The Dancer and the Raja

by Javier Moro

  Anita spends as much time as possible with her parents. Although they seem happy to see their daughter and have their grandchildren there, she can see they are very worried about Victoria’s situation.

  “Couldn’t you have persuaded her to come with you?” Doña Candelaria asks, the tension in her face reflecting her deep concern.

  “No, she thinks the war will be over in a few weeks. And she doesn’t want to leave her husband.”

  “You always said he was full of hot air, but you didn’t go far enough. He’s a good-for-nothing. And the worst thing is that she still doesn’t see it.”

  “Love is blind, Mother.”

  “At least you’ve been lucky. This prince of yours is a real charmer. Even though we don’t see each other from one end of the year to the next, at least we know you’re all right. Why are you going off to America so soon …? Can’t you stay a bit longer with us?”

  “We can’t, Mother. But next year Ajit and I will come to spend the holidays.”

  Anita is not paying much attention to her mother’s words. Her mind is on something else. There is a question she is burning to ask.

  “Mother,” she says, interrupting her, “it’s very important for you to answer truthfully what I’m going to ask you … When you set up my marriage to the maharaja, did he tell you he was married … and that he already had four wives?”

  Doña Candelaria feels awkward. She tightens the strap on her bag. The question puts her on the spot.

  “He did tell me. Not only did he tell me, but he insisted I should tell you. But I didn’t. He told me he would never leave his wives because he had a duty toward them, but that he would treat you like a European wife, that you would never lack for anything, and that he would do everything in his power to make you happy.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “So as not to scare you.”

  At Anita’s look of tremendous disappointment, Doña Candelaria rushes to explain things. “Your father and I were in a desperate situation and …”

  “Don’t, Mother. It’s best if you don’t say any more.”

  Anita does not want to hear any more. She stands there looking at her mother as if she did not know her, as if at that moment she had just discovered who she was for the first time. She does not even feel resentful toward her; suddenly she just feels tremendously weary. That night when she goes to bed, she dries her tears on the pillowcase. She still has a taste of bitterness in her mouth: the taste of loneliness. Until today she thought she could only feel it in India and that it had to do with being uprooted, but she has just realized that it is inside her, like an incurable disease.

  PART FIVE

  The Sweet Crime of Love

  38

  The war goes on. It is not a matter of weeks or months, as Anita’s sister, and even Clémenceau himself, thought, but of years. Those who predicted a lightning victory for the Allies have had to moderate their enthusiasm in view of the Germans’ fierce offensive. During the trip around the United States, Anita receives very worrying news from Paris: her sister’s husband has abandoned her. The American has left her high and dry at the worst possible moment, when France is under the threat of famine, and she is about to give birth to her fourth child. And to top it all, he has run off with Carmen, the girl who helped around the house, an Andalusian girl who is underage and is a protégée of the Delgados. And to round things off, the girl is pregnant. A real gentleman, this Mr. Winans.

  The news arrives with a big delay in Hollywood, where Anita and the maharaja get to meet the big names in the cinema. Charles Chaplin invites them to the filming of The Tramp and a filmmaker named Griffith shows them the reconstruction of ancient Babylon for a film he is making in which he wants to denounce “the intolerant behavior of mankind.” They have been to New York, where Anita has found an editor to publish a book she has written about her travels in India,24 and then on to Chicago, where the maharaja shared with Anita his memories of the Universal Exhibition of 1893. They have spent a few very pleasant weeks, far away from the awful atmosphere there is in Europe.

  But Anita is in turmoil. How can she help her sister at this difficult time? Her parents cannot do much from Spain. Even Mme Dijon, the only one who could help her out, is not in Paris. The Frenchwoman has gone back to India, where she has gotten married again, to an Englishman, a headmaster, like her first husband. Given the lack of alternatives, Anita thinks of cutting the trip short to go to Paris to be with her sister. Just the idea of suggesting that to the maharaja prevents her from sleeping, but in the end the worry that is gripping her heart is stronger.

  “Mon chéri, I think I should return to Paris … Victoria must be having a very hard time.”

  “We cannot interrupt the journey at this time. And you cannot travel on your own, it’s too dangerous.”

  “If anything happens to my sister, I would never forgive myself.”

  “Nothing’s going to happen to her. We’ll try to help her from here.”

  “She needs someone to give her a hand, someone who can send her to Spain as soon as she has the baby.”

  “Write to Kamal. He must be in Paris still. He can help her.”

  “By the time he gets the letter the war will be over …” says Anita in dismay.

  “No, because we’re going to use diplomatic channels. We’ll get the letter through to him by means of the Foreign Office bag.”

  They are in Buenos Aires when they receive a reply from Kamal, who has not wasted any time in setting to work. In the message he says he has been in touch with Benigno Macías, the Argentinian magnate who is a friend of the family, and he is happy to help Victoria. “He is trying to use his influence to get the family out of the country. The situation in Paris is very difficult. Tomorrow I’m leaving for London …” Kamal’s reply is a relief. Macías is a good person and will not leave Victoria on her own.

  Anita, calmer now, feels happy enough to enjoy what she most likes about Argentina: the tango. Those days everyone is talking about a young singer who has had so much success that he was carried through the streets of the district after his first recital at the Armenonville, the most luxurious cabaret in the city, as if he was a bullfighter. His name is Carlos Gardel and he has a voice that touches Anita’s soul:

  Swallows with fever on their wings,

  Pilgrims drunk on emotion …

  The crazy rhythm of your heart

  Always dreams of other paths …

  Traveling is more and more risky, whether by land or by sea. When Anita and Jagatjit get back to Europe, the war has spread to become worldwide. In London the King makes an appeal to the princes of India to increase their participation. The Allied offensive in the region of Alsace-Lorraine has been a failure. The French armies are withdrawing to the Seine. Shortage of supplies in the big cities forces the establishment of strict rationing. The situation is serious for the Allies.

  The maharaja reacts immediately by committing himself to recruiting a further four thousand soldiers to be sent to the French front, set up along a line 750 kilometers in length. Maharaja Ganga Singh of Bikaner takes advantage of the situation to demand greater autonomy for the Indian states and suggests they can achieve self-government. Contrary to what is expected, the British response is positive. The prince’s demands are accepted, and the English promise to see them through. All that is required is for the maharajas to agree among themselves on the way of achieving this self-government, something that, unfortunately for them, they will never do.

  After collecting Ajit, who, according to his mother, has turned into a “real little English gentleman,” they go to France with the aim of embarking from Marseilles for Bombay in the SS Persia. But first they go to Paris. The city of lights has become the city of darkness. This time, not even the rich are having fun. Everything is closed, including Benigno Macías’s cabaret. With the Germans less than a hundred kilometers
away, the city, debilitated by hunger and penury, is struggling amid poverty and fear. With her heart in her mouth at such desolation, Anita goes to Victoria’s house. The building looks abandoned. The door squeaks when she pushes it. Inside she can hear the fluttering of birds that seem to have taken refuge in the stairwell. No sooner has she gone up the first few steps than a voice calls to her, “Where are you going?”

  “I’m Mrs. Winans’s sister …”

  “Mrs. Winans isn’t here,” an older woman says stolidly. Her white hair is untidy and she is slightly bent over. “I’m Madame Dieu, the concierge … There’s no one left in the building. All the families have gone off to the country before the Boches25 get here. An Argentinian gentleman came for your sister and the children and took them away …”

  “Do you know where they’ve gone?” Anita asks.

  “Near Orleans, but they didn’t give an address. I don’t think even they knew one.”

  “Thank you,” says Anita, pushing the door, while the concierge carries on talking to herself before going into her rooms. “Soon I’ll be the only one left in the whole of Paris to be here to see the Boches arrive …!”

  Benigno Macías was a blessing, Anita says to herself, but I should have forced my sister to go back to Spain, she adds immediately, feeling guilty. Hearses, ambulances, and military trucks are driving round the streets, and all of a sudden Anita has a feeling the war will take its toll on her. Why did I leave her in a country that has been invaded, at the mercy of that damned husband of hers? she asks herself time and time again, as she goes back to the hotel, where the maharaja and his entourage are waiting for her to continue their journey.

  Marseilles is in chaos. The recent incursions of German submarines in the Mediterranean have caused problems for maritime traffic. Several ships have delayed their departure; others have cancelled. The outline of the SS Persia, belonging to the English shipping company Peninsular & Oriental, with its black hull and its two tall, black smokestacks, is a familiar sight for the maharaja. He has made a number of voyages in this elegant steamer of seventy-five hundred tons, which has a first-class section that is truly luxurious. On the last passage, in 1910, he coincided with a team of pilots and mechanics who were transporting two biplanes in which they made the first aerial exhibition flight ever done in India. It took place on the banks of the Ganges during a multitudinous religious festival that is celebrated every twelve years. While making their offerings in the holy river, more than a million of the faithful saw for the first time ever the flight of an object heavier than air that was not a bird. It was miraculous. The news reached the farthest corners of the subcontinent.

  On the day of departure, while supervising with Inder Singh the loading of the 240 trunks into the ship’s hold, a man in civilian dress who identifies himself as a British agent addresses the maharaja.

  “Highness, allow me to inform you that the Secret Service has intercepted a coded message from the German army, according to which the SS Persia could become a military target. We are advising all passengers with a British passport not to travel on this ship.”

  “But it’s about to set sail …”

  “Yes, the ship will sail, although it will vary its route as a precaution. It is also possible it is a false alarm. But my duty is to inform you. Your Highness is free to make the decision you esteem appropriate.”

  This last-minute news changes all the plans and sows consternation among the sovereign’s numerous entourage. What should be done? A couple they know well are due to be traveling on the same ship. They are English; he is an aristocrat and military man called Lord Montagu, who is going to take command of a unit of the British army in India. Known for his passion for cars, he is the director of the magazine The Car and, in spite of being married, he is traveling with his secretary, Eleanor Velasco Thornton, a woman of Spanish origin who is also his mistress. Except for a restricted circle of friends, among whom are the maharaja and Anita, they keep their relationship a secret, especially among high society in London. Eleanor is an intelligent woman of unparalleled beauty. She has everything, as Anita would say, except the social status needed to marry the man with whom she is in love. That is what Victorian England is like, the same England that also pushes Anita aside; perhaps for that reason the two women have become friends.

  But without anyone knowing it is her, the figure of Eleanor has become very popular since it has been decorating the radiator grilles of all Rolls-Royces. The idea was her lover’s, the lord’s, who has persuaded his friend, the famous sculptor Charles Sykes to design a mascot for his Silver Ghost. Sykes used Eleanor as a model for a statuette that shows a young woman wrapped in diaphanous clothing that floats back in the wind, with her index finger on her lips, the symbol of the secret of his love. He has called it Spirit of Ecstasy, and it has been so successful that Rolls-Royce has decided to install it on all its models.

  After two hours of serious discussion of the possible decisions that can be taken, the captain of the escort proposes a Solomon-style solution, which does not mean disembarking the cargo and yet maintains the security of His Highness. The best thing will be for Inder Singh to embark on the threatened ship together with most of the retinue in order to keep an eye on the cargo. Meanwhile the maharaja and his family will wait in Marseilles for the departure of the Dutch ship Prinz Due Nederland, which will sail for Egypt in two days’ time. From there they can change ships to the SS Medina, which covers the route from Cairo to Bombay. It is more difficult and longer, but safer. Lord Montagu prefers not to be separated from the British officers who are traveling on the ship, so he and Eleanor decide to leave on the SS Persia.

  The maharaja, Anita, her son, Dalima, and a reduced entourage of maids and escorts leave two days later. “It was a dangerous and tiring voyage,” Anita would write. “Nights on board were sad and worrying, always listening out for the sound of planes that might bombard us. The worst moment was when we were told of the sinking of the SS Persia.”

  On December 30, 1915, at ten past one in the afternoon and while sailing seventy miles off the coast of Crete, the ship was struck by a torpedo launched without warning from a German submarine, the U-38. The missile perforated the prow, on the portside. Five minutes later the engine boilers exploded and the ship sank with five hundred passengers on board. The world press reported the tragedy, and in Aujla, Inder Singh’s village in the heart of the Punjab, the people are very upset. The final news bulletins lament the loss of twenty-one British officers, especially the figure of Lord Montagu, the U.S. consul in Aden, Mrs. Ross, the wife of the headmaster of the Scottish school in Bombay, and four Scottish nuns who were going to Karachi. Of the others they only mention that they were second- and third-class passengers.

  Shut in her cabin, which she only leaves for meals, Anita writes in her diary: “After the worry of not knowing anything about Victoria, now we lose Inder Singh, who has always behaved like a real gentleman, and our servants. We have also been left without the Montagus. Poor Eleanor! Eighteen people in our close circle have vanished, as well as most of our luggage, trunks, and some not very important jewels. I remember those letters written by Indian soldiers who went to the front that say it is not a war, but rather the end of the world. I’m beginning to think they are right.”

  But as details begin to emerge about the shipwreck, some hopeful news is also found. Ten days after the sinking, a Chinese cargo ship, the Nung Ho, managed to rescue a hundred or so survivors. Among them is Lord Montagu, who reappears with the frightened expression of someone who has been brushed by death. Perhaps his sadness is due to the fact that he was unable to save Eleanor as they were in different places at the moment of the explosion. He was waiting for her in the dining room on deck while she was getting ready in her cabin. He reaches London the same day as his obituary is published in the newspapers. Another survivor worthy of mention is the captain of the Third Batallion of Gurkhas, E. R. Berryman, who would be decorated for
having helped keep a French lady passenger afloat while the cargo ship approached to rescue them. But the best news for the maharaja and Anita is that Inder Singh is among the survivors. He was adrift for three days holding on to a piece of wood, and after he was rescued, he was taken to a hospital in Crete where he is recovering well. “I praid to the Virgin to thank her for the double miracle, for having saved us and our dear Inder Singh,” wrote Anita.

  Days later, when the inhabitants of Aujla see the great Inder Singh appear in the maharaja’s Rolls-Royce, many of them are frightened because they think they are seeing a ghost who has come from the other world. Others are convinced that the maharaja’s supernatural powers have brought him back to life. Sitting in the porch of his bungalow, Inder Singh explains to his astonished neighbors all the details of his adventure, and they listen to him, engrossed. When he finishes telling the story, they all want to shake his hand or hug him as though to make sure they are not the victims of a hallucination. Afterward, they all celebrate together in a way never seen before in the little village. “I was given my first whiskey at the age of eleven,” Inder Singh’s grandson would say, “the day my grandfather came back to the village after we all thought he had been killed.” To commemorate such a notable event, the maharaja adopted the custom of going to Aujla every year on that date to hunt partridges.

  24 The book is written in French under the title Impressions de mes voyages en Inde (Sturgis & Walton Co., New York, 1915).

  25 Boches, a pejorative way of referring to Germans.

  39

  When her son, Ajit, goes back to England after the holidays in Kapurthala, Anita’s anguish at the fact the child is traveling alone for the first time is added to her even greater loneliness. In order to keep herself going, she dedicates all her efforts to clothing and encouraging the troops. She hates this war, which is carrying off the youngest sons of India in another country’s conflict. After what she has seen on the French front, it seems cruel to go on recruiting peasants who because they are going off to war believe they are taking part in a mythological epic like those their parents sang to them when they were little. However, all the Indian leaders push to go on helping England, including a lawyer who has just arrived from South Africa, a small, brave, indiscreet man, who lives like one of the poor and defends the homeless against the rich. Anita first heard of him from Bibi, who met him in Simla. His name is Mohandas Gandhi. In spite of being a fervent supporter of independence, he has declared that India would be nothing without the English and that helping the empire is helping India, and that Indians can only aspire to independence, or at least to self-government, in the case of an Allied victory.