Amitav Ghosh - Flood of Fire

‘He asked my forgiveness and said that I should put the past behind me. He said I should look to the future and make the best of my remaining years. Then he took his leave, saying jauch , and that was all. He was gone. That was when I woke up.’

Snatching up the end of her sari, Shireen began to dab her eyes.

‘Why are you crying, Bibiji?’ said Zadig. ‘There was nothing bad in what you heard.’

Shireen swallowed a sob. ‘It’s just that I don’t understand — why was he asking my forgiveness, Zadig Bey? What for?’

There was no answer, so she turned to look him in the eye. ‘Tell me the truth, Zadig Bey — did Bahram … did he die by his own hand?’

Zadig pursed his lips. ‘I don’t think it was as simple as that, Bibiji,’ he said. ‘If anything, it probably happened as Freddie says: he must have thought that he had heard Chi-mei’s voice. Bahrambhai told me once that he had had a vision of her, on this very ship, the Anahita .’

‘A vision?’ scoffed Shireen. ‘Impossible! Bahram never believed in such things!’

‘But he told me so himself, Bibiji: it happened on his last voyage, long after Chi-mei’s death. The Anahita was hit by a storm, in the Bay of Bengal. Bahram-bhai’s cargo of opium was knocked loose so he went down to secure the chests. That was when he heard her voice and saw her face. He said the hold was filled with the smell of raw opium — the fumes could have conjured up all kinds of things in his mind. Maybe that’s how it happened on the night of his death as well. Opium probably had something to do with it.’

‘I don’t follow,’ said Shireen. ‘Are you saying that my husband was taking opium?’

Zadig shifted uncomfortably in his chair: ‘I wish I didn’t have to tell you this, Bibiji, but the truth is that Bahram was smoking a lot of opium in his final days. After the crisis in Canton he was in a very downcast state of mind.’

‘Because of his financial losses?’

‘Yes, but it wasn’t just that, Bibiji. He had other things on his mind as well.’

‘Tell me, Zadig Bey.’

‘Bibiji, the opium crisis was a great trial for Bahram-bhai — he was torn between his two families, between Canton and Bombay, between China and Hindustan. There he was in Canton, with a huge cargo of opium; to lose it would bring ruin, not just on him but also on you and your daughters. On the other hand he knew very well what opium had done to Freddie; he was aware of what it was doing to China; he knew that it was slowly corroding families, clans, monasteries, the army; every chest that came in was creating more addicts …’

Zadig stopped to scratch his chin.

‘Bibiji, one thing about Bahram-bhai, he was not a moralizer; he was not a man to hold forth about religion, or good and evil. His emotions, his thoughts, they followed his flesh, his blood, his heart. He was above all a family man — but it so happened that fate gave him two families, one in China and one in India. He knew that his actions in Canton, as an opium-trader, would haunt both his families, for generations, and it was more than he could bear. I think that was why he began to smoke so much: it wasn’t just that he was seeking escape; it was as if he were sacrificing himself, in expiation for what he had done.’

Shireen crumpled the wet end of her sari between her hands. ‘Did he talk to you about these things, Zadig Bey? Did he talk about Chi-mei? Did he say he loved her?’

‘No, Bibiji!’ said Zadig emphatically. ‘Bahram-bhai was not a romantic man. He thought love and romance were not for practical men like himself.’

Zadig stopped to clear his throat. ‘In this, Bibiji, he and I were completely different.’

‘What do you mean, Zadig Bey?’

‘When I first fell in love, as a young man, I knew I had no choice in the matter: I was helpless.’

He swallowed a couple of times, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. Then, in a low, hoarse voice, he said: ‘And with you too, I knew — since that day in the church.’

The words sent a shiver through Shireen. When he placed his hands on hers she did not pull them back.

*

Hearing a drum-roll in the distance Paulette pulled Raju into her arms and kissed the boy on the cheek. Onek katha holo , she said. ‘We’ve been talking a long time now. Your friends in the band will be wondering where you went.’

‘Yes, I’d better go,’ said Raju. ‘Goodbye, Miss Paulette.’

‘Goodbye.’

Then Freddie’s hand fell on his shoulder: ‘Good thing we saw you, eh? Coming out of that suite?’

‘Yes, sir, Mr Lee.’

‘Why were you there anyway? What were you doing in that suite?’

‘The door was open so I went in,’ said Raju. ‘I didn’t know anyone was inside.’

‘There was someone inside?’

‘Yes, a gentleman.’

‘Gentleman, eh?’ Freddie dropped into a squat and looked him straight in the face. ‘Who was he?’

‘I don’t know who he was,’ said Raju. ‘I had never seen him before.’

‘What did he look like?’

‘He had a beard and he was wearing a white turban.’

‘Oh?’

Reaching for Raju’s shoulder, Freddie pulled him to his chest and gave him a hug. ‘Don’t worry, lah. Everything will be all right. I will get a message to your father. It may take a little time, but he will know that you are here.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ said Raju. ‘And goodbye.’

‘Goodbye. Be careful.’

As Raju ran off, Freddie seemed to lapse into a trance. Then, without a word to Paulette, he began to walk towards the door at the end of the gangway. Following on his heels, Paulette looked over his shoulder as he put a hand on the doorknob and pushed it open.

There was a heap of furniture inside, silhouetted against a pair of moonlit windows. One of the windows was open and its shutter was flapping gently in the breeze; beside it stood an empty chair.

Freddie walked over to the window at a slow, measured pace, almost as though he were afraid of what he would find. Paulette heard a deep sigh as he looked over the sill.

‘Come. See.’

Stepping up to the window she saw that a rope-ladder was hanging from the rim, flapping gently in the breeze.

‘Is it this ladder you saw that day?’ said Freddie. ‘Was is it hanging like this, eh?’

‘Maybe, I cannot say,’ said Paulette. ‘Anyway why is it hanging there now?’

Freddie made no reply. Leaning forward, he thrust his head out of the window and looked down into the water, at the shimmering reflection of the moon.

For a while he seemed to listen to the waves, with his eyes closed. Then she heard him say: ‘I can hear them, lah — calling me, the two of them, my mother and father.’

On an impulse she put a hand on his shoulder and pulled him back. His angular cheekbones stood out in the silvery moonlight, lending a strange beauty to his gaunt, haunted face.

‘You cannot go,’ said Paulette. ‘I will not let you.’

‘Why?’

‘Didn’t you say yourself? That the bonds of the Ibis are very strong? We all need each other.’

Two days after the start of the English New Year, Compton came over to Whampoa unexpectedly, bearing freshly issued orders for the Cambridge to move to a new position. She was to be taken downriver to the island of North Wantung, which lay directly opposite Humen, at the centre of the Tiger’s Mouth.

The Cambridge weighed anchor that very day, with Compton on board: he was under instructions to accompany the crew. About the reasons for these changes he said nothing and Neel knew better than to ask.