Tiger Boy

by Mitali Perkins

  “Keep a sharp eye out for pugmarks, small and big,” another ranger added. “In the meantime we’ll do our best to keep the mother inside the reserve, but she’s frantic to find her missing baby.”

  “I’m sure you have learned from your error,” said Headmaster. He turned to Kushal. “You won’t let another tiger escape, will you, Son?”

  The head ranger shook his head vehemently. “It will never happen again, sir. But we have to get back and make sure there aren’t more tears in the fence. It’s been a pleasure to see you. I’ll never forget all you did—”

  Headmaster held up his hand, palm out. “That’s enough, Kushal.There’s a missing cub out there. Go and spread the news about how to find her. And keep the other tigers safe, will you? We need even more tigers to lure tourists—and their rupees—to the Sunderbans.”

  “Yes, sir!” With one last salute to Headmaster, the rangers hurried down the path.

  “Let’s go, boy. As they say in England, ‘A moving pebble doesn’t get covered with dirt.’”

  A rolling stone gathers no moss. Neel never said the corrections out loud. Correcting him was unthinkable.

  What was Headmaster planning to say to Baba? Neel had seen the delight and pride on his parents’ faces when he’d read them the letter:

  I have selected your son to compete against students from all the other schools in the region for the prestigious Sunderbans Scholarship. The scholarship pays for the top-scoring student in the region to study at a private boarding school in Kolkata. Our school has not had a winner of this competition in recent years, but your son, Neel, is the brightest student I have seen in my tenure here. His grasp of English and Bangla is superior. We will work with him in mathematics to increase his understanding of that subject. It is our earnest expectation that you will do all you can to help your son seize this opportunity.

  Yours truly,

  Headmaster Arjun Sen

  Neel’s voice had dwindled almost to a mumble as he’d read the letter aloud. He had no desire to study in the big city of Kolkata. Why would he want to live anywhere but the island? He could never leave Ma and her delicious cooking; his sister, Rupa, who coddled and teased him; and Baba, who protected and provided for all of them. The sights, sounds, and smells of the Sunderbans were as much a part of him as his dark skin and curly black hair.

  But Headmaster ruled the school like the prime minister ruled India—nobody said no to his decisions. The exam was in twelve weeks, and Neel lugged home piles of extra geometry problems that made his tired brain feel as thick and sticky as mud. Not that he worked too hard. He went through the motions, but he certainly didn’t intend to win that scholarship. He’d have to take the exam, of course, but then he planned to start secondary school right here in the Sunderbans, on a neighboring island that was just a quick ferry ride away.

  He did feel a twinge of guilt when he pictured his parents’ disappointment. Would Baba be angry when Headmaster told him how little Neel had been trying? Baba had never lost his temper with Neel or his sister, but there was a first for everything. Today, when Baba heard about Neel swimming with his friends instead of studying, would he give his son the kind of punishment Viju and Ajay often endured—no dinner, a slap or two, even a beating with a stick?

  The raised dirt path that wound around the island was bolstered by bags of sand to prevent any more of the shore from disappearing into the water. Villagers had planted new mangrove plants to replace the bushes and trees torn away by the cyclone, and new roots were beginning to push through the salty soil. Dinghies, fishing boats, and other nauka passed in the water, and shrimp fishermen trawled blue nets along the shore. Boatmen and passengers alike called loud greetings to Headmaster, who lifted a hand in answer. On the far side of the waterway, the bright orange mesh fence barricaded the islands of the reserve. I wonder where the cub broke through, Neel thought. It’s a long swim for a baby, but she made it and landed on a bank somewhere along here.

  To the right they passed patches of mangrove forest and small parcels of land, rice paddies, and chili pepper fields. Neel kept his eyes open for any small pugmarks leading off the path, but Headmaster was hurrying him along. Soon they were in view of Neel’s house, where his mother and Rupa were outside in a sunny corner, hanging clothes on the line. Theirs was the only property for kilometers where a grove of tall sundari trees provided shade for the house and most of the yard. The trees were aptly named after beauty— their wood wasn’t just supple and strong, it was a lovely, glowing red. Baba had planted the grove when Neel was a baby, and he guarded the family trees fiercely from woodcutters. As if in thanks, the sturdy trees had protected their house and fields from the brunt of the cyclone. Because the trees’ strong roots had kept the soil in place, the paddies would produce rice this coming harvest. Most of the other farmers would have to wait for another planting cycle.

  Neel could see Ma sweeping the area around the outdoor stove where she and Rupa cooked, near where the family gathered to eat. She was moving slowly; it had only been a few days since she’d been able to get up after being sick with dysentery. She didn’t catch sight of Headmaster hurrying Neel along the path, but Rupa’s head swiveled, her mouth fell open, and she dropped the towel she was wringing. Two black baby goats bleated at Neel from the pen attached to the family’s thatch-roofed clay hut, a rooster joined in with a loud crow, and the huddle of hens clucked their worry from the shade of the grove of sundari trees.

  Headmaster stopped at a small shack that sold homemade goodies, this time to guzzle the juice of a coconut. “It’s so blazing hot for January. I’ll sweat to death, I’m sure. Our climate is changing due to the rest of the world, and we’re the ones who suffer. How much farther?”

  “We’re close, sir. Just near that tall tree.”

  Four

  THE DOCK WAS SURROUNDED by anchored nauka bobbing in the current. Boatmen unloaded baskets of wares for customers who would come later in the evening to haggle over prices in the nearby market. Safely away from the bustle of the dock, in the shade of a large tamarind tree, a clearing marked the site for Gupta’s new house. The building was to be one of the biggest on the island, made with bricks and wood instead of clay and thatch.

  Several men were scattered across the building site. Neel glanced around and spotted his father. Baba was bending over a large pile of wood, which he seemed to be carving as part of a wide veranda on the new building. Was that sundari wood? It was. Neel couldn’t believe it—usually Baba’s was one of the loudest voices on the island protesting the cutting of sundari trees. Some of Gupta’s men must have risked their lives deep in the reserve to gather such a big amount of the red, sturdy branches. Surely Baba hadn’t joined them. The cost of Ma’s medicine and doctor visit must be really high, Neel thought. He had known that money was short, but he hadn’t realized Baba was in such a tight situation.

  Gupta, a balding, plump man smoking a fat cigar, was shouting at a foreman. A servant held an umbrella aloft to keep Gupta in the shade, but the burly foreman was sweating in the sunshine. Neel’s stomach coiled like a cobra—how could a big, powerful man like Gupta hunt down a defenseless tiger cub?

  Gupta caught sight of Headmaster and stopped his tirade. He whispered to his servant, cocked his head to listen, and then lifted a hand to wave. “Delighted to see you, Headmaster!” he called. “I’ll be with you shortly.”

  Headmaster cupped his hands around his mouth. “Jai, come here!” he barked, and Neel remembered that Headmaster had taught the little-boy version of Baba years ago.

  Baba turned to see who was calling. Immediately he rose and walked over, wiping his hands on his shirt. A trio of curious bricklayers followed. Baba raised his eyebrows when he caught sight of Neel.

  “Good to see you, Headmaster, sir,” said Baba. “How might I help you?”

  “I sent a letter a few months back about your son competing for the scholarship in Kolkata,” Headmaster said. “Did you read it?”

  “Yes, sir.”

>   Headmaster’s eyes raked Baba’s muddy sandals and torn shirt. “Could you read it?”

  Baba hesitated for a second. “Neel read it to me, sir.”

  “This is exactly why I scolded your father for pulling you out of school before you learned to read. Didn’t the contents of my letter explain the extent of study your son must undertake to win this prestigious scholarship?”

  “Yes, sir. We’re grateful to you for selecting him.”

  “Do you understand, Jai, that graduates of the school in Kolkata where your son would study have taken top positions everywhere in the world? San Francisco, Mumbai, New York, London, Dubai— these people are changing the world!”

  The world maybe, but not my island, thought Neel.

  “I understand, sir,” said Baba. “I am sure he can win this scholarship.”

  “Not if he doesn’t try. He is making absolutely no progress in math. And today I caught him swimming in the pond after school—as if he doesn’t have a care in the world! It’s virtually impossible to teach a boy who doesn’t want to learn. The only solution for your family at this late date is to hire a top tutor—a miracle worker, in fact. I know of one such man in Kolkata, but it would be expensive to bring him here. Do you have the money?”

  Neel could see the other men smirking. They were jealous of Baba’s carpentry skills, which earned a higher pay than their work of laying bricks, and of how quickly his rice harvest had recovered. They were enjoying this spectacle.

  Baba threw a quick glance at Neel and took a deep breath, as if the next words were hard to utter. “I’m afraid we don’t, sir.”

  “Well, you have this job, don’t you?”

  Baba’s jaw was set, and a muscle in his cheek was twitching. “I’m paying back a bit of debt. My wife fell sick, and we had to pay the doctor and buy medicine.”

  “Oh! So you’re borrowing money. Another poor practice to teach your son.”

  Baba was silent. Neel wished his father would shout at Headmaster, but Baba never lost his temper. “Angry answers hinder God’s purposes,” he often said.

  Neel yelled at Headmaster in his head: If Baba spoke English, he’d never make such stupid mistakes! There were so many things a boy could think but never say to his elders.

  Headmaster groaned. “It’s too late now to submit another name for the competition.” He turned to Neel. “You must start trying, boy. You’re going to bring shame to our whole village.”

  “I’m sure he will put his mind to the task of studying hard now, sir,” Baba said.

  Gupta was walking over, still shadowed by his umbrella-bearing servant. Yanking the cigar stub out of his mouth, he handed it to the servant, who crushed it under his sandaled foot. “Headmaster! What an honor to receive you on this side of our island. I’ve been wanting to meet you. I am Mr. Gupta. What might I do for you, sir?”

  “Ah, these boys will be the death of me. But they are the future of the Sunderbans, you know, and we must invest in their education. We have big plans for our school, so I’m glad a visionary man like you has come to invest in our island. As the English like to say, ‘Two brains are two times as strong as one brain.’”

  Two heads are better than one, Neel thought, gritting his teeth. The botched proverb grated on his already raw nerves.

  Gupta smiled, flashing yellow teeth that reminded Neel of a crocodile. “Come, join me for tea, Headmaster. I’ll arrange for a rickshaw to take you back. My, what a dedicated fellow you are!”

  The servant hoisted the umbrella higher so that Headmaster could join Gupta under the portable shade. The two men walked toward the tamarind tree, chatting and laughing like old friends.

  Baba drew Neel closer, turning his back to the bricklayers. “Son, have you been studying wholeheartedly? This scholarship is a chance to have a different kind of future. A life of hard labor—is that what you want? For your hands to look like this?” He held his hands in front of Neel’s face.

  Neel flinched. “Yes, Baba—” he started.

  “You! Enough jabbering.” It was the foreman. “Gupta isn’t paying you to chat with your lazy son.”

  Neel saw Baba’s fists clench and unclench. Though scarred and cracked, they were sculpted from years of hammering, chiseling, and fishing, and were twice the size of the foreman’s. One swing could flatten any man on the island. But Baba didn’t speak as he strode back to his work. And he didn’t look Neel’s way again.

  Five

  NEEL THREW ONE LAST SCOWL at Headmaster and Gupta, who were sipping tea in the shade of the tamarind tree. At first he walked fast to vent his fury, but soon he slowed and began to push aside bushes and leaves. The thought of the small cub far from home and hungry, at the mercy of Gupta’s men, was unbearable. She had to get back to the reserve before she was killed and skinned, with each of her body parts sold on the black market to line that rich man’s pockets with even more rupees. Maybe someone who didn’t know about the reward would find her first, but Neel knew how fast gossip spread on the island. How many people were desperate enough to be tempted by the money?

  He didn’t expect to see small pugmarks along the banks of the rivulets and creeks, because two high tides and two low tides swept in and out every day. It was low tide now, so he was able to take short detours into the dense patches of mangrove plants that lined the small creeks and inlets, but there was still no sign of the cub. And now Neel was almost home, where he’d have to face his mother and sister and tell them what had happened. He dawdled at the outhouse and took a long time to wash his face, hands, and feet at the pump.

  “What did Headmaster want with you?” Rupa demanded as soon as he walked in the doorway.

  Neel kept his eyes on his sandals as he left them on the flat stone threshold. Ma was standing next to his sister, waiting for his answer. Might as well tell them now, he thought, before Baba gets home and things get even worse. “He thinks I’m not learning enough math—that I won’t do well on the exam.”

  “Ay-yo!” Ma wailed. “You have to win that scholarship, Neel! A good education in Kolkata will save our family! Do you see how hard your father works to put rice on our plates? You could get a good job, take care of all of us!” She hurried to the small shrine in the back of the hut, lit an incense stick, and began chanting prayers to the statue of Bon Bibi that always stood there.

  “Get out of that dirty uniform,” Rupa said, “and then we need to talk.”

  Neel slipped behind the long sari that divided the room diagonally. Another shorter sari cut the back half in two. Ma and Baba slept on mats in the quarter of the hut that also sheltered the family shrine, and Rupa slept on a mat in the other quarter, along with three boxes full of extra pots and pans, flashlights, soap, toothpaste, cooking oil, spices, and other supplies. Neel had been given the entire front half of the hut for sleeping and studying late into the night. The clean, sleeveless white undershirt and cotton pants his sister left for him after school were folded on her mat. He changed quickly and came back out.

  Rupa tossed the dirty uniform onto the threshold, looking ready to launch into one of her sisterly lectures. Neel tried to forestall it by blurting out the news about the cub. But not all of it, even though he usually told his sister everything. He could barely restrain himself from sharing the secret of Gupta’s hunt. By picturing the fear in Viju’s eyes, though, he managed it. “And there are crocodiles out there!” he ended.

  “Poor baby,” Rupa said. “Far from home. She must be so scared.”

  “The rangers said she would be easy to carry,” Neel said. “You and I should look, too. The two of us can find her, Didi.” His first word years ago had been didi, or “older sister.”

  “We might, but you can’t waste any more time doing anything but studying. I’ll keep my eyes open— I promise.” She sighed and picked up the broom that stood in the corner near Baba’s pile of sundari wood. The broom was short, made of thin sticks that were tied together. “Did Headmaster take you to Baba and scold you in front of everybody?”


  “He didn’t say much to me,” Neel answered, swallowing. “He . . . he blamed Baba, Didi. It was so awful.”

  “It must have been! And it’s not even his fault! I know you don’t study, Neel. You sit here daydreaming every afternoon. I’d give my whole dowry to go to that school in Kolkata—every single bangle, sari, and necklace. And you don’t want to even try?”

  Neel didn’t answer. His sister had stopped going to school after Class Four—Ma had been sick then, too, and had needed her help. Rupa bent to sweep the floor in tidy arcs, lifting the longer sari draped across the room and ducking under it to reach the far corners of the one-room hut.

  Neel slumped on the small chair that Baba had built with wood from their trees. The chair was sturdy, solid, and just his size. The matching desk was built carefully at the right height and slant. At school his back ached from sitting in a stiff chair, and the desks were so rickety it was a challenge to write neatly. But at home he could sit in comfort. Baba had even carved flowers and leaves into the wood. These two pieces were the only wooden furniture in the hut—the supply boxes in Rupa’s quarter were made of cardboard. Even the gold and jewelry Ma and Baba had saved over the years to give to Rupa’s future in-laws as a dowry present were in a cardboard box, although that one was tied securely with thick rope.

  Rupa’s sweeping had reached Neel’s feet, and he lifted them so she could continue. Instead she stopped, straightened, and pointed to his books with her broom. “You spend so many hours sitting there every day, Neel. You must be learning something!”

  “Not math. I hate math so much. My brain has a big math block.”

  “More like a ‘leaving home’ block, I think.”

  “I don’t want to leave home, Didi. Would you?”