Page 46 of Six Days in Bombay

Dr. Stoddard thinks I should find Father. Well, he didn’t say so, but I know that’s what he’s thinking. But why should I, Mum? He left us in Calcutta with nothing. How could he do that to us?

I’m going to tell you something I saw when I was five that I’ve never told anybody. That was when we lived in a house with another family and their four children. You and I had a tiny room big enough for a charpoy and a chest of drawers. The family lived in the rest of the house. We kept to ourselves even though their daughter was the same age as me. She spit on me the first time we met (remember you kept asking why I didn’t play with her?). One night, I had a baddream about a dog running after me. I woke up and reached for you. You weren’t there, so I got out of bed to look for you. The house was quiet because the family was away at a wedding for a few days. All at once, I realized I could go anywhere in the house I wanted. I went from room to room, bad dream forgotten. I touched the girl’s marionette dolls. I moved pieces on the chessboard even though I didn’t know how to play. I rifled through their clothing. I was about to step into their kitchen to see if they had any biscuits lying about when I saw you at their dining table. I almost called for you but something told me not to. You were bent from the waist over the table. Your sari was bunched around your hips. I could only see his silhouette, but I knew from his beard that it was the landlord leaning over you, groaning. You weren’t making a sound. My heart was pounding so hard I thought you could hear it. I snuck back quietly to our room and pulled the covers over my face. But I could still see it. And I knew it was bad. That’s what my father’s desertion did to you, to us. It robbed you of your pride and it made me a witness to your shame. If I were to tell the good doctor this, would he still want me to find my father?

The RMS Viceroy was scheduled to make a stop along the Suez Canal so passengers en route to Cairo could disembark. Then the steamship would continue to the Mediterranean Sea and Istanbul.

I missed Amit too. I wrote letters to him every day in mynotebook. I couldn’t send them to the hospital. What would the staff think of him, receiving letters from a disgraced, unmarried nurse? I didn’t know where he lived either. Sometimes, as I strolled the deck, I pretended we were walking arm in arm, talking, as we’d talked on that tonga ride to Dev Singh’s house.

Dear Amit,

I’ve never seen so much water or so much desert! Calcutta and Bombay and everything in between that Mum and I had ever seen was simply green fields and forests. Along the Suez Canal, there is only one color: sand. Every now and then, we see camel riders, men unloading small cargo ships and ferries, mosques, a little patch of green. Some distance away there are tiny villages and small cities. Along the railing, I often stand behind Dr. Stoddard’s wheelchair as he points out the enormous griffon vultures crossing the skies overhead. He tells me that the hot air rising from the desert allows them to fly without moving a muscle.

The doctor has me playing cards with the gamblers, and I fear I’m turning into one myself. He’s also got me drinking scotch in the evening. All the things I’ve been missing out on all these years! Why did no one tell me?

Speaking of things I’ve been missing out on, do you know what I was imagining the night of the Singh party? I only dared to kiss you, but I would have done so much more had we been alone. I wanted tofeel your hands on my body, my hands on yours, the pressure of you against me. I would have liked to—

I felt my cheeks burning as these thoughts raged through my mind. Of course, I couldn’t imagine actually saying these things out loud. I wouldn’t have had the nerve.

I wish you were here, Amit, and that we were standing on the railing taking in this great big adventure. I’m keeping hopeful thoughts for you and your aunt in Shimla.

Cairo was the destination for many on the ship. Businessmen, traders, tourists and archeologists were taken by buses to Cairo upon disembarking. Several of the men we’d played gin rummy with were climbing into taxicabs waiting at the port. I would have liked to see Cairo, to explore the open-air markets, the busy narrow lanes, drink the thick Egyptian coffee I’d heard the deckhands talking about. But Dr. Stoddard and I were going straight through to Istanbul. I would have to be satisfied with what I could glean of Egypt from the railing of the Viceroy.

As we watched the passengers leaving the port, Dr. Stoddard sucked his teeth. “Do you know…there’s a large Dewar’s Whisky sign on the rooftop of an apartment building in Cairo. In the square below, Muslim men and women mill about in their long robes. Imagine the contrast.” He sighed. “More collateral damage. That’s what we English create.”

We disembarked at the busy Istanbul port. Dr. Stoddard’s son, as wiry as his father, was solicitous to us both but in a hurry to get back to his office. Like his father and his cousin Timothy, he wore glasses too. His tweed suit and white shirt were worse for wear in the Turkish heat.

“Nurse Falstaff, this is my son, Edward. Edward, this is my very capable Nurse Falstaff.” He leaned forward toward his son. “She’s a card shark. Watch out.”

I laughed. Edward smiled, a dimple appearing on his left cheek. He had the same long nose as his father and the high forehead, but the features were softer, blunted. His skin was just a mite darker than mine—I assumed from working under the Turkish sun. I tried not to compare him to Amit, but it was impossible since Amit was so much on my mind. Was Amit’s smile more appealing? Was Amit’s voice raspier?

“Now, I know you’d like to get back to the office, Edward, but we owe our nurse a little rest and relaxation. After all, she’s had to look after me for an age. Poor soul.”

My train wouldn’t be leaving for Prague for another four hours. Dr. Stoddard had been kind enough to arrange my ticket from the steamship. I couldn’t impose on him further. And truth be told, I didn’t want to owe him any more than I already did. My trunk was heavy with coins, pound notes and gratitude.

“Doctor, you’ve already been so generous. I couldn’t possibly—”

His son turned his gaze in my direction and lifted a brow. “Brought out the port, did he? And cheated? Had you playing gin rummy?” The laugh lines around his mouth meant he didn’t take life as seriously as I did. He winked. “Did the same to me on my maiden voyage.”

His father grinned.

Edward took the reins of the wheelchair. “We owe you, Nurse Falstaff. Right then, Father. The office can wait. To the Grand Bazaar it is.”

The indoor market smelled like India. There were mounds of spicy turmeric, mustard powder, cumin powder and barrels of pistachios. Many shops sold only essential oils—rose attar, jasmine attar, sandalwood oil, oud. Others sold carpets, fezzes, brass lanterns and furniture. The sharp aroma of leather sandals and shoes permeated the hallways. And the monied smell of glitteringgold chains in the jeweler’s row was the same as at the Zaveri Bazaar in Bombay. However, Istanbul didn’tfeellike India. Here the female shoppers wore European skirt suits and hats. There was not adhotiin sight. I missed the humble cows and bullock carts of Bombay. I even missed the wily women behind the stalls trying to get me to buy a woven basket I didn’t need.

My uniform drew plenty of stares. In Istanbul, I supposed nurses weren’t in the habit of shopping at the souks. I felt self-conscious, not knowing where to look. It was similar to the discomfort I felt when Indian rickshaw drivers stared at me on the streets of Bombay. I tried leveling a bold glare in their direction, but usually ended up lowering my eyes in embarrassment.

The doctor stopped to chat with a vendor about his sweet offerings. Cubes of Turkish delights in cheerful shades of rose, lemon, violet. Some were covered in pistachio, others in coconut. “My guilty pleasure,” Dr. Stoddard said.

While he quizzed the vendor about the flavor of each one, Edward and I waited in the aisle, watching him indulgently like parents with their child.

“Pater is extremely fond of you, you know. He’s written to me at length about how capable you are. How charming. How good-looking. I was almost jealous.” I turned to see him smiling at me, his eyes twinkling. “And I must say, he was absolutely off the mark there. I would have called you beautiful.”

I couldn’t help but blush.

“Tell me. How is Pater doing? I thought he’d be out of the wheelchair by now. Should I be concerned?”

I laughed. “Oh, he doesn’t need it anymore. We’ve got him walking by himself. He just loves the attention. It’s a new device, and he means to make the most of it. Your cousin Timothy would take him on joyrides around the hospital.”

Edward laughed, a joyous thing that seemed to travel all the way from his lips to his toes. Happiness filled him. I took asecond look at him then. His delight was different from Dev Singh’s. There was nothing roguish about Edward.

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