Flowers in the Blood

by Gay Courter

  “So what is the connection?” Uncle Samuel asked.

  “I don't believe there ever was a man with an injured hand. Sadka's chief concern was the anesthesia. He persisted in asking how it was done, what the name of the chemical was, and even how much was required to deliver 'a small man unconscious.' When I said 'chloroform' to him, he asked me to write the word so he would not forget it.”

  “Have you told this to the inspector?”

  “Certainly.”

  This unusual word, “chloroform,” which sounded to me like the name for a pretty English girl, was heard again in the next few days. Inquisitive about this new person, I asked Yali. “Who is Miss Form?”

  “Who?”

  “Chloro Form.”

  “I have no idea,” she said, dismissing me.

  I thought better of questioning my grandparents. When I pumped Dr. Hyam, he laughed with his head thrown back. “She's not a person, she's—I mean, it's—a medicine. We use it to help people sleep when they need to have cuts sewn. Why?”

  “I heard it mentioned,” I said, smarting from my stupidity. After that I was alert anytime the word was used. This is how I learned Sadka had acquired a considerable quantity of the drug. The chemists Messrs. Smith and Stanistreet in Dalhousie Square reported they had sold a one-ounce vial of chloroform to Moosa Chachuk on the fifteenth of September, two weeks before the murder. The next day, another firm in Lal Bazaar was asked for the same amount by Nissim Sadka. Because he was unknown to the proprietor, he refused to sell it to him. Nevertheless, the firm of Scott Thompson and Company in Old Court House Street complied. Armed with this information, police inspectors questioned Sadka's employees.

  Terrified of being implicated, his manservant, Arup, supplied the evidence that led to his master's arrest.

  Dr. Hyam reported this confession. “Arup says that Sadka and Chachuk took breakfast together the day before the tragedy. Sadka ordered Arup to accompany Chachuk to the market and make whatever transactions his friend desired because 'Jews could not handle money that day since it was Succoth, the Feast of the Tabernacles.' At Moulali, in Lower Circular Road, Arup used his master's money to buy a twelve-foot bamboo ladder for five annas. After selecting a box of matches at Tiretta Bazaar, Chachuk told Arup to have a coolie deliver the ladder to his house by evening, since it was needed at a carpentry job the next day. Arup identified this as the same ladder found in the garden at Theatre Road.”

  The final piece of evidence, an empty chloroform vial with a wrapper from Smith and Stanistreet, also discovered in the garden, led to the arrest of Moosa Chachuk, who protested he had been at home with three men—including Nissim Sadka—on the night of the first of October. Unfortunately for Chachuk, the third man's name could not be recalled and he could not be located.

  Other proof emerged. One rubber shoe, spotted with blood only on the outside, had been discovered under my father's bed. The inside was clean, an indication the shoe must have been on the murderer's foot. Arup confirmed the shoe matched a pair that had belonged to his master.

  Once this much was known, once the men were jailed, the gloom in my grandparents' house dissipated markedly. Yali asked me if I still wished her to sleep in my room. I did. Grandmother asked me if I was ready to increase my lessons. I was. Aunt Bellore came to tea and asked if I wouldn't feel more at home in Theatre Road.

  “No! No shutters!”

  “What is this business about shutters?” she asked in a disgruntled tone.

  “The bad man came in through the window.”

  Aunt Bellore looked meaningfully at my grandfather. She knew he did not like having me drawn into the matter.

  “No, he didn't,” my grandfather said soothingly.

  “Yes, he did.”

  “Then how do you explain the shutters being latched from the inside?” Aunt Bellore asked in an exasperated voice.

  “I closed them,” I responded, startling them both.

  “Don't tell tales,” she chastised angrily.

  “But I did!” I shouted. Why wouldn't anyone believe me when I was the one who was there?

  “When did you do this?” Nana asked.

  “I heard them banging. That was what woke me. So I went in to latch them. After that—”

  Aunt Bellore placed her hand on my shoulder. “When you looked outside, did you see anyone moving about?”

  “No.”

  “Did you hear other noises?”

  “No. It was quiet in the house.”

  “Nothing outside?”

  “No.”

  “Has anyone else asked you about this?”

  “No.” I sniffed. “So that's why I want to stay here.”

  Nana gave Bellore Lanyado a warning glance. “And so you shall, until it is entirely safe to return home” was his final word on the matter.

  I was soon to learn that “safety” was a relative word. Another disaster would send us back to Theatre Road sooner than my grandfather could have anticipated, but this time its origin was natural, rather than man-made.

  Calcutta is situated south of the Tropic of Cancer on the left bank of the Hooghly River, sixty miles from the sea. Constructed on the eastern side of the Indo-Gangetic plain, the city lies only twenty feet above sea level and is prone to flooding whenever it rains heavily. The region has three predominant seasons: hot, wet, and cool. The hot weather arrives at the beginning of March, bringing scorching temperatures that often exceed one hundred and ten degrees. During this period, heat prostration, breathing difficulties due to the swirling dust, dehydration, and stomach ailments tortured Grandfather's patients. By the time the monsoon sweeps through the region in June, it is a great relief, even though the daily downpours flood the streets with more than ten inches of rain each month. The high humidity combined with temperatures hovering in the nineties makes it impossible to exert oneself even slightly without becoming bathed in perspiration. In that season my grandfather would treat collapses, fungal and skin eruptions, pestilence from sewage leaking into water supplies, and diseases borne by the increased population of insects. Just after the cyclone season, typically taking place in September, the air becomes drier. If no tropical storms develop, this is a most agreeable, trouble-free time of year. The “cold weather,” lasting from the beginning of December to mid-February, brings a welcome respite, with pleasant days and nights rarely lower than fifty degrees.

  By the first of November everyone had concluded that it was too late in the year to be concerned about a cyclone. As if in perverse response, barometers around Calcutta began to drop. Aunt Bellore began insisting, because of a twinge in her shoulder, that a huge storm was on the way.

  In a few days her predictions seemed on target. Even Nani complained of strange chest-crushing sensations. The next morning Yali woke me and asked me to stand in the courtyard and raise my hands.

  “Can you grasp it?”

  “What?”

  “The thick air.”

  “No, you're silly.”

  “Remember the feeling, then. It's like a panting beast. You will know its breath when it comes again.”

  I pondered this during the morning while devilish squalls blew sheets of rain across the Hooghly River. Sudden gusts tore shutters from houses and crushed rickshaws against buildings like flimsy toys. Between the slashing torrents were periods of relief when no rain would fall and the air would ripple with an eerie crackling sound. Nani put me to bed during one of these lulls.

  Yali woke me in the middle of the night. Her soft voice made a queer echoing sound in my room. As I swung my feet around, thinking she wanted to take me to the toilet, she pushed me back. “I must carry you.”

  Thundering volleys cracked in the hellish sky. Dr. Hyam arrived with a bullock-cart that could carry only our family. The durwan helped the ayahs and other servants climb onto the flat roof above the kitchen and wrapped blankets about them. In the splintering light of the storm I rolled away, waving and calling to Yali.

  Eventually we arrived at the house wh
ere my father had been born— now the Lanyados' residence—which was built on higher ground. In the rain, which poured off the roof in liquid sheets, Grandmother carried Asher. I took Jonah's hand. Dr. Hyam lifted Grandfather inside. We were not the only refugees from the storm. The entire Sassoon clan had united there.

  The next morning, I surveyed the filthy ribbons of water that snaked through the district. A sea interspersed with queer concrete islands sprawled from the Hooghly. The city seemed an aquatic burial ground. The Maidan, Calcutta's vast park, rippled with swirling eddies. I thought about transformations, how quickly everything that has been an accepted part of one's life can be altered by a single event. A mother's death leaves a child awash. A cyclone does the same to a city. Children splashed in the turgid water. Stranded families huddled on the few raised porches.

  Oblivious of the turmoil, the sun shone. I could not find my clothes, so I went in search of Yali. Aunt Bellore stopped me before I could reach the kitchens.

  “Where's Yali?”

  Aunt Bellore gave a massive groan. “Look around you! Confusion. Upset. So many to feed, to care for. I can't keep track of everyone's servants, can I?”

  “I need a dress.”

  “You can borrow something of Sultana's.” Aunt Bellore had three girls. Sultana, her oldest, was nearly my age, but much smaller.

  In the nursery Aunt Bellore had me try on several dresses. “I can't believe how much bigger you are than Sultana. You certainly won't be turning out like your moth—” She caught herself. Piqued, she gave me a robe. “Try this. Just tie it loosely at the waist.”

  “No. Yali will do it. Where is Yali?”

  “She has gone to find her own family.”

  “Liar!”

  “Dinah!” Aunt Bellore slapped my cheek. “Mind your words.”

  “Liar!” Blinded by tears, I ran to find Nani.

  Yali did not return to the Lanyados' house. After the flood dissipated, the Raymonds' house was declared uninhabitable, but my father's residence in Theatre Road was undamaged.

  My grandfather took me on his lap in his rolling chair. “Dinah, would you rather stay with your Aunt Bellore or with us in Theatre Road?”

  I touched the cheek that my aunt had slapped and replied without hesitation, “Theatre Road, Nana.”

  The prisoners were to stand trial at the next criminal sessions, in December. As the day approached, everyone kept asking whether my father would arrive before the trial.

  “Better that he stays away” was Nani's attitude.

  Nana disagreed. “He should see justice done, or else he will question forever the way the matter was handled.”

  With no knowledge of my father's whereabouts, the trial began on Monday, the second of December, 1878. Moosa Chachuk was charged with the willful murder of Luna Sassoon, and Nissim Sadka was arraigned as his accomplice. The suspects were tried before Chief Justice Sir John Neville and Sir Peter Grant, the second justice. Mr. Gardner, the advocate-general, conducted the case for the crown. Mr. Hicks defended Sadka, while Mr. O'Reilly defended Chachuk. My grandfather was well enough to attend the sessions, fully expecting that by the end of that week the men who had taken his daughter's life would be pronounced guilty and would face their just punishment. In the beginning, my grandmother could not bring herself to visit the courtroom.

  After the first day of the trial, Uncle Saul, my father's eldest brother, and Aunt Bellore and her husband, Samuel Lanyado, escorted Grandfather back to Theatre Road. Uncle Saul took my father's place in the drawing room—in our family it was called the “hall.” Grandmother poured tea. Asher and Jonah were brought in for a few minutes. I was permitted to remain for some chutney sandwiches.

  Aunt Bellore clucked her tongue when she saw the short hem on my dress. “We'll have to see you have some new ones ordered. After this is over, I'll have the dressmaker in for the girls.”

  Uncle Saul tapped his foot.

  “Dinah, why don't you go upstairs with the boys now?” Aunt Bellore asked in a honey-smooth voice.

  I looked to Grandmother for confirmation that I might stay.

  “Yes, Dinah,” Nani said, meaning I had to do as I had been told.

  I walked over to my grandfather and held his hand. He patted mine. I took this to mean he had championed my cause.

  Uncle Saul was glaring.

  Nana gave me a squeeze. “G-go now . . . later . . .”

  I turned away as slowly as I could. Out in the corridor I made a loud clomping sound, then removed my shoes and slipped into the serving pantry, where a door had been left slightly ajar. I pressed my back to the wall and breathed silently.

  “The advocate-general's implications about the fact that the participants are Jewish are bothering me,” Uncle Saul bellowed.

  “What would that have to do with the case?” Grandmother asked.

  Nana answered in short, stuttering phrases: “The advocate-general was t-trying to justify . . . that Ch-Chachuk would not act alone . . . t-to help prove that . . . S-Sadka had the m-m—”

  Uncle Saul filled in for him. “A motive. Or vice versa. We do not yet know which one committed the violent act. The problem seems to be that if Nissim acted in a frenzy of passion—a crime that might receive a lesser sentence than premeditated murder—then he would not have organized the murder and brought in a second to assist. The sum of the early evidence—why, the chloroform alone—leads us to think it was planned in advance.”

  Nani spoke slowly. “What does being Jewish have to do with it?”

  Uncle Saul tried again. “I believe the advocate-general reasoned that if Sadka selected someone to assist him in a premeditated crime, the accomplice would—as he put it—'be of the same creed, inferior in position, but strong and accustomed to violence, and desperate—for either money or acceptance.' “

  “An excellent description of Chachuk—after the fact,” Uncle Samuel remarked. “I wonder if he would have come up with that argument if Chachuk had not been implicated.”

  “My thoughts exactly,” Aunt Bellore agreed.

  Through the cracked door, I could see Uncle Saul pacing. “All that aside, I thought the advocate-general's arguments were laid out with excellent logic,” he continued. “He mentioned the need to silence the victim and the knowledge that the men had acquired chloroform recently. He introduced the purchase of the ladder and matches, both needed to scale a wall at night.” He paused. “As the evidence is developed, each point should be proved beyond a doubt.”

  “What about Dinah?” my aunt mumbled.

  My heart pounded as I strained to hear the whispers that followed. Maybe they would listen to me at last.

  “. . . testify ... not a child . . .”

  “. . . but the shutters . . .”

  “. . . shouldn't be necessary.” Uncle Saul's statement ended on a peremptory tone, and I could hear the scrape of chairs against the hard floor. They were probably getting ready to leave.

  “At least this should be over in short order,” I heard Aunt Bellore say as I tiptoed away in case anyone came looking for me.

  The second day of the trial, the family was less ebullient. They were also more careful about closing doors and excluding me. Later I would learn the accuseds' lawyers had begun to discuss the circumstantial nature of the evidence, the lack of eyewitnesses, and the fact that Chachuk and Sadka claimed they had people who would substantiate testimony of their whereabouts that evening.

  Concerned that the men might possibly be acquitted, Nani steeled herself and accompanied her husband on the third day. When they returned, she went directly to her room, and I was permitted to greet her for only a few moments.

  “Nani!” I cried when I saw her flushed and trembling. “Are you ill?”

  “No, dearest Dinah, just tired.”

  “Where are Uncle Saul and Aunt Bellore?”

  “I asked them not to come today because I will be retiring early. Why don't you go in to see your grandfather for a few minutes before you have your supper?” She ga
ve me a limp hug. My mother's former servant, a plump Bengali woman who rarely spoke, brought her some fizzy tablets and pushed me out the door.

  When I went to Grandfather's room, which previously had been a day nursery on the ground floor, I found him trembling in his chair. His eyes were weeping continuously. Whatever had happened in the courts that day had sucked dry his reservoir of strength. Dr. Hyam was giving him an injection in his thigh.

  “What's that?” I asked as I watched with more curiosity than horror. “Something to make him more comfortable,” the doctor said softly. When the hypodermic was withdrawn, I threw my arms around Nana. “Is that better?” Nana made a feeble attempt to reach over and pat me. His palsied fingers ruffled my hair and glanced off my cheek.

  Short, heavyset Dr. Hyam sat with a sigh and waited until the medicine began to work. Grandfather's head lolled to the side and his limbs twitched intermittently.

  I touched his cheek, his lips, his pulse, in a pantomime of Dr. Hyam's usual actions. “He will rest now,” I pronounced.

  Dr. Hyam stood up and left the room. “Come with me, Dinah,” he said as I lingered behind.

  I rose to my feet, but on my way out the door I fingered the vial of medicine that had calmed my grandfather. “Laudanum” it said, but I misread the label as “Loudanum” and wondered how something with “loud” in it had quieted him so quickly. Next to it was another with a milky liquid. I touched it, and its label rolled into view. Chloroform! I lifted it and twisted the cap. An acrid fume stung my eyes. That had been the aroma about my mother's face that terrible morning.

  The next day Grandfather Ephraim was confined at home, and my grandmother went to court in his stead. After that, the Sassoons visited no longer. When Nani returned, she would tell her husband what had happened. Huddled in the alcove outside their door, I listened to her explanations, trembling first at the idea of being caught, second at the revelations about my mother.