognition and surprise. “Isn’t she the one who bought Gayle last trip? For her maharajah? What happened? I hope Gayle gave no cause for displeasure.”

  Bow. Scrape. Grin. “No, no. Gayle do fine, great sir, just like you. All look forward see you again, and lovely ladies here.”

  With that, he trotted away, and Jack turned to them.

  “So, girls. Let’s get you into the crate.”

  “What?”

  “That’s right, my dears. You don’t think I’d sink so low as to display your charms to the swill-eating residents of this great metropolis, do you?”

  In truth, Jack was more concerned that the legal authorities not become aware of his secondary business: traffic in womanflesh. His main cargo, also packed in great wooden crates, was made up of fine New England harness, bridles, saddles, racing gear, refined accouterments with polished spangles, just the thing for a maharajah’s midnight ride. So the crate in which Selena and Roxanne were ensconced was carried out over the water by crane, along with the rest of the cargo, and deposited on a long, flat wagon. Through cracks in the wood, they could breathe, partake of the stink of Daman, and watch the swaying rear ends of the water buffalo that pulled the wagon. It was terribly hot, and the smell of the city and its people all but overwhelming. Selena would have sobbed, except she was too busy gasping for breath. Then the noise diminished and the smell, too, as they left the city behind. It became a little cooler. Selena caught a glimpse of Captain Jack, arrogantly riding a spirited Arabian stallion. It was hard to decide if the horse or Jack showed more disdain for the world. The horse she admired; she hated Captain Jack with all her heart.

  Finally, the buffalo halted, voices babbled, and the crate was crowbarred open.

  “Had a nice trip, I trust,” Captain Jack laughed. “Fix yourselves up, now. I’ll be showing you soon.”

  And there was Haruppa again, rubbing his hands, licking his lips like the crewmen aboard the Meridian. Part of the male language that was the same all over the world.

  Steeled against humiliation, Selena and Roxanne were surprised but still suspicious at the relative decorum of the proceedings. There was no auction block; they were not made public spectacles. Instead, it seemed as though some kind of family party were going on at this house called Damanhaya, a cool, white, amazingly beautiful palace, more than stunning after the horror of the city. From time to time an older woman would come into the room in which they had been told to wait, a wide, bright room of muted colors, with odd, decorative columns all about. The women were usually middle-aged, well-dressed in shining, spotless saris, gaudy headdress, many rings and jewels. Some spoke English, and asked Selena and Roxanne to stand, turn, or smile. The first two or three of them asked if they had known men. Selena just nodded; Roxanne said “yes,” in a quiet, matter-of-fact voice. After that, the word must have been passed, because the question was no longer put to them. Later, though, a dark, mannish woman, with slitty, sinister eyes and two gold teeth, asked them to expose their breasts and show their legs. When they balked, she said something, a word like a growl deep in her throat, and two men appeared instantly from an adjacent chamber. They wore togalike uniforms and carried nasty swords. Again, the growl. The soldiers disappeared. And the girls did as they had been instructed.

  Then, for a long time, no one came. Refreshments were brought: fruit drinks of an unfamiliar but very pleasant, if pulpy, delicacy, and a sweet, very thin, waferlike bread. The two women tried to relax on the unaccustomed, low lounges, and wondered what was happening.

  “Those women!” Roxanne exclaimed. “They give me shivers. And the one with gold teeth!”

  “Yes. I expected men. I don’t understand. I wonder how we’re doing? Haruppa seemed very pleased with the girl called Gayle that Jack sold last year.”

  “I think in this country it is more than necessary to please the men.”

  “Do you know what all these people remind me of? In a strange way? It’s like a gathering of the clans in Scotland, once every year or so. A huge festivity, where there is entertainment, business deals are made, trades and such matters…”

  “Hey-o, my lovelies,” exuded Captain Jack, bursting into the room. He had been drinking, his face was flushed, but he was in fine spirits. “The offers are being prepared now. I believe you’ve done well, indeed. I’m proud of both of you.”

  The sarcastic tone was still there, but not as cutting as it had been. Clearly, he felt his business was successful and all but concluded. When he left, Selena realized, she and Roxanne would probably be separated. She would truly be alone then, having lost her last contact with the West. And she knew so little about what was happening, what would happen!

  “Yes, I do believe the stupid Wogs are ready to cross my palm, as the saying goes…”

  “Why did the women come in to see us?” Selena had to know.

  “You mean why not the men? Simple. The women you saw were harem mistresses. In charge of the wives and concubines of their maharajahs. You see, they were shopping. It is their business to provide constant delights for their rulers—you will learn more of that very soon, I daresay—and, in the harems, their rule is as unflinching and beyond question as is their masters’ in the political realm.”

  “How hideous!” said Roxanne, shivering.

  “Au contraire,” Captain Jack demurred. “It’s a very orderly system, once you get the hang of it.” He laughed. “India has many cultures, most of them overlapping, all of them ancient. Women are highly prized. Older women, that is. The mother is revered. Younger women, like yourselves, have your purposes, too, though. You must please the other object of sacred reverence among the Indians. Surely you have noted the statuary in this room?”

  But they had not. They had been too upset and preoccupied to notice such distractions. But now Selena and Roxanne took a long look at what they had casually dismissed earlier. White, marblelike ornaments, on shelves and pedestals, larger ones standing in the corners of the room, two of them just outside the window, overlooking the gardens, upon which ivy climbed. All of them, every one, a representation in stone of the phallus.

  “Look at it this way,” Jack chortled, “I have brought you here to be of service to the gods. Certainly, there are more than one.”

  “How did you get involved in this filthy business anyway?”

  “Come now, what’s so bad about it? You’ll have a good, easy life. Do as you’re told, and you’ll want for nothing.”

  “But it’s like…like exile, or jail.”

  “What isn’t, my dear?” he asked, cynical now.

  “Where will we…be sent?”

  He shrugged. “Don’t know, for certain. If Ku-Fel takes you, it would be somewhere in the interior. You can say good-bye to civilization then. You’ll never get back out.”

  “Ku-Fel?”

  “The ugly one with the two gold teeth. Meanest woman I’ve ever met. Tricky. The soul of India, that one. She tells me Gayle did please her maharajah, though.” He laughed.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “Nothing. It’s just that when Ku-Fel bought Gayle, she didn’t know the bargain she was getting.”

  Nothing their puzzled expressions, Jack explained. “They got two for the price of one, so to speak. You see, Gayle was…what is the delicate expression?�
�in the family way.”

  Selena’s heart went out to that unknown girl, bearing a child in this primitive, far-off land.

  “Yes,” Jack was chortling, “if you run into a little European kid somewhere out in the wilds, tell him Daddy Jack says hello.”

  “You haven’t a decent impulse in your…”

  “That’s right,” he agreed cheerfully.

  Somewhere outside their chamber, a brass gong sounded, then sounded again. Turbaned servants came for them, bowed solemnly, and led them into a great hall, the opulence of which Selena had never seen, not even in the greatest, richest castles of Scotland. Gigantic, multicolored Oriental rugs covered the lustrous floors, and delicate tapestries hung from the walls. A long table, covered with white and glistening cloth, was laden with exotic food and drink, and guests sat cross-legged before it. One side of the room was open to the garden, where cooks tended the fires. There, too, was a statue of a Brahman cow, made of gold. An Indian, with the peremptory manner of royalty, rose from his place at the head of the table.

  “Captain Randolph,” he said, in a clipped, artificial, but not unpleasant manner. “Will you and the ladies please be seated beside me?”

  Selena stifled an impulse to seize Roxanne’s hand as they crossed the great room under the gaze of hundreds of black eyes. She caught sight of Ku-Fel, watching her through narrowed lids, like a snake. Seated just behind the sinister woman, so black and so motionless that Selena gasped, was a young boy, motionless as a piece of onyx, with the largest, most tragic eyes she had ever seen.

  Captain Jack, relishing the attention, led them to their places, and helped them to their seats with a display of gallant aplomb.

  “Now, to begin,” the man said. “Business first, and then we dine and pleasure ourselves. Is that not right?”

  Jack agreed, leaning toward Selena and whispering, “He’s the Nawab of Maharashtra. He’s been giving the British a lot of trouble, but he appreciates my skills.”

  The nawab smiled thinly. His eyes were extraordinarily forceful. He did not look like the kind of man who would be greatly impressed by Captain Jack.

  “All these stupid Wogs are alike,” Jack hissed, “except some of them wrap a sheet around their arses instead of just a kitchen rag.”

  “The decisions have been made,” pronounced the nawab.

  “Here’s the good news for you two girls,” Jack gloated.

  “Ku-Fel, representing the Maharajah of Jabalpur, will purchase from you the young lady called Se-le-na, to take her for concubinage straightaway, and to instruct her in such arts as will bring delight to their mutual master.”

  “Jabalpur,” Jack hissed. “That’s in Central India. Goodbye, Selena. I’ll remember you.”

  “Ku-Fel acknowledges Captain Randolph’s previous sale, the girl Gayle.”

  Jack took it as a compliment, a tribute to his sagacity, but Selena caught something dangerous in Ku-Fel’s gaze when she nodded to the captain.

  “And the girl Roxanne,” the nawab was saying, “has been selected to join my own court in Bombay.”

  Beneath the white cloth, Selena felt Roxanne’s hand grasp her arm. The look on her face was one of relief. She knew! She knew where she was going and with whom she would be. The waiting was over. Selena, by contrast, had yet to meet the man who would be master of her fate. Whoever he was, he had to be better than Ku-Fel.

  “And he’s not at all the worst-looking of men,” Roxanne whispered, then dropped her eyes and bowed her head to the nawab, a perfect response. Selena was about to congratulate her friend—her future seemed at least bearable—when she caught some mysterious signal in the eyes of the black boy seated behind Ku-Fel.

  Be silent, he seemed to say. Don’t speak. Wait.

  “Now, where’s my gold?” Jack cried. “Pay me, and let’s get on with the feasting.”

  Again, the nawab’s thin, disconcerting smile. “There is your gold,” he said, and pointed to the statue of the cow.

  Jack was amazed, and so, too, were the guests. In spite of the difference in cultures, Selena could gauge their surprise and gasps and hisses and sudden, questioning glances. All that gold for two women? Inexplicably, she felt drawn again to the black boy, and, although she fought the impulse as hard as she could, her effort failed. She glanced at him, and saw it there in his suffering eyes.

  This was a place of great evil! Something terrible was about to happen.

  “Good lord!” Jack cried, on his feet now. “I guess you Wogs know quality when you see it. But how on earth will I transport all that to my ship…?”

  The nawab rose now, too. “Do not worry. We shall melt it down for you. Would you like to inspect your reward?”

  Selena knew that she would remember as long as she lived the ominous, humming stillness in the great hall, the calling of birds and chittering insects in the gardens outside. Cooks at the fires stood at attention, and guests watched in silence, as the nawab led swaggering Jack across the gorgeous carpets. The golden cow stood there, jeweled eyes sparkling. It glittered in Jack’s eyes: the immensity and weight of it, a fortune even to a king. And all his! He stroked the awesome smoothness, silenced for the first time in his life in the presence of wealth beyond his imagination.

  “And it opens, too,” the nawab said, very quietly.

  He touched a tiny protuberance near the cow’s golden udder, and hidden springs responded. The body of the cow parted, revealing the hollowness within.

  Jack had time only to comprehend the emptiness when the “cooks” leaped forward in a body, grabbed him roughly, and jammed him inside the hollow space. The twin sides of the idol were pushed together. A locking mechanism clicked into place. And the statue was set upon the fire.

  “We will melt it down for him,” the nawab explained casually to his guests.

  Roxanne fainted.

  In moments, Jack was screaming, calling for mercy, for help, calling on every god. Selena, in spite of her loathing for the man, was ready to cry out, but again she received that alien yet entirely authoritative impression.

  Be silent, the black boy told her with his eyes. Be silent, there is nothing you can do.

  The nawab returned to his seat,and bade the feast begin. People ate and laughed, barely noticing the melting cow, or Jack’s pitiful howling and insane babbling. Selena sat transfixed, putting a cool cloth on Roxanne’s forehead. No one paid any attention to them, just as no one gave notice to Jack’s agony. It was as natural as night, or life, or death. A punishment to fit the crime. What crime?

  “I wish that you should understand,” Ku-Fel whispered in her ear, having crept mysteriously to her place at the table. “The man named Jack sold my maharajah a girl, Gayle. She was with child, and was of no use to my master. This nawab is a friend of my…or our master. The British have taught us one thing: it is of extreme importance to settle all accounts.”

  Jack cried out one last time, but it was as if a horse were dying, or a great bear, its leg severed in the jaws of an iron trap. The cow was dripping down into the fire. The smell of burnt flesh was all about the room. Servants were showering perfume, spreading incense, to lessen the smell.

  “The account has been settled,” Ku-Fel said. “Let it be a lesson to you. No one wishes you harm, but you must do as you are bidden. I will make you what you must be. I will create out of the flesh and soul of you the woman you must be to please a god.”

  Selena must have been conscious enough to register some slight surprise. Ku-Fel smiled, showing her golden teeth.

  “The Maharajah of Jabalpur is your god,” she repeated. “Forever from this day.”

  The black boy closed his eyes and fixed her with his mind.

  Say: I understand.

  “I understand,” Selena said.

  “That is good,” Ku-Fel praised. “That is very good. We cannot be friends, but we need not be enemies. I will teach you what you will need to know.”

  Selena could not eat, but tried to stay in control. Eventually, Roxanne came bac
k to consciousness, and was led away, dazed and confused. There was no time to say goodbye.

  And when Selena turned to seek out the dark boy again, he was not there. His space was as empty as if he had never existed at all. Ku-Fel was there and watched her, though, and her golden teeth glinted on the flesh of tender fowl.

  On the smoldering grates, warped gold hardened around the charred bones of Jack Randolph.

  Still alive, trapped but undefeated, Selena had not enough passion for anger, or tears. For the first time in her life, she was confronted with too many things that she could not understand. She slept that night, a former princess of the nobility of Scotland, in a beautiful room in the nawab’s white palace. It was far larger, and far more luxurious, than her room in Coldstream Castle had been, and instead of the sconces and smoky tapers on the wall, there were golden candelabra, silver-framed mirrors, and all the easy touches of vast and casual wealth. She slept alone and unmolested, in a fine bed. It was the bed of a princess, a queen.

  And Selena was a slave.

  Haruppa stood that night in the great court, salved by the sweet whisper of the mango trees, running through his fingers, over and over, the coins he had been given for luring the Englishman back to Damanhaya for revenge. The smooth touch of the metal was pleasant, and also his last. He stiffened abruptly, and sank to the hard yellow stones. A dirk was yanked from his body, and Davi, the dark one, feet muffled in horsehide and wearing about his neck on a chain, for luck, the severed tip of an elephant’s tusk, vanished into darkness. “That is for Gayle,” he said.

  The Fields of Eden

  So who is God, can you tell me? The mythical wolf of a Scottish knight, stalking the Highlands forever? Or a rajah of timeless India, as yet unknown, unseen, but who already possessed such power over Selena that he might as well have held in his dark-skinned, indolent hand her beating heart?

  The Maharajah of Jabalpur. Master of millions. Master of Selena. Remote in the Indian interior, he ruled as of old, by a combination of cruelty and whim, intelligence and caprice. So said Ku-Fel, drawing out the word caaapreeece, as Roxanne might have done. There, in the Pradesh heartland, in the land of his ancestors, the Great One had not yet been assaulted by the persistent, unremitting mercantile sorties of the gold-and-silver-and-spice-loving Westerners. That was all coming to him. Meanwhile, he loved to have a woman with gold in her hair.