The Inheritance Of Loss Part 7

But outside the clinic he would run into Kesang or the cleaner at the hospital or the Metal Box watchman, who would begin to declaim, "Now there is no hope, now you'll have to do puja, puja, it will cost many thousands of rupees...." it will cost many thousands of rupees...."

Or: "I knew someone who had exactly what you are describing, never walked again...." By the time he had returned home he would have lost his faith in science and begun to howl: "Hai hai, hamara kya hoga, hai hai, hamara kya hoga?" "Hai hai, hamara kya hoga, hai hai, hamara kya hoga?" And he'd have to go back to the clinic the next day to recover his good sense. And he'd have to go back to the clinic the next day to recover his good sense.

So, appreciating, desiring reasonableness, the cook brought in tea and fried cheese toast with chili pepper mixed into the cheese, and then sat on his stool just outside the door, keeping an eye on Sai and the new tutor, nodding approval at Gyan's careful tone, the deliberate words that led, calculation by calculation, to an exact, tidy answer that could be confirmed by a list at the back of the text.

Foolish cook. He had not realized that the deliberateness came not from faith in science, but from self-consciousness and doubt; that though they appeared to be engrossed in atoms, their eyes latched tightly to the numbers in that room where the walls swelled like sails, they were flailing; that like the evening hour opening to deeper depths outside, they would be swallowed into something more treacherous than the purpose for which Gyan had been hired; that though they were battling to build a firmness from all that was available to them, there was reason enough to worry it was not good enough to save them.

The small correct answer fell flat.

Gyan produced it apologetically. It was anticlimactic. It would not do. Flicking it aside, the tremendous antic.i.p.ation that could no longer be pinned on the sum gathered strength and advanced, leaving them gasping by the time two hours were up and Gyan could flee without looking at Sai, who had produced such a powerful effect upon him.

"It is strange the tutor is Nepali," the cook remarked to Sai when he had left. A bit later he said, "I thought he would be Bengali."

"Hm?" asked Sai. How had she looked? she was thinking. How had she appeared to the tutor? The tutor himself had the aspect, she thought, of intense intelligence. His eyes were serious, his voice deep, but then his lips were too plump to have such a serious expression, and his hair was curly and stood up in a way that made him look comic. This seriousness combined with the comic she found compelling. asked Sai. How had she looked? she was thinking. How had she appeared to the tutor? The tutor himself had the aspect, she thought, of intense intelligence. His eyes were serious, his voice deep, but then his lips were too plump to have such a serious expression, and his hair was curly and stood up in a way that made him look comic. This seriousness combined with the comic she found compelling.

"Bengalis," said the cook, "are very intelligent."

"Don't be silly," said Sai. "Although they certainly would agree."

"It's the fish," said the cook. "Coastal people are more intelligent than inland people."

"Who says?"

"Everyone knows," said the cook. "Coastal people eat fish and see how much cleverer they are, Bengalis, Malayalis, Tamils. Inland they eat too much grain, and it slows the digestion-especially millet-forms a big heavy ball. The blood goes to the stomach and not to the head. Nepalis make good soldiers, coolies, but they are not so bright at their studies. Not their fault, poor things."

"Go and eat some fish yourself," Sai said. "One stupid thing after another from your mouth."

"Here I bring you up as my own child with so much love and just see how you are talking to me...," he began.

That night Sai sat and stared into the mirror.

Sitting across from Gyan, she had felt so acutely aware of herself, she was certain it was because of his gaze on her, but every time she glanced up, he was looking in another direction.

She sometimes thought herself pretty, but as she began to make a proper investigation, she found it was a changeable thing, beauty. No sooner did she locate it than it slipped from her grasp; instead of disciplining it, she was unable to refrain from exploiting its flexibility. She stuck her tongue out at herself and rolled her eyes, then smiled beguilingly. She transformed her expression from demon to queen. When she brushed her teeth, she noticed her b.r.e.a.s.t.s jiggle like two jellies being rushed to the table. She lowered her mouth to taste the flesh and found it both firm and yielding. This plumpness jiggliness firmness softness, all coupled together in an unlikely manner, must surely give her a certain amount of bartering power?

But if she continued forever in the company of two bandy-legged men, in this house in the middle of nowhere, this beauty, so brief she could barely hold it steady, would fade and expire, unsung, unrescued, and unrescuable.

She looked again and found her face tinged with sadness, and the image seemed faraway.

She'd have to propel herself into the future by whatever means possible or she'd be trapped forever in a place whose time had already pa.s.sed.

Over the days, she found herself continually obsessed with her own face, aware that she was meanwhile whetting her appet.i.te for something else.

But how did she appear? She searched in the stainless-steel pots, in the polished gompa b.u.t.ter lamps, in the merchants' vessels in the bazaar, in the images proffered by the spoons and knives on the dining table, in the green surface of the pond. Round and fat she was in the spoons, long and thin in the knives, pocked by insects and tiddlers in the pond; golden in one light, ashen in another; back then to the mirror; but the mirror, fickle as ever, showed one thing, then another and left her, as usual, without an answer.

Fourteen.

At 4:25 a.m., Biju made his way to the Queen of Tarts bakery, watching for the cops who sometimes came leaping out: where are you going and what are you doing with whom at what time and why? Biju made his way to the Queen of Tarts bakery, watching for the cops who sometimes came leaping out: where are you going and what are you doing with whom at what time and why?

But Immigration operated independently of Police, the better, perhaps, to bake the morning bread, and Biju fell, again and again, through the cracks in the system.

Above the bakery the subway ran on a rawly sketched edifice upheld by metal stilts. The trains pa.s.sed in a devilish screaming; their wheels sparked firework showers that at night threw a violent jagged brightness over the Harlem projects, where he could see a few lights on already and some others besides himself making a start on miniature lives. At the Queen of Tarts, the grill went zipping up, the light flickered on, a rat moved into the shadow. Tap root tail, thick skulled, broad shouldered, it looked over its back sneering as it walked with a velvet crunch right over the trap too skimpy to detain it.

"Namaste, babaji," said Saeed Saeed.

Biju considered his previous fight with a Pakistani, the usual attack on the man's religion that he'd grown up uttering: "Pigs, pigs, sons of pigs."

Now here was Saeed Saeed, and Biju's admiration for the man confounded him. Fate worked this way. Biju was overcome by the desire to be his friend, because Saeed Saeed wasn't drowning, he was bobbing in the tides. In fact, a large number of people wished to cling to him like a plank during a s.h.i.+pwreck-not only fellow Zanzibaris and fellow illegals but Americans, too; overweight confidence-leached citizens he teased when they lunched alone on a pizza slice; lonely middle-aged office workers who came by for conversation after nights of lying awake wondering if, in America-in America!-they were really getting the best of what was on offer. They told such secrets as perhaps might only be comfortably told to an illegal alien.

Saeed was kind and he was not Paki. Therefore he was OK?The cow was not an Indian cow; therefore it was not holy?Therefore he liked Muslims and hated only Pakis?Therefore he liked Saeed, but hated the general lot of Muslims?Therefore he liked Muslims and Pakis and India should see it was all wrong and hand over Kashmir?No, no, how could that be and- This was but a small portion of the dilemma. He remembered what they said about black people at home. Once a man from his village who worked in the city had said: "Be careful of the hubs.h.i.+. hubs.h.i.+. Ha ha, in their own country they live like monkeys in the trees. They come to India and become men." Ha ha, in their own country they live like monkeys in the trees. They come to India and become men."

Biju had thought the man from his village was claiming that India was so far advanced that black men learned to dress and eat when they arrived, but what he had meant was that black men ran about attempting to impregnate every Indian girl they saw.

Therefore he hated all black people but liked Saeed?Therefore there was nothing wrong with black people and Saeed?Or Mexicans, Chinese, j.a.panese, or anyone else...???

This habit of hate had accompanied Biju, and he found that he possessed an awe of white people, who arguably had done India great harm, and a lack of generosity regarding almost everyone else, who had never done a single harmful thing to India.

Presumably Saeed Saeed had encountered the same dilemma regarding Biju.

From other kitchens, he was learning what the world thought of Indians: In Tanzania, if they could, they would throw them out like they did in Uganda.In Madagascar, if they could, they would throw them out.In Nigeria, if they could, they would throw them out.In Fiji, if they could, they would throw them out.In China, they hate them.In Hong Kong.In Germany.In Italy.In j.a.pan.In Guam.In Singapore.Burma.South Africa.They don't like them.In Guadeloupe-they love us there?No.

Presumably Saeed had been warned of Indians, but he didn't seem wracked by contradictions; a generosity buoyed him and dangled him above such dilemmas.

He had many girls.

"Oh myeee G.o.d!!" he said. "Oh myeee Gaaaawd! She keep calling me and calling me," he clutched at head, "aaaiii... I don't know what what to do!!" to do!!"

"You know what to do," said Omar sourly.

"Ha ha ha, ah ah, no, I am going crazeeeeee. Too much pooky pooky, man!"

"It's those dreadlocks, cut them off and the girls will go."

"But I don't want them to go!" go!"

When pretty girls came to pick out their cinnamon buns with mine shafts of jeweled brown sugar and spice, Saeed described the beauty and the poverty of Zanzibar, and the girls' compa.s.sion rose like leavened loaf-how they wanted to save him, to take him home and lull him with good plumbing and TV; how they wanted to be seen down the road with a tall handsome man topped with dreadlocks. "He's cute! cute! He's He's cute! cute! He's He's cute!" cute!" they'd say, winding up tight and then wringing out their desire over the telephone to their friends. they'd say, winding up tight and then wringing out their desire over the telephone to their friends.

Saeed's first job in America had been at the Ninety-sixth Street mosque, where the imam hired him to do the dawn call to prayer, since he did a fine rooster crow, but before he arrived at work, he took to stopping at the nightclubs along the way, it seeming a natural enough progression time-wise. Disposable camera in his pocket, he stood at the door waiting to have snapshots of himself taken with the rich and famous: Mike Tyson, yes! He's my brother. Naomi Campbell, she's my girl. Hey, Bruce (Springsteen)! I am Saeed Saeed from Africa. But don't worry, man, we don't eat white people anymore.

There came a time when they began to let him inside.

He had an endless talent with doors, even though, two years ago during an INS raid, he had been unearthed and deported despite having been cheek-to-cheek, Kodak-proof, with the best of America. He went back to Zanzibar, where he was hailed as an American, ate kingfish cooked in coconut milk in the stripy shade of the palm trees, lazed on the sand sieved fine as semolina, and in the evening when the moon went gold and the night shone as if it were wet, he romanced the girls in Stone Town. Their fathers encouraged them to climb out of their windows at night; the girls climbed down the trees and onto Saeed's lap, and the fathers spied, hoping to catch the lovers in a compromising position. This boy who once had so long dawdled on the street corner-no work, all trouble, so much so that the neighbors had all contributed to his ticket out-now this boy was miraculously worth something. They prayed he would be forced to marry Fatma who was fat or Salma who was beautiful or Khadija with the gauzy gray eyes and the voice of a cat. The fathers tried and the girls tried, but Saeed escaped. They gave him kangas kangas to remember them by, with slogans, "Memories are like diamonds,"and "Your pleasant scent soothes my heart," so that when he was relaxing in NYC, he might throw off his clothes, wrap his to remember them by, with slogans, "Memories are like diamonds,"and "Your pleasant scent soothes my heart," so that when he was relaxing in NYC, he might throw off his clothes, wrap his kanga kanga about him, air his b.a.l.l.s, and think of the girls at home. In two months time, back he was-new pa.s.sport, new name typed up with the help of a few greenbacks given to a clerk outside the government office. When he arrived at JFK as Rasheed Zulfickar, he saw the very same officer who had deported him waiting at the desk. His heart had beat like a fan in his ears, but the man had not remembered him: "Thank G.o.d, to them we all of us look the same!" about him, air his b.a.l.l.s, and think of the girls at home. In two months time, back he was-new pa.s.sport, new name typed up with the help of a few greenbacks given to a clerk outside the government office. When he arrived at JFK as Rasheed Zulfickar, he saw the very same officer who had deported him waiting at the desk. His heart had beat like a fan in his ears, but the man had not remembered him: "Thank G.o.d, to them we all of us look the same!"

Saeed, he relished the whole game, the way the country flexed his wits and rewarded him; he charmed it, cajoled it, cheated it, felt great tenderness and loyalty toward it. When it came time, he who had jigged open every back door, he who had, with photocopier, Wite-Out, and paper cutter, spectacularly sabotaged the system (one skilled person at the photocopy machine, he a.s.sured Biju, could bring America to its knees), he would pledge emotional allegiance to the flag with tears in his eyes and conviction in his voice. The country recognized something in Saeed, he in it, and it was a mutual love affair. Ups and downs, sometimes more sour than sweet, maybe, but nonetheless, beyond anything the INS could imagine, it was an old-fas.h.i.+oned romance.

By 6 A.M A.M. the bakery shelves were stocked with rye, oatmeal, and peasant bread, apricot and raspberry biscuits that broke open to a flood of lush amber or ruby jam. One such morning, Biju sat outside in a pale patch of sun, with a roll. He cracked the carapace of the crust and began to eat, plucking the tender fleece with his long thin fingers- But in New York innocence never prevails: an ambulance pa.s.sed, the NYPD, a fire engine; the subway went overhead and the jolting rhythm traveled up through his defenseless shoes; it shook his heart and sullied the roll. He stopped chewing, thought of his father- Ill. Dead. Maimed.

He reminded himself his panicked thoughts were just the result of extra virile transport going by, and he searched for the bread in his mouth, but it had parted like an ethereal cloud about his tongue and disappeared.

In Kalimpong, the cook was writing, "Dear Biju, can you please help...."

Last week the MetalBox watchman had paid him a formal visit to tell the cook about his son, big enough now to get a job, but there were no jobs. Could Biju help him across to America? The boy would be willing to start at a menial level but of course a job in an office would be best. Italy would also be all right, he added for good measure. A man from his village had gone to Italy and was making a good living as a tandoori cook.

At first the cook was agitated, upset by the request, felt a war in him between generosity and meanness, but then...: "Why not, I will ask him, very difficult, mind you, but there is no harm in trying."

And, he began to feel a tingle-the very fact the watchman had asked! It reestablished Biju in his father's eyes as a fine-suited-and-booted-success.

They sat outside his quarter and smoked; and it felt good to be two old men sitting together, talking of young men. The deadly nightshade was blooming, giant glowing bell flowers, white and starched, sinister and spotless. A star came forth and a lost cow wandered slowly by in the dusk.

So, the further to bolster his son and his own pride, the cook wrote on the blue airmail form: "Dear beta, beta, please see if you can help the MetalBox watchman's son." please see if you can help the MetalBox watchman's son."

He went to bed snug and glad, only at one moment waking in terror at a thud, but it was just the lost cow that had come back up through the ravine and was trying to push her way in out of the rain. He chased her out, brought back the thought of his son, and thus reconnected with his peace, returned to sleep.

A pet.i.tion improved your status.

The green card, the green card- Saeed applied for the immigration lottery each year, but Indians were not allowed to apply. Bulgarians, Irish, Malagasys-on and on the list went, but no, no Indians. There were just too many jostling to get out, to pull everyone else down, to climb on one another's backs and run. The line would be stopped up for years, the quota was full, overfull, spilling over.

At the bakery, they called the immigration hotline as soon as the clock struck 8:30 and took turns holding the receiver for what might be an all-day activity of line holding.

"What is your status now, sir? I can't help you unless I know your current status."

They put down the phone hurriedly then, worried that immigration had a superduper zing bing beep peeping high-alert electronic supersonic s.p.a.ce speed machine that could transfer connect dial read trace the number through to their- Illegality.

Oh the green card, the green card, the- Biju was so restless sometimes, he could barely stand to stay in his skin. After work, he crossed to the river, not to the part where the dogs played madly in hanky-sized squares, with their owners in the fracas picking up feces, but to where, after singles night at the synagogue, long-skirted-and-sleeved girls walked in an old-fas.h.i.+oned manner with old-fas.h.i.+oned-looking men wearing black suits and hats as if they had to keep their past with them at all times so as not to lose it. He walked to the far end where the homeless man often slept in a dense chamber of green that seemed to grow not so much from soil as from a fertile city crud. A homeless chicken also lived in the park. Every now and then Biju saw it scratching in a homey manner in the dirt and felt a pang for village life.

"Chkchkchk," he called to it, but it ran away immediately, fl.u.s.tered in the endearing way of a plain girl, shy and convinced of the attractions of virtue. he called to it, but it ran away immediately, fl.u.s.tered in the endearing way of a plain girl, shy and convinced of the attractions of virtue.

He walked to where the green ran out into a tail of pilings and where men like himself often sat on the rocks and looked out onto a dull stretch of New Jersey. Peculiar boats went by: garbage barges, pug-nosed tugboats with their snoots pus.h.i.+ng big-bottomed coal carriers; others whose purpose was not obvious-all rusty cranes, cogs, black smoke flaring out.

Biju couldn't help but feel a flash of anger at his father for sending him alone to this country, but he knew he wouldn't have forgiven his father for not trying to send him, either.

Fifteen.

In Kalimpong, the plum tree outside the clinic, watered with rotted blood from the path lab, produced so many flowers, that newlyweds had their pictures taken on a bench underneath. Disregarding one couple's entreaties to remove himself from their photo shoot, the cook settled down at the end of the bench, donning his spectacles to read the letter from Biju that had just arrived. the plum tree outside the clinic, watered with rotted blood from the path lab, produced so many flowers, that newlyweds had their pictures taken on a bench underneath. Disregarding one couple's entreaties to remove himself from their photo shoot, the cook settled down at the end of the bench, donning his spectacles to read the letter from Biju that had just arrived.

"I have a new job in a bakery and the boss leaves us in complete charge...."

It was haat haat day in Kalimpong and a festive crowd thronged to the market in a high pitch of excitement, everyone in their best clothes. day in Kalimpong and a festive crowd thronged to the market in a high pitch of excitement, everyone in their best clothes.

The cook folded up the letter and put it in his s.h.i.+rt pocket. Feeling joyful, he descended steeply into the haat, haat, pus.h.i.+ng his way between bent and bowed Nepali ladies with golden nose rings dangling and Tibetan women with braids and prayer beads, between those who had walked from faraway villages to sell muddy mushrooms covered with brackish leaves or greenery, already half cooked in the sun. Powders, oils, and ganglions of roots were proffered by Lepcha medicine men; other stalls offered yak hair, untidy and rough as the hair of demons, and sacks of miniature dried shrimp with oversized whiskers; there were smuggled foreign goods from Nepal, perfumes, jeari jackets, electronics; there were kukri sickles, sheets of plastic rainproofing, and false teeth. pus.h.i.+ng his way between bent and bowed Nepali ladies with golden nose rings dangling and Tibetan women with braids and prayer beads, between those who had walked from faraway villages to sell muddy mushrooms covered with brackish leaves or greenery, already half cooked in the sun. Powders, oils, and ganglions of roots were proffered by Lepcha medicine men; other stalls offered yak hair, untidy and rough as the hair of demons, and sacks of miniature dried shrimp with oversized whiskers; there were smuggled foreign goods from Nepal, perfumes, jeari jackets, electronics; there were kukri sickles, sheets of plastic rainproofing, and false teeth.

When the cook and judge had first arrived in Kalimpong, wool caravans were still coming through, chaperoned by Tibetan muleteers in furry boots, earrings swinging, and the earthy smell of men and beasts had run a hot current against that exquisite scent of pine that people like Lola and Noni came from Calcutta to sample. The cook remembered yaks carrying over two hundred pounds of salt and, balanced on the top, rosy babies stuffed in cooking pots, chewing on squares of dried churbi churbi cheese. cheese.

"My son works in New York," the cook boasted to everyone he met. "He is the manager of a restaurant business.

"New York. Very big city," he explained. "The cars and buildings are nothing like here. In that country, there is enough food for everybody."

"When are you going, Babaji?"

"One day," he laughed. "One day soon my son will take me."

Dried azalea and juniper lay bundled in newspaper packages. He remembered the day the Dalai and Panchen Lamas came to Kalimpong, and they had burnt this incense all along the path. The cook had been in the crowd. He was not Buddhist, of course, but had gone in a secular spirit. The m.u.f.fled thunder of prayer rumbled down the mountain as the mules and horses stepped pom-pommed out of the fog, bells singing, prayer flags flying from the saddles. The cook had prayed for Biju and gone to bed feeling pious, so sparkily so that he felt clean although he knew he was dirty.

Now he walked through the greasy bus station with its choking smell of exhaust and past the dark cubbyhole where, behind a soiled red curtain, you could pay to watch on a shaking screen such films as Rape of Erotic Virgin Rape of Erotic Virgin and and SHE: The Secrets of Married Life. SHE: The Secrets of Married Life.

n.o.body here would be interested in the cook's son.

At the Snow Lion Travel Agency, the cook waited to claim the manager's attention. Tas.h.i.+ was busy chatting up a tourist-he was famous for charming the Patagonia pants off foreign women and giving them an opportunity to write home with the requisite tale of amorous adventure with a sherpa. All around were brochures for the monastery trips Tas.h.i.+ organized, photographs of hotels built in the traditional style, furnished with antiques, many of which had been taken from the monasteries themselves. Of course he omitted the fact that the centuries-old structures were all being modernized with concrete, fluorescent lighting, and bathroom tiling.

"When you go to America, take me along also," said Tas.h.i.+ after he had sold the tourist a trip to Sikkim.