A passage to India
had thought of the ‘Mr. Fielding High School,’ but failing that,
the ‘King-Emperor George the Fifth.’”
“Godbole!”
The old fellow put his hands together, and looked sly and charming.
“Is Aziz innocent or guilty?”
“That is for the Court to decide. The verdict will be in strict
accordance with the evidence, I make no doubt.”
“Yes, yes, but your personal opinion. Here’s a man we both like,
generally esteemed; he lives here quietly doing his work. Well,
what’s one to make of it? Would he or would he not do such a
thing?”
“Ah, that is rather a different question from your previous one,
and also more difficult: I mean difficult in our philosophy. Dr.
Aziz is a most worthy young man, I have a great regard for him;
but I think you are asking me whether the individual can commit
good actions or evil actions, and that is rather difficult for us.”
He spoke without emotion and in short tripping syllables.
“I ask you: did he do it or not? Is that plain? I know he didn’t,
and from that I start. I mean to get at the true explanation in a
couple of days. My last notion is that it’s the guide who went
round with them. Malice on Miss Quested’s part—it couldn’t be that,
though Hamidullah thinks so. She has certainly had some appalling
experience. But you tell me, oh no—because good and evil are the
same.”
“No, not exactly, please, according to our philosophy. Because
nothing can be performed in isolation. All perform a good action,
when one is performed, and when an evil action is performed, all
perform it. To illustrate my meaning, let me take the case in point
as an example.
“I am informed that an evil action was performed in the Marabar
Hills, and that a highly esteemed English lady is now seriously
ill in consequence. My answer to that is this: that action was
performed by Dr. Aziz.” He stopped and sucked in his thin cheeks.
“It was performed by the guide.” He stopped again. “It was performed
by you.” Now he had an air of daring and of coyness. “It was
performed by me.” He looked shyly down the sleeve of his own coat.
“And by my students. It was even performed by the lady herself.
When evil occurs, it expresses the whole of the universe. Similarly
when good occurs.”
“And similarly when suffering occurs, and so on and so forth, and
everything is anything and nothing something,” he muttered in his
irritation, for he needed the solid ground.
“Excuse me, you are now again changing the basis of our discussion.
We were discussing good and evil. Suffering is merely a matter for
the individual. If a young lady has sunstroke, that is a matter of
no significance to the universe. Oh no, not at all. Oh no, not the
least. It is an isolated matter, it only concerns herself. If she
thought her head did not ache, she would not be ill, and that would
end it. But it is far otherwise in the case of good and evil. They
are not what we think them, they are what they are, and each of us
has contributed to both.”
“You’re preaching that evil and good are the same.”
“Oh no, excuse me once again. Good and evil are different, as their
names imply. But, in my own humble opinion, they are both of them
aspects of my Lord. He is present in the one, absent in the other,
and the difference between presence and absence is great, as great
as my feeble mind can grasp. Yet absence implies presence, absence
is not non-existence, and we are therefore entitled to repeat,
‘Come, come, come, come.’” And in the same breath, as if to cancel
any beauty his words might have contained, he added, “But did you
have time to visit any of the interesting Marabar antiquities?”
Fielding was silent, trying to meditate and rest his brain.
“Did you not even see the tank by the usual camping ground?” he
nagged.
“Yes, yes,” he answered distractedly, wandering over half a dozen
things at once.
“That is good, then you saw the Tank of the Dagger.” And he related
a legend which might have been acceptable if he had told it at the
tea-party a fortnight ago. It concerned a Hindu Rajah who had slain
his own sister’s son, and the dagger with which he performed the
deed remained clamped to his hand until in the course of years he
came to the Marabar Hills, where he was thirsty and wanted to drink
but saw a thirsty cow and ordered the water to be offered to her
first, which, when done, “dagger fell from his hand, and to
commemorate miracle he built Tank.” Professor Godbole’s conversations
frequently culminated in a cow. Fielding received this one in
gloomy silence.
In the afternoon he obtained a permit and saw Aziz, but found him
unapproachable through misery. “You deserted me,” was the only
coherent remark. He went away to write his letter to Miss Quested.
Even if it reached her, it would do no good, and probably the
McBrydes would withhold it. Miss Quested did pull him up short.
She was such a dry, sensible girl, and quite without malice: the
last person in Chandrapore wrongfully to accuse an Indian.
CHAPTER XX
Although Miss Quested had not made herself popular with the English,
she brought out all that was fine in their character. For a few
hours an exalted emotion gushed forth, which the women felt even
more keenly than the men, if not for so long. “What can we do for
our sister?” was the only thought of Mesdames Callendar and Lesley,
as they drove through the pelting heat to enquire. Mrs. Turton was
the only visitor admitted to the sick-room. She came out ennobled
by an unselfish sorrow. “She is my own darling girl,” were the
words she spoke, and then, remembering that she had called her “not
pukka” and resented her engagement to young Heaslop, she began to
cry. No one had ever seen the Collector’s wife cry. Capable of
tears—yes, but always reserving them for some adequate occasion,
and now it had come. Ah, why had they not all been kinder to the
stranger, more patient, given her not only hospitality but their
hearts? The tender core of the heart that is so seldom used—they
employed it for a little, under the stimulus of remorse. If all is
over (as Major Callendar implied), well, all is over, and nothing
can be done, but they retained some responsibility in her grievous
wrong that they couldn’t define. If she wasn’t one of them, they
ought to have made her one, and they could never do that now, she
had passed beyond their invitation. “Why don’t one think more of
other people?” sighed pleasure-loving Miss Derek. These regrets
only lasted in their pure form for a few hours. Before sunset,
other considerations adulterated them, and the sense of guilt (so
strangely connected with our first sight of any suffering) had
begun to wear away.
People drove into the club with studious calm—the jog-trot of
country gentlefolk between green hedgerows, for the natives must
not suspect that they were agitated. They exchanged the usual
drinks, but everything tasted different, and then they looked out
at the palisade of cactuses stabbing the purple throat of the sky;
they realized that they were thousands of miles from any scenery
that they understood. The club was fuller than usual, and several
parents had brought their children into the rooms reserved for
adults, which gave the air of the Residency at Lucknow. One young
mother—a brainless but most beautiful girl—sat on a low ottoman in
the smoking-room with her baby in her arms; her husband was away
in the district, and she dared not return to her bungalow in case
the “niggers attacked.” The wife of a small railway official, she
was generally snubbed; but this evening, with her abundant figure
and masses of corn-gold hair, she symbolized all that is worth
fighting and dying for; more permanent a symbol, perhaps, than poor
Adela. “Don’t worry, Mrs. Blakiston, those drums are only Mohurram,”
the men would tell her.
“Then they’ve started,” she moaned, clasping the infant and rather
wishing he would not blow bubbles down his chin at such a moment
as this. “No, of course not, and anyhow, they’re not coming to the
club.” “And they’re not coming to the Burra Sahib’s bungalow
either, my dear, and that’s where you and your baby’ll sleep
tonight,” answered Mrs. Turton, towering by her side like Pallas
Athene, and determining in the future not to be such a snob.
The Collector clapped his hands for silence. He was much calmer
than when he had flown out at Fielding. He was indeed always calmer
when he addressed several people than in a _tête-à-tête._ “I want
to talk specially to the ladies,” he said. “Not the least cause
for alarm. Keep cool, keep cool. Don’t go out more than you can
help, don’t go into the city, don’t talk before your servants.
That’s all.”
“Harry, is there any news from the city?” asked his wife, standing
at some distance from him, and also assuming her public-safety
voice. The rest were silent during the august colloquy.
“Everything absolutely normal.”
“I had gathered as much. Those drums are merely Mohurram, of
course.”
“Merely the preparations for it—the Procession is not till next
week.”
“Quite so, not till Monday.”
“Mr. McBryde’s down there disguised as a Holy Man,” said Mrs.
Callendar.
“That’s exactly the sort of thing that must not be said,” he
remarked, pointing at her. “Mrs. Callendar, be more careful than
that, please, in these times.”
“I . . . well, I . . .” She was not offended, his severity made
her feel safe.
“Any more questions? Necessary questions.”
“Is the—where is he——” Mrs. Lesley quavered.
“Jail. Bail has been refused.”
Fielding spoke next. He wanted to know whether there was an official
bulletin about Miss Quested’s health, or whether the grave reports
were due to gossip. His question produced a bad effect, partly
because he had pronounced her name; she, like Aziz, was always
referred to by a periphrasis.
“I hope Callendar may be able to let us know how things are going
before long.”
“I fail to see how that last question can be termed a necessary
question,” said Mrs. Turton.
“Will all ladies leave the smoking-room now, please?” he cried,
clapping his hands again. “And remember what I have said. We look
to you to help us through a difficult time, and you can help us by
behaving as if everything is normal. It is all I ask. Can I rely
on you?”
“Yes, indeed, Burra Sahib,” they chorused out of peaked, anxious
faces. They moved out, subdued yet elated, Mrs. Blakiston in their
midst like a sacred flame. His simple words had reminded them that
they were an outpost of Empire. By the side of their compassionate
love for Adela another sentiment sprang up which was to strangle
it in the long run. Its first signs were prosaic and small. Mrs.
Turton made her loud, hard jokes at bridge, Mrs. Lesley began to
knit a comforter.
When the smoking-room was clear, the Collector sat on the edge of
a table, so that he could dominate without formality. His mind
whirled with contradictory impulses. He wanted to avenge Miss
Quested and punish Fielding, while remaining scrupulously fair. He
wanted to flog every native that he saw, but to do nothing that
would lead to a riot or to the necessity for military intervention.
The dread of having to call in the troops was vivid to him; soldiers
put one thing straight, but leave a dozen others crooked, and they
love to humiliate the civilian administration. One soldier was in
the room this evening—a stray subaltern from a Gurkha regiment; he
was a little drunk, and regarded his presence as providential. The
Collector sighed. There seemed nothing for it but the old weary
business of compromise and moderation. He longed for the good old
days when an Englishman could satisfy his own honour and no
questions asked afterwards. Poor young Heaslop had taken a step in
this direction, by refusing bail, but the Collector couldn’t feel
this was wise of poor young Heaslop. Not only would the Nawab