The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [429]
He said aloud and incredulously: ‘You were wrong. She is not afraid.’
The clamour from below almost drowned his words, but Anjuli heard them, and imagining that they had been addressed to her instead of to himself, she said: ‘Not yet. It is still only a game to her. No, not a game – I don't mean that. But something that is only happening in her mind. A part she is playing.’
‘You mean she is drugged? I don't believe it.’
‘Not in the way you mean, but with emotion – and desperation and shock. And – and perhaps… triumph…’
‘Triumph!’ thought Ash. Yes. The whole parade smacked more of a triumphal progress than a funeral. A procession in honour of a goddess who has deigned to show herself, for this time only, to accept the homage of her shouting, exultant and adoring worshippers. He remembered then that Shushila's mother, in the days before her beauty captured the heart of a Rajah, had been one of a troupe of entertainers: men and women whose livelihood depended upon their ability to capture the attention and applause of an audience – as her daughter was doing now. Shushila, Goddess of Bhithor, beautiful as the dawn and glittering with gold and jewels. Yes, it was a triumph. And even if she was only playing a part, at least she was playing it superbly.
‘Well done!’ whispered Ash, in a heart-felt endorsement of all those outside who were hailing her with the same words. ‘Oh, well done –!’
Beside him, Anjuli too was murmuring to herself, repeating the same invocation as Shushila: ‘Ram, Ram – Ram, Ram…’ It was only a breath of sound and barely audible in that tumult, but it distracted Ash's attention, and though he knew that the prayer was not for the dead man but for her sister, he told her sharply to be quiet.
His mind was once again in a turmoil and torn with doubts. For watching the unfaltering advance of that graceful scarlet and gold figure, it seemed to him that he had no right to play providence. It would have been excusable if she had been dragged here weeping and terrified, or dazed with drugs. But not when she showed no sign of fear.
She must know by now what lay ahead; and if so, either the stories that Gobind had heard were true and she had come to love the dead man – and loving him, preferred to die cradling his body in her arms rather than live without him – or else, having steeled herself to it, she was glorying in the manner of her death and the prospect of sainthood and veneration. In either case, what right had he to interfere? Besides, her agony would be very quickly over; he had watched the pyre being built and seen the priests heap cotton between the logs and pour oils and clarified butter on it, and had thought even then that once it was lit the smoke alone would probably suffocate poor little Shu-shu before a flame touched her.
‘I can't do it,’ decided Ash. ‘And even if I do, it won't be all that much quicker: Juli ought to know that… Oh, God, why don't they hurry up. Why can't they get it over, instead of dragging it out like this.’
His whole being was suddenly flooded with hatred for everyone out there: the presiding priests, the excited onlookers, the mourners in the funeral procession and even the dead man and Shushila herself. Shushila most of all, because –
No, that was not fair, thought Ash; she couldn't help being herself. This was the way she was made, and she could not help battening upon Juli any more than Juli could keep from allowing herself to be battened upon. People were what they were, and they did not change. Yet despite all her selfishness and egotism, at the last Shu-shu had spared a thought for her sister, and instead of insisting on her support to the end, had let her go – at what cost to herself, no one would ever know. He must not let himself forget that again…
The red haze of rage that had momentarily blinded him cleared away, and