“There must be at least a dozen specimens.” She looked at Mr. Alford, but he gazed off toward the woods.
“Yes. I hope you work quickly.” He gave her a sharp look. “Professor Comstock assured me one of you is a skilled artist. I assume it’s you.”
“It is.”
He approached her. “We’ve been commissioned by the Crown. I hope you can do these butterflies justice. This book is to be the very best quality.”
“I’m sure you will be pleased with my renderings.” She crossed her arms. “Will I be able to join your expeditions once I’ve caught up?”
His attention had been snagged by William, who clutched a pair of butterfly nets. “Don’t forget the kill jars this time.”
William hustled back into the cabin, emerging a moment later with a sack tossed over his shoulder.
Owen joined Nora and Mr. Alford. “Is it safe for Nora to be here alone?”
The leader of their group sighed. “Pallavi will stay in camp. I believe she does laundry today. Nora, you may join her at the stream if you feel unsafe alone.”
She blinked. “Do the laundry?”
He threw up his hands. “Or not. Just get those illustrations done.” He stomped off, yelling at William not to break the jars during their hike.
Nora looked at Owen and shook her head. “It seems I’ve crossed the world so I can do your laundry.”
“And illustrate, which is something you’re particularly skilled at.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I can stay with you. I don’t feel right leaving you here alone.”
“I’m sure I’ll be fine. Let’s not give Mr. Alford any more reason to believe I’m a burden. I will do my drawings.” She settled into the chair at the table and arranged her brushes, paints, and jars. She’d illustrate the butterflies.
But she hoped Mr. Alford would see her worth soon. She hadn’t come this far just to paint pretty pictures.
When the men walked back into camp late that afternoon, Nora was just putting the finishing touches on her fourth butterfly. She spread the canvases over the table so the sun could dry them.
Mr. Alford approached to assess her work. Nora hoped he liked them. She hated herself for caring, but maybe if she could impress him with her illustrations, he’d be more apt to allow her to do some actual work.
He nodded once. “I think I’d rather see the Aphnaeus elima done with pencil. You could better illustrate the markings on the wings. You can do it tomorrow.”
Nora gathered the specimen she’d been working on and placed it back in the box. She forced her tone to be even, not wanting to seem too desperate. “Did you discover anything exciting today?”
He gave her a distracted look. “Nothing you’d be interested in.”
Nora clenched her teeth. How would he know what she was interested in? “Given my degree in entomology, I’m sure I’d be interested in anything you found.”
He blinked, then twirled the end of his mustache with exacting care. He looked down at her, and Nora wished she were taller. It would be much easier to feel equal to a man if she were.
“Your mind is equal to any man’s.”
Her father’s words, spoken so many years ago, stiffened her spine.
“Don’t allow convention to limit you. Know who you are.”
“Who am I, Papa?” Her ten-year-old voice had sounded breathless. She often sounded like that, speaking to her father. She hung on his every word.
“You are Nora Beatrice Shipley. My daughter. A child of God. And you will never allow someone to dismiss you because their mind is too small to understand that we are all more than our parts.”
Nora didn’t soften her stance. She didn’t offer Mr. Alford relief from the awkwardness. She didn’t flirt with him or stroke his ego. She held herself erect, secure in the knowledge that she was Nora Beatrice Shipley and deserved his respect. He might not realize it. He might not be willing to give it. But she wouldn’t settle for anything less than what her father had demanded for her.
He broke eye contact first. “Yes, well . . .” And then he wandered away.
Owen approached, scratching his head and offering a wry smile. “Mr. Alford was hoping to spot the Papilio buddha. He believes it’s the most beautiful butterfly native to the Western Ghats and wants to spend time observing its habits, but we never did see one.”
“What did you do, then?” She was hungry for information. If she couldn’t be with the team in the field, she could at least have a description of their work.
He shrugged. “Nothing much. We hiked to all the spots they normally visit, spent some time exploring a waterfall that turned up some interesting caterpillars.” He dug through his rucksack and pulled out a couple of jars. Inside, a jumble of spiky pupae rolled around the leaves scattering the container’s floor. “I’m going to raise them and see what they turn up. None of the men were familiar with them. Other than these, Mr. Steed found a flying lizard we studied for a bit, but that’s it. It was a lot of waiting. And talking. I discovered Mr. Steed and Mr. Alford taught together at Oxford. They don’t seem particularly close, though.” He held up a jar and squinted into it.
Nora took it from him and shook it gently, causing one of the pupa to uncurl. “Let me know if you need any help. I’ve raised butterflies since I was a child.” She didn’t wait for an answer, just shoved the jar back into his hands and went back to her pens and paints on the table.
Mr. Alford avoided Nora for the rest of that night as the group ate rice and lentils and drank cups of warm buffalo milk. He chatted with the men around the fire after the moon had risen and hung heavy in a sky as black as India ink. Nora, near the men but so far away, tilted her head and watched the progress of a shooting star. She inhaled deeply, her jasmine-tinged breath perfuming the resentment making its home within her.
“What are you doing?” Owen asked, leaning over the arm of his chair, his head inches from her face.
She looked at him. The moon’s light set off the silver darting across his irises. “Stargazing.”
He assumed her position, face upturned and a small smile twitching his lips. She reluctantly turned back toward the sky. She preferred watching the moon reflect in his eyes.
The next morning, while Nora sipped her fragrant masala tea, William dragged the table and art supplies from the cabin again. She blew across her mug and watched as Mr. Alford stacked the insect boxes.
“I believe you have about six drawings left.” He didn’t look at her, instead focusing on lining the brushes up so that their tips made an even row across the table. “We will probably have another specimen or two for you today.”
“And when I finish?” Nora wrapped both her hands around her mug.
“Finish with what?”
“With the illustrations, Mr. Alford. When I finish, will I be welcome to join you on your expeditions?”
Pallavi began to sing, her voice tripping so high, Nora could almost see the vibrations rippling her tea.
Mr. Alford’s eye twitched. “That infernal noise. Pallavi. Pallavi!”
Pallavi winked at Nora, turned her back on them, and continued to sing. Mr. Steed stumbled from his tent singing some Italian opera in a falsetto that made Mr. Alford clench his jaw. Pallavi paused, but for only a moment. Then her raspy soprano joined Mr. Steed as she hummed along.
Mr. Alford stuck a finger in his ear and wiggled it around. “Just finish the illustrations, please.” He handed Pallavi a few coins, then looked back at Nora. “Why don’t you go with Pallavi to the market this morning? You might find it interesting.”
The men left camp, Mr. Alford’s complaints drifting toward her as they tramped into the woods. Nora crossed her arms and glared at the tree line they’d disappeared into. Pallavi joined her, staring into the forest, then looking at Nora, one brow raised in question.
“Top of my class, Pallavi, and he wants me to pick out ripe mangos.”
Pallavi shrugged. “I will help you.” She squeezed her hand into a fist and held it to her nose
. Pumping her hand and sniffing at it, she said, “It must be soft and smell like flowers.”
A laugh bubbled up inside Nora. “At least I’ll return home having discovered something.”
After Nora had finished redrawing the Aphnaeus elima in pencil, she jammed her hat onto her head, slung her bag across her shoulder, and watched Pallavi bend at the waist to lift a basket. The skin around her midsection rippled and folded upon itself, and as Pallavi lifted the basket to her head, her biceps bunched. She was a couple of decades older than Nora’s mother, but her body was made of sturdier stuff.
A flap of wings drew Nora’s attention skyward, where a great hornbill soared ten feet above her head. It landed halfway up a tree, its tail feathers looking like a Chinese fan, and shoved its beak into a narrow slit carved into the trunk. Nora took a mental picture of it to tell Bitsy about when she returned home.
Pallavi passed Nora, her hips swaying with gentle rhythm, the basket held steady atop her head. Nora pulled her attention from the male bird feeding its nesting mate and followed her from camp.
Pallavi’s sandals slapped against her cracked heels as she stomped along the path. Nora’s eyes flitted from tree to bush to flower like hummingbirds. There was too much to see. Too many things worth noticing. She’d never experienced color so vibrant. The heavy scents of earth and decay and water carried her toward Kodaikanal. She pressed her hand to her chest as she inhaled and allowed herself to release her worries.
A flash of red against green caught her attention. As Nora hurried toward the bush, she pulled a kill jar from her sack. “Look at it! Oh, it’s gorgeous.”
Pallavi, ten feet ahead, set her basket down and watched with interest as Nora scooped the Buprestidae into the jar. She held it up to her eyes, watching as it scuttled around until the cyanide did its job. She grinned at Pallavi.
Pallavi shook her head and threw her hands in the air. “Why do you kill them?”
Nora frowned at the jewel beetle. “So I can study them.”
“Why?”
She approached Pallavi. “I . . . because I’m interested in them. In learning about them.”
“Why can’t you learn about them when they’re alive?”
Nora stood taller than Pallavi—a rarity—and she looked down her nose at her. “You wouldn’t understand.”
Pallavi sniffed and tucked her sari tighter around her waist. “You don’t understand. The insects don’t live for your sake. They have their own purpose.”
“Yes, but don’t you believe we should understand that purpose?” Nora waved her hand. “It doesn’t matter.”
It didn’t. Pallavi was uneducated. Not a scientist. She made meals and did laundry and went to the market. She sang warbling songs to her idols and wore a length of cloth instead of proper clothing.
Pallavi smiled at her, but in her deep-set eyes, Nora saw something that told her Pallavi understood more than Nora gave her credit for. Nora saw herself reflected—arrogant, dismissive, and proud—and her face went hot.
She was Mr. Alford! Even worse, she was Lucius.
Ice flooded her veins, and she wrapped her goose-fleshed arms around herself. How easy it is to see splinters through the forest.
She tucked her jar into her rucksack and grabbed Pallavi’s arm. “Let me tell you why I study them. Why it’s important.”
She spent the remainder of their walk trying to convince Pallavi of the importance of economic entomology, of pest control, of the possibility that insects held medical cures. But she knew she was trying to convince herself that she had an open mind and didn’t judge people superficially.
By the time they reached Kodaikanal and the market, Pallavi held her hands over her ears. “Shush, shush. I understand.”
Nora grinned, then allowed Pallavi to lead her from one stall to the next, arguing with fruit sellers, sniffing and then discarding bananas and onions, and piling bags of lentils and rice into the basket.
The market, teeming with people, stood in stark contrast to the woods they’d just walked through. Nora found she couldn’t discuss the finer points of choosing cucumbers with Pallavi because her voice got lost amid the hawking and arguing. She couldn’t admire the baskets of lentils and buckets of passion fruit because everywhere she looked, color assaulted her—from the vibrant saris to golden bangles and rings.
They ducked beneath a canopy, and Nora found herself facing a dizzying array of spices mounded in silver bowls on a red cloth. They dazzled the senses. Filled the air with a heady aroma and her eyes with a profusion of color rivaling insect wings.
Pallavi pinched a powdered bit of something bright red and rubbed it between her fingers. She touched the tip of her tongue to it. Her mouth drooped, and her eyes flashed. “Ni oru dhrogi.”
The merchant, sitting cross-legged at the head of his rainbow of masalas, curries, and seeds, shook his head. A vehement argument poured from between his lips, and his words tangled and wrestled with Pallavi’s.
It was all too stimulating. Too much.
Nora pulled away and edged toward the lake, which sparkled and winked at her, calling her to its shore. Calling her from the exotic and overwhelming market to something that reminded her of Ithaca.
She picked her way over the uneven ground, skirting piles of cow manure and hopping birds. Rose would love to be here, watching animals in their natural habitat instead of trapped behind bars in a zoo. When Nora reached the lake, she closed her eyes. For a moment she heard and smelled and tasted home—in the lapping water at her feet, the breeze rustling through the evergreen trees, the scent of water.
A keening pierced the peace, and the cry formed itself into a name. “Lukose!”
Nora’s spirit absorbed the grief in that word. She’d experienced that sort of wrenching sadness when her father died. She knew the sound of hopelessness.
On wobbling legs, she skirted the water and looked around, trying to locate the source of all that pain.
She found it in the shape of a woman wearing a black crepe gown and sitting at the edge of the lake, her legs tucked beneath her. Her small face was upturned and her pinched lips colorless. Dark, shiny waves of hair fell from the knot at the back of her head and over her shoulders. Everything about her spoke of shadows and clouds. She worried a small painted tin boat between her long, tapered fingers.
“Lukose.” The word caught on a sob.
Seeing the pain etched on the woman’s lovely face, Nora allowed herself to reimagine her father lying on the shore of Cascadilla Creek, his white face glistening in the sunlight. She sniffed.
The woman started, her head whirling and her eyes growing wide.
“I’m sorry,” Nora said. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
The woman curled in on herself, her chest caving toward her back. She drew her knees up and pressed the little boat against her cheek. “He’s dead. Typhoid fever.”
Nora approached and sat near her. She could see tears making tracks down the woman’s cheeks and the vacant look in her eyes. “Who?”
The woman began to wail, the sound squeezing Nora’s heart. She gripped Nora’s upper arms, the child’s toy biting through her sleeve and into her flesh.
“It’s okay,” Nora said, pulling the woman into her arms. “It’s okay.”
It didn’t matter who had died. Nora understood this. She knew what the woman needed, and even though she didn’t consider herself a consoling sort of person, she was a person. And being alone made grief even more unbearable.
By the time the woman’s weeping had calmed, Nora’s bodice was soaked through with tears and sweat. The sun burned upon their heads, and she almost wished for the parasol William had suggested. Glancing back toward the market, she realized Pallavi had probably left and gone back to camp.
The woman’s crying had turned to sniffles, and she spoke with a lyrical accent. “I’m Swathi Davies.”
Nora pulled back. “I’m Nora Shipley.”
“My son died of typhoid fever a month ago. He was eight.”
“I’m so sorry.”
Mrs. Davies nodded. “I was too sick to attend his funeral. My husband bundled me up and brought me here once the doctor said I would survive it.” Her eyes skittered toward Nora’s. “I didn’t want to survive it.”
Nora, so confident in her intelligence, had no words to give. What had people said to her when her father died? What had brought comfort? She couldn’t remember. She had buried herself in her bed, and when people offered solace, her mind had her at the waterfall, watching her father tumble to his death. “I understand.”
“He was my only child. I’ll never have another.” Mrs. Davies sighed, the sound coming from a thousand miles away. “We lived in Madurai his entire life. He never saw anything else, but he always wanted to. And now we’re here. Without him.”
“How did you end up in Kodaikanal?” Most of the city was made up of American missionaries and British military. There was only a smattering of local people.
“My husband is Eurasian, his father a British general who secured him a position with the Greater British Missionary Alliance. After Lukose died and I wasn’t able to regain my strength, the alliance sent us here to convalesce. My husband is working with the director. It’s supposed to be a great blessing, but I want to go home.” She looked at Nora, her lips twisted into a grimace. “I want to be where my son’s memory lives.”
Clouds gathered overhead, and a few fat raindrops fell. Nora stood and lifted Mrs. Davies with her. “Let me take you home. Can you show me the way?”
“Across the mountain, before death.” Mrs. Davies dropped her head and allowed Nora to shelter her beneath her arm. “But I’ll show you where I’m living.”
Nora strained to see Pallavi when they passed the market, but most of the merchants were packing up, and she knew Pallavi had left her. Mrs. Davies led her down neat streets to a one-story bungalow fronted by a long verandah.
As they climbed the stairs, a man rushed out the door and caught Mrs. Davies’s arms. “Where have you been, darling? I was so worried.”
A Mosaic of Wings Page 10