And yet — it was safer to keep out of this
business
altogether.
Orwell - Burmese Days
But it is a corrupting thing to live
one’s real life in secret. One should live with the stream of life, not against it. It would be
better to be the thickest-skulled pukka sahib who ever hiccuped over ‘Forty years on’,
than to live silent, alone, consoling oneself in secret, sterile worlds.
Flory had never been home to England. Why, he could not have explained, though he
knew well enough. In the beginning accidents had prevented him. First there was the
War, and after the War his firm were so short of trained assistants that they would not let
him go for two years more. Then at last he had set out. He was pining for England,
though he dreaded facing it, as one dreads facing a pretty girl when one is collarless and
unshaven. When he left home he had been a boy, a promising boy and handsome in spite
of his birthmark; now, only ten years later, he was yellow, thin, drunken, almost middle-
aged in habits and appearance. Still, he was pining for England. The ship rolled westward
over wastes of sea like rough-beaten silver, with the winter trade wind behind her. Flory’s
thin blood quickened with the good food and the smell of the sea. And it occurred to
him — a thing he had actually forgotten in the stagnant air of Burma — that he was still
young enough to begin over again. He would live a year in a civilized society, he would
find some girl who did not mind his birthmark — a civilized girl, not a pukka
memsahib — and he would marry her and endure ten, fifteen more years of Burma. Then
they would retire — he would be worth twelve or fifteen thousand pounds on retirement,
perhaps. They would buy a cottage in the country, surround themselves with friends,
books, their children, animals. They would be free for ever of the smell of pukka
sahibdom. He would forget Burma, the horrible country that had come near ruining him.
When he reached Colombo he found a cable waiting for him. Three men in his firm had
died suddenly of black-water fever. The firm were sorry, but would he please return to
Rangoon at once? He should have his leave at the earliest possible opportunity.
Flory boarded the next boat for Rangoon, cursing his luck, and took the train back to his
headquarters. He was not at Kyauktada then, but at another Upper Burma town. All the
servants were waiting for him on the platfonn. He had handed them over en bloc to his
successor, who had died. It was so queer to see their familiar faces again! Only ten days
ago he had been speeding for England, almost thinking himself in England already; and
now back in the old stale scene, with the naked black coolies squabbling over the luggage
and a Burman shouting at his bullocks down the road.
The servants came crowding round him, a ring of kindly brown faces, offering presents.
Ko STa had brought a sambhur skin, the Indians some sweetmeats and a garland of
marigolds, Ba Pe, a young boy then, a squirrel in a wicker cage. There were bullock carts
waiting for the luggage. Flory walked up to the house, looking ridiculous with the big
garland dangling from his neck. The light of the cold-weather evening was yellow and
kind. At the gate an old Indian, the colour of earth, was cropping grass with a tiny sickle.
The wives of the cook and the mali were kneeling in front of the servants’ quarters,
grinding curry paste on the stone slab.
Something turned over in Flory’s heart. It was one of those moments when one becomes
conscious of a vast change and deterioration in one’s life. For he had realized, suddenly,
that in his heart he was glad to be coming back. This country which he hated was now his
native country, his home. He had lived here ten years, and every particle of his body was
compounded of Burmese soil. Scenes like these — the sallow evening light, the old Indian
cropping grass, the creak of the cartwheels, the streaming egrets — were more native to
him than England. He had sent deep roots, perhaps his deepest, into a foreign country.
Since then he had not even applied for home leave. His father had died, then his mother,
and his sisters, disagreeable horse-faced women whom he had never liked, had married
and he had almost lost touch with them. He had no tie with Europe now, except the tie of
books. For he had realized that merely to go back to England was no remedy for
loneliness; he had grasped the special nature of the hell that is reserved for Anglo-
Indians. Ah, those poor prosing old wrecks in Bath and Cheltenham! Those tomb-like
boarding-houses with Anglo-Indians littered about in all stages of decomposition, all
talking and talking about what happened in Boggleywalah in ‘88! Poor devils, they kn ow
what it means to have left one’s heart in an alien and hated country. There was, he saw
clearly, only one way out. To find someone who would share his life in Burma — but
really share it, share his inner, secret life, carry away from Burma the same memories as
he carried. Someone who would love Burma as he loved it and hate it as he hated it. Who
would help him to live with nothing hidden, nothing unexpressed. Someone who
understood him: a friend, that was what it came down to.
A friend. Or a wife? That quite impossible she. Someone like Mrs Lackersteen, for
instance? Some damned memsahib, yellow and thin, scandalmongering over cocktails,
making kit-kit with the servants, living twenty years in the country without learning a
word of the language. Not one of those, please God.
Flory leaned over the gate. The moon was vanishing behind the dark wall of the jungle,
but the dogs were still howling. Some lines from Gilbert came into his mind, a vulgar
silly jingle but appropriate — something about ‘discoursing on your complicated state of
mind’. Gilbert was a gifted little skunk. Did all his trouble, then, simply boil down to
that? Just complicated, unmanly whinings; poor-little-rich-girl stuff? Was he no more
than a loafer using his idleness to invent imaginary woes? A spiritual Mrs Wititterly? A
Hamlet without poetry? Perhaps. And if so, did that make it any more bearable? It is not
the less bitter because it is perhaps one’s own fault, to see oneself drifting, rotting, in
dishonour and horrible futility, and all the while knowing that somewhere within one
there is the possibility of a decent human being.
Oh well, God save us from self-pity! Flory went back to the veranda, took up the rifle,
and wincing slightly, let drive at the pariah dog. There was an echoing roar, and the bullet
buried itself in the maidan, wide of the mark. A mulberry-coloured bruise sprang out on
Flory ’s shoulder. The dog gave a yell of fright, took to its heels, and then, sitting down
fifty yards farther away, once more began rhythmically baying.
CHAPTER 6
The morning sunlight slanted up the maidan and struck, yellow as goldleaf, against the
white face of the bungalow. Four black-purple crows swooped down and perched on the
veranda rail, waiting their chance to dart in and steal the bread and butter that Ko STa had
set down beside Flory’s bed. Flory crawled through the mosquito net, shouted to Ko STa
to bring him some gin, and then went into the bathroom and sat for a while in a zinc tub
of water that was supposed to be cold. Feeling better after the gin, he shaved himself. As
a rule he put off shaving until the evening, for his beard was black and grew quickly.
While Flory was sitting morosely in his bath, Mr Macgregor, in shorts and singlet on the
bamboo mat laid for the purpose in his bedroom, was struggling with Numbers 5, 6, 7, 8
and 9 of Nordenflycht’s ‘Physical Jerks for the Sedentary’. Mr Macgregor never, or
hardly ever, missed his morning exercises. Number 8 (flat on the back, raise legs to the
perpendicular without bending knees) was downright painful for a man of forty-three;
Number 9 (flat on the back, rise to a sitting posture and touch toes with tips of fingers)
was even worse. No matter, one must keep fit! As Mr Macgregor lunged painfully in the
direction of his toes, a brick-red shade flowed upwards from his neck and congested his
face with a threat of apoplexy. The sweat gleamed on his large, tallowy breasts. Stick it
out, stick it out! At all costs one must keep fit. Mohammed Ali, the bearer, with Mr
Macgregor’s clean clothes across his arm, watched through the half-open door. His
narrow, yellow, Arabian face expressed neither comprehension nor curiosity. He had
watched these contortions — a sacrifice, he dimly imagined, to some mysterious and
exacting god — every morning for five years.
At the same time, too, Westfield, who had gone out early, was leaning against the
notched and ink-stained table of the police station, while the fat Sub-inspector
interrogated a suspect whom two constables were guarding. The suspect was a man of
forty, with a grey, timorous face, dressed only in a ragged longyi kilted to the knee,
beneath which his lank, curved shins were speckled with tick-bites.
‘Who is this fellow? ’ said Westfield.
‘Thief, sir. We catch him in possession of this ring with two emeralds very-dear. No
explanation. How could he — poor coolie — own a emerald ring? He have stole it. ’
He turned ferociously upon the suspect, advanced his face tomcat-fashion till it was
almost touching the other’s, and roared in an enormous voice:
‘You stole the ring! ’
‘No. ’
‘You are an old offender! ’
‘No. ’
‘You have been in prison! ’
‘No. ’
‘Turn round! ’ bellowed the Sub-inspector on an inspiration. ‘Bend over! ’
The suspect turned his grey face in agony towards Westfield, who looked away. The two
constables seized him, twisted him round and bent him over; the Sub-inspector tore off
his longyi, exposing his buttocks.
‘Look at this, sir! ’ He pointed to some scars. ‘He have been flogged with bamboos. He is
an old offender. THEREFORE he stole the ring! ’
‘All right, put him in the clink,’ said Westfield moodily, as he lounged away from the
table with his hands in his pockets. At the bottom of his heart he loathed running in these
poor devils of common thieves. Dacoits, rebels — yes; but not these poor cringing rats!
‘How many have you got in the clink now, Maung Ba? ’ he said.
‘Three, sir. ’
The lock-up was upstairs, a cage surrounded by six-inch wooden bars, guarded by a
constable anned with a carbine. It was very dark, stifling hot, and quite unfurnished,
except for an earth latrine that stank to heaven. Two prisoners were squatting at the bars,
keeping their distance from a third, an Indian coolie, who was covered from head to foot
with ringworm like a coat of mail. A stout Bunnese woman, wife of a constable, was
kneeling outside the cage ladling rice and watery dahl into tin pannikins.
‘Is the food good? ’ said Westfield.
‘It is good, most holy one,’ chorused the prisoners.
The Government provided for the prisoners’ food at the rate of two annas and a half per
meal per man, out of which the constable’s wife looked to make a profit of one anna.
Flory went outside and loitered down the compound, poking weeds into the ground with
his stick. At that hour there were beautiful faint colours in everything — tender green of
leaves, pinkish brown of earth and tree-trunks — like aquarelle washes that would vanish
in the later glare. Down on the maidan flights of small, low-flying brown doves chased
one another to and fro, and bee-eaters, emerald-green, curvetted like slow swallows. A
file of sweepers, each with his load half hidden beneath his garment, were marching to
some dreadful dumping-hole that existed on the edge of the jungle. Starveling wretches,
with stick-like limbs and knees too feeble to be straightened, draped in earth-coloured
rags, they were like a procession of shrouded skeletons walking.
The mali was breaking ground for a new flower-bed, down by the pigeon-cote that stood
near the gate. He was a lymphatic, half-witted Hindu youth, who lived his life in almost
complete silence, because he spoke some Manipur dialect which nobody else understood,
not even his Zerbadi wife. His tongue was also a size too large for his mouth. He
salaamed low to Flory, covering his face with his hand, then swung his mamootie aloft
again and hacked at the dry ground with heavy, clumsy strokes, his tender back-muscles
quivering.
A sharp grating scream that sounded like ‘Kwaaa! ’ came from the servants quarters. Ko
S’la’s wives had begun their morning quarrel. The tame fighting cock, called Nero,
strutted zigzag down the path, nervous of Flo, and Ba Pe came out with a bowl of paddy
and they fed Nero and the pigeons. There were more yells from the servants’ quarters,
and the gruffer voices of men trying to stop the quarrel. Ko STa suffered a great deal
from his wives. Ma Pu, the first wife, was a gaunt hard-faced woman, stringy from much
child-bearing, and Ma Yi, the Tittle wife’, was a fat, lazy cat some years younger. The
two women fought incessantly when Flory was in headquarters and they were together.
Once when Ma Pu was chasing Ko STa with a bamboo, he had dodged behind Flory for
protection, and Flory had received a nasty blow on the leg.
Mr Macgregor was coming up the road, striding briskly and swinging a thick walking-
stick. He was dressed in khaki pagri-cloth shirt, drill shorts and a pigsticker topi. Besides
his exercises, he took a brisk two-mile walk every morning when he could spare the time.
‘Top o’ the mornin’ to ye! ’ he called to Flory in a hearty matutinal voice, putting on an
Irish accent. He cultivated a brisk, invigorating, cold-bath demeanour at this hour of the
morning. Moreover, the libellous article in the Burmese Patriot, which he had read
overnight, had hurt him, and he was affecting a special cheeriness to conceal this.
‘Morning! ’ Flory called back as heartily as he could manage.
Nasty old bladder of lard! he thought, watching Mr Macgregor up the road. How his
bottom did stick out in those tight khaki shorts. Like one of those beastly middle-aged
scoutmasters, homosexuals almost to a man, that you see photographs of in the illustrated
papers. Dressing himself up in those ridiculous clothes and exposing his pudgy, dimpled
knees, because it is the pukka sahib thing to take exercise before breakfast — disgusting!
A Burman came up the hill, a splash of white and magenta. It was Flory’s clerk, coming
from the tiny office, which was not far from the church. Reaching the gate, he shikoed
and presented a grimy envelope, stamped Bunnese-fashion on the point of the flap.
‘Good morning, sir. ’
‘Good morning. What’s this thing? ’
‘Local letter, your honour. Come this morning’s post. Anonymous letter, I think, sir. ’
‘Oh bother. All right, I’ll be down to the office about eleven. ’
Flory opened the letter. It was written on a sheet of foolscap, and it ran:
MR JOHN FLORY,
SIR, — I the undersigned beg to suggest and WARN to your honour certain useful pieces
of information whereby your honour will be much profited, sir.
Sir, it has been remarked in Kyauktada your honour’s great friendship and intimacy with
Dr Veraswami, the Civil Surgeon, frequenting with him, inviting him to your house, etc.
Sir, we beg to inform you that the said Dr Veraswami is NOT A GOOD MAN and in no
ways a worthy friend of European gentlemen. The doctor is eminently dishonest, disloyal
and corrupt public servant. Coloured water is he providing to patients at the hospital and
selling drugs for own profit, besides many bribes, extortions, etc. Two prisoners has he
flogged with bamboos, afterwards rubbing chilis into the place if relatives do not send
money. Besides this he is implicated with the Nationalist Party and lately provided
material for a very evil article which appeared in the Burmese Patriot attacking Mr
Macgregor, the honoured Deputy Commissioner.
He is also sleeping by force with female patients at the hospital.
Wherefore we are much hoping that your honour will ESCHEW same Dr Veraswami and
not consort with persons who can bring nothing but evil upon your honour.
And shall ever pray for your honour’s long health and prosperity.
(Signed) A FRIEND.
The letter was written in the shaky round hand of the bazaar letter-writer, which
resembled a copybook exercise written by a drunkard. The letter-writer, however, would
never have risen to such a word as ‘eschew’. The letter must have been dictated by a
clerk, and no doubt it came ultimately from U Po Kyin. From ‘the crocodile’, Flory
reflected.
He did not like the tone of the letter. Under its appearance of servility it was obviously a
covert threat. ‘Drop the doctor or we will make it hot for you’, was what it said in effect.
Not that that mattered greatly; no Englishman ever feels himself in real danger from an
Oriental.
Flory hesitated with the letter in his hands. There are two things one can do with an
anonymous letter. One can say nothing about it, or one can show it to the person whom it
concerns. The obvious, the decent course was to give the letter to Dr Veraswami and let
him take what action he chose.
And yet — it was safer to keep out of this business altogether. It is so important (perhaps
the most important of all the Ten Precepts of the pukka sahib) not to entangle oneself in
‘native’ quarrels. With Indians there must be no loyalty, no real friendship. Affection,
even love — yes. Englishmen do often love Indians — native officers, forest rangers,
hunters, clerks, servants. Sepoys will weep like children when their colonel retires. Even
intimacy is allowable, at the right moments. But alliance, partisanship, never! Even to
know the rights and wrongs of a ‘native’ quarrel is a loss of prestige.
If he published the letter there would be a row and an official inquiry, and, in effect, he
would have thrown in his lot with the doctor against U Po Kyin. U Po Kyin did not
matter, but there were the Europeans; if he, Flory, were too conspicuously the doctor’s
partisan, there might be hell to pay. Much better to pretend that the letter had never
reached him. The doctor was a good fellow, but as to championing him against the full
fury of pukka sahibdom — ah, no, no! What shall it profit a man if he save his own soul
and lose the whole world? Flory began to tear the letter across. The danger of making it
public was very slight, very nebulous. But one must beware of the nebulous dangers in
India. Prestige, the breath of life, is itself nebulous. He carefully tore the letter into small
pieces and threw them over the gate.
At this moment there was a terrified scream, quite different from the voices of Ko S’ la’s
wives. The mali lowered his mamootie and gaped in the direction of the sound, and Ko
S’la, who had also heard it, came running bareheaded from the servants’ quarters, while
Flo sprang to her feet and yapped sharply. The scream was repeated. It came from the
jungle behind the house, and it was an English voice, a woman’s, crying out in terror.
There was no way out of the compound by the back. Flory scrambled over the gate and
came down with his knee bleeding from a splinter. He ran round the compound fence and
into the jungle, Flo following. Just behind the house, beyond the first fringe of bushes,
there was a small hollow, which, as there was a pool of stagnant water in it, was
frequented by buffaloes from Nyaunglebin. Flory pushed his way through the bushes. In
the hollow an English girl, chalk-faced, was cowering against a bush, while a huge
buffalo menaced her with its crescent-shaped horns. A hairy calf, no doubt the cause of
the trouble, stood behind. Another buffalo, neck-deep in the slime of the pool, looked on
with mild prehistoric face, wondering what was the matter.
The girl turned an agonized face to Flory as he appeared. ‘Oh, do be quick! ’ she cried, in
the angry, urgent tone of people who are frightened. ‘Please! Help me! Help me! ’
Flory was too astonished to ask any questions. He hastened towards her, and, in default of
a stick, smacked the buffalo sharply on the nose. With a timid, loutish movement the
great beast turned aside, then lumbered off followed by the calf. The other buffalo also
extricated itself from the slime and lolloped away. The girl threw herself against Flory,
almost into his arms, quite overcome by her fright.
‘Oh, tha nk you, thank you! Oh, those dreadful things! What ARE they? I thought they
were going to kill me. What horrible creatures! What ARE they? ’
They’re only water-buffaloes. They come from the village up there. ’
‘Buffaloes? ’
‘Not wild buffaloes — bison, we call those. They’re just a kind of cattle the Bunnans
keep. I say, they’ve given you a nasty shock. I’m sorry. ’
She was still clinging closely to his arm, and he could feel her shaking. He looked down,
but he could not see her face, only the top of her head, hatless, with yellow hair as short
as a boy’s. And he could see one of the hands on his arm. It was long, slender, youthful,
with the mottled wrist of a schoolgirl. It was several years since he had seen such a hand.
He became conscious of the soft, youthful body pressed against his own, and the warmth
breathing out of it; whereat something seemed to thaw and grow warm within him.
‘It’s all right, they’re gone,’ he said. ‘There’s nothing to be frightened of. ’
The girl was recovering from her fright, and she stood a little away from him, with one
hand still on his arm. ‘I’m all right,’ she said. ‘It’s nothing. I’m not hurt. They didn’t
touch me. It was only their looking so awful. ’
‘They’re quite hannless really. Their horns are set so far back that they can’t gore you.
They’re very stupid brutes. They only pretend to show fight when they’ve got calves. ’
They had stood apart now, and a slight embarrassment came over them both immediately.
Flory had already turned himself sidelong to keep his birthmarked cheek away from her.
He said:
‘I say, this is a queer sort of introduction! I haven’t asked yet how you got here.
Wherever did you come from — if it’s not rude to ask? ’
‘I just came out of my uncle’s garden. It seemed such a nice morning, I thought I’d go for
a walk. And then those dreadful things came after me. I’m quite new to this country, you
see. ’
‘Your uncle? Oh, of course! You’re Mr Lackersteen’s niece. We heard you were coming.
I say, shall we get out on to the maidan? There’ll be a path somewhere. What a start for
your first morning in Kyauktada! This’ll give you rather a bad impression of Burma, I’m
afraid. ’
‘Oh no; only it’s all rather strange. How thick these bushes grow! All kind of twisted
together and foreign-looking. You could get lost here in a moment. Is that what they call
jungle? ’
‘Scrub jungle. Burma’s mostly jungle — a green, unpleasant land, I call it. I wouldn’t walk
through that grass if I were you. The seeds get into your stockings and work their way
into your skin. ’
He let the girl walk ahead of him, feeling easier when she could not see his face. She was
tallish for a girl, slender, and wearing a lilac-coloured cotton frock. From the way she
moved her limbs he did not think she could be much past twenty. He had not noticed her
face yet, except to see that she wore round tortoise-shell spectacles, and that her hair was
as short as his own. He had never seen a woman with cropped hair before, except in the
illustrated papers.
As they emerged on to the maidan he stepped level with her, and she turned to face him.
Her face was oval, with delicate, regular features; not beautiful, perhaps, but it seemed so
there, in Burma, where all Englishwomen are yellow and thin. He turned his head sharply
aside, though the birthmark was away from her. He could not bear her to see his worn
face too closely. He seemed to feel the withered skin round his eyes as though it had been
a wound. But he remembered that he had shaved that morning, and it gave him courage.
He said:
‘I say, you must be a bit shaken up after this business. Would you like to come into my
place and rest a few minutes before you go home? It’s rather late to be out of doors
without a hat, too. ’
‘Oh, thank you, I would,’ the girl said. She could not, he thought, know anything about
Indian notions of propriety. ‘Is this your house here? ’
‘Yes. We must go round the front way. I’ll have the servants get a sunshade for you. This
sun’s dangerous for you, with your short hair. ’
They walked up the garden path. Flo was frisking round them and trying to draw
attention to herself. She always barked at strange Orientals, but she liked the smell of a
European. The sun was growing stronger. A wave of blackcurrant scent flowed from the
petunias beside the path, and one of the pigeons fluttered to the earth, to spring
immediately into the air again as Flo made a grab at it. Flory and the girl stopped with
one consent, to look at the flowers. A pang of unreasonable happiness had gone through
them both.
‘You really mustn’t go out in this sun without a hat on,’ he repeated, and somehow there
was an intimacy in saying it. He could not help referring to her short hair somehow, it
seemed to him so beautiful. To speak of it was like touching it with his hand.
‘Took, your knee’s bleeding,’ the girl said. ‘Did you do that when you were coming to
help me? ’
There was a slight trickle of blood, which was drying, purple, on his khaki stocking. ‘It’s
nothing,’ he said, but neither of them felt at that moment that it was nothing. They began
chattering with extraordinary eagerness about the flowers. The girl ‘adored’ flowers, she
said. And Flory led her up the path, talking garrulously about one plant and another.
‘Took how these phloxes grow. They go on blooming for six months in this country.
They can’t get too much sun. I think those yellow ones must be almost the colour of
primroses. I haven’t seen a primrose for fifteen years, nor a wallflower, either. Those
zinnias are fine, aren’t they? — like painted flowers, with those wonderful dead colours.
These are African marigolds. They’re coarse things, weeds almost, but you can’t help
liking them, they’re so vivid and strong. Indians have an extraordinary affection for them;
wherever Indians have been you find marigolds growing, even years afterwards when the
jungle has buried every other trace of them. But I wish you’d come into the veranda and
see the orchids. I’ve some I must show that are just like bells of gold — but literally like
gold. And they smell of honey, almost overpoweringly. That’s about the only merit of
this beastly country, it’s good for flowers. I hope you’re fond of gardening? It’s our
greatest consolation, in this country. ’
‘Oh, I simply adore gardening,’ the girl said.
They went into the veranda. Ko S’la had hurriedly put on his ingyi and his best pink silk
gaungbaung, and he appeared from within the house with a tray on which were a decanter
of gin, glasses and a box of cigarettes. He laid them on the table, and, eyeing the girl half
apprehensively, put his hands flat together and shikoed.
‘I expect it’s no use offering you a drink at this hour of the morning? ’ Flory said. ‘I can
never get it into my servant’s head that SOME people can exist without gin before
breakfast. ’
He added himself to the number by waving away the drink Ko S’ la offered him. The girl
had sat down in the wicker chair that Ko S’la had set out for her at the end of the veranda.
The dark-leaved orchids hung behind her head, with gold trusses of blossom, breathing
out warm honey-scent. Flory was standing against the veranda rail, half facing the girl,
but keeping his birthmarked cheek hidden.
‘What a perfectly divine view you have from here,’ she said as she looked down the
hillside.
‘Yes, isn’t it? Splendid, in this yellow light, before the sun gets going. I love that sombre
yellow colour the maidan has, and those gold mohur trees, like blobs of crimson. And
those hills at the horizon, almost black. My camp is on the other side of those hills,’ he
added.
The girl, who was long-sighted, took off her spectacles to look into the distance. He
noticed that her eyes were very clear pale blue, paler than a harebell. And he noticed the
smoothness of the skin round her eyes, like a petal, almost. It reminded him of his age
and his haggard face again, so that he turned a little more away from her. But he said on
impulse:
‘I say, what a bit of luck you coming to Kyauktada! You can’t imagine the difference it
makes to us to see a new face in these places. After months of our own miserable society,
and an occasional official on his rounds and American globe-trotters skipping up the
Irrawaddy with cameras. I suppose you’ve come straight from England? ’
‘Well, not England exactly. I was living in Paris before I came out here. My mother was
an artist, you see. ’
‘Paris! Have you really lived in Paris? By Jove, just fancy coming from Paris to
Kyauktada! Do you know, it’s positively difficult, in a hole like this, to believe that there
ARE such places as Paris. ’
‘Do you like Paris? ’ she said.
‘I’ve never even seen it. But, good Lord, how I’ve imagined it! Paris — it’s all a kind of
jumble of pictures in my mind; cafes and boulevards and artists’ studios and Villon and
Baudelaire and Maupassant all mixed up together. You don’t know how the names of
those European towns sound to us, out here. And did you really live in Paris? Sitting in
cafes with foreign art students, drinking white wine and talking about Marcel Proust? ’
‘Oh, that kind of thing, I suppose,’ said the girl, laughing.
‘What differences you’ll find here! It’s not white wine and Marcel Proust here. Whisky
and Edgar Wallace more likely. But if you ever want books, you might find something
you liked among mine. There’s nothing but tripe in the Club library. But of course I’m
hopelessly behind the times with my books. I expect you’ll have read everything under
the sun.
one’s real life in secret. One should live with the stream of life, not against it. It would be
better to be the thickest-skulled pukka sahib who ever hiccuped over ‘Forty years on’,
than to live silent, alone, consoling oneself in secret, sterile worlds.
Flory had never been home to England. Why, he could not have explained, though he
knew well enough. In the beginning accidents had prevented him. First there was the
War, and after the War his firm were so short of trained assistants that they would not let
him go for two years more. Then at last he had set out. He was pining for England,
though he dreaded facing it, as one dreads facing a pretty girl when one is collarless and
unshaven. When he left home he had been a boy, a promising boy and handsome in spite
of his birthmark; now, only ten years later, he was yellow, thin, drunken, almost middle-
aged in habits and appearance. Still, he was pining for England. The ship rolled westward
over wastes of sea like rough-beaten silver, with the winter trade wind behind her. Flory’s
thin blood quickened with the good food and the smell of the sea. And it occurred to
him — a thing he had actually forgotten in the stagnant air of Burma — that he was still
young enough to begin over again. He would live a year in a civilized society, he would
find some girl who did not mind his birthmark — a civilized girl, not a pukka
memsahib — and he would marry her and endure ten, fifteen more years of Burma. Then
they would retire — he would be worth twelve or fifteen thousand pounds on retirement,
perhaps. They would buy a cottage in the country, surround themselves with friends,
books, their children, animals. They would be free for ever of the smell of pukka
sahibdom. He would forget Burma, the horrible country that had come near ruining him.
When he reached Colombo he found a cable waiting for him. Three men in his firm had
died suddenly of black-water fever. The firm were sorry, but would he please return to
Rangoon at once? He should have his leave at the earliest possible opportunity.
Flory boarded the next boat for Rangoon, cursing his luck, and took the train back to his
headquarters. He was not at Kyauktada then, but at another Upper Burma town. All the
servants were waiting for him on the platfonn. He had handed them over en bloc to his
successor, who had died. It was so queer to see their familiar faces again! Only ten days
ago he had been speeding for England, almost thinking himself in England already; and
now back in the old stale scene, with the naked black coolies squabbling over the luggage
and a Burman shouting at his bullocks down the road.
The servants came crowding round him, a ring of kindly brown faces, offering presents.
Ko STa had brought a sambhur skin, the Indians some sweetmeats and a garland of
marigolds, Ba Pe, a young boy then, a squirrel in a wicker cage. There were bullock carts
waiting for the luggage. Flory walked up to the house, looking ridiculous with the big
garland dangling from his neck. The light of the cold-weather evening was yellow and
kind. At the gate an old Indian, the colour of earth, was cropping grass with a tiny sickle.
The wives of the cook and the mali were kneeling in front of the servants’ quarters,
grinding curry paste on the stone slab.
Something turned over in Flory’s heart. It was one of those moments when one becomes
conscious of a vast change and deterioration in one’s life. For he had realized, suddenly,
that in his heart he was glad to be coming back. This country which he hated was now his
native country, his home. He had lived here ten years, and every particle of his body was
compounded of Burmese soil. Scenes like these — the sallow evening light, the old Indian
cropping grass, the creak of the cartwheels, the streaming egrets — were more native to
him than England. He had sent deep roots, perhaps his deepest, into a foreign country.
Since then he had not even applied for home leave. His father had died, then his mother,
and his sisters, disagreeable horse-faced women whom he had never liked, had married
and he had almost lost touch with them. He had no tie with Europe now, except the tie of
books. For he had realized that merely to go back to England was no remedy for
loneliness; he had grasped the special nature of the hell that is reserved for Anglo-
Indians. Ah, those poor prosing old wrecks in Bath and Cheltenham! Those tomb-like
boarding-houses with Anglo-Indians littered about in all stages of decomposition, all
talking and talking about what happened in Boggleywalah in ‘88! Poor devils, they kn ow
what it means to have left one’s heart in an alien and hated country. There was, he saw
clearly, only one way out. To find someone who would share his life in Burma — but
really share it, share his inner, secret life, carry away from Burma the same memories as
he carried. Someone who would love Burma as he loved it and hate it as he hated it. Who
would help him to live with nothing hidden, nothing unexpressed. Someone who
understood him: a friend, that was what it came down to.
A friend. Or a wife? That quite impossible she. Someone like Mrs Lackersteen, for
instance? Some damned memsahib, yellow and thin, scandalmongering over cocktails,
making kit-kit with the servants, living twenty years in the country without learning a
word of the language. Not one of those, please God.
Flory leaned over the gate. The moon was vanishing behind the dark wall of the jungle,
but the dogs were still howling. Some lines from Gilbert came into his mind, a vulgar
silly jingle but appropriate — something about ‘discoursing on your complicated state of
mind’. Gilbert was a gifted little skunk. Did all his trouble, then, simply boil down to
that? Just complicated, unmanly whinings; poor-little-rich-girl stuff? Was he no more
than a loafer using his idleness to invent imaginary woes? A spiritual Mrs Wititterly? A
Hamlet without poetry? Perhaps. And if so, did that make it any more bearable? It is not
the less bitter because it is perhaps one’s own fault, to see oneself drifting, rotting, in
dishonour and horrible futility, and all the while knowing that somewhere within one
there is the possibility of a decent human being.
Oh well, God save us from self-pity! Flory went back to the veranda, took up the rifle,
and wincing slightly, let drive at the pariah dog. There was an echoing roar, and the bullet
buried itself in the maidan, wide of the mark. A mulberry-coloured bruise sprang out on
Flory ’s shoulder. The dog gave a yell of fright, took to its heels, and then, sitting down
fifty yards farther away, once more began rhythmically baying.
CHAPTER 6
The morning sunlight slanted up the maidan and struck, yellow as goldleaf, against the
white face of the bungalow. Four black-purple crows swooped down and perched on the
veranda rail, waiting their chance to dart in and steal the bread and butter that Ko STa had
set down beside Flory’s bed. Flory crawled through the mosquito net, shouted to Ko STa
to bring him some gin, and then went into the bathroom and sat for a while in a zinc tub
of water that was supposed to be cold. Feeling better after the gin, he shaved himself. As
a rule he put off shaving until the evening, for his beard was black and grew quickly.
While Flory was sitting morosely in his bath, Mr Macgregor, in shorts and singlet on the
bamboo mat laid for the purpose in his bedroom, was struggling with Numbers 5, 6, 7, 8
and 9 of Nordenflycht’s ‘Physical Jerks for the Sedentary’. Mr Macgregor never, or
hardly ever, missed his morning exercises. Number 8 (flat on the back, raise legs to the
perpendicular without bending knees) was downright painful for a man of forty-three;
Number 9 (flat on the back, rise to a sitting posture and touch toes with tips of fingers)
was even worse. No matter, one must keep fit! As Mr Macgregor lunged painfully in the
direction of his toes, a brick-red shade flowed upwards from his neck and congested his
face with a threat of apoplexy. The sweat gleamed on his large, tallowy breasts. Stick it
out, stick it out! At all costs one must keep fit. Mohammed Ali, the bearer, with Mr
Macgregor’s clean clothes across his arm, watched through the half-open door. His
narrow, yellow, Arabian face expressed neither comprehension nor curiosity. He had
watched these contortions — a sacrifice, he dimly imagined, to some mysterious and
exacting god — every morning for five years.
At the same time, too, Westfield, who had gone out early, was leaning against the
notched and ink-stained table of the police station, while the fat Sub-inspector
interrogated a suspect whom two constables were guarding. The suspect was a man of
forty, with a grey, timorous face, dressed only in a ragged longyi kilted to the knee,
beneath which his lank, curved shins were speckled with tick-bites.
‘Who is this fellow? ’ said Westfield.
‘Thief, sir. We catch him in possession of this ring with two emeralds very-dear. No
explanation. How could he — poor coolie — own a emerald ring? He have stole it. ’
He turned ferociously upon the suspect, advanced his face tomcat-fashion till it was
almost touching the other’s, and roared in an enormous voice:
‘You stole the ring! ’
‘No. ’
‘You are an old offender! ’
‘No. ’
‘You have been in prison! ’
‘No. ’
‘Turn round! ’ bellowed the Sub-inspector on an inspiration. ‘Bend over! ’
The suspect turned his grey face in agony towards Westfield, who looked away. The two
constables seized him, twisted him round and bent him over; the Sub-inspector tore off
his longyi, exposing his buttocks.
‘Look at this, sir! ’ He pointed to some scars. ‘He have been flogged with bamboos. He is
an old offender. THEREFORE he stole the ring! ’
‘All right, put him in the clink,’ said Westfield moodily, as he lounged away from the
table with his hands in his pockets. At the bottom of his heart he loathed running in these
poor devils of common thieves. Dacoits, rebels — yes; but not these poor cringing rats!
‘How many have you got in the clink now, Maung Ba? ’ he said.
‘Three, sir. ’
The lock-up was upstairs, a cage surrounded by six-inch wooden bars, guarded by a
constable anned with a carbine. It was very dark, stifling hot, and quite unfurnished,
except for an earth latrine that stank to heaven. Two prisoners were squatting at the bars,
keeping their distance from a third, an Indian coolie, who was covered from head to foot
with ringworm like a coat of mail. A stout Bunnese woman, wife of a constable, was
kneeling outside the cage ladling rice and watery dahl into tin pannikins.
‘Is the food good? ’ said Westfield.
‘It is good, most holy one,’ chorused the prisoners.
The Government provided for the prisoners’ food at the rate of two annas and a half per
meal per man, out of which the constable’s wife looked to make a profit of one anna.
Flory went outside and loitered down the compound, poking weeds into the ground with
his stick. At that hour there were beautiful faint colours in everything — tender green of
leaves, pinkish brown of earth and tree-trunks — like aquarelle washes that would vanish
in the later glare. Down on the maidan flights of small, low-flying brown doves chased
one another to and fro, and bee-eaters, emerald-green, curvetted like slow swallows. A
file of sweepers, each with his load half hidden beneath his garment, were marching to
some dreadful dumping-hole that existed on the edge of the jungle. Starveling wretches,
with stick-like limbs and knees too feeble to be straightened, draped in earth-coloured
rags, they were like a procession of shrouded skeletons walking.
The mali was breaking ground for a new flower-bed, down by the pigeon-cote that stood
near the gate. He was a lymphatic, half-witted Hindu youth, who lived his life in almost
complete silence, because he spoke some Manipur dialect which nobody else understood,
not even his Zerbadi wife. His tongue was also a size too large for his mouth. He
salaamed low to Flory, covering his face with his hand, then swung his mamootie aloft
again and hacked at the dry ground with heavy, clumsy strokes, his tender back-muscles
quivering.
A sharp grating scream that sounded like ‘Kwaaa! ’ came from the servants quarters. Ko
S’la’s wives had begun their morning quarrel. The tame fighting cock, called Nero,
strutted zigzag down the path, nervous of Flo, and Ba Pe came out with a bowl of paddy
and they fed Nero and the pigeons. There were more yells from the servants’ quarters,
and the gruffer voices of men trying to stop the quarrel. Ko STa suffered a great deal
from his wives. Ma Pu, the first wife, was a gaunt hard-faced woman, stringy from much
child-bearing, and Ma Yi, the Tittle wife’, was a fat, lazy cat some years younger. The
two women fought incessantly when Flory was in headquarters and they were together.
Once when Ma Pu was chasing Ko STa with a bamboo, he had dodged behind Flory for
protection, and Flory had received a nasty blow on the leg.
Mr Macgregor was coming up the road, striding briskly and swinging a thick walking-
stick. He was dressed in khaki pagri-cloth shirt, drill shorts and a pigsticker topi. Besides
his exercises, he took a brisk two-mile walk every morning when he could spare the time.
‘Top o’ the mornin’ to ye! ’ he called to Flory in a hearty matutinal voice, putting on an
Irish accent. He cultivated a brisk, invigorating, cold-bath demeanour at this hour of the
morning. Moreover, the libellous article in the Burmese Patriot, which he had read
overnight, had hurt him, and he was affecting a special cheeriness to conceal this.
‘Morning! ’ Flory called back as heartily as he could manage.
Nasty old bladder of lard! he thought, watching Mr Macgregor up the road. How his
bottom did stick out in those tight khaki shorts. Like one of those beastly middle-aged
scoutmasters, homosexuals almost to a man, that you see photographs of in the illustrated
papers. Dressing himself up in those ridiculous clothes and exposing his pudgy, dimpled
knees, because it is the pukka sahib thing to take exercise before breakfast — disgusting!
A Burman came up the hill, a splash of white and magenta. It was Flory’s clerk, coming
from the tiny office, which was not far from the church. Reaching the gate, he shikoed
and presented a grimy envelope, stamped Bunnese-fashion on the point of the flap.
‘Good morning, sir. ’
‘Good morning. What’s this thing? ’
‘Local letter, your honour. Come this morning’s post. Anonymous letter, I think, sir. ’
‘Oh bother. All right, I’ll be down to the office about eleven. ’
Flory opened the letter. It was written on a sheet of foolscap, and it ran:
MR JOHN FLORY,
SIR, — I the undersigned beg to suggest and WARN to your honour certain useful pieces
of information whereby your honour will be much profited, sir.
Sir, it has been remarked in Kyauktada your honour’s great friendship and intimacy with
Dr Veraswami, the Civil Surgeon, frequenting with him, inviting him to your house, etc.
Sir, we beg to inform you that the said Dr Veraswami is NOT A GOOD MAN and in no
ways a worthy friend of European gentlemen. The doctor is eminently dishonest, disloyal
and corrupt public servant. Coloured water is he providing to patients at the hospital and
selling drugs for own profit, besides many bribes, extortions, etc. Two prisoners has he
flogged with bamboos, afterwards rubbing chilis into the place if relatives do not send
money. Besides this he is implicated with the Nationalist Party and lately provided
material for a very evil article which appeared in the Burmese Patriot attacking Mr
Macgregor, the honoured Deputy Commissioner.
He is also sleeping by force with female patients at the hospital.
Wherefore we are much hoping that your honour will ESCHEW same Dr Veraswami and
not consort with persons who can bring nothing but evil upon your honour.
And shall ever pray for your honour’s long health and prosperity.
(Signed) A FRIEND.
The letter was written in the shaky round hand of the bazaar letter-writer, which
resembled a copybook exercise written by a drunkard. The letter-writer, however, would
never have risen to such a word as ‘eschew’. The letter must have been dictated by a
clerk, and no doubt it came ultimately from U Po Kyin. From ‘the crocodile’, Flory
reflected.
He did not like the tone of the letter. Under its appearance of servility it was obviously a
covert threat. ‘Drop the doctor or we will make it hot for you’, was what it said in effect.
Not that that mattered greatly; no Englishman ever feels himself in real danger from an
Oriental.
Flory hesitated with the letter in his hands. There are two things one can do with an
anonymous letter. One can say nothing about it, or one can show it to the person whom it
concerns. The obvious, the decent course was to give the letter to Dr Veraswami and let
him take what action he chose.
And yet — it was safer to keep out of this business altogether. It is so important (perhaps
the most important of all the Ten Precepts of the pukka sahib) not to entangle oneself in
‘native’ quarrels. With Indians there must be no loyalty, no real friendship. Affection,
even love — yes. Englishmen do often love Indians — native officers, forest rangers,
hunters, clerks, servants. Sepoys will weep like children when their colonel retires. Even
intimacy is allowable, at the right moments. But alliance, partisanship, never! Even to
know the rights and wrongs of a ‘native’ quarrel is a loss of prestige.
If he published the letter there would be a row and an official inquiry, and, in effect, he
would have thrown in his lot with the doctor against U Po Kyin. U Po Kyin did not
matter, but there were the Europeans; if he, Flory, were too conspicuously the doctor’s
partisan, there might be hell to pay. Much better to pretend that the letter had never
reached him. The doctor was a good fellow, but as to championing him against the full
fury of pukka sahibdom — ah, no, no! What shall it profit a man if he save his own soul
and lose the whole world? Flory began to tear the letter across. The danger of making it
public was very slight, very nebulous. But one must beware of the nebulous dangers in
India. Prestige, the breath of life, is itself nebulous. He carefully tore the letter into small
pieces and threw them over the gate.
At this moment there was a terrified scream, quite different from the voices of Ko S’ la’s
wives. The mali lowered his mamootie and gaped in the direction of the sound, and Ko
S’la, who had also heard it, came running bareheaded from the servants’ quarters, while
Flo sprang to her feet and yapped sharply. The scream was repeated. It came from the
jungle behind the house, and it was an English voice, a woman’s, crying out in terror.
There was no way out of the compound by the back. Flory scrambled over the gate and
came down with his knee bleeding from a splinter. He ran round the compound fence and
into the jungle, Flo following. Just behind the house, beyond the first fringe of bushes,
there was a small hollow, which, as there was a pool of stagnant water in it, was
frequented by buffaloes from Nyaunglebin. Flory pushed his way through the bushes. In
the hollow an English girl, chalk-faced, was cowering against a bush, while a huge
buffalo menaced her with its crescent-shaped horns. A hairy calf, no doubt the cause of
the trouble, stood behind. Another buffalo, neck-deep in the slime of the pool, looked on
with mild prehistoric face, wondering what was the matter.
The girl turned an agonized face to Flory as he appeared. ‘Oh, do be quick! ’ she cried, in
the angry, urgent tone of people who are frightened. ‘Please! Help me! Help me! ’
Flory was too astonished to ask any questions. He hastened towards her, and, in default of
a stick, smacked the buffalo sharply on the nose. With a timid, loutish movement the
great beast turned aside, then lumbered off followed by the calf. The other buffalo also
extricated itself from the slime and lolloped away. The girl threw herself against Flory,
almost into his arms, quite overcome by her fright.
‘Oh, tha nk you, thank you! Oh, those dreadful things! What ARE they? I thought they
were going to kill me. What horrible creatures! What ARE they? ’
They’re only water-buffaloes. They come from the village up there. ’
‘Buffaloes? ’
‘Not wild buffaloes — bison, we call those. They’re just a kind of cattle the Bunnans
keep. I say, they’ve given you a nasty shock. I’m sorry. ’
She was still clinging closely to his arm, and he could feel her shaking. He looked down,
but he could not see her face, only the top of her head, hatless, with yellow hair as short
as a boy’s. And he could see one of the hands on his arm. It was long, slender, youthful,
with the mottled wrist of a schoolgirl. It was several years since he had seen such a hand.
He became conscious of the soft, youthful body pressed against his own, and the warmth
breathing out of it; whereat something seemed to thaw and grow warm within him.
‘It’s all right, they’re gone,’ he said. ‘There’s nothing to be frightened of. ’
The girl was recovering from her fright, and she stood a little away from him, with one
hand still on his arm. ‘I’m all right,’ she said. ‘It’s nothing. I’m not hurt. They didn’t
touch me. It was only their looking so awful. ’
‘They’re quite hannless really. Their horns are set so far back that they can’t gore you.
They’re very stupid brutes. They only pretend to show fight when they’ve got calves. ’
They had stood apart now, and a slight embarrassment came over them both immediately.
Flory had already turned himself sidelong to keep his birthmarked cheek away from her.
He said:
‘I say, this is a queer sort of introduction! I haven’t asked yet how you got here.
Wherever did you come from — if it’s not rude to ask? ’
‘I just came out of my uncle’s garden. It seemed such a nice morning, I thought I’d go for
a walk. And then those dreadful things came after me. I’m quite new to this country, you
see. ’
‘Your uncle? Oh, of course! You’re Mr Lackersteen’s niece. We heard you were coming.
I say, shall we get out on to the maidan? There’ll be a path somewhere. What a start for
your first morning in Kyauktada! This’ll give you rather a bad impression of Burma, I’m
afraid. ’
‘Oh no; only it’s all rather strange. How thick these bushes grow! All kind of twisted
together and foreign-looking. You could get lost here in a moment. Is that what they call
jungle? ’
‘Scrub jungle. Burma’s mostly jungle — a green, unpleasant land, I call it. I wouldn’t walk
through that grass if I were you. The seeds get into your stockings and work their way
into your skin. ’
He let the girl walk ahead of him, feeling easier when she could not see his face. She was
tallish for a girl, slender, and wearing a lilac-coloured cotton frock. From the way she
moved her limbs he did not think she could be much past twenty. He had not noticed her
face yet, except to see that she wore round tortoise-shell spectacles, and that her hair was
as short as his own. He had never seen a woman with cropped hair before, except in the
illustrated papers.
As they emerged on to the maidan he stepped level with her, and she turned to face him.
Her face was oval, with delicate, regular features; not beautiful, perhaps, but it seemed so
there, in Burma, where all Englishwomen are yellow and thin. He turned his head sharply
aside, though the birthmark was away from her. He could not bear her to see his worn
face too closely. He seemed to feel the withered skin round his eyes as though it had been
a wound. But he remembered that he had shaved that morning, and it gave him courage.
He said:
‘I say, you must be a bit shaken up after this business. Would you like to come into my
place and rest a few minutes before you go home? It’s rather late to be out of doors
without a hat, too. ’
‘Oh, thank you, I would,’ the girl said. She could not, he thought, know anything about
Indian notions of propriety. ‘Is this your house here? ’
‘Yes. We must go round the front way. I’ll have the servants get a sunshade for you. This
sun’s dangerous for you, with your short hair. ’
They walked up the garden path. Flo was frisking round them and trying to draw
attention to herself. She always barked at strange Orientals, but she liked the smell of a
European. The sun was growing stronger. A wave of blackcurrant scent flowed from the
petunias beside the path, and one of the pigeons fluttered to the earth, to spring
immediately into the air again as Flo made a grab at it. Flory and the girl stopped with
one consent, to look at the flowers. A pang of unreasonable happiness had gone through
them both.
‘You really mustn’t go out in this sun without a hat on,’ he repeated, and somehow there
was an intimacy in saying it. He could not help referring to her short hair somehow, it
seemed to him so beautiful. To speak of it was like touching it with his hand.
‘Took, your knee’s bleeding,’ the girl said. ‘Did you do that when you were coming to
help me? ’
There was a slight trickle of blood, which was drying, purple, on his khaki stocking. ‘It’s
nothing,’ he said, but neither of them felt at that moment that it was nothing. They began
chattering with extraordinary eagerness about the flowers. The girl ‘adored’ flowers, she
said. And Flory led her up the path, talking garrulously about one plant and another.
‘Took how these phloxes grow. They go on blooming for six months in this country.
They can’t get too much sun. I think those yellow ones must be almost the colour of
primroses. I haven’t seen a primrose for fifteen years, nor a wallflower, either. Those
zinnias are fine, aren’t they? — like painted flowers, with those wonderful dead colours.
These are African marigolds. They’re coarse things, weeds almost, but you can’t help
liking them, they’re so vivid and strong. Indians have an extraordinary affection for them;
wherever Indians have been you find marigolds growing, even years afterwards when the
jungle has buried every other trace of them. But I wish you’d come into the veranda and
see the orchids. I’ve some I must show that are just like bells of gold — but literally like
gold. And they smell of honey, almost overpoweringly. That’s about the only merit of
this beastly country, it’s good for flowers. I hope you’re fond of gardening? It’s our
greatest consolation, in this country. ’
‘Oh, I simply adore gardening,’ the girl said.
They went into the veranda. Ko S’la had hurriedly put on his ingyi and his best pink silk
gaungbaung, and he appeared from within the house with a tray on which were a decanter
of gin, glasses and a box of cigarettes. He laid them on the table, and, eyeing the girl half
apprehensively, put his hands flat together and shikoed.
‘I expect it’s no use offering you a drink at this hour of the morning? ’ Flory said. ‘I can
never get it into my servant’s head that SOME people can exist without gin before
breakfast. ’
He added himself to the number by waving away the drink Ko S’ la offered him. The girl
had sat down in the wicker chair that Ko S’la had set out for her at the end of the veranda.
The dark-leaved orchids hung behind her head, with gold trusses of blossom, breathing
out warm honey-scent. Flory was standing against the veranda rail, half facing the girl,
but keeping his birthmarked cheek hidden.
‘What a perfectly divine view you have from here,’ she said as she looked down the
hillside.
‘Yes, isn’t it? Splendid, in this yellow light, before the sun gets going. I love that sombre
yellow colour the maidan has, and those gold mohur trees, like blobs of crimson. And
those hills at the horizon, almost black. My camp is on the other side of those hills,’ he
added.
The girl, who was long-sighted, took off her spectacles to look into the distance. He
noticed that her eyes were very clear pale blue, paler than a harebell. And he noticed the
smoothness of the skin round her eyes, like a petal, almost. It reminded him of his age
and his haggard face again, so that he turned a little more away from her. But he said on
impulse:
‘I say, what a bit of luck you coming to Kyauktada! You can’t imagine the difference it
makes to us to see a new face in these places. After months of our own miserable society,
and an occasional official on his rounds and American globe-trotters skipping up the
Irrawaddy with cameras. I suppose you’ve come straight from England? ’
‘Well, not England exactly. I was living in Paris before I came out here. My mother was
an artist, you see. ’
‘Paris! Have you really lived in Paris? By Jove, just fancy coming from Paris to
Kyauktada! Do you know, it’s positively difficult, in a hole like this, to believe that there
ARE such places as Paris. ’
‘Do you like Paris? ’ she said.
‘I’ve never even seen it. But, good Lord, how I’ve imagined it! Paris — it’s all a kind of
jumble of pictures in my mind; cafes and boulevards and artists’ studios and Villon and
Baudelaire and Maupassant all mixed up together. You don’t know how the names of
those European towns sound to us, out here. And did you really live in Paris? Sitting in
cafes with foreign art students, drinking white wine and talking about Marcel Proust? ’
‘Oh, that kind of thing, I suppose,’ said the girl, laughing.
‘What differences you’ll find here! It’s not white wine and Marcel Proust here. Whisky
and Edgar Wallace more likely. But if you ever want books, you might find something
you liked among mine. There’s nothing but tripe in the Club library. But of course I’m
hopelessly behind the times with my books. I expect you’ll have read everything under
the sun.
