The Henna Artist(80)

I stood at the window for a long time. Thought about what I had just given up for a few minutes of righteous anger. I’d slept with her husband. I’d made contraceptive sachets for him. I had no right to the high moral ground.

From the corner of my eye, I saw a postman walking to my house from the other end of the street. He was coming for me, like a homing pigeon.

I ran to my front gate, heedless of the rain. Before he could tell me I had a telegram, I snatched it from him and tore it open.

It was from Radha.

All it said was, Come. Now. Auntie needs you.





      PART FOUR





      EIGHTEEN


    Shimla, Himalaya Foothills, India

September 2, 1956


“When I close my eyes, all I see is Auntie’s sari dripping blood.” Radha sobbed into my neck. “Dr. Kumar said her baby had stopped breathing. Days ago. Her body was trying to get rid of it, but she tried to stop it from happening.”

I stroked my sister’s arm as we sat on a hospital bed opposite Kanta’s. Radha had filled out, and not just around her middle. Her arms were plumper. Her face was heavier. How different she looked from the girl who had showed up in Jaipur last November!

“You did the right thing to call Dr. Kumar right away. She might have died of blood poisoning,” I whispered into her hair.

Tubes ran from Kanta’s arm to bottles hanging upside down above her bed. The bulging belly I’d expected to see—she’d been in her ninth month—was gone. Huddled under the blankets, Kanta looked small and frail. Manu was sleeping in another room, on an empty bed. He had driven all night to get us to Shimla.

Radha hiccupped. I handed her my handkerchief and she blew her nose.

When I first arrived, she’d cried out, like a child. “Jiji!”

Without hesitating, I’d wrapped my arms around her, as tightly as her pregnant belly would allow. She was shaking. “It’s all right. It’s going to be fine,” I’d said. Dr. Kumar, who had led me to my sister, told me he had given her something for the shock when she had brought Kanta in the night before.

“This place frightens me,” my sister was saying. “All these nurses with serious faces and starched caps who call each other ‘Sister,’ even though they’re not. My baby must think the whole world smells like the bottom of a medicine bottle.” She sniffed. “I prayed to Krishna every day at Jakhu Temple, Jiji. Prayed that our babies would have their naming ceremonies together. Eat their first cooked rice at the same party. Share their toys. I know I wasn’t supposed to, but I couldn’t help imagining the babies growing up together.” Radha nestled into my neck, her tears wetting my sari.

This was what Dr. Kumar had been talking about in his letters. Radha’s baby had become real to her; their separation would be unbearable. But I held my tongue. I couldn’t remember the last time Radha had needed me like this. I didn’t want her to let go.

She made a choking sound, and I pulled away to see what was wrong. She was staring at me in astonishment. Her mouth opened but no words came out. She clutched her belly and let out a deafening scream.



* * *



As he had the first time I’d met him, Dr. Kumar’s eyes studied several objects in the waiting room—the metal table, the leather chairs, the faded photograph of Lady Bradley—before coming to rest on me. “Seven pounds, give or take an ounce. He’s small but perfectly healthy. A boy. Radha is doing fine. She’ll need time to recover from the stitches.”

I covered my mouth with cupped hands, sighing in relief. She was fine! My little sister was fine! I fought the urge to hug Dr. Kumar. To my surprise, I felt a burst of pride and wonder: Radha has a son! No sooner had I thought it than I tamped it down, deep. What was I thinking? That baby was now the property of the palace!

I dropped my hands. “Where is he now?”

“The nurses are cleaning him. After that, as you instructed, they will put him in the nursery.”

I nodded. “And Kanta? How is she?”

His eyes shifted to the batik print of an elephant and rider on the wall behind me. “Her organs weren’t compromised. And we’re taking care of the infection. There’s a—I didn’t want to tell her, but Mrs. Agarwal insisted.” Dr. Kumar looked at his hands. “She will not be able to have children. Her body has undergone a major trauma.”

Oh, Kanta. I put a hand on my chest to steady my heartbeat. “Perhaps your medicine is better, after all, Dr. Kumar. None of my herbs helped her keep the baby.”

“I doubt she could have conceived without your help.”

A nurse entered the room and handed the doctor a cup of tea. He offered it to me and asked the nurse for another. “Take it, Mrs. Shastri. Please. You look as if you haven’t slept.”

I took the cup gratefully. “The altitude doesn’t agree with me. And that winding road up the Himalayas. Now I know why people take the train.”

“I’m glad you made it,” he said, looking at his shoes. “Safely.”

The nurse brought another steaming cup, which he accepted. The skin under his eyes was puffy; he’d been up all night, too.

“I want to show you something,” Dr. Kumar said. He led me down the hall and out the double doors to a garden. We were closer to the sun here, in the Himalayas; the light was so bright it hurt my eyes. I had to wait a moment for them to adjust, and then I managed, just, to squint, taking in the pink roses, blue hibiscus and orange bougainvillea surrounding us.