Amitav Ghosh - Flood of Fire

*

December was Calcutta’s social season, and thanks to the Doughties Zachary received a fair number of invitations to Christmas celebrations, and even more for the arrival of the New Year — 1840. Mrs Burnham was also present at some of these events and when they happened to come face to face they would exchange perfunctory greetings, barely acknowledging one another.

But her presence always kept Zachary on his toes: he knew that she would be watching him covertly and that there would be a detailed post-mortem later, in which he would be taken to task if he had lapsed in any way from the best standards of sahib-dom in clothes, manners or deportment. Sometimes, rarely, she would offer a few words of praise and he would lap them up eagerly. Every word of approbation made him hungry for more; nor did it diminish his appetite that he could never be sure whether she was teasing or in earnest.

On New Year’s Day their paths crossed briefly at a tiffin and that night, in the boudoir, Mrs Burnham said with a laugh: ‘Oh Mr Reid! You’re becoming quite the sahib, aren’t you? Soon you’re going to be so perfectly pucka you’ll turn into a brick. That cravat! The fob!’

‘And the suit?’ he said eagerly. ‘What did you think of it?’

Somewhat to his chagrin, this made her giggle. ‘Oh my dear, dear mystery,’ she said, cradling his face in her palms, ‘there is not a suit in the world to match the one you were born with. And now that I have it in my hands, I’d like to slip into it myself …’

As a prominent hostess Mrs Burnham herself entertained regularly at home, but it was made clear to Zachary that he could not expect to be invited and would do well to stay out of sight. When forewarned he would usually go into town or make other arrangements. But sometimes he would get busy with his work and forget: thus it came about one day that he was laying down some deckplanks when he noticed a long line of gharries and buggies rolling up the driveway. Only then did he remember that Mrs Burnham was holding a levée that afternoon.

It happened that he was working in a part of the budgerow that was hidden from the house so he decided that there was no need to retreat to the interior of the vessel as he sometimes did when Mrs Burnham was entertaining. He stayed where he was, doubled up on his knees, hammer in hand.

He was hard at work, with his back to the vessel’s prow, when he heard a voice behind him: ‘Hello there!’

Leaping to his feet, he turned around to find himself facing a flaxen-haired girl, of about seventeen or eighteen.

‘Don’t you remember me, Mr Reid?’ she said, with a shy smile. ‘I’m Jenny Mandeville: we danced at the Harbourmaster’s Ball — a quadrille, I think. You said to call you Zachary.’

‘Oh yes, of course.’ He glanced down at his soiled work-clothes — scuffed breeches and a sweat-soaked shirt — and made a gesture of embarrassment. ‘I’m sorry; I’m not dressed for company.’

She gave a tinkling laugh: ‘Oh I don’t mind in the least! What you’re doing looks most diverting. Can I try?’

‘Why yes, of course. Here.’

She gave a little cry as he handed her the hammer. ‘Ooh! It’s heavy!’

‘Not really,’ he said. ‘Not if you hold it right. Here — let me show you.’

He took hold of her palm and closed her fingers around the hammer’s wooden handle.

Their hands were still joined when another voice cut in: ‘Ah! There you are, Jenny! The mystery of the missing missy-mem is solved at last!’

They looked towards the foredeck and found a glowering Mrs Burnham standing there, with her fists resting on her hips; despite her dread of sunlight, she was, for once, devoid of either a hat or a parasol.

The girl snatched her hand guiltily away. ‘Oh Mrs Burnham!’ she cried. ‘I was just looking …’

‘Yes, dear,’ said Mrs Burnham tartly, ‘I can see what you were looking at. But it’s time for you to be off now — your parents are already in their carriage.’

Without a word to Zachary, both women hurried off, leaving him standing foolishly in the gangway, hammer in hand.

It had been arranged between Zachary and Mrs Burnham that he would come to the boudoir that night — she liked to have him visit on nights when she had been entertaining — but he was so upset by the brusqueness of her manner that he decided not to go. He went to bed early and was sleeping soundly, sheltered by his mosquito net, when the door of his stateroom flew suddenly open. He woke with a start to find Mrs Burnham standing in the doorway, lamp in hand: her expression was like none he had ever seen before — her face was contorted with anger and her eyes were ablaze.

‘You blackguard!’ she hissed at him. ‘You vile chute-looter of a luckerbaug! How dare you? How dare you?’

Leaping out of bed, Zachary pushed the door shut. In the light of the lamp he saw that she had not changed after her levée and was still wearing the same dress he’d seen her in earlier.

‘You filthy cheating ganderoo …!’

‘Mrs Burnham — calm down.’ Taking the lamp from her hands he led her towards the bed. ‘And please! Lower your voice.’

‘Oh how dare you?’ she cried. ‘First you flirt with that slam-merkin of a girl, and then you keep me waiting? How dare you?’

He had never before seen her in such a fury: he kept his own voice down so as not to further incense her. ‘I wasn’t flirting with her,’ he said. ‘It was she who came looking for me.’

‘You’re lying!’ she said. ‘You’ve been seeing her behind my back. I know you have!’

‘That’s not true, Mrs Burnham,’ he said. ‘This is the first time I’ve spoken to her since the Harbourmaster’s Ball.’

‘Then why’s she always asking about you? Why is it always Zachary this, Zachary that whenever I see her?’

‘I have no idea,’ said Zachary. ‘Don’t know nothin bout that.’

This seemed to calm her a little, so Zachary took hold of her elbow and led her to the bed. Parting the mosquito net he said: ‘You’d better get in, Mrs Burnham, or you’ll be eaten alive.’

She shrugged his hand off but allowed herself to be ushered inside the net. Blowing out the lamp, he climbed in beside her, to discover that her rage had now turned into a flood of tears.

‘Why didn’t you come?’ she said, between sobs. ‘I waited and waited.’

‘Mrs Burnham,’ he said quietly, ‘I don’t know if this has occurred to you, but I’m not just a mystery, you know: I’m also a human being, and it hurts me when you treat me like a stray dog as you did this afternoon.’

‘What the devil do you mean?’ she retorted. ‘Do you expect me to shower choomers on you in public? You know perfectly well I can’t be familiar with you in front of people.’

‘Lookit, Mrs Burnham,’ said Zachary patiently, ‘I understand that you’re a memsahib and I’m a mystery and we have to act a certain way to keep up appearances. But do you always have to be so rude to me in company? Why, there’s not a servant in the house you treat so badly. Even the way you look at me — it’s like I was a chigger or something.’

Her hands flew to her face and she shook her head convulsively from side to side. ‘Oh what a fool you are, Mr Reid!’ she said, swallowing her sobs. ‘You’re no mystery — what you are is an absolute and complete gudda.’

‘And how do you figure that?’

‘Oh Mr Reid,’ she said, ‘do you not understand? The reason I cannot bear to look at you in company is that I am gubbrowed half to death.’

‘Why?’

‘I am stricken with terror that my face will give away the goll-maul that wells up in me at the very sight of you!’

Zachary reached for her hand, in the dark, and found that it was shaking. ‘But it isn’t only in public that you’re hard on me, you know,’ he said. ‘Even when we’re alone, you have no praise for anyone but “our little sepoy” as you call him.’