Child of Spring (12 page)

T
he wind had died down as quickly as it had begun. The clouds had all been chased away, and the sky was blue once more. Yesterday’s storm had been a trick after all. But we were glad for the sunshine. It would help us do our job today.

Lali and I sat under the guava tree, surrounded by pots, big and small. They were filled with the tamarind pods we had collected yesterday after the wind knocked them down from the tree.

“Tell me again,” Lali said. “Why exactly are we are doing all this big work?”

“Goose!” I laughed. “This big work’s going to earn us big money for Mausi.”

“But it’s going to take us hours and hours …”

“Tell me, Lali. Are you afraid of hard work?”

Lali shook her head.
“Na!”
she said. “I’m not afraid.”

“Good! I’m not either!” I was used to working hard for Little Bibi, all week long. It wasn’t so much more to do a bit extra for a friend.

We rolled up our sleeves and got busy. First we cracked
the brown tamarind pods open with our thumbs to remove the pulpy fruit. Next we soaked the fruit in water until it was soft and squishy. Then we held a bunch of the fruit in our hands and pressed. The dark brown pulp oozed out between our fingers and dripped into a pot. We saved the seeds that were trapped in our palms to add to our stash later.

We stirred sugar and salt and cumin and red chili powder into the pulp. Amma had agreed to let us have them after we told her what we were doing. “
Daiyya!
Such curious notions!” she grumbled, but she gave us a little bit of everything we needed.

We scooped globs of tamarind out onto a palm frond mat, stuck a small stick into each glob, and set the mat in the blazing sun for the candy to dry. We worked late into the afternoon, until our backs ached and our palms were as wrinkled as Old Nahni’s face.

When they were done, we had a pile of mouth-puckering, eye-crinkling tamarind lollipops to sell to the people of the
busti,
ten paisa a piece.

“We’re going to have ourselves the best tamarind candy sale ever!” I told Lali.

But she was not convinced. “It may not work.”

“What may not work?”

“This!” Lali swept her hand at the growing mound of candy. “We’ve worked until our arms are sore, but people may not come.”

“They’ll come,” I reassured her.

They
would
come. Who in their right mind would say no to a mouthwatering tamarind lolly? Still, to be safe we recruited Nandi and Pummi to get the word out.

The sun burned down mercilessly.

“
Oo
Maa!
” Lali fanned herself with the hem of her skirt.

For once I was glad for the heat. “Look, Lali!” I tested a lolly with my fingertip. “The hot sun is already drying them up nicely!”

We shooed away flies. We talked about this and that. We waited and waited under the guava tree.

“
Na.
No one’s coming,” Lali said.

The
busti
was quiet. Where was Ramu? Rukmani? The old cobbler? Where were Paki and Raju?

I stared at the piles of lollies. “Maybe the heat is keeping everyone indoors,” I said. “Paki and Raju should have been the first ones, though. We all know how they are about the tamarind—”

“Paki’s not coming,” Lali said.

“He is!” I insisted. “He loves tamarind second only to his kites!”

“He can’t walk this far yet,” Lali reminded me.

Oo Maa!
All the hard work and exciting thoughts had made me forget about Paki’s leg. But still, he hadn’t been crying so much in the hut, and two days had passed since his fall.

We waited, but no one came. My head was full of troubling thoughts. Then we heard loud squeals and Nandi and Pummi came flying toward us.

“Oi!”
Nandi squawked. “Prepare yourself!”

Following them was a crowd of people!

“They’re here!” I yelled to Lali. “I told you they’d come!”

Raju was the first in line with money in his fist.

“How’s Paki feeling?” I asked.

“Better, not that it’s your business,” Raju snarled. “He begged Amma to let him come, but she threatened him with a thrashing. Doctor Babu said he’ll soon be as good as new. Our mother was so happy, she gave me extra to spend.”

“Yes, yes,” I said. “You must buy many.”

“Oi!”
Raju pointed to the fattest ones. “Let us have that one … and the one over there!”

Business was brisk and coins rained into our bowls! The sugarcane man bought some, and so did the peanut man. The bangle woman came running, and the maker of palm frond baskets as well. We sold to the vegetable vendor and to the seller of beetle nut leaves.

Even Amma dug pennies out from the knot in her
pullo.
“There’s a child lurking in everyone,” she laughed as she licked her lollipop.

“I wish Vimla Mausi were here to share in the fun,” I said.

“She keeps close to Hari,” Amma replied. “A mother can be only as happy as her saddest child,” she murmured. “Sister Vimla’s time for happiness may not be today but if Lord Rama wills it, it will surely come tomorrow.”

We can’t wait that long,
I said to myself.

The lollies ran out about the time the sun went down, and everyone went home feeling satisfied. Lali and I scooped up our earnings, threw them in the air, and laughed at the tinkling shower of coins. The pile was so big that it filled three pouches to the brim. Our throats were raw and our voices were hoarse from eating so many tart lollies, but our hearts were happy.

I made Lali swear on her head that she wouldn’t breathe a word to her mother. The lollies were my idea and I wanted to be the one to tell her.

Their hut was so dark that I could barely discern the hump that was Vimla Mausi’s
chullah.
A small fire was burning in the fat, round stove. Poor Hari lay still on a mat, his face to the wall. His breath came out in short rasps.

“How’s he doing today?” I asked Mausi.

“He has kept down a few bites of soft rice,” she replied.

“You were right about the dream,” Lali told me. “He is a little more spirited and that’s a good thing,
nai?
”

“He probably still needs the Doctor Babu,” I said, thrusting the money into Mausi’s hand.

Her eyes widened.

“It’s for proper medicine,” Lali said.

“
Arrey daiyya!
Did your dear and generous mother send this?” Mausi asked.

I shook my head. I told her about the tamarind lollipop sale from start to finish and Lali filled in the details.

Vimla Mausi’s fist closed over the money. I could tell by the glistening in her eyes that she was very happy and very relieved.

There was nothing left for me to do. “I’ll be going then.” I folded my hands in respectful parting.

Mausi stopped me with a kiss on my forehead. “Your heart is better than gold, dear child,” she said. “Your mother has reared you well.”

I
t took me two days to get my voice back. Little Bibi said I sounded cute, and that made me so happy that I hummed all day. I made extra sure that there were no mosquitoes in her bed netting.

That evening, as I made my way to the dear tamarind tree, the strong smell of coconut oil assailed my nose. Rukmani sat under the mango tree, oiling her hair.

“
Oi!
Come sit with me for a bit of chitchat,” she called in a lazy voice. She was humming and I took that as a good sign. I walked up to her.

“
Arrey,
Basanta!” Rukmani drawled. “I am so bored I could scream. Tell me stories of the Big House,
nai?
”

I was startled by her request. I’d been prepared for an earful about hiding behind the Gul Mohr tree or about the failed
laddu
mission, but the flighty girl appeared to have moved on to newer ground.

She was asking about something that was clearly out of bounds, though. “Do not discuss Memsaab and Big Master and Little Bibi with anyone,” Amma had warned me time and time again. “They are not the business of others.”

“There’s nothing to tell. Everything is just ho-hum,” I told Rukmani.

“That’s not my impression.” She coiled her hair into a tight bun with an expert twist of her wrist. “If I were to go by the size of the Big House, I’d say you get no respite from horrible Little Bibi’s demands on you, you poor sorry little scrawny thing.”

Was Rukmani feeling sorry for me? Or was she only rubbing it in? “My job’s not so bad,” I said. “And Little Bibi—”

“And Little Bibi, what? Tell, tell,
nai?
”

“Little Bibi’s fine,” I declared. “She’s actually quite nice and helpful.”

“
Oo
Ma!
” Rukmani curved a finger under her nose to signify her skepticism. “Just listen to you, sticking up for precious Little Bibi!”

“I’m not!” I said. But I
had
jumped to Little Bibi’s defense. I had done for my young mistress what Ramu had done for me.

“These hoity-toity rich folk!” Rukmani sneered. “
Oo Ma!
So many stories … Would you like to hear about my
memsaab
?”

“
Hanh!
Of course I would.” Amma had strict instructions about talking about
my memsaab
but she had no rules about others.

“My
memsaab
has little bottles with water that smells so nice.”

“It’s called
scent.
” I knew I sounded haughty, but I kept talking. “It’s an
Angrezi
or
Eengleesh
word, as Little Bibi
would say. She has rows and rows of pretty bottles on her dressing table.”

“
Aiyyo!
I know
Angrezi
too, Miss Show-off!” Rukmani snapped. “I know all about scent too, and I will let you sniff. Come!”

She extended her wrist and I got a whiff of rose petals and jasmine.

“And this … look!” She tilted back her head. Tucked behind her
pullo,
nestled in her bosom, was a delicate string of black beads.

“Where did you get those?” I asked.

“
Aiyyo!
No need to look so shocked,” Rukmani said scornfully. “It’s not like you’ve never taken a thing or two!”

“Never mind,” I said. “I’ve got something for you.”

“Oh?”

“It’s a sweet message from a sweet man!”

By now, Ramu’s message was very old, but I had promised him that I would tell her.
Shame, shame!
I chided myself, and then, to make myself feel better, I added,
Perhaps he’s already whispered it in her ear under the mango tree.

“He said to tell you he’s saving to buy a cozy little house on the other end of town.”

“Oh, he did, did he?”

“Yes … a nice house for the girl with a swan walk. Those are his words!”

“
Humph
! Tell me something I don’t already know!”

Arrey daiyya!
Ramu
had
told her! “Will there be a wedding in the
busti
this year?” I asked.

“Wouldn’t you just love to know?” Rukmani tossed a green guava in the air and caught it with a snap. “Run along,” she said dismissively. “Tell your little friend all the latest gossip, and while you’re at it, you might tell Ramu I will not wait forever.”

I turned to go and then stopped. There was something I had been meaning to clear up. “Oh, Rukmani,” I said. “About that night …”

There was a sharp intake of breath. “What night?”

“The night Kalu barked when someone tried to steal our stuff?”

“
Aiyyo!
So?”

“My father says he has a fair idea who the thief is, and if she dares try again, he’ll go straightaway to the police station.”

Rukmani flinched. “
Aiyyo!
Why are you telling me all this?”

“No reason.”

“It’s no skin off my nose. I don’t care what your father says!” Rukmani turned on her heel and walked away really fast, her hips swaying with a
thumak, thumak.

My hunch had been right! The nervous glances, twitches, and tics were proof that Rukmani had tried to steal the ring.

“Wait!” I yelled. “I’m going to make a garland of motia flowers for your pretty neck if there is a wedding.”

But she didn’t even look back.