by Peg Kingman
But Catherine had caught a glimpse, as the platform was lifted, and as the little dog scrambled on the lady’s lap to keep his balance, of—of something. Or rather, of nothing. Where Harini’s right foot should have been, nested in a swath of crimson muslin, there was only a stump, a rough and scarred stump ending at the ankle.
Mr Fleming offered Catherine his arm, but Catherine turned away and startled Hector by taking his arm instead.
Mr Fleming’s airy dining room was furnished in the British style, with tables and chairs, plates, forks, and spoons. But the food was Indian; dish after delicious dish cooked in the native manner was brought to the table by servants who bowed to Harini, showing her each dish for approval before carrying it around the table to serve to the guests. Sharada helped with the serving. Eventually, over a richly spiced biryani, the subject arose of the unfortunate Dr Macpherson, who had started out aboard Increase with them; and of the poor doctor’s obsession on the subject of his kinsman James Macpherson.
“Not even you, Dr Carey, with your own impeccable credentials as a translator of ancient literatures, could have made any impression on that unfortunate person, I feel certain,” Captain Mainwaring was saying. “He was in the grip of a mania on the subject. Or, I beg your pardon; perhaps you are a believer in Ossian yourself?”
“Oh, no, sir; the poems of Ossian are quite evidently a modern production,” said Dr Carey mildly. “And they could have passed current only in our own age. In any other time or place, their singular lack of any reference to the sacred, to divine affairs, would have stamped them immediately as inauthentic. Yet our own age has a blind spot in that regard, or rather cherishes a delusion in that regard. It is only our own age which seeks to explain the inexplicable without recourse to the sacred—anything but a divine presence or force or will! That is why I feel quite certain that the poems of Ossian are a modern production. And that explains also why they had been received with such a fanatical enthusiasm. Every fraud, every deception, every art carries its own betrayal in it.” Dr Carey spoke these words with such a gentle expression, such a quiet and mild voice, without force or any intent to convince others, that Catherine was struck by the essential modesty of the man.
Yet another dish was carried in. “Ah, for this I have been awaiting!” said Harini. “But good Mr F says I must give warning before letting you taste, for some persons may have objection to poppy.” Catherine looked as Sharada offered the dish: It was a bright green cooked vegetable, glistening with the oil or butter in which it had been cooked, and sprinkled thickly with tiny blue-gray seeds. But it was not beans nor okra nor fenugreek nor anything else that Catherine recognised. “It is the poppy pods, picked green, quartered, cooked in ghee, and sprinkled with poppy seeds,” said Harini, “and it is my especial favorite; I eat this every day when the season allows. It has such healthful tonic effect, and then I can reduce my usual opium. May I help you to it, Mrs MacDonald?” But Catherine pleaded that she could not eat anything more.
After their meal, it was proposed to treat Dr Carey and Harini to a little cruise aboard one of the steamships. But when Dr Carey explained that he had to return to his house to meet a printer’s apprentice who was coming especially to meet him, it was decided instead to bring Dr Carey to his mission house—on the opposite shore, and a short distance up a quiet tributary. His own little boat, in which he had arrived, could be towed behind.
With all the usual unpleasant fuss and commotion attendant upon such occasions, everyone boarded Castor once again. Harini, on her litter, was installed under the awning near Catherine’s chair, her little dog still on her lap. But Harini was markedly quieter now; her eyes were heavy-lidded, and her breathing was very slow as she reclined against her bolsters and cushions. After a short time, Catherine saw that Harini was asleep. Dr Carey, who had been pointing out sites of interest on the riverbank, came back to the shade of the awning and, seeing that Harini slept, quietly took the empty chair next to Catherine. “There is no waking ease for her,” he said quietly to Catherine, “neither of mind nor of body.”
“She seemed so high-spirited when we arrived,” said Catherine.
“It is a very great effort which cannot be sustained for long. Yet she always does make the effort.”
“Is it the loss of the foot?” asked Catherine.
“Ah, you noticed. Oddly enough, the absent foot still causes excruciating pain—or so she admits when she can be got to admit anything at all. But that pain is somewhat dulled by the opium. No, the greater pain, the pain that cannot be eased even by opium, is the loss of her children.”
And still in a low voice, Dr Carey told Catherine the history of Harini: a beautiful girl, cherished by her family, married young and well to a handsome, wealthy, affectionate husband of her own caste. They produced four healthy children in five years—two sons and two daughters—and lived a charmed, happy life. Then one day, when Harini walked into the bathing room among the tall jars of water set to cool, she was struck on her right foot by a poisonous snake, a little black cobra. “It struck just below her ankle bracelet, the thick snug-fitting bangle that all married women wear about their ankles. Pure gold, hers was, for it was a prosperous family,” explained Dr Carey. “Her foot swelled immediately. Her people did everything for her, everything that was usual and customary. They said all the prayers, and made all the offerings. Her husband did an extraordinary puja at the Kali temple, offering many goats and perhaps his own blood too. No one cut off the gold ankle bracelet, which perhaps prevented the venom from streaming into her whole body, but the skin on her foot dissolved, and the flesh putrefied. The foot resembled a mass of raw meat. Her sufferings must have been beyond imagining. She was not conscious as the poison, whether from the gangrene or from the snake’s venom, filled her body. At last her life was despaired of. The last kindness they could do her, the last sacrament they could perform for her, was to bring her to the bank of the holy river—for this Hoogly, you know, is the true Ganges—and let death overcome her there, with the holy mud on her body and in her very nostrils. For this, you see, guarantees moksha—release from the eternal cycle of worldly rebirth and suffering. Hindus, you know, believe that to die on the bank of this holy river is salvation itself.” Catherine glanced at the river; the water here was gray-green, opaque, smooth-gliding. The muddy red-brown banks were steep and littered with rocks, shards of brown pottery, and discarded rags.
Dr Carey continued: “So they brought her to the river—just a little distance upstream from Mr Fleming’s villa, in fact. And there they performed the last rites for her. They chanted their prayers as they laid her half submerged in the lapping water of the river. They smeared her body with the holy mud, and filled her nostrils with it, too. Then they sat by, waiting for her to die.
“But she did not die. Although poisoned with gangrene and venom, her nostrils stopped by mud, still she breathed. Her people waited all night; in the morning still she breathed! Then they left her alone on the riverbank and crept away, back to their houses. To them she was dead; there is no provision for anyone to recover once they have been brought to the riverbank to die. She must die; if she does not, still she is considered dead.
“It was our friend Mr Fleming who found her there in the mud late in the morning. First he supposed it was a corpse, washed up, for sometimes these cremations are rather incomplete if the family cannot afford a sufficient supply of firewood for the bier. But something made him go investigate, he told me later, though he was understandably most unwilling to approach the gruesome, mud-daubed thing. He found that she was quite alive, and actually conscious, though unable to move or speak. He had her carried to his house and had the surgeon over from Barrackpore at gallop. The surgeon amputated what remained of the foot, of course. Interestingly, he said that the mud was probably what had saved her life.
“Mr Fleming sought out her people, expecting them to reclaim her joyfully, but they would have nothing to do with her. They insisted she was dead. Gradually, even against her wil
l, her body healed. But not her spirit. She did not want to be alive. Mr Fleming consulted me; had he done a terrible thing in saving her when she was so unwilling to be saved?
“I came to see her. Of course I am a missionary, Mrs MacDonald, and perhaps you might suppose that it is my calling to baptise as many converts as I can. But I am not eager for ignorant, uninformed converts. I am not among those who hold that every soul who dies unbaptised is condemned to eternal damnation. I am not looking for large numbers, only for genuine conversion, unmotivated by fear or ambition or any other unworthy cause. And this was a genuinely thirsty soul, a soul crying out in the wilderness. Her conversion—and her opium—are what make it possible for her to continue in this life, one day after another. And yet I know, and I am not betraying anything told me in confidence when I tell you, Mrs MacDonald, that the pain which bears the most excruciatingly upon her, body and spirit, is that she never will embrace her children again. It is a deep thirst, she says, a thirst that can never be slaked.”
What moved Dr Carey to tell her all this? A small snore escaped the sleeper. Catherine’s gaze fell upon Grace, who was leaning over the stern rail to watch the marbled water of their wake. “And so she lives at Mr Fleming’s house?” asked Catherine.
“She runs his household. All the servants there now, of course, are Muselmani, for Hindus will have nothing to do with her.” Dr Carey looked frankly into Catherine’s face. “I daresay that some people may suppose that there is something disreputable in her living there. But I do not believe that is the case, or ever has been, or ever will be. And though Mr Fleming contends that it suits his own convenience to keep this house and all its servants even when he is abroad for months or years, I am certain that he does so only that Harini may have a place to live. It is the pure generosity of his good heart.”
Catherine did not choose to argue with him. Yet it was clear that Dr Carey was one of those mild, innocent souls who was unable to conceive of anything discreditable to anyone until it was proved to him beyond all doubt. How pleasant it would be, thought Catherine, to be so naive as that! She looked about; where was he, this pure, generous, good-hearted Mr Fleming? There, at the bow, sharing some joke with Mr Morris. Perhaps he felt Catherine looking at him, for he unexpectedly met her gaze, suddenly quite sober, not laughing now. Catherine looked away, trying not to scowl. The “good Mr F” indeed!
Oh, but she was beautiful, this Harini. Even in her opium sleep.
This Mr Fleming’s lady.
Catherine felt very angry, but mostly with herself. Captain Mainwaring had dropped the first hint to her. Men were men everywhere; but she herself had not yet been long enough in the Indies, the land of zenana—of harem—and of opportunity, to contemplate the fact with any equanimity. Why had she expected anything different from Mr Fleming? And what in the world had he expected from her?
When they arrived at the landing place below Dr Carey’s villa, it was found that the person whom he had hurried to meet had sent a note to say that he was delayed for several hours.
Mr Fleming said, “Dr Carey, it would be so pleasant to walk ’round your garden before we return, especially if you will accompany us and tell us what we are seeing. Will you be so good as to show us your collection of camellias? I think that Mrs MacDonald and Mr MacDonald might be particularly interested in those. Dr Wallich has told us that a kinsman of theirs—their late brother, in fact, the late Mr Alexander MacDonald—consulted you regarding some specimens of a camellia native to Assam. This would have been perhaps a year and a half or two years ago.”
Catherine did not wish to walk around any gardens in Mr Fleming’s company. But to hear of Sandy—here, two years ago!—this she could not resist.
Dr Carey said, “Oh, but I remember him very well, and was so sorry when I later heard of his tragic accident. And was he indeed your own brother, Mrs MacDonald? He made a vivid impression. Of course I should be very glad to show you the plants he brought me. Will Mr MacDonald come with us? No; something about the steam engine engages his attention, I see. A marvelous machine. So. Along this path, if you please. Do stay clear of these overenthusiastic creepers, Mr Fleming; they were hacked back only last week, but I think they only redouble their efforts under such treatment, hydra-like. Ah, now here is a novel sight for you! The giant Himalayan lily, in bloom! I had it from Dr Wallich himself.”
Catherine’s gaze ran up the thick stems, punctuated indeed by giant, lily-like lanceate leaves, alternate; up to the crown of nodding, heavy ivory trumpets well overhead. “They are fragrant, too,” said Dr Carey, “and especially free-scented at dusk. I have climbed upon a ladder to smell them. Isn’t it an odd sensation, though, to feel so dwarfed by a plant which is otherwise quite familiar?”
“I feel as though I had suddenly shrunk,” said Catherine.
“Just so! Now, there are the daturas, their blooms conveniently offered at nose level, and quite as fragrant as the lilies. Angels’ trumpets, they are sometimes called, meaning, I suppose, the Last Trumpet, for everything about the plant is exceedingly poisonous. But I have a correspondent in London who advises me that certain experiments are being conducted to establish what the species’ medicinal applications may be.” Most of the daturas had drooping ghostly white flowers; but some were yellow, and some were rose of differing vividness and fadedness. Their triangular leaves were pale and lax, too. To Catherine, the plants looked menacing, and as deadly as Dr Carey said.
“This way. Here we are. They like this high, light shade, the camellias, under the canopy of these acacias, with their pinnate leaflets. These lovely things are from the mountains of China; those others are from the islands to the east of China, where, I am told, they have been cultivated by the kings and nobles in their gardens since time began. So refined! But look; look. Here are the Assamese plants your kind brother brought me, Mrs MacDonald. It was about the new year of ’twenty-one; I remember perfectly well. We had such an interesting conversation. During the short afternoon and evening which he spent here with me, we discovered a great many interests and tastes in common—rather to our mutual surprise, I think. Not just botanical but literary as well; his feeling for translation and for the classics—the native classics in Sanskrit, I mean—was impressive, and he was most interested in the operations of my printing press too.”
Mr Fleming was thoughtfully fingering the long glossy serrated leaves of the Assamese camellias. These, growing in soil that was well-drained, even a little coarse and rocky, looked greener and more vigorous than the specimens they had seen in Dr Wallich’s botanical garden below Calcutta, but they appeared to Catherine’s eye to be the same plant. “Why did he bring these to you?” asked Mr Fleming.
“He wanted my opinion—my botanical opinion—as to whether they might in fact be tea itself. It is certainly an engaging question.” Dr Carey paused and gazed over the glistening river, remembering. “He had found in Calcutta a native of China who had formerly been employed in the manufacture of tea, and he had induced this Chinaman to prepare the leaves from these plants in just the same manner as tea is manufactured in that country. He brought me a small sample of these leaves, so we boiled water and drank some, sitting out above the river in the summerhouse. It did taste like tea, certainly; and looked like it, too.”
“What was the method of manufacture? How did this Chinaman prepare the leaves?” asked Mr Fleming.
“It is quite simple. The freshly plucked leaves are crushed and rolled in the hand by certain skilled individuals, then left to be exposed to the night air. In the morning the wilted, discoloured leaves are roasted lightly over a fire until they are perfectly dry. And that is all.”
“‘Picked, steamed, pounded, shaped, dried, and sealed,’” quoted Mr Fleming, “or so the Chinese ancients assure us. So, sir, what is your botanical opinion?” he asked, fingering the plant once more. He plucked a leaf, crushed it, and rolled it between his palms. “Is this plant camellia, or is it tea?”
“Oh, my opinion? I am only an amateur, sir. W
ho am I to contradict a trained botanist such as Dr Wallich? Who am I to debate whether this is proper Thea chinensis or only Camellia assama? But names can be exceedingly deceptive. Things may so easily change their names, or they may go by several names. Do I not struggle with language in every translation I undertake? Language is only a human creation, and, like all human creation, it is subject to change and error. But if only this plant were tea! We talked of that until the moon set, Mrs MacDonald—your clever brother and I.”
They turned back toward the ghat where Castor was tied. “But it is all up to Dr Wallich,” said Dr Carey as they made their way. “The directors credit no opinion but his, and he maintains stoutly that tea does not, cannot, thrive here.”
Catherine caught the heel of her shoe on a root, and stumbled; instantly Mr Fleming caught her arm to steady her. She recovered herself, and drew her arm quickly away. “Oh, but this path is terribly uneven, I am afraid!” said Dr Carey. “I ought to have the grass more closely mowed.”
“It does not matter at all, sir,” said Catherine, although she regretted this most unfortunate moment for clumsiness. She was annoyed with herself; and annoyed, as they arrived at the stone landing on the riverbank, that she still felt the place where Mr Fleming had touched her arm.