Flame Tree Road

by Shona Patel

  Biren was already halfway out of the door.

  “I know the family,” he yelled back. “I have to go and offer my condolences. I will see you tomorrow.”

  * * *

  A month passed and the dry winds of September lifted some of the humidity from the air. The neem trees started to send out feathery new shoots and leaves. One day the peon boy walked in with a handwritten note for Biren. It was from Jatin Nandi, who wanted to see him.

  Jatin Nandi had shaved his head after his mother’s death to mark his mourning. Without his shock of gray hair and only a thin gray fuzz he looked bony and old, barely recognizable. He also appeared awkward and nervous.

  “A marriage proposal has come on your behalf from your uncle in Agartala. This actually puts me in a very awkward position.”

  Biren’s heart went plummeting down. He waited to be told that the horoscopes had been compared and found to be incompatible and that therefore marriage was out of the question.

  “As you know, my mother, Maya’s grandmother, passed away a month ago, and as a result our family is forbidden to celebrate any occasion for a whole year.”

  “I understand,” said Biren, still waiting for the ax to fall.

  “So unfortunately, your marriage to Mandakini will have to wait. For a year.”

  It took Biren a moment to realize he was talking about Maya. His heart was beginning to make itself heard. “So, if I understand correctly,” he said slowly, and paused, almost too afraid to ask, “after a year Maya, I mean, Mandakini and I can get married?”

  “Yes.” Jatin Nandi nodded solemnly. “Mandakini is disappointed as well, but she understands. I have written back to your family explaining why we have to delay the wedding. I hope it won’t be too much of an issue.”

  “I don’t think it will,” said Biren, still blinded by his luck. The papaya tree outside the window seemed to glow with blessing. The birds were chirping, too.

  “I have also written back to your uncle and mentioned that there is no need to take the trouble to come and propose formally to our family. If my mother were still alive, it would have been a different matter. But my mother is no more and I, as the current head of the family, have no need for such formalities. Also, the matter of consulting horoscopes is out of the question. I abhor such things, as you well know. All I care about is my daughter’s happiness.”

  Biren was so relieved he had the sudden urge to embrace Jatin Nandi, but the house was still in mourning, so all he could do was give a somber nod. A large garlanded picture of the granny stared down at him severely from the wall.

  “So I give you my blessings to marry Mandakini. We will have a small engagement ceremony, just for the family if that’s all right, to formalize the matter. Then I’ll break the news to the community. But I have one request of you. For the sake of propriety I ask that both of you not be seen alone in public. Tongues wag easily in this town, and especially since you are still regarded as rather unorthodox—with your British job and Western ways—I would rather keep things low-key until you get married. I am not asking that Mandakini be chaperoned at all times, just that you take a third person along when you are out together.” He smiled. “You will find an eager, if not overenthusiastic, accomplice in our Mitra.”

  “I will certainly keep that in mind,” said Biren.

  He had not seen Maya in so many months his heart ached. He longed to speak to her. He felt bolder, more entitled now.

  “I am keen to hear what Mandakini has to say,” he said. “Perhaps I can have a word with her?”

  “But of course,” said Jatin Nandi. “She is waiting to talk to you. We were also hoping you could stay and have dinner with us tonight. We still don’t know your food preferences, but next time we will prepare the dishes of your choice.”

  “Please don’t worry. I am not a fussy eater,” said Biren quickly. Food! Who cared about food? All he cared for was Maya—rather, Mandakini. He would have to remember to call her by her proper name in public. After they were married, of course, she would become his Maya.

  * * *

  By the third dinner, to Biren’s relief, Mandakini had once again become Maya. Also, by the third dinner he was comfortable enough to arrive at the Nandi house with a fork and spoon in his pocket. He figured if dinner was going to be daily affair, which it was turning out to be, they might as well get used to his idiosyncrasies. It was not that Biren could not eat rice with his fingers; rather, he preferred to use a fork and spoon—a habit he had picked up in boarding school that had stayed with him. The Nandi family barely registered surprise, but Mitra was mightily impressed. She watched him keenly as he dissected a piece of fish, picking out the fine bones with the tip of his fork.

  “I also have to eat with a fork and spoon,” she declared. “I cannot eat with my hands.”

  “Here, take mine,” offered Biren. “Or we can each use one if you like. What do you prefer, the fork or the spoon?”

  Mitra eyed both. “The fork,” she said.

  Biren handed it across the table and continued to eat with the spoon.

  Mitra poked at her fish only to find the fork less friendly than she had imagined. She gave it back to Biren. “You can have it,” she said.

  “Thank you,” Biren replied solemnly. “If you need to use it at any time just let me know.” He looked up and caught Maya’s eyes. They were dancing with laughter.

  He got to know the old crone who ran the household. Everybody called her Buri Kaki. Buri Kaki cleaned fish and beheaded chickens with shocking savagery. She also made mustard-chili paste on a grinding slab with a pillow-shaped rock, and muttered to herself as she swept around the yard. She became coy and coquettish around Biren after she learned he was engaged to Maya. She addressed him as “Jamai-babu”—the son-in-law of the house.

  Biren pandered to her. “Buri Kaki, you make the best tea in the world,” he said, lifting his cup to her in a toast. She gave him a gummy smile and almost swooned when he winked at her.

  “She is besotted with you,” said Maya. Dusk was falling as they sat on the stoop outside the house, drinking tea.

  “And what about you?” he asked softly, his finger stroking her wrist.

  “Same,” she whispered, curling her little finger around his.

  CHAPTER

  48

  January arrived with gray-green dawns, the color of Maya’s eyes, and melted into mornings of pure gold. He saw her everywhere, even in the bare branches of the flame trees; the seedpods rattled her name with every passing breeze. He had ample time to be with her, but it was never enough. Most days he had dinner at the Nandis’. The better parts of the evenings was spent discussing building plans for the new school with his future father-in-law, or teaching Mitra arithmetic by amusing her with rocks, shells and a pile of peanuts, which she could eat to subtract one sum from another. Then there were moments with Maya. They went for boat rides and river walks where Little Miss Big Ears stuck like a cocklebur between them, walked toe to toe and listened to every word, acting as if it was her birthright to be part of this jolly threesome.

  Biren took them both to see his new house. Maya was surprised at the location.

  “It’s in the middle of nowhere, I know,” he apologized. “One day this road will be lined with gorgeous flame trees, just for you, my darling wife.”

  Maya smiled. “I did not know the British had built such an impressive road in this part of the town,” she marveled. “Why, it’s almost a highway. Is it going to connect to some place important eventually?”

  “To my house,” said Biren, adding, “for now.”

  Maya was incredulous.

  “I am the person who commissioned this road,” Biren said. “I can name it whatever I want. I was thinking of Maya—no, wait—Mandakini Avenue? Sounds impressive, yes?”

  He opened the front gate and invite
d them in. “Welcome to your future home.”

  Mitra skipped up the garden path. Maya wandered from room to room, empty of furniture, filled only with books and light.

  “Do you like it?” he asked anxiously. “It feels a little empty, I know. It needs a woman’s touch. I haven’t really had time to do anything.”

  “It’s sheer poetry,” she said softly. “I would not change a thing. This house is beautiful, unadorned, in its simplicity.”

  “You just described yourself,” said Biren happily. “That’s exactly how I see you.”

  Maya just gazed out at the river and smiled.

  CHAPTER

  49

  Biren had escaped the formalities of the wedding proposal, but there was no escaping a full-fledged Bengali wedding with all its terrifying chaos. The wedding had little to do with him and Maya; it was the marriage of two villages, several communities and a medley of assorted people. Besides the entire population of the bride’s and groom’s ancestral villages, there were fishermen, potters and weavers, Bengali babus from the jute mill and Silchar offices, Nitin’s college friends from Calcutta, a sprinkling of pink-faced belaytis, random relatives and wedding crashers. Everybody felt rightfully entitled to celebrate Biren and Maya’s wedding.

  Thankfully, five days of feasting and ceremonies came to an end, and a convoy of boats set sail for Silchar to a conch-blowing, ululating crowd who trampled the river mud to a squelchy mess. The bride and groom, seated on a decorated ferry, were accompanied by boisterous young men, Nitin and his college friends among them, while the women, children and elders followed in separate boats. During the past five days Biren and Maya had not had a chance to exchange a single private word. Now, seated among the joking and teasing men, they were brain-dead, exhausted.

  The boat wound its way down the river to the big fork, where, to Biren’s surprise, it veered toward the estuary instead of the main waterway leading to Silchar.

  “This is the wrong direction,” Biren called out to the boatman. “We have to turn around.”

  “Oh, Dada, I forgot to tell you,” Nitin apologized. “My Calcutta friends want to do a little sightseeing. There’s another boat waiting for them at the estuary.” His face wore a strange expression. One of his friends—Bela’s brother—winked back at him. “Oh, there it is, can you see the boat?”

  Sure enough, there was a boat moored on the shore. And a fine boat it was, too, decorated with tuberose garlands, silk bolsters, and filled with fragrant lilies!

  Nitin laughed and clapped his hands. “It’s for you! Are you surprised, Dada? This is your private boat and will take you and boudi to Silchar. You don’t want to be on this boat with my hoodlum friends. There won’t be a moment of peace and quiet, I can tell you, because look—” he pointed to a jute bag stuffed with bottles of hooch under the boat bench “—they have made party plans of their own.”

  Biren looked at his brother with joy and relief. “Thank you,” he said, embracing him.

  “I can’t take credit for the idea,” confessed Nitin. “It was Ma’s. She told me after Baba and she got married, Baba took her on a romantic boat ride and filled it with lilies. She wanted to do the same for you.”

  The boatman reached out to help Maya into the boat, and Biren stepped in after her.

  “Take all the time you want to get home, Dada!” yelled Nitin as the ferry pushed off. “We will tell everybody you both got kidnapped by the water gypsies!”

  His friends wolf-whistled and waved; their voices faded as their boat turned the bend in the river.

  Biren turned to look at Maya. She looked like a goddess sitting in her flame-red sari surrounded by fragrant white lilies. Her gossamer bridal veil fluttered in the breeze. Surely this had to be a dream? Maya smiled; her eyes were warm.

  “Which way should I take you, mia?” the boatman asked as he pushed out from the shore.

  “The longest way,” said Biren, settling down in the bolsters beside Maya. “Take us by the slowest, most scenic route you know. We are in no hurry to get home.”

  CHAPTER

  50

  Maya’s peaceful entry into Biren’s life was heralded by the arrival of a creature of mammoth proportions. Biren watched mystified from the veranda of his house as a bullock cart lumbered up to the gate carrying what looked like an elephant sewn up in burlap.

  “What the dickens...” he muttered, sitting up in the plantation chair.

  “Oh,” said Maya, looking a little flustered. “I forgot to tell you. That’s Baba’s gift for me. He ordered a dressing table. I had to accept it. Otherwise, Baba’s feelings would be hurt, you know. It looks very big, doesn’t it?”

  “I imagine you will need a very large dressing table.” Biren grinned. “Where else will you put all your potions and powder puffs?” Maya’s beauty tools consisted of an ivory comb and a bottle of sandalwood lotion, but Biren loved the idea of the dressing table. It was a purely feminine addition to their home and reinforced Maya’s presence in his life.

  He slipped into his clogs and ambled down the garden path to talk to the bullock-cart man.

  The bandy-legged bullock-cart man was standing under the shade of the mango tree wiping his face with a dirty rag. “Jatin-babu told me to wait here,” he said. “He is sending two coolies to unload this thing. I don’t know what it is, babu, but it weighs like a small house.”

  The coolies arrived and the dressing table was maneuvered with some difficulty into the master bedroom, where it was placed facing the window with a leafy neem tree outside. Once unveiled, it turned out to be a monstrosity with three angled mirrors of curlicue patterns of etched glass, exaggerated moldings and enormous claw feet. Set against the Spartan simplicity of the room, the dressing table was a shocking assault to the senses.

  For the next few days both Biren and Maya could only stare at it and burst out laughing. After a while Biren got used to its ponderous presence and even began to regard it with a certain fondness. Ostentatious and cumbersome, the only purpose the dressing table served was to remind Maya of her father’s overwhelming love and gratitude—emotions too large and unwieldy to express in words.

  Often Biren would lie in bed and watch Maya comb out her hair with her ivory comb. In the three-way angled mirrors every subtle aspect of her beauty was reflected back to him, manifold.

  Silchar

  16th May 1897

  How quietly she slipped into my life. Like spring slips into summer. Her lovely presence is all around me—delicate, whisper soft and almost invisible. I find her in the hairpin tucked inside the pages of a book, the sandalwood scent on my pillow, the jingle of the silver key chain hooked in the waistband of her sari.

  I think back to the time we first met. We had a soul connect even before we set eyes on each other, in another lifetime perhaps. There is an old knowing, a place of comfort and familiarity, that transcends time. I have never felt this way about anyone. Sometimes in the quiet evening when the throb of a busy day stills, we dwell on the wonder of how we found each other.

  Two years passed, and the pages of Biren’s diary remained empty. He felt no desire to record the bounty of his life. Pen, paper and words were inadequate to capture the magnitude and delicacy of his days with Maya, and any attempts to record it had the danger of sounding ornate, flowery and ultimately redundant—like Maya’s dressing table.

  It was not that they spent all their time together. They both had their work. Biren’s travels took him away from home, but Maya was so deeply embedded in his being that he never felt they were apart. Initially he had misgivings about leaving Maya alone for long periods, but it turned out she was immersed in her own interests. She did not try to manipulate his attention or make him feel guilty for not spending time with her. She was the most self-contained person he knew.

  In another six months the old century would be ushering in
the new. There was something momentous about the turning of a century. If years could be compared to pages, decades to chapters, a century was like an entire history book. There was the nostalgia of closure, and at the same time the anticipation of new beginnings.

  “Imagine, beloved,” said Biren. “This is the only turn of the century we will ever witness in our lifetime. I wonder what the twentieth century holds in store for us, don’t you?”

  They were lying in bed, fingers entwined. The moonlight filtered through the neem tree scattered like delicate lace on the bed. Maya pulled his hand and laid it wordlessly on her belly. She did not have to say it in words, but Biren knew. He imagined he felt an imperceptible tremor of the life they had created together. His tears of joy wet her breast, and when he reached out to touch Maya’s face he felt her smile curl around his fingertips.

  CHAPTER

  51

  Estelle was trimming back the rosebushes in Daddy’s garden. She had pulled on a waterproof canvas jacket and a pair of gardening gloves a size too large, which made handling the pruning shears rather awkward.

  After his heart attack Daddy tired easily. The rose garden, his pride and joy, had fallen into disrepair, although the hollyhocks along the garden wall bloomed carefree and tall with no attention.

  Estelle used the garden shears to lop off all the dead wood and crossing branches, then deployed a pair of sharp secateurs to make angled cuts above the outward-facing buds. Her father’s garden tools were always honed and sharp, as he insisted it was important to keep the cuts clean, because a frayed cut would leave the rosebushes open to pests and fungus.

  She could feel a head cold coming on, the sniffles just starting. She reached into the pocket of her woolen skirt for her hanky and came across the letter she had received from James a few days ago. It had been folded and unfolded so many times the creases had become soft and tired, and now she felt compelled to read it again. She rested the tools on the upturned wheelbarrow and went into the kitchen.