The House of Blue Mangoes (16 page)

Joshua nodded. ‘Anna, you already possess the sort of strength and wisdom that is granted to few.’ He laughed. ‘And besides, you have me, don’t you think you are fortunate?’

‘Of course, of course,’ Solomon said with a smile, ‘but I’m curious. Why have you come back just at this time?’

‘To see you all,’ Joshua said lightly. Then he added, ‘Actually, a kinsman I met in the west told me about the troubles in Melur and Sivakasi and I wondered whether they were being echoed here. It gave me an excuse to return . . .’

‘Things are different here now,’ Solomon said sombrely. ‘Muthu is not the only problem. A general sorrow has come over the land. Drought, taxes, unrest. It seems as though the evening of the world is upon us, Joshua.’

Joshua said, ‘Everywhere I’ve been, I’ve seen suffering and tension. The world is tired, anna, it’s been around for so long that its cares press heavy on it.’

‘They press heavy on me. There are fools and enemies everywhere I look. I’ve told you about Vakeel Perumal. Thank the Lord that he’s in jail where he can’t cause too much trouble. And Muthu, well, you know him . . .’

‘This is a violent land, anna. Muthu is more representative of it than you will ever be.’

‘Isn’t that sad? If discord and bullies are the norm.’

‘Yes,’ Joshua said, ‘but that is the way things are. Everything seems to have fallen apart, the white man is losing his grip, and in the absence of any real authority even the smallest of men becomes a tyrant.’

‘Do you really think the white man is losing control?’

‘It’s not so much about losing control, as a general indifference to the problems of the country. The British came here not to rule but to take what they could get. All they’re doing is revealing their true colours.’

‘But there are good men among them . . .’

‘There will always be exceptions but sadly such men are rare,’ Joshua said, ‘and that is why we will need to find our own answers.’

After lunch, they sprawled out on the veranda again. The serious mood of the morning had passed and Joshua, loquacious as ever, regaled Solomon with the many wondrous things he had seen and heard during his relentless travelling. He described the crowded streets of Madras, the grand British officials and merchants, so different from Father Ashworth, and unparalleled wonders such as the mysterious round objects of glass that sprang into radiance brighter than anything he had seen. ‘Rooms would fill with the sun at night,’ he said to Solomon, who laughed indulgently. When he was telling his stories, Joshua was known to be fanciful. He had even taken a train to Bombay. But he had soon tired of the press and crush of urban living and set off southwards again.

He had met with adventures everywhere. He told the incredulous Solomon about a village of high-caste women so fair that when they sneezed, their faces stained red with the onrush of blood. ‘They’re incredibly beautiful, anna, but they’re deadlier than kraits. In fulfilment of an ancient vow to Devi, the mothers-in-law are expected to kill their daughters’ husbands. They catch and kill a gecko and hang it over a small pot. Over the days, the poisonous fluids in the dead lizard slowly drip into the receptacle. When they have enough, they dry the liquid and mix it with the food of their victim in small quantities. Until he dies. Slowly. The locals call it the village of widow-makers, but the women are so beautiful that there is no dearth of men willing to defy the odds.’ Joshua’s stories grew wilder as the day stretched into evening. After they had dined off appams and a rich mutton stew simmered in coconut milk and spices, they wandered into the compound, and stood around for a while, listening to the sounds of the night.

They didn’t speak for a space, then Joshua said, ‘In the course of my wanderings I met a baba at one of those crude roadside shrines; there was no one about. It must have been somewhere in Dharwad. The old man seemed bored and glad to have some company. We talked for a long time. Most of what he said was the usual religious stuff but one thing stayed with me. He asked me why I was so restless, why I wandered so far from home, and I said my village held nothing for me, it was something I had always longed to escape. He said, no matter how far you run from Chevathar or for how long, it will never let you go because you have been fashioned by Chevathar, it is in you, you are Chevathar. Maybe that’s why I came back; maybe this is where I’m destined to be. And if Muthu’s people kill me, I’ll be here for ever.’ He gave a short laugh to dilute the weight of the moment, and added: ‘Besides, nobody can escape what the stylus of the Creator has carved on our foreheads.’

They walked back to the veranda then, and sat quietly for a while, lost in their thoughts. Night deepened, and still they lingered on the veranda, talking little. Above them a storm of stars stretched across the unwrinkled sky, their brilliance unmarred by the diminished moon.

24

High above the altar in St Paul’s was an exquisite example of local craftsmanship: an image of Christ carved out of deep brown, almost purple, rosewood, the eyes sorrowful, the features contorted in pain. When Father Ashworth had first set eyes on it, he was shaken. It was the very picture of the Lord he had carried within him since he was a schoolboy.

His public school sat on the edge of the Sussex downs. He had loved to tramp the ancient paths that criss-crossed the region. One morning, he had been out walking when the hare-bells in the grass in front of him had suddenly disappeared. A man stood before him, dressed in long flowing robes of white. He had seemed very familiar to the young boy’s eyes. He was of medium height but possessed of such great beauty and presence that Paul fell to his knees. But it was as if he had not moved at all, for he saw himself walking with the man, who while not saying a word was yet speaking to him. ‘Ye are not of the world, even as I am not of the world’ were the only words Paul could later recall.

When he got back to school, he realized why the man had seemed so familiar. In the chapel, to which they had lately become regular visitors as Easter approached, there was a stained-glass window with an especially skilful rendering of Jesus. There was a perfect resemblance, except in one crucial respect. The man Paul saw was brown-skinned and his hair and eyes were black. This appeared so remarkable to him that he had summoned up the courage to ask his history teacher about it. ‘Did Jesus really have blue eyes and blond hair?’

‘Of course not,’ Mr Barnes had replied. ‘Come, let me show you what I mean.’

On a globe, Mr Barnes showed him the harsh desert lands of West Asia. ‘If Jesus was to appear in England today, he would shock most of the people who worship him. For this was where he was born, lived and preached – in Asia. He was brown-skinned, black-eyed. He didn’t speak English but Aramaic, a tongue of the people of the desert. He was really a very minor peasant leader from Galilee. He would have barely warranted a footnote in the history books – if he hadn’t been the Messiah, of course. In fact we know there was a historical Jesus who lived during the Augustan period. I can look it up for you.’ Mr Barnes scrambled around among the books on his cluttered table until he found what he was looking for. ‘Ah, here we are. According to the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, whose account dates back to the first century, there was a wise man called Jesus who lived and taught in the approximate period of time in which he was historically located, who was put to death by Pontius Pilate . . .’ Barnes was off, like a greyhound after a hare, and there had been no stopping him after that.

Father Ashworth had risen as usual before dawn to pray. Under the gaze of the rosewood Christ, he creaked to his feet, blessed himself and walked over to the communion table. A gust of wind had scattered the pages of his manuscript, and he slowly began picking them up. The events of the past week had, in addition to everything else, brought work on the book to a halt.

He had visited Solomon daily but was unable to make much headway with him. He had tried talking to Joshua but that had come to nothing. Muthu Vedhar had refused to see him. And, incredibly, the deputy tahsildar had chosen this time to go on a tour of the other villages under his purview. Father Ashworth had tried contacting Chris Cooke, but he was touring as well. He had spent some time with the poojari of the Murugan temple, but it was clear that the old man’s concerns were no longer of this world. When Father Ashworth pleaded with Subramania Sastrigal to use his immense power to stop the madness that was about to ravage Chevathar, the saint had replied: ‘What you grieve about is unworthy’, and had quoted scripture in support of his view.

He could expect nothing, he knew, from the poojari’s son, Swaminathan. He was sure the scheming young man was encouraging Muthu Vedhar to fight. If Muthu became headman, Swaminathan’s own importance would increase immeasurably.

As Father Ashworth put the pages in order, he read what he had written.

At the heart of every religion in the world is the divine mystery. The problem that the teachers who have contributed to the evolution of each faith have always been confronted with can be simply stated: How to plumb the divine mystery, describe it, explain it to themselves and the followers of the faith? It is a problem almost without solution, for how do you describe God? There are no facts that can adequately explain the Supreme Reality; none but the greatest seers are granted the intuition to experience the Divine. As a result, each religion has evolved a host of symbols and myths and convention and dogma, to make its central mystery better understood. Over the centuries, these have often obscured the central mystery to the impoverishment of the faith. And the priestly class has only itself to blame for obscuring and misinterpreting the Truth, perverting religion for its own selfish ends, setting brother against brother, saint against saint, dogma against dogma. Is Krishna’s memorable message to Arjuna on the battlefield of Kurukshetra any less important than Christ’s Sermon on the Mount or the Buddha’s explication of the Eightfold Path? No, a thousand times no! Men of vision of all faiths need to explain to their followers that the goal of every religion is the same – to achieve the transcendent state, experience the one true Reality, understand fully the eternal Truth . . .

He liked the opening paragraph, but he would need to work on the rest of it. He longed to get back to his book. But even when everything was normal he found the act of writing so taxing that he had often been tempted to give up; the only thing that had kept him going was the thought that if he ever finished the book and had it published, it might be of some use in countering the evil men who tried to set man against man in the name of religion. Lord, please let me finish the book, he prayed, shutting his eyes briefly. Then a thought struck him so forcefully that he forgot all about his writing. I have appealed to the good sense and sanity of virtually everyone in Chevathar, Father Ashworth thought, but not the women. Perhaps they could divert the tragedy.

That evening he paid a visit to the Big House and was very pleased to find Charity alone on the stoop. He accepted her offer of coffee, and then without wasting much time on preliminaries, asked for her support. ‘I can’t help, padre,’ she said simply. He was about to try to persuade her when she spoke again: ‘When Valli was attacked, I was terrified. Not so much for myself but for my daughter Rachel. It could so easily have been her . . .’ She broke off the narrative as the coffee arrived. When the servant had finished serving them, she said, ‘On the day it happened I went to Valli’s home to see whether there was anything I could do to help. That’s when the full horror of it hit me. There was nothing I could do. And none of the women there expected me to be of any use. They knew how powerless I was, even though I was the thalaivar’s wife. For the first time I truly understood how defenceless we are. Not a day passes when I don’t wake up frightened, but I’m powerless to do anything. We can pray, of course, that our men will protect us. My husband is a good man. He’ll do his best. And if he’s defeated, all I can pray for is that my daughters and I will be given enough time to prepare ourselves.’

For a moment Father Ashworth was incapable of speech, then he said, ‘You mustn’t speak like that, daughter. Our Lord Jesus Christ will keep you out of harm’s way.’

‘We pray that he will, but nevertheless we must be prepared.’

‘Isn’t there some way you can encourage your husband to resolve the issue peacefully with Muthu Vedhar?’

‘I cannot influence his decision, padre.’

There was little more to be said. They chatted for a while, then he finished his coffee and prepared to leave. As he got up, Charity said, ‘We are being tested, aren’t we?’

He nodded, and she remarked, ‘I hope we aren’t found wanting.’

He walked home in the perfection of the evening. Dusk had sheared the tops off the trees, but the ground beneath them was still lit by the sun and it looked as though the great banyans were rooted in pale gold dust. Such beauty invests this place, he thought, such beauty, such despair!

25

The hardy acacia is native to Sindh but over the years it has spread to the rest of the subcontinent. In the north it’s called kikar, in the west, east and centre it’s known as babul. To the Tamils it’s karuveli. But no matter what name it goes under, it is one of the most common trees in India, its dull green mop often spotted in terrain which supports no other foliage. In Chevathar, the acacia forest spread for a couple of furlongs along the wasteland beyond the Murugan temple. The trees grew so closely together that they formed an impenetrable canopy, keeping the ground cool on the hottest days. The forest had other benefits. Little grew in its shade, so the field of vision of the women who frequented it was unrestricted. Its greatest advantage, however, was the sharp white thorns that lay thickly on the ground, making it difficult for anyone to sneak up quickly or unobserved.

For these reasons, the most inaccessible part of the acacia forest was the natural choice of the women of Chevathar when it came to choosing a spot to relieve themselves. Safe from predatory men and prying eyes, in the early hours of the morning and in the late evening, the women, each armed with a little chembu, would gather to defecate. They would sit in small groups chatting about their children and husbands. Now and again a choice bit of gossip would galvanize the place with excitement, and within minutes every woman present would know about the married Marudar woman who had been caught with her Paraiyan lover or the venereal disease the deputy tahsildar’s brother had contracted from a prostitute in Ranivoor.