Dignity

by Alys Conran

  ‘So you see, I know how the past can jab through, like a knife.’

  Susheela stares at me.

  I can feel the heat of uncried things at my eyes. My voice quakes with a built-up pressure when I say it: ‘Don’t you let it, do you hear? Don’t you let it do that.’

  Susheela’s deep eyes, looking at him.

  I am suddenly weighted and dull. I take a breath and then take my hand from his and say, ‘Go to the damned doctor.’ Then, ‘I’m tired,’ I say to her. ‘Take me upstairs. Bring me a cup of tea.’

  She nods. Her man springs to his feet.

  ‘Wait here for her,’ I say to him, as sternly as I can, though my breath shows ragged between the words. ‘She’ll need you to do that.’

  On the way through the wide hallway, there is Aashi, dusting. I reach to stroke her shoulder as I pass, and, for once, she almost turns, I almost get to see her smile again.

  Once she’s wheeled me into the bedroom, Susheela sits down hard on the bed, determinedly present among the perhapsness of all my ghosts.

  ‘I don’t want to be a bad mother,’ she says. I laugh. ‘You?’ I say.

  She nods. ‘I’m not ready,’ she says.

  Mother in the corner is using one of Father’s drawing implements to pick something from a hole in the wood panelling. I can hear her muttering to herself. Dirt, perhaps she says. Dirt.

  ‘What type of a mother did you have?’ I ask Susheela.

  She looks at her feet, looks up again with full eyes.

  ‘Kind,’ she says, her voice splitting with the word. ‘Funny,’ she says, half laughing and wiping her nose with the back of her hand. ‘Loving,’ she says. These words, in her mouth, aren’t lacking in form and precision as I would have assumed them to be in another’s. They pulse with the presence of someone.

  ‘Well then,’ I say. ‘You’re a sight more prepared than I ever would have been.’

  In the corner, Mother, with her back to me, stops, stiffens, but does not turn round.

  That’s when she does it, the girl. She bends down to me, and she takes me in her arms. I’m surprised to feel the first thaw of it, and the shiver of tears that come suddenly. When I look up, Mother stands facing us now. She is Mother and not Mother. She is some other unseen, homely thing. She wears only a pinny, plain flats on her feet, a scarf around her hair. She is not the person I knew who went from tea party to gala. The look in this woman’s eye is open. And perhaps there is … love there beneath the empty dignity?

  ‘Did that really happen?’ the girl asks. ‘Did you see your dad killed?’

  I look at her, focusing again, slowly. I nod.

  ‘Why?’ she asks.

  The question so simple. The answer so huge and so full of time.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  A model of the doll’s house presented to Princess Elizabeth by the Welsh people. Double-fronted, with four rooms, hall, staircase and landing. Opening metal windows. Imitation thatched roof. Four electric lights, less batteries. Front hinged in two parts. Length 30’. Height 23 ¾’.

  TriAng Catalogue, 1930s

  Tonight I go along the dusty street, and I turn into the alley. I imagine that Raja is here, holding my hand and leading me down the street saying, Come on, madam, come along. And so I arrive at his dirty road with the pretend houses and I walk along with the people in the houses staring at me as I go, because I am a white girl. I am a proper little Englishwoman, and so I do not belong with these poor people who look so big in their little houses. On this street they do not have drainage. That is what Mummy says. On the other streets in India, they do not have drainage as they do on ours, and that is why it smells.

  I have trouble finding Raja’s because all the houses look alike to me, and how should I know which one is his?

  Ah, but Aashi comes out of it, so I know! She is dressed in a bright sari, and bangles, unlike the white one she wears at our house. I am about to say, Hello, Aashi. How are you? I should like to see Raja if you please. But then I see that she is talking to someone who is coming out of their house behind her. It is my papa! I jump when I see him, and I almost cry out with shock. Papa looks very tall and very yellow, coming out of their house. Papa should not be here! It is all wrong.

  I hide. I am lucky that I did not cry out, and that my papa did not notice me, a little Englishwoman on this Indian road, or I might be in a great deal of trouble. Like hide and seek, I hide behind the big tin can, which is full of gasoline for the lamps in the houses, and I watch as Papa gives Aashi something. I think it is money.

  What is he doing here? What is the money for? What is my tall, yellow papa doing in this place?

  I watch from behind the tin can as my papa walks away down the road.

  ‘You are a spy!’ says the whisper behind me.

  It is Raja. Oh! It is my friend! I am smiling because I am oh so pleased to see him.

  But he is not smiling. Raja is serious. He is serious, and he is very, very thin. Perhaps they do not have food now that Aashi does not work for Daddy?

  ‘You are a spy! Who sent you, was it your mother?’

  ‘No. I am not a spy! I am here myself. Mummy and Daddy have no idea.’

  Raja looks at me. I can’t hear what he thinks by his look.

  ‘Papa shot Meg the dog,’ I say.

  Raja looks up the street, then he takes a breath, then he looks at me.

  ‘Your father has a gun?’ he says.

  I nod. ‘He shot Meg the dog.’

  ‘Is she dead?’

  I nod.

  ‘Where is his gun?’ he says, as if he doesn’t believe me that Papa has one at all.

  ‘It is in his study, in the drawer,’ I say, and then, because he still looks at me strangely, ‘It is a small handgun. Papa has shown it to me and we have looked at the bullets and we have put it back in the drawer ready, just in case.’

  ‘In case?’ he asks.

  ‘Yes, just in case.’ I don’t know in case of what. No one ever says. But the gun is for safety, and so Papa keeps it close.

  Raja takes my hand, and he drags me into the house after him, just as he did last time we were here.

  Aashi is there, cooking over a small fire. She looks up at us. ‘Magda!’ she says. ‘What are you doing here?’ and then she starts shouting at Raja in Bangla. She shouts so quickly that I can’t understand. All I hear is ‘English’, ‘dirt’ and ‘trouble’. Raja stands there; he ignores her. He ignores his mother. She shouts more loudly and then she hits him across the face. On his face the slap is red.

  She comes towards me now.

  ‘Magda,’ she says. ‘You must go home.’

  ‘Why?’ I ask her. ‘And why don’t you come with me?’

  She shakes her head. ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Why? Is it because of what Papa has done?’

  She stares at me. And then she nods her head.

  I hate my papa. I hate him. What he has done must be terrible. And he shot Meg the dog.

  ‘Will you go home, Magda?’ she asks me then. ‘We need you to go Home.’

  I stare at her. Aashi never speaks to me like this. She never speaks to me so honestly and with tears in her eyes.

  ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘All right.’

  ‘Raja, walk her to the end of the road,’ she says in Bangla. Then she comes to me, and her arms are round me as tight as a bud. One seconds, two seconds. She pushes me, and says to Raja and me, ‘Go.’

  He runs out, and I follow him. Raja says nothing to me all the way up the road, and then he points.

  ‘That way,’ he says. ‘Go that way.’

  When I arrive at our house there is shouting inside. I can hear Mummy and Daddy shouting.

  ‘I’ve given her money,’ he’s saying. ‘What more do you want?’

  I can’t hear what she says back.

  ‘For god’s sake, Evelyn,’ he says. ‘This is ridiculous.’

  Then I hear a great sound of hitting. I hear Mummy crying.

  I go to the door of the stu
dy. I see Mummy and Daddy struggling. Daddy is struggling and has Mummy by the neck. He has Mummy by the neck, and he has pulled up her skirt. It is terrible, what he is doing to Mummy. What is he doing? He is like an animal with her. He is terrible. She makes a sound that I don’t understand. And he makes sounds. Finally then, he’s quiet.

  I hear what she says then.

  ‘I hate you. I hate you.’ And she runs out of the room.

  I hate him too. Mummy and I and Aashi all hate him together.

  There is trouble in our house because something has gone missing. Something is missing and the servants are all in trouble. Mummy and Daddy are scared the servants are turning on us.

  I look at Anwar and Madan, and I know they would not. But Daddy doesn’t know that because he lines all the servants up in the garden, and shouts at them all. He has them turn out their pockets, and searches their quarters.

  ‘It must have been someone from outside,’ says Anwar. ‘A thief.’

  The police come. They put dust all over Papa’s study, to look for fingerprints, but they don’t find anything, only Anwar’s fingerprints.

  ‘Of course Anwar’s fingerprints are in there,’ says Mummy. ‘He’s the only servant allowed in to put that place in order.’

  ‘Well he’s the only one it could be,’ says Daddy.

  When the police are gone, Mummy says to Daddy, ‘If you let them blame Anwar for this, I’ll tell them about the money. I’ll tell them you knew about the problems the hydroelectrics would cause and went ahead with them anyway. I’ll tell everyone about Aashi.’

  The servants and Mummy are busy upstairs preparing my things to go Home. I will have lots of trunks full of things and I will go on the ship with my cases and my clothes and Mrs Greenson.

  I am in my little house in the garden having a tea party with my dolls when I see Raja coming to our big house. He is sneaking into the house. He pushes the door and runs inside. I have just seated all of the dolls and have begun to serve the tea, but I stop, and I get up and out of my little house and I follow him. I don’t call his name. There will be big big trouble when Papa sees that Raja is here. I run to our proper house through the sunny garden, I open the door and go in, just as Raja did. In the hallway it is so dark compared to outside, and it is cool. I can only hear Papa talking on the telephone. His voice comes through the hallway and entrance hall and into my ears.

  ‘No,’ he says. ‘For god’s sake, man, you have it all wrong.’ Papa is angry. Papa is always angry on the telephone.

  In the hallway, I can’t see Raja. He must have gone up the stairs or to the kitchen. Anwar will box his ears. Papa will have him in deep trouble. Raja is a thief. Raja is a thief now in my house.

  He must be in the kitchen and so I go there first. There is no Anwar. The kitchen is empty. And no Raja. Raja is somewhere else. With Papa?

  Then my head is full of the sound. It is the sound of a gun, like when Papa shot Meg the dog. I am frozen.

  In the kitchen there is only the beans, soaking, and the smell of pickle simmering, and there is some meat, hanging.

  I hear Raja’s little feet. I hear Raja leaving the house.

  I stand in the kitchen. Still.

  There is the sound of a great many feet now, coming down the stairs. The sound of gasping and screaming. That is Mummy, screaming. She is screaming nothing. And then she is screaming my name. My name. ‘Magda, Magda!’

  ‘Yes,’ I am saying. ‘Yes.’ And I am walking towards Daddy’s study, and the door is open and Mummy is inside. She is silent. Mummy is standing.

  ‘I’m here, Mummy,’ I say. She turns.

  ‘Oh thank god!’ she says, and she runs to me, and she lifts me and hugs me.

  Past Mummy, I see Daddy. Daddy is lying with all his blood, and his eyes closed oh so very, very shut oh so shut and quiet and flat. And it is terrible oh it is terrible.

  It is because Raja is cleverer than me. It is because I told him, about the gun. And it is because Daddy is hated – even now, when he lies with his blood, Mummy looks at him, and he is hated.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Native teachers boast that not only can they tell a person’s sex and age by their tracks, but also their character. They say that people who turn out their toes much are generally ‘liars’.

  How Girls Can Help to Build up the Empire:

  The Handbook for Girl Guides,

  Miss Baden-Powell and Sir R. Baden Powell

  ‘Daddy shot,’ Magda says over and over. Daddy shot. Daddy was shot. I send her off with Madan. This is no place for a child.

  It is a frightful mess. Benedict has fallen forwards in his seat so that he lies across the desk and has bled out all over his latest draftings. The paper has curled red with the wet glimmer of it. And now, just now, the first drips begin to fall to the rug. The blue rug. That will take several washes. The bullet must have flown clear through Benedict’s mind and into the wood panelling behind him, for it has split through the polished mahogany, and has left a small hole.

  I walk over to the hole, and peer in. Yes, there it is. Despite its squalid journey, the bullet shines, glistens faintly, deep within the wood.

  I turn round. Just the thing! In Benedict’s hand, his brass compass. I remove it from his grip.

  ‘Memsahib!’ Anwar is standing behind me.

  ‘What?’ I say under my breath as I begin to pick and pick at the hole. But the bullet won’t be brought out. We will have to undo the whole thing!

  It is then that I realise my daughter is back again and crying. I turn round and she is standing there, and beside her is Mrs Greenson, who has the most stricken expression on her face.

  I smile at Mrs Greenson.

  ‘You’ll be leaving tomorrow,’ I say brightly.

  She has the temerity to look slightly offended, amid the shock.

  It’s then that I look at Magda. She must have run up to her father, and touched him, for she has blood smears on her face, her hands, and on her pale blue dress.

  ‘Child!’ I say. ‘You’re dirty. Go with Anwar and have a wash. Anwar, what on earth are you doing? Clean her up. And tell all the other servants to stay in the house, until I say they can go home. Don’t let anyone else in.’

  Anwar is staring at Benedict. And then looking at me with wary eyes, but he does as I say, and takes her along the hallway to the kitchen where no doubt he will stand her in the sink and wash her right there where the food is prepared. Still, now is not the time to fuss.

  When he has left with Magda, I ask Mrs Greenson to go up the road and report it to the police. She gets her bag directly, and positively dives out of the house. I stand, looking at Benedict’s blood on the clean carpet, wondering what on earth will get the stain out.

  Magda is, apparently, clean now, so I have her brought to me. Anwar passes her to me, wrapped in a big white towel. She is like a chrysalis in my arms. If they have bathed her well enough she will sprout wings. I dry her, rubbing furiously until she cries out.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry. I’m sorry, darling,’ hugging her. What is wrong with me? Each task I do becomes frantic, overzealous, mad.

  I carry her to my bed, pull a small nightdress over her limp body and tuck her in. She is asleep before I turn out the light. Terror does that to children. They run, they scream, but when the terror is over, they sleep like the dead. My small, porcelain daughter is the only live thing in me, here, at my chest, beneath all this starch and pomp and perfection, fluttering.

  Anwar comes in, and puts a cup of something hot and sweet and spiced in my hand. He places my fingers round the handle. His hands are firm.

  ‘Drink,’ he says, steadily.

  When I look up at him, we are two people, bare and alone.

  The army investigators that come are faultlessly polite. They wipe their feet at the door.

  ‘We had a report of a shooting?’

  ‘Yes,’ I say, nodding. ‘My husband. You had better go up and see.’

  They’re staring at me, like Anwar did.r />
  I nod. ‘He’s in the study,’ I say. ‘Dead.’

  When they finally come down, they accept graciously my offer of tea. I have Anwar bring cake also. They look at him, and look at each other. My heart is beating, beating, but my hands, serving the tea, are steady. I am practised now. The perfect gentlewoman.

  They sit down. Faultlessly correct. Polished shoes, army issue. Stiff collars. Slicked hair.

  ‘Any idea who did this, ma’am?’ The one with the moustache.

  ‘None at all. I’m afraid to say the door was left open. They must have walked straight in, and then straight out.’

  ‘Was he alone in the house at the time?’

  ‘Good lord no, there were, what … two people … and at least three servants.’

  He continues to ask questions tirelessly: where was I, where was Magda, where were the servants, who was first on the scene? They will need to speak to each of the servants in turn, and ‘Can we speak to your daughter?’

  I have Anwar bring Magda in. She is pale and sleepy. They ask her several questions, which make her cry, and establish that the poor girl is a terrible witness – who besides, they seem to accept, has seen nothing. I watch her face. There’s an expression there I don’t know. A grown-up, secret expression on my child’s face.

  ‘Gosh, how the army works its officers!’ I say, when they seem to have given up with her. I give them some of Madan’s cake, delicious, and impeccably English except for the butter, which is goat, not cow. Madan is a very obedient cook, at least on the face of it. I now have him fully trained. There’s very little Indian about his cooking at all these days. They sit back, enjoying the cake, and we talk of the weather and the increasing heat, and they smile at me, and perhaps flirt a little even, though good lord I am out of practice and my stomach turns so at the thought of men.

  ‘He’ll be shot, most likely, madam – the man who did this.’

  ‘Good,’ I say. Although I feel indebted to him. Freedom fighter or fiend. ‘Good.’

  I look past the men on the armchairs, at Magda sitting in the window seat. Her face is white as bone. The men leave, and I go to her. She is holding a toy rabbit that was sewn and stuffed for her by Aashi. She is rocking and holding it and looking out over our garden, its careful lawn and tidy beds.