by Ruskin Bond
Mr Dayal called for Daya Ram, and the big amiable youth came lumbering into the lounge. We took an arm each and helped Miss Deeds, feet dragging, across the room. We got her to her room and on to her bed. When we were about to withdraw she said, ‘Don’t go, my dear, stay with me a little while.’
Daya Ram had discreetly slipped outside. With my hand on the doorknob I said, ‘Which of us?’
‘Oh, are there two of you?’ said Miss Deeds, without a trace of disappointment.
‘Yes, Daya Ram helped me carry you here.’
‘Oh, and who are you?’
‘I’m the writer. You danced with me, remember?’
‘Of course. You dance divinely, Mr Writer. Do stay with me. Daya Ram can stay too if he likes.’
I hesitated, my hand on the doorknob. She hadn’t opened her eyes all the time I’d been in the room, her arms hung loose, and one bare leg hung over the side of the bed. She was fascinating somehow, and desirable, but I was afraid of her. I went out of the room and quietly closed the door.
As I lay awake in bed I heard the jackal’s ‘Pheau’, the cry of fear which it communicates to all the jungle when there is danger about, a leopard or a tiger. It was a weird howl, and between each note there was a kind of low gurgling. I switched off the light and peered through the closed window. I saw the jackal at the edge of the lawn. It sat almost vertically on its haunches, holding its head straight up to the sky, making the neighbourhood vibrate with the eerie violence of its cries. Then suddenly it started up and ran off into the trees.
Before getting back into bed I made sure the window was shut. The bullfrog was singing again, ‘ing-ong, ing-ong’, in some foreign language. I wondered if Sushila was awake too, thinking about me. It must have been almost eleven o’clock. I thought of Miss Deeds with her leg hanging over the edge of the bed. I tossed restlessly and then sat up. I hadn’t slept for two nights but I was not sleepy. I got out of bed without turning on the light and slowly opening my door, crept down the passageway. I stopped at the door of Miss Deeds’ room. I stood there listening, but I heard only the ticking of the big clock that might have been in the room or somewhere in the passage. I put my hand on the doorknob, but the door was bolted. That settled the matter.
I would definitely leave Shamli the next morning. Another day in the company of these people and I would be behaving like them. Perhaps I was already doing so! I remembered the tonga driver’s words: ‘Don’t stay too long in Shamli or you will never leave!’
When the rain came, it was not with a preliminary patter or shower, but all at once, sweeping across the forest like a massive wall, and I could hear it in the trees long before it reached the house. Then it came crashing down on the corrugated roof, and the hailstones hit the window panes with a hard metallic sound so that I thought the glass would break. The sound of thunder was like the booming of big guns and the lightning kept playing over the garden. At every flash of lightning I sighted the swing under the tree, rocking and leaping in the air as though some invisible, agitated being was sitting on it. I wondered about Kiran. Was she sleeping through all this, blissfully unconcerned, or was she lying awake in bed, starting at every clash of thunder as I was? Or was she up and about, exulting in the storm? I half expected to see her come running through the trees, through the rain, to stand on the swing with her hair blowing wild in the wind, laughing at the thunder and the angry skies. Perhaps I did see her, perhaps she was there. I wouldn’t have been surprised if she were some forest nymph living in the hole of a tree, coming out sometimes to play in the garden.
A crash, nearer and louder than any thunder so far, made me sit up in bed with a start. Perhaps lightning had struck the house. I turned on the switch but the light didn’t come on. A tree must have fallen across the line.
I heard voices in the passage—the voices of several people. I stepped outside to find out what had happened, and started at the appearance of a ghostly apparition right in front of me. It was Mr Dayal standing on the threshold in an oversized pyjama suit, a candle in his hand.
‘I came to wake you,’ he said. ‘This storm …’
He had the irritating habit of stating the obvious.
‘Yes, the storm,’ I said. ‘Why is everybody up?’
‘The back wall has collapsed and part of the roof has fallen in. We’d better spend the night in the lounge—it is the safest room. This is a very old building,’ he added apologetically.
‘All right,’ I said. ‘I am coming.’
The lounge was lit by two candles. One stood over the piano, the other on a small table near the couch. Miss Deeds was on the couch, Lin was at the piano stool, looking as though he would start playing Stravinsky any moment, and Dayal was fussing about the room. Sushila was standing at a window, looking out at the stormy night. I went to the window and touched her but she didn’t look around or say anything. The lightning flashed and her dark eyes were pools of smouldering fire.
‘What time will you be leaving?’ she asked.
‘The tonga will come for me at seven.’
‘If I come,’ she said, ‘if I come with you, I will be at the station before the train leaves.’
‘How will you get there?’ I asked, and hope and excitement rushed over me again.
‘I will get there,’ she said. ‘I will get there before you. But if I am not there, then do not wait, do not come back for me. Go on your way. It will mean I do not want to come. Or I will be there.’
‘But are you sure?’
‘Don’t stand near me now. Don’t speak to me unless you have to.’ She squeezed my fingers, then drew her hand away. I sauntered over to the next window, then back into the centre of the room. A gust of wind blew through a cracked windowpane and put out the candle near the couch.
‘Damn the wind,’ said Miss Deeds.
The window in my room had burst open during the night and there were leaves and branches strewn about the floor. I sat down on the damp bed and smelt eucalyptus. The earth was red, as though the storm had bled it all night.
After a little while I went into the veranda with my suitcase to wait for the tonga. It was then that I saw Kiran under the trees. Kiran’s long black pigtails were tied up in a red ribbon, and she looked fresh and clean like the rain and the red earth. She stood looking seriously at me.
‘Did you like the storm?’ she asked.
‘Some of the time,’ I said. ‘I’m going soon. Can I do anything for you?’
‘Where are you going?’
‘I’m going to the end of the world. I’m looking for Major Roberts, have you seen him anywhere?’
‘There is no Major Roberts,’ she said perceptively. ‘Can I come with you to the end of the world?’
‘What about your parents?’
‘Oh, we won’t take them.’
‘They might be annoyed if you go off on your own.’
‘I can stay on my own. I can go anywhere.’
‘Well, one day I’ll come back here and I’ll take you everywhere and no one will stop us. Now is there anything else I can do for you?’
‘I want some flowers, but I can’t reach them,’ she pointed to a hibiscus tree that grew against the wall. It meant climbing the wall to reach the flowers. Some of the red flowers had fallen during the night and were floating in a pool of water.
‘All right,’ I said and pulled myself up on the wall. I smiled down into Kiran’s serious, upturned face. ‘I’ll throw them to you and you can catch them.’
I bent a branch, but the wood was young and green and I had to twist it several times before it snapped.
‘I hope nobody minds,’ I said, as I dropped the flowering branch to Kiran.
‘It’s nobody’s tree,’ she said.
‘Sure?’
She nodded vigorously. ‘Sure, don’t worry.’
I was working for her and she felt immensely capable of protecting me. Talking and being with Kiran, I felt a nostalgic longing for childhood—emotions that had been beautiful because they were
never completely understood.
‘Who is your best friend?’ I said.
‘Daya Ram,’ she replied. ‘I told you so before.’
She was certainly faithful to her friends.
‘And who is the second best?’
She put her finger in her mouth to consider the question, and her head dropped sideways.
‘I’ll make you the second best,’ she said.
I dropped the flowers over her head. ‘That is so kind of you. I’m proud to be your second best.’
I heard the tonga bell, and from my perch on the wall saw the carriage coming down the driveway. ‘That’s for me,’ I said. ‘I must go now.’
I jumped down the wall. And the sole of my shoe came off at last.
‘I knew that would happen,’ I said.
‘Who cares for shoes,’ said Kiran.
‘Who cares,’ I said.
I walked back to the veranda and Kiran walked beside me, and stood in front of the hotel while I put my suitcase in the tonga.
‘You nearly stayed one day too late,’ said the tonga driver. ‘Half the hotel has come down and tonight the other half will come down.’
I climbed into the back seat. Kiran stood on the path, gazing intently at me.
‘I’ll see you again,’ I said.
‘I’ll see you in Iceland or Japan,’ she said. ‘I’m going everywhere.’
‘Maybe,’ I said, ‘maybe you will.’
We smiled, knowing and understanding each other’s importance. In her bright eyes I saw something old and wise. The tonga driver cracked his whip, the wheels creaked, the carriage rattled down the path. We kept waving to each other. In Kiran’s hand was a spring of hibiscus. As she waved, the blossoms fell apart and danced a little in the breeze.
Shamli station looked the same as it had the day before. The same train stood at the same platform and the same dogs prowled beside the fence. I waited on the platform till the bell clanged for the train to leave, but Sushila did not come.
Somehow, I was not disappointed. I had never really expected her to come. Unattainable, Sushila would always be more bewitching and beautiful than if she were mine.
Shamli would always be there. And I could always come back, looking for Major Roberts.
The Crooked Tree
‘You must pass your exams and go to college, but do not feel that if you fail, you will be able to do nothing.’
My room in Shahganj was very small. I had paced about in it so often that I knew its exact measurements: twelve feet by ten. The string of my cot needed tightening. The dip in the middle was so pronounced that I invariably woke up in the morning with a backache; but I was hopeless at tightening charpoy strings.
Under the cot was my tin trunk. Its contents ranged from old, rejected manuscripts to clothes and letters and photographs. I had resolved that one day, when I had made some money with a book, I would throw the trunk and everything else out of the window, and leave Shahganj forever. But until then I was a prisoner. The rent was nominal, the window had a view of the bus stop and rickshaw stand, and I had nowhere else to go.
I did not live entirely alone. Sometimes a beggar spent the night on the balcony; and, during cold or wet weather, the boys from the tea shop, who normally slept on the pavement, crowded into the room.
Usually I woke early in the mornings, as sleep was fitful, uneasy, crowded with dreams. I knew it was five o’clock when I heard the first upcountry bus leaving its shed. I would then get up and take a walk in the fields beyond the railroad tracks.
One morning, while I was walking in the fields, I noticed someone lying across the pathway, his head and shoulders hidden by the stalks of young sugar cane. When I came near, I saw he was a boy of about sixteen. His body was twitching convulsively, his face was very white, except where a little blood had trickled down his chin. His legs kept moving and his hands fluttered restlessly, helplessly.
‘What’s the matter with you?’ I asked, kneeling down beside him.
But he was still unconscious and could not answer me.
I ran down the footpath to a well and, dipping the end of my shirt in a shallow trough of water, ran back and sponged the boy’s face. The twitching ceased and, though he still breathed heavily, his hands became still and his face calm. He opened his eyes and stared at me without any immediate comprehension.
‘You have bitten your tongue,’ I said, wiping the blood from his mouth. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll stay with you until you feel better.’
He sat up now and said, ‘I’m all right, thank you.’
‘What happened?’ I asked, sitting down beside him.
‘Oh, nothing much. It often happens, I don’t know why. But I cannot control it.’
‘Have you seen a doctor?’
‘I went to the hospital in the beginning. They gave me some pills, which I had to take every day. But the pills made me so tired and sleepy that I couldn’t work properly. So I stopped taking them. Now this happens once or twice a month. But what does it matter? I’m all right when it’s over, and I don’t feel anything while it is happening.’
He got to his feet, dusting his clothes and smiling at me. He was slim, long-limbed and bony. There was a little fluff on his cheeks and the promise of a moustache.
‘Where do you live?’ I asked. ‘I’ll walk back with you.’
‘I don’t live anywhere,’ he said. ‘Sometimes I sleep in the temple, sometimes in the gurdwara. In summer months I sleep in the municipal gardens.’
‘Well, then let me come with you as far as the gardens.’
He told me that his name was Kamal, that he studied at the Shahganj High School, and that he hoped to pass his examinations in a few months’ time. He was studying hard and, if he passed with a good division, he hoped to attend a college. If he failed, there was only the prospect of continuing to live in the municipal gardens …
He carried with him a small tray of merchandise, supported by straps that went round his shoulders. In it were combs and buttons and cheap toys and little vials of perfume. All day he walked about Shahganj, selling odds and ends to people in the bazaar or at their houses. He made, on an average, two rupees a day, which was enough for his food and his school fees.
He told me all this while we walked back to the bus stand. I returned to my room, to try and write something, while Kamal went on to the bazaar to try and sell his wares.
There was nothing very unusual about Kamal’s being an orphan and a refugee. During the communal holocaust of 1947, thousands of homes had been broken up, and women and children had been killed. What was unusual in Kamal was his sensitivity, a quality I thought rare in a Punjabi youth who had grown up in the Frontier provinces during a period of hate and violence. And it was not so much his positive attitude to life that appealed to me (most people in Shahganj were completely resigned to their lot) as his gentleness, his quiet voice and the smile that flickered across his face regardless of whether he was sad or happy. In the morning, when I opened my door, I found Kamal asleep at the top of the steps. His tray lay a few feet away. I shook him gently, and he woke at once.
‘Have you been sleeping here all night?’ I asked. ‘Why didn’t you come inside?’
‘It was very late,’ he said. ‘I didn’t want to disturb you.’
‘Someone could have stolen your things while you slept.’
‘Oh, I sleep quite lightly. Besides, I have nothing of special value. But I came to ask you something.’
‘Do you need any money?’
‘No. I want you to take your meal with me tonight.’
‘But where? You don’t have a place of your own. It will be too expensive in a restaurant.’
‘In your room,’ said Kamal. ‘I will bring the food and cook it here. You have a stove?’
‘I think so,’ I said. ‘I will have to look for it.’
‘I will come at seven,’ said Kamal, strapping on his tray. ‘Don’t worry. I know how to cook!’
He ran down the steps and made for the baza
ar. I began to look for the oil stove, found it at the bottom of my tin trunk, and then discovered I hadn’t any pots or pans or dishes. Finally, I borrowed these from Deep Chand, the barber.
Kamal brought a chicken for our dinner. This was a costly luxury in Shahganj, to be taken only two or three times a year. He had bought the bird for three rupees, which was cheap, considering it was not too skinny. While Kamal set about roasting it, I went down to the bazaar and procured a bottle of beer on credit, and this served as an appetizer.
‘We are having an expensive meal,’ I observed. ‘Three rupees for the chicken and three rupees for the beer. But I wish we could do it more often.’
‘We should do it at least once a month,’ said Kamal. ‘It should be possible if we work hard.’
‘You know how to work. You work from morning to night.’
‘But you are a writer, Rusty. That is different. You have to wait for a mood.’
‘Oh, I’m not a genius that I can afford the luxury of moods. No, I’m just lazy, that’s all.’
‘Perhaps you are writing the wrong things.’
‘I know I am. But I don’t know how I can write anything else.’
‘Have you tried?’
‘Yes, but there is no money in it. I wish I could make a living in some other way. Even if I repaired cycles, I would make more money.’
‘Then why not repair cycles?’
‘No, I will not repair cycles. I would rather be a bad writer than a good repairer of cycles. But let us not think of work. There is time enough for work. I want to know more about you.’
Kamal did not know if his parents were alive or dead. He had lost them, literally, when he was six. It happened at the Amritsar railroad station, where trains coming across the border disgorged thousands of refugees, or pulled into the station half-empty, drenched with blood and littered with corpses.
Kamal and his parents were lucky to escape the massacre. Had they travelled on an earlier train (they had tried desperately to get into one), they might well have been killed; but circumstances favoured them then, only to trick them later.