Fire on the Wind

by Olivia Drake

  She edged around a pile of coarse blankets. Ducking past the cloth hung crookedly over the doorway, she stepped into the bustling bazaar. The silk of her veil muted the bright sunlight and gave the marketplace a gauzy green aspect. She inhaled the mingled scents of spices, incense, and excrement. The babble of shoppers blended with the harsh calls of hawkers.

  Casting a single backward glance at the blanket shop, she slipped into the crowd. People thronged the many stalls containing heaps of foodstuffs, rice and sugar and lentils. Everywhere, shops sold the earthenware jars used to collect the Ganges water, considered holiest here at the Gate of Vishnu, where the sacred river left its Himalayan birthplace to enter the vast plains. Pilgrims journeyed hundreds of miles to fill pots and carry them home for drinking at weddings and death ceremonies.

  A man selling woven hats caught her eye. On his cart lay a tiny red cap that would keep Kit warm in the mountains. Quickly she struck a bargain with the man, then tucked the cap into the gathered material at her waist.

  She bought paper and pen at another stall. She composed a brief note, wrapped it around the photograph, and securely tied the small bundle with string. She addressed it to the Government House in Calcutta. Someone there would know how to get in touch with MacMurtry’s widow.

  Debating how to mail the letter, she left the maze of the bazaar and reached a platform overlooking the Ganges. Through a gap in the hills, the river rushed relentlessly downward, foaming over boulders and gurgling an endless song. Beyond the green foothills loomed the hazy, white-peaked Himalayas.

  The waterfront abounded with pilgrims. Sadhus in orange robes sat cross-legged. Some of the holy men had smeared their skin with sacred cow dung. Others had styled their hair into stiff cones of mud and wore the three-pronged stripes of Shiva on their brows. They blew conch shells and struck gongs until the high-pitched noises made Sarah’s ears ring. The scent of burning incense from their coal-lit braziers stung her nose.

  The filth and poverty tempered her fascination with sadness. A legless beggar slowly pulled himself across the cobblestones. Emaciated old men perched on the embankment, marking time until they died beside the holy Ganges. Children in rags took turns using an animal bone to bat at a pottery shard.

  Near the ghat, Sarah saw a young lad staring hungrily at a pilgrim munching a chupatty. On impulse, she approached the boy.

  “Would you like to earn some money?” she asked in Hindi.

  He eyed her suspiciously. His somber dark eyes bore a poignant resemblance to Kit’s. “How?

  “I must mail this to Calcutta.” She held out the packet. “Can you get it there?”

  “The mail packet leaves from Kurnaul.” His dirt-smeared face alight with eagerness, he looked her up and down. “Please, I will take it there for twelve rupees.”

  “I have but ten.”

  “That is enough.”

  She took out the money, the last of the small stash Damien had given her, and placed the silver coins in the boy’s grubby palm. Gripping the money and the parcel to his heart, he salaamed. “Dhanyavad, great lady. Thank you.” Turning, he darted into the throng.

  Her stomach squeezed tight. At least she had helped one urchin earn enough to feed him for a fortnight. Now that she’d fulfilled her duty, she could return to the blanket shop.

  Sarah hesitated. What did a few more minutes matter? Damien must already be furious with her. Keppu, too.

  An irresistible sense of discovery lured her onward, and she followed the riverbank. Tall dharmsalas, rest houses for pilgrims, crammed the byway alongside shrines and ghats. She spied the great bathing place where the headman had taken Lalji. Controlling a shiver, she made a wide detour around the place.

  A prickly sensation made her look over her shoulder. She saw no familiar faces in the crowd, only the sadhus and old men and pilgrims with shaved heads.

  Thankfully, the veil hid her face. Hardwar might not be one of the volatile military stations, but no doubt there were travelers here who hated the English.

  Ahead, sunlight glinted off the triangular brass roof of a temple. Sarah carefully descended the few short stairs to the water’s edge, where the flagstones were slick with moss. The shrine sat beside a small crook in the river, a quiet oasis amid the clamor of the city.

  She rang the tiny string of bells at the entrance of the temple, then went inside the dim interior. A few pilgrims squatted beside pots of acrid incense. She stopped before a stone carving of the many-armed Shiva. On impulse, Sarah bowed her head to pray.

  Please, God, help me keep Kit safe. Help Damien and me to escape our foes.

  When she turned around, Lalji stood before her.

  She staggered back. Her gasp echoed against the stone walls. His unnatural milky eye gave him an evil aspect. A smear of yellow marked the center of his forehead, and his turban was gone, his head shaved.

  “Does my appearance alarm you...Shivina?”

  Too frightened to speak, Sarah shook her head.

  “Come outside with me,” he said.

  He beckoned and she saw no way to escape, no other exit from the shrine. Biting her lip beneath the veil, she followed him into the sunshine.

  “I slipped away from Jawahir when I saw you pass the ghat,” he said. “You are so seldom apart from your husband.”

  She edged toward the staircase. “What do you want from me?”

  “A few words, nothing more.” Lalji stepped in front of her. “One would think you are afraid of me.”

  “My husband will beat me if I talk to other men.”

  “What is this you have here?” He snatched the red cap and turned it around and around in his long-nailed hands.

  “A gift for Madakka’s baby.”

  He handed the cap back. “You take great interest in a child who does not belong to you.”

  Sarah stiffened. Dear God, did he suspect? Willing her hands not to shake, she tucked the cap into her sash. “It is natural for women to like babies.”

  “Ah, you wish for one from your husband? The two of you enjoy sexual congress often enough.”

  Her cheeks stung with humiliating heat. So many nights she’d lain beside Damien to foster the illusion of man and wife. “That is none of your concern.”

  “For two weeks you have been avoiding me.” Like a whiny child, Lalji turned the corners of his mouth downward. “Lakshmi and Madakka answer my questions and treat me with respect. They show their faces to me. Why won’t you?”

  “I am ugly.” Again she started past him, and again he blocked her path.

  “Even ugly women need companionship. I had hoped to take you up the river and show you the footprint of Vishnu.”

  “I cannot go.”

  “You will not view the ancient mark of the god?” he said. “It is a sight all true pilgrims yearn to see.”

  He put a faint but unmistakable emphasis on true. Shakily, Sarah said, “My husband will take me to worship properly.”

  Lalji shrugged. “I would not wish to displease a man so big and strong as your Dharam. But you must at least allow me to buy you an offering.” He flipped a coin to a passing urchin bearing a basket of trinkets.

  “I do not think—”

  “Bah. Everyone must make an offering to Ganga, men and women alike.” He paused, peering at her with his strange eye. “Else why have you come to Hardwar?”

  Fear paralyzed her limbs. Did he guess her identity? No, he could not be sure, or he would waste no time slitting her throat.

  As he stepped closer to press the object into her hand, she caught the stench of curry on his breath. Looking down, she saw a tiny boat made of plaited green leaves and filled with marigolds and rose petals.

  Lalji bought one for himself as well. Afraid to provoke his suspicions, she followed him to the embankment. He put his vessel into the rushing water. She bent and placed her own a few feet downstream. The current whirled the miniature boats in a dance that gained speed as they moved away from shore. The one dropped by Lalji shot after hers.
r />   “See how my offering chases yours,” he said.

  His boat bumped hers and overturned it. The contents strewed the river and swirled swiftly away. His vessel bobbed onward until it vanished into the white, foaming water.

  “Ahh.” He sighed in satisfaction and turned to gaze at her. “So Ganga Ma lets me catch you. Perhaps it is a sign from her. Perhaps she means to reveal you to me at last.”

  He lunged at Sarah, caught her arm, and yanked at her chuddur. She grabbed desperately for the enveloping veil, but it slipped off her head and fell into the water. Her pulse beat madly in her throat. His dark face loomed into sharp focus. His body smelled of heavy incense.

  “Aha! Eyes the color of the morning sky.” He tugged at her hair; it tumbled in a black mass around her shoulders. “Keppu was right. You have dyed your hair and skin, but you are a feringhi.”

  “No,” she said in desperation. “I am from the hills. Some of my people have light-colored eyes—”

  “Bah.” He spat on the ground. “You have English features. And no pockmarks to mar your beauty. I am sick of your lies. You have made a fool of me for too long.” He scraped the long nail of his forefinger over her jugular vein. “Was it Delhi you fled? Or Meerut?”

  Terror struck her heart. Merciful God, she had to distract him. A yellow-orange flash behind him caught her eye. A sadhu emerged from the temple. The lanky man started down toward the river.

  She raised her chin. “Release me, and I will reveal all you wish to know.”

  Lalji regarded her with contempt. “And let you run from me? No, you will go with me to a private place I know. There I will conduct your punishment.”

  He tugged her in the direction of the stairs. Her stomach clenching, she hung back. A short way down the riverbank, the sadhu struck his gong and chanted a prayer.

  “If I am English,” Sarah said, “then you soil yourself by touching me. You forfeit your caste for the sake of revenge.”

  His grip eased. “For an Englishwoman, you know much of our Hindu ways—”

  She threw herself out of his grasp. Too far away to risk the steps, she leaped toward the holy man. His odor of cow dung nipped at her. “Help me!” She caught his arm, and his gong splashed into the water. “Save me from death!”

  Glazed brown eyes peered at her from beneath hair shaped with mud into a beehive. His mouth formed a startled O. He swayed in a trance.

  Lalji sprang after her. “Do not listen! She is a feringhi— “

  She darted behind the sadhu and gave him a mighty shove. He collapsed against the sepoy.

  They clutched at each other like a macabre couple, teetering on the embankment.

  Both men tumbled into the river. Lalji thrashed and howled. The water abruptly swallowed his curses.

  Sarah spun around and ran for the stairs. Her trail-hardened feet sped over the mossy stone steps. She paused at the top and spared a glance back.

  His dark yellow robes floating around him and his beehive sagging, the sadhu calmly swam toward the bank. Farther out, Lalji flailed with the panic of a non-swimmer. Already the swift current swept him downstream. His shaved head bobbed on the water like a huge billiard ball.

  In a panic, Sarah hastened through the crowd. She tried to keep her gaze downcast so that no one would notice her blue eyes. She felt naked and vulnerable without the veil. Everyone seemed to be watching her.

  Dear God, she shouldn’t have slipped away from Damien. Touring Hardwar seemed frivolous now. Frivolous and dangerous. She felt no elation at besting Lalji, only the shaky comfort of a reprieve. He might yet reach the shore. With cold certainty, she knew that if he found her, he would kill her. And Damien.

  Perhaps even Kit.

  Spurred by fear, she half ran past a blur of holy men and pilgrims. The bazaar. She must get to the bazaar and warn Damien. He’d know what to do.

  She reached the narrow streets of the marketplace. A hawker of clay pots snatched at her arm, but she shook him off. She pushed her way past the shoppers until the blanket shop came into view. Sidestepping the door flap, she entered the musty interior.

  She scanned the small room with its heaps of blankets and filthy clay walls. Dear Lord, Damien had gone.

  At the back of the store, the grizzled proprietor was haggling with a customer. A man with a shaved head. Sarah gasped.

  Then the man turned, so she could see his mild, bearded face. Her heart resumed beating. How foolish of her—he wasn’t Lalji.

  “Please,” she breathed, stepping toward them, “have you seen my husband? He was here purchasing a gun a short time ago.”

  “So you are the wife who ran away,” said the shopkeeper. He shook his finger at her. “He was very, very angry. He and his great bullock of a friend.”

  “Do you know where my husband went?”

  “He said if you returned to send you to the dharmsala, to wait with the other women.” Coming closer, the shopkeeper peered at her in open astonishment. “But what is this? You have the eyes of an Englishwoman.”

  “Dhanyavad, sir. Thank you for your help.”

  Sarah whirled and dashed out. She couldn’t afford to wait with the other women. She had to find Damien and tell him of the peril they faced.

  Where in heaven was he?

  Where in hell was she?

  One hand shading his eyes, Damien scanned the crowded waterfront. A breeze whipped down from the forested foothills, wafting the aromas of cedar and incense along with the stink of rubbish. The ghats by the river buzzed with life. His flute lilting, a man charmed a green snake from a brass spittoon. Astrologers beseeched business from shaven-headed pilgrims and yellow-robed sadhus reciting their private pujas. Beneath the spreading branches of a nearby shisham tree, a young penitent slept off the effects of the hookah cradled in the crook of his arm.

  A sacred cow lumbered past Damien and paused to excrete a pile of dung. As the humpbacked animal ambled on, a sadhu bent and scooped the steaming heap into a clay jar, which he bore reverently away.

  Damien focused on the scores of women pilgrims. There were saris in reds and pinks and whites and blues. He spotted none in a distinctive olive-green hue trimmed with gold, encasing a body that unaccountably drove him mad.

  Damn you, Miss Sarah-Hardhead-Faulkner, he thought. Bloody double damn you.

  He despised the fear that soured his stomach. The fear that he wouldn’t find her in this swarm of people. The fear that when he finally did track her down in some dark backstreet alley, she would be lying in a crumpled heap, her blue eyes wide and sightless, her slim throat ripped open in a bloodied gash.

  He banished the grisly image from his mind. His imagination was running rampant not because he cared for her, but because he didn’t want the trouble of securing another nanny for his son. Where else would he find someone who could cope half as well as Sarah? With Lalji guarded by Jawahir, the only real threat to her stood beside Damien.

  “So,” snarled Keppu, “where is your errant wife?”

  Damien swung toward his bull-faced companion. “She’s around here somewhere. You must remember she is only a country girl. She was probably swept up by all the strange new sights here.”

  “My woman would never dare to leave against my command.”

  The sepoy’s cruel expression and flat voice disgusted Damien. “We probably missed her in the bazaar. She must have strayed off to examine some trinket or to have her fortune told.”

  “If you lie to me, I’ll kill you and the other pilgrims.’’

  “Why would I mislead you?” Damien said in an injured voice. “Have we not been brothers these past weeks? Am I not prepared to stand at your side and slay the feringhis? Once we have all cleansed ourselves in the holy waters, we will be ready to join the great mutiny.”

  Keppu grunted an indistinct sound that might have been an apology or a jeer.

  “Let us return to the market,” Damien added. “Perhaps she’s gone back to the shop where we bought the gun.

  “Perhaps, perhaps,” Ke
ppu grumbled as he fell into step beside Damien. “I grow weary of chasing a foolish woman.”

  Damien swallowed a retort. His fingers itched for the revolver or the rifle. He’d like nothing better than to plant a slug of lead in that oversized belly. But like a beggar clutching his alms, the sepoy jealously guarded both parcels against his watermelon stomach. Sunlight glinted off the dagger stuck in his belt, and his red uniform coat bore a brown splotch of dried English blood like a badge of dishonor.

  Control yourself, Damien thought. Just stick to the plan and you’ll be rid of this scum. Don’t let your fury at Sarah make you do something rash.

  He adjusted the bundle of scratchy blankets under his arm as he continued to scrutinize the throng. Just wait until he got his hands on that tart-tongued spinster. He wouldn’t let her out of his sight again. And he really would blister her shapely little bottom.

  The density of the crowd in the bazaar slowed their progress. People jostled him, shoppers hurrying from stall to stall and vendors vying for customers. The air held the heavy scent of frying chupatties, the piquant aroma of curry, the acrid smoke of dung-fires. A mangy cur lunged at a plucked chicken hanging in a butcher’s stall; the proprietor swatted futilely with a stick as the dog dashed off with its prize. The scene was earthy and alive, yet anxiety darkened Damien’s vision. Keppu scowled at every veiled woman they passed, and his murderous expression struck Damien like a killing frost.

  A merchant with a pencil-thin mustache elbowed in front of him. The man swept back his dirty sleeve and shook an armload of clinking bracelets.

  “O honorable pilgrim, will you not buy a bangle to take home to your wife? I have gold and silver and brass—”

  “Chale jao,” Damien snapped, thrusting the man aside. “Go away.” Ahead lay the crooked door flap of the blanket stall.

  If Sarah wasn’t waiting there, he thought feverishly, he’d go to the dharmsala. And if she hadn’t joined the women, either? Blast her to hell for leaving him to explain her behavior.

  Another vendor tugged at his sleeve. He tried to yank himself free, out this one clung with the tenacity of a leech. Turning his head sharply, he growled, “Let loose, you son of a snake—”