Vikram Chandra - Red Earth and Pouring Rain

Finally, with the look of a man who has encountered an unfamiliar, immutable natural force, Hercules began to seek a compromise — the journey, he said, would be sanctioned if the party were escorted by a detachment of the Company’s cavalry, which precaution would properly foster an atmosphere of official formality and strength likely to prevent criminal mishaps. My daughters must come with me, Sikander’s mother said. Leave them out of this foolishness, you will endanger their health, the air in this country is foul always, but especially fecund for fevers at this time, and who knows what waters they will have to drink, and why not go to the river here, on the edge of the town, if you must, it’s just as good, to my eye. There is only one holy river, they will drink what I have tasted first, Sikander’s mother said, and whatever you want you have done with them, you have done with them as you Angrez do to your women, so that now I can hardly speak to them, but before I die I will see them bathe once in the river.

At this Hercules looked a little taken aback, even a little ashamed, and he said, perhaps if Mr. Sarthey and two of his companions could go along to chaperon the whole affair, maintaining, thus, a sense of propriety and so on. Fine, Sikander’s mother said, but Sanjay’s uncle will come, he must come to look after the boy’s health. The cripple? Hercules said, I suppose it is all right if Mr. Sarthey is there too, but all in all this is a sorry piece of women’s uselessness, and too damn close to the monsoons for comfort. But Sikander’s mother was already gone, looking to packing of provisions; Hercules turned, nodded at his sons, and walked back to his part of the house, clearing his throat.

Nine days later, the party set out. In front of Sikander’s house, elephants shook their heads, camels refused to get to their feet under their loads, horses balked and cantered about, servants ran about doing nothing, dogs barked, soldiers shouted orders and palanquin-bearers sat in groups, smoking sullenly. But finally, out of this swirling mass, a stream evolved and sluggishly headed off down the street — a party of cavalry went first, lance-heads sparking red from the first sun, and Sikander and Chotta, after much consultation and assurance, were allowed to go with them, seated in front of two grey-bearded officers; behind, their mother and sisters followed in two curtained palanquins (the bearers now chanting steadily, ‘Hunh-HA, Hunh-HA, Hunh-HA’), surrounded by attendants on foot; then came an elephant named Gajnath, the largest elephant in the group, and on this elephant, behind the mahout, sat Sanjay, giddily happy, almost unaware of the slight pain in his right upper arm, caused by the bony grip exerted on it by his uncle, who sat bolt upright behind him, his face twitching in alarm each time Gajnath’s back rolled and dipped in the course of a stride. As they wound through the streets, children ran out onto balconies and roofs to look at the horses, the soldiers, and Gajnath; Sanjay straightened up, concentrated on looking directly ahead, and wished they had a band of musicians to play some sprightly martial tune — he was a king on his way to survey his domains, he was a prince off to win a beautiful princess in spite of scheming rivals, he was commander of a small army headed into battle with a powerful invading tyrant.

‘O Gajnath, Lord of Elephants, you are indeed mighty, O Expansive One,’ Ram Mohan said. Finding that the pressure on his arm had ceased, Sanjay turned, his illusion broken, to his uncle, who was laughing at the way Gajnath had twisted his tail to one side and high, at the huge steaming circles of black dung he was depositing, one after another, in the middle of the street. Then Gajnath stopped, and began to mark the path with a dark, wet circle that soon spread at least twenty feet, and two soldiers who cantered past raised their right hands and said, ‘Fine, fine, very good!’ and the on-lookers applauded in wonder, and Sanjay wished he could get off and look at the prodigious stream, for surely it was something to be remembered. But just then, as Gajnath finally lowered his tail, three horsemen in black, their long coats flapping, rode up and past, their faces held carefully up, nostrils quivering, and then took positions around the red palanquin bearing Sikander’s sisters. One of them, whom Sanjay recognized as the choleric foreign gentleman from the garden, the speaker with the book, leaned close to the curtains and spoke, then straightened up to peer about at the crowds with unmistakable hostility, or at least fear.

‘I think that one, the one with the red face, is the one who wants our books, Sanju,’ Ram Mohan said. ‘What’s the matter? Do you want to pee? No? Listen, if you want to, you must, keeping it in has the most undesirable results. We’ll hold you here at the back of the howdah, and you can make a nice mark in the mud just like Gajnath. No?’

Sanjay shook his head violently, aghast at the loss of regal dignity such a procedure would entail; in fact he wasn’t sure of the reason for his sudden uneasiness, at his inability to sit still. He shut one eye, and the three black horsemen rode steadily alongside the red palanquin; he repeated the same operation through the other eye, and still they trotted along, surrounding the palanquin like guards; he opened both eyes, and the three became six, a black circle.

‘Listen,’ Ram Mohan said. ‘I’ll tell you a story, all right? Did I ever tell you about the play that your father and I wrote once, long ago, when you weren’t even with us, and the knot, and Sikander of Macedon, who wanted to kill the world? Did I tell you about that? Well, in it, we had a part, a scene which dealt with this very issue, a short scene that we took out before we performed it in court, because Skinner, yes, Sikander’s father, in his capacity as resident, advised us such a thing was incompatible with the dignity of the court, that’s what he said, ‘the dignity of the court,’ which he had himself degraded and humiliated until the Raja became like a nervous old camel, but in any case there was this scene, want to listen? Listen, then; it went something like this. This is the famous scene when Sikander comes upon some sadhus under a tree, and we thought we’d done a good job of it, but the Company man said that Sikander of Macedon deserved a more dignified treatment, more exalted dialogue, but in any case it went like this. Sikander, you understand, is speaking to the sadhus through a translator.

TRANSLATOR

He wants to know why you’re naked.

SADHU

Ask him why he’s wearing clothes.

TRANSLATOR

He says he’s asking the questions here.

SADHU

Questions give birth only to other questions.

TRANSLATOR

He says people who get funny with him get executed.

SADHU

Why?

TRANSLATOR

Because he’s the King of Kings. And he wants you to stop asking questions.

SADHU

King of Kings?

TRANSLATOR

He came all the way from a place called Greece, killing other kings, so he’s King of Kings, see.

SADHU

Fool of Fools. Master-Clown of Clowns. Maha-Idiot of idiots.

TRANSLATOR

You want me to tell him that?

SADHU

I said it, didn’t I?

TRANSLATOR

You’re crazier than he is. He says he’ll kill you. Right here, right now.

SADHU

I’11 have to die someday.

TRANSLATOR

Listen, don’t do this. He’s demented, he doesn’t realize who you are, he thinks naked people are poor savages. He’ll really kill you.