‘No,’ he said. ‘Oh no. I know the way; have been there many times. I have another service to beg of thee - to take this letter to the ship.’
Hcr face clouded: she pushed out her lower lip: her whole body expressed displeasure and negation. ‘Thou art not afraid to take it in the dark?’ he asked, glancing at the sun, no more than its own breadth above the sea.
‘Bah,’ she cried, kicking the ground. ‘I want to go with thee. Besides, if I do not go with thee, where are my three wishes? There is no justice in the world.’
It had never been difficult to make out the nature of Dil’s wishes, whatever their number: from the first day of their friendship she had spoken of bracelets, silver bracelets; she had told him, objectively and at length, the size, weight and quality of every kind in the Presidency as well as those current in the neighbouring province and kingdoms; and he had seen her kick more than one wellfurnished clanking child from mere envy. They walked to a grove of coconut-?palms overlooking Elephanta Island. ‘I have never yet seen the eaves,’ he observed, and took a cloth parcel from his bosom. As though she, too, had been warned in a dream, Dil stopped breathing and watched with motionless intensity. ‘ here is the first wish,’ he said, taking out one bangle. ‘Here is the second,’ taking out two. ‘And here is the third,’ taking out three more.
She reached forward a hesitant hand and touched them lightly; her fearless and cheerful expression was now timid, very grave. She held one for a moment; put it solemnly down; looked at Stephen gazing at the island in the bay. Put it silently on and squatted there amazed, staring at her arm and the gleaming band of silver: put on another and another; and the rapture of possession seized her. She burst into wild laughter, slipped them all on, all off, all on in a different order, patting them, talking to them, giving them each a name. She leapt up and spun, jerking her thin arms to make the bracelets clink. Then suddenly she dropped in front of Stephen and worshipped him for a while, patting his feet - earnest, loving thanks broken by exclamations - how had he known? - preternatural wisdom nothing to him, of course - did he think them better this way round or that?
- such a blaze of light! - might she have the cloth they were wrapped in? She took them off, comforting them, put them on again - how smoothly they slipped! - and sat there pressed against his knee, gazing at the silver on her arms.
‘Child,’ he said, ‘the sun has set. It is the dark of the moon and we must go.’
‘Instantly,’ she cried. ‘Give me the chit and I fly to the ship; straight to the ship, ha, ha, ha!’
She ran skipping down the hill: he watched her until she vanished in the twilight, her gleaming arms held out like wings and the letter grasped in her mouth.
He had seen the house often enough from the outside -was familiar with its walls, windows, entrances - a retired house deep behind its courts and inner walled gardens;
but he was surprised to find how large it was inside. A small palace, in fact: not so large as the commissioner’s residence; but very much finer, being made of white marble, cool and intricately fretted in the room where he stood, an octagonal room, domed, with a fountain in the middle of it.
Under the dome, a gallery, screened with this same marble lace: a staircase curving down from the gallery to the place where Stephen stood; and on the fifth step above him, three small pots, a brass pan for gathering filth; on the sixth a short brush made of finely-?divided toddy-?palm frond, and a longer brush - virtually a broom. A scorpion had hidden under the pan, but it did not judge the shelter adequate and he was watching its uneasy movements among the pots. Moving between them it balanced its claws and tail, rising on its legs with a certain grace.
At the sound of voices he looked up: shapes could be seen flitting through the pierced gallery, and Diana, followed by another woman, appeared at the top of the stairs. Most women show at a disadvantage, viewed from below: not Diana. She was dressed in light blue muslin trousers, tight at the ankle, and a sleeveless jacket above a deep, deep blue sash: remarkably tall and slim: the foreshortening effect quite overcome. She cried ‘Maturin,’ and ran down the stairs. She caught her right foot on the pan and her left on the handle of the larger brush: the impetus of her run carried her clear of the remaining implements, the remaining stairs, and Stephen caught her at the bottom. He held her lithe body in his arms, kissed her on both cheeks, and set her on her feet.
‘Pray take notice of the scorpion, ma’am,’ he called to the elderly woman on the stairs. ‘He is beneath the little broom.’
‘Maturin,’ cried Diana again, ‘I am still amazed to see you, utterly amazed. It is impossible you should be standing here - much more astonishing than sitting there in the crowd by the Fort, like a dream. Lady Forbes, may I introduce Dr Maturin? Dr Maturin, Lady Forbes, who is so kind as to live with me.’
She was a dumpy woman, dressed in a haphazard way with ornaments here and there; but she had taken great care over her large face, which was painted out of resemblance to humanity, and with her wig, whose curls stood in order low on her forehead. She recovered from her deep curtsey, saying, ‘he is an odd-?looking bugger; a streak of the tar-?brush, I dare say. God damn this leg. I shall never get up. Hlow do you do, sir? So happy. Was you born in India, sir? I remember some Maturins on the Coromandel coast.’
Diana clapped her hands: servants flowed into the room - exclamations of deep and even tragic concern at her danger and at the mess; soft, deprecating murmurs; bows; anxiety; gentle, immovable obstinacy. At last an aged person was brought in and he carried the pan away; the scorpion was removed in wooden tweezers; two different servants gathered up what was left. ‘Forgive me, Maturin,’ she said. ‘You cannot imagine what it is, keeping house with so many different castes - one cannot touch this, another cannot touch that; and half of them are only copy-?cats - such stuff: of course a radha-?vallabhi can touch a pot. However, let us try whether they can give us anything to wet our whistles with. Have you eaten yet, Maturin?’
‘I have not,’ he said.
She clapped her hands again. A fresh company appeared, a score of different people; and while Diana was issuing her orders - there was more wrangling, exhortation and laughter than he would have expected outside Ireland - he turned to Lady Forbes and said, ‘It is remarkably cool here, ma’am.’
‘Wrangle, wrangle, wrangle,’ said Lady Forbes. ‘She has no idea of managing her servants: never had. when she was a girl. Yes, sir; it is sunk for the purpose; quite underground, you know. God’s my life, I hope she calls for the champagne: I am fair parched. Will she think this young fellow worth it? Ay, there’s the point. Canning is very near with his wine. But there is the inconvenience that it floods; I remember two foot of mud on the floor, in Raghunath Rao’s time; for it belonged to him then, you know. However, there was really no rain this monsoon; no rain at all, hardly. Presently there will be another famine in Gujerat, and the tedious creatures will be dying off in droves, and making one’s morning ride so disagreeable.’ The parts of her conversation that were intended for herself were uttered in a deeper tone; but there was no variation in the volume of sound.
‘Villiers,’ he said, ‘pray what language were you speaking to them?’
