The Hungry Tide (36 page)

I was so taken with this idea that I began to copy some passages of the pamphlet into the back of a notebook I was carrying in my jhola — this very one, as it happens. The print was tiny and I had to squint hard at the page to decipher it. Absent-mindedly, I handed the booklet to Fokir, as I might have to one of my pupils. I said, “Read it out aloud so I can copy it.”

He began to speak the words out aloud while I wrote them down. Suddenly a thought struck me and I said to Kusum, “But you told me Fokir can neither write nor read.”

“That's right, Saar,” she said. “He can't.”

“Then?”

She smiled and patted him on the head. “It's all inside here. I've told it to him so often that the words have become a part of him.”

It is evening now and Kusum has given me a candle so I can go on writing. Horen is impatient to leave: he has been entrusted with the task of taking Fokir to safety. Only Kusum and I will remain. We can hear the patrol boats, which have encircled the island. Horen will use the cover of darkness to slip past.

He wants to go now. I say to him, “Just a few more hours. There's a whole night ahead.” Kusum joins her voice to mine; she leads Horen outside: “Come, let's go down to your boat. Let's leave Saar alone.”

INTERMEDIARIES

B
Y THE TIME
Piya had organized her notes, washed her clothes and cleaned her equipment, the day was over and night had fallen. She decided to turn in without waiting for dinner. There was no telling how long it would be before she slept in a real bed again. She might as well make the most of this one and get a good night's sleep. She decided not to interrupt Kanai, who was upstairs in the study. She mixed a tumbler of Ovaltine for herself and took it downstairs, into the open.

The moon was up, and in the silvery light Piya spotted Nilima standing outside her door. She appeared to be deep in thought, but her head turned as Piya approached.

Piya sketched a wave with her free hand: “Hello.”

Nilima answered with a smile and a few words of Bengali. This drew a rueful response from Piya. “I'm sorry,” she said, shaking her head. “I'm afraid I don't understand.”

“Of course,” said Nilima. “I'm the one who should apologize. I always forget. It's your appearance that gets me mixed up — I keep having to remind myself not to speak to you in Bangla.”

Piya smiled. “My mother used to say that a day would come when I'd regret not knowing the language. And I guess she was right.”

“But tell me, my dear,” Nilima said. “Just as a matter of interest: why is it your parents never taught you any Bangla?”

“My mother tried a little,” said Piya. “But I was not an eager student. And as for my father, I think he had some doubts.”

“Doubts? About teaching you his language?”

“Yes,” said Piya. “It's a complicated story. You see, my father's parents were Bengalis who'd settled in Burma — they came to India as refugees during the Second World War. Having moved around a lot, my father has all these theories about immigrants and refugees. He believes that Indians — Bengalis in particular — don't travel well because their eyes are always turned backward, toward home. When we moved to America, he decided he wasn't going to make that mistake: he was going to try to fit in.”

“So he always spoke English to you?”

“Yes,” said Piya, “and it was a real sacrifice for him because he doesn't speak English very well, even to this day. He's an engineer and he tends to sound a bit like an instruction manual.”

“So what did he speak with your mother?”

“They spoke Bengali to each other,” said Piya with a laugh. “But that was when they were speaking, of course. When they weren't, I was their sole means of communication. And I always made them translate their messages into English — or else I wouldn't carry them.”

Nilima made no response and her silence led Piya to wonder whether she had taken offense at something she had said. But just then Nilima reached for the hem of her sari and brought it up to her face. Piya saw that her eyes had filled with tears.

“I'm sorry,” Piya said quickly. “Did I say something wrong?”

“No, my dear,” said Nilima. “You said nothing wrong. I was just thinking of you as a little girl, carrying your parents' words from one to the other. It's a terrible thing, my dear, when a husband and wife can't speak to each other. But your parents were lucky: at least they had you to run between them. Imagine if they had no one —”

She let the sentence die unfinished and fell silent again. Piya knew she had unwittingly touched on some private grief and she waited quietly while Nilima composed herself.

“Only once was there ever a child in our home,” Nilima said presently. “That was when Kanai came to stay with us as a boy. To my husband it meant more than I could ever have imagined. More than anything else he longed to have someone to whom he could pass on his words. For years afterward he would say to me, ‘I wish Kanai would come again.' I'd remind him that Kanai wasn't a boy anymore: he was a grown man. But that didn't stop my husband. He wrote to Kanai many times, asking him to come.”

“And Kanai never came?”

“No,” said Nilima. She sighed. “Kanai was on the way to success and that takes its own toll. He didn't have time for anyone but himself — not his parents and certainly not us.”

“Has he always been like that?” Piya said. “So driven?”

“Some would say selfish,” said Nilima. “Kanai's problem is that he's always been too clever for his own good. Things have come very easily to him so he doesn't know what the world is like for most people.”

Piya could see that this judgment was both shrewd and accurate but she knew it was not her place to concur. “I haven't known him long enough to have an opinion,” she said politely.

“No, I don't suppose you have,” said Nilima. “Just a word of warning, my dear. Fond as I am of my nephew, I feel I should tell you that he's one of those men who likes to think of himself as being irresistible to the other sex. Unfortunately, the world doesn't lack for women who're foolish enough to confirm such a man's opinion of himself, and Kanai seems always to be looking for them. I don't know how you describe that kind of man nowadays, my dear — but in my time we used to call them ‘fast.'” She paused, raising her eyebrows. “Do you get my meaning?”

“I sure do.”

Nilima nodded and blew her nose into the hem of her sari. “Anyway, I mustn't be rattling on like this. You have a long day ahead tomorrow, don't you?”

“Yes,” said Piya. “We're starting early. I'm really looking forward to it.”

Nilima put an arm around her shoulders and gave her a hug. “Do be careful, my dear. It's dangerous in the forest — and not just because of the animals.”

BESIEGED

A
few days after my trip to Garjontola, Nilima returned from her travels, full of news of the world outside. Almost in passing she said, “And as for Morichjhãpi, there are soon going to be developments.”

My ears pricked up. “What developments?”

“The government is going to take measures. Very strong measures.”

I said nothing but began to wonder if there was any way I could get word to Kusum, to warn the settlers. As it turned out, no warning was possible. The very next day the government announced that all movement in and out of Morichjhãpi was banned under the provisions of the Forest Preservation Act. What was more, Section 144, the law used to quell civil disturbances, was imposed on the whole area: this meant it was a criminal offense for five people or more to gather in one place.

As the day wore on, waves of rumors came sweeping down our rivers: it was said that dozens of police boats had encircled the island, tear gas and rubber bullets had been used, the settlers had been forcibly prevented from bringing rice or water to Morichjhãpi, boats had been sunk, people had been killed. The rumors grew more and more disturbing as the day passed; it was as if war had broken out in the quiet recesses of the tide country.

For Nilima's sake I tried to keep up appearances, to present as normal a front as I could. But I could not sleep that night and by the time morning came I knew I would make my way to Morichjhãpi in whatever way I could, even at the expense of a confrontation with Nilima. But fortunately that contingency did not arise — not yet, anyway. Early in the morning a group of schoolmasters came to see me; they had heard the same rumors I had, and they too had become concerned. So much so that they had hired a bhotbhoti to take them to Morichjhãpi to see if any intercession was possible. They asked if I wanted to join them, and I was only too glad to say yes.

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Not long afterward we spotted official motorboats patrolling the rivers. The owner of our bhotbhoti now became quite concerned and we had to plead with him to take us a little closer. He agreed to do so, but only on the condition that we stay by the near shore, as far as possible from the island. And so we proceeded, hugging this shore while all our eyes were turned in the other direction, toward Morichjhãpi.

Soon we drew close to a village. A great number of people had gathered on the shore and they were busily loading a boat — not a bhotbhoti or a sailboat, but a plain country nouko of the kind Horen owned. Even from a distance we could see that the boat was being stocked with a cargo of supplies
— sacks of grain, jerry cans of drinking water. Then a number of people climbed into the boat, mainly men, but also a few women and children; some, no doubt, were day laborers who'd gone to work on some other island and been unable to return home. As for the others, perhaps they were people who had been separated from their families and were trying to get back to their homes in Morichjhãpi. Whatever their reasons for going, clearly they were pressing enough to make them take the risk of cramming themselves into that frail craft. By the time the boat was pushed into the water there must have been a good two dozen people sitting huddled inside. The boat wobbled as it drifted out into the currents; it was so heavily loaded that it seemed incredible that it would actually stay afloat. Watching from a distance, we speculated excitedly: these settlers were evidently hoping to slip through the police cordon with some provisions, to bring relief to their fellow islanders. What would the police do? Everyone offered a different theory.

Then, as if to put an end to our speculations, a police speedboat came roaring down the Bagna River. Moving at great speed, it drew level with the settlers' rowboat and began to circle around it. There was a loudspeaker on the police boat, and even though we were a good distance away, snatches of the policemen's orders reached us across the water: they were telling the settlers to turn back, to return to the shore they had come from. What was said in answer we could not hear, but we could tell from the gesticulations of the people on the boat that they were pleading with the policemen to let them proceed.

This had the effect of enraging the policemen who now began to scream into their loudspeaker. Suddenly, like a thunderclap, came the noise of a gunshot, fired into the air.

Surely the settlers would turn back now. In our hearts we prayed they would. But what happened instead was something unforeseen: the people in the boat began to shout in unison, “Amra kara? Bastuhara.” Who are we? We are the dispossessed.

How strange it was to hear this plaintive cry wafting across the water. It seemed at that moment not to be a shout of defiance but rather a question being addressed to the very heavens, not just for themselves but on behalf of a bewildered humankind. Who, indeed, are we? Where do we belong? And as I listened to the sound of those syllables, it was as if I were hearing the deepest uncertainties of my heart being spoken to the rivers and the tides. Who was I? Where did I belong? In Calcutta or in the tide country? In India or across the border? In prose or in poetry?

Then we heard the settlers shouting a refrain, answering the questions they had themselves posed:
“Morichjhãpi chharbona.”
We'll not leave Morichjhãpi, do what you may.

Standing on the deck of the bhotbhoti, I was struck by the beauty of this. Where else could you belong, except in the place you refused to leave.

I joined my feeble voice to theirs: “Morichjhãpi chharbona!”

It had not struck me to ask how the policemen in their motorboat would interpret these cries. The boat, which had been idling for a few minutes, started up its engine. Its bow came around and it began to move away from the settlers. At first it seemed the policemen might have decided to look the other way and let the boat pass.