‘We have gardens here.’
‘We do.’
‘And a palace.’
‘Not with a king and queen inside it.’
‘How long will we be away?’
‘Long enough to do what needs to be done and not a moment more or less.’
This answer, which was not really an answer at all, was not typical of Mamma, who was usually very good at meeting Ada’s many questions, but Ada had no time then to unpick her mother’s reticence. ‘On your way, now,’ she had said, making a fluttery sweeping motion with her elegant fingers. ‘Father will be home from his club any minute and I still have the flowers to set. Lord Curzon is coming, as you know, and everything must be perfect.’
Afterwards, Ada turned slow cartwheels on the terrace, watching the world change kaleidoscopically from purple to orange as the queen’s crepe myrtles took turns with the hibiscus. The gardener was sweeping the lawn and his helper was cleaning down the curved cane chairs on the wide verandah.
Ordinarily, cartwheeling was one of Ada’s favourite things to do, but this afternoon her heart wasn’t in it. Rather than enjoying the way the world spun around her, she felt dizzy, even queasy. After a time, she sat instead on the edge of the verandah near the spider lilies.
Ada’s father was an important man and their mansion was on the very top of a hill in the centre of Bombay; from her vantage point, Ada could see all the way over the Hanging Gardens to where the Arabian Sea rolled its shoulders. She was busy peeling long white tentacles from an enormous spider lily flower, breathing in its sweet perfume, when her aaya, Shashi, found her.
‘There you are, pilla,’ said Shashi, in careful English. ‘Come, now – your mother wishes us to collect some extra fruits for the dessert.’
Ada stood up and took Shashi’s outstretched hand.
Usually she loved market chores – there was a man with a snack stall who always gave her an extra chakkali to nibble on while she followed Shashi and her enormous basket around to all of the various fruit and vegetable sellers – but today, in the shadow of her mother’s worrying announcement, she dragged her heels as they walked together down the hill.
Storm clouds were gathering in the east, and Ada hoped that it would rain. Great, drenching rain, just as the carriages were arriving with her parents’ guests. She sighed heavily as she turned over each line of her mother’s unexpected proposal in her mind, searching the words for hidden meaning. England. The faraway land of her parents’ childhood, the realm of the mysterious and legendary ‘Grandmother’, the homeland of a people Shashi’s father called the monkey bottoms …
Shashi switched to Punjabi. ‘You are very quiet, pilla. Make no mistake, my ears are enjoying the peace, but I have to wonder, has something happened to hurt your snout?’
Ada hadn’t yet finished her considering, but she heard herself blurting out a report of the conversation regardless. She drew breath as she finished. ‘And I don’t want to go!’
‘Stubborn little mule! Such a fuss about a trip back home?’
‘It is their home, not mine. I don’t ever want to go to England and I intend to tell Mamma so as soon as we get back from the markets.’
‘But, pilla’ – the setting sun had balanced itself on the horizon and was leaching gold into the sea, which carried it back towards the shore in ripples – ‘you are going to visit an island.’
Shashi was wise, for while Ada had no interest in ‘England’, she was exceedingly excited by islands and she had forgotten, in her vexation, that England happened to be part of one in the middle of the North Sea: an hourglass-shaped island, shaded pink, all the way at the top of the map. There was a globe in her father’s study, a large cream-coloured sphere in a dark mahogany grip, that Ada spun sometimes when she was permitted entrée into the cigar-scented domain, because it made a wonderful clicking noise that sounded like a giant swarm of cicadas. She had spotted the island called Great Britain and commented to her father that it did not look particularly ‘great’ to her. He had laughed when she said that and told her that looks could be deceiving. ‘Within that small island,’ he’d said, with a hint of personal pride that made Ada unaccountably flustered, ‘is the engine that drives the world.’
‘Yes, well,’ she conceded now, ‘an island is good, I suppose. But Britain is an island of monkey bottoms!’
‘Pilla!’ Shashi stifled a laugh. ‘You must not say such things – certainly not close to your mother and father’s ears.’
‘Mother and father are monkey bottoms!’ Ada blustered hotly.
The delicious risk and irreverence of referring to her dignified parents in such a way was a spark that lit a flame, and Ada felt her commitment to being cross begin to melt. A surprise of laughter threatened. She took her aaya’s free hand and squeezed it hard. ‘But you must come with me, Shashi.’
‘I will be here when you return.’
‘No, I will miss you too much. You must come with us. Mamma and Papa will say yes.’
Shashi shook her head gently. ‘I cannot come to England with you, pilla. I would wilt like a plucked flower. I belong here.’
‘Well, I belong here, too.’ They had reached the bottom of the hill and the line of palms that grew along the coast. The dhows bobbed mildly on the flat sea, their sails down, as white-robed Parsees gathered along the shores to begin their sunset prayers. Ada stopped walking and faced the golden ocean, the dying sun still warm on her face. She was infused with a feeling for which she did not have a name, but which was exquisitely wonderful and painful at the same time. She repeated, more softly now, ‘I belong here, too, Shashi.’
Shashi smiled at her kindly but said nothing further. This, of itself, was unusual, and Ada was troubled by her aaya’s silence. In the space of an afternoon, it seemed that the world had tilted and everything had slid off-centre. All of the adults in her life had broken like once-reliable clocks that had started showing the wrong time.
She’d had that feeling a lot lately. She wondered whether it was something to do with having recently turned eight. Perhaps this was the way of adulthood?
The breeze brought with it the scent of salt and over-ripe fruit, and a blind beggar held up his cup as they passed him. Shashi dropped him a coin and Ada took a new tack, saying airily, ‘They can’t make me go.’
‘They can.’
‘It wouldn’t be fair.’
‘Wouldn’t it?’
‘Not a bit.’
‘Do you remember the story of “The Rat’s Wedding”?’
‘Of course.’
‘Was it fair that the rat who had done no wrong ended with nothing but a singed bottom?’
‘It was not!’
‘And what about “The Bear’s Bad Bargain”? Was it fair that the poor bear did everything asked of him but ended up with no khichri and no pears, either?’
‘Certainly not!’
‘Well then.’
Ada frowned. It had never occurred to her how many of the stories Shashi told contained the moral that life was not fair. ‘That bear was bevkuph! Stupid. I would have punished the woodman’s wife if I were him.’
‘Very stupid,’ Shashi agreed, ‘and I know you would have.’
‘She was a liar.’
‘She was.’
‘And a glutton.’
‘Mmm, speaking of gluttons …’ They had reached the edge of the busy market place and Shashi led Ada by the hand towards her favourite snack stall. ‘It seems to me that we need to feed that little snout of yours. I cannot have complaints while I select the fruit.’