Page 108 of The Secrets of the Tea Garden
CHAPTER 20
Belgooree, late June
Dear Libby
I was surprised but pleased to receive your letter out of the blue. I’m sorry for not replying sooner but I’ve been away in East Bengal covering stories for the paper and didn’t get your letter until my return this week.
By now you will probably have heard that both the Legislative Assemblies in Bengal and Punjab have voted for partition. It is a catastrophe. I am not just disappointed but angry. The country that I have campaigned for all my adult life – a free, democratic, secular India for all Indians, unshackled from the yoke of British rule – is never to be.
I have already seen the turmoil this is bringing to Bengal – there is a new wave of refugees on the move from the east to the west of the state. The Hindus don’t feel safe staying in the east when they know they will be under Muslim rule in a few weeks’ time – though no one knows where the border is actually going to be and this is beginning to cause panic. Also there is to be a referendum in Assam over Sylhet – but you probably already knowthat. It’s a foregone conclusion – the majority Hindus will vote to get rid of Sylhet and its Muslim population. So no doubt you will see Muslim workers on the move from Assam into East Bengal in the weeks to come.
My editor is a decent man but he isn’t interested in lots of bad news stories from East Bengal. Perhaps I won’t have a job for much longer. Still, I can always find other work with my pen and my loud mouth – as my sister keeps reminding me. No doubt you, as a good socialist, would also add that I have rich relations in Gulgat and Lahore who will bail me out if, like the Prodigal Son, I go cap in hand and beg forgiveness.
It was kind of you to ask after my family. Fatima assures me they are all safe and well. She has heard from our older sister Noor.
I’m sorry to hear that your father’s health is still a worry but if the time has come for him to return home then I’m glad to hear he will be handing over to an Indian assistant. That shows foresight. Who is this Manzur you write about? I seem to remember you mentioning him to me once before.
What do you intend to do, Libby? Will you go home with your father? If so, I hope that Fatima and I will have the chance to see you in Calcutta before you leave.
Kind regards
Ghulam
Libby had read the letter a dozen times since it was delivered to the house that afternoon by Nitin, a grinning Khasi youth and a grandson of Banu, the tea garden overseer. She could hear Ghulam’s voice in her head as she committed his words to memory, his tone serious one moment and sardonic the next.
He was pleased to hear from her and wanted to see her again – even if it was only briefly on her way back to England. But was he just being polite or was there warmth behind the words? He sent his ‘kind regards’, not just ‘yours sincerely’ or some other formal farewell.
Unable to keep still, Libby went for a ride through the gardens despite the sapping heat. There had been a few rumbles of thunder in recent days but no real let-up to the oppressive atmosphere. The monsoon was late this year.
After half an hour, she reached the glade where Clarrie had taken her on a previous ride to show where she had first met Wesley and where the family had liked to camp. The ruins of an ancient temple lay strewn across the clearing, close to a stream and a hut with a fallen-in roof where a holy man had once lived. Later, the swami’s dwelling had been occupied by Adela’s old ayah whom Libby remembered from childhood visits to Belgooree. Her brothers had been frightened of the wrinkled old woman but Libby had been fascinated by her and often sat with her and listened to her high-pitched singing. Ayah Mimi still lived in the compound at Belgooree, though she was very old and virtually a recluse. Only Clarrie was encouraged to visit her.
Despite being armed with a rifle, Libby found the solitary camping site unnerving; the jungle was alive with squawking birds and animals rustling. The cloud was low and hid any mountain views. It wasn’t a burial ground and yet it had the feel of somewhere peopled with ghosts from the distant past. Libby shivered; she preferred the company of the living. She pulled out Ghulam’s letter from where she’d tucked it beneath her blouse. She imagined his dextrous hands folding the paper and pushing it into the envelope, and his tongue licking the gum. Her yearning for him was suddenly overpowering. He had asked her questions so she had an excuse to reply to him. Kicking her pony into a trot, Libby hurried away from the swami’s dell.
Dear Ghulam
I was so pleased to get your letter yesterday. I wish I could whisk you here on a magic carpet so that you could tell me in person about your travels in East Bengal. It annoys me that your editor is not interested in your reporting but I suppose your newspaper is biased towards what goes on in Calcutta and what they think will interest the English-speakers.
I hope that you keep your job and don’t have to go begging to your father like the Prodigal Son. Who would be the jealous older brother? Not Rafi – I know he wouldn’t begrudge you anything. But to be a prodigal presupposes that you’ve had a riotous time in Calcutta, spending a fortune and thinking only of your own pleasure. I don’t know you well, but you don’t strike me as a man who has lived anything remotely akin to a debauched life. Although you do have a weakness for cigarettes and Scottish toffees.
My father still won’t face up to what he should do next. I’m worried about him. Both Clarrie and I are urging him to return to Britain to see my mother and brothers – even if it’s just for a spell of leave. I think he is coming round to the idea that he may not be going back to work at the Oxford – he really does seem to agree that his days as a planter are over, even if his ones in India aren’t. I feel I must stay here and help him until he decides what to do.
You ask about Manzur. He is my father’s assistant manager at the Oxford and a very able man. He wanted to be a teacher but my father offered to train him as a planter and his parents encouraged it. Manzur’s father is our bearer at Cheviot View and his mother was my ayah.No doubt you will roll your eyes at such colonial exploitation but believe me when I say that Ayah Meera was the person I loved most as a child.
My mother was so grateful to Meera for her help with us children that she encouraged my father to put Manzur through school. Manzur and my brother Jamie were like brothers, always playing together and teasing me when I tried to join in. Of course, when Jamie was sent back to England to school they could no longer be best friends.
But Manzur is still just as friendly as I remember. Perhaps he will end up being a teacher one day – he’s very enthusiastic but also patient with people. During the War he used to come over to Belgooree and tutor my cousin Harry as Clarrie didn’t want to send him away to school so soon after Harry’s father had died. I think I told you about Wesley being killed by a tiger on a hunt in Gulgat, didn’t I? He saved Adela’s life but died of his wounds. I think the family are still struggling to get over his loss.
Anyway, that’s probably more information than you ever wanted to know about Manzur and my family. Is it unbearably hot in Calcutta? I wish I could go and drink ice-cold nimbu pani with you at Nizam’s. Do you still go there?
I think of you often.
Warm regards
Libby
When Libby walked down to the factory to hand in her letter for posting, she went looking for Clarrie and found her in the withering shed with her factory manager, Daleep. The noise of the vibrating belts and pounding machinery drowned out their conversation but they werelooking concerned. Clarrie waved at her and mouthed she would be five minutes.
‘Is everything all right?’ Libby asked, when Clarrie joined her in the shade of a peepal tree.
