"Sea of Poppies" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ghosh Amitav)

Six

The candle in Paulette's window was the first to pierce the predawn darkness that surrounded Bethel: of all the residents of the house, master and servant alike, she was always up the earliest and her day usually began with the hiding of the sari she had slept in at night. It was only in the seclusion of her bedroom, sheltered from the prying gaze of the staff, that she dared wear a sari at all: Paulette had discovered that at Bethel, the servants, no less than the masters, held strong views on what was appropriate for Europeans, especially memsahibs. The bearers and khidmutgars sneered when her clothing was not quite pucka, and they would often ignore her if she spoke to them in Bengali – or anything other than the kitchen-Hindusthani that was the language of command in the house. Now, on rising from her bed, she was quick to lock her sari in her trunk: this was the one place where it would be safe from discovery by the procession of servants who would file through to clean the bedroom later in the day – the bed-making bichawnadars, the floor-sweeping farrashes and the commode-cleaning matranees and harry-maids.

The apartment that Paulette had been assigned was on the uppermost floor of the mansion, and it consisted of a sizeable bedroom and a dressing room; more remarkably, it also had an adjoining water-closet. Mrs Burnham had made sure that her residence was among the first in the city to do away with outhouses. 'So tiresome to have to run outside,' she liked to say, 'every time you have to drop a chitty in the dawk.'

As with the rest of the mansion, Paulette's water-closet boasted of many of the latest English devices, among them a comfortable, wood-lidded commode, a painted porcelain basin and a small footbath made of tin. But from Paulette's point of view the water-closet lacked the most important amenity of all – it had no arrangements for bathing. Through years of habit, Paulette had grown accustomed to daily baths and frequent dips in the Hooghly: it was hard for her to get through a day without being refreshed at least once, by the touch of cool, fresh water. At Bethel a daily bath was permitted only to the Burra Sahib, when he returned, hot and dusty, from a day at the Dufter. Paulette had heard rumours that Mr Burnham had created a special contraption for the purpose of this daily wash: holes had been bored into the bottom of a common tin balty, and the bucket had been strung up in such a way as to permit it to be constantly filled by a bearer, while the sahib stood underneath, revelling in the flow. Dearly would Paulette have loved to make use of this device, but her one attempt to broach this subject had scandalized Mrs Burnham, who, with her usual indirection, had made puzzling reference to the many reasons why frequent cold baths were necessary for a man but unseemly, even perverse, in the gentler, less excitable sex; she had made it clear that, so far as she was concerned, a bathtub was the pucka amenity for a memsahib, to be used at decent intervals of every two or three days.

At Bethel there were two enormous goozle-connahs – bathrooms outfitted with cast-iron tubs, imported directly from Sheffield. But to have the tubs filled required at least half a day's advance notice to the ab-dars, and Paulette knew that if she were to issue this command more than twice a week, word would quickly get back to Mrs Burnham. In any event, to bathe in those tubs was not much to Paulette's taste: it gave her no pleasure to soak in a tepid pool of her own scum; nor did she relish the ministrations of the three female attendants – the 'cushy-girls' as Mrs Burnham liked to call them – who would fuss over her as she lay in the tub, soaping her back and scrubbing her thighs, tweezing wherever they saw fit, and all the while murmuring 'khushi-khushi?' as if there were some great joy in being pinched, prodded and rubbed all over one's body. When they reached for her most intimate recesses, she would fight them off, which always left them looking surprised and wounded, as if they had been prevented from properly performing their duties: this was a trial to Paulette, for she could not imagine what it was that they intended to do and wasn't inclined to find out.

Desperation had led Paulette to devise her own method of washing, inside her water-closet: standing in her tin footbath, she would reach carefully into a balty, with a mug, and then allow the water to trickle gently down her body. In the past she had always bathed in a sari, and to be wholly unclothed had made her uncomfortable at first, but after a week or two she had grown used to it. Inevitably, there was a certain amount of spillage and she always had to spend a good deal of time afterwards, in towelling the floor, to remove all trace of the ritual: the servants were ever-curious about the doings of Bethel's inmates and Mrs Burnham, for all her vagueness, seemed to have an efficient way of extracting gossip from them. Despite her precautions, Paulette had reason to think that word of her surreptitious bathing had somehow trickled through to the mistress of the house: of late, Mrs Burnham had made several derisive remarks about the incessant bathing of the Gentoos and how they were always dipping their heads in the Ganges and muttering bobberies and baba-res.

Recalling these strictures, Paulette went to considerable trouble to make sure that no water remained on the floor of her water-closet. But immediately after this struggle, there followed several more: first she had to grapple with the stays of a pair of knee-length drawers; next, she had to twist herself into knots to find the fastenings of her bodice, her chemise, and her petticoat; only then could she wriggle into one of the many dresses her benefactress had bequeathed to her upon her arrival at Bethel.

Although Mrs Burnham's clothes were severe in cut, they were made of much finer stuffs than any that Paulette had ever worn before: not for her common Chinsurah calicoes, nor even the fine shabnam muslins and zaituni satins that many memsahibs made do with; the Burra BeeBee of Bethel would have nothing less than the finest kerseymere, the best silks from China, crisp linens from Ireland and soft Surat nainsooks. The trouble with these fine fabrics, as Paulette had discovered, was that once having been cut and stitched, they could not easily be adapted for the use of another wearer, especially one as maladroit as herself.

At seventeen, Paulette was unusually tall, of a height where she could look over the heads of most of those around her, men and women alike. Her limbs, too, were of such a length that they tended to wave like branches in a wind (years later, this would be her chief complaint about the way she was represented in Deeti's shrine – that her arms looked like the fronds of a coconut palm). In the past, Paulette's awareness of her unusual stature had led to a shy indifference to her appearance: but in a way this awkwardness had also amounted to a charter of freedom, in that it had rid her of the burden of having to care about her looks. But since her arrival at Bethel, her diffidence about her appearance had been transformed into an acute self-consciousness: in repose, her nails and fingertips would seek out small blemishes and tease them until they became ugly blotches on her pale complexion; while walking she would lean forward as if she were striding into a powerful wind; while standing, she would stoop, with her hands clasped behind her back, swaying back and forth, as though she were about to deliver an oration. In the past, she had worn her long, dark hair in pigtails, but of late she had taken to tying it back, in a severe little knot, as if it were a corset for her skull.

On her arrival at Bethel, Paulette had found four dresses laid out on her bed, with all the necessary chemises, blouses and petticoats: Mrs Burnham had assured her that they had all been properly altered to fit and were ready to be worn to dinner. Paulette had taken Mrs Burnham at her word: she had dressed hurriedly, ignoring the cluckings of the maid who'd been sent to help her. Eager to please her benefactress, she had run enthusiastically down the stairs and into the dining room. 'But only regard, Mrs Burnham!' she'd cried. 'Look! Your robe is perfectly of my cut.'

There was no answer: only a sound like that of a large crowd collectively drawing its breath. Coming through the doors, Paulette had noticed that the dining room seemed strangely full, especially considering that this was meant to be a family supper, with only the Burnhams and their eight-year-old daughter, Annabel, at table. Being unaccustomed to the ways of the house, she had not allowed for the others who were present at every meal: the turbaned bearers who stood behind each chair; the masalchie with the sauceboat; the chobdar whose job it was to ladle soup from the sideboard tureen; the three or four young chuckeroos who always followed at the feet of the more senior retainers. And nor were these the only servants present that night: curiosity about the newly arrived missy-mem had spread to the bobachee-connah and many of the kitchen staff were lurking in the anterior vestibule, where the punkah-wallahs sat, pulling the overhead fans by means of ropes attached to their toes: among them were the curry consumah, the caleefa who roasted the kabobs and the bobachees who were responsible for the stews and the joints of beef. The indoors servants had even contrived to smuggle in a few whose place was strictly out-of-doors – malis from the garden, syces and julibdars from the stables, durwauns from the gatehouse, and even some beasties from the gang that kept the house supplied with water. The servants held their breath as they waited for their master's response: the sauceboat wobbled on the masalchi's tray, the chobdar lost his ladle, and the ropes on the punkah-wallahs' toes went slack as they watched the eyes of the Burra Sahib and the Burra BeeBee descending from Paulette's ill-fitting bodice – the stays of which had come undone – to the hem of her dress, which was so short as to expose Paulette's ankles, in all their nakedness. The only voice to be heard was little Annabel's who gave a gleeful shout of laughter: 'Mama! she forgot to bundo her jumma! And oh dekko mama, do: there's her ankle! Do you see it? Look what the puggly's done!'

The name stuck, and from then on Paulette was Puggly to Mrs Burnham and Annabel.

The next day a contingent of tailors, consisting of some half-dozen darzees and rafoogars, had been summoned to adapt Mrs Burnham's clothing to the measure of the newly arrived missy-mem. Yet, for all their diligence, their efforts had met with limited success: such was Paulette's build that even with the hems let out to the fullest, Mrs Burnham's gowns did not come quite as far down as they should – around the waist and arm, on the other hand, they seemed always to be much wider than was necessary. As a result, when draped upon Paulette, those finely tailored gowns had a tendency to slip and flap; memsahib costume of this kind being, in any case, unfamiliar to her, the lack of fit greatly compounded her discomfort: often, when the loose fabric chafed against her skin, she would pinch, pull and scratch – sometimes causing Mrs Burnham to ask if little chinties had got into her clothes.

Since that awful night, Paulette had laboured hard to behave and speak exactly as she should, but not always with success. Just the other day, in referring to the crew of a boat, she had proudly used a newly learnt English word: 'cock-swain'. But instead of earning accolades, the word had provoked a disapproving frown. When they were out of Annabel's hearing, Mrs Burnham explained that the word Paulette had used smacked a little too much of the 'increase and multiply' and could not be used in company: 'If you must buck about that kind of thing, Puggly dear, do remember the word to use nowadays is "roosterswain".'

But then, unaccountably, the BeeBee had burst into giggles and slapped Paulette's knuckles with her fan. 'As for that other thing, dear,' she said, 'no mem would ever let it past her lips.'

One reason why Paulette had risen early was to give herself time to work on the unfinished manuscript of her father's Materia Medica of the plants of Bengal. Dawn was the only time of day that she felt to be entirely her own; in the spending of that hour, there was no need to feel any guilt, even if she chose to do something that she knew to be displeasing to her benefactors. But rare were the days when she was actually able to devote any time to the manuscript: more often than not, her gaze would stray across the river, to the Botanical Gardens, and she would find herself slipping into a spell of melancholy remembrance. Was it cruel or kind of the Burnhams to have given her a room with a window that commanded so fine a view of the river and the shore beyond? She could not decide: the fact was that even when seated at her desk, she had only to crane her head a little to catch a glimpse of the bungalow she had left some fourteen months before – its presence, beyond the water, seemed a mocking reminder of all that she had lost with her father's death. Yet, even to revisit those memories, was to be assailed by a wave of guilt – to hanker after that earlier life seemed not just ungrateful, but disloyal to her benefactors. Whenever her thoughts strayed across the river, she would conscientiously remind herself of her good fortune in being where she was, and in receiving all that the Burnhams had given her – her clothes, her bedroom, pin-money to spend, and most of all, instruction in things of which she had been sadly ignorant, such as piety, penitence and Scripture. Nor was gratitude hard to summon, for to be mindful of her luck she had only to think of the fate that would otherwise have been hers: instead of sitting in this spacious room, she would have found herself in a barracks in Alipore, an inmate of the newly instituted poorhouse for destitute Eurasians and white minors. Such indeed was the lot to which she'd resigned herself when she was summoned before Mr Kendalbushe, a stern-faced judge of the Sudder Court. Instructing her to offer thanks to a merciful heaven, Mr Kendalbushe had let her know that her case had come to the notice of none other than Benjamin Brightwell Burnham, a leading merchant and philanthropist with a distinguished record of receiving destitute white girls into his house. He had written to the presiding officer of the court, offering to provide the orphaned Paulette Lambert with a home.

The judge had shown Paulette the letter: it was prefaced with the line: 'Above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins.' To her shame, Paulette had not been able to identify the provenance of the verse: it was the judge who told her that it was from 'The Book of the Lord: I Peter, chapter 4, verse 8'. Mr Kendalbushe had then proceeded to ask her a few simple scriptural questions; her answers, or rather, the lack of them, had shocked him into delivering a caustic judgement: 'Miss Lambert, your godlessness is a disgrace to the ruling race: there is many a Gentoo and Mom'den in this city who is better informed than yourself. You are but a step away from chanting like a Sammy or shrieking like a Sheer. In the opinion of this court you will be better served by Mr Burnham's tutelage than ever you were by your father's. It falls to you now to show yourself worthy of this good fortune.'

In the months she had spent at Bethel, Paulette's knowledge of Scripture had grown apace, for Mr Burnham had undertaken to personally instruct her. As with her predecessors, it had been made clear to her that nothing would be asked of her other than regular churchgoing, good behaviour and a willingness to open herself to religious instruction. Before her arrival, Paulette had imagined that the Burnhams would expect her to make herself useful in the manner of a poor relative: the discovery that she had little to offer them, by way of compensatory services, had come as something of a shock. Her offers of help in tutoring Annabel had been politely declined, for reasons that had soon become apparent to Paulette: not only was her command of English far from perfect, her education had followed a path exactly contrary to that which Mrs Burnham deemed appropriate for a girl.

For the most part, Paulette's schooling had consisted of assisting her father as he went about his work. This provided a wider range of instruction than might be supposed, for it was Pierre Lambert's practice to label his plants, when possible, in Bengali and Sanskrit, as well as in accordance with the system recently invented by Linnaeus. This meant that Paulette had learnt a good deal of Latin from her father, while also absorbing Indian languages from the learned munshis who had been enlisted to assist the curator with his collections. French she had studied of her own volition, reading and re-reading her father's books until she knew them almost by heart. Thus, through effort and observation, Paulette had become, while still quite young, an accomplished botanist and a devout reader of Voltaire, Rousseau, and most particularly M. Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, who had once been her father's teacher and mentor. But Paulette had not thought to mention any of this at Bethel, knowing that the Burnhams would not wish to have Annabel instructed in botany or philosophy or Latin, their dislike of Romish popery being almost equal to their detestation of Hindus and Muslims – or 'Gentoos and Musselmen' as they liked to put it.

By default, since it was not in her nature to be idle, Paulette had assigned herself the task of overseeing the Burnhams' gardens. But this too had proved no easy matter, for the Head Malley had quickly made it clear that he would not willingly take instructions from a girl of her age. It was over his objections that she had planted a chalta tree by the chabutra, and only with the greatest difficulty had she prevailed on him to put a pair of latanias in a bed on the main driveway: these palms, a great favourite of her father's, were another slender link with her past.

Not the least of the reasons why Paulette so often found herself slipping into a state of melancholy was that she had not yet been able to find a way of being properly useful to her benefactors. Now, just as a wave of despair was beginning to build, Paulette was startled out of her despondency by the sound of hoofs and wheels, crackling urgently on the conkers of the gravelled driveway that led to the main entrance of Bethel. She glanced up at the sky and saw that the darkness of night had begun to yield to the first rosy streaks of dawn: but even so, it was very early for a visitor. Opening her door, she crossed the vestibule that ran past her room and unlatched a window on the far side of the house. She was just in time to see a carriage pulling up to the portico of the Burnham mansion: the vehicle was a caranchie, a ramshackle coach constructed from the remains of an old hackney carriage. These humble carriages were common in the Bengali quarters of the city, but Paulette could not remember ever having seen one at Bethel; certainly none had ever pulled up to the main entrance of the house. As she was looking down from above, a man dressed in a kurta and dhoti climbed out and leant over to spit a mouthful of paan into a bed of cobra-lilies: Paulette caught a glimpse of a braided tail of hair hanging down from an enormous head and she knew that the visitor was Baboo Nobokrishna Panda, Mr Burnham's gomusta – the agent responsible for the shipping of indentured migrants. Paulette had seen him about the house a few times, usually carrying armloads of paper for Mr Burnham's perusal – but never before had he presented himself so early in the morning and nor had he ever summoned the courage to bring his caranchie up the main driveway, to the front door.

Paulette guessed that there would be no one about to let the Baboo in at this hour: this was the one time of day when the outdoors durwauns could be counted on to fall asleep, while the indoors khidmutgars would not yet have risen from their charpoys. Always eager to make herself useful, she went flying down the stairs, and after a brief struggle with the brass latches, pushed the durwauza open to find the gomusta standing outside.

The gomusta was a man of middle age, with cheeks that hung down as if weighted with gloom; he was stout in girth, with dark shapeless ears that stuck out from his huge head like outgrowths of fungus on a mossy rock. Although he still had a full head of hair, his brow was shaven clean, while the locks at the back of his head were braided into a long, priestly tikki. The Baboo was clearly surprised to see her and even though he smiled and dipped his head, in a gesture that was at once a greeting and a signal of submission, she sensed a hesitation in his manner and guessed that it had something to do with an uncertainty about her situation: was she to be treated as an extension of the Burnham family or was she an employee or dependant, not unlike himself? To set him at ease, she joined her hands in the Indian way, and was about to say, in Bengali – Nomoshkar Nobokrishno-babu – when she recalled, just in time, that the gomusta preferred to be spoken to in English, and liked to be addressed by the anglice of his name, which was Nob Kissin Pander.

'Please but enter, Baboo Nob Kissin,' she said, stepping well away from the door to let him in. Noticing the three lines of sandalwood paste on his forehead, she quickly dropped the hand she had almost offered in greeting: the gomusta was a fervent devotee of Sri Krishna, she recalled, and as a celibate Seeker, he might well look askance upon a woman's touch.

'Miss Lambert, you are well today?' he said, as he came in, nodding and bobbing his head, while also stepping backwards to maintain a safe distance from the possible pollutions of Paulette's person. 'Motions were not loose, I hope?'

'Why no, Baboo Nob Kissin. I am very well. And you?'

'I have come running like anything,' he said. 'Master only has told to reach message – his caique-boat is urgently required.'

Paulette nodded. 'I will send word to the boatmen.'

'That will be most appreciable.'

Looking over her shoulder, Paulette noticed that a khidmutgar had entered the hallway. She sent him off to alert the boatmen and led Baboo Nob Kissin towards the small withdrawing room where visitors and petitioners were usually seated before being admitted to Mr Burnham's presence.

'Perhaps you would like to attend here until the boat is ready?' she said. She was about to close the door when she noticed, somewhat to her alarm, that the gomusta's expression had changed: baring his teeth in a smile, he shook his head in such a way as to set his tikki wagging.

'Oh Miss Lambert,' he said, in a strangely ardent voice, 'so many times I'm coming to Bethel and always I am wanting to meet and raise up one matter. But never you are lonely with me one minute also – how to commence discussions?'

She drew back, startled. 'But Baboo Nob Kissin,' she said. 'If there is anything you wish to say to me, surely it can be said all in the open?'

'That you only can be judging, Miss Lambert,' he said, and his tikki danced in such a comical way that Paulette could not but bite back a laugh.

Paulette was not alone in seeing something absurd in the gomusta: many years and thousands of miles later, when Baboo Nob Kissin Pander found his way into Deeti's shrine, his was the only likeness to figure as a caricature, a great potato of a head sprouting two fernlike ears. Yet Nob Kissin Pander was always full of surprises, as Paulette was imminently to discover. Now, from the pocket of his black jacket, he pulled out a small object that was wrapped in cloth. 'Only one minute, Miss: then you dekho.'

Laying the bundle on his palm, he began to undo the folds, very fastidiously, using just the tips of his fingers, without once touching the thing itself. When the wrappings had been undone and the object lay nested in a bed of cloth, he extended his palm towards Paulette, moving his arm slowly, as if to remind her not to approach too close: 'Kindly do not catch.' Despite the distance, Paulette recognized instantly the tiny face that smiled up at her from the gold-framed locket in the gomusta's palm; it was an enamelled miniature of a woman with dark hair and grey eyes – her mother, whom she had lost at the very moment of her birth and of whom she possessed no other token or likeness.

Paulette glanced at the gomusta in confusion: 'But Baboo Nob Kissin!' After her father's death, she had looked for the miniature everywhere, without success, and had been forced to conclude that it had been stolen, in the confusion that befell the house after his sudden passing. 'But how you have found this? Where?'

'Lambert-sahib only gave,' said the gomusta. 'Just one week before shifting to heavenly-abode. His conditions were extremely parlous; hands were trembling like anything and tongue was also coated. Rigorous constipation must have been there, but still he is reaching to my daftar, in Kidderpore. Just imagine!'

She recalled the day, in a clarity of detail that brought tears to her eyes: her father had told her to summon Jodu and his boat and when she asked why, his answer was that he had business in the city and needed to cross the river. She had demanded to know what business he might have that she couldn't see to, but he gave her no answer, insisting that Jodu be called. She'd watched as Jodu's boat made its way slowly across the river: when they were almost at the far side, she was surprised to see that they were heading not towards the centre of the city but to the docks at Kidderpore. What business could he have there? She could not imagine, and he never answered her questions about it; not even Jodu could do anything to enlighten her, upon their return. All he could tell her was that her father had left him to wait in his boat, while he disappeared into the bazar.

'That time was not his first to my chamber,' the gomusta said. 'As such, many sahibs and mems are coming when some funds are required. They give some jewelleries and trinkets for disposal. Lambert-sahib graced with his presence only two-three times, but he is not like others – not loocher, not gambler, not shrubber. For him, difficulty is that he is too-much good-hearted, all the time doing charities and giving up funds. Naturally many villains are taking advantage…'

This description was neither unjust nor inaccurate, Paulette knew, but that was not how she chose to remember her father: for of course the great majority of those who benefited from his kindness were people desperately in need – waifs and urchins, porters crippled by their loads and boatmen who had lost their boats. And even now, after being thrown into the care of people who were, after all, strangers, no matter how kind, she could not bring herself to reproach her father for the greatest of his virtues, the one thing she had loved in him most. But yes, it was also true, and there was no denying it, that her lot would have been different if he had been – like most other Europeans in the city – bent upon his own enrichment.

'Lambert-sahib always discussing with me in Bangla,' the gomusta continued. 'But I am always replying in chaste English.'

But now as if to belie his own pronouncement, he surprised Paulette by switching to Bengali. With the change of language, she noticed, a weight of care seemed to lift from his huge, sagging face: Shunun. Listen: when your father came to me for money, I knew, even without his saying so, that he would be giving it away to some beggar or cripple. I'd say to him: 'Arre Lambert-shaheb, I've seen many a Christian trying to buy his way into heaven, but I've never come across one who worked as hard at it as you do.' He'd laugh like a child – he liked to laugh, your father – but not this time. This time there was no laughter, and hardly a word was said before he stretched out his hand and asked: How much will you give me for this, Nob Kissin Baboo? I knew at once that it was of great value to him; I could tell from the way he held it – but of course, such is the evil of this age that things that are of value to us are not necessarily so to the world at large. Not wishing to disappoint him, I said: 'Lambert-sahib, tell me, what is the money for? How much do you need?' 'Not much,' was his answer, 'just enough for a passage back to France.' I said, in surprise: 'For yourself, Lambert-sahib?' He shook his head. 'No,' he said, 'for my daughter, Putli. Just in case something happens to me. I want to be sure she has the means to return. Without me this city would be no place for her.'

The gomusta's fist closed on the locket as he broke off to glance again at his watch. Your father, Miss Lambert – how well he knew our language. I used to marvel as I listened to him speak…

But now, even as the gomusta continued, in the same sonorous tones, Paulette heard his words as though they were being spoken by her father, in French:… a child of Nature, that is what she is, my daughter Paulette. As you know I have educated her myself, in the innocent tranquillity of the Botanical Gardens. She has had no teacher other than myself, and has never worshipped at any altar except that of Nature; the trees have been her Scripture and the Earth her Revelation. She has not known anything but Love, Equality and Freedom: I have raised her to revel in that state of liberty that is Nature itself. If she remains here, in the colonies, most particularly in a city like this, where Europe hides its shame and its greed, all that awaits her is degradation: the whites of this town will tear her apart, like vultures and foxes, fighting over a corpse. She will be an innocent thrown before the money-changers who pass themselves off as men of God…

'Stop!' Paulette raised her hands to her ears, as if to shut out her father's voice. How wrong he was! How mistaken he had always been in his understanding of her, making her into that which he himself wished to be, rather than seeing her for the ordinary creature that she was. Yet, even as she chafed against his judgement, Paulette's eyes misted over at the thought of those childhood years, when she and her father had lived with Jodu and Tantima, as though their bungalow were an island of innocence in a sea of corruption.

She shook her head, as if to rid herself of a dream: So what did you tell him then, Nob Kissin Baboo – about the worth of the locket?

The gomusta smiled, tugging at his tikki. 'After careful considerations I clarified that passage to France, even in steerage, would definitely be costing more than this locket. Maybe two-three similar items would be required. For the cost of this one he could send only up to Mareech-díp.'

Mareech-díp? She wrinkled her eyebrows, wondering what place he could be thinking of: the expression meant 'pepper-island' but she had never heard it used before. Where is that?

'The Mauritius Islands, they call in English.'

O les îles Maurice? cried Paulette. 'But that is where my mother was born.'

'That is what he told,' the gomusta said, with a thin smile. 'He said: Let Paulette go to Mauritius – it is like her native-place. There she can cope up with the joys and agonies of life.'

And then? Did you get him the money?

'I told him to come back after some days and funds would be there. But how he is to come? Expired, no, after one week?' The gomusta sighed. 'Even before, I could tell that his conditions were already parlous. Eyes were red and tongue was wheatish colour, indicating stoppages of bowels-movement. I advised to him: Lambert-sahib, just for some days, kindly refrain from meat-eating – vegetarian stool is easier to pass. But no doubt he ignored, leading to untimely demise. After that I had too much difficulties in obtaining back the item. The moneylender had already delivered at pawnshop; and so on and so forth. But as you see, now it is again in my possession.'

Only then did it occur to Paulette that he need not have told her any of this: he could have kept the money for himself and she would never have known any better. 'I am truly grateful to you for bringing back the locket, Nob Kissin Baboo,' she said. Unthinkingly she extended a hand towards his arm, only to see him back away as if from a hissing snake. 'I do not know how you to remercy.'

The gomusta's head reared in indignation and he switched back to Bengali: What do you think, Miss Lambert? Do you think I would keep something that is not my own? I may be man of commerce in your eyes, Miss – and in this age of evil, who is not? – but are you aware that eleven generations of my ancestors have been pandas at one of Nabadwip's most famous temples? One of my forefathers was initiated into the love of Krishna by Shri Chaitanya himself. I alone was not able to fulfil my destiny: it is my misfortune…

'Even now I am searching Lord Krishna left and right,' continued the gomusta. 'But what to do? He is not heeding…'

But even as he was extending his hand towards Paulette's open palm, the gomusta hesitated and drew back his arm. 'And the interest? My means are deficient, Miss Lambert, and I am saving for higher purpose – to build temple.'

'You shall have the money, never fear,' said Paulette. She saw a look of doubt enter the gomusta's eyes, as though he were already beginning to rethink his generosity. 'But you must let me have the locket: it is my mother's only picture.'

Now, in the distance, she heard a footfall that she knew to be the sound of the khidmutgar returning from the boathouse. This made her suddenly desperate, for it mattered very much to her that no one at Bethel should know of this dealing between herself and Mr Burnham's gomusta – not because she took any pleasure in deceiving her benefactor, but only because she did not wish to provide them with any further material for their recurrent indictments of her father and his godless, improvident ways. She lowered her voice and whispered urgently in English: 'Please Baboo Nob Kissin; please, I beg you…'

At this, as if to remind himself of his better instincts, the gomusta reached up and gave his tikki a tug. Then, opening his fingers, he allowed the cloth-wrapped locket to fall into Paulette's waiting hands. He stepped back just as the door opened to admit the khidmutgar, who had returned to let them know that the boat was ready.

'Come, Baboo Nob Kissin,' said Paulette, making an effort to be cheerful. 'I will walk you to the boathouse. Come: to there one goes!'

As they were walking through the house, towards the garden, Baboo Nob Kissin came suddenly to a halt beside a window that looked towards the river: he raised his hand to point and Paulette saw that a ship had entered the rectangular frame – the chequered flag of the Burnham firm was clearly visible on the vessel's mainmast.

'Ibis is there!' cried Baboo Nob Kissin. 'At last, by Jove! Master waiting, waiting, all the time breaking my head and collaring me – why my ship is not coming? Now he will rejoice.'

Paulette flung open a door and went hurrying across the garden towards the riverfront. Mr Burnham was standing on the schooner's quarter-deck, waving a hat triumphantly in the direction of Bethel. He was answered by the crew of the caique, who waved back from the boathouse.

While the men were waving, on ship and shore, Paulette's gaze strayed towards the river and she caught sight of a dinghy that seemed to have come loose from its moorings: it was floating adrift, with no one at the helm. Caught by the river's current, it had been pulled out to midstream and was on its way to a collision with the oncoming schooner.

Paulette choked on her breath as she looked more closely: even from that distance, the boat looked very much like Jodu's. Of course there were hundreds of similar dinghies on the Hooghly – yet, there was only one that she herself had known intimately: that was the boat on which she was born and on which her mother had died; it was the boat she had played in as a child and in which she had travelled with her father, to collect specimens in the mangrove forests. She recognized the thatch, the crooked turn of the prow, and the stubby jut of the stern: no, there could be no doubt that it was Jodu's boat, and it was just a few yards from the Ibis, in imminent danger of being rammed by its knife-edged cutwater.

In a desperate attempt to avoid a collision, she began to mill her arms through the air, shouting as loud as she could. 'Look out! Dekho! Dekho! Attention!'

After weeks of anxious wakefulness at his mother's side, Jodu had slept so deeply as to be unaware that his boat had slipped its moorings and was drifting out into mid-river, right into the path of the ocean-going ships that were using the incoming tide to make their way to Calcutta. The Ibis was almost upon him when the flapping of her foretopsail roused him; the sight that met his eyes was so unexpected that he could not immediately respond: he lay motionless in the boat, his gaze locked on the protruding bill of the vessel's carved figurehead, which seemed now to be bearing directly down on him, as if to snatch him from the water like prey.

Lying as he was, flat on his back, on the bamboo slats of his dinghy, Jodu could have been an offering to the river, set afloat on a raft of leaves by some pious pilgrim – yet he did not fail to recognize that this was no ordinary ship bearing down on him, but an iskuner of the new kind, a 'gosi ka jahaz', with agil-peechil ringeen rather than square sails. Only the trikat-gavi was open to the wind and it was this distant patch of canvas that had woken him as it filled and emptied with the early morning breeze. Some half-dozen lascars sat perched like birds on the crosswise purwan of the trikatdol, while on the tootuk beneath the serang and the tindals were waving as if to catch Jodu's attention. He could tell, because their mouths were open, that they were shouting too, although nothing was audible of their voices because of the sound of the wave created by the ship's knife-like taliyamar as it cut through the water.

The iskuner was so close now that he could see the green glint of the copper that sheathed the taliyamar; he could even see the shells of the siyala-insects that were clinging to the wet, slime-covered surface of the wood. If his boat were to take the impact of the taliyamar squarely in its flank, it would split, he knew, like a bundle of twigs hit by a falling axe; he himself would be pulled under by the suction of the wake. All this while, the long oar that served as the dinghy's rudder was only a step and a stretch away – but by the time he leapt to put his shoulder to the handle, it was too late to significantly alter the boat's course; he was able to turn it just enough so that instead of being hit smack in the middle, the boat bounced off the hull of the Ibis. The impact rolled the dinghy steeply to one side, at exactly the moment when the ship's bow-wave was crashing down on it, like a breaker on a beach; the hemp ropes snapped under the weight of the water, and the logs flew apart. As the boat was disintegrating under him, Jodu managed to catch hold of one of the logs; he clung on as it bobbed under and back again to the top. When his head was clear of the water, he saw that he had floated almost to the stern of the ship, along with the rest of the wreckage; now he could feel the powerful suction of the awari beginning to tug at the log he was holding on to.

'Here! Here!' he heard a voice shouting in English, and looked up to see a curly-haired man, whirling a weighted rope above his head. The line snaked out and Jodu succeeded in getting a grip on it just as the ship's stern was sweeping past, sucking the remains of his boat under its keel. The turbulence spun him around and around, but in such a way as to wrap the rope securely around him, so that when the sailor began to pull, at the other end of the line, his body broke quickly free of the water and he was able to use his feet to scramble up the iskuner's side and over the bulwark, to collapse in a heap on the after-tootuk.

While lying on the scrubbed planks, coughing and spluttering, Jodu became aware of a voice, speaking to him in English, and he looked up to see the bright-eyed face of the man who had thrown him the rope. He was kneeling beside him, saying something incomprehensible; arrayed behind him were the looming figures of two sahibs, one tall and bearded, the other big-bellied and bewhiskered: the latter was armed with a cane, which he was tapping excitedly on the tootuk. Fixed as he was, under the scrutiny of the sahibs' eyes, Jodu became suddenly aware that he was naked except for the thin, cotton gamchha that was wrapped around his waist. Lowering his chest to his knees, he hunched his body into a defensive huddle and tried to shut their voices out of his head. But soon enough he heard them calling out the name of one Serang Ali; then a hand fell on his neck, forcing him to look up into a sternly venerable face, with a thin moustache.

Tera nám kyá? What's your name? said the serang.

Jodu, he said, and added quickly, in case this sounded too childish: That's what people call me, but my good-name is Azad – Azad Naskar.

Zikri Malum's gone to get some clothes for you, continued the serang, in broken Hindusthani. You go below deck and wait. Don't need you under our feet while we're berthing.

Keeping his head lowered, Jodu followed Serang Ali off the quarter-deck and through the staring phalanx of the crew, to the hatch that led down to the 'tween-deck. There's the dabusa, said the serang. Stay down there till you're sent for.

Standing on the lip of the dabusa, with his feet on the ladder, Jodu became aware of a sickly, fetid odour, welling upwards from the darkness below: it was a smell that was at once offensive and disturbing, familiar and unrecognizable, and it became stronger as he descended. When he reached the bottom of the ladder, he looked around and saw that he had entered a shallow, empty space, unlit but for the shaft of light that was pouring through the open hatch. Although as wide as the vessel, the dabusa had a close, cramped feel – partly because its ceiling was not much taller than a man, but also because it was divided, by timber ribs, into open compartments, like cattle-pens. As his eyes became accustomed to the dim light, Jodu stepped warily into one of these pens and immediately stubbed his toe upon a heavy iron chain. Falling to his knees, he discovered that there were several such chains in the pen, nailed into the far beam: they ended in bracelet-like clasps, each fitted with eyeholes, for locks. The weight and heft of the chains made Jodu wonder what sort of cargo they were intended to restrain: it occurred to him that they might be meant for livestock – and yet the stench that permeated the hold was not that of cows, horses or goats; it was more a human odour, compounded of sweat, urine, excrement and vomit; the smell had leached so deep into the timbers as to have become ineradicable. He picked up one of the chains, and on looking more closely at the bracelet-like clasps, he became convinced that it was indeed meant for a human wrist or ankle. Now, running his hands along the floor, he saw that there were smooth depressions in the wood, of a shape and size that could only have been made by human beings, over prolonged periods of time. The depressions were so close to each other as to suggest a great press of people, packed close together, like merchandise on a vendor's counter. What kind of vessel would be equipped and outfitted to carry human beings in this way? And why had the serang sent him, Jodu, down here to wait, out of sight of other people? Suddenly he remembered stories, told on the river, of devil-ships that would descend on the coast to kidnap entire villages – the victims were eaten alive, or so the rumour went. Like an invasion of ghosts, unnamed apprehensions rushed into his mind; he pushed himself into a corner and sat shivering, falling gradually into a trance-like state of shock.

The spell was broken by the sound of someone coming down the hatch: Jodu focused his eyes on the ladder, expecting to see Serang Ali – or perhaps the curly-haired man who'd thrown him the rope. But he saw, instead, the figure of a woman, dressed in a long, dark gown and a close-fitting bonnet that kept her face hidden. The thought of being discovered, almost naked, by this unknown memsahib prompted him to slip quickly into another pen. He tried to hide himself, by flattening his body against the bulwark, but his foot struck a chain, sending a rattle of iron through the cavern of the hold. Jodu froze as the memsahib's shoes came tapping towards him. Suddenly he heard his own name spoken: Jodu? The whisper echoed through the hold as the bonneted face stepped around a beam and came closer: Jodu? The woman paused to remove the bonnet and he found himself looking into a familiar face.

It's just me, Putli. Paulette smiled into his wide-eyed, disbelieving face: Aren't you going to say anything?

In his cabin, up on the quarter-deck, Zachary was upending a ditty-bag on his bunk, looking for some clothes to give to Jodu, when along with a heap of banyans, shirts and trowsers, something he had long given up for lost came tumbling out – his old penny-whistle. Zachary grinned as he reached for it: this was beyond praise, it seemed like a sign, a portent of good things to come. Forgetting all about the errand that had brought him to his cabin he put the whistle to his lips and began to play 'Heave Away Cheerily', one of his favourite sea-shanties.

It was this tune, as much as the sound of the instrument, that arrested Baboo Nob Kissin's hand just as it was about to knock on the cabin door. He froze, listening intently, and soon every inch of his upraised arm was prickling with gooseflesh.

For more than a year now, ever since the untimely death of the woman who had been his spiritual preceptor and Guru-ma, Baboo Nob Kissin's heart had been filled with premonitory foreboding: Ma Taramony, as she was known to her disciples, had promised him that his awakening was at hand and had told him to watch carefully for its signs, which were sure to be manifested in the unlikeliest places and in the most improbable forms. He had promised her that he would do his best to keep his mind open, and his senses watchful, so that the signs would not elude him when they were revealed – yet, now, despite his best efforts, he could not believe the evidence of his own ears. Was it really a flute, Lord Krishna's own instrument, that had started to play, just as he, Nob Kissin Pander, stepped up to the door of this cabin and raised his hand? It seemed impossible, but there could be no denying it – just as there was no denying that the tune, although unfamiliar in itself, was set to Gurjari, one of the most favoured ragas for the singing of the Dark Lord's songs. So long, and so anxiously, had Baboo Nob Kissin awaited the sign that now, as the tune breathed itself to an end and a hand made itself heard on the doorknob inside, he fell to his knees and covered his eyes, trembling in fear of what was imminently to be revealed.

This was why Zachary all but tripped over the gomusta's kneeling body as he made to leave his cabin with a banyan and a pair of trowsers tucked under his arm. 'Hey!' he said, gaping in surprise at the stout, dhoti-clad man who was crouching in the gangway with his hands over his eyes. 'What the hell you doin down there?'

Like the leaves of some shrinking, touch-averse plant, the gomusta's fingers prised themselves apart, to allow a full view of the figure that had appeared in front of him. His first response was one of intense disappointment: he had heeded well his preceptor's warning, that the message of awakening might be delivered by the unlikeliest of messengers, but he still could not bring himself to believe that Krishna – whose very name meant 'black' and whose darkness had been celebrated in thousands of songs, poems and names – would choose as his emissary someone of so pale a cast of countenance, one who showed no trace of the monsoonal tint of Ghanshyam, the Cloud-Dark Lord. And yet, even as he was yielding to his disappointment, Baboo Nob Kissin could not help but notice that the face was comely, not unbecoming of an emissary of the Slayer of Milkmaids' Hearts, and the eyes were dark and quick, so that it was not too great a stretch to imagine them as night-birds drinking from the moonlit pool of a maiden's love-thirsty lips. And surely it was, if not quite a sign, then at least a minor indication that his shirt was yellowish, of the same colour as the clothes in which the Joyful Lord was known to disport himself with the lovelorn girls of Brindavan? And it was true too that the shirt was stained with sweat, as Careless Krishna's was said to be after the fatigue of a tumultuous love-making. Could it be, then, that this ivory-tinted Rupa was exactly what Ma Taramony had warned him of: a Guise, wrapped in veils of illusion by the Divine Prankster, so as to test the quality of his devotee's faith? But even then, surely there would be some additional sign, some other mark…?

The gomusta's protuberant eyes started further forward in his head as a pale hand came winding down to help him to his feet. Could this be a limb blessed by the Butter-Thieving Lord himself? Snatching at the proffered limb, Baboo Nob Kissin turned it over, examining the palm, the lines, the knuckles – but nowhere was a trace of darkness to be seen except beneath the nails.

The intensity of this scrutiny, and the eye-rolling that accompanied it, caused Zachary no little alarm. 'Hey, quit that!' he said. 'What're you lookin at?'

Choking back his disappointment, the gomusta released the hand. No matter: if the Guise was who he thought him to be, then a sign was sure to be concealed somewhere else on his person – it was just a question of guessing where it was. A thought occurred to him: could it be that to compound the deception, the Master of Mischief had chosen to give his emissary an attribute that belonged properly to the Blue-Throated Lord – Shiva NeelKunth?

In the urgency of the moment, this seemed self-evident to Nob Kissin Baboo: heaving himself tremulously to his feet, the gomusta made a grab at the fastened collar of Zachary's shirt.

Startled as he was by the gomusta's lunge, Zachary was quick enough to slap his hand away. 'What you gettin up to?' he cried in disgust. 'You crazy or somethin?'

Chastened, the gomusta dropped his hands. 'Nothing, sir,' he said, 'just only searching to see if kunth is blue.'

'If what is what?' Raising his fists, Zachary squared his shoulders. 'You cussin me now?'

The gomusta shrank back in dread, amazed at the dexterity with which the Guise had assumed the Warrior's stance. 'Please sir – no offence. Myself only Burnham-sahib's accountant. Good-name is Baboo Nob Kissin Pander.'

'And what're you doin here, on the quarter-deck?'

'Burra sahib has sent to get ship's papers from your kind self. Logs, crew manifests, all-type papers are required for insurance purposes.'

'Wait here,' said Zachary gruffly, slipping back into his cuddy. He had prepared the papers already, so it took no more than a moment to fetch them. 'Here they are.'

'Thank you, sir.'

Zachary was disconcerted to note that the gomusta was still examining his throat with all the intensity of a professional strangler. 'You'd best be on your way, Pander,' he said curtly. 'I've got other business to take care of now.'

In the gloom of the dabusa, Jodu and Paulette were holding each other tight, as they so often had in their childhood, except that they had never then had to reach around the stiff, crackling barrier of a dress like the one she was now wearing.

He scratched the rim of her bonnet with a fingernail: You look so different…

He had half-expected that she wouldn't understand, that she had lost her Bengali since he'd seen her last. But when she answered it was in the same language: You think I look different? she said. But it's you who's changed. Where were you all this while?

I was in the village, he said. With Ma. She was very sick.

She gave a start of surprise: Oh? And how is Tantima now?

He buried his face in her shoulder and she felt a tremor running up the sinews of his back. Suddenly alarmed, she pulled his nearly naked body still closer, trying to warm him with her arms. His loincloth was still wet and she could feel the dampness seeping through the folds of her dress. Jodu! she said. What's happened? Is Tantima all right? Tell me.

She died, said Jodu through his clenched teeth. Two nights ago…

She died! Now Paulette lowered her head too, so that they each had their noses buried in the other's neck. I can't believe it, she whispered, wiping her eyes on his skin.

She was thinking of you to the last, said Jodu, sniffing. You were always…

He was cut short by a cough and the clearing of a throat.

Paulette felt Jodu stiffen even before the sound of the intrusion reached her ears. Pulling free of his arms, she spun around and found herself face-to-face with a sharp-eyed, curly-haired young man in a faded yellow shirt.

Zachary too was taken utterly by surprise, but he was the first to recover. 'Hullo there, Miss,' he said, sticking out a hand. 'I'm Zachary Reid, the second mate.'

'I'm Paulette Lambert,' she managed to say, as she was shaking his hand. Then in a rush of confusion, she added: 'I witnessed the mishap from the rivage, and I came to see what had happened to the unfortunate victim. I was much concerned about his fate…'

'So I see,' said Zachary drily.

Now, looking into Zachary's eyes, Paulette's mind brimmed over with wild imaginings of what he must think of her, and of what Mr Burnham would do when he learnt that his memsahib-in-the-making had been discovered in an embrace with a native boatman. A stream of exonerating lies tumbled through her head: that she had fainted because of the stench of the 'tween-deck, that she had stumbled in the darkness: but none of these would be as convincing, she knew, as to say that Jodu had assaulted her and taken her unawares – and that she could never do.

But oddly, Zachary did not seem to be disposed to make much of what he had seen: far from giving vent to an explosion of sahibish outrage, he was going quietly about the errand that had brought him to the 'tween-deck, which was to hand Jodu a set of clothes – a shirt and a pair of canvas trowsers.

After Jodu had stepped away to change, it was Zachary who broke the awkward silence: 'I take it you're acquainted with this gawpus of a boatman?'

Faced with this, Paulette could not bring herself to mouth any of the fictions that were bubbling in her head. 'Mr Reid,' she said, 'you were no doubt shocked to find me in an embracement of such intimacy with a native. But I assure you there is nothing compromising. I am able to explicate all.'

'Not necessary,' said Zachary.

'But yes indeed, I must explain,' she said. 'If for no other reason, then only to show you the depth of my gratitude for your saving of him. You see, Jodu, who you rescued, is the son of the woman who brought me up. Our growing was together; he is like my brother. It was as a sister that I was holding him, for he has suffered a great loss. He is the only family I have in this world. All this will seem strange to you no doubt…'

'Not at all,' he said, shaking his head. 'Miss Lambert, I know very well how such a connection might arise.'

She noticed that there was a tremor in his voice, as if to indicate that her story had touched a chord in him. She laid a hand on his arm. 'But please,' she said guiltily, 'you must not speak of it to others. There are some, you know, who might look askance upon the chouteries of a memsahib and a boatman.'

'I'm good with secrets, Miss Lambert,' he said. 'I won't blow the gaff on you. You can be sure of that.'

Paulette heard a footfall behind her and turned away to find Jodu standing there, dressed in a blue sailor's banyan and a pair of old canvas trowsers. This was the first time Paulette had ever seen him in anything but lungis and gamchhas, vests and chadars – and because she was looking at him anew she saw also how much he had changed since she had seen him last: he had grown leaner, taller, stronger, and she could see in his face the shadow of what he had almost become, a man, and thus necessarily a stranger: this was deeply unsettling, for she could not imagine that she would ever know anyone as well as she had known Jodu. In other circumstances, she would have started at once to tease him, with the peculiar savagery they had always reserved for each other, when either of them had shown signs of taking too long a step outside the boundaries of their intimate universe: what a setting-to they would have had, a fierce bout of baiting and mockery that would have ended in slaps and scratches – but here, constrained by Zachary's presence, all she could do was give him a smile and a nod.

As for Jodu, his eyes went from Paulette's face to Zachary's and he knew at once, from the stiffness of their attitudes, that something of significance had passed between them. Having lost everything he owned, he had no qualms in using their new-found friendship to his advantage. O ké bol to ré, he said in Bengali to Paulette: Tell him to find me a place on this ship's lashkar. Tell him I have nowhere to go, nowhere to live – and it's their fault, for running down my boat…

Here Zachary broke in. 'What's he saying?'

'He says that he would like to gain a place on this ship,' said Paulette. 'Now that his boat is destroyed, he has nowhere to go…'

As she was speaking, her hands had risen to toy with the ribbons of her bonnet: in her awkwardness she presented a picture that was so arresting to Zachary's starved eyes that there was nothing he would not have done for her at that moment. She was, he knew, the boon promised by the rediscovery of his penny-whistle, and if she had asked him to throw himself at her feet or take a running jump into the river, he would have paused only to say: 'Watch me do it.' An eager flush rose to his face as he said: 'Consider it done, Miss: you can count on me. I will speak to our serang. A place on the crew won't be hard to arrange.'

Just then, as if summoned by the mention of his office, Serang Ali came stepping down the ladder. Zachary lost no time in drawing him aside: 'This fellow here is out of a job. Since we've sunk his boat and given him a laundering, I think we have to take him on, as a ship's-boy.' Here, Zachary's eyes strayed back to Paulette, who flashed him a smile of gratitude. Neither this, nor the shy grin with which it was reciprocated, eluded Serang Ali's notice; his eyes narrowed in suspicion.

'Malum hab cuttee he head?' he said. 'What for wanchee this-piece boy? He blongi boat-bugger – no can learn ship-pijjin. Better he wailo chop-chop.'

Zachary's voice hardened. 'Serang Ali,' he said sharply; 'I don need no explateratin here: I'd like you to do this, please.'

Serang Ali's eyes darted resentfully from Paulette to Jodu before he gave his reluctant assent. 'Sabbi. Fixee alla propa.'

'Thank you,' said Zachary with a nod, and his chin rose in pride as Paulette stepped up to whisper in his ear: 'You are too kind, Mr Reid. I feel I should give you an explanation more complete – for what you have seen, of me and Jodu.'

He gave her a smile that made her sway on her feet. 'You don't owe me no explanation,' he said softly.

'But maybe we can speak – as friends, perhaps?'

'I would be…'

Then suddenly Mr Doughty's voice went booming through the hold: 'Is that the gooby you fished out of the water today, Reid?' His eyes bulged as they took in Jodu's newly clothed form. 'Well I'll be damned if the blackguard hasn't squeezed his wedding-tackle into a pair of trowsers? There he was, a naked little cockup half a puhur ago, and now he's tricked out like a wordy-wallah!'

'Ah! I see you've met,' said Mr Burnham as Zachary and Paulette emerged from the booby-hatch into the heat of the sunlit deck.

'Yes, sir,' said Zachary, taking good care to keep his eyes away from Paulette, who was holding her bonnet over the spot where her dress had been dampened by Jodu's wet loincloth.

'Good,' said Mr Burnham, reaching for the ladder that led to his caique. 'And now we must be off. Come along now – Doughty, Paulette. You too, Baboo Nob Kissin.'

At the mention of this name Zachary glanced over his shoulder and was perturbed to see that the gomusta had cornered Serang Ali and was conferring with him in a manner so furtive, and with so many glances in his own direction, that there could be no doubt of who was being talked about. But the annoyance of this was not enough to eclipse his pleasure in shaking Paulette's hand again. 'Hope we'll meet again soon, Miss Lambert,' he said softly as he released his hold on her fingers.

'Me also, Mr Reid,' she said, lowering her eyes. 'It would give me much pleasure.'

Zachary lingered on deck until the caique had faded completely from view, trying to fix in his mind the lineaments of Paulette's face, the sound of her voice, the leaf-scented smell of her hair. It was not till much later that he remembered to ask Serang Ali about his conversation with the gomusta: 'What was that man talkin to you about – what's his name? Pander?'

Serang Ali directed a contemptuous jet of spit over the deck rail. 'That bugger blongi too muchi foolo,' he said. 'Wanchi sabbi allo foolo thing.'

'Like what?'

'He ask: Malum Zikri likee milk? Likee ghee? Ever hab stole butter?'

'Butter?' Zachary began to wonder whether the gomusta was not some kind of investigator, looking into a report of misplaced or manarveled provisions. Yet, why would he concern himself with butter of all things? 'Why the hell'd he ask bout that?'

Serang Ali tapped his knuckles on his head. 'He blongi too muchi sassy bugger.'

'What'd you tell him?'

'Told: how-fashion Malum Zikri drinki milk in ship? How can catch cow on sea?'

'Was that all?'

Serang Ali shook his head. 'Also he ask – hab Malum ever changi colour?'

'Change colour?' Suddenly Zachary's knuckles tightened on the deck rail. 'What the devil did he mean?'

'He say: Sometimes Malum Zikri turn blue, no?'

'And what'd you say?'

'I say: maski, how-fashion Malum blue can be? He is sahib no? Pink, red, all can do – but blue no can.'

'Why's he asking all these questions?' said Zachary. 'What's he up to?'

'No need worry,' said Serang Ali. 'He too muchi foolo.'

Zachary shook his head. 'I don't know,' he said. 'He may not be as much of a fool as you think.'

Deeti's intuition that her husband would not be able to go back to work was soon confirmed. Hukam Singh's condition, after his seizure at the factory, was so enfeebled that he had not the strength to protest even when she took away his pipe and his brass box. But instead of initiating an improvement, deprivation provoked a dramatic turn for the worse: he could neither eat nor sleep and he soiled himself so often that his bed had to be moved out of doors. Drifting in and out of consciousness, he would scowl and mutter in incoherent rage: Deeti knew that if he had possessed the strength, he would not have stopped at killing her.

A week later, Holi arrived, bringing neither colour nor laughter to Deeti's home: with Hukam Singh muttering deliriously, on his bed, she did not have the heart to step outside. In Chandan Singh's house, across the fields, people were drinking bhang and shouting 'Holi hai!' The joyful cheers prompted Deeti to send her daughter over, to join in the fun – but even Kabutri had no appetite for merrymaking and was back within the hour.

As much to keep up her own spirits as to ease her husband's suffering, Deeti exerted herself to find a cure. First she brought in an ojha to exorcize the house and when this produced no effect, she consulted a hakim, who purveyed Yunani medicines, and a vaid who practised Ayurveda. The doctors spent long hours sitting at Hukam Singh's bedside and consumed great quantities of satua and dalpuris; they dug their fingertips into the patient's stick-like wrists and exclaimed over his pallid skin; they prescribed expensive medicines, made with gold foil and shavings of ivory, to obtain which Deeti had to sell several of her bangles and nose-rings. When the treatments failed, they confided secretly that Hukam Singh was not long for this world, one way or another – why not ease his passage by allowing him a taste of the drug his body craved? Deeti had decided never to return her husband's pipe and she was true to her resolve; but she relented to the point where she allowed him a few mouthfuls of akbari opium to chew on every day. These doses were not enough to bring him to his feet, but they did ease his suffering and for Deeti, it was a relief to look into his eyes and know that he had slipped away from the mundane pains of the world and escaped into that other, more vivid reality where Holi never ceased and spring arrived afresh every day. If that was what was necessary to postpone the prospect of widowhood, then she was not the woman to flinch from it.

In the meanwhile there was the harvest to attend to: within a short frame of time each poppy would have to be individually incised and bled of its sap; the coagulated gum would then have to be scraped off and collected in earthenware gharas, to be taken to the factory. It was slow, painstaking work, impossible for a woman and child to undertake on their own. Being unwilling to ask for her brother-in-law's help, Deeti was forced to hire a half-dozen hands, agreeing to pay them in kind when the harvest was done. While they were at work she had often to be away, to attend to her husband, and thus could not keep as close a watch as she would have liked: the result, predictably, was that her tally of sap-filled jars was a third less than she had expected. After paying the workers, she decided it wouldn't be wise to entrust the delivery of her jars to anyone else: she sent word to Kalua to come around with his oxcart.

By this time Deeti had abandoned the thought of paying for a new roof with the proceeds of her poppies: she would have been content to earn enough to provide provisions for the season, with perhaps a handful or two of cowries for other expenses. The best she could hope for, she knew, was to come away from the factory with a couple of silver rupees; with luck, depending on the prices in the bazar, she might then have two or three copper dumrees left – maybe even as much as an adhela, to spend on a new sari for Kabutri.

But a rude surprise was waiting at the Carcanna: after her gharas of opium had been weighed, counted and tested, Deeti was shown the account book for Hukam Singh's plot of land. It turned out that at the start of the season, her husband had taken a much larger advance than she had thought: now, the meagre proceeds were barely enough to cover his debt. She looked disbelievingly at the discoloured coins that were laid before her: Aho se ka karwat? she cried. Just six dams for the whole harvest? It's not enough to feed a child, let alone a family.

The muharir behind the counter was a Bengali, with heavy jowls and a cataract of a frown. He answered her not in her native Bhojpuri, but in a mincing, citified Hindi: Do what others are doing, he snapped. Go to the moneylender. Sell your sons. Send them off to Mareech. It's not as if you don't have any choices.

I have no sons to sell, said Deeti.

Then sell your land, said the clerk, growing peevish. You people always come here and talk about being hungry, but tell me, who's ever seen a peasant starve? You just like to complain, all the time khichir-michir…

On the way home, Deeti decided to stop at the bazar anyway: having hired Kalua's cart, it made no sense now to return without any provisions. As it turned out, she was able to afford no more than a two-maund sack of broken rice, thirty seers of the cheapest arhar dal, a couple of tolas of mustard oil and a few chittacks of salt. Her frugality was not lost on the shopkeeper who happened to be also a prominent seth and moneylender. What's happened-ji, O my sister-in-law? he said, with a show of concern. Do you need a few nice bright Benarsi rupees to see you through till the shravan harvest?

Deeti resisted the offer till she thought of Kabutri: after all, the girl had just a few years left at home – why make her live through them in hunger? She gave in and agreed to place the impression of her thumb on the seth's account book in exchange for six months' worth of wheat, oil and gurh. Only as she was leaving did it occur to her to ask how much she owed and what the interest was. The seth's answers took her breath away: his rates were such that her debt would double every six months; in a few years, all the land would be forfeit. Better to eat weeds than to take such a loan: she tried to return the goods but it was too late. I have your thumbprint now, said the seth, gloating. There's nothing to be done.

On the way home Deeti sat bowed with worry and forgot about Kalua's fare. By the time she remembered he was long gone. But why hadn't he reminded her? Had things come to the point where she had become an object of pity for a carrion-eating keeper of oxen?

Inevitably, word of Deeti's plight filtered across the fields to Chandan Singh, who appeared at her door with a sackful of nourishing satua. For her daughter's sake, if not her own, Deeti could not refuse, but once having accepted, nor could she shut the door on her brother-in-law with the same finality as before. After this, on the pretext of visiting his brother, Chandan Singh took to invading her home with increasing frequency. Although he had never before shown any interest in Hukam Singh's condition, he now began to insist on his right to enter the house in order to sit beside his brother's bed. But once past the door, he paid no attention to his brother and had eyes only for Deeti: even as he was entering he would brush his hand against her thigh. Sitting on his brother's bed, he would look at her and fondle himself through the folds of his dhoti; when Deeti knelt to feed Hukam Singh, he would lean so close as to brush her breasts with his knees and elbows. His advances became so aggressive that Deeti took to hiding a small knife in the folds of her sari, fearing that he might attack her, right on her husband's bed.

The assault, when it came, was not physical, but rather an admission and an argument. He cornered her inside the very room where her husband was lying supine on his bed. Listen to me, Kabutri-ki-ma, he said. You know very well how your daughter was conceived – why pretend? You know that you would be childless today if not for me.

Be quiet, she cried. I won't listen to another word.

It's only the truth. He nodded dismissively at his brother's bed. He couldn't have done it then any more than he can now. It was me; no one else. And that is why I say to you: wouldn't it be best for you to do willingly now what you did before without your knowledge? Your husband and I are brothers after all, of the same flesh and blood. Where is the shame? Why should you waste your looks and your youth on a man who cannot enjoy them? Besides, the time is short while your husband is still alive – if you conceive a son while he is still living, he will be his father's rightful heir. Hukam Singh's land will pass to him and no one will have the right to dispute it. But you know yourself that as things stand now, my brother's land and his house will become mine on his death. Jekar khet, tekar dhán – he who owns the land, owns the rice. When I become master of this house, how will you get by except at my pleasure?

With the back of his hand, he wiped the corners of his mouth: This is what I say to you, Kabutri-ki-ma: why not do willingly now what you will be compelled to do a short while hence? Don't you see that I'm offering you your best hope for the future? If you keep me happy, you will be well looked after.

There was a part of Deeti's mind that acknowledged the reasonableness of this proposal – but by this time her loathing of her brother-in-law had reached such a pitch that she knew she would not be able to make her own body obey the terms of the bargain, even if she were to accede to it. Following her instincts, she dug her elbow into his bony chest and pushed him aside; baring just enough of her face to expose her eyes, she bit the hem of her sari, drawing it aslant across her face. What kind of devil, she said, can speak like this in front of his own dying brother? Listen to my words: I will burn on my husband's pyre rather than give myself to you.

He drew back a step and his slack mouth curled into a mocking smile. Words are cheap, he said. Do you think it's easy for a worthless woman like you to die as a sati? Have you forgotten that your body ceased to be pure on the day of your wedding?

All the more reason then, she said, to burn it in the fire. And it will be easier than to live as you say.

Big-big words, he said. But don't depend on me to stop you, if you try to make yourself a sati. Why should I? To have a sati in the family will make us famous. We'll build a temple for you and grow rich on the offerings. But women like you are all words: when the time comes, you'll escape to your family.

Dikhatwa! We'll see, she said, slamming the door in his face.

Once the idea had been planted in her mind, Deeti could think of little else: better by far to die a celebrated death than to be dependent on Chandan Singh, or even to return to her own village, to live out her days as a shameful burden on her brother and her kin. The more she thought about it, the more persuasive the case – even where it concerned Kabutri. It was not as if she could promise her daughter a better life by staying alive as the mistress and 'keep' of a man of no account, like Chandan Singh. Precisely because he was her daughter's natural father, he would never allow the girl to be the equal of his other children – and his wife would do everything in her power to punish the child for her parentage. If she remained here, Kabutri would be little more than a servant and working-woman for her cousins; far better to send her back to her brother's village, to be brought up with his children – a lone child would not be a burden. Deeti had always got on well with her brother's wife, and knew that she would treat her daughter well. When looked at in this way, it seemed to Deeti that to go on living would be nothing more than selfishness – she could only be an impediment to her daughter's happiness.

A few days later, with Hukam Singh's condition growing steadily worse, she learnt that some distant relatives were travelling to the village where she was born: they agreed readily when she asked them to deliver her daughter to the house of her brother, Havildar Kesri Singh, the sepoy. The boat was to leave in a few hours and the pressure of time made it possible for Deeti to remain dry-eyed and composed as she tied Kabutri's scant few pieces of clothing in a bundle. Among her few remaining pieces of jewellery were an anklet and a bangle: these she fastened on her daughter, with instructions to hand them over to her aunt: She'll look after them for you.

Kabutri was overjoyed at the prospect of visiting her cousins and living in a household filled with children. How long will I stay there? she asked.

Until your father gets better. I'll come to get you.

When the boat sailed away, with Kabutri in it, it was as if Deeti's last connection with life had been severed. From that moment she knew no further hesitation: with her habitual care, she set about making plans for her own end. Of all her concerns, perhaps the least pressing was that of being consumed by the cremation fire: a few mouthfuls of opium, she knew, would render her insensible to the pain.