The Hungry Tide - Amitav Ghosh [73]
Shutting the door behind him, he stepped out onto the roof and discovered that the landscape, in its epic mutability, had undergone yet another transformation: the moonlight had turned it into a silvery negative of its daytime image. Now it was the darkened islands that looked like lakes of liquid, while the water lay spread across the earth like a vast slick of solid metal.
“Kanai-babu?”
He turned to see a woman standing silhouetted in the doorway with her sari drawn over her head.
“Moyna?”
“Yes.”
“Did you hear?” No sooner had he said the words than he heard the sound again: it was the same indistinct echo, not unlike the bellowing of a faraway train, and again it was followed by an outburst of barks as though all the island’s dogs had been waiting to hear it repeated.
“Is it a — ?” Kanai began, and then, seeing her flinch, cut himself short. “I shouldn’t say the word, should I?”
“No,” she said. “It’s not to be spoken aloud.”
“Where do you think it’s coming from?”
“It could be from anywhere,” she said. “I was just sitting in my room waiting, but then I heard it and I couldn’t sit still anymore.”
“So Fokir isn’t back yet?”
“No.”
Kanai understood now that the animal’s roar had a direct connection with her anxiety. “You shouldn’t worry,” he said, trying to reassure her. “I’m sure Fokir will take all the right precautions. He knows what to do.”
“Him?” Anger seethed in her voice as she said this. “If you knew him you wouldn’t say that. Whatever other people do, he does just the opposite. The other fishermen — my father, my brothers, everyone — when they’re out there at night, they tie their boats together in midstream so they won’t be defenseless if they’re attacked. But Fokir won’t do that; he’ll be off on his own somewhere without another human being in sight.”
“Why?”
“That’s just how he is, Kanai-babu,” she said. “He can’t help himself. He’s like a child.”
The moonlight caught the three points of gold on her face, and once again Kanai was reminded of stars lined up in a constellation. Even though her ãchol was drawn carefully over her head, there was a restlessness in the tilt of her face that was at odds with the demure draping of her sari.
“Moyna, tell me,” said Kanai in a half-jocular, teasing tone, “was Fokir a stranger to you before you married him? Didn’t you know what he was like?”
“Yes,” said Moyna, “I did know him, Kanai-babu. After his mother died, he was brought up by Horen Naskor. Our village was not far from theirs.”
“You’re a bright girl, Moyna,” Kanai said. “If you knew what he was like, why did you marry him?”
She smiled, as if to herself. “You wouldn’t understand,” she said.
He was nettled by the certainty in her voice. “I wouldn’t understand?” he said sharply. “I know five languages. I’ve traveled all over the world. Why wouldn’t I understand?”
She let her ãchol drop from her head and gave him a sweet smile. “It doesn’t matter how many languages you know,” she said. “You’re not a woman and you don’t know him. You won’t understand.”
Leaving him standing, she whirled around and left.
LISTENING
THE DOLPHINS’ QUIET, regular breathing had lulled Piya into a doze from which she was woken by a sound that seemed to come booming out of a dream. By the time she opened her eyes and sat up, the forest was quiet again and the echoes had already faded. The river was lapping gently at the boat’s hull and the stars above had become faint pinpricks of light, their glow dimmed by the brightness of the moon.
Then the boat began to rock and she knew that Fokir was awake too. Raising her head, she saw that he had seated himself in the center of the boat with his blanket draped shawl-like around his shoulders. Now she roused herself and made her way like a crab along the boat, seating herself beside him. “What was it?” She mimed the question with raised eyebrows and a turn of her hand. He gave her a smile but made no direct answer, only pointing vaguely across the water. Then, resting his chin on his knees, he fixed his eyes on the island they had visited earlier, visible now as a faint silver filigree