The Flower Boy (36 page)

They bought peanuts from a man who sat by the side of the road, roasting them in a sandy pan, ripe mangoes from a woman who sliced them expertly, mopped them on a grubby cloth and handed them over, sherbet from a sherbet man, and luridly colored candy floss.

They wanted to taste everything, see everything, do everything. It was like a delightful sensory overload that left you hungry for more.

They walked in twos. Premawathi and Anne in front, talking softly and walking softly, Chandi and Rose-Lizzie next, loud and excited, and finally John and Robin Cartwright bringing up the rear.

They stopped to look over the moonlit lake.

Unreal, was Chandi's first thought. It looks unreal, more like a photograph of a lake than a real lake. Although it was surrounded by constantly undulating activity, it still managed to look remote and untouched.

He looked at the others. Anne had dreams in her eyes, Premawathi's had the peculiar glassiness of one who looks but does not see, John was smiling faintly to himself and his eyes smiled also, Robin Cartwright's eyes were full of thoughts and Rose-Lizzie—Rose-Lizzie noisily cracked a peanut shell between her teeth and the spell was broken. Mentally shaking themselves out of their respective reveries, they continued walking.

Dinner was at the Lyon's Tea House, which Chandi thought was a very inappropriate name for a place that served breakfast, lunch and dinner. They sat in cheerful green chairs, wolfed down thick roast beef sandwiches that Premawathi thought were far better than the leather and straw ones at the Queen's, and made plans for the next day.

That night, while the others slept and dreamed dreams of peanuts, thalagoyas and lost-forever daughters, Chandi stood by the window looking out over the lake, fed up with dreaming, longing to live instead.

Live in England, to be precise.

THE NEXT MORNING, they all assembled in the lounge and by mutual consent decided to go back to Lyon's for breakfast. Lyon's also did packed lunches, which were needed, because today they were going to a spot that John had told them about the previous night. It had a waterfall and they were going to stay the whole day.

After hastily bolting down breakfast, they set off, packed lunches, impatient people and all.

Later, Chandi would remember that day as a magical, mystical experience where wounds were healed, harmony was restored and life lifted itself up with a gentle sigh to continue on its course.

Even the memory of Rangi, whom no one could
not
remember, given the fact that this was another picnic in another beauty spot, cast no more than a soft shadow that was more of a shade really. A soft, nostalgic lilac shade.

Glencairn seemed far removed from that day, rather like a distant recollection. The funny thing was, no one actually did anything particularly meaningful or said anything really significant. It was the place, a patch of indecently green grass fringed with ferns and small unknown flowers, by the side of a waterfall. No one knew the name of the waterfall, if it had a name at all, and somehow it didn't matter. Ordinarily, Chandi and Rose-Lizzie would have demanded to know all about it—name, height, width, everything. But they didn't because this wasn't an ordinary day.

And yet, it was more than the place. It was them. As if this impromptu picnic had somehow become some sort of pilgrimage whose purpose was so important that it remained undefined.

They did everything and nothing that day.

As soon as they arrived, they immediately set off to explore. The waterfall was beautiful, starting from high up the mountain and cascading gently down like a bride's veil. It flowed into a large pool full of rocks and ferns and, unfortunately, leeches. Luckily, Chandi spotted them before they could peel off their socks and shoes and wade. Still, it was wonderful to stand close by and lift their faces up to the powdery spray. Presently, they ventured farther, coming upon nothing more exciting than patches of tiny daisies and a brilliant kingfisher who didn't fly away as they approached but turned to look inquiringly at them with his shiny eyes.

Everyone else had wandered off too, and wandered back at about the same time, talking in low voices as if they were afraid to wake up the sleeping fairies who'd put their magical spell on the day.

After a slow lunch, they all lay back to rest, but in reality, they were all lost in their own thoughts and dreams and fears—they spoke and listened and argued and wept and made tremulous peace with themselves.

Why then?

Why there? Was it some kind of a Shangri-la, which renewed and restored the body and soul? Or was it just a patch of indecently green grass by the side of a pretty waterfall?

It didn't matter.

CHANDI SAT UP on his elbow and looked around. Everyone was asleep, or at least they had their eyes closed. Their faces were slack in relaxation and the worry lines on both John's and Premawathi's faces were smoothed away. Anne looked like a picture, her pale skin delicately flushed by the sun, and Robin Cartwright's ears were scarlet. Rose-Lizzie's eyes were closed but her mouth was half open.

He drew his knees up to his chest and hugged them, wishing this peace could last forever, knowing it wouldn't. He looked around him. It was a pretty spot for sure, but there were prettier ones at Glencairn that only he and Rose-Lizzie knew of. Still, it was special, there was no denying that. He wondered what England looked like and felt a pang. No matter how much he wanted to go there, he would still miss home. He would still look for the fisherbirds and listen for the oya. He would still taste ginger-beer-drowned raisins. He felt a moment's panic. How could he possibly go? How would he survive without the sounds and smells and sights he'd seen every day for as long as he could remember?

“You'll see new things,” Rose-Lizzie said softly. “And while you'll never forget these, you'll have those too.” He hadn't heard her wake up, but he was glad she had.

“How do you know?” he asked desperately.

“I know. It will be like your rocks. You've got rocks from under the leaking gutter at home and rocks from a dozen other places—even Deniyaya. But your Glencairn ones are the most special. They're the ones that started the collection.”

“Yes. I know what you mean.” He turned to face her, his eyes wide with fear. “Rose-Lizzie, what if I don't go? What if something happens? I think I'd die.”

She laughed softly, suddenly years older than him in her confidence and sureness. “Of course you'll go. And you won't die, even if you didn't.”

“Maybe I won't die, but I'll stop living,” he said.

chapter 31

THE ROAD BACK TO KANDY WAS UNLIT, WHICH MADE THE DRIVE SLIGHTLY surreal.

Anne elected to sit in the front with John and Robin Cartwright, and Chandi sat sandwiched between his mother and Rose-Lizzie.

One smelled of coconut oil and Pond's powder, the other of crushed grass and confidence.

Premawathi dipped her head slightly so it rested on his shoulder, then rubbed it back and forth as if she were a cat until it rested comfortably. She looked upward at his chin and saw the light shadow on it. When did he start shaving? she asked herself with a pang. He grew up and I didn't even notice. She nestled closer, not wanting to lose him, knowing she would anyway.

Such was life.

They arrived late at the Queen's Hotel and went straight up to bed with murmured good nights.

Chandi stood at the door of his room and watched as John laid an infinitely gentle hand on his mother's head, watched her stretch her neck upward to meet it, the way a cat arches toward a stroking hand.

That night, he looked at the moonlit lake for a long moment, then turned and climbed into his bed. He listened for nocturnal sounds but all he heard was his mother's rhythmic breathing.

He smiled to himself as he thought of the day just gone. His smile faded as he thought of his mother and John. In his experience, such contentment didn't last.

His dreams were seamless pictures that he couldn't remember the next morning.

They took longer driving back to Glencairn because they stopped frequently to buy things—more peanuts, pineapples, pomegranates and small tart apples, clay cooking pots, a couple of straw mats for sitting out on the lawn and finally—flowers.

The little boy whom Chandi vaguely remembered from the workers' compound flashed a gap-toothed grin and thrust his haphazard bunch in through the window of the car, then realized who was in it. The grin fled, replaced by guilt. The hand that held the flowers trembled ever so slightly.

In the rearview mirror, Chandi's eyes met John's. They grinned at each other, then John dug into his pocket for the required two rupees and handed it to the boy, whose grin flashed back immediately. He unceremoniously dumped the bunch into the nearest lap and tore off down the hillside.

Premawathi eyed the flowers suspiciously. “These look as if they're from our gardens,” she said.

“Yes, they do, don't they,” John said blandly.

THEY SAW IT the minute they alighted from the car. It lay on the front door-mat like an accusing finger. Pink paper in a cellophane-windowed envelope. As John stooped to pick it up, Premawathi laid an urgent hand on his arm. “Don't pick it up,” she said, realizing immediately how she must sound.

He seemed to understand. “I must,” he said gravely. “It could be important.” He picked it up, but put it in his pocket to open later. The cellophane made rustling, warning noises.

They went their separate ways, John to his study and Robin and the girls to their rooms. Chandi and Premawathi went straight to the kitchen to put the fruit away and unpack their small bag.

They had finished and were sitting on the step when the little brass bell rang. Premawathi jumped up and flew down the corridor before Chandi could even stand. She knocked briefly, entered the study and stood just inside the door.

He looked at her for a long time, committing her face to memory. She stared back, her eyes wide with worry. Wordlessly he handed her the single sheet of paper.

POSSIBLE TROUBLE COLOMBO STOP IMPERATIVE YOU LEAVE IMMEDIATELY STOP MAKE ARRANGEMENTS FOR HOUSEHOLD THINGS TO BE SHIPPED LATER STOP LOCAL POST ARRANGED LONDON STOP WELCOME BACK STOP

She handed it back, her eyes curiously opaque. “When?”

“I don't know,” he said expressionlessly. “Maybe the day after tomorrow. There's a steamer leaving Colombo on Thursday.”

Today was Monday.

She looked back, equally expressionless. “You'd better tell the girls and Robin. I'll start packing.” She started to leave when his voice stopped her.

“Will you come home with us? You and Chandi?”

She shook her head. “No, John,” she said. “This is our home.”

“Please? Please come. You can always come back if you hate it.”

She shook her head again. “It's impossible, John,” she said. “Do you know what you're asking?”

“What about Chandi? Rose-Lizzie?”

“What about them?”

“They're so close. And Chandi's education—he's intelligent. He could have such a promising future.” He realized his words were disjointed, but desperation made his tongue trip in its efforts to rid itself of his words.

She looked levelly at him. “They'll learn to adjust. We all will.” Then her face softened. She came to stand beside him, stroking his head. “Don't you see, John? It's happened. We knew it would, and it has. It's just that it's today. Not next month or next year. Today. That's what is so difficult. And yet, if you had been told and given six months, would that make it any easier? I don't think so. This way is better.”

He stared at her, wondering at her calmness, searching for an anguish similar to what he was feeling and finding nothing but more calmness.

Layers of calmness.

He hadn't known what her reaction would be because he hadn't thought about it. He had managed so far to convince himself that when the time came, she would consent to go. Now, her calmness almost destroyed him.

“I love you,” he said hopelessly.

“I know,” she said gently. “That's why you must go.”

TELLING THE GIRLS was hard.

Anne was adult enough to understand the futility of protest, so she simply gave in and began preparing herself for the inevitable.

Rose-Lizzie was a different story, but one that only Robin Cartwright felt sympathetic enough to read. When she was first told she fairly beamed, automatically assuming everyone was going. When John told her gently that Premawathi and Chandi were staying, she flew into a rage, accusing him of upsetting them and making them not want to go. John's heart ached as he tried patiently to explain to her that it was Premawathi's decision. She ran into the kitchen and threw herself on Premawathi, begging her to go or, at the very least, to let Chandi go with them. Premawathi held her gently and smoothed her hair, but when Rose-Lizzie drew back to search Premawathi's face, she saw only sorrow.

Then she burst into a storm of weeping that lasted hours. John tried unsuccessfully to calm her down, and finally retired into his study, emotionally drained and exhausted.

When her tears were spent, she dashed out to look for Chandi, to ask him to make his mother change her mind, but he seemed to have disappeared. After almost an hour searching, she sought bewildered sanctuary on the banks of the oya.

It was there that Robin Cartwright finally found her. He knew enough not to attempt any explanations, for what explanation could there be that would possibly make sense to a heartbroken girl? He held her hand and sat there quietly, a little worried and more than a little angry at the selfishness of the others. If he knew what Glencairn meant to her, then they knew so much better.

When darkness fell with its customary suddenness, he led her gently back to Glencairn and her room.

When John finally went in to check on her, he found her still fully dressed, but fast asleep, her thumb in her mouth. When he tried to remove it, she stuck it defiantly right back in.

Yes, she would adjust, he thought wearily, but will I?

CHANDI WAS BUSY detaching himself from his home and his dreams. For he was not just losing his only chance to go to England. He was also losing his home. He knew they couldn't remain at Glencairn once the Sudu Mahattaya left. They would have to go. Somewhere.

He was almost eighteen years old, a man, and yet there was a part of him that had never grown up, a child that had clung to the hope that this would always be. Even when things had been so wrong, when he had longed to leave Glencairn, he hadn't wanted to think about not living here anymore. Except in England.

When Premawathi had gently told him what had happened, he too had been overjoyed initially, assuming that the time had finally come. It had, but not the time he thought. He had listened dumbstruck as his mother told him that they were not going. That the Sudu Mahattaya had asked them to, but that she had refused. Then she told him why. She said they would never have a place in England, that it wasn't their home, that she couldn't risk ending up penniless and destitute in a strange land. She hadn't asked him what he thought. If he was willing to take the risk.

But then, without warning, she did. She told him he was free to go, that she was sure the Sudu Mahattaya's offer would stand even if she didn't go. That she would understand and love him no matter what. It was those last words that made him see that he could never leave her. Without him, she had nothing. She was already losing so much so quickly.

He understood, and while his brain quietly accepted the inevitable, his heart raged impotently at the fates. He rose quietly, laid his hand on her shoulder, tacitly telling her of his decision, and left. He walked for hours, memorizing the hills that would always be there and the mists that changed shape before his eyes. He poured them all into himself like some desperate drunk.

In the space of a few hours, he withdrew so much into himself that it was as if he was drawing all his thoughts and experiences and memories into a hard knot deep inside. His eyes held great distance. When he spoke, his voice was filled with echoes of emptiness.

So while Glencairn prepared itself for the imminent departure of her master, Chandi prepared himself for the imminent departure of his life.

He watched his mother curiously, watched her preparing, with great care and precision, for the imminent departure of her short-lived happiness. She dusted trunks, packed away breakables in layers of newspaper and impersonally folded and packed John's clothes. The same clothes she used to furtively hold to her cheek when no one was watching. If there was any feeling of empathy between them, he was too far away to feel it.

At night, Premawathi lay on her mat and pressed her fingertips against her eyelids. Just a few days more, she told herself.

Far away in the room next door, Chandi lay motionless on his mat and wondered if he could make his body levitate if he concentrated very hard.

IT RAINED THE day Rose-Lizzie left. A violent, destructive rain that churned up the flowerbeds and brought branches down with frightening force.

The car stood under the porch. Countless trips from the house to the porch had already been made; countless more would come. The veranda wore a pattern of muddy footprints that no one had the time or the energy to clean.

It was not as if it mattered.

ROBIN CARTWRIGHT HAD left for Colombo earlier that morning, laden with as many trunks and boxes as his car could carry. He would meet the Buckwaters in Colombo. Only Premawathi stood on the steps and watched him go, feeling a pang of regret, for she had liked him. But it was fleeting.

He had held her hands in his own and looked worriedly down at her. “Will you be okay?” he asked anxiously.

She looked up at him with curiously blank eyes. “Of course,” she said serenely.

He resisted the urge to grab her shoulders and shake her hard. To ask her to think of her son, if not of herself. She had no right to make a martyr of him. But something in her eyes stopped him.

He got into his car quickly. He glanced in his rearview mirror once, just before he turned out of the open gates, and she was already gone.

JOHN, ANNE AND Rose-Lizzie were ready. At least, they were dressed and all their remaining belongings had been loaded into the car.

Rose-Lizzie was silent, her eyes red and swollen from weeping. She had finally found Chandi the night before, but it was not the Chandi she knew. This was a silent stranger who had been unmoved by her tears. She had begged him not to give up hope, to keep saving money until he could pay his own way, she had promised to save whatever she could and send it to him, she had entreated him to write to her, never to stop being her best friend. Finally defeated by his lack of reaction, she had backed away and run back into her room. She couldn't even cry anymore.

John's overwhelming sadness was fast being replaced by frustration. He had waited for Premawathi to come to him, to speak with him, but she had avoided him. He couldn't blame her really. What was there to say? John had never felt so alone in his life. He wondered if she felt the same.

He rang the bell, reflecting on the irony that it alone had not been packed. The furniture was still there, waiting for the movers, but all his books, ornaments and other evidence of his study being
his
study were gone. All except the bell.

She came, but kept her eyes on the floor.

He held out the envelope. “Premawathi.”

She looked up and flinched.

“It's what I owe you,” he said. “For work.”