The Sleeping Dictionary Read online

  “Do you mean for me to return there now without my baby?” Through my pain, another feeling was emerging. It was protection.

  “Of course! That has always been the plan,” Mummy said in a friendly way, but with an expression that didn’t match. “Hazel can stay here with Jayshree through the early years. After that, you may pay for her schooling somewhere. Literate girls are more attractive. In fact . . .”

  I lost the rest of what Mummy said because yellow spots were appearing behind my eyes. I had never been so angry. Mummy must have sensed my distress because all of a sudden she stopped speaking but waved her fingers and swept out.

  Lina came in straight afterward, carrying the flask of boiled water in one hand and my bundled baby in the crook of her other arm. Dr. DeCruz chided her for the casual manner in which Hazel was being handled and took the baby from her and placed her into my arms. Then he fiddled with some milk powder and a glass bottle that were in his doctor’s big leather bag. He said the drink was too hot; it would have to wait twenty minutes before Hazel could take it.

  I could barely pay attention to his lesson in making and serving baby milk because I finally had the chance to examine my daughter. How well she looked. The thin mat of hair I remembered had grown into a robust thatch of dark brown curls. Her pale, plump arms waved in the air as the doctor tapped at them. I thought how perfect her lashes were, surrounding eyes that were lotus-shaped like mine but so much lighter; there was green mixed with the golden brown. I wondered if this color would stay or change as years went on. I wanted to know. I had not wanted this child while she was in me, but now that I’d seen her, I felt as if there was a magical silken cord knotting us together.

  The doctor ordered Lina to leave the room. After we were alone, he closed the door and said, “I want to ask you something in confidence. Do you wish to leave your child to be raised here?”

  I looked at him, trying to sense if this was a kind of test Mummy had asked him to use with me. And how did he know about my true secret feelings?

  The doctor’s voice was soft. “Leaving her here is not your only choice. I can help.”

  My body collapsed with relief, and the words rushed out of me. “Doctor, I cannot keep her with these people. I would rather us both die than that happen!”

  “You shouldn’t stay here, either, but I know that you won’t be able to find any kind of decent home or work for yourself with babe in arms. That is why I want to bring Hazel to a very good home.” The doctor reached into his case and withdrew a crisp paper.

  It was an official birth certificate issued by the Railway Hospital. On it was typed the name Hazel Mary Smith, Date of Birth 15 May 1938, Bengal Nagpur Railway Hospital, Khargpur. Race Anglo-Indian. John Smith was listed as deceased father, nationality, English. I was listed as Pamela Barker, mother born 1920, Anglo-Indian.

  “She is so fair, nobody has to know that you are Indian,” Dr. DeCruz said, when I looked up at him in dismay. “It’s only to make things easier for her.”

  “Who is this Mr. Smith?” I felt confused. “And you know that I did not give birth at the hospital!”

  “I typed and signed this all myself.” Dr. DeCruz’s gaze was stern. “If the document is used outside Kharagpur limits, no one will think to challenge it. The child is obviously Anglo-Indian.”

  “Where will our home be?” How much I wanted a real home; it was all that I had longed for, ever since the tidal wave.

  Stroking his silver-black mustache, Dr. DeCruz said, “I shall bring Hazel to one of the church homes for Anglo-Indian children in the hills. In these places, Anglo-Indian children receive housing, food, and religious education. She will be cared for until maturity.”

  The idea of the strange place, so far away, was frightening, but it did not sound as if Hazel would be made into a servant. And at a school, I might be allowed to tutor or teach, especially if I managed to get the Cambridge certificate. Hesitantly, I asked, “May I live and work at this place, too?”

  “No. These schools bring up children in a completely English fashion, so they are never confused as to their identity. Hazel is quite lucky to qualify for a place like this. Many of the children get scholarships that lead to higher education and good jobs in the railways and schools and even hospitals.”

  I shivered, thinking about how my daughter might grow up to become like one of the Anglo-Indian nurses at the Railway Hospital. If she saw me on the street, she would recognize me only as a native below her. Should she ever learn that she was my flesh and blood, she would weep. Pushing down my sorrow, I spoke carefully. “There is so much to think about. I must make sure my baby is getting enough milk and growing strong. She needs my care and cannot travel now.”

  “And you are still recovering!” Dr. DeCruz said, his voice smooth in the same way as when he prepared me for my life in prostitution. “Take all the time you need to heal, Pamela. When you are of sound mind and body, the right decision will be obvious.”

  He had spoken of a school in the hills; but what kind of school would take an infant less than a month old? I studied the doctor, thinking that he could do anything he pleased with her. He might be planning to sell or give her to an Anglo-Indian family. Because I would have no further contact with her, I’d never know.

  The baby made a rude noise, breaking my train of thought.

  Dr. DeCruz laughed. “Hazel may be ready for the bottle now. What do you think?”

  “Let me try.” I tilted the bottle again, and her rosebud lips fluttered against it a few times. But then she took it, and as she drank, her eyes looked up at me. It was as if she were saying, This does not make any sense, but I am doing it for you.

  “She’s a clever little one.” Dr. DeCruz sounded approving. “Now, before she spits on it, I’ll take back her birth certificate.”

  “Here you are.” I handed it to him, and watched it disappear into his deep leather bag, thinking that this would be all he’d ever get of the girl he’d named Hazel Mary Smith.

  CHAPTER

  17

  FUGITIVE: 1. Apt or tending to flee; given to, or in the act of, running away.

  —Oxford English Dictionary, Vol. 4, 1933

  There was so much to do for my daughter that I could hardly keep track. Fortunately, Lina helped: reminding me when to take my medicine, bringing water and the baby’s milk, and washing the baby’s and my laundry. I thanked her over and over, knowing that, without her, both the baby and I would fail. Then a large box from Rose Villa was delivered. It contained baby clothes, skin cream for me, and at the bottom of the basket, one hundred rupees hidden inside a bottle. The congratulations card was from Lucky-Short-for-Lakshmi. I was overwhelmed by the kindness of the gift and hoped Lucky would come to see the baby.

  The hundred rupees were more than enough to get passage to Calcutta. But it would not be enough to pay rent for a decent place, to buy food, and to pay for school fees, although how could I even attend school with a baby? I wished so much for advice from Bidushi, because she understood money and knew a little about Calcutta. But now I would have to rely on Lucky. After the first big gift, I waited in vain for her to come. When she stayed away, I realized she must be under orders to do so. Mummy wouldn’t like Lucky or any of the girls to feel the kind of maternal yearnings that could lead to a professional mistake.

  Out of the money Lucky had gifted me, I paid Lina ten annas each week with strict instructions to hide it for herself. I told her she might want to leave the brothel someday; that to clean houses or care for a family’s babies might be better suited to her nature. Lina said nothing but looked as if she were thinking about it.

  TWENTY-ONE DAYS WAS all the time I had left before returning to Rose Villa. And I found that as much as I had wanted to get out of the dancing girls’ house, I regretted the end date coming because of leaving my daughter. I could not leave her with Jayshree; nor did I want to give her to Dr. DeCruz. I avoided thinking about them, instead spending hours memorizing her small face with its sparking green-gold ey
es. The eyes had made me fall in love and dream of how beautifully and happily she might grow.

  As a girl, I used to hide in an imaginary gold almirah; as a mother, the sanctuary of my dreams changed into a tall white bungalow. In such a home, I imagined that my daughter would inhale only good smells: saffron from rice at the table, jasmine from the garlands twined in her hair, and ink from her school notebook. How different it would be from this brothel, where we were always on the run from the opium fumes that curled their way under my door if people smoked nearby.

  As my strength improved, I was able to do more for my child. I bathed her several times each day and, afterward, rubbed her skin with mustard oil until it gleamed. I sent Lina to the bazar to buy the baby tiny cotton smocks, and I made nappies and swaddling cloths from my own old saris. The brothel women called this frivolous waste and said that the baby was too young to hear stories. But she fed beautifully when I recited poems. And that joy she gave me led to my understanding of what her first name should be: Kabita, which meant poem. Her middle name was Lina, after the little girl who had saved us both.

  Dear Kabita! Sweet Kabita! I whispered into her tiny pink shell of an ear, willing her to do the improbable and learn her name to hold inside her always.

  Twenty-one days shrank to eleven and then to only five. I knew that I could not linger on, yet I knew I could not give Kabita up to Jayshree or Dr. DeCruz. Surely there was a better situation. A bud of an idea grew secretly inside me, just like Kabita had. And just like before, there was no one I dared tell.

  I WAS NERVOUS to leave Kabita on the day of my medical appointment with Dr. DeCruz; but I feared bringing her with me would be more dangerous, lest the doctor seize her from my arms. So I kept her home under Lina’s care.

  As I’d expected, Dr. DeCruz immediately asked for Kabita when I stepped into his chambers. After I assured him she was only home due to a cold, he bade me to his table and swiftly removed the stitches that he had placed. “I did something for you,” he said briskly. “I stitched in a way that it appears your hymen is still intact. You can make your debut again before returning to your profession.”

  I stared at him, not believing it. How could I pretend to be a novice after all that had happened? I was a woman of eighteen years, and my face was not that of a child anymore. Nor did he understand that the baby had changed me, and I had finally gained the strength not to return to Rose Villa. He had thought prostitution was not the life for Kabita: why would he recommend it for me?

  Dr. DeCruz was talking about Hazel again and holding out a certificate of relinquishment for me to sign and date. Dutifully, I signed Pamela Barker but marked it for the next day.

  “That’s a bit of a delay.” When the doctor frowned, the edges of his mustache drooped. “You see, I have a nun waiting to escort the baby tonight.”

  I tried to look sorry, and I said that the brothel would be very busy that evening with many drunken customers, and that Jayshree and Tilak could easily enlist some of these ruffians to prevent Hazel’s departure. In a respectful tone, I said, “Could you please come for her tomorrow before noon, when the customers and ruffians are gone? It will be quiet and safe, and I can leave at the same time for Rose Villa.”

  Dr. DeCruz didn’t look pleased, but he nodded. “Very well, then, I’ll come tomorrow around ten in the morning. With the nun.”

  As the doctor stepped out of the room so I could dress privately, he left his instruments on a tray and the folder of papers next to it. I opened the folder, seeing notes about the birth and my health condition going back to the time I’d come to Kharagpur, the relinquishment statement I’d just signed, and underneath it, my baby’s birth certificate. The relinquishment I would later tear to bits, but the birth certificate was a different matter. It proclaimed my baby the daughter of an Englishman, something that would give her chances at many schools and jobs: a life better than my own.

  Slipping both papers into my bag, I finished dressing and left the room. In the front reception area, I said a polite good-bye to his nurse-receptionist. I had been a model patient. I doubted that Dr. DeCruz would look for the papers until it was too late.

  THAT AFTERNOON, I went into the Gole Bazar and bought baby frocks in larger sizes, another bottle, and more milk powder. Then I went to a sari shop, where I found two durable cotton saris suitable for an ordinary housewife. Then, in a Muslim shop, I ignored the curious expression of the shop owner and purchased a black burka. I could think of no better disguise for the task I had ahead.

  When I returned to my room, Kabita was screaming. Lina handed her to me with apologies, but I told her not to worry. Inside, I felt more confident than I had in years. After I’d settled Kabita, I slid out the suitcase I’d brought from Rose Villa. I packed all the books I still had and the few European dresses and saris that did not seem too gaudy for my future life.

  As I’d told Dr. DeCruz, it was a busy night at the brothel: the end of a pay fortnight for the men who worked in the railway yards and workshops. I kept out of sight but heard them laughing as usual. The men trouped upstairs with the women, and it always seemed just as one pair were settled, someone new would announce his entry with shouts at the door. Matters were complicated when Jayshree demanded use of my room for the customer overflow, as she did from time to time.

  Kabita and I were banished to the children’s sleeping room. I asked Lina and her brother to take my suitcase out to the hallway and hide it under a table with a long cloth. They easily accepted the story I told them about wanting to keep my things safe from the strangers in my room.

  I stayed in the room that Lina and the other children shared, telling them stories until they all slept; my words were calm, but inside I was not. Not until four in the morning did I tiptoe downstairs with my baby and her bundle of things. My suitcase was still under the table. I unlocked it to take out the burka I’d bought, and put it over my simple sleeping sari. Now that I was dressed, I went outside with Kabita and the suitcase, closing the door softly behind me. My heart pounded fiercely, for the journey had begun.

  The man who had taken me to the hospital was sleeping in his rickshaw as usual, but I decided that I could not risk his recognizing my voice through my disguise. So I waited in the shadows with Kabita strapped to me with a scarf under the burka. When a tonga stopped at another brothel to drop off an early customer, I hurried out and negotiated a fee for a ride to the station. As I rode off, I looked through the narrow slit in my black veil at the slum to which I would never return. How ugly it was: full of women’s and children’s misfortunes. But not ours. I whispered to Kabita that now her real life would begin.

  AT KHARAGPUR STATION, things were more complicated than I thought they’d be. To reach the platform for Midnapore, I had to climb steps to an overhead walkway, all the while managing the baby and my suitcase. I couldn’t manage it without the help of a coolie, who took the case and also saved me a seat inside the crowded third-class compartment.

  Even though I could see little outside the small window the burka offered me, I had the sense everyone was looking at me and wondering about my situation. Only after the stationmaster blew his whistle and the train moved did I feel safe enough to uncover Kabita from the heavy burka. Because she was out of her quiet, dark hideaway, she promptly awoke, wet herself, and wailed. I was beset with annoyed looks and criticism from the rest of the compartment while I changed her. When I heard the conductor call for Midnapore, I was very relieved to get away from them.

  At the small railway station, I stored my suitcase and took another tonga straight to the mosque, which I thought was vague enough that my path could not be tracked. Outside the tremendous white building decorated with many minarets, I asked the driver to stop and wait until I returned. I disembarked with Kabita, walking around the mosque with a group of women and then melting away from them into a maze of small streets, eventually coming to the one I remembered. A few steps down the street, and I spotted the small walled compound that belonged to Abbas and Hafeeza
.

  Since the night before, I had been mentally composing the letter I’d leave with Kabita. I dared not write anything down at the brothel that might be discovered; and on the train my hands had been too full with Kabita to write. Now at last was the time to bring out the paper and pen I had tucked into Kabita’s bundle. In Bengali script I wrote:

  Honored Uncle and Aunt:

  Aadab; my most respectful and loving greeting. This beloved girl of mine was born on May 15th of this year. Her father is unwilling to take responsibility. I have no roof over my head to give her, and no means to feed and clothe her. I have brought her to you in the hopes you may raise her as your own.

  As you can see, she is in good health. I believe that she will be a pleasant, helpful, and grateful child. She comes with some money I have left for her expenses and education. It is my sincere wish that she might attend school.

  I have called her Kabita, but you should give her any name you would like. She takes her bottle six to eight times daily, three spoons of milk powder and the rest boiled water. Your beloved Allah will bless you many times for your kindness to a child whose only crime is being born in a dangerous place to a wretched mother.

  I did not sign. I was ashamed of how I’d turned out, even after the help Abbas and Hafeeza had given. And for this reason, I decided not to leave the birth certificate. It was better for them to believe the child was merely fair. I looked down on Kabita’s sweet, sleeping face and thought how long it might be before I saw her again. Then I whispered to her the words that I left out of the note: that I loved her. No person would believe it of a woman giving up her child; and I didn’t care to try to convince them. Kabita knew my voice, though, and as I whispered it, I hoped she would at least have a brief feeling of comfort.

  The property’s gate was locked, so I could not bring her in. For a moment, I panicked, but then I noticed a broken-down crate a bit farther down the lane. I retrieved it and climbed up and found that now I could reach over the top of the gate. I hung Kabita in her little sling over the top of the gateposts, so she remained safely on the inside where the right people would discover her. Through all of this, Kabita slept quietly on.