Under the weight of his basket, Shamuel’s neck and arm muscles are taut cables on his small, compact frame. His bare chest heaves, his ribs appear to be more out of the skin than in; his body is quite hairless save for stubble on his cheek and above his lip and a cropped head of hair, graying at the sides. He looks her husband’s age, though Thankamma said he’s younger.
When Shamuel spots her, a huge smile transforms his face, his cheekbones shining like polished mounds of ebony and the white, even teeth highlighting his fine features. There’s a childlike quality to his excitement at getting to welcome the new bride. “Aah!” he says—but there’s a practical matter to deal with first: “Molay, could you ask Thankamma chechi to come out? This basket might be too heavy for you to help me.”
Once Thankamma helps him lower the basket, he removes the thorthu coiled atop his head, shakes it out, then wipes his face, neither his smile nor his eyes leaving the new bride. “More baskets coming. We’ve been climbing all morning, the thamb’ran and me.” He points and she sees her husband in the distance, arms crossed, sitting astride a crooked palm at a spot where the trunk is almost horizontal. His legs dangle carelessly, and he looks lost in thought. The sight makes her shudder involuntarily, stirring up her fear of heights. She can’t imagine a landowner risking his life like that when there are pulayar to do that work.
“How come you let the thamb’ran up there so soon after his wedding?” Thankamma says, acting cross. “Tell the truth—if he climbs, it’s half the work for you.”
“Aah, you try to stop him. He’s like the little thamb’ran here,” he says, prodding JoJo’s belly. “Happier in the sky than on the ground.” JoJo is pleased to be called the little master.
Shamuel’s bare chest is flecked with bark. Still grinning at the thamb’ran’s wife, he fastidiously pleats his blue-checked thorthu lengthwise and then drapes it over his left shoulder. She turns shy and drops her eyes, noticing his deformed right big toe, flattened out like a coin, the nail gone.
Thankamma says, “Aah, Shamuel, please husk three coconuts for us, then. After that, wash up and come eat something. Your new mistress will serve you.”
Shamuel has his own clay dish hanging from a hook under the overhang of the roof at the back of the kitchen and that’s where he will eat, on the back steps. Pulayar never enter the house. Sara cooks for him at home, but a meal at the main house spares his store of paddy. After rinsing out his dish, he fills it with water and drinks it all, and then squats on the step. The bride serves him kanji—soupy rice in its cooking water—with a piece of fish and lime pickle.
“You like it here, then?” he asks, a big ball of rice bulging his cheek. She stands shyly before him and nods. Her finger absentmindedly traces ?, the first letter in ?na, or elephant, a letter she thinks somehow manages to resemble an elephant. “I was younger than you when I came to Parambil. Just a boy, you know,” he says. “Before there was even a house. I feared we’d be trampled as we slept. A house protects you. The secret is the roof, did you know? Why do you think we always build it this way?”
To her eyes the roof is like any other. Only the front gable—the face of the house with its pattern of carved openings in the wood—is unique to every home. Everywhere else, the thatch eaves flare out, as though the roof intends to swallow the dwelling. Shamuel points. “When the rafters stick out like that, an elephant has no flat surface on which to lean. Or push.” He’s like JoJo in his pride in instructing her. She takes to him.
“The elephant came to greet me on my first night,” she offers in a small voice.
“Did he? Damodaran!” Shamuel says, laughing, shaking his head. “That fellow comes and goes as he pleases. I was about to sleep but I felt the ground shake. I knew it was him. I went out and there was Unni sitting atop of him, grumbling because Damo chose to come from the logging camp when it was already dark. Aah, but Unni didn’t complain too much. Whenever Damo is here, Unni gets the nights off to be home with his wife. And the thamb’ran sleeps next to Damo. They talk.”
Keeping an elephant, she has heard, is expensive. Not just paying for Unni, who must be the mahout, but the cost of feeding Damo.
“Is Damodaran ours?”
“Ours? Is the sun ours?” Shamuel waits like a schoolmaster for her to shake her head to say no. “Aah aah, just like the sun, Damodaran is his own boss. I tease Unni that Damo is really the mahout, even if he lets Unni sit on top and pretend to steer him. No one told you about Damo? Aah, let Shamuel tell you. Long before there was this house, as the thamb’ran and my father slept outside, they heard terrible cries. Trumpeting. The ground shook! The sound of trees cracking was like thunder. My father thought the world was ending. At dawn they found young Damodaran just over there, on his side, one eye gone, bleeding, with a broken tusk sticking out between his ribs. The bull elephant that attacked him must have been in musth. The thamb’ran tied a rope around that tusk and then, standing far away, he pulled it out. You’ve seen the tusk? It’s in thamb’ran’s room. Damodaran bellowed in pain. Bubbles and blood poured out of the wound. Thamb’ran—so brave he is—climbed up onto Damo’s side and plugged the hole with leaves and mud. He poured water little by little into Damodaran’s mouth and sat there talking to him all that day and night. He said more to Damo than he has to all the people in his life put together, that’s what my father said. After three days, Damodaran got up. A week later he walked away.
“A few days after that, the thamb’ran and my father cut a big teak tree and were trying to lever it to the clearing. Damodaran stepped out from the forest and pushed it for them, just like that. Elephants like to work. He became so good with logs. Now he works in the teak forests with the loggers, but only when he feels like it. Whenever he decides, he comes back here. He came to see the thamb’ran’s new wife. That’s what I think.”
Under Thankamma’s guidance, she slowly eases into her new life at Parambil. With every passing day, she feels the home she left behind fade, which makes her longing more acute. She doesn’t want to forget. After breakfast, Thankamma says, “Today, I thought we can make jackfruit halwa together. Because JoJo and I are craving it!” JoJo claps his hands. “Molay, the sweetness of life is sure in only two things: love and sugar. If you don’t get enough of the first, have more of the second!” Thankamma has already boiled pieces of jackfruit and now she mashes them with melted jaggery. “Here’s a secret: as you mash the jackfruit, close your eyes and think of something you want from your husband.” Thankamma screws her eyes shut, grinning from the effort, and showing off the gap between her front teeth. “Now a pinch of cardamom, salt, and a teaspoon of ghee. Ready! It must cool more now. Taste it. Isn’t it wonderful?” She lowers her voice. “I’m serious, molay. This is the key to a happy marriage. Make your wish and then feed your husband this halwa. Whatever you want will come true!”