Anuradha Roy - An Atlas of Impossible Longing

They could not say at Mrs Barnum’s where Kananbala was. She had been taken away in a car by Mrs Barnum and her khansama.

Amulya sat in his armchair by the window and stared at the wall opposite, frozen into inaction by fury and astonishment. He could not think of returning to the factory. Where would he begin to hunt for his wife? What did the Barnum woman intend to do to her? Perhaps there had been some development in the police investigation and she was going to silence Kananbala? Maybe the police had lied to Mrs Barnum and told her Kananbala was about to depose against her? Could one put anything past a woman who had killed her husband for the sake of a lover?

He sat straight-backed, saying nothing to anyone, unable to still his mind. Manjula peeped in through the door at his preoccupied face, his rigid body, and stole away. She sat in her room eating a hurried, stolen snack to make up for their forgotten lunch. Her afternoon nap was out of the question. What if her father-in-law summoned her? “What a lot of trouble the woman is,” Manjula spluttered under her breath with exasperation. “What the hell is the old bag up to?”

* * *

The car sped over the smooth road and then turned into a narrower one that was bumpy. Around them were fields of stubble, the earth damp, exhaling, grass shooting out almost before their eyes with the new rain. They had left the houses behind, and now, apart from a villager’s hut or crop-guard’s shack, there were no buildings. The car bumped and lurched more and more until they passed first the rustling shade of a eucalyptus stand, then a stretch of open field, and then Kananbala knew where she was, though she could hardly believe it.

There, across the horizon, was the spine of the ridge, its body visible too, closer than she had ever seen it. This close, she could see the slopes had trees and scrub poking out of them, and the trees continued right down to the flat ground where they became the forest and met a dry stream-bed. The same forest she could see from her window, the forest where her lion was.

The car twisted round the dirt track and turned the corner, and Mrs Barnum said, “There! Now, have you seen that before?”

They were before the ruins of the fort. The car had stopped. Kananbala took no notice of Mrs Barnum helping her out of the car as she stepped across, hesitant at first, then with strong strides, to the old stone walls. She touched the stone with a wondering hand and looked around. She saw the enormous, aged, banyan tree that had sent out hundreds of aerial roots, now joined with the ground. Kananbala stood among the roots, looking up at them towering past her, a forest made by just one giant tree. She noticed the bark on the tree’s main trunk had knotted up into an odd shape, and looked closer.

“That’s meant to be the face of the Buddha.” The khansama translated what Mrs Barnum was saying. “He is said to have meditated here. This tree is supposed to bring people peace. It certainly does me!” She laughed. Then she said, “Shall we go further or stop here?”

“Stop!” Kananbala said.

“Right! Bring out the hamper, khansama, and the carpet, will you?” Mrs Barnum tripped ahead calling out, “Come, there’s more!”

She reached for Kananbala’s hand again and almost pulled her along. Kananbala watched the wine-coloured velvet of shoes that had lain perfect in their tissue wrapping for years grow beige with mud. She smiled a sudden, radiant smile of uncomplicated happiness, and then she saw a shallow pool of water, faded arabesques on the floor around it. She almost ran towards the water, ungainly, wobbly, sari entangling her legs. Mrs Barnum let go, watching her. The pool was cool with water from the new rain, not much deeper than a big puddle, but Kananbala, forgetting she was a woman in her fifties, threw off her shoes as children do and sat dipping her toes, then let her feet slide in, shivering at the touch of water.

Mrs Barnum was busy with the hamper. The khansama laid out a bright, striped duree, and on it a tablecloth that covered a portion of the middle. He took a few boxes out of the hamper, and a bottle. He laid out forks and napkins. Then he stepped back and said in English, “I will wait in the car?”

“Yes, I suppose … ” Mrs Barnum was irresolute for a moment and then said, “Yes, go to the car. If I need you, I will call, thank you.”

Kananbala saw Mrs Barnum crouching next to her, her peacock-blue dress trailing in the dust. Mrs Barnum had a bottle in her hand, and string.

“Ah,” she was muttering to herself, “Now let’s see … um, yes.” She tied the neck of the bottle with string and slid it into the water of the pool. She took the other end and tied it to a tree root. Then she rubbed her palms together in glee, exclaiming, “Now our picnic begins!”

* * *

When the afternoon was at its most silent, they heard someone at the door of 3 Dulganj Road. A servant came upstairs to Amulya’s room, followed by a stranger. It was a thin, balding man in a crumpled dhoti and a grey, sweat-stained shirt. Under his arm was a rolled-up, long, black umbrella with a wooden handle. In his other hand he held a very small, worn cloth bag of the kind people used when buying vegetables from the market. He came into the room and stood silently for a few minutes, opening his mouth as if to say something, then shutting it again. After this happened a few times, Amulya said, “Sit down. Where have you come from?”

The man remained standing.

“Kindly sit!” Amulya repeated, sounding a little impatient. “What’s the matter?”

Amulya did not think the man was from Songarh. His clothes marked him out as being from rural Bengal. Amulya was filled with foreboding.

Then the man began to speak.

After many minutes, he finished what he had to say and left the room. Amulya’s normally rigid back drooped semi-circular, and his skeletal face caved in further. He put his hands over his eyes as if he could not bear the daylight any more.

Gouranga, who was hovering just outside the door, heard a sound of anguish, something between a groan and a cry, from inside the room and fell back a few steps, startled. What could Kananbala have done, he wondered, to make Amulya Babu feel like this, where could she be?

* * *

They sat on the duree in the shade of an old spreading tree. Kananbala did not recognise most of the things Mrs Barnum laid out. There were sandwiches, cut fine and thin, wrapped in damp cheesecloth. Lunch boxes revealed cream biscuits and chocolate eclairs. One box was deep with small cakes studded with ruby red raisins. Mrs Barnum brought out cheese and a knife. She opened a tin of condensed milk and dipped a finger into it saying, “Try it, scrumptious!” She dipped her finger in again.

Kananbala shuddered at that. How could she eat anything contaminated by someone else’s saliva? She tried to smile and picked up a biscuit. But what if the bread slices had meat in them? What if the cake had egg in it? Yet if she did not eat, wouldn’t Mrs Barnum be displeased?

She started to babble, worried. “Slut, whore, daughter of the devil, syphilitic hen.”

“Pity we can’t understand each other!” Mrs Barnum said, “We’d have such a jolly time.”

Kananbala bit into the biscuit mumbling fresh expressions of horror through the crumbs.

Mrs Barnum said, “The wine must have cooled a little by now, let me see.” She drew the bottle out of the water and tested it. “Yes, it’ll have to do.” She produced a corkscrew from the hamper and opened the bottle as Kananbala watched intrigued. Mrs Barnum poured the deep red liquid into two crystal wine glasses and then, ceremoniously, held one out to Kananbala.

“Cheers.” she said. “Go on, there’s no-one looking, try it!”