Flowers in the Blood

by Gay Courter

  “So you primarily produce black tea.”

  “Yes. Now, I believe the area to develop is the highest end of the spectrum: the rare-tea market. I will call my newest blends Emperor and Imperial. What do you think?”

  I reined in my pony. This was the first time he had asked my opinion, and I did not want to blandly agree, nor sound ignorant with a careless remark. “I see the necessity for both, like gold and rice,” I said slowly, choosing my words. “On one side of the scale, there will always be people who want gold—a small quantity for a large price. On the other, there will be more who require rice—a large quantity for a small price. I suppose the fluctuations in the market might balance each other in good times and bad, but . . .” Silas was staring at me queerly, so I stopped myself.

  “Go on, please,” he urged.

  “Well, even though there must be a large market for something very inexpensive and a small market for something very dear, the most stable market most likely would be the middle ground. You know, the government worker, the civil servant, the army major, the professor. They would want the finest quality they could afford at a price they thought was fair but not cheap. Do you understand what I mean? They certainly do not want the same brew their servants drink.”

  “What a mind you have! You have set out the question more exactly than anyone else I have ever heard. What we are attempting to do is to arrive at three grades of leaf tea: one which produces the lighter, less intense tea the lower classes select; a broken grade, which gives the brisk liquor the Continentals prefer, for the middle markets; and a fancy line of expensive blends, for the upper classes. I expect to do a brisk business from brisk tea.” He rambled on about how his father had reservations about his idea to combine the body of an Assam with the fragrance of a Darjeeling and a touch of the pungency from a Ceylon leaf, but at the moment I was too flattered to follow the details.

  Later, as I lay in bed that night, I thought about Maurice and wondered again why I had not seen him yet. I was more certain than ever there was some difficulty between father and son—the cause of which I had not yet discovered. Putting those distressing thoughts aside, I concentrated on my husband's complimentary words and went to sleep more content than I had been since seeing Euclid skirting the path.

  Over the next several days, winds buffeted Xanadu Lodge around the clock. I was learning that it howled from the west and whined when it poured through a gap in the hills to the east. Then, three nights later, a storm blew up the valley, lashing the house with dry, violent winds. The windows that brought us the snow views were shuttered and locked with iron bars. As there were but small high windows on the entry side of the house, I felt as if I were being encased in a coffin. “Better than a shower of glass,” Silas replied when I complained. “If this subsides in the night, Gulliver will have them off before you awaken.” Seeing my distress, he had reached out to touch me. I pulled back as a reminder that I was still unclean. He did not persist.

  I understood the laws of niddah, the days my husband could not come to me, but did not know how to signal him when he again might do so. Grandmother Helene had explained that sexual contact was prohibited from the moment I discerned blood, and continued at least five days or until every trace of the menses had disappeared, plus another seven clean days thereafter—always a minimum of twelve days. I expected this would mean two weeks away from Silas. This was the eleventh day. I had a few more days to find a way to tell him, although I was both anticipating and fearing our next intimate encounter. I hoped he would find me more desirable the next time, especially if I made no more foolish mistakes, but what if the time apart had muted his interest in resuming our marital relations?

  On that turbulent night, as I lay awake listening to the high-pitched screeching that rolled up the ravine, then dissipated somewhere far in the distance before beginning again, my mind churned with the possibilities. During the lulls, I slept lightly. A new clatter brought me to my feet. Voices. I opened the door a crack. Gulliver and Silas were speaking. Other servants were moving around. More storm protection, I assumed. I closed my door. Soon the house was quiet except for the wailing through the treetops in concert with the tattoo of branches slapping on the roof.

  Because the protective boards were not removed before dawn, I had no sense of day and night. I was awake through the fiercest hours of the tempest, asleep when the winds diminished to a dull roar. Lucretia did not arouse me until after one in the afternoon. My head was pounding, my stomach weak with hunger. I took my meal in bed, then dressed in a loose dressing gown and went out to find Silas.

  Gulliver stood by the hearth as I entered the room. I looked for Silas in his usual chair or by his writing desk. “Where is Mr. Luddy?” I asked.

  “He went to Darjeeling, memsahib.”

  “When?”

  “Last night.”

  “In that storm?”

  “On an urgent matter, memsahib.”

  I thought at once of Maurice Luddy. “Is someone in his family ill?”

  “He left you a letter.” Gulliver handed me an ivory envelope like the ones I had received in Calcutta in what seemed like another lifetime.

  I sat on the hearth bench to read the few scratchy sentences.

  I did not want to disturb you, but a friend has had an accident. Do not concern yourself about me. The roads are dry and pose no problems downhill. I will return in time for supper tomorrow. Forgive my haste. Silas.

  A friend? An accident? Euclid! I called for Gulliver.

  “Yes, memsahib.”

  “Who has had the misfortune?”

  “I do not know.”

  Yes, he did. “Euclid?”

  The bearer's impassive face twitched imperceptibly.

  “That will be all, Gulliver,” I said, dismissing him.

  In the late afternoon, the winds whipped up once more. Accompanying them were claps of thunder that reverberated across the ravines and echoed off the cliffs in eerie volleys of dwindling booms. Anxiously awaiting Silas' return, I called for Gulliver and ordered an elaborate tea to be readied. “Certainly, memsahib,” he said, bowing.

  I did not want him to leave yet. “Gulliver, what is your given name?”

  He blinked, then replied, “Jetha.”

  “And what is Lucretia's?”

  “Namgal.”

  “Jetha,” I repeated. “Namgal.” I liked the way they felt on my tongue far better than Silas' affectations. I wondered what Euclid's real name was, but sent Gulliver away without asking.

  The rest of the afternoon passed without a sign from Silas. At last, only moments before darkness fell, he rode up to the gate in the tonga. I opened the door for him myself. Gulliver stepped forward to close it, then took my husband's cloak.

  “Bring the tea at once, Gulliver.”

  Even in the murky light I could see his pallor. The skin under his eyes was gray. His mouth was drawn into a tight line that puckered his mustache into a terrible grimace. Only once before, when he had been in the throes of his headache, had he looked so miserable. I knew something terrible had happened to Euclid—and though it pains me to admit this, I could not help feel relief that the disagreeable little man was out of my life.

  “Here, drink this,” I said, serving Silas a cup of tea and adding a chota peg of brandy without asking if he wanted any. He clasped the cup with a wooden gesture. I poured myself the same, but with a burra peg to fortify me for whatever was about to come.

  I waited for him to gather his strength, which at that moment was a feat of great restraint. As a lightning bolt struck close to the house, its sharp flare flashed through the cracks in the wood battens and illuminated the bolts carved above the windows. Next came the thundering crescendos, each one stopping my heart.

  “Darjeeling deserves its name,” I managed between the bursts. Seeing my distress, Silas finally spoke. “Don't be afraid, Dinah. There are always storms like this at the start of the cold weather. They clear the air, and though the temperatures fall, the views ar
e splendid and the climate is exceedingly healthy.”

  “I have never feared natural phenomena,” I replied firmly. “My concerns are for you. Something awful has happened.”

  “Yes, Dinah.” His voice broke. Almost a minute passed before he could begin again. “Euclid—he . . .”

  “Is he dead?”

  “No, thank God, no!”

  I hoped he took my shocked expression as confusion, not disappointment. “What happened?”

  “He tried to kill himself.”

  “How? Why?”

  He shook his head. “So much to explain . . . Dinah, please forgive me. If I had known the consequences, if I had known any of this could have happened, I would never have . . .” He trembled so violently I darted for his cup and placed it on a table.

  Looking around, I saw Gulliver standing ramrod straight in the shadows. Lucretia was at her post by my doorway. “Could we talk about this in your room?”

  Silas did not protest as I led him by the arm. I glanced over my shoulder as a warning for the servants to leave us in peace. Silas propped himself up on his bed. I brought a chair to the edge, but he took my hand and pulled me to his side. Leaning back on the fur pillows, we both stared across the blank boarded wall, which flickered with the eerie reflections of the one lit lamp.

  After a long while he spoke in a singsong voice that assisted his untidy confession to roll off his lips. “I met Euclid when he was a boy of fifteen. Ever since I can remember, since I was a schoolboy, I found that I preferred the company of men. When I was in England, I met other like-minded friends who helped me to see there were many who felt as I did. I dreaded the moment when I would have to come back out to India, especially to the closed society of the Jewish community, where they would never tolerate my difference. The first year I lived under my father's roof again was a terrible strain. We fought most of the time. I do not think he discovered my secret, but he guessed I was not like the others and blamed my education for giving me lofty, elitist ideas.” He closed his eyes. “It was then I knew I would have to live on my own and thought of building a house near Tiger Hill.” His face firmed into an impenetrable shield.

  Ignoring the fact I was unclean, I stroked his cheek, much as he often had done to mine. This act of tenderness crumbled his shell. He gasped and blurted, “When I met Euclid, I found happiness in India for the first time. He was a gentle, sweet boy who looked up at me as if I were a prince. I encouraged his studies and invited him to live in our home. My father never liked him. He thought Euclid was only using me to further himself. And then . . . then . . .” He turned toward me, sobbing.

  Perhaps I should have been thinking how this affected me, but I was so lost in his pain that I worried only if. I had the means to comfort him. “Silas, Silas, please do not cry. Please, I only want to know the truth . . .”

  “Then, he discovered me . . . with Euclid.”

  “Who did?”

  “M-my father.”

  That explained the estrangement between Maurice and his son. The long silence was punctuated by the sudden torrent of rain that drilled on the roof. I took his hand in mine. “So you built this house and came here to live with Euclid.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you were happy together for many years.”

  “Yes.”

  “He was your assistant, your confidant, your closest friend—but never your babu.” I gave a weak laugh, showing that I had understood his warning not to use the title of “clerk” with his friend.

  “How wonderfully understanding you are.”

  I understand nothing! I wanted to scream, but all I said was, “So, that is why Euclid resented me. I did not realize he was jealous, but now everything makes more sense, except. . .”

  Silas filled in. “Why he left and why he—”

  “What did he do?” I interrupted. “And will he recover?”

  “Belladonna and ground glass, a common rat poison. The symptoms began much like dysentery. He told the family he was staying with—an old professor from school—that he was having stomach troubles, and they left him alone. When the storm began, a servant sent to close the shutters found that Euclid had fallen into a stupor. If the doctor had not come at once, if he had not treated a child who had mistakenly tasted the same poison only weeks before . . .”

  “And now?”

  “The doctor is unsure of the damage caused by the glass—bleeding continues internally—but the effects of the belladonna have been counteracted.”

  “Then he is not out of danger.”

  “They think he will survive, but he might have done some permanent damage.”

  “All because of me.”

  “No, not you. You are entirely innocent. Everything is my fault. I was crazy to believe I could work out something that would satisfy everyone. I did not want anything to change between Euclid and me. Through the ages, other men have managed to have families as well as their male friends. I thought that if I lived more normally, Euclid and I could preserve our way of life forever. And it might have worked out that way, if he had not been so demanding, wanting me to himself, expecting me to ignore you. Euclid's own selfish stupidity led to this crisis!” Silas stopped himself. “No, my selfish stupidity. How could I have believed I could balance everything? Worse, I deceived you from the first.”

  As he spoke, I was devastated by a confusing galaxy of feelings, as though a mirror had broken and I was gazing into thousands of reflective fragments of my life. I understood everything. I understood nothing. Yet underneath the layer of distress ran a river of relief. The trepidation I had felt since the first day in Calcutta, when I had thought Silas had found me repulsive, the apprehension that had festered during the first days of our marriage, when he had not approached me, and had culminated in our unsatisfactory intimate encounters, when I was certain he found me undesirable, were melting in the glare of his confession.

  “Why did you choose me?”

  “I always had wanted a wife, a wife who would prove my normalcy to the outside world. I even believed I wanted children. And you seemed the perfect choice. Most Calcutta girls would not have been happy in Darjeeling, let alone on this godforsaken hill. The remoteness frightened any my father approached on my behalf. One or two candidates became available, but I rejected them as unsuitable, as they lacked any education. I knew that if I were to tolerate a woman's presence, I would have to meet my intellectual equal. When I heard about you, I became enthusiastic. I thought: Here is a possibility! You were the most brilliant woman I had ever heard about. And, as my father so shrewdly saw, you had good reason to want to leave Calcutta, and also to be content at Xanadu Lodge. He said, 'She will be grateful for a man like you and will turn a blind eye to your . . . your faults.' “

  “You assumed I would accept Euclid, and you required Euclid to accept me!”

  “No. It was my intention you should never know about Euclid. I believed we could be discreet. Nothing worked out as I had imagined. Since meeting you, I honestly had begun to lose interest in Euclid. You kept me enthralled—you were so curious, so humorous, so pleasant to be with. I was beginning to feel very close to you, and Euclid sensed this. I explained it was only right that I devote myself to you for the first few months. I told him I would approach you slowly, try to make you my friend before making you my wife. The moment he supposed I was attempting to meet my marital obligations, he went crazy with jealousy. We fought. He left the house, saying he was returning home to Bhutan, but going only as far as the town. Then he badgered me with messages, begging me to join him for a few hours. I refused, out of loyalty to you. And, so he took a drastic course.”

  “Now what shall you do about him?”

  “What can I do?”

  “Bring him back here?” I offered without sincerity.

  “Impossible, now that you know.”

  “I agree. Unless . . . I went away.”

  “Where would you go?”

  Where could I go?

  Silas sat upright and sw
ung around to face me. With the lamp behind his head, he loomed like a blank, expressionless ghost. “I want you to stay with me.”

  My face was illuminated; thus he must have seen the cost to me written in my eyes as I spoke my version of the truth. “No, you are only saying that because you feel duty-bound. I cannot be what you want. I am a woman. You never wanted a woman, did you?”

  “I was not certain. Believe me, Dinah, I did not know if I did. I prayed I would find you appealing. After ten years of looking—oh, forgive me for saying this now—but I thought I could be attracted to you because your body is not too encumbered with curves. I liked touching you, being with you. And it might have worked if Euclid's questions and threats had not infected me. Every time we were alone together, he grilled me about what had occurred. He warned me it would never work, that I could never make love to a woman. No matter how I tried to shake his predictions, they loomed in my mind, rendering me unfit. But, Dinah, if this terrible accident had not happened, if he had left me in peace, I think we could have come together as man and wife. With your kindness, I would have overcome my . . . my difficulties.” In the long pause, he swallowed audibly. “We could still try again—”

  “No.” I. moved to the far edge of the bed. “I suspected something was the matter. I thought it was my fault, and some of it was. Still, out of ignorance I persisted. Now that I know, I would rather have no man than one who comes to me with a natural aversion.”

  “You do not understand. I am committed to you, tonight more than ever before. I want to find a way to earn your forgiveness and make you content. Your situation was not good when we met, and I admit it is not greatly improved now, but with me at your side you can have far more than you could alone. If you want, we both can forget the physical side of marriage. You can have me, to lean on, and have your freedom besides. I admit it was thoughtless and selfish to marry you, but you must believe me when I say there was never any concern for your dowry. It is inviolate. Everything else I own or will possess is at your disposal, so you may live the life of your choosing. Can't you see that if we remain together, we both may lead a life of dignity? I would treat you like an honored sister. You would have more freedom than any other married woman—or any single woman—and if a child should ensue, I would claim it as my own.”