Nelycinda and Other Stories

By Susan Visvanathan

Susan Visvanathan is Professor of Sociology at Jawaharlal Nehru University. She is the author of The Christians of Kerala; Friendship, Interiority and Mysticism; and The Children of Nature. Her books of fiction include Something Barely Remembered, The Visiting Moon, Phosphorous and Stone, and The Seine at Noon.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Roli Books
• Release date: Oct 18, 2012
• ISBN: 9789351940258

Book preview

‘You know the terror that for poets lurks

Beyond the ferry when to Minos brought.’

W.H. Auden (From Letter to Lord Byron)

Nelycinda

1/20

We set sail from Hormuz; it was dark, and the waters rent the air with a loud and terrible noise. Egypt lay behind us, and India ahead. The whale was behind us now, and so were the blue skies. Food was in plenty since we had stored bananas, which we dipped in batter and fried in hot oil that sputtered to the sound of water. There were pineapples too, and sweet coconut water, which we had left in the hold for several years without spoiling.

We sailed over water that was so deep and dead that it had no depth. Whales appeared; we speared them and ate flesh of fish, flaccid and white, for weeks after that. The days were without end, and no one realized that one year had come to an end, and another had begun.

Nelycind was still weeks away. Muziris had appeared in the first dawn of morning, chill and sunny, with trees looming before us without end, the perennial season of coconuts hanging heavy like heads, which had been decapitated from the bodies of men. We had seen that, too, in the warm desperate days of haggling for hot bodies in ports, the hot bodies of slaves in Arab and African ports. Our memories of those bloody fights were as coarse as the imagination could serve. We were guilty. Not like the slave traders were, but guilty nonetheless, for we had sought battles after tedious weary days at sea, as if they were food for the limbs of the mind. Those slaves were sold like yams in a country market. They lay tied and trussed like goats for slaughter, their hands, legs, wrists, arms and necks bearing striations like those on tapioca stalks, knobbly, strange, goat horns of time amid the tangle of teeth and torso. I think of those markets with fear and loathing, for some of those slaves, —black children of strange fathers and lost mothers—were untied and brought to our boats for pleasure. I flagellate myself, my monkhood disrobed by these thoughts, but then, we are witnesses to history, describing death and life with equal felicity.

Our cargo was, among other things, last year’s pepper, and our payment was in gold coins, amphorae of beetroot wine— cheaper than grapes—that stained the teeth, and was had in sunny sea-side towns, as easily as salad oil in the countries which turned the coast at the heel of the shoe. We travelled this way and that, unafraid of the tides, of the rain, of the hot sharp stench of sudden death. We were the bringers of songs and perfumes, of light cotton and linen, of goat’s meat and sheep’s wool. Sometimes, we forgot to speak, lulled by the sound of water, and the questions we could not ask one another, we forgot to speak. We left everything for the last, sitting on the dry sand, near clear blue water, waiting for the boats to take us to the ships.

In some odd way, my ravaged past appeared before my eyes, ancient in the sense that manuscripts and irises of eyes caught the tinge of the sea, rimmed in blue ink, sometimes providing anodyne to the soul. The warm winds were trapped in the warp and weft of tides, rain would fall, we would be caught for a while in the coldness that could descend in the tropics when the sea smouldered. Romans we were, to the last hot breath, waiting for the tide to turn, longing to see the egrets which would bring us news of fresh water and the sound of boats swishing on the surface like the sarongs of the women. Nelycind was where the heart was at peace, where the Pamba awaited us, where the gnarled knots of trees were polished by waiting into fine furniture, and the reeds in the river floated alongside the black water snakes, and where the women swore they were faithful to us. Our religion was the same as theirs, and the Greek they spoke to us as rough as the fishermen’s Greek in those of our lands where the Lord’s word was remembered. By the sign of Pisces they made themselves known, and swore fidelity to their saint, Thoma, who had brought them news of the Lord. The Lord’s going was now more than a century, a hundred years of war and death and blood, but to us, who believed, the time of tomorrow was never fearsome.

Nelycind was where I had left my tunic and sandals, at the house of a merchant. His home was made of wood. It had rained every night when I slept there last year in the month of Augustus. Coconuts fell with a sound that would have woken armies from their troubled sleep, but the family of Thoman, the merchant, slept soundly. They fed me the food of their forefathers, sang for me their lullabies of the wisdom of King Solomon of whom they knew much. They feared nothing, not even my speeches on the world that was to come. The sweetness of their rice fields and their mango orchards was sufficient for them, making their sugar from dates brought on ships from far away countries of which they knew little.

‘How do you know the songs of Solomon, if you knew nothing about his land?’

‘Songs come with wanderers,’ Thoman said, smiling at me a little foolishly for he hated being asked questions. ‘Tell me about your country and your name for God.’

I was aghast by his question, but then, he lived like Indians do, with many others for friends.

And so, several months passed in the company of wise people. They were farmers and the pepper vines with the heart-shaped leaves grew around the trees; the pepper itself was green at first, like tiny well-rounded grapes—small, hard and clustered, then like stones dried by the sun, white inside, black outside, and when crushed they released the aroma we craved in our food. Far out at sea, on my return home through the green waters of the Aegean, where monsters lay in wait for us, goring us as we slept with their slimy horned tales, the fragrance of pepper would haunt me into wakening. I would reach out for the sea snake, pull out its hot and steamy tongue, and then I would vomit green and terrible bile into the silver spittoon. My eyes would open, I would see the stars embellishing the sky, lovely women would appear, each as distant as the cold moon, and I would look away, for the custom was that we could never marry or bear children, and so, were free to celebrate the Lord’s body. I had always been a religious child; boys who served the Christ were not many. We lived in small bands, singing songs and learning the rituals, which would save the world from poverty. Poverty of the spirit, I mean. We were never short of food, and what we sought in our travels was the strangeness of new worlds. If we could not fly to the moon, or scorch the sun, then the waters of these new lands beckoned and we were slaves to the idea of new worlds. Of course, the world was flat, and we could fall off it. Had not Pythagoras said that our behaviour should be such that were we to bear children, we should look after them? And so it was that men like me did not marry. We had not the wherewithal to form bonds of consequence.

Nelycinda

2/20

Thoman’s daughter was a fine-boned woman, with the face of Rome, but the dark sheen of skin which was her country’s delight. That darkness haunted the old priest, who thought of her often, not licentiously it may be hoped, but with the wisdom of his age and circumstance. He often spoke to her, while she served her father and him the fatted meat of her courtyard—the screeching of the cock heard the previous night, the green feathers lying in abandon in the morning, the feast foretold by the weathered, webbed feet lying upright and forgotten in the corner. The black cat with the white vest of fur, which followed her out plaintively, would feast on the dreadful innards of dead bird that she threw out, lungs and giblets. These she gave to him as he arched his spine and lusted for more, purring all the while. They could hear the crows, the splashing of fish in the stream that adjoined the house, the thud of the flat heavy knife on the bones of the rooster who would never again crow in the morning as the sun rose. And the price of pepper rent his skull in the complex calculations of weight and gold, while the fragrance of hot soup, cooked by spilt blood came to them. They had spinach, which he had never seen, and Roman beetroot coloured the tongue. He tried to take the wild spinach back with him, but they would not allow him, saying that his land was too cold for it. They were careful about everything, not permitting wastage of the smallest tendril. They counted everything most carefully, assured that any waste would bring sorrow to the family. The cat waited upon them at meal times, fed surreptitiously, by a woman’s delicate hand, as she caressed its head under the table. Sometimes he would claw her while he waited for the next morsel. She ate with the men, because her mother was dead, and not only did she cook and clean, she kept accounts and could describe last year’s losses and loads in exact terms of Greek. Koyne, fishermen’s Greek, is what they chose to write in. And sometimes they spoke of the Lord who had visited them in dreams, wearing robes of red and gold, carrying a sceptre, and a lamb. He had sent seventy families, so they had heard, but two years had passed since, and there was no sign of them. Thomas the trader, Thomas, of Cana, whom they knew so well, had promised to accompany them, but the world was an unknown place, full of fears and false promises. Three hundred years had passed since the servant of the Lord had brought news of him to them. The old monk who bought pepper from them always said ‘hundred’, but his sense of time was as lacking as his head for money, always charging them more and gawking at her as if he were a donkey let out among the cows.

The cat cried in the rain, asking to return to his warm place near the fire, where the blackened pots hung on nails, blocking the breeze from the soot-encrusted windows, but he had been lured to a far-off place by those who craved a good night’s sleep freed from his mating calls, but Susa looked for him everywhere, never finding him. She decided that if that was his destiny so be it, but her heart wept for the cat as if he were human. There was no saying in her mind whether he was dead or alive; she knew that he would always be hers in memory, and that her grandchildren would weep if they knew he was truly gone. They had come back from their other grandmother’s house, and not finding their pet, had gone out to play, believing he would return.

It rained for many days, and the cat could not find its way home. Dogs chased it, other cats refused shelter, so many lifetimes it lived in the short duration of its time on earth. Cossetted at home, but always longing to run away in search of adventure, fed poisoned meat by someone who hated him instinctively. He was bored by love, always seeking new conquests, and as long as he was monarch of his home there was no problem. But the further he went, the stranger he got, and the more vulnerable he became to wind and fog and hunger and the last racking heat of impending death. Meanwhile, Susa waited, not knowing his fate. She was used to waiting. There was no alternative to love but waiting. Seeds in the ground took ages to germinate, four months almost if it was not the rainy season, and children took ages to grow, and as for death, one could hunger for the end of time, but Jesus would take forever to come! They all waited for Jesus’ return. It was the only thing that made their days worthwhile. They could imagine him, for they had been told… long black hair, earth-coloured skin, short as Didymus. The Roman priest with the black hood had another picture. Tall, fair, gold haired: that is what they said in his country.

Susa remembered her mother’s stories of Alexander, who had never come so far south. But all the traders knew of him and Porus, and the Scythians and Parthians who were always at war. The caravans went far north, down the Hindu Kush mountains and then by sea, hugging the coast till they reached Malabar. Oh yes, they could return with the traders by the old routes if they wished. But the newer routes the Romans had found were much quicker, though it was hard for the women to be billeted in boats, with the soldiers and the traders. Occasionally a woman would go, but she returned soon enough complaining of the sea’s turbulence, and advising others from venturing out. ‘Marriage is sufficiently a sea crossing’ was the formula the women used when they wedded the traders.

Susa’s husband Yakub was a large hairy man, full of his own sense of self-worth, dealing not in pepper and cottons as she did, but in silks and gold. He had a warehouse near the beach, and never walked to his shop. Slaves carried him, and while they groaned under his weight, he drank fine wine, and read notes on papyrus that the sailors brought him from Cairo. He travelled often to make up for his laziness at home.

‘Where are you going?’ Susa would ask softly when she saw him packing his linens.

‘Rome.’ He would say without explanation.

‘Why?’

‘I have some work there.’

She minded her business, not understanding his, waiting for him past the monsoon, and then when he did return, her heart would be calm again. They never exchanged a word, and he always preferred to leave matters of the house to her, knowing that her loyalty to her father would keep the pepper prices on the standard. But who would follow the silk? Not her; she loathed the ghosts of dead butterflies who had never been born.

The young slave whom they had hired in their youth was now an old man with many children. He was ancient; slavery bestowed years on those who served others. Susa was dependent on him for everything—advice, hot broth, loans of gold coins from the business that she put back before her husband returned for he demanded an explanation from her for everything. Kurup was dark and handsome, with hair that grew springing like a bush from his forehead. He had a torso like gnarled tree trunks, scarred from falling out of trees when he was a boy. His father was their kinsman, and not having changed his religion, he had remained outside their clan. They still spoke of Thomas’ arrival in hushed tones. Three hundred years had not made a difference. It was like yesterday. A day clouded by rain and lit by the sun in the way that blue skies could turn grey and pink at the end of a hard day’s work. The boat floating on the water like a leaf. The old man in his thick double-woven robes with the face rendered rugged by the years, getting off into the golden swan of the shore. Somewhere the peacocks crowed though it was not yet dark, and the children’s shouts through the groves came to a halt. Dogs barked, and the houses were lit by early candles since the sky had gone dim. The old man was welcomed by Esau and Sarah, and by Mathen, son of Bilal. They were the merchants who kept the synagogue fire alive, and they had news of Thomas’ arrival. For centuries the Jews had lived here, arriving with pearls and coins and the Torah. Thomas the Apostle knew that he would find friends who had knowledge of Jesus’ last years. They helped him with food and introductions to the kings in every part of the land. Then said they would not join him in his prayers because the time was not right for them. This they remembered though three hundred years had passed.

Susa was frightened of the silence that followed from Yakub’s departure. No dreams were sufficient for her, nor advice from her mother-in-law, before she died, that if she accompanied him to Rome she could begin trading in gems as well. Her son was now able to travel with her husband, but refused, saying that someone had to stay at home with his mother. Her daughters lived in faraway villages, coming for the seasons of harvest when the rice became golden stalks in the fields. They had small children with them who were happy to stay with Susa while their mothers reaped. The two festivals of Christmas and Easter framed their stay, beginning with one and closing with the other. Easter marked New Beginnings, and they returned to their own homes, taking gifts of fried bread soaked in date honey.

‘Goodbye, Mother!’ they would shout, as the cows called in the sheds, content with new hay. Susa would hold the fat bodies of her little grandchildren slightly longer.

She gave them food for the journey, each setting off in a different direction.

‘Come back to me soon,’ she would reply softly, but the girls would laugh, because once they returned to their husbands there was no saying when they would be allowed to return.

Kurup was responsible for making sure they reached safely and to this purpose he had called his own sons to drive the carts that would go over hills and through forests and by the side of innumerable streams—all in a day. Nothing was too far, but it was a difficult, tiring day, hot, without any stops for food or rest. In the evening when Susa put out food for her mother- and father-in-law, she would imagine her daughters safely in their own homes, and in the morning the carts would return laden with bananas and coconuts from her sons, made in marriage with her daughters. She had no need for gifts and gave them away to whoever came to her door, and many people did. Her world was a very silent one, for she found speech difficult, and so welcomed people with a smile and a nod of her head, usually saying nothing.

Alexander had travelled through the hot plains, and returned with the fugues of a hotter illness, that drove him mad with fever. They say that Susa was one of his favourite cities. When he returned it was with the intent of living there, but then Porus had already had his revenge; lost the battle, but won the war, as they say. The fevers were frequent among all of them, but with Alexander of the curly head and the vacant eyes, —for battle made men’s eyes look inward, —there was no hope for staying on in India. He loved the yellow flowers born of heat, and the dusty plains, and the perfect blues of the rivers, so many of them, each with a different name, though the source was the same. Of course, the traders married among each other, and the descent of Porus to the south Indian hills was possible only because of the sea, and the journeys of Arabs and Mediterranean peoples in search of pepper. They came by caravan route from the mountains, through the snow-laden peaks, where breath fell short, and survivors longed to return. And then past the sand dunes, back to the sea, where the colours were so similar they could not see the horizon, and the mirage made men go mad, and women stayed inside till it was nightfall and the sun disappeared and the bright stars came out, so many that the children fell asleep counting them.

From the desert to the sea was not that far, and the salt was worthy of any man’s reputation as a trader. Cloth and glass was also had in exchange for gold, and salted fish filled the bottom of the boat, enough to sell in exchange for indigo further ashore. And then months of lonely travel, and they would arrive in Malabar. So that was India, and the sons of Porus and Alexander, given in loveless marriages to women who brought them wealth, would find themselves with the faces that the Romans found so familiar right along the coast at every turn.

Susan was called so after her mother, who in turn was named after hers, and all the daughters following Susan would have the same name. Susa was the city that they remembered when the bread fell short, and the dates could not be harvested because of untoward rain. The rice was not like the corn, the fish were smaller, and the coconut harvest depended on the loyalty of slaves, well-fed like themselves, but completely hostile to them. She did not blame them; Samoha was several whales’ breath away from Nineveh and Susa. They had never needed to cross one another’s path, but that the wind blew them here and there. The boats of the Samohans were different from their own,