The Hungry Tide - Amitav Ghosh [146]
The thought of this, a tiger coming down to the water’s edge in order to watch their progress across the mohona, was just far-fetched enough to make Kanai smile.
“Why would it want to look at us?” said Kanai.
“Maybe because it smelled you,” said Fokir. “It likes to keep an eye on strangers.”
There was something about Fokir’s expression that convinced Kanai he was playing a game with him, perhaps unconsciously, and the thought of this amused him. Kanai understood all too well how the dynamics of their situation might induce Fokir to exaggerate the menace of their surroundings. He himself had often stood in Fokir’s place, serving as some hapless traveler’s window on an unfamiliar world. He remembered how, in those circumstances, he too had often been tempted to heighten the inscrutability of the surroundings through subtly slanted glosses. To do this required no particularly malicious intent; it was just a way of underscoring the insider’s indispensability: every new peril was proof of his importance, each new threat evidence of his worth. These temptations were all too readily available to every guide and translator — not to succumb was to make yourself dispensable; to give in was to destroy the value of your word, and thus your work. It was precisely because of his awareness of this dilemma that he knew too that there were times when a translator’s bluff had to be called.
Kanai pointed to the shore and made a gesture of dismissal. “Those are just burrows,” he said, smiling. “I saw crabs digging into them. What makes you think they have anything to do with the big cat?”
Fokir turned to flash him a bright, white smile. “Do you want to know how I know?”
“Yes. Tell me.”
Leaning over, Fokir took hold of Kanai’s hand and placed it on the back of his neck. The unexpected intimacy of this contact sent a shock through Kanai’s arm and he snatched his hand back — but not before he had felt the goosebumps bristling on the moist surface of Fokir’s skin.
Fokir smiled at him again. “That’s how I know,” he said. “It’s the fear that tells me.” Rising to a crouch, Fokir directed a look of inquiry at Kanai. “And what about you?” he said. “Can you feel the fear?”
These words triggered a response in Kanai that was just as reflexive as the goosebumps on Fokir’s neck. The surroundings — the mangrove forest, the water, the boat — were suddenly blotted from his consciousness; he forgot where he was. It was as though his mind had decided to revert to the functions for which it had been trained and equipped by years of practice. At that moment nothing existed for him but language, the pure structure of sound that had formed Fokir’s question. He gave this inquiry the fullest attention of which his mind was capable and knew the answer almost at once: it was in the negative; the truth was that he did not feel the fear that had raised bumps on Fokir’s skin. It was not that he was a man of unusual courage — far from it. But he knew also that fear was not — contrary to what was often said — an instinct. It was something learned, something that accumulated in the mind through knowledge, experience and upbringing. Nothing was harder to share than another person’s fear, and at that moment he certainly did not share Fokir’s.
“Since you asked me,” Kanai said, “I’ll tell you the truth. The answer is no, I’m not afraid, at least not in the way you are.”
Like a ring spreading across a pool, a ripple of awakened interest passed over Fokir’s face. “Then tell me,” he said, leaning closer, “if you’re not afraid, there’s nothing to prevent you from taking a closer look. Is there?”
His gaze was steady and unblinking, and Kanai would not allow himself to drop his eyes: Fokir had just doubled the stakes, and it was up to him now to decide whether he would back down or call his bluff.
“All right,” Kanai said, not without some reluctance. “Let’s go.”
Fokir nodded and turned the boat using a single oar. When the bow pointed toward the shore he started to