Escape From Java and Other Tales of Danger Page 7

  Neither grandparent could read or write, and as a result Sita couldn’t read or write.

  There was a school in one of the villages across the river, but Sita had never seen it. She had never been further than Shahganj, the small market town near the river. She had never seen a city. She had never been in a train. The river cut her off from many things, but she could not miss what she had never known and, besides, she was much too busy.

  While Grandfather mended his net, Sita was inside the hut, pressing her grandmother’s forehead which was hot with fever. Grandmother had been ill for three days and could not eat. She had been ill before but she had never been so bad. Grandfather had brought her some sweet oranges but she couldn’t take anything else.

  She was younger than Grandfather but, because she was sick, she looked much older. She had never been very strong. She coughed a lot and sometimes she had difficulty in breathing.

  When Sita noticed that Grandmother was sleeping, she left the bedside and tiptoed out of the room on her bare feet.

  Outside, she found the sky dark with monsoon clouds. It had rained all night and, in a few hours, it would rain again. The monsoon rains had come early at the end of June. Now it was the end of July and already the river was swollen. Its rushing sounds seemed nearer and more menacing than usual.

  Sita went to her grandfather and sat down beside him.

  ‘When you are hungry, tell me,’ she said, ‘and I will make the bread.’

  ‘Is your grandmother asleep?’

  ‘Yes. But she will wake soon. The pain is deep.’

  The old man stared out across the river, at the dark green of the forest, at the leaden sky, and said, ‘If she is not better by morning, I will take her to the hospital in Shahganj. They will know how to make her well. You may be on your own for two or three days. You have been on your own before.’

  Sita nodded gravely—she had been alone before; but not in the middle of the rains with the river so high. But she knew that someone must stay behind. She wanted Grandmother to get well and she knew that only Grandfather could take the small boat across the river when the current was so strong.

  Sita was not afraid of being left alone, but she did not like the look of the river. That morning, when she had been fetching water, she had noticed that the lever had suddenly disappeared.

  ‘Grandfather, if the river rises higher, what will I do?’

  ‘You must keep to the high ground.’

  ‘And if the water reaches the high ground?’

  ‘Then go into the hut and take the hens with you.’

  ‘And if the water comes into the hut?’

  ‘Then climb into the peepul tree. It is a strong tree. It will not fall. And the water cannot rise higher than the tree.’

  ‘And the goats, Grandfather?’

  ‘I will be taking them with me. I may have to sell them, to pay for good food and medicine for your grandmother. As for the hens, you can put them on the roof if the water enters the hut. But do not worry too much,’ and he patted Sita’s head, ‘the water will not rise so high. Has it ever done so? I will be back soon, remember that.’

  ‘And won’t Grandmother come back?’

  ‘Yes—but they may keep her in the hospital for some time.’

  The Sound of the River

  That evening it began to rain again. Big pellets of rain, scarring the surface of the river. But it was warm rain and Sita could move about in it. She was not afraid of getting wet, she rather liked it. In the previous month, when the first monsoon shower had arrived, washing the dusty leaves of the tree and bringing up the good smell of the earth, she had exulted in it, had run about shouting for joy. She was used to it now, even a little tired of the rain, but she did not mind getting wet. It was steamy indoors and her thin dress would soon dry in the heat from the kitchen fire.

  She walked about barefooted, barelegged. She was very sure on her feet. Her toes had grown accustomed to gripping all kinds of rocks, slippery or sharp, and though thin, she was surprisingly strong.

  Black hair, streaming across her face. Black eyes. Slim brown arms. A scar on her thigh: when she was small, visiting her mother’s village, a hyena had entered the house where she was sleeping, fastened on to her leg and tried to drag her away, but her screams had roused the villagers and the hyena had run off.

  She moved about in the pouring rain, chasing the hens into a shelter behind the hut. A harmless brown snake, flooded out of its hole, was moving across the open ground. Sita took a stick, picked the snake up with it, and dropped it behind a cluster of rocks. She had no quarrel with snakes. They kept down the rats and the frogs. She wondered how the rats had first come to the island—probably in someone’s boat or in a sack of grain.

  She disliked the huge black scorpions which left their waterlogged dwellings and tried to take shelter in the hut. It was so easy to step on one and the sting could be very painful. She had been bitten by a scorpion the previous monsoon, and for a day and a night she had known fever and great pain. Sita had never killed living creatures but now, whenever she found a scorpion, she crushed it with a rock! When, finally, she went indoors, she was hungry. She ate some parched gram and warmed up some goat’s milk.

  Grandmother woke once and asked for water, and Grandfather held the brass tumbler to her lips.

  It rained all night.

  The roof was leaking and a small puddle formed on the floor. Grandfather kept the kerosene lamps alight. They did not need the light but somehow it made them feel safer.

  The sound of the river had always been with them, although they seldom noticed it. But that night they noticed a change in its sound. There was something like a moan, like a wind in the tops of tall trees, and a swift hiss as the water swept round the rocks and carried away pebbles. And sometimes there was a rumble as loose earth fell into the water. Sita could not sleep.

  She had a rag doll, made with Grandmother’s help out of bits of old clothing. She kept it by her side every night. The doll was someone to talk to when the nights were long and sleep elusive. Her grandparents were often ready to talk but sometimes Sita wanted to have secrets, and though there were no special secrets in her life, she made up a few because it was fun to have them. And if you have secrets, you must have a friend to share them with. Since there were no other children on the island, Sita shared her secrets with the rag doll whose name was Mumta.

  Grandfather and Grandmother were asleep, though the sound of Grandmother’s laboured breathing was almost as persistent as the sound of the river.

  ‘Mumta,’ whispered Sita in the dark, starting one of her private conversations, ‘do you think Grandmother will get well again?’

  Mumta always answered Sita’s questions, even though the answers were really Sita’s answers.

  ‘She is very old,’ said Mumta.

  ‘Do you think the river will reach the hut?’ asked Sita.

  ‘If it keeps raining like this and the river keeps rising, it will reach the hut.’

  ‘I am afraid of the river, Mumta. Aren’t you afraid?’

  ‘Don’t be afraid. The river has always been good to us.’

  ‘What will we do if it comes into the hut?’

  ‘We will climb on the roof.’

  ‘And if it reaches the roof?’

  ‘We will climb the peepul tree. The river has never gone higher than the peepul tree.’

  As soon as the first light showed through the little skylight, Sita got up and went outside. It wasn’t raining hard, it was drizzling; but it was the sort of drizzle that could continue for days, and it probably meant that heavy rain was falling in the hills where the river began.

  Sita went down to the water’s edge. She couldn’t find her favourite rock, the one on which she often sat dangling her feet in the water, watching the little chilwa fish swim by. It was still there, no doubt, but the river had gone over it.

  She stood on the sand and she could feel the water oozing and bubbling beneath her feet.

  The rive
r was no longer green and blue and flecked with white. It was a muddy colour.

  Sita milked the goat thinking that perhaps it was the last time she would be milking it. But she did not care for the goat in the same way that she cared for Mumta.

  The sun was just coming up when Grandfather pushed off in the boat. Grandmother lay in the prow. She was staring hard at Sita, trying to speak, but the words would not come. She raised her hand in blessing.

  Sita bent and touched her grandmother’s feet and then Grandfather pushed off. The little boat—with its two old people and three goats—rode swiftly on the river, edging its way towards the opposite bank. The current was very swift and the boat would be carried about half a mile downstream before Grandfather would be able to get it to dry land.

  It bobbed about on the water, getting small and smaller, until it was just a speck on the broad river.

  And suddenly Sita was alone.

  There was a wind, whipping the raindrops against her face; and there was the water, rushing past the island; and there was the distant shore, blurred by rain; and there was the small hut; and there was the tree.

  Sita got busy. The hens had to be fed. They weren’t concerned about anything except food. Sita threw them a handful of coarse grain, potato peels and peanut shells.

  Then she took the broom and swept out the hut, lit the charcoal burner, warmed some milk, and thought, ‘Tomorrow there will be no milk . . .’ She began peeling onions. Soon her eyes started smarting, and pausing for a few moments and glancing round the quiet room, she became aware again that she was alone. Grandfather’s hookah pipe stood by itself in one corner. It was a beautiful old hookah, which had belonged to Sita’s great-grandfather. The bowl was made out of a coconut encased in silver. The long, winding stem was at least four feet long. It was their most treasured possession. Grandmother’s sturdy shisham-wood walking stick stood in another corner.

  Sita looked around for Mumta, found the doll beneath the light wooden charpoy, and placed her within sight and hearing. Thunder rolled down from the hills. Boom—boom—boom . . .

  ‘The gods of the mountains are angry,’ said Sita. ‘Do you think they are angry with me?’

  ‘Why should they be angry with you?’ asked Mumta.

  ‘They don’t need a reason for being angry. They are angry with everything and we are in the middle of everything. We are so small—do you think they know we are here?’

  ‘Who knows what the gods think?’

  ‘But I made you,’ said Sita, ‘and I know you are here.’

  ‘And will you save me if the river rises?’

  ‘Yes, of course. I won’t go anywhere without you, Mumta.’

  The Water Rises

  Sita couldn’t stay indoors for long. She went out, taking Mumta with her, and stared out across the river to the safe land on the other side. But was it really safe there? The river looked much wider now. It had crept over its banks and spread far across the flat plain. Far away, people were driving their cattle through waterlogged, flooded fields, carrying their belongings in bundles on their heads or shoulders, leaving their homes, making for high land. It wasn’t safe anywhere.

  Sita wondered what had happened to Grandfather and Grandmother. If they had reached the shore safely, Grandfather would have had to engage a bullock cart or a pony-drawn ekka to get Grandmother to the district hospital, five or six miles away. Shahganj had a market, a court, a jail, a cinema and a hospital.

  She wondered if she would ever see Grandmother again. She had done her best to look after the old lady, remembering the times when Grandmother had looked after her, had gently touched her fevered brow, and had told her stories—stories about the gods—about the young Krishna, friend of birds and animals, so full of mischief, always causing confusion among the other gods. He made God Indra angry by shifting a mountain without permission. Indra was the god of the clouds, who made the thunder and lightning, and when he was angry, he sent down a deluge such as this one.

  The island looked much smaller now. Some of its mud banks had dissolved quickly, sinking into the river. But in the middle of the island there was rocky ground, and the rocks would never crumble; they could only be submerged.

  Sita climbed into the tree to get a better view of the flood. She had climbed the tree many times, and it took her only a few seconds to reach the higher branches. She put her hand to her eyes as a shield from the rain and gazed upstream.

  There was water everywhere. The world had become one vast river. Even the trees on the forested side of the river looked as though they had grown out of the water, like mangroves. The sky was banked with massive, moisture-laden clouds. Thunder rolled down from the hills, and the river seemed to take it up with a hollow booming sound.

  Something was floating down the river, something big and bloated. It was closer now and Sita could make out its bulk—a drowned bullock being carried downstream.

  So the water had already flooded the villages further upstream. Or perhaps, the bullock had strayed too close to the rising river.

  Sita’s worst fears were confirmed when, a little later, she saw planks of wood, small trees and bushes, and then a wooden bedstead, floating past the island.

  As she climbed down from the tree, it began to rain more heavily. She ran indoors, shooing the hens before her. They flew into the hut and huddled under Grandmother’s cot. Sita thought it would be best to keep them together now.

  There were three hens and a cockbird. The river did not bother them. They were interested only in food, and Sita kept them content by throwing them a handful of onion skins.

  She would have liked to close the door and shut out the swish of the rain and the boom of the river, but then she would have no way of knowing how fast the water rose.

  She took Mumta in her arms, and began praying for the rain to stop and the river to fall. She prayed to God Indra, and just in case he was busy elsewhere, she prayed to other gods too. She prayed for the safety of her grandparents and for her own safety. She put herself last—but only after an effort!

  Finally Sita decided to make herself a meal. So she chopped up some onions, fried them, then added turmeric and red chilli powder, salt and water, and stirred until she had everything sizzling; and then she added a cup of lentils and covered the pot.

  Doing this took her about ten minutes. It would take about half an hour for the dish to cook.

  When she looked outside, she saw pools of water among the rocks. She couldn’t tell if it was rainwater or the overflow from the river.

  She had an idea.

  A big tin trunk stood in a corner of the room. In it Grandmother kept an old single-thread sewing machine. It had belonged once to an English lady, had found its way to a Shahganj junkyard, and had been rescued by Grandfather who had paid fifteen rupees for it. It was just over a hundred years old but it could still be used.

  The trunk also contained an old sword. This had originally belonged to Sita’s great-grandfather, who had used it to help defend his village against marauding Rohilla soldiers more than a century ago. Sita could tell that it had been used to fight with, because there were several small dents in the steel blade.

  But there was no time for Sita to start admiring family heirlooms. She decided to stuff the trunk with everything useful or valuable. There was a chance that it wouldn’t be carried away by the water.

  Grandfather’s hookah went into the trunk. Grandmother’s walking stick went in, too. So did a number of small tins containing the spices used in cooking—nutmeg, caraway seed, cinnamon, coriander, pepper—also a big tin of flour and another of molasses. Even if she had to spend several hours in the tree, there would be something to eat when she came down again.

  A clean white cotton dhoti of Grandfather’s and Grandmother’s only spare sari also went into the trunk. Never mind if they got stained with curry powder! Never mind if they got the smell of salted fish—some of that went in, too.

  Sita was so busy packing the trunk that she paid no attention to the
lick of cold water at her heels. She locked the trunk, dropped the key into a crack in the rock wall and turned to give her attention to the food. It was only then that she discovered that she was walking about on a watery floor.

  She stood still, horrified by what she saw. The water was oozing over the threshold, pushing its way into the room.

  In her fright, Sita forgot about her meal and everything else. Darting out of the hut, she ran splashing through ankle-deep water towards the safety of the peepul tree. If the tree hadn’t been there, such a well-known landmark, she might have floundered into deep water, into the river.

  She climbed swiftly into the strong arms of the tree, made herself comfortable on a familiar branch and thrust her wet hair away from her eyes.

  The Tree

  She was glad she had hurried. The hut was now surrounded by water. Only the higher parts of the island could still be seen—a few rocks, the big rock into which the hut was built, a hillock on which some brambles and thorn apples grew.

  The hens hadn’t bothered to leave the hut. Instead, they were perched on the wooden bedstead.

  ‘Will the river rise still higher?’ wondered Sita. She had never seen it like this before. With a deep, muffled roar it swirled around her, stretching away in all directions.

  The most unusual things went by on the water—an aluminium kettle, a cane chair, a tin of tooth powder, an empty cigarette packet, a wooden slipper, a plastic doll . . .

  A doll!

  With a sinking feeling, Sita remembered Mumta.

  Poor Mumta, she had been left behind in the hut. Sita, in her hurry, had forgotten her only companion.