Flame Tree Road

by Shona Patel

  “He starts next week, doesn’t he?”

  “Yes,” said Shibani. They had waited all this time because Shamol wanted him to go to the big school in the Tamarind Tree Village near the jute mill. It was a better school because the jute mill funded it privately. Most of the mill workers’ children studied there. “Thank God Biren is a quick learner. He’s already far ahead in reading and math because Shamol tutors him every night. That reminds me, did you talk to your mother-in-law about Ruby’s tuition?”

  Apu sighed. “I asked her. Twice. Both times it was a big no. It is so frustrating. Your suggestion made so much sense. Shamol can easily tutor Ruby along with Biren in the evenings. But Mother-in-law won’t have it. She says if you educate a girl nobody will want to marry her.”

  “What nonsense!” cried Shibani. “We both had private tutors and we got married, didn’t we? Thank God our parents were not so narrow-minded. Let me tell you, sister, Shamol especially picked me because I was educated. He said he wanted a wife he could talk to, not a timid mouse to follow him around with her head covered.”

  “At least you two communicate. My husband doesn’t talk at all,” grumbled Apu. “He is gone all week and when he comes home I can’t get two words out of the man. Living with him is like living with a mango tree, I tell you. He gives shade, he bears fruit, but he does not talk.”

  “He’s a good man,” murmured Shibani. “He adores you and the girls. We were both lucky, really, to get good husbands.”

  “But just see my karma! Thanks to my mother-in-law I am going to end up with two illiterate daughters.”

  Shibani gave Apu a crooked smile “What is your problem, sister?” she said sweetly. “Your Ruby will marry my Biren and Ratna will marry Nitin. It’s all settled between us, remember? We decided that the day they were born. Now, concerning my future daughter-in-law’s education—has your husband spoken to his dear mother? He may be able to convince her to change her mind.”

  Apu shook her head. “Oh, he will never go against his mother’s wishes, even if he disagrees with her. It’s just as well I have you to talk to, sister. Otherwise, I would have surely gone mad.”

  Shibani gave a noisy huff. “How can anybody go through life without talking? I don’t understand.”

  A loud wail came from the direction of Apu’s house. Apu glanced hastily over her shoulder. “Did you hear that? I better run! Ratna has woken up. I think she is coming down with a fever.”

  “Can you come and oil my hair for me tomorrow?” Shibani called after her. “You give the best head massage!”

  “I’ll come after lunch!” Apu yelled back. “Around this time when Ratna takes a nap. Don’t forget my chili tamarind.”

  * * *

  Later that evening Shibani overheard Biren talking to his grandfather. “Grandfather, can you please check? Are my ears getting a little loose?”

  “Why should your ears be getting loose? Did your mother box them for you?”

  “No, no, please see, Grandfather. I think they are going to fall off. What should I do?” Biren wailed.

  Grandfather twisted Biren’s ear and pulled out a cowrie. “Look what I found,” he said, handing it to Biren. “Your ears are not loose. They are full of loose change.”

  “Sometimes I think I hear buzzing inside. I think it may be a bee.”

  “They are buzzing because they are full of money,” said Grandfather. “I wish my ears buzzed like yours. I’d be rich.”

  CHAPTER

  4

  Every morning, Shamol Roy took the passenger ferry to the jute mill dressed in a spotless dhoti and a starched cotton tunic, with a handkerchief perfumed with rose water folded in his pocket. At sundown he returned, wilted and worn, smelling like the rotting dahlias in a flower vase.

  The stench of decomposing organic matter clinging to his clothes and hair came from the raw jute in the mill storage godown where he worked as a bookkeeper along with his assistant. For ten hours a day Shamol Roy sat in the windowless godown of Victoria Jute Mills as sweaty laborers went in and out of the single door to unload the bullock carts lined up outside. The laborers hoisted the heavy bales on the claw hook of the large industrial weighing scale; the assistant squinted at the scales and shouted the weight, which Shamol Roy noted in neat, precise rows on his red tombstone-shaped ledger. The floor of the godown was black and sticky with dirt, and vermin of all kinds—cockroaches, rats, even predatory snakes—squeaked and scrabbled in the dark corners.

  A small, tidy man, fastidious by nature, Shamol Roy sat on an elevated wooden pallet with four bowls of water placed under each foot to discourage the creatures from crawling up. There was little he could do, however, about the rotting smell that pervaded the godown; it came from the jute stalks that had been submerged in stagnant water to ret so that the useful fibers could be pulled out and dried for use.

  The sun was already deeply slanted in the sky when he caught the ferry home. A sweet river breeze caressed his face and a great flock of cranes crossed overhead to roost in the marsh. The boatman sang a soulful river ballad accompanied by the beat of the oar as it broke the water into pleats of gold. As the boat turned the fork in the river, the flame tree of Momati Ghat first appeared like a gash on the horizon and blazed into full glory as the boat pulled up to shore. The tea shop was closed and a mongoose scrabbled among the broken terra-cotta cups. It streaked off into the undergrowth at the sound of his approaching footfalls.

  As Shamol Roy walked down the crooked path to his basha, his heart skipped to see his pretty wife dressed in a fresh sari with jasmine twisted in her hair. His two little boys, scrubbed and clean with their hair combed, ran up to meet him. They each held a hand and walked him back to the house. Biren was bright with chatter about his first fallen tooth, which he rattled in a matchbox, while little Nitin toddled along sucking his thumb.

  Shibani went inside the house to prepare his tea. She never waited to greet him at close quarters, knowing well that Shamol was embarrassed by his disheveled appearance and the smell that came off his clothes. The boys didn’t mind. For them it was the smell of their father coming home. In the bedroom Shamol Roy found a set of clean home clothes laid out on the bed: a chequered lungi, cotton vest and his wooden clogs on the floor.

  He picked up the brass lota from the kitchen steps and headed down to the well, where he washed down the smell of the workday from his skin and hair. Only after he had changed into fresh clothes did he begin to feel human again.

  He sat in the courtyard, a tumbler of hot tea warming his hands, a happy man.

  “So how was school today?” he asked Biren.

  “We had English lessons, and the new boy spelled elephant starting with an L.” Biren rolled his eyes as if to say, What an idiot.

  Shamol Roy feigned ignorance. “Oh, elephant is spelled with an L, is it not?”

  “Baba!”

  “Then what is it?”

  Biren mouthed E and his tongue poked through the gap in his teeth, reminding him of his recent toothless status. He opened the matchbox and looked momentarily stricken when he couldn’t see his tooth, but there it was in the far corner.

  “So what should I do with the tooth?” he asked his father.

  Shamol Roy looked at the sweet, solemn face of his son. “Let me see, now,” he said gently, pulling down Biren’s bottom lip. “It’s the bottom tooth, isn’t it? Then you must throw it on the roof of the house and ask a sparrow to get you a new tooth.”

  “But how can I do that, Baba?” Biren cried. “I’m not tall enough. I can’t throw it over the roof. Then the sparrow won’t get me a new tooth.”

  “I’ll lift you up. You’ll throw it over the roof, don’t worry.”

  Nitin plucked at Shamol’s sleeve.

  Shamol turned to address him. “Yes, what is it, Nitin mia?”

  Nitin pulled down h
is lip to display his own pearly whites.

  “Now, let me see. Good, good, you have all your teeth. No need to throw your tooth over the roof. You don’t need any new teeth right now.”

  Shibani emerged from the kitchen with a ripe papaya on a brass plate. Next to it was a dark knife with a white sharpened edge.

  “The first papaya of the season,” she announced, setting it down. “Perfectly tree ripened. Will you cut it for us, please?”

  “But of course, my queen.”

  The boys settled down to watch. They never got tired of watching their father cut a papaya because he did it with such ceremonial style. Shamol Roy held the papaya in both hands, turned it over and pressed down with his thumbs to examine its ripeness. He then picked up the knife, and with clean easy swipes peeled away the skin in even strips. The bright orange fruit was laid bare and the juice dripped onto the brass tray. Then came the sublime moment, the lengthwise cutting open of the papaya. The boys leaned over and gasped to see the translucent seeds nesting like shiny black pearls in the hollowed chamber. The seed and the fiber were scraped away and discarded on an old newspaper. Nitin amused himself by pressing down on the seeds and making them slip around like tadpoles. The peeled fruit was segmented into long, even slices. The boys were given a slice each and the rest disappeared into the kitchen.

  No matter how wilted and crushed Shamol Roy looked at the end of the day in his foul-smelling clothes and the jute fibers trapped in his hair, he became God in the eyes of his sons when he peeled a papaya. They were convinced no other person in the world could peel a papaya as beautifully and expertly as their own father did.

  CHAPTER

  5

  Eight-year-old Samir Deb came to the Tamarind Tree Village School wearing knife-edged pleated shorts, knee-length socks and real leather shoes. If that was not impressive enough, there were two brand-new pencils, one red and the other blue, sticking out in a flashy manner from his shirt pocket.

  The pencils were immediately confiscated by the young schoolmaster, who probably fancied them as much as the other boys. Pencils and paper were a luxury, after all, erasers coveted and rare and a mechanical pencil sharpener considered a technological marvel. The boys were given slates and chalks to use in class that remained in the school. To take a piece of chalk home, they had to steal it. No wonder Samir Deb with his new pencils created such a sensation.

  Samir said he was born in Calcutta. He also claimed he had been to London—twice—and seen Big Ben. Since nobody in the village school knew who this Big Ben was, the boys nicknamed him Big Beng. Big Frog. He was rather froggy looking, as well, with his flabby face and thin legs; Samir Deb was odd in every way. To begin with, he arrived in a tasseled palanquin carried by four burly men instead of by boat like the other village children. During recess he tried to join the boys in their rough play and pleaded with them in a high girlish voice. When he got pushed, he fell down, scuffed his knees and cried. Sammy’s humiliation was complete when he received a sharp rap on his knuckles from the schoolmaster after he was caught passing a wooden top from one boy to another in class. By the time he had climbed into the palanquin and left for home, he was convulsing in hiccupping sobs, and his knee-length socks had collapsed around his ankles.

  * * *

  The next day there was pandemonium in school. A brood of belligerent women in shiny saris and oversize nose rings rushed into the schoolmaster’s tiny office and cornered him against the wall.

  “Why did you beat him so?” cried a pitcher-shaped woman with gold bracelets up to her elbow. She had a pale froggy face that looked like Samir’s, and was most likely his mother. “The poor child is completely traumatized. He cried all night. He would not eat, he would not sleep. Today he was terrified of coming to school.”

  “My goodness.” The schoolmaster stared from one angry face to the other. “I hardly beat him at all. I just gave him a small tap on his knuckles because he was misbehaving in class. How else is the child going to learn a lesson?”

  “You hit him with a stick.” The woman pointed to Samir’s knees, which looked ghastly thanks to the red Mercurochrome that had been applied to the scrape. “Look at his knees. The poor child can hardly walk.”

  “I did nothing to his knees, excuse me,” said the schoolmaster indignantly.

  “In our family we believe in kindness and love,” said a gray-haired woman who was probably Samir’s grandmother. She glared at the young schoolmaster severely. “You had no business to beat the child.”

  “I repeat, I did not beat the child,” said the schoolmaster in a tired voice.

  “But you just admitted you took a ruler to his hands. I want to make sure this never happens again,” said the pitcher-shaped mother in a stern voice. “This darling boy has never heard a harsh word in his life. It is unthinkable that anybody should beat and punish him.”

  “So how do you suppose he is going to learn what is right from wrong?” demanded the schoolmaster.

  “He will learn by watching others,” said the grandmother. “By following their example. May I please make a suggestion?”

  “Go ahead,” said the schoolmaster in a resigned voice. Through a gap in the wall of female forms he spied the curious faces of his students looking in through the window. He clapped his hands abruptly to disperse them, and Samir’s mother, interpreting his action as a sign of mockery, flew into a sudden rage.

  “Do you know who my husband is?” she shrieked. “He is Dhiren Deb. My husband is supplier of all the goods in the Victoria Jute Mills co-op store. My husband will ask the jute mill owners to stop all funding to this school if you do not pay attention, do you understand?”

  “I am listening,” said the schoolmaster, a little taken aback.

  “All we are suggesting,” the grandmother said in a soothing voice, “is the next time Samir needs to be disciplined, just take the ruler and beat the child next to him. If Samir sees the other child suffering, he will be frightened and behave himself.”

  The schoolmaster was incredulous. “Beat some other innocent child who has not done anything wrong instead of the real culprit? How does that even make any sense?”

  “Just try it,” said the granny, nodding wisely. “We know it works. Samir gets very frightened when he sees somebody else being punished. At home we just beat the servant boy and Samir immediately behaves himself. Now, don’t get us wrong. We want the child to be disciplined and grow up to be a fine boy. Just don’t beat our little darling is all we are saying.”

  * * *

  Samir quickly figured out some friendships were negotiable. He could join in a game by giving the leader a pencil. But most games involved a lot of push and shove, and he was deathly afraid of getting hurt, so he just stood on the sidelines and cheered the players on in his high girlish voice. Sometimes he was generous for no reason at all. He played treasure hunt and left coveted items in secret places so that they could be “stolen.” He even left his leather shoes under the tamarind tree and watched secretly to see who would steal them.

  The one person Sammy wanted most to be friends with was the brilliant and smooth-talking Biren Roy. But Biren Roy avoided him. He and his three friends walked around with their hands in their pockets avoiding the riffraff. In class, Biren Roy asked such intelligent questions that he made the schoolmaster nervous.

  Samir learned that Biren Roy lived in another village and went home every day in a small boat with a one-eyed boatman. He also came to grudgingly accept that there was no hope in the world of ever calling him a friend.

  CHAPTER

  6

  Some days after school, Biren loitered at the tea shop on Momati Ghat. It would be around closing time in the early afternoon with a few fishermen smoking their last bidis. Sold as singles in the tea shop, the bidis were lit with a slow-burning coir rope hung from a bamboo pole. The fishermen who idled at the tea shop were
the ones who had returned without a sizable catch. There was no fish to spoil in their baskets and no need to rush to the market. Those were also the ones who told the tallest stories.

  Kanai, the one-eyed fisherman, waggled his foot and sucked the smoke from his bidi through a closed fist.

  “I saw the petni again last night,” he said, narrowing his single eye.

  “Saw it or heard it?” asked Biren. He had heard fearful stories from the fisherman about the faceless ghost of Momati Ghat with backward-facing feet who wailed in the voice of a child.

  Kanai glared at him. “I saw it. I may have one eye but I am not blind.”

  “What did the petni look like?” Biren asked.

  “It was white,” said Kanai. “Completely white from head to toe.”

  “Was it a boy or a girl?”

  “What kind of question is that? A petni is a petni. It is neither a boy nor a girl.”

  “If you are talking about the creature that is hanging around the ghat late at night, that is no petni, Kanai,” said the ancient fisherman they called Dadu. Grandfather. He had a foamy white beard and the skin on his face was cracked and creased like river mud. “That is one of the cursed ones.”

  “Who is cursed?” asked Biren. He tapped a dimple in the soft ground with a twig and watched a tiny sand beetle pop out and take a swipe before sliding back into a whirlpool of sand.

  “Widows,” said the old fisherman. “They are the most wretched creatures on earth. A widow is even more dangerous than a petni because it can appear in the daytime and spit on the happiness of others.”

  Biren shuddered. “I hope I never see one,” he said.

  “You’ve seen them, mia. They are everywhere,” said Kanai. “There’s one that begs under the banyan tree near the temple. Surely you’ve seen that one?”

  “Oh, that one.” Biren sighed with relief. “That is only Charulata. She is harmless. We talk to her all the time. Baba said she is a poor woman whose husband died when she was only thirteen. A mango tree fell and cut her husband in half, poor thing.”