by Ruskin Bond
‘The Emperor Napoleon, of course.’
‘Of course. And this must be the Empress Josephine.’ Uncle Ken bowed to the lady beside him.
‘Actually, she’s Marie Waleska,’ said Napoleon. ‘Josephine is indisposed today.’
I was beginning to feel like Alice at the Mad Hatter’s tea party, and began tugging at Uncle Ken’s coat sleeve, whispering that we were getting late for lunch.
A turbaned warrior with a tremendous moustache loomed in front of us. ‘I’m Prithviraj Chauhan,’ he announced. ‘And I invite you to dinner at my palace.’
‘Everyone’s royalty here,’ observed Uncle Ken.
‘It’s such a privilege to be with you.’
‘Me too,’ I put in nervously.
‘Come with me, boy, and I’ll introduce you to the others.’
Prithviraj Chauhan took me by the hand and began guiding me across the lawn. ‘There are many famous men and women here. That’s Marco Polo over there. He’s just back from China. And if you don’t care for Caruso’s signing, there’s Tansen under that tamarind tree. Tamarind leaves are good for the voice, you know that of course. And that fashionable gentlemen there, he’s Lord Curzon, who used to be a viceroy. He’s talking to the Sultan of Marrakesh. Come along, I’ll introduce you to them . . . You’re the young prince of Denmark, aren’t you?’
‘Hamlet himself,’ said Uncle Ken with a wink.
Before I could refute any claims to royalty, we were intercepted by a white-coated gentleman accompanied by a white-coated assistant. They looked as though they were in charge.
‘And what are you doing here, young man?’ asked the senior of the two.
‘I’m with my uncle,’ I said, gesturing towards Uncle Ken, who approached and gave the in-charge an affable handshake.
‘And you must be Dr Freud,’ said Uncle Ken. ‘I must say this is a jolly sort of place.’
‘Actually, I’m Dr Goel. You must be the new patient we were expecting. But they should have sent you over with someone a little older than this boy. Never mind, come along to the office and we’ll have you admitted.’
Uncle Ken and I both protested that we were not potential patients but had entered the grounds by mistake. We had our bicycles to prove it! But Dr Goel would have nothing of this deception. He and his assistant linked arms with Uncle Ken and marched him off to the office, while I trailed behind, wondering if I should get on my bicycle and rush back to Granny with the terrible news that Uncle Ken had been incarcerated in a lunatic asylum.
Just then an ambulance arrived with the real patient, a school principal suffering from a persecution complex. He kept shouting that he was perfectly sane, and that his entire staff had plotted to have him put away. This might well have been true, as the staff was there in force to make sure he did not escape.
Dr Goel apologized to Uncle Ken. Uncle Ken apologized to Dr Goel. The good doctor even accompanied us to the gate. He shook hands with Uncle Ken and said, ‘I have a feeling we’ll see you here again.’ He looked hard at my uncle and added, ‘I think I’ve seen you before, sir. What did you say your name was?’
‘Geoff Boycott,’ said Uncle Ken mischievously, and rode away before they changed their minds and kept him in their ‘Rest Home’.
At Sea with Uncle Ken
With Uncle Ken, you had always to expect the unexpected. Even in the most normal circumstances, something unusual would happen to him and to those around him. He was a catalyst for confusion.
My mother should have known better than to ask him to accompany me to England, the year after I’d finished school. She felt that a boy of sixteen was a little too young to make the voyage on his own. I might get lost or lose my money or fall overboard or catch some dreadful disease. She should have realized that Uncle Ken, her brother (well spoilt by my mother and her sisters), was more likely to do all these things.
Anyway, he was put in charge of me and instructed to deliver me safely to my aunt in England, after which he could either stay there or return to India, whichever he preferred. Granny had paid for his ticket, so in effect he was getting a free holiday, which included a voyage on a posh P & O liner.
Our train journey to Bombay passed off without incident, although Uncle Ken did manage to misplace his spectacles, getting down at the station wearing someone else’s. This left him a little short-sighted, which might have accounted for his mistaking the stationmaster for a porter and instructing him to look after our luggage.
We had two days in Bombay before boarding the S.S. Strathnaver, and Uncle Ken vowed that we would enjoy ourselves. However, he was a little constrained by his budget and took me to a rather seedy hotel on Lamington Road, where we had to share a toilet with over twenty other people.
‘Never mind,’ he said. ‘We won’t spend much time in this dump.’ So he took me to Marine Drive and the Gateway of India, and then to an Irani restaurant in Colaba where we enjoyed a super dinner of curried prawns and scented rice. I don’t know if it was the curry, the prawns, or the scent, but Uncle Ken was up all night, running back and forth to that toilet, so that no one else had a chance to use it. Several dispirited travellers simply opened the windows and ejected into space, cursing Uncle Ken all the while.
He had recovered by morning and proposed a trip to the Elephanta Caves. After a breakfast of fish pickle, a Malabari chilli chutney and sweet Gujarati puris, we got into a launch, accompanied by several other tourists, and set off on our short cruise. The sea was rather choppy, and we hadn’t gone far before Uncle Ken decided to share his breakfast with the fishes of the sea. He was as green as a seaweed by the time we went ashore. Uncle Ken collapsed on the sand and refused to move, so we didn’t see much of the caves. I brought him some coconut water and he revived a bit and suggested we go on a fast until it was time to board our ship.
We were safely on board the following morning and the ship sailed majestically out from Ballard Pier, Bombay, and India receded into the distance, quite possibly forever as I wasn’t sure that I would ever return. The sea fascinated me and I remained on deck all day, gazing at small craft, passing steamers, seabirds, the distant shoreline, the surge of the waves, and of course my fellow passengers. I could well understand the fascination it held for writers such as Conrad, Stevenson, Maugham and others.
Uncle Ken, however, remained confined to his cabin. The rolling of the ship made him feel extremely ill. If he had been looking green in Bombay, he was looking yellow at sea. I took my meals in the dining saloon, where I struck up an acquaintance with a well-known palmist and fortune teller who was on his way to London to make his fortune. He looked at my hand and told me I’d never be rich, but that I’d help other people get rich.
When Uncle Ken felt better (on the third day of the voyage) he struggled up on the deck, took large lungfuls of sea air and subsided into a deckchair. He dozed the day away, but was suddenly wide awake when an attractive blonde strode past us on her way to the lounge. After some time we heard the tinkling of a piano. Intrigued, Uncle Ken rose and staggered into the lounge. The girl was at the piano playing some classical piece, which wasn’t something that Uncle Ken normally enjoyed. But he was smitten by the girl’s good looks and stood enraptured. His eyes gleaming brightly, his jaw sagging with his nose pressed against the glass of the lounge door, he reminded me of a goldfish who has fallen in love with an angel fish that has just been introduced into the tank.
‘What is she playing?’ he whispered, aware that I had grown up on my father’s classical record collection.
‘Rachmaninoff,’ I made a guess. ‘Or maybe Rimsky-Korsakov!’
‘Something easier to pronounce,’ he begged.
‘Chopin,’ I said.
‘And what’s his most famous composition?’
‘Polonaise in A Flat. Or maybe it’s A Major.’
He pushed open the lounge door, walked in, and when the girl had finished playing, applauded loudly. She acknowledged his applause with a smile, and then went on to play something else. When she
had finished he clapped again and said, ‘Wonderful! Chopin never sounded better!’
‘Actually, it’s Tchaikovsky,’ said the girl. But she didn’t seem to mind.
Uncle Ken would turn up at all her practice sessions, and very soon they were strolling the decks together. She was Australian, on her way to London to pursue a musical career as a concert pianist. I don’t know what she saw in Uncle Ken, but he was good at giving people the impression that he knew all the right people. And he was quite good looking in an effete sort of way.
Left to my own devices, I followed my fortune-telling friend around and watched him study the palms of our fellow passengers. He foretold romance, travel, success, happiness, health, wealth and longevity, but never predicted anything that might upset anyone. As he did not charge anything (he was, after all, on holiday) he proved to be a popular passenger throughout the voyage. Later he was to become quite famous as a palmist and mind-reader, an Indian ‘Cheiro’, much in demand in the capitals of Europe.
The voyage lasted eighteen days, with stops for passengers and cargo at Aden, Port Said and Marseilles, in that order. It was at Port Said that Uncle Ken and his friend went ashore, to look at the sights and do some shopping.
‘You stay on the ship,’ Uncle Ken told me. ‘Port Said isn’t safe for young boys.’
He wanted the girl all to himself, of course. He couldn’t have shown off with me around. His ‘man of the world’ manner would not have been very convincing in my presence.
The ship was due to sail again that evening and passengers had to be back on board an hour before departure. The hours passed easily enough for me, as the little library kept me engrossed. If there are books around, I am never bored. Towards evening I went up on deck and saw Uncle Ken’s friend coming up the gangway, but of Uncle Ken there was no sign.
‘Where’s Uncle?’ I asked her.
‘Hasn’t he returned? We got separated in a busy marketplace and I thought he’d get here before me.’
We stood at the railings and looked up and down the pier, expecting to see Uncle Ken among the other returning passengers. But he did not turn up.
‘I suppose he’s looking for you,’ I said. ‘He’ll miss the boat if he doesn’t hurry.’
The ship’s hooter sounded. ‘All aboard,’ called the captain on his megaphone. The big ship moved slowly out of the harbour. We were on our way! In the distance I saw a figure that looked like Uncle Ken running along the pier, frantically waving his arms. But there was no turning back.
A few days later my aunt met me at Tilbury Dock.
‘Where’s your Uncle Ken?’ she asked.
‘He stayed behind at Port Said. He went ashore and didn’t get back in time.’
‘Just like Ken. And I don’t suppose he has much money with him. Well, if he gets in touch we’ll send him a postal order.’
But Uncle Ken failed to get in touch. He was a topic of discussion for several days, while I settled down in my aunt’s house and looked for a job. At seventeen I was working in an office, earning a modest salary and contributing towards my aunt’s housekeeping expenses. There was no time to worry about Uncle Ken’s whereabouts.
My readers know that I longed to return to India, but it was nearly four years before that became possible. Finally I did come home and, as the train drew into Dehra’s little station, I looked out of the window and saw a familiar figure on the platform. It was Uncle Ken!
He made no reference to his disappearance at Port Said, and greeted me as though we had last seen each other the previous day.
‘I’ve hired a cycle for you,’ he said. ‘Feel like a ride?’
‘Let me get home first, Uncle Ken. I’ve got all this luggage.’
The luggage was piled into a tonga, I sat on top of everything, and we went clip-clop down an avenue of familiar litchi trees. Uncle Ken rode behind the tonga, whistling cheerfully.
‘When did you get back to Dehra?’ I asked.
‘Oh, a couple of years ago. Sorry I missed the boat. Was the girl upset?’
‘She said she’d never forgive you.’
‘Oh well, I expect she’s better off without me. Fine piano player. Chopin and all that stuff.’
‘Did Granny send you the money to come home?’
‘No dear, I had to take a job working as a waiter in a Greek restaurant. Then I took tourists to look at the pyramids. I’m an expert on pyramids now. Great place, Egypt. But I had to leave when they found I had no papers or permit. They put me on a boat to Aden. Stayed in Aden six months teaching English to the son of a sheikh. Sheikh’s son went to England, I came back to India.’
‘And what are you doing now, Uncle Ken?’
‘Thinking of starting a poultry farm; lots of space behind your Granny’s house. Maybe you can help me with it.’
‘I couldn’t save much money, Uncle.’
‘We’ll start in a small way; there’s a big demand for eggs, you know. Everyone’s into eggs—scrambled, fried, poached or boiled. Egg curry for lunch. Omelettes with dinner. Egg sandwiches for tea. How do you like your egg?’
‘Fried,’ I said. ‘Sunny side up.’
The poultry farm never did happen, but it was good to be back in Dehra, with the prospect of limitless bicycle rides with Uncle Ken.
The Regimental Myna
In my great-grandfather’s time, British soldiers stationed in India were very fond of keeping pets, and there were very few barrack rooms where pets were not to be found. Dogs and cats were the most common, but birds were also great favourites.
In one instance, a bird was not only the pet of a barrack room but of a whole regiment. His owner was my great-grandfather, Private Bond, a soldier of the line who had come out to India with the King’s Own Scottish Rifles.
The bird was a myna, common enough in India, and Great-grandfather named it Dickens after his favourite author. Dickens came into Great-grandfather’s possession when quite young, and he was soon a favourite with all the men in the barracks at Meerut where the regiment was stationed. Meerut was hot and dusty; the curries were hot and spicy; the General in command was hot-tempered and crusty. Keeping a pet was almost the sole recreation for the men in barracks.
Because he was tamed so young, Dickens (or Dicky, for short) never learned to pick up food for himself. Instead, just like a baby bird, he took his meals from Great-grandfather’s mouth. And other men used to feed him in the same way. When Dickens was hungry, he asked for food by sitting on Great-grandfather’s shoulders, flapping his wings rapidly and opening his beak.
Dicky was never caged, and as soon as he was able to fly he attended all parades, watched the rations being issued and was present on every occasion which brought the soldiers out of their barracks. When out in the country, he would follow the regiment or party, flying from shoulder to shoulder or from tree to tree, always keeping a sharp lookout for his enemies, the hawks.
Sometimes he would choose a mounted officer as a companion; but after the manoeuvres were over, he would return to Great-grandfather’s shoulder.
One day there was to be a General’s inspection, and the Colonel gave orders that Dicky was to be confined, so that he wouldn’t appear on parade.
‘Lock him away somewhere, Bond,’ the Colonel snapped. ‘We can’t have him flapping all over the parade ground.’
Dickens was put into a storeroom, with the windows closed and the door locked. But while the General’s inspection was going on, the mess orderly, who wanted something from the storeroom and knew where to find the key, opened the door.
Out flew Dickens. He made straight for the parade ground, greatly excited at being late and chattering loudly.
Dicky must have thought the General had something to do with his detention, or else he may have felt an explanation was due to him. Whatever his reasoning, he chose to alight on the General’s pith helmet, between the plumes.
Here he chattered faster than ever, much to the surprise of the General, who was obliged to take his helmet off before he could
dislodge the bird.
‘What the dickens!’ exclaimed the General, going purple in the face, for Dicky had discharged his breakfast between the plumes of the helmet.
Meanwhile, Dicky had flown to the Colonel’s shoulder to make further complaints, to the great delight of the men.
‘Fall out, Bond!’ the Colonel screamed. ‘Take this bird away—for good! I don’t want to see it again!’
A crestfallen Private Bond returned to the barracks with Dicky, wondering what to do next. To part with Dicky, or even to cage him, was out of the question.
But Great-grandfather was not the only one who loved Dickens. He was also highly popular with the entire battalion. In the end, Great-grandfather decided to ask his Captain to bring him before the Colonel so he could ask forgiveness for Dicky’s behaviour.
The Colonel gave Private Bond and his Captain a patient hearing. Then the Colonel consulted his officers and decided that the bird could stay—provided he was taken on as a serving member of the regiment!
Dickens’s popularity was not surprising, as he was highly intelligent. He knew the men of his own regiment from those of others, and would only associate with Scottish Rifles. Even in the drill season, when there were as many as twenty regiments in camp, Dicky never made a mistake.
Dickens had a unique method of getting from one part of the camp to another. Instead of flying over the top of the camp, he would go in stages from tent to tent, flying very low, sheltering in each one, then peeping out and looking carefully for hawks before moving on to the next.
One day Great-grandfather was admitted to hospital with malaria. Dicky couldn’t find him anywhere, and searched and searched all over the camp in great distress. The hospital was a couple of kilometres from the barracks, and it wasn’t until the third day of searching that Dickens finally discovered Great-grandfather lying there.
From then on, for as long as Great-grandfather was on the sick list, Dicky spent his time at the hospital. An upturned helmet was placed on a shelf for him near Great-grandfather’s bed, and Dickens spent the night inside it. As soon as Great-grandfather was discharged from the hospital, Dickens left as well and never returned, not even for a visit.