A passage to India
don’t you worry. He had some motive in what he said. My personal
belief is that the remark wasn’t true.”
“How not true?”
“He abused the Major in order to impress you.”
“I don’t know what you mean, dear.”
“It’s the educated native’s latest dodge. They used to cringe, but
the younger generation believe in a show of manly independence.
They think it will pay better with the itinerant M.P. But whether
the native swaggers or cringes, there’s always something behind
every remark he makes, always something, and if nothing else he’s
trying to increase his izzat—in plain Anglo-Saxon, to score. Of
course there are exceptions.”
“You never used to judge people like this at home.”
“India isn’t home,” he retorted, rather rudely, but in order to
silence her he had been using phrases and arguments that he had
picked up from older officials, and he did not feel quite sure of
himself. When he said “of course there are exceptions” he was
quoting Mr. Turton, while “increasing the izzat” was Major
Callendar’s own. The phrases worked and were in current use at the
club, but she was rather clever at detecting the first from the
second hand, and might press him for definite examples.
She only said, “I can’t deny that what you say sounds very sensible,
but you really must not hand on to Major Callendar anything I have
told you about Doctor Aziz.”
He felt disloyal to his caste, but he promised, adding, “In return
please don’t talk about Aziz to Adela.”
“Not talk about him? Why?”
“There you go again, mother—I really can’t explain every thing. I
don’t want Adela to be worried, that’s the fact; she’ll begin
wondering whether we treat the natives properly, and all that sort
of nonsense.”
“But she came out to be worried—that’s exactly why she’s here. She
discussed it all on the boat. We had a long talk when we went on
shore at Aden. She knows you in play, as she put it, but not in
work, and she felt she must come and look round, before she
decided—and before you decided. She is very, very fair-minded.”
“I know,” he said dejectedly.
The note of anxiety in his voice made her feel that he was still
a little boy, who must have what he liked, so she promised to do
as he wished, and they kissed good night. He had not forbidden her
to think about Aziz, however, and she did this when she retired to
her room. In the light of her son’s comment she reconsidered the
scene at the mosque, to see whose impression was correct. Yes, it
could be worked into quite an unpleasant scene. The doctor had
begun by bullying her, had said Mrs. Callendar was nice, and
then—finding the ground safe—had changed; he had alternately whined
over his grievances and patronized her, had run a dozen ways in a
single sentence, had been unreliable, inquisitive, vain. Yes, it
was all true, but how false as a summary of the man; the essential
life of him had been slain.
Going to hang up her cloak, she found that the tip of the peg was
occupied by a small wasp. She had known this wasp or his relatives
by day; they were not as English wasps, but had long yellow legs
which hung down behind when they flew. Perhaps he mistook the peg
for a branch—no Indian animal has any sense of an interior. Bats,
rats, birds, insects will as soon nest inside a house as out; it
is to them a normal growth of the eternal jungle, which alternately
produces houses trees, houses trees. There he clung, asleep, while
jackals in the plain bayed their desires and mingled with the
percussion of drums.
“Pretty dear,” said Mrs. Moore to the wasp. He did not wake, but
her voice floated out, to swell the night’s uneasiness.
CHAPTER IV
The Collector kept his word. Next day he issued invitation cards
to numerous Indian gentlemen in the neighbourhood, stating that he
would be at home in the garden of the club between the hours of
five and seven on the following Tuesday, also that Mrs. Turton
would be glad to receive any ladies of their families who were out
of purdah. His action caused much excitement and was discussed in
several worlds.
“It is owing to orders from the L.G.,” was Mahmoud Ali’s explanation.
“Turton would never do this unless compelled. Those high officials
are different—they sympathize, the Viceroy sympathizes, they would
have us treated properly. But they come too seldom and live too
far away. Meanwhile——”
“It is easy to sympathize at a distance,” said an old gentleman
with a beard. “I value more the kind word that is spoken close to
my ear. Mr. Turton has spoken it, from whatever cause. He speaks,
we hear. I do not see why we need discuss it further.” Quotations
followed from the Koran.
“We have not all your sweet nature, Nawab Bahadur, nor your
learning.”
“The Lieutenant-Governor may be my very good friend, but I give
him no trouble.—How do you do, Nawab Bahadur?—Quite well, thank
you, Sir Gilbert; how are you?—And all is over. But I can be a
thorn in Mr. Turton’s flesh, and if he asks me I accept the
invitation. I shall come in from Dilkusha specially, though I have
to postpone other business.”
“You will make yourself chip,” suddenly said a little black man.
There was a stir of disapproval. Who was this ill-bred upstart,
that he should criticize the leading Mohammedan landowner of the
district? Mahmoud Ali, though sharing his opinion, felt bound to
oppose it. “Mr. Ram Chand!” he said, swaying forward stiffly with
his hands on his hips.
“Mr. Mahmoud Ali!”
“Mr. Ram Chand, the Nawab Bahadur can decide what is cheap without
our valuation, I think.”
“I do not expect I shall make myself cheap,” said the Nawab Bahadur
to Mr. Ram Chand, speaking very pleasantly, for he was aware that
the man had been impolite and he desired to shield him from the
consequences. It had passed through his mind to reply, “I expect
I shall make myself cheap,” but he rejected this as the less
courteous alternative. “I do not see why we should make ourselves
cheap. I do not see why we should. The invitation is worded very
graciously.” Feeling that he could not further decrease the social
gulf between himself and his auditors, he sent his elegant grandson,
who was in attendance on him, to fetch his car. When it came, he
repeated all that he had said before, though at greater length,
ending up with “Till Tuesday, then, gentlemen all, when I hope we
may meet in the flower gardens of the club.”
This opinion carried great weight. The Nawab Bahadur was a big
proprietor and a philanthropist, a man of benevolence and decision.
His character among all the communities in the province stood high.
He was a straightforward enemy and a staunch friend, and his
hospitality was proverbial. “Give, do not lend; after death who
will thank you?” was his favourite remark. He held it a disgrace
to die rich. When such a man was prepared to motor twenty-five
miles to shake the Collector’s hand, the entertainment took another
aspect. For he was not like some eminent men, who give out that
they will come, and then fail at the last moment, leaving the small
fry floundering. If he said he would come, he would come, he would
never deceive his supporters. The gentlemen whom he had lectured
now urged one another to attend the party, although convinced at
heart that his advice was unsound.
He had spoken in the little room near the Courts where the pleaders
waited for clients; clients, waiting for pleaders, sat in the dust
outside. These had not received a card from Mr. Turton. And there
were circles even beyond these—people who wore nothing but a
loincloth, people who wore not even that, and spent their lives in
knocking two sticks together before a scarlet doll—humanity grading
and drifting beyond the educated vision, until no earthly invitation
can embrace it.
All invitations must proceed from heaven perhaps; perhaps it is
futile for men to initiate their own unity, they do but widen the
gulfs between them by the attempt. So at all events thought old
Mr. Graysford and young Mr. Sorley, the devoted missionaries who
lived out beyond the slaughterhouses, always travelled third on
the railways, and never came up to the club. In our Father’s house
are many mansions, they taught, and there alone will the incompatible
multitudes of mankind be welcomed and soothed. Not one shall be
turned away by the servants on that verandah, be he black or white,
not one shall be kept standing who approaches with a loving heart.
And why should the divine hospitality cease here? Consider, with
all reverence, the monkeys. May there not be a mansion for the
monkeys also? Old Mr. Graysford said No, but young Mr. Sorley, who
was advanced, said Yes; he saw no reason why monkeys should not
have their collateral share of bliss, and he had sympathetic
discussions about them with his Hindu friends. And the jackals?
Jackals were indeed less to Mr. Sorley’s mind, but he admitted that
the mercy of God, being infinite, may well embrace all mammals.
And the wasps? He became uneasy during the descent to wasps, and
was apt to change the conversation. And oranges, cactuses, crystals
and mud? and the bacteria inside Mr. Sorley? No, no, this is going
too far. We must exclude someone from our gathering, or we shall
be left with nothing.
CHAPTER V
The Bridge Party was not a success—at least it was not what Mrs.
Moore and Miss Quested were accustomed to consider a successful
party. They arrived early, since it was given in their honour, but
most of the Indian guests had arrived even earlier, and stood
massed at the farther side of the tennis lawns, doing nothing.
“It is only just five,” said Mrs. Turton. “My husband will be up
from his office in a moment and start the thing. I have no idea
what we have to do. It’s the first time we’ve ever given a party
like this at the club. Mr. Heaslop, when I’m dead and gone will
you give parties like this? It’s enough to make the old type of
Burra Sahib turn in his grave.”
Ronny laughed deferentially. “You wanted something not picturesque
and we’ve provided it,” he remarked to Miss Quested. “What do you
think of the Aryan Brother in a topi and spats?”
Neither she nor his mother answered. They were gazing rather sadly
over the tennis lawn. No, it was not picturesque; the East,
abandoning its secular magnificence, was descending into a valley
whose farther side no man can see.
“The great point to remember is that no one who’s here matters;
those who matter don’t come. Isn’t that so, Mrs. Turton?”
“Absolutely true,” said the great lady, leaning back. She was
“saving herself up,” as she called it—not for anything that would
happen that afternoon or even that week, but for some vague future
occasion when a high official might come along and tax her social
strength. Most of her public appearances were marked by this air
of reserve.
Assured of her approbation, Ronny continued: “The educated Indians
will be no good to us if there’s a row, it’s simply not worth while
conciliating them, that’s why they don’t matter. Most of the people
you see are seditious at heart, and the rest ’ld run squealing.
The cultivator—he’s another story. The Pathan—he’s a man if you
like. But these people—don’t imagine they’re India.” He pointed to
the dusky line beyond the court, and here and there it flashed a
pince-nez or shuffled a shoe, as if aware that he was despising
it. European costume had lighted like a leprosy. Few had yielded
entirely, but none were untouched. There was a silence when he had
finished speaking, on both sides of the court; at least, more
ladies joined the English group, but their words seemed to die as
soon as uttered. Some kites hovered overhead, impartial, over the
kites passed the mass of a vulture, and with an impartiality
exceeding all, the sky, not deeply coloured but translucent, poured