Ravi the Unknown Prince

by Rookmin Cassim

  Then he asked me whether I was a relative and I told him that I met the family once, before I went abroad and now I came back and I had come to see them.

  He told me to wait, that she should be back soon and he offered me a seat next to him on a long wooden bench.

  While we were talking the woman arrived and the old man said, “Bena this young man is waiting to see you.”

  The woman looking frightened and then I reminded her that I came to see her logy a long time ago when her sons were little.

  Then she remembered and she began to tell me her life story; after listening to her I told her that I was offering her a job.

  To help my wife to look after our children after they were born and if she was interested I would come and fetch her to live with us.

  The old man told her to go and that she would not get another chance like this one, instead of living here alone and struggling to make ends meet.

  She told me to come back on Saturday afternoon to pick her up after she paid the logy manager her rent and told him that she was leaving.

  When I arrived home I told Muna that I had someone to help her when our twins were born and on Saturday I would take her to meet this woman.

  That Saturday Bena was waiting for me as planned and then I introduced Muna to her.

  Afterwards I took Muna to show her where Bena lived and told her that my great grand-mother Princess Razia once lived in a place like this.

  Muna was in tears and I hugged her and said, “When I first came here and saw this place I also was in tears.”

  I looked for the elderly man but he was not around and then we left. Muna gave Bena some of her dresses and told her to get rid of her old ones.

  Then she explained to her that she was having twins and that she would need all the help that she could get.

  A week later at the end of my six months we packed some of our belongings and left the West Coast for the Air-base.

  Alam was waiting to fly us to our destination. When we arrived we were chauffeur driven to the Palace.

  Bena asked Muna where we were going and she told her to our new home and that she was going to meet an old man and that she must be polite to him.

  I kept in regular contact with uncle and he was aware of what was going on and the woman, Bena, we had brought with us.

  Bena was given some light kitchen duties until the twins were born and the staffs were informed that there was going to be two new arrivals.

  I took over from uncle and for the first time I was going to meet with all twelve of his veterinary surgeons.

  That day I drove to the ranch house and met with Red Eagle and asked him about these men and he told me that they did good work.

  While they were out checking some of the cows before they were sold into the food chain, I went through their C. V [Curriculum Vitae] to make sure that they were fully qualified to do their job and the salary uncle was paying each one of them.

  They were all trained abroad from Canada to England and the West Indies. After they had finished their duties I told Red Eagle to get Condor to bring the men in to see me.

  When they arrived I introduced myself to them and told them to sit down and then I asked each of them to tell me about him-self.

  The men looked worried perhaps they thought that some of them were going to lose their job.

  Condor and Red Eagle went to brew us some tea and when they brought that in the men were more relaxed.

  I told them that I was going to increase their salary starting from the following month. Apparently they did ask for a pay rise but uncle turned them down.

  As we talked and drank our tea I realised that diligent workers should be given a decent salary.

  The men invited me to come and watch when the calves were being branded and other duties they performed daily.

  Six months later, my twins were born at the Palace, uncle brought in a Private physician and a midwife to take care of Muna during the birth and afterwards.

  I had a son and we named him Mahir and a daughter uncle named her Razia after his grand-mother and my great grand-mother, Princess Razia and their names were added to the family tree.

  We had a visit from Muna’s mum and Maymun, the woman who called me her son and they spent two weeks with us before returning home.

  By then I took up flying lessons with Alam and was learning the Arawak language. Shooting was not my style and I stayed clear from it.

  Eighteen months later, I was out on the ranch and Alam came out looking for me. He told me that uncle had taken ill and that I should return immediately.

  I left my horse Jupiter with Condor and told him and Red Eagle to take care of him and gave them the keys to the ranch house.

  They were good guys and I bonded with them, they were teaching me their language and I was teaching them mine.

  I drove back with Alam in the Jeep and when I arrived home uncle told me that he wanted to go back to the West Coast and that I must take him there.

  I took some of our staff with us and the rest I gave them time off, except the two guards, and closed the palace.

  I rang uncle’s son Nazir in Canada and on the fifth time I managed to get hold of his wife and I told her exactly where I was taking uncle.

  When we arrived on the West Coast uncle wanted to go down to the beach, Habib took a chair with us to make it easy for him to sit and looked out into the ocean.

  The following evening when we were having supper Nazir and his wife arrived.

  He said that they got lost and ended up at the ferry crossing and he asked a taxi driver to take them to hope village; and they were looking for a house named “Hope Villa.”

  The man said that he knew the house and the guy who owns it is married to an Arab woman.

  I was looking at Muna and she spoke in Arabic saying, “These village idiots, they like to spread false rumours.”

  I replied also in the same language, “This idiot is lying he knows all about us.”

  Muna and I were laughing and then uncle remarked, “We like to share in some of your jokes.”

  Nazir turned around with his mouth full of food and said, “Cousin Hasan, you have a beautiful villa by the sea. Does this land belongs to you?” he questioned

  “Thank you, cousin Nazir, this land once belonged to my father and his father before and now it is mine.” I answered.

  His wife was chatting to Sultana the house keeper, our main cook, and one of the cleaning maids.

  We were total strangers to all these people. Nazir and Alam grew up at the palace and lived with these people they moved out after they got married and uncle set them up with thriving businesses.

  Although he had given me half of his fortune in dollars I would have to work for the other half and be sensible about it.

  Now with four children I had no choice and with over a hundred people on his books for salary each month had added extra pressure to keep the ranch and other businesses he owns in the city to generate income to pay his workers a decent wage.

  I did not know who to trust when uncle passed away, but I would have to keep an open mind and watch carefully at the behaviour of everyone around me.

  The next day Edwin and Ruby came for a quick visit to see uncle and I took Edwin to one side and asked him whether he thought I would get any problem from uncle’s two adopted sons.

  He told me maybe Nazir that was the reason he brought his wife with him but I should not get too stressed about it.

  “Hanif had it all written down on paper,” he said, “Who is to get what and it would be read to those mentioned in his Will.”

  Two days later uncle took a turn for the worse, and I sent for the local doctor, even though I knew Nazir was a doctor.

  He was out strolling on the beach with his wife and when he came back he heard that the local doctor had been here and gone and I was not there either.

  I took Muna with the children and the nanny to her mother’s house. I did not want the children making too much noise with a dy
ing man around.

  Nazir did not like what I did and when I returned he was waiting to have an argument with me.

  He asked me why I did not send for him to attend to his father, I was annoyed and said, “Where were you, Dr Persaud when your father needed you? I was not going to send out a search party to look for you.”

  Alam put his arm around my shoulder and said, “Its all right cousin, it is a stressful time for all of us.”

  His wife was whispering with the other women in one corner of the room and then she told him to keep quiet and not to upset anyone.

  Uncle passed away in the early hours of the following morning with me and Habib by his bedside.

  The instructions he left I carried through and laid him to rest at the spot he had chosen next to his mother.

  Alam, Habib and his wife Sultana shed lots of tears. I did not know him that well but for the short time we spent together I got to love him and admired his courage and strength.

  After a week of sadness in our hearts I went back to Sunset Palace with my family and the staff.

  I invited Nazir and his wife to come and stay with us for as long as they were in the country but they decided to book into the Lotus Hotel which was owned by me.

  The cost for a room in that luxury hotel was five hundred dollars for one night stay.

  RULER OF MANAOS KINGDOM

  A few days later Edwin called me and Habib in for the reading of uncle’s Will.

  When we arrived Alam and Nazir were both there. I greeted them and we all went into a large room and sat round a table.

  Edwin came in with a folder and opened it up and began to read the contents of the ‘Will’. Uncle had left equal sums of money to Alam and Nazir.

  Habib and his wife together were both given a similar sum. The Kingdom of Manaos he left that to me, his only surviving relative and my future generation to carry out his work and to take care of the people in the Kingdom.

  He had already given me a large sum of money which was not mentioned in that part of the Will.

  Nazir and his wife were leaving the following day for Canada. I gave him a hug and told him that he and his family were always welcome at Sunset Palace which was once his home.

  He smiled and told me that he would bear that in mine, whenever he decided to come to these parts again.

  Alam would come over with his wives and children to visit us and we would visit them.

  He would tell me about his dad who was patient, honest, and strict with the rules of his Kingdom but good to his people.

  “He was a loving father and grand-father,” he said, “And that his memory he would always cherished.”

  Before I went back to work I called all the staff and made a few changes.

  I appointed Habib as my assistant. When I needed time off he would take my place, and also head of the children’s orphanage on the main- land.

  He would visit the orphanage once every month to check that the children were well looked after and make notes on what he saw. He would be chauffeur-driven to his duties to and fro, and I gave him a pay rise.

  Sultana, his wife’s duties would remain the same as the head-house keeper and she would be in charge of all the female staff except the nanny and I gave her a pay rise.

  The cook and her assistance, the two cleaning maids, and two gardeners; I gave them all a pay rise.

  The two guards at the gates and the chauffeur; I gave them a slightly higher pay rise and told them that they were welcome to have their meals with the rest of the staff.

  The office women and the accountant I moved them out of the palace and into a building in the village not far from the Mosque.

  The women were always playing with the twins and chasing after them, in-stead of getting on with their work.

  I gave the four of them a pay rise and told them when the children are older I would bring them back in.

  Muna wanted something to do and I appointed her as my part time assistant she would check the account books and my mails, and I included her in the pay list.

  All the men that worked for me on the ranch; I gave them a pay rise. I wanted to keep everyone happy.

  I decided to build the health clinic between the village and the city centre, once the architect completed the drawing and I was happy with it we started building the clinic.

  When it was completed I named it “Hanif Latchman Clinic.” with free treatments for all children up to the ages of sixteen and the over sixties.

  I advertised for two doctors and two nurses. When we finally got them we were open for business.

  The following year I released some waste-land to grow rice, coffee beans and walnut for the export market and extend the city and village further out and to build more houses.

  When that programme commenced I advertised for people to come to live and work in the Kingdom. We received thousands of applicants and I had to do my own checks.

  Muna wanted me to let her brother Shazam and his family in, but I refused. He was a thief; he stole my fowl and said that he found it on the waste-land.

  If I let him in he might steal the cows and sell them on, and the rangers would shoot him.

  Muna told me that he had changed over the years but I was not going to take chances with him, once a thief always a thief.

  When the twins were three years and six months old we took them to the West Coast for a short break.

  I wanted to see Maymun before she left for New York to live with her children. I also wanted to give her enough money to pay off the mortgage owing on the house in New York.

  Asma, her daughter came over to take her mother across. She had not met my twins.

  One afternoon they came to visit and Asma picked up my daughter Razia and held her on her lap and was talking to her.

  Muna came in looking angry and snatched Razia from Asma’s grip and remarked,”Don’t touch my daughter you evil witch. You said bad things about my husband when he was in Georgetown.

  And you called me a cannibal and now you pretend to be our friends. Just clear off and leave us alone.”

  I was stunned at Muna’s remark; she was not that sort of person to be abusive to anyone.

  Asma replied, “I don’t know how Hasan puts up with such a miserable crazy Carib woman.”

  Muna took Razia upstairs and Asma joined her mother in the back garden picking cherries with Mahir.

  When they were ready to leave I walked with them as far as the road-side and stopped a taxi to get them back home.

  Muna was furious with me when I came indoors she said that I kept quiet and did not say anything to Asma which meant that I agreed with what she had said.

  I did not want to get into an argument with her; she was already upset over what was said.

  I told her that we were going back home the next day and she told me that she was not coming; she needed some extra time off work.

  I told nanny to take good care of the twins and when Muna was ready to come home to let me know and I would pick them up at the air-base outside Georgetown.

  I left the next morning to return to work when I arrived home all the staffs were asking for the twins. I had to tell them that Muna was having some extra days off.

  A week went by and I heard nothing from her. I rang and she would not come to the phone and I was beginning to miss my twins.

  I rang again the following day and told nanny to tell Muna to come home by Wednesday.

  After that day the plane was going in for service and it might take at least four days and that her paper-work was piling up.

  That same week Alam came to see me and left a message for me to contact him.

  A day later, I received a telephone call from Nizam my eldest son in London and he told me that Muna was planning to go to Birmingham with the twins and nanny.

  She was going to visit her friend and to see him and Husain. He wanted to know what had happened between us.

  I became despondent after receiving that telephone call and did not get back to Alam and h
e came to see me.

  I had to talk to someone but I could not confide in any of my staff that worked for me.

  Alam had been through some rocky situations in the past with his two wives and I decided to confide in him.

  I drove him to the lake and we sat in the jeep away from the Palace and then he told me that he was planning to buy his own light air craft to start up a school to train people to become pilots.

  But he was short of cash and whether I would like to come into partnership with him.

  I told him that I would love to but right now I was having some problems of my own and then I told him that I thought Muna was planning on leaving me.

  I told him what had happened and the telephone call I received from Nizam in London.

  He remarked, “I am shocked, cousin Hasan I did not think for one moment that sister Muna would do such a thing.”

  “Money changes people cousin Alam. Perhaps she is going to England to get an English lawyer for a huge divorce settlement.”

  Alam was deep in his thoughts and then he said, “I am going to bring the twins and sister Muna back home, cousin Hasan.”

  “How you going to do that?” I asked.

  He told me that he was going to let me know when I should go to the ranch house to stay until he came to fetched me, but he would need the “Desert Queen” to do the job.

  “I am going to put the flying school on hold for the time being until I sort your problem first,” he reassured me.

  After we had supper that evening, on his way out he told me to stop worrying that he was going to bring them home safely.

  After he had gone I was wondering whether I done the right thing to tell Alam about my problem and trust him.

  The next afternoon he rang and told me to go and stay at the ranch house and to tell my staff that I was going to be away for a few days with the veterinary surgeons on the ranch.

  Shortly after that telephone call I locked my office and told my assistant Habib that I was wanted at the ranch to see the vets.

  I packed a few items of clothing in a bag and left in the Jeep. I drove for an hour on the deserted road that no one used except me; as an air-strip for taking off and landing of the “Desert Queen” and to drive the Jeep.