The Hungry Tide

by Amitav Ghosh

  We were just schoolmasters, most of the men had families, children. We quailed; we went to the shore to drop off the people we had pulled from the water and then we turned back.

  My pen is out of ink and I must switch to my pencil stub. Every footstep I hear is a reminder that Kusum and Horen will soon be back, and that Horen will want to leave at once. But I cannot stop. There’s too much to tell.

  WORDS

  ENSCONCED IN Nirmal’s study, Kanai forgot about dinner. He was still reading when the compound’s generator shut down and the lights went off. He knew there was a kerosene lamp somewhere in the study, and he was fumbling for it in the dark when he heard a footfall in the doorway.

  “Kanai-babu?”

  It was Moyna, holding a candle. “Do you need a match?” she said. “I came to get the tiffin carrier and saw you still hadn’t eaten.”

  “I was on my way down,” said Kanai. “I was just looking for the hurricane lamp.”

  “There it is.”

  Moyna went over to the lamp, candle in hand, and snapped back the glass cover. She was trying to light the wick when her hands slipped, sending both the lamp and the candle crashing to the floor. The glass shattered and the study was suddenly filled with the acrid smell of kerosene.

  The candle had rolled into a corner and although the flame was out, Kanai saw that the wick was still glowing. “Quick.” Falling to his knees, he lunged for the candle. “Pinch out the wick or it’ll set fire to the kerosene. The whole place will burn down.”

  He took the candle out of Moyna’s hands and squeezed the glowing wick between finger and thumb. “It’s all right — it’s out now. We just have to sweep up the glass.”

  “I’ll do it, Kanai-babu,” she said.

  “It’ll be quicker if we both do it.” Kneeling beside her, Kanai began to brush his hands gingerly over the floor.

  “Why did you let your dinner get cold, Kanai-babu?” Moyna said. “Why didn’t you eat?”

  “I was busy getting ready for tomorrow,” Kanai said. “You know we’re leaving early in the morning? I’m going too.”

  “Yes,” said Moyna, “I heard. And I’m glad you’re going, Kanaibabu.”

  “Why?” said Kanai. “Are you tired of bringing me my meals?”

  “No,” she said. “It’s not that.”

  “Then?”

  “I’m just glad that you’ll be there, Kanai-babu; that they won’t be alone.”

  “Who?”

  “The two of them.” Her voice was suddenly serious.

  “You mean Fokir and Piya?”

  “Who else, Kanai-babu? I was really relieved when I heard you were going to be with them. To tell you the truth, I was hoping you would talk to him a little.”

  “To Fokir? Talk about what?”

  “About her — the American,” Moyna said. “Maybe you could explain to him that she’s only here for a few days — that she’s going to be gone soon.”

  “But he knows that, doesn’t he?”

  He could hear her sari rustling in the darkness as she pulled it tightly around herself. “It would be good for him to hear it from you, Kanai-babu. Who knows what he’s begun to expect — especially when she’s giving him so much money? Maybe you could speak with her too — just to explain she would do him harm if she made him forget himself.”

  “But why me, Moyna?” Kanai said. “What can I say?”

  “Kanai-babu, there’s no one else who knows how to speak to both of them — to her and to him. It’s you who stands between them: whatever they say to each other will go through your ears and your lips. But for you neither of them will know what is in the mind of the other. Their words will be in your hands and you can make them mean what you will.”

  “I don’t understand, Moyna,” Kanai said, frowning. “What are you saying? What exactly are you afraid of ?”

  “She’s a woman, Kanai-babu.” Moyna’s voice sank to a whisper. “And he’s a man.”

  Kanai glared at her in the dark. “I’m a man too, Moyna,” he said. “If she had to choose between me and Fokir, who do you think it would be?”

  Moyna’s reply was noncommittal and slow in coming: “How am I to know what she has in her heart, Kanai-babu?”

  Her hesitation provoked Kanai. “And you, Moyna? Whom would you choose, if you could?”

  Moyna said quietly, “What are you asking, Kanai-babu? Fokir is my husband.”

  “But you’re such a bright, capable girl, Moyna,” said Kanai insistently. “Why don’t you forget about Fokir? Can’t you see that as long as you’re with him you’ll never be able to achieve anything?”

  “He’s my son’s father, Kanai-babu,” Moyna said. “I can’t turn my back on him. If I do, what will become of him?”

  Kanai laughed. “Moyna, it’s true he’s your husband — but then why can’t you talk to him yourself ? Why do you want me to do it for you?”

  “It’s because he’s my husband that I can’t talk to him, Kanai-babu,” Moyna said quietly. “Only a stranger can put such things into words.”

  “Why should it be easier for a stranger than for you?”

  “Because words are just air, Kanai-babu,” Moyna said. “When the wind blows on the water, you see ripples and waves, but the real river lies beneath, unseen and unheard. You can’t blow on the water’s surface from below, Kanai-babu. Only someone who’s outside can do that, someone like you.”

  Kanai laughed again. “Words may be air, Moyna, but you have a nice way with them.”

  He stood up and went to the desk. “Tell me, Moyna, don’t you ever wonder what it would be like to be with a different kind of man? Aren’t you ever curious?”

  He had said it in a light, mocking way, and this time he succeeded in provoking her.

  She rose angrily to her feet. “Kanai-babu, you’re making a fool of me, aren’t you? You want me to say yes and then you’ll laugh in my face. You’ll tell everybody what I said. I may be a village girl, Kanaibabu, but I’m not so foolish as to answer a question like that. I can see that you play this game with every woman who crosses your path.”

  This struck home and he flinched. “Don’t be angry, Moyna,” he said. “I didn’t mean any harm.”

  He heard her sari rustling as she rose to her feet and pulled the door open. Then, in the darkness, he heard her say, “Kanai-babu, I hope it goes well for you with the American. It’ll be better for all of us that way.”

  CRIMES

  The siege went on for many days and we were powerless to affect the outcome. All we heard were rumors: that despite careful rationing, food had run out and the settlers had been reduced to eating grass. The police had destroyed the tube wells and there was no potable water left; the settlers were drinking from puddles and ponds and an epidemic of cholera had broken out.

  One of the settlers managed to get through the police cordon by swimming across the Gãral River — an amazing feat in its own right. But not content with that, the young man had somehow made his way to Calcutta, where he talked at length to the newspapers. A furor erupted, citizens’ groups filed petitions, questions were asked in the legislature, and finally the High Court ruled that barricading the settlers was illegal; the siege would have to be lifted.

  The settlers, it seemed, had won a notable victory. The day after the news reached us, I saw Horen waiting near the bãdh. Neither he nor I needed to say anything: I packed my jhola and went down to his boat. We set off.

  There was a lightness in our hearts now; we thought we would find the people of Morichjhãpi celebrating, in a spirit of vindication. But such was not the case: on getting there we saw that the siege had taken a terrible toll. And even though it had been lifted now, the police were not gone; they continued to patrol the island, urging the settlers to abandon their homes.

  It was terrible to see Kusum: her bones protruded from her skin, like the ribs of a drum, and she was too weak to rise from her mat. Fokir, young as he was, appeared to have weathered the siege in better health and it was he who
was looking after his mother.

  Summing up the situation, I assumed that Kusum had starved herself in order to feed Fokir. But the truth was not quite so simple. For much of the time, Kusum had kept Fokir indoors, fearing to let him out because of the swarming police. But from time to time he had managed to go outside and catch a few crabs and fish. These, at Kusum’s insistence, he had mainly eaten himself, while she had subsisted on a kind of wild green known as jadu-palong. Palatable enough at first, these leaves had proved deadly in the end, for they had caused severe dysentery. That, on top of the lack of proper nutrition, had been terribly debilitating.

  Fortunately, we had taken the precaution of buying some essential provisions on the way — rice, dal, oil — and we now occupied ourselves in storing these in Kusum’s dwelling. But Kusum would have none of it. She roused herself from her mat and hefted some of the bags on her shoulders. Fokir and Horen were made to pick up the others.

  “Wait,” I said. “What are you doing? Where are you taking those? They’re meant for you.”

  “I can’t keep them, Saar; we’re rationing everything. I have to take them to the leader of my ward.”

  Although I could see the point of this, I persuaded her that she did not need to part with every last handful of rice and dal. To put aside a little for herself would not be immoral, given she was a mother with a child to provide for.

  As we were measuring out the cupfuls she would keep for herself, she began to cry. The sight of her tears came as a shock to both Horen and me. Kusum had never till now shown any flagging in courage and confidence; to see her break down was unbearably painful. Fokir went to stand behind her, putting an arm around her neck, while Horen sat beside her and patted her shoulder. I alone was frozen, unable to respond except in words.

  “What is it, Kusum?” I said. “What are you thinking of?”

  “Saar,” she said, wiping her face, “the worst part was not the hunger or the thirst. It was to sit here, helpless, and listen to the policemen making their announcements, hearing them say that our lives, our existence, were worth less than dirt or dust. ‘This island has to be saved for its trees, it has to be saved for its animals, it is a part of a reserve forest, it belongs to a project to save tigers, which is paid for by people from all around the world.’ Every day, sitting here with hunger gnawing at our bellies, we would listen to these words over and over again. Who are these people, I wondered, who love animals so much that they are willing to kill us for them? Do they know what is being done in their name? Where do they live, these people? Do they have children, do they have mothers, fathers? As I thought of these things, it seemed to me that this whole world had become a place of animals, and our fault, our crime, was that we were just human beings, trying to live as human beings always have, from the water and the soil. No one could think this a crime unless they have forgotten that this is how humans have always lived — by fishing, by clearing land and by planting the soil.”

  Her words and the sight of her wasted face affected me so much — useless schoolmaster that I am — that my head reeled and I had to lie down on a mat.

  LEAVING LUSIBARI

  LUSIBARI WAS SHROUDED in the usual dawn mist when Kanai walked down the path to the hospital. Early as it was, there was already a cycle-van waiting at the gate. Kanai led it back to the Guest House and, with the driver’s help, he and Piya quickly loaded their baggage onto the van — Kanai’s suitcase, Piya’s two backpacks and a bundle of blankets and pillows they had borrowed from the Guest House.

  They set off at a brisk pace and were soon at the outskirts of Lusibari village. They had almost reached the embankment when the driver spun around in his seat and pointed ahead. “Look, something’s happening over there on the bãdh.”

  Kanai and Piya were facing backward. Craning his neck, Kanai saw that a number of people had congregated on the crest of the embankment. They were absorbed in watching some sort of spectacle or contest taking place on the other side of the earthworks: many were cheering and calling out encouragement. Leaving their baggage on the van, Kanai and Piya went up to take a look.

  The water was at a low ebb and the Megha was moored at the far end of the mudspit, alongside Fokir’s boat. The boat was the focus of the crowd’s attention: Fokir and Tutul were standing on it, along with Horen and his teenage grandson. They were tugging at a fishing line that was sizzling as it sliced through the water, turning in tight zigzag patterns.

  The catch, Kanai learned, was a shankor-machh, a stingray. Now, as Piya and Kanai stood watching, a flat gray form broke from the water and went planing through the air. Fokir and the others hung on as if they were trying to hold down a giant kite. The men had gamchhas wrapped around their hands, and with all of them exerting their weight, they slowly began to prevail against the thrashing ray: the struggle ended with Fokir leaning over the side of the boat to plunge the tip of his machete-like daa into its head.

  When the catch had been laid out on the shore, Kanai and Piya joined the crowd clustering around it. The ray was a good five feet from wingtip to wingtip, and its tail was about half as long again. Within minutes a fish seller had made a bid and Fokir had accepted. But before the catch could be carted off, Fokir raised his dá and with a single stroke cut off the tail. This he gave to Tutul, handing it over with some ceremony, as though it were a victor’s spoils.

  “What’s Tutul going to do with that?” said Piya.

  “He’ll make a toy out of it, I suppose,” said Kanai. “In the old days landlords and zamindaris used those tails as whips, to punish unruly subjects: they sting like hell. But they make good toys too. I remember I had one as a boy.”

  Just then, as Tutul was admiring his trophy, Moyna appeared before him, having pushed her way through the crowd. Taken by surprise, Tutul darted out of her reach and slipped behind his father. For fear of hurting the boy, Fokir raised his dripping dá above his head with both hands, to keep the blade out of his way. Now Tutul began to dance around his father, eluding his mother’s grasp and drawing shouts of laughter from the crowd.

  Moyna was dressed for duty, in her nurse’s uniform, a blue-bordered white sari. But by the time she finally caught hold of Tutul, her starched sari was spattered with mud and her lips were trembling in humiliation. She turned on Fokir, who dropped his eyes and raised a knuckle to brush away a trickle of blood that had dripped from the dá onto his face.

  “Didn’t I tell you to take him straight to school?” she said to Fokir in a voice taut with fury. “And instead you brought him here?”

  To the sound of a collective gasp from the crowd, Moyna wrung the stingray’s tail out of her son’s hand. Curling her arm, she flung the trophy into the river, where it was carried away by the current. The boy’s face crumpled as his mother led him away. He stumbled after her with his eyes shut, as though he were trying to blind himself to his surroundings.

  Moyna checked her step as she was passing Kanai, and their eyes met for an instant before she went running down the embankment. When she had left, Kanai turned around to find that Fokir’s eyes were on him too, sizing him up — it was as if Fokir had noticed the wordless exchange between his wife and Kanai and was trying to guess its meaning.

  Kanai was suddenly very uncomfortable. Spinning around on his heels, he said to Piya, “Come on. Let’s start unloading our luggage.”

  THE MEGHA PULLED away from Lusibari with its engine alternately sputtering and hammering; in its wake came Fokir’s boat, following fitfully as its tow rope slackened and tightened. To prevent accidental collisions, Fokir traveled in his boat rather than in the bhotbhoti: he had seated himself in the bow and was holding an oar in his hands so as to fend off the larger vessel in case it came too close to his own.

  Kanai was on the upper deck, where two deep, wood-framed chairs had been placed near the wheelhouse, in the shade of a canvas awning. Although Nirmal’s notebook was lying open on his lap, Kanai’s eyes were on Piya: he was watching her make her preparations for the work of the day.
<
br />   Piya had positioned herself to meet the wind and the sun headon, at the point where the deck tapered into a jutting prow. After garlanding herself with her binoculars, she proceeded to strap on her equipment belt with its dangling instruments. Only then did she take her stance and reach for her glasses, with her feet wide apart, swaying slightly on her legs. Although her eyes were unwavering in their focus on the water, Kanai could tell she was alert to everything happening around her, on the boat and on shore.

  As the sun mounted in the sky, the glare off the water increased in intensity until it had all but erased the seam that separated the water from the sky. Despite his sunglasses, Kanai found it hard to keep his eyes on the river — yet Piya seemed to be troubled neither by the light nor by the gusting wind: with her knees flexed to absorb the shaking of the bhotbhoti, she seemed scarcely to notice its rolling as she pivoted from side to side. Her one concession to the conditions was a sun hat, which she had opened out and placed on her head. From his position in the shade, Kanai could see her only in outline and it struck him that her silhouette was not unlike that of a cowboy, with her holsters of equipment around her hips and her widebrimmed hat.

  About midmorning there was a flurry of excitement when Fokir’s voice was heard shouting from the boat. Signaling to Horen to cut the bhotbhoti’s engine, Piya went running to the back of the deck. Kanai was quick to follow but by the time he had made his way aft the action was over.

  “What happened?”

  Piya was busy scribbling on a data sheet and didn’t look up. “Fokir spotted a Gangetic dolphin,” she said. “It was about five hundred feet astern on the starboard side. But don’t bother to look for it; you won’t see it again. It’s sounded.”

  Kanai was conscious of a twinge of disappointment. “Have you seen any other dolphins today?”

  “No,” she said cheerfully. “That was the only one. And frankly I’m not surprised, considering the noise we’re making.”