death if there were no chance for reincarnation?
“Christians are favored here, Beti.” Abbas was whispering in the same reassuring way he had during the tonga journey, but his eyes weren’t smiling. “Miss Rachael, the housekeeper, is Christian. She will treat you better if she thinks you are like her.”
“But I cannot be Christian. I don’t know their gods’ names except for Mary and Jesus, and I know nothing of the prayers!” And what of my beloved Goddess Lakshmi or Thakurma’s favorite, Lord Krishna? Goddess Durga, Lord Shiva . . . I resolved never to forget these holy friends, no matter what the Burra-memsaheb or Miss Rachael wanted. I would not speak their names aloud, but I would keep them in my heart.
“You will learn those prayers.” Abbas beckoned me forward. “Come see your old friend.”
I recognized Mala’s sweet brown face peering out from the midst of other buffalos and cows and hurried forward to greet her. Where pointy ribs had stuck out before, there was a smooth layer of fat. As I reached my arms toward her, the new, healthy Mala stamped, forcingme to step back. She bent her head and continued eating, not giving me a second glance.
I was taken aback, for Mala seemed to have forgotten how I’d rescued her from the dogs and fed and watered and milked her during our long journey together. I had become as invisible to her as I’d been to the English girls. And this lonely bit of knowledge gathered so quickly upon my arrival turned out to be an accurate prediction of how the next three years at Lockwood School would pass.
CHAPTER
5
VOUCHSAFE: 1. To confer or bestow (some thing, favour, or benefit) on a person. 2. To give, grant, or bestow in a gracious or condescending manner.
— Oxford English Dictionary , Vol. 12, 1933
I n no time at all, I lost track of the traditional Bengali seasons. A year was divided into three academic terms, and that was how I thought of things: whether the girls were almost to Christmas holiday or summer leave or October’s puja days. But while Lockwood students were promoted to a higher standard each year, things did not change for me, even though it was 1933, and I was thirteen years old.
I spent the early mornings bringing bed tea to sleepy teachers housed in their private rooms off a long red oxide corridor. It rattled my nerves, even after all this time, to be the first each morning to enter these bedchambers with their exotic furniture—tables designed just for one person to sit and write; wooden cases filled with books and papers; and a tall, netting-draped bed that belonged to a memsahebwho expected morning service of tea and biscuits her own particular way, without fail each morning. After delivering the teachers their bed tea, it was time to set up the dining hall. I did this for each meal and afterward washed the room clean. Times in between were spent dusting, polishing, and cleaning other parts of the school, depending on Miss Rachael’s wishes.
Abbas had warned me that Burra-memsaheb Jamison was the most important person at Lockwood, but I did not see her nearly as much as Miss Rachael: a tall, strong Christian woman with skin like copper who wore a sari in the same green as the school uniform, which was mill-woven with a fine border of white. The directress of housekeeping seemed older than my ma but younger than Thakurma. The other servants said she was married to a man who worked as a driver in Calcutta, but had never had any children. Because of this, and my Christian conversion, Abbas thought she might take a liking to me.
He was wrong. From the moment she’d received me, there was never a smile or laugh, only criticism. Miss Rachael sang at Sunday services in a tuneless shout that reminded me of the way she called after me in the school hallways. Sarah, get here now. Fans are dirty. You missed a dead cricket near English classroom. Pick up your feet, close your mouth!
Miss Rachael was the one who decided I shouldn’t sleep with
“Christians are favored here, Beti.” Abbas was whispering in the same reassuring way he had during the tonga journey, but his eyes weren’t smiling. “Miss Rachael, the housekeeper, is Christian. She will treat you better if she thinks you are like her.”
“But I cannot be Christian. I don’t know their gods’ names except for Mary and Jesus, and I know nothing of the prayers!” And what of my beloved Goddess Lakshmi or Thakurma’s favorite, Lord Krishna? Goddess Durga, Lord Shiva . . . I resolved never to forget these holy friends, no matter what the Burra-memsaheb or Miss Rachael wanted. I would not speak their names aloud, but I would keep them in my heart.
“You will learn those prayers.” Abbas beckoned me forward. “Come see your old friend.”
I recognized Mala’s sweet brown face peering out from the midst of other buffalos and cows and hurried forward to greet her. Where pointy ribs had stuck out before, there was a smooth layer of fat. As I reached my arms toward her, the new, healthy Mala stamped, forcingme to step back. She bent her head and continued eating, not giving me a second glance.
I was taken aback, for Mala seemed to have forgotten how I’d rescued her from the dogs and fed and watered and milked her during our long journey together. I had become as invisible to her as I’d been to the English girls. And this lonely bit of knowledge gathered so quickly upon my arrival turned out to be an accurate prediction of how the next three years at Lockwood School would pass.
CHAPTER
5
VOUCHSAFE: 1. To confer or bestow (some thing, favour, or benefit) on a person. 2. To give, grant, or bestow in a gracious or condescending manner.
— Oxford English Dictionary , Vol. 12, 1933
I n no time at all, I lost track of the traditional Bengali seasons. A year was divided into three academic terms, and that was how I thought of things: whether the girls were almost to Christmas holiday or summer leave or October’s puja days. But while Lockwood students were promoted to a higher standard each year, things did not change for me, even though it was 1933, and I was thirteen years old.
I spent the early mornings bringing bed tea to sleepy teachers housed in their private rooms off a long red oxide corridor. It rattled my nerves, even after all this time, to be the first each morning to enter these bedchambers with their exotic furniture—tables designed just for one person to sit and write; wooden cases filled with books and papers; and a tall, netting-draped bed that belonged to a memsahebwho expected morning service of tea and biscuits her own particular way, without fail each morning. After delivering the teachers their bed tea, it was time to set up the dining hall. I did this for each meal and afterward washed the room clean. Times in between were spent dusting, polishing, and cleaning other parts of the school, depending on Miss Rachael’s wishes.
Abbas had warned me that Burra-memsaheb Jamison was the most important person at Lockwood, but I did not see her nearly as much as Miss Rachael: a tall, strong Christian woman with skin like copper who wore a sari in the same green as the school uniform, which was mill-woven with a fine border of white. The directress of housekeeping seemed older than my ma but younger than Thakurma. The other servants said she was married to a man who worked as a driver in Calcutta, but had never had any children. Because of this, and my Christian conversion, Abbas thought she might take a liking to me.
He was wrong. From the moment she’d received me, there was never a smile or laugh, only criticism. Miss Rachael sang at Sunday services in a tuneless shout that reminded me of the way she called after me in the school hallways. Sarah, get here now. Fans are dirty. You missed a dead cricket near English classroom. Pick up your feet, close your mouth!
Miss Rachael was the one who decided I shouldn’t sleep with
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