Travelers

by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

  “To see you,” she answered; she pinched his cheek and smiled. “Pretty, pretty.” He jerked away indignantly and that made her laugh again. “What, are you shy with your Bulbul?”

  “Are you mad coming here? My God, what trouble you will get me into.” He looked around him in fright.

  But the alley was completely deserted. Bulbul’s cart was parked at the end of it, abutting on to an abandoned building site. This too was deserted except for the owner of the cart and horse who squatted there on his haunches. He showed no sign of interest in them, only in his cigarette butt at which he pulled and puffed through his cupped hands.

  “I told a lie,” Bulbul confessed. “It is she who has sent me. Only she said don’t tell him I sent you. How she cried and cried and begged and begged, ‘Bring him to me! Bulbul, bring him!’”

  Gopi turned away from her and scowled.

  “If you had seen her, if you had heard her!” When Gopi gave no sign of relenting, she edged up close to him and whispered in his ear: “Have you forgotten? All those lovely times we had . . . in the hotel. . . .”

  Gopi drew back. He felt repelled by Bulbul’s nearness, by her breath on his ear, by her smell of betel, spices, and musty unwashed clothes. And he didn’t want to be reminded of the hotel.

  “That’s all finished now,” he said.

  “Not for her.”

  “For her also. It is all philosophical now. Philosophical and spiritual. You don’t know anything.” He made as if to jump down from the cart but Bulbul held on to him. She had skinny, tight hands that held him like a vise.

  “You think that bald old witch knows better than Bulbul?”

  “Don’t speak of Banubai like that! You are not fit to speak of her. She is a saint.”

  Bulbul spat betel juice in a practiced stream. Again Gopi tried to jump down, again she prevented him. “Come with me, we’ll go to my sweetheart. She is waiting for us.”

  This time, by being quite rough, he managed to free himself. He jumped off the cart and hurried away down the alley; he longed to be safe inside his uncle’s house again, enjoying the party with the others and smiling at their jokes. Bulbul was like a bad dream.

  She was calling after him in a loud voice. He was afraid that someone might hear and come out and find them, so he had to stop. She had got off the cart and was coming after him as fast as she could, clutching a painful hip.

  “What should I tell her? When will you come?”

  They were quite close to the little back gate leading into his uncle’s house. Gopi had to get rid of her fast. He said, “Soon.”

  “When?” Suddenly she broke into a wail. “How she will be waiting, how she will be looking out for us! Oh, I can see her before my eyes! She is suffering, suffering!”

  Gopi shushed her desperately. “I’ll come—as soon as I can.”

  “Tonight?”

  He nodded.

  “I shall wait for you. I shall be standing at the end of the road—you know where?”

  “Yes, yes.”

  “Not the river—”

  “I know.”

  “By the wall. If you don’t come—”

  “I’ll come.”

  “If you don’t, I will be here to fetch you. I shall come right into the house and I shall ask, ‘Where is Gopi?’”

  “Go now—”

  “At seven o’clock. By the wall.”

  Before leaving, she tweaked his cheek again—affectionately but also quite hard, like a warning.

  Lee

  He was very nice to Miss Charlotte. He insisted we should bring a chair for her to sit on instead of on the ground with the rest of us and he called her madam and apologized for the heat and discomfort. Afterward he talked a lot about his admiration for Jesus Christ and how really all religions are one and God is one. Miss Charlotte didn’t say much. She looked funny sitting there perched up on her chair with her hands folded in her lap and her ankles crossed. She was wearing one of her awful frocks. Whatever Swamiji said, she said “yes” and “quite” like a polite guest agreeing with the hostess. She was prim in the same way Raymond gets prim and terribly polite when he’s embarrassed or put out. Actually, the two of them sitting there seemed to sort of belong together—if only because they were so different from the rest of us. Raymond didn’t get a chair but the way he sat on the ground was quite prissy and awkward (he’s never learned to do it properly, he doesn’t know what to do with his legs). He was also the only one besides Miss Charlotte who was not wearing Indian clothes. Their faces were different too, I can’t quite say how but they didn’t have that look that everyone else in the ashram has, Evie and Margaret and all the rest whether they’re Indian or foreign (but especially foreign). I suppose it comes from meditation and all of us feeling the way we do about him.

  Then suddenly, while he was talking about Jesus Christ, Miss Charlotte asked about Margaret. Swamiji pointed at her and said, “Well, how does she look to you?” but Miss Charlotte didn’t answer that, instead she said that these diseases could be very insidious and it was impossible to tell when they might not flare up again or what they might not secretly be doing to you from inside. Margaret didn’t like Miss Charlotte talking like that, and she interrupted her to say that she was quite all right, that she had taken some Indian powders which had cured her completely. She said she felt better than she had ever felt in her whole life before. And when she said that, she looked at him, and really there was a glow in her face that I know has never been there before. But he told her to be quiet and not to interrupt Miss Charlotte. So Miss Charlotte went on to say—she spoke calmly like always but there was something stubborn in her now too—she said that it was true these Indian powders were often very efficacious, but on the other hand it happened that the disease could get a deeper grip than the patient suspected. Experience had unfortunately taught her that this was not unusual with Westerners coming to India and unaccustomed to its food or water or climate; and that in their case it was only the most powerful antibiotics that had any effect. Margaret said she didn’t believe in antibiotics. Miss Charlotte went on as if she hadn’t heard her, she said that she really must warn Margaret that not only were these diseases extremely dangerous but even, and not all that infrequently, deadly. Miss Charlotte did not pull her punches when she said that word—it came out really like death and all it meant, so that everyone was quiet for a moment. But then Margaret cried out—she sounded a bit frightened now—she cried she was all right, all right, and it wasn’t only the powders that had cured her but her own happiness too and being in spiritual harmony. Yes, said Miss Charlotte, spiritual harmony was fine, was very good, but we did live in physical bodies too and we couldn’t achieve much if we failed to look after those.

  Swamiji applauded her. He said he liked to hear such good sense spoken, and that the trouble with all of us was that we tried to live on too high a plane: higher than we deserved, he told us, affectionately but meaning it too. Now, he said, what he would like to do was to put ourselves entirely in Miss Charlotte’s capable hands and whatever Miss Charlotte said should be done about Margaret we should follow her advice. Miss Charlotte lost no time in taking up his offer and said that she would like to take Margaret back to Benares with her and show her to a doctor there.

  “I’ve seen a doctor!” Margaret said. She began to look a bit panicky.

  Miss Charlotte argued with her, tried to persuade her. It was just between the two of them, no one else said anything. Margaret kept glancing toward Swamiji, as if waiting for him to intervene. And because he didn’t—because he didn’t order her to go with Miss Charlotte as he could have done, and as we all (including perhaps Margaret herself) expected him to do—she became bolder with Miss Charlotte and at last she said definitely, “No, I’m not going, and you can’t make me go.” Then she got up and left us. And again we all waited for him to do something, to call her back perhaps, and again he didn’t. Instead he spread his arms helplessly and said to Miss Charlotte, “Now you can see with your o
wn eyes what naughty disobedient disciples I have,” and he smiled at her in his nicest, most charming manner.

  She didn’t smile back. Her face was flushed, and she was fumbling to pin up her thin little bun, which had come undone in her agitation. She told Raymond they had better go back to town or it would get too late and their driver would miss his meal. Swamiji got up off his cot and personally escorted them to their car. Miss Charlotte walked in front and busied herself in talking to me, so he had to walk behind us talking to Raymond. He was jovial and laughing, I could hear him, but Raymond was very quiet. Then I heard Swamiji say, “I think you’re cross with me, Raymond,” but Raymond caught up with Miss Charlotte and me and walked by my side, leaving Swamiji behind. I stopped still to be with Swamiji but Raymond wouldn’t let me, he drew me aside. He said, “There’s something wrong with you too.”

  I knew he had been watching me all the time. Not in curiosity but in concern. And that was the way he looked at me now too. I wanted to get away from him, but also I was terribly tempted to speak, to unburden myself.

  “Lee?” he asked, waiting for me to answer. And his voice was also full of concern—personal concern—caring for me. At that moment I was ready to open my heart: and how I longed to do so!

  But I was saved from my own weakness. I glanced away from Raymond and—yes, of course, his eyes were on me. For the first time in how long he showed a sign that he was aware of me. I left Raymond at once to go and stand beside Swamiji. He gave no further sign to me—he was busy being polite to Miss Charlotte—but I stood there and felt grateful and was able to say good-bye to Raymond cheerfully.

  Home Is Home

  Miss Charlotte did not talk much on the way back in the taxi. Raymond could see that she was disturbed but also that she was doing her best to overcome her feelings. She seemed disinclined to discuss the two girls. There was nothing that could be done for them. So Miss Charlotte struggled to resign herself to this knowledge, and after a time she appeared to have succeeded. Her face was again serene and her bun firmly pinned into place. She asked Raymond, “What do you hear from your mother?”

  “She is well, thank you.”

  “I expect,” said Miss Charlotte, “she’s beginning to look forward now to your return.” She spoke with lively pleasure as if she were putting herself in Raymond’s mother’s place and sharing her joyful anticipation.

  His mother wrote practically every day now. Her letters were full of local gossip, about her friends and activities and new books at the library, and also how she was planning to go up to town to have lunch with his Uncle Paul. She tried to make out that she was busy and contented, but between every line he knew what she was asking him. That was why nowadays her letters did not give him as much pleasure as before, and often he put off reading them.

  “As soon as I’ve settled everything in Delhi, I shall be on my way too,” Miss Charlotte said. “There are still so many little things—what a job it is to wind up! I’m getting quite impatient.”

  “Impatient to be off?”

  “Yes. I want to go home.”

  She no doubt felt Raymond’s surprise but did not for some time comment on it. They had got to the place where she was staying. It was a British-built bungalow, almost identical with the mission in Delhi, standing stolidly—in spite of age and disrepair—amid the encroachments of an overgrown garden.

  Miss Charlotte said, “When your work here is finished, then it is time to go home.”

  “But you’ve been here thirty years!”

  Miss Charlotte smiled. She said, “Still, home is home. . . .”

  An ancient servant, indistinguishable from the ancient servants at the Delhi mission, came out on the veranda to peer at them. Miss Charlotte did not yet get out, for she had more to say.

  “I’ve been enjoying myself this last month, being a tourist. It was a lovely little holiday. . . . Perhaps we’ll be going home about the same time? You’ll write and tell me, won’t you, when you’re leaving?”

  “Not just yet, Miss Charlotte.”

  “But soon?”

  The old servant opened the taxi door for her and she got out without waiting for an answer. Raymond waved to her and called that he would probably be seeing her in Delhi before she left. He drove to his hotel, where he found Gopi anxiously awaiting him.

  Lee

  Last night Margaret came to bed very late. I was still awake, lying on my bed and looking up at the corrugated sheet roof. It wasn’t quite dark, moonlight came in through the bit of dusty skylight set into the wall. Evie was asleep; and Evie sleeping is always like a person not there at all. She lies absolutely still on her back the whole night through and doesn’t even seem to be breathing. She wasn’t in the least disturbed by the noise Margaret was making. Margaret is always clumsy and drops and bumps into things, after which she curses to herself. She doesn’t usually worry about disturbing others, so I was surprised when she leaned over me and, seeing my eyes open, asked, “I didn’t wake you, did I?” However, she didn’t care much about my answer. I think she was glad I was awake so that she could share her thoughts with someone. She had a lot of thoughts, I could see. She sat on the edge of her bed and looked up to the skylight and her face, lit by the filtered moonlight, was radiant. She sighed, but with too much happiness, not pain.

  “Why aren’t you asleep?” she asked at last.

  “It’s these bedbugs.”

  She made a sound of impatience. Obviously she thought it was petty of me to be bothered by such things. I remember a time when she herself was very much bothered by them. But nowadays she never complains about anything—the bugs, or the heat, or the food—she doesn’t seem to notice them at all any more. I know she’s still sick—she doesn’t tell anyone, she tries to hide it—but I know her stomach is very bad and once when she was bathing I saw it was distended and also she had a funny sort of rash down the back of her thighs. She looks unhealthy too, there’s something wrong with the color of her skin, but somehow one doesn’t notice because of this look she has, of contentment and even bliss.

  She said, “I was with him. We were working on his itinerary.”

  I pretended I wasn’t interested. I hate her at such moments. I hate myself even more for hating her. She’s happy and I’m not, that’s all.

  “He wants to go to Copenhagen first because of a Mrs. Lund there who’s interested in the Movement. Have you been to Copenhagen?”

  When I didn’t answer, she assumed I was asleep. She lay down too, but I think she didn’t get to sleep either for a long time. I’ve noticed there are whole nights she hardly sleeps, but all the same next day she’s bright and active.

  I drag myself around. I’ve never been like this before. Everything is so strange, so dismal; it’s as if there’s no light in the sun, and those glorious Indian nights, well, they too now are dark and drab to me. Even at the hymn singing we have morning and evening when he always seems to be singling out each of us separately, even then I’m not there for him. Lately I’ve stopped joining in with the others when they sing. I just stand there silent; I don’t feel like singing. I’m sure he’s noticed—he always notices when anyone doesn’t sing fervently enough—but now with me he pretends not to. He ignores me completely. I don’t know why. I think about it all the time.

  I spoke to Evie about it. Because I couldn’t stand it any longer by myself. At first she wouldn’t say anything, she thought I was accusing him, so she turned away her face. But when I said I must have failed somewhere and wanted to know what I could do to make it right, she became more sympathetic. I asked her had he ever been like that with her—had he cut her out the way he was doing to me—and she said no; but she said it in a hesitating sort of way as if there were more she could say only she wouldn’t because it was some secret thing.

  I said, “He never speaks to me. He doesn’t look at me.”

  She asked me to be patient. She said she knew what I was going through because she’d gone through the same. I interrupted her eagerly: so he ha
d been like that with her too at one stage? But she became all shy and trembly and said no, not like that but in another way. She begged me not to ask her any questions, she said she couldn’t tell me anything more. It was something only between her and him, just as what was happening now was only between me and him. And if I could bring myself to understand that his present neglect of me was nothing but an expression of his care and love for me—if I could only accept that, then not only would my suffering be at an end but I would live in joy at my own submission. When she said that, she lowered her eyes and blushed softly. It was the first time I had seen her express so much emotion. She was even holding my hand and pressing it ever so gently. I didn’t like that much, though.

  Three Mad Crones

  At first Raymond tried to refuse Gopi. He was very reluctant to meet Bulbul by the wall. But Gopi was so frightened and pleaded so hard that in the end Raymond knew he had to go. As soon as she saw him, Bulbul made a questioning gesture and asked, “Gopi?” Raymond shook his head. She said something which he couldn’t hear because of the noise. It was the time of evening prayers—always the noisiest part of the day with singing and cymbals bursting out of the temples and prayers echoing up and down the river as the sun sank into it.

  Bulbul beckoned him into the house. It was just as noisy in there. Not only did the sounds penetrate from outside, but Banubai was leading a group of devotees in singing hymns. Bulbul drew Raymond into the windowless, pitch-dark little storeroom where she slept at night. She made him sit on the floor close beside her and began to talk very fast; but of course he couldn’t understand a word.