should tell you in person.
Go on, said Bahram impatiently. What happened?
It seems there was a robbery. Some thieves boarded the kitchen-boat, and she tried to chase them away. That’s how it happened.
Bahram’s hand froze and the nut-cutter fell out of his fingers. Are you telling me she was murdered?
Yes, my friend, said Zadig. I am sad that it is I who have to tell you this.
And Freddy?
Chunqua could tell me nothing about him, said Zadig. He disappeared shortly before Chi-mei’s death and has not been heard from again.
Do you think something may have happened to him too?
There’s no knowing, said Zadig. But you should not jump to conclusions. He may just have left and gone off somewhere. I heard that his half-sister had married and moved to Malacca – maybe he went to join her there.
Bahram thought back to his last meeting with Chi-mei, three years ago, on the last boat she had bought – a large and fanciful vessel with a stern that was shaped like an upraised fishtail. He had gone to say goodbye to her, before leaving for Bombay. Having long since fallen into a relationship of easy companionability with Chi-mei, he often went to her boat for his evening meal – they had become, in a way, something like a long-married couple. Chi-mei did not usually cook when Bahram went to visit: her specialities were restricted to the subtle fare of Canton and she knew that he liked spicier food. She would send someone off to other boats nearby, to fetch some Dan-dan noodles, and some ‘Hot-and-Numbing Chicken’, and perhaps some fiery Sichuanese ‘Married-Couple-Slices’. When the food came she would serve it to him herself, sitting opposite him and waving a fan to keep the flies away. Over the years she had grown a little portly, and her face had become plumper, but her clothes were still sack-like in cut and severe in colour. It annoyed him that she took so few pains over her appearance and he had asked why she never wore any of the jewellery he had given her. She had fetched a gold-and-jade brooch, pinned it to her tunic and given him a wide smile: ‘Mister Barry too muchi happy now?’
Was it the jewellery they had come for, those thieves? He thought of her trying to fend off their knives, and an image appeared in front of his eyes, of a rent in the fabric of her tunic, where that brooch had been, and of blood welling up from her chest.
Bahram clasped his hands to his face: I can’t believe it; I can’t believe it.
Zadig came to stand beside him and put a hand on his shoulder. It is hard for you, isn’t it?
I can’t believe it, Zadig Bey.
Do you remember, my friend, said Zadig gently, all those years ago, when you and I talked of love? You said that what you and Chi-mei had was not love? That it was something else, something different?
Bahram brushed his hand across his eyes, and cleared his throat. Yes, Zadig Bey, I remember very well.
Zadig squeezed Bahram’s shoulder: I think maybe you were wrong, no?
Bahram had to swallow several times before he could speak: Look, Zadig Bey, I’m not like you – I don’t think about such things. Maybe it’s true what you say – maybe what I felt for Chi-mei was the closest I’ll ever come to these things you speak of: love, pyar, ishq. But what does it matter now? She’s gone, isn’t she? I have to carry on: I have a cargo to sell.
That’s correct. You have to look ahead Bahram-bai.
Exactly. So tell me, Zadig Bey, will you come to Canton with me? On the Anahita? I will give you a fine cabin.
Yes, of course, Bahram-bhai! It will be wonderful to travel again with you.
Good! So when will you come on board?
Give me a day or two and I will be back with my baggage.
After Zadig had left, Bahram could not bear to remain in his suite. For the first time since the storm, he decided to go up to the main deck.
He had been dreading the moment when he would see for himself the wound in the Anahita’s prow, and the sight proved even more shocking than he had expected. Although the jib had already been replaced, to Bahram’s eyes the absence of the gilded figurehead was starkly evident.
I cannot stand it, Vico, he said. I must go down.
Bahram’s horror was not so much for the loss itself, as for the effect it would have on the Mistries, most of all on Shireenbai, who was a keen votary of signs and portents. Bahram’s refusal to heed omens and oracles had long been a source of contention between them: she had never made any secret of her belief that it was largely responsible for the greatest of the many disappointments of their marriage: her lack of a son.
Shireenbai had grown up in a family of powerful, self-willed men, and even though they both doted on their two daughters, she had long wanted a boy of her own. To this end she had visited many magical wells, touched a great number of miraculous rocks, tied uncountable threads and sought the blessings of a legion of pirs, fakirs, swamis, sants and saints. That none of these missions had resulted in success seemed only to strengthen her belief in the potency of these intermediaries. She would often plead with Bahram to participate in her efforts to find a cure: but why? pante kain? why won’t you come with me?
Once, many years ago, she had overcome his objections and taken him to visit one of her gurus: she had somehow got it into her head that this man would be able to remedy her failure to bear a male child and she had insisted that Bahram go with her to see him. After resisting for months Bahram had finally relented when she pointed out that her child-bearing years were almost at an end: in the hope of buying some peace at home, he had agreed to visit the miracle-monger. This master of fecundity turned out to be a hirsute, ash-covered sadhu who lived in the jungles of Borivli, two hours from the city: he had asked Bahram many questions and had taken extensive readings of his pulse; then after much cogitation and coaxing he had announced that the cause of the problem had been revealed to him – it lay not with Shireenbai but with him, Bahram. The masculine energies of Bahram’s bodily fluids had become depleted, he said, because of his domestic circumstances: it could scarcely be otherwise with a ghar-jamai – a man who lived under the roof of his wife’s family was bound to be weakened by his dependency on his in-laws. To make him strong enough to sire a male child would be no easy task, but could be achieved if he, Bahram, were willing to dose himself with potions, apply certain ointments, and of course, contribute very large sums of money to the sadhu’s ashram.
Bahram had been uncharacteristically patient in enduring this performance, but at the end of it he let his annoyance show by asking: Are you sure you know what you are talking about?
The old man, whose cataract-clouded eyes contained a surprising glint of shrewdness, had smiled at him sweetly and answered: Why? Do you have any reason to think that your seed is capable of begetting a male child?
Bahram had understood at once that the old man had sprung a carefully crafted trap. To denounce him as a fraud would surely have excited Shireenbai’s suspicions, and expensive though the alternative might be, the cost was negligible in comparison with the price he would have to pay if it came to be known that he had already sired a son – a bastard. A short while ago, a similar revelation had caused an upheaval in the community: the man concerned, a trader of Bahram’s acquaintance, had been expelled from the Parsi panchayat. Not only had he become a social outcast, a pariah to whom no Parsi would so much as rent a room, he had also been financially ruined because no one would do business with him any more; there was almost no price that Bahram would not have paid to prevent such an outcome.
Yet, when he tried to speak the words of denial he found himself gagging on them. It was one thing to skim over the subject in silence; but to actively deny his son’s existence, to pretend that he had played no part in engendering the life of his own child – this was impossibly difficult. Fatherhood and family were a kind of religion to him, and it would be like denying his faith, erasing the sacred ties of blood that connected him, not only to his son but also to his daughters.
The sadhu, perhaps sensing his dilemma, said: You have not answered my question…
Bahram could feel his wife’s eyes boring into him, and somehow, swallowing hard, he had managed to say: No. You’re right; the fault must lie in my seed. I will take the treatment – all of it, whatever is necessary.
Over the next several months he had taken the sadhu’s tonics, applied the ointments, paid whatever was asked for and lain with Shireenbai in the prescribed ways, at exactly the prescribed times. The effort was not entirely wasted, for Shireenbai had never again talked to him about her wish for a son – but on the other hand, the failure of the ‘treatment’ had seemed only to confirm her forebodings about the future. Her belief in signs and omens had grown even more fervent than before.
