The Selector of Souls

by Shauna Singh Baldwin

  After a long long moment, Kiran extends the baby boy to Damini and then begins to weep.

  This little one weighs less than Kiran’s premature girl—of course, he is Goldina’s.

  Sister Anu picks up the girl and lays her beside Kiran.

  “Damini-amma,” says Kiran from behind her handkerchief. “I’m almost thirty-seven now and Aman-ji is fifty-four. He wants his homes, his factories and businesses, the summer cottages he’s building to be inherited by his own blood, not a second son-in-law. He needs a son now, to grow up in time to train him into the businesses. He was planning such a celebration—and here I went and had another girl. I just didn’t want to disappoint him—I couldn’t disappoint him. And you know, Aman-ji is fighting his elder brother for his inheritance—without a son, who will carry on the court case after him?”

  “If you and Amanjit-ji really don’t want your little girl,” Sister Anu says, as if making an effort to be kind, but in Hindi, thereby including Damini and Goldina, “Everlasting Hope has orphanages, and we find parents who want girls. Some baby girls go to America and Canada, some to other countries. Some are even adopted in India.” “Some” sounds more optimistic than “very few,” but Damini was an amma long enough to know adopted girls can become unpaid maidservants. Sister Anu continues, “But adoption is usually necessary only if a girl-child is abandoned. And mothers who abandon children are usually terribly poor.”

  A sudden quiet comes over them. Damini gives Goldina her son.

  After all his talk about purity and defilement, Damini wonders, could Suresh lie with a Christian sweeper-woman, even one as beautiful as Goldina?

  ANU

  GOLDINA IS CROONING AND ROCKING HER INFANT SON in her arms. Sister Anu accompanies her back to the women’s ward, and checks her bleeding. After checking her pulse, temperature and blood pressure, she brings Goldina tea and rotis to replenish her calories and fluids. She stokes up the coals in the bukhari, and helps Goldina begin feeding Moses. Within half an hour, Goldina’s uterus is already responding to the feeding by contracting—praise the Lord! What complexity and planning it took to create a woman’s body and endow it with hormones that activate exactly when required.

  When she returns to the men’s ward, she finds Kiran holding the swaddled baby girl and wearing the kind of martyred look Mumma wears when thwarted in any way.

  “You’ll get used to her,” Sister Anu says to Kiran. “I was a mother who never wanted her baby, but I got used to her. And now I miss her so much.”

  Kiran shakes her head. “No one understands. I’m ruined.” She looks down at her little girl. A tear glitters on her dark lashes. Is that tear for this daughter or in regret for children she might have had with Vikas?

  “You know a Vikas Kohli?” There, the question is out.

  Kiran looks up, wariness stirring in her eyes. “There are many men of that name.”

  “Yes, but only one who came all the way here from New Delhi a few months ago, driving a saffron-orange Mercedes. Do you know him?”

  Kiran gives a wry smile. “I thought I knew him. But I didn’t.”

  “When?”

  “A long time ago, in college.”

  “Did he have a Cord Roadster?”

  “Yes,” Kiran smiles as if watching a fond memory. “He’d take me for a ride, with the top down. How do you know him? I don’t think he was ever interested in nuns.”

  Sister Anu’s scar twitches involuntarily. “You were to be married?”

  “I thought so.”

  “If you loved him, why did you agree to marry Amanjit-ji?”

  Kiran purses her lips, as if biting back words. After a long silence, she says, “Remember 1984? A Muslim neighbour came to my father’s home and warned him to leave. My father thought of taking a train out of New Delhi, but the government radio and TV stations kept repeating that “two Sikhs” had killed Madam G. They didn’t say whether they meant Sikh men or women, but the news incited violence in Kanpur, Lucknow, Patna and onward. Sikh men were pulled off a train at Lucknow and massacred. He couldn’t decide which place would be safe, so we fled to our local gurdwara, mustered up any weapons we could, and barricaded ourselves within. All the time that Madam G.’s body lay in state, mobs yelling ‘Khoon ka badla khoon!’ besieged us. They were calling for our blood though none of us killed Madam G. I used a crate of empty Coke bottles to make Molotov cocktails. For three days, Sikh men, women and even children fought side by side, holding the Hindu mobs off with kirpans and swords. Then my father cut his hair. That’s how they missed him when other Sikh men were hacked to pieces. When we returned, we found our home had been looted, our cars and Sikh servants set on fire.

  “But you don’t know about this, right? Because it didn’t affect you Hindus. Because the killings weren’t mentioned on radio or TV or in print. For my parents, all Hindus had blood on their hands.”

  “I—I’m sorry, Kiran-ji, but what does this have to do with—”

  Kiran says, “My father said if I married Vikas, I should never return. And if I didn’t cooperate—by which they meant marry a Sikh man, so I would have Sikh children—they would take me to a psychiatrist. My mother said I would be locked away. They wanted to do their dharma regardless of the effect of their actions on me. I was not Kiran to them, I was their daughter, their duty.

  “I cried for Vikas. I called, begging him to elope. He wouldn’t.” She gives a great sigh. “I don’t blame him now. His father told him he would throw him out without a dime if he married a Sikh girl. His father said, ‘The Sikhs killed our prime minister,’ as if every Sikh was guilty of the assassination of Madam G. Vikas never said his father was wrong. Either he agreed with him, or he loved his creature comforts too much to sacrifice them for love.”

  “But—aren’t Hindus and Sikhs very similar? More similar than Hindus and Christians, certainly. I have a cousin who married a Sikh man …”

  “Did she marry him after 1984?” says Kiran.

  “Before.”

  “Since the massacre, Sikh men are wearing baseball caps instead of turbans. Many have cut their hair to blend in. Vikas may use Sikh men in government travel ads so Indians look different from Pakistanis or Bangladeshis, but the Sikh men I know try to go unnoticed. Many of us have emigrated. Those who cannot are educating Sikh children to speak Hindi and English—and almost no Punjabi. Sikh families now try to marry their sons to Hindu women to make alliances with Hindu families.

  “But when I was a little girl, we Sikhs took pride in never worshipping pictures or calendars or idols—not even idols of our ten gurus. We believed our gurus were teachers, not gods and used to be proud of believing in one god—Vaheguru. But who would dream that Congress Party politicians and the police would lead Hindu mobs to our homes?”

  She stops. “Wait—how do you know Vikas drove a Cord? You know him?”

  “I was married to him,” says Sister Anu. “For almost nine years.”

  A well-tweezed eyebrow rises. “Oh, truly this is a night of revelations,” says Kiran. “First we find out you, a nun, were raped, now that you were married, and to my old boyfriend. A Bollywood scriptwriter could do no better.”

  “My rapist and your old boyfriend are one and the same.”

  Genuine confusion and surprise cloud her face. “Vikas? He was such a gentleman.”

  “He has drawing-room manners when the world is watching.” Sister Anu doesn’t succeed at keeping bitterness from her tone.

  “Well, you left him, obviously. You’re a lesbian?”

  “No,” says Sister Anu. “Nuns are celibate, not lesbians.”

  Kiran’s mouth twists in disbelief.

  “I wanted to rule myself.”

  A short sharp laugh. “As if a woman is a country! Is there a woman in the world who rules herself?”

  “You can try raising one,” says Sister Anu. “You can begin with believing your daughter is precious, even if everyone around you says she isn’t.”

  Kiran rolls her eyes.

/>   Sister Anu returns to her desk and a night-chilled cup of tea.

  Was it because Kiran’s parents showed contempt for Kiran’s wishes and decisions? No, that’s too harsh. All fathers are not as liberal as Dadu, and many parents ignore a daughter’s wishes. Yet every woman doesn’t try to switch her baby daughter for a son.

  Rejecting your baby is like rejecting a limb. How could she?

  Mothers can reject daughters in many ways, not only by starving, selling, abandoning or exchanging them for sons. Just look at Mumma.

  And what about you and Chetna? Have you rejected her or saved her by sending her to Rano? Did you feel her to be gift or burden? Every time you look at her, don’t you feel Vikas’s violence again?

  With all her anxiety for the baby girl, Sister Anu understands what it will cost Amanjit Singh and Kiran to raise and marry off not one but two girls. She wouldn’t wish that on any father, not even Vikas. In hindsight, the solution Anu proposed, adoption of a girl baby just because she is a girl, is as unjust as Kiran’s trying to exchange the girl. So Anu too has contributed to the happening of all that is happening.

  Lord, give us courage.

  How much courage? And why should a woman always have to be brave? Where are fathers like Dadu who are gladly responsible, caring and protective of the girls they create?

  Would she be asking such questions if she lived in Canada like Rano? Her neural connections are really not up to thinking this through at this hour of the morning.

  It is not only Kiran and Damini and Goldina who need healing. Every man, woman and child in this village needs healing. But if there’s one thing Sister Anu has learned while nursing, it is that healing must happen from within.

  “He loved his creature comforts too much to sacrifice them for love.” Kiran’s words rattle around in Sister Anu’s head. An image takes centre stage: Vikas, lounging in his most comfortable chair.

  Is he dead? There’s a terrible look on his face. Her blood freezes as fear grows. Now another fear rises, grows to terror. Has she killed him?

  That look, as if he died mid-sneer. O Lord, help me.

  Sounds, like leaves rustling … the image vanishes.

  God is merciful.

  Sister Anu cracks open the door of the men’s ward. An uncanny wind is blowing, carrying Kiran’s whispered words to her ears.

  Kiran is asking Damini to “look after” the girl. There is no mistaking her meaning. “Tell Aman-ji I had a miscarriage because the doctor didn’t arrive on time.”

  Sister Anu feels herself go rigid with anger and outrage. Even if Kiran owns the clinic, she can’t pressure Damini this way! Bread of Healing could be blamed for Kiran’s miscarriage. Sister Anu is about to rush in and put a stop to this nonsense.

  But wait, this is a test of Damini.

  Damini sticks one leg straight out in front of her, then the other. She regards her combat-boots. Finally, she looks up.

  “No,” she says.

  Not “No, Kiran-ji.” Just “no.”

  “See the moon?” says Damini. “I see it, and also my parents’ spirits, though they may not be visible to you. My father and mother are saying I am still your family servant. My father says obedience to you is like obedience to a husband. If I agree to do this favour for you, he says, you’ll take care of me till I escape from living. But he doesn’t know those times are gone. I’m just a labourer you pay for a few hours when you need me, and this is the age of Kaliyug.

  “My husband Piara Singh is also here. He is telling me, No. He wants me to do what’s good for my karma. He has not come to visit me in many months—he was angry at me because I did a great paap. I will take his advice. This baby has Mem-saab’s blood and spirit. I don’t have to raise this girl or arrange her marriage, but I know you can.”

  Tension releases in Sister Anu’s neck and shoulders.

  Damini holds the baby girl in her arms tenderly and croons to her. Could this kindly, caring old woman have harmed her own granddaughter? No. Anu cannot believe it.

  And would she guide young women to the Jalawaaz Fertility Clinic? Dr. Gupta said the number of infants who died before six months in Gurkot and five villages around is lower than last year. Children are more likely to survive when they’re wanted—may the Church forgive that thought. If families abort girls, they end up with wanted children only—sons. Is Damini the cause of the decrease in infant mortality?

  It’s taken so much work to bring Bread of Healing this far. Its reputation is precious. What is the compassionate thing to do? Sin and salvation seem remote to this situation—injury and healing feel more significant.

  In a small town, you believe you know people. But really, you don’t. We can’t know others, any more than I knew Vikas the night we were married off. We don’t know what others are capable of.

  There’s that image again—Vikas lounging back in his most comfortable chair, a terrible look on his face.

  I don’t even know what I am capable of.

  Outside the clinic, the bell tower shines silver, and the snow peaks are jagged as a hound’s teeth. It’s 3 a.m. and Sister Anu has left Damini sleeping beside Kiran and the baby girl. Goldina would not return baby Moses to the crib, so Sister Anu has put a towel between Goldina and the boy, so there’s less danger of Goldina smothering Moses in her sleep. Unable to sleep herself, she stands at the front gate, looking up at the jewelled parasol of the blue-black sky.

  Hard to believe all those far-flung stars were once together, that the events of this night were once compressed to a dot within them. She clasps her elbows above her head and sways, stretching cramped muscles. The universe is fertile—many things replicate and reproduce, not only people, not only stars.

  A fricative skidding startles her—a small animal dislodging tiles as it jumps to the clinic roof. A flying squirrel or the ubiquitous monkeys.

  She pulls herself together and vows that next time she’s in Shimla, she will buy a book with colour photos of mountain plants and animals. And familiar local names, rather than Latin and English ones. If she could name each animal and plant she might feel more kindly toward all of them.

  Can she do any more to help Kiran accept her baby daughter? Sister Anu’s hand rises to her heart. Like that tiny hand that once groped for her breast—you will love me, said that gesture. She remembers how, incredibly, mother-love came, after fifteen hours of labour, like a life-jolt from heaven. How she connected with a force much stronger than herself. The same force that pulled her to a bright warm light. The god-particle that connects everything in the universe. The force she yearns to reconnect with through daily prayer and her work.

  Somehow she must persuade Kiran to love the baby’s sweetness, her helplessness, to feel responsible for this little girl’s life.

  Yet a mother shouldn’t be encouraged to believe she owns her daughter or she might act like Mumma. How do you say “son of” or “daughter of” in Hindi, Punjabi or Pahari, or any of seven hundred Indian languages, without suggesting possession? Maybe children should be given temporary names, until they’re old enough to give themselves inspiring names the way Goldina did.

  A name. Even a temporary one. An inspiring name.

  Sister Anu re-enters the clinic and takes up a lighter shawl. Damini is still sitting beside Kiran in the men’s ward, the baby girl in her lap. Sister Anu wraps the shawl about her head, slips off her shoes and approaches Kiran’s bed. She reaches for the cloth-wrapped prayer book on Kiran’s nightstand.

  “Careful!” says Kiran. “That’s my gutka.”

  “I know,” says Sister Anu. Book in hand, she crosses her ankles and sinks to the dhurrie beside Kiran’s bed, “I’m opening it at random. I’m looking at the top left corner. Let me show you what your Guruji says: it’s an Arah—the letter A. The Guru says you must name the baby with the letter A. What will you call her?”

  Kiran is quiet. Then she says, “I know what you’re up to, Sister. You have no right to do this.”

  Damini says, “Anyone can r
ead the words of the Guru, men and women, high and low—even Christians.”

  She strokes the baby girl’s forehead, caresses her cheek.

  Kiran says, “This is no way to name a child. You dress up in your best clothes and jewellery, you invite guests, you sing kirtan, you distribute food and kara parshaad and sweets to the whole community, you say the Ardaas …”

  “At least temporarily,” says Sister Anu using her most persuading gentle voice. Names flash through her head like lightning. She doesn’t know very many Sikhs or Sikh names—just a few names of the Sikh gurus. But she does know that Sikh names can be for girls or boys. “Let’s call her Angad, just for now.” She pronounces it ung-ud, like the name the first Guru gave his successor.

  Another long silence.

  “Angad,” says Kiran, very low. “Piece of my body.”

  She takes the girl from Damini’s arms.

  Sister Anu reads several couplets aloud to let Kiran reacquaint herself with the verses, hesitating a little over the archaic Punjabi. Kiran’s makeup is disintegrating, her cheeks are blotchy red.

  Sister Anu looks up from the small book as she hears a car. The driver’s palm thumps the horn as it pulls to a stop before the gate. She closes the prayer book, bows slightly over it, and gives it back to Kiran, then hurries to the veranda. “The child is born and the mother is well,” she calls calmly to Amanjit Singh as he alights.

  He storms past Sister Anu, into the patients’ waiting room—“Ohé! Where’s my boy?”

  Sister Anu leads Amanjit to his wife’s bed and closes the door to the men’s ward. Let Kiran choose what she wants to tell Amanjit Singh, and let Kiran deal with the consequences.

  ANU

  SO PERTURBED IS ANU BY THE EVENTS OF THE NIGHT, she takes the 5 a.m. minibus and the 8 a.m. bus to Chhota Shimla, loyally accompanied by Bethany. At St. Anne’s, they are told Sister Imaculata is in Delhi for an interfaith conference, and Father Pashan and all the nuns are away on a rare outing to Baljees restaurant at the city centre. Two more buses and a ride in a lift up the mountain ensue. Then Sister Anu strides down the Mall from one end of Shimla to the other, closely followed by Bethany. Through the hundreds of tourists thronging the pedestrian-only central promenade, without a glance at Tibetan shawls in lean-to stalls, the antiquarian books at Maria Brothers, the chocolate biscuits displayed at Gainda Mull Hem Raj, or the high-heeled shoes in the Chinese shoemaker’s shop. Without a sniff at the fragrance of sizzling ghee and cardamom rising from Lower Bazaar, or a wrinkle of her nose at baboons sunning themselves on rooftops. Her pace slows only when she passes the Raj-era grey stone municipal buildings and nears the hole-in-the-wall Punjabi restaurant at Scandal Point. The nuns have finished lunch and are preparing for a leisurely walk back to the lift.