The Sleeping Dictionary (52 page)

“Yes, I heard,” I said, because I’d seen a memorandum about it in Mr. Lewes’s desk. Apparently, the British suspected the Japanese planes would drop more than just rice on Bengal.

“So you are making your own rice kitchen, Kamala. That is a great thing. Would you like Supriya to print a leaflet about your address and the feeding time from noon till two? Someone will distribute it on the Maidan. That is not too far from you.”

“Yes, but there will be no set feeding time. I want to feed anyone who manages to find our place, any time of day—”

She interrupted me, sounding exasperated. “Kamala, you don’t understand! All the other rice kitchens are on the same timing. Otherwise people will travel throughout the city to take food twice a day and use up what little supply we have. Or they will camp out on your property permanently.”

I did not like what Mrs. Sen said, but it seemed that following the rules would mean a more manageable system. So with reluctance, I agreed.

The first day, only those staying nearby came. Reverend McRae and I oversaw the tureens, giving each person a generous scoop that filled the clay teacups. Afterward, people sat on the grass, digesting. Some vomited, and others lost control of their bowels. Two constables stopped by to see if I had a permit for such a nuisance to the neighborhood. I gave each a rupee and thanked them for their concern. They straightened the sign I had put on the gate as they left.

I had feared people might battle one another to get phan, but the lines remained quiet and orderly. Tragically, one woman died at the end of the line, so by midafternoon, the undertakers’ cart came to Middleton Street. The next day, nobody died. And two hundred came. The clay cups were all gone, so people were using leaves or even their hands to cup the gruel. I wished I could tell Pankaj about these people and the way it felt to serve them, but I did not dare write to him again.

As my days serving rice continued, I noticed something curious; almost all the refugees were children and females. One woman explained it best: she had left her husband in the country because he could eat leaves and worms. Her children could not. I had not talked to peasants in a long time, and I felt my old country accent coming back. Reverend McRae’s Scottish Bengali made the children laugh. But there was a problem: our rice could not last forever. I worried aloud to the reverend about the supply, and whether I would have to offer phan only to newcomers to the city. There was less than a week’s store left, by my calculations.

“How can you refuse one person over another?” he asked.

“I can’t. It would break my heart.”

“Then all who come to you are meant to receive.” His blue eyes glowed like unearthly coals against his weathered skin. “That is why you created this kitchen, isn’t it?”

His optimism frustrated me; it was unrealistic. “But I do not have enough rice, as I have been saying!”

The reverend’s voice was gentle. “If you pray, you will receive. God’s angels will bring the message of how this will be.”

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes, because I had never seen a winged being in Calcutta except for bats in the garden. And while I deeply respected the way Reverend McRae related to his Christian God, I could not see him as different from the Allah who had led Abbas to rescue me, or Goddess Lakshmi who had guided me out of poverty and into the comforts of Middleton Street. Did the reverend understand that it would be to all of them I would pray? Somehow, I didn’t think it mattered.

THAT EVENING, I did not share my anxiety with Mr. Lewes, although I imagined he would be concerned if he knew that twenty maunds were almost depleted. After dinner, we all went into the
library to listen to a classical music broadcast. Mr. Lewes stretched out on the settee with a book on his chest. Reverend McRae sat snugly in a wing chair reading a book of essays by Swami Vivekananda. I slouched at the desk, ostensibly looking over the day’s papers but thinking of only one thing: rice.

The flat’s bell shattered this peaceful moment. I jerked my head up to hear Shombhu opening the door a flight below us and then a stamping of feet upstairs. In the next minute, Mr. Weatherington strode into the library with Shombhu anxiously following in his wake, making an apologetic face at Mr. Lewes.

“You left quite early today. An official document came in a half hour later and I’ve taken it upon myself to bring it.” Mr. Weatherington glowered at the whole room.

Mr. Lewes put down his book, looking as irritated as I felt. “Reverend McRae, may I introduce Mr. Weatherington? Who would like coffee, and who is for tea?”

Mr. Weatherington pointed a bony finger at me. “I heard about an Indian woman luring refugees into the White Town. Seeing the condition of the garden outside, I know who it is. Shame on you!”

“I’m not ashamed at all,” I answered in a cool voice, but inside I was furious. He would not ruin the last days of the rice kitchen; I could not stand it.

“The rice kitchen was both our ideas; and with Reverend McRae’s assistance, it has served thousands of meals.” Mr. Lewes came up to stand behind me. He put a hand on the back of my chair, which had the odd effect of making me feel like we were touching.

“Running a place like this out of a good residential establishment could get you evicted by your own landlord,” Mr. Weatherington said, watching us closely.

“If you make a fuss about it, perhaps. But I’ll know it’s your doing.”

I cast a glance backward and saw my employer was staring hard at his colleague. It was as if the polite English veneer was gone and something tougher had emerged.

Mr. Weatherington must have noticed, for his voice rose as if in self-defense. “That’s not my intention, Simon, but I wish to remind you that Calcutta is India’s war production center. You must return to saving India from the Japanese, not saving it for the huddled masses!”

“I’m giving up my car for the war effort. What about you?” Mr. Lewes coldly scrutinized his colleague.

“Oh, no,” Mr. Weatherington huffed. “I don’t believe in empty symbolic gestures like giving up cars or setting up charities in high-rent districts. Nobody would allow it in Alipore.”

I realized now that I despised Mr. Weatherington as much as the worst individuals I’d known: Miss Rachael who’d told lies about me, Mummy who’d sold me, and the Railway Hospital nurses who had almost killed Kabita with their kicks. I hated him, but I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing me upset.

Mr. Lewes still hadn’t taken his eyes off his colleague. “What is this really about, Wilbur?”

“I honestly don’t know. You tell me!” Mr. Weatherington lifted up his briefcase, unlocked its clasp and took out a sealed envelope.

“Good night,” I said, beginning to rise in my seat. I knew what the argument was really about: Mr. Weatherington’s jealousy of his colleague, the one he thought the governor preferred.

“Don’t go, Kamala. This is news you may need to hear.” Mr. Lewes had opened the paper and was reading it over swiftly. “Yes, exactly as I’d hoped!”

“What in hell are you saying?” Mr. Weatherington sputtered. “Don’t reveal privileged communications!”

“Actually, Kamala and the reverend are involved.” Mr. Lewes leaned down, and I felt his breath against my skin as he put the letter in my hands. “The Relief Control office will send us rice. A dozen maunds per week for an unspecified time.”

Mr. Weatherington’s mouth worked for an instant, as if he had a hundred objections to raise. But he only made a sharp exhalation,
then stormed out of the room and downstairs without as much as saying good night.

“Praise God!” said Reverend McRae, smiling from the wing chair where he’d watched the whole drama unfold. I thought it was about the letter; but perhaps Mr. Weatherington’s departure, too.

“Did you know this wonderful thing would happen? Is it your doing?” I had risen to rush over to the reverend and clasp his hand.

“Nothing to do with it, Miss Mukherjee. I’m as happily surprised as you are!”

I glanced back at Mr. Lewes, who was still standing behind my vacated chair and suddenly understood. He must have done it. Slowly, I read through the letter written on engraved letterhead and signed by the governor. It was just as Mr. Lewes had said. Within two days, we’d receive a regular supply of rice each week, free of charge.

Everything had happened as the reverend had predicted. But there was still one thing that troubled me. Although Mr. Weatherington clearly was the bearer of good news, I could not consider him any kind of angel.

CHAPTER

33

In wartime practically everything is either rationed or off the market altogether. But it is surprising how comparatively little these shortages inconvenience one by now. In fact, some are positively a blessing in disguise. Food for example. There are no luxuries, of course, and quite apart from luxuries, most of one’s old favorites have vanished. It is months, years in fact, since I have made close acquaintance with a genuine mutton chop. Substitutes too are everywhere and most of what one eats, it seems to me, ‘tastes’ different. But there is ‘enough.’

—Calcutta’s controller of rationing, Lord Elton,
Amrita Bazar Patrika,
Jan. 30, 1944

A
ngrily, I crushed up the page with Lord Elton’s editorial. The pompous aristocrat didn’t know how few Indians would ever see a mutton bone, let alone a mutton chop. Nor did he seem to understand how pitifully scant the permitted amounts of rice, flour, and sugar were. Mr. Lewes and Reverend McRae obtained their ration
cards easily, but I had to visit the ration office several times in order to get the cards for Shombhu, Jatin, Manik, and myself. After experiencing how difficult obtaining a card was, I guessed thousands of Calcuttans might not get ration cards. And what of Kabita and others in the countryside, where there were no ration cards at all?

As Mr. Lewes had pledged, he gave up his car. His driver, Sarjit, was quickly hired by an American colonel come to town. This was the way of the times: because American military officers earned far more than their British counterparts, many neighborhood servants were looking for new bosses. I thought Shombhu and Jatin would stay, but I worried about Manik. The rice kitchen, plus his usual cooking schedule, was much more than he’d had to do before.

“Take rest this afternoon,” I said to Manik at least several times a week.

“But who will make dinner then?” He looked at me glumly.

“I shall!”

“You do not know about kitchens.”

I could have told Manik that as a girl, I’d crouched on a mud floor sorting stones from lentils, but that would shock and confuse him. I held my tongue, thinking about the many lies, spoken or not, that had become part of me. I did not want to mislead Manik, but admitting humble origins could lead to everything falling apart.

It was easier to concentrate on rice. My mornings were filled with getting the pots gently boiling enough rice for the four to five hundred who came daily. After serving and clean up, I took a brief rest and gave Reverend McRae his Bengali lesson. Then it was time to welcome Mr. Lewes home for dinner and to read him the newspaper translations, which he’d asked me to resume since he began closely monitoring local information about the famine.

These days, all he talked of was the hunger. He had even convinced some colleagues in Delhi to direct national funds toward relief in Bengal. Despite this, he remained worried about the distribution system ordered by Governor Casey, who insisted two-thirds of the rice
must stay in Calcutta, although there were ten times more deaths per week in the countryside. As Mr. Lewes doggedly continued, I began understanding why he was doing so much. The new governor, Mr. Casey, had decided to run his office differently than the other governors before him. He had even stopped sending fortnightly letters to the viceroy.

“It’s unheard of,” Mr. Lewes said one evening at dinner with the reverend and me. “The secretary of state is very much against cutting the flow of information about Bengal’s status at a time such as this. He is so perturbed he wrote a letter about it.”

“Do you think it’s because Mr. Casey prefers the telephone to writing?” I asked, thinking that if letter-writing duties were stripped, Mr. Lewes had lost half of his job.