The Temple Dancer (9 page)

The man rose in answer. He was much smaller than Lucinda expected.
"In the name of the Blessed Virgin and of Jesus Christ our Savior I welcome
you to my humble dwelling." He had a thin voice and an unrecognizable accent. When he came forward to greet them, leaving the harsh glare of the
torches, it took Lucinda a moment to puzzle through what she was seeing.

Fernando Anala was a Hindi.

He wore the clothes of a Portuguese trader-the long coat, knee breeches,
leather shoes-in fact he was dressed almost exactly like Geraldo, but with
more gold braid. But he himself was tiny, dark, delicate-clearly a Hindi. She had seen Hindi women in European dress, but never a man. He reminded her of an organ-grinder's monkey.

"I am Fernando Anala at your service," he said, now returning Da
Gama's bow. "I say that name with pride, for it was given to me when I became a Christian. But you must not call me senhor. ... as we share one Father; you must call me Brother Fernando." With that, Anala walked to Da
Gama and put his tiny arms around the soldado's chest. "Brother," he said,
embracing him. Da Gama looked too shocked to move. Anala then reached
Geraldo. "Brother," he whispered. Geraldo had recovered sufficiently to embrace him back.

Anala now came to Lucinda. She could not take her eyes from his,
which glistened in the torchlight, radiant against his dark skin. He seemed
hesitant but excited as he placed his arms around her waist. "Sister," he
sighed, nestling his head against her breasts. His thinning, perfumed hair
had been pulled back into a queue, and Lucinda found herself looking
straight down on to his dark scalp while he clung to her.

He stood there for a long time, stepping away only when Da Gama
cleared his throat. Even then he kept Lucinda's hand sandwiched between
his palms. She had always thought of her hands as delicate, but in his tiny
ring-covered fingers her hands seemed huge and clumsy.

"My wife, Silvia, is also a Christian, of course," he said. His eyes fixed
on Lucinda. "She is honored that you will be her guest tonight. She waits
for you in the guesthouse." His fingers rubbed Lucinda's palm. "I'm sure
we men would only bore you with our talk."

Lucinda lowered her eyes and nodded.

"There are other women in your party?" He did not let go.

"Just the bayadere," Da Gama said. Anala blinked as though the word
eluded him. "The nautch girl, I mean. The devadasi."

At the last word, Anala's head flew up. "You have a devadasi with
you? No one told me." He seemed upset. Lucinda seized this opportunity
to slip her hand away, but still he held on. "I should have been informed."

"The blame for the secrecy is mine, senhor. She's a gift to the grand
vizier.

"Ahcha. Baksheesh. " He hissed when he said the word. Anala lifted his
dark face to Lucinda's. "Bijapur is full of sinners. A city of the damned.
Muslims have the blackest souls." He leaned toward Lucinda as if revealing a
confidence: "A Muslim will keep a dozen wives and a hundred concubines." But it seemed to Lucinda as if Anala were sizing her up for a place in his own
harem. "Well, we must save souls, not condemn them. What better way to
save a soul than trade, eh? In trade we find the vehicle for redemption." He
leaned so close to Lucinda that his ear nearly touched her breast. "If I had
not begun to trade with farangs, sister, my wife and I would still be damned
today, instead of glorying in Our Lord's salvation."

"How nice for you," Lucinda replied. Anala would not let go her hand.

Soon Anala had tallied everyone: Maya and Slipper, he decided, would
be entertained by his wife, while Pathan would join the Christian men for
dinner. There was some hope, Anala said, that the three Christians could
save his soul. The arrangements settled, Da Gama and Geraldo made
sweeping bows as Anala approached them, and managed this way to fend
off another embrace. Anala once more pressed his head against Lucinda's
breasts. "Sister," he said fondly. "My servant will see to your comfort," he
told them all as they left. "We say the rosary in here before supper."

"Oh good," Da Gama managed to say.

The silk-turbaned servant led Lucinda across the courtyard and opened the
door for her, saying, "Good evening, senhorita," in perfect Portuguese. The
room was spacious, dominated by two big canopied feather beds that stood
in the center of the room. Lucinda saw her smaller trunk had been placed
near the end of one of them. Wooden chairs stood stiffly against the walls,
as if no one had ever sat there, and here and there a small table and the odd
chest.

Maya was already there. On the carpet she had spread out a few of her
belongings from her floppy cloth bag. Lucinda wondered whether that one
bag was all of Maya's luggage.

Maya nodded toward the beds and lifted her eyebrows. "So this is how
farangs sleep," she said softly. "I will be too frightened to sleep so high.
How do you not roll off?"

"You don't roll off. You sink into the feathers like a big pillow. It's very
comfortable."

"Comfortable for farangs. Not for Hindis. I shall sleep on the floor."

"Our host and hostess are Hindi," Lucinda said. Maya looked up, but when she saw that Lucinda was serious Maya giggled. "I was surprised as
well," Lucinda went on. "The man calls himself Fernando, so who would
know? And he dresses like a Portuguese. I haven't seen the wife. Anyway,
she will be eating with us here."

Lucinda circled the room as she spoke, but stopped when she noticed
something unusual on a table. A sort of shrine, she decided; amidst a scattering of white grains of rice, a single silver lamp; lying next to it a crucifix,
the head and hands stained red by kumkum. "What is this?" she said, almost to herself.

Maya came to her side and looked. "She must love this god very much."

"Well, no Christian would treat a crucifix this way."

"No, she is Christian. But not like you are Christian." Maya looked suddenly concerned. "You say she's eating with us? Where will Slipper eat?"

"With us, of course."

"That will not be pleasant. I must speak to Deoga."

"Who is Deoga?"

Maya looked at her, confused. "Senhor Da Gama. Do you not call him
Deoga as well?"

"No," Lucinda replied, equally confused. "What is Da Gama to do?"

"Look here; look at this woman's puja. She is Hindi. She will not eat
with a hijra."

"Why don't we ask her first?" Lucinda suggested.

Maya looked at her as if suddenly seeing her heart. "You speak Hindi
so well that I imagined you understood our ways as well. Of course she'd
agree.

"Then where's the problem?"

"She would say so only to be polite. It would be most unkind to impose so. Like asking her to eat in a latrine."

Lucinda's face twisted. "But why?"

"Don't worry. Deoga can fix it. He's very good with these things, once
you tell him."

"How do you know this?"

"Didn't we sail together in a dhow for three weeks?"

Lucinda nodded. But a second later she began to wonder-Maya's answer any number of interpretations. So of course she changed the subject.
"But don't you eat with Slipper?"

"I do a great many things that Hindi women do not do, and before long I shall do a great many more. You know why as well as I do. Let us not
speak of it again. I will tell Deoga and that will be enough."

"You seem very certain."

Maya smiled. "He is a good man. Haven't you seen that?" A moment
later she was out the door.

Da Gama, of course, understood, and did what Maya asked. After a wearying hour standing beside "Brother" Fernando, intoning rosary after rosary in
front of a particularly gruesome crucifix, Da Gama persuaded him to invite
Slipper to the men's supper. At first their host had been reluctant, but with
Da Gama repeatedly imploring, Anala's concern for Slipper's immortal soul
overcame his distaste at eating with a hijra. "A Hindi would never agree," he
told Da Gama. "It shall be the proof that I am reborn a Christian."

"Your actions reflect well on Christ," Da Gama assured him.

Anala's servant found Slipper in a small courtyard by the stables, at
evening prayer with the other Muslims. Pathan's guards laughed when they
heard Slipper being invited. "What shall I do?" Slipper asked Pathan.

"You must accept. I'm sure the Christian considers his invitation to be
some sort of honor."

"Will there be forks?" the eunuch asked. "I've wanted to try eating
with a fork."

"Forks, yes," the servant replied. "Also wine."

"Wine..." Slipper said dreamily. "Tell him I shall come."

The dining table was lit by a chandelier. The sideboard was crowded: a platter of roasted chickens the size of pigeons, a mutton haunch, a loin of pork,
each rubbed with pepper and coarse salt. The steaming meats glistened; juice
trickled onto the pewter platters. Beside them stood gravies and sauces fragrant with wine and herbs, crisp round loaves of yeasty bread, and a bowl of
butter. If not for the bowl of rice and dal and a plate of mango pickle, they
might have been eating in Lisbon.

The men sat in chairs (Fernando's seat a few inches taller than the others), used forks, ate from porcelain. A pair of waiters, dressed as farangs except for bare feet and turbans, served them with unexpected skill. "How
did he get all this stuff?" Geraldo whispered to Da Gama. But Da Gama
was too busy eating to answer.

"Don't I get a glass of wine?" Slipper asked in a piping voice after a few
minutes. "Everyone else has one."

"Not the burak. Muslims, I assumed..." said Anala, looking miffed.
But he recovered, and with a flick of his delicate fingers, directed one of his
servants to bring a glass.

Slipper drank the whole glass before the servant had time to step away,
and held it out for more. Soon his round cheeks flushed in a mottled patchwork. He gave up trying to use his cumbersome fork, and like Pathan ate
with his fingertips, washing down his food with big gulps of wine. One of
the servants took to hovering near him, pitcher in hand.

Soon Slipper could barely speak for giggling. One of his eyelids began
to droop. Fernando kept trying to bring the conversation around to theology, but Slipper brushed each effort aside with a joke, often lewd.