River of Smoke - Amitav Ghosh [137]
The one good thing about Jackass Point was that the crowds that poured through it were always in a hurry: of the usual loiterers and bonegrabbers there were very few here, so a man who was not particularly pressed for time could usually find some spot where he could stand and look around, without being noticed or accosted; it was in one such corner that Bahram positioned himself while Apu went off to arrange for a boat and boatman.
Watching the crowds surge past, Bahram remembered his first visit to Honam Island, decades ago, when he was all of twenty-two: he recalled how he had stared, open-mouthed and unashamed, at the exquisite pavilions, the carved griffins, the terraced gardens and landscaped lakes – he had seen things whose very existence he could not have imagined. He remembered how eagerly he had attacked the food, delighting in the unknown aromas and unfamiliar tastes; he remembered the heady taste of the rice wine, and how it had seemed to him that he had stepped into some kind of waking dream: how was it possible that he, a penniless chokra from Navsari, had wandered into a place that seemed to belong in some legendary firdaus? It seemed to him now that he would gladly trade all his years of experience, all his knowledge of the world, to be granted once again an instant of such incandescent wonder – a moment in which, even in the midst of so many new and amazing things, nothing would seem more extraordinary than that he, a poor boy from a Gujarat village had found his way into a Chinese garden.
He was woken from this daydream by a disturbingly familiar voice: ‘Mister Barry! Chin-chin!’
‘Allow?’
‘Chin-chin Mister Barry! What-side you go now ah? Honam?’
Bahram was annoyed and unsettled to find Allow at his elbow. It seemed hardly possible that such an encounter could happen by accident in the midst of this surging crowd; it occurred to Bahram to wonder whether Allow might have been forewarned that he, Bahram, was planning to cross the river today. But of course there was no way of knowing.
‘Yes,’ he said, curtly. ‘Go Honam.’
Allow treated him to a broad, insinuating smile. ‘What for Mister Barry no talkee Allow eh? Can takee Honam. Mister Barry savvy Allow have one-piece nice boat, no?’ He raised a hand to point to the waterside. ‘There – look-see.’
Turning to look where Allow was pointing, Bahram met with a shock. He recognized the boat at a glance, even though it was much changed: it was the last ‘kitchen-boat’ that Chi-mei had bought – the very one on which she had been killed. It had since been re-fitted and repainted, in the gaudy colours of a pleasure-boat – red and gold – but it was still recognizable because of its distinctive stern, shaped like an upraised fishtail. The main deck, which had once housed Chi-mei’s eatery, was now tricked out with brightly decorated windows; the upper deck, which had served as her living quarters, had been turned into a richly ornamented pavilion. At its fore was a balcony-like gallery: Bahram and Chi-mei had often sat there in the past, on a pair of old chairs. These had been replaced by a divan with a canopy of billowing silk.
‘Mister Barry likee?’
Bahram answered with a brusque nod: ‘Yes. Likee.’ It irked him to think that Allow had probably bought the boat cheap; he had clearly done well with it.
Allow bowed and smiled and nodded energetically. ‘Can take Mister Barry Honam chop-chop. Boat can go fitee-fitee.’
Only now did Bahram notice that the boat was rigged out with sails as well as a complement of six oars: while in Chi-mei’s possession it had always stayed at its moorings – never once had he seen it move.
‘Why Mister Barry no go Honam with Allow?’
Bahram was momentarily tempted to accept Allow’s offer. But his instincts told him that this was merely a ploy to wheedle