Life's Passenger: Chapter 1 : Edit One

Chapter 1

As if born of an artist's palette, the landscape is painted in lush blushes of green, golden brown, and poppy red.
Thick brushstrokes hide the detail of waving wheat, water flooded rice and delicate fruits. Yet where the canvas appears fixed, texture is transmitted still by the changing scents of sun-baked earth, gentle aromatic crops, and the pungent must of island copses and cool forest darkness. In each scene, discordant splashes of colour distil the shapes of workers in the fields, women washing by streams, or wood and water collectors on long-worn ways.

Periodically the blushes give way to substantial strokes of dripping mud-ochre and grey concrete, and the splashes pool and leak together into a kaleidoscopic human sea. I ride along the shoreline, immersed in the waves of scent.  All around me open fires, sweet cooking food, and the crush of human sweat and waste provide intoxicating thunderstorms of polluted air.
Without warning, the desperate scream of the boiling whistle drowns all other senses.
An accompanying rhythm returns slowly, dominated by the hair-raising screech of metal on metal, the jarring 'ker-thump, ker-thump' of steam pistons, the unintelligible barks of voices, and the hum of life in and outside the train.

Instinctively, I swing out on the sunburnt steel grabs outside the door, and watch the pools of colour slashed and parted by the steel bow. We plough through the ocean, surrounded by a living monsoon, which gutters my throat, and draws the breath from my body.

Sometimes individuals below turn their dark faces towards me, and a flash of bone white teeth is matched by a friendly wave of envy. I just nod, for I am aloof, apart. But at the same time I am ashamed. Shamed by my arrogance. Shamed by my failure to keep the promises I made my family.

The same promises my father made when he left us behind.



On the day that he walked out of our lives, our family and friends waited in the cool shadow of our whitewashed home as he tried to soothe my mother. She wailed wordlessly, dragging handfuls of hair across her sharp, tear-stained features. Between wheezing mouthfuls of air she spluttered his name, just as my grandmother had done at her husband’s funeral. My father lived then, and he may still, but his love’s reflection on our lives began to die that afternoon. As if a cancer gnawed simultaneously at us all, we grieved for ourselves until, years later, his love was gone.

Remembering that day, I can still feel his kiss on my forehead as he bent beneath the cool eaves, where I sheltered from the fierce heat. I sat cross-legged, hugging my knees to my chest and my face pressed into my lap, refusing to look up. Perhaps if I didn’t see him leave, he couldn’t.

Eventually impatient at his frustrated attempts to tease me out of the shadows, he placed his hands on my shoulders, and kissed me warmly this time on the top of my head. Snivelling, I at last looked up as he released me, just in time to see his back turned as he walked away to shake hands with village well-wishers.

I should have never looked up.

        ***

Six years passed. Now ten years old, I danced upon the step plate of the Lahore to Bombay express. I shared this life with rich businessmen riding inside the carriages, and the poor clinging to the gutters and roofs.

I had found a living on the trains; I had been working as a bag-boy for more than a year. I was fortunate to befriend a stationmaster in a small town outside Hyderabad. He had shown me how to get the best work, and how to avoid falling or being thrown from the train. Meanwhile I learned to serve the businessmen, and saved a few Annas at a time for a new destination.

During rare solitary moments away from the other passengers, I wondered if my own father was now a rich businessman. Perhaps he had reached England? That’s where he said he was going to make his fortune. He planned to work his passage as a seaman on one of the thousands of merchant ships that navigated from the Indian Jewel back to the foot of the Empress’ throne.
He, his father, and our fathers before, had all been fishermen. Getting work on a steamship for an experienced fisherman would be easy, he had assured us. He promised (another broken promise) to send a letter home as soon as he had found a berth.

So for five years after he left our village and family, I fished with my uncle from before dawn until the sun fell again behind the black sparkling cloak of the Indian Ocean. Each night we would haul our catch back to my mother, who would tut and wish us better the next day. My uncle would smile in return. Day by day, year by year, we gradually forgot my father’s promises, and I watched my uncle’s smile grow.
One night my mother greeted us with praise for our catch, and warm bread. She asked Uncle Ramish to move in with us.

Ramish was not just a fisherman, but a Majik too. Although my father and I shared the family name, my uncle and grandfather were the only remaining true practitioners of the faith. A hundred years before, I was told, every village had it’s own Majik. But the old faiths and traditions were dying out within the valley. Locomotive tracks brought contemporary monsters disgorging white missionaries and red-suited soldiers, spreading new faiths and allegiances. Our traditions were becoming legends. 

As early as I could recall, every day during the summer months would end with a fireside tale from an elder. The adults would creep closer to the fire at dusk, and the young would half-wake, climbing back into the warm laps of their parents, while yellow flames crackled a gentle lullaby.

Frequently, the elder would recount the legends of the Majiks many generations since dead. They were tales of the ancient civilizations that grew on the banks of the Indus, when dragons swept the mountain slopes for careless shepherds, and sea monsters terrorised the brave fishermen; timeless yarns that described an ancient people, and in doing so tied the living to the dead.

Most such stories told of the self-sacrifice of the Majik. How a brave young Shagird, girl or boy, would assist their master the High Majik to throw down the rampaging scourge, returning the land to peace at the expense of their own lives and loves.

Shivering despite the warmth, I would listen earnestly to the storyteller’s final words, when we would be warned to keep our faith and traditions alive, lest the evils return. Night after night I fell asleep, running down the mountainsides of the Indus valley, a fearless warrior and sorcerer protecting the freedom of our homelands.



   
As a storyteller, Uncle Ramish was as entrancing as any. He was also well respected in the village as Majik and elder, as well as my father’s more reputable younger brother. It was his duty to take my father’s place. The family would be secure, and Paris would marry; Paris was my sister, my only sibling, and she was five years older than I. Although I loved her, I could not understand her. While I listened to the late night tales and imagined myself a wizard, she cried at the death of the handsome, valiant Majik, and imagined herself married to the High Majik himself.

My mother would shake her head with a smile when she listened to Paris’ romantic notions. She would raise her eyebrows in my Uncle’s direction with an unspoken ‘See?’ and Ramish would chuckle silently.

I remember years before, asking my father if Paris would one day become Shagird, and train as a Majik. He didn’t answer immediately, stopping mid-motion with a half-gutted fish in one hand, and a sharp knife in the other, as he sat at the kitchen table. He placed the knife and fish down carefully, and turned towards me.

He and my mother, he said, had chosen my sister’s name of Paris because the British called Hyderabad, the capital of our province, the ‘Paris of India’, due to the fragrances from the perfume used to wash the streets everyday. She would never, he whispered, become Majik.

I absorbed this information, feeling confused. After a pause, I asked him why they called me Ishwar, and he sighed, patting my head with a bloody hand.
“When you’re older, my son. Much older.” He turned back to the fish and knife.


Uncle Ramish was kind, but, to me, he was always also a Majik. In my head I heard the rustling wings of a swooping dragon whenever he stopped smiling. However, I learned to read his expressions, and generally life with Uncle Ramish and my mother was comfortable and content.
By the time I had forgotten my father’s face, my grandfather the High Majik ordered the dissolution of my parents’ marriage, and for a few days I had no name at all. Then one day in early January, the whole village braved the heat to attend the ceremony of my mother and uncle’s marriage. The village watched my grandfather join the two, as they swore solemn commitment to four thousand years of Indus valley tradition.

That night we dined and drank and danced under the ancient stars, and finally I lay exhausted in the dirt, surrounded by sweat-glistened legs and the rouge reflections of the bonfire.

Just before I fell asleep, I reached an implacable decision. I would leave the village, and complete my father’s duty. I would replace his promises with my own, and maybe on the way I’d find my father too.

                  ***

Since my first letter home, written for me by the stationmaster, I had received three letters back from my family. One was from my sister, and there were two from my mother and uncle. In the first they sounded relieved and happy for me, but in the second they begged me to return.

My grandfather was old and sick they wrote, and my uncle would succeed him one day soon as the High Majik. Uncle Ramish would then need a Shagird of his own.

I would not return, I decided. Not yet, I told myself. I must keep my promises first. I must return triumphant, so that my father’s failures could be truly forgotten.

So I continued to earn and hoard a few Anna coins at a time, shining shoes, porting baggage, and finding seats or baggage space. Sometimes the latter meant running atop the length of the train, clutching my benefactors case, leaping from one carriage to another without tripping over the prone bodies of the roof travellers, who, too poor to pay for a seat or even standing, rode out a journey clinging to the gutters. When the only baggage space was well away from where the gentleman client chose to sit, such hazardous roof-top races were unavoidable.

Some of the gentlemen even deliberately found the worst places to seat themselves. They delighted in watching me drag their case up the side of the carriage, from where I staggered and lurched between stinking bodies, amid curses and swinging fists and feet, to a clear patch of burning metal roof.

Of course, such attempts when the train was at speed were suicidal. Success was possible only when the train was at relatively low speeds as it approached or departed a station.

Twice I had watched, horrified and sick to the stomach, as other bag-boys were thrown by the headwind from a speeding train as they balanced a client’s bag.

Both times, I looked back to see the rag-doll boys cartwheeling and spiralling into the hard dirt of the trackside. One managed to return gingerly to his feet before I lost sight of him, whilst on the other occasion the boy lay still, at impossible angles, spread-eagled in the dust.

Nevertheless, work was not always hard, nor were my clients always cruel. One, a doctor, paid me one whole Anna for shining his shoes to a mirror finish, and then asked me to stay and tell him about myself.

With the enthusiasm of any young boy, I recanted my tale and he listened attentively, nodding encouragingly. When I eventually finished, he smiled as if I had pleased him, and shook my hand. Guiltily, I used the opportunity to slip his watch from his wrist, watching his face as I eased the watch within my shirt after he released my hand. He appeared not to notice.

“A good tale. Don’t lose your faith in Majik, boy,” he said, “ many mysteries remain unsolved in this life, and you may need it yet.”

As the train pulled to a stop, he collected his case from the rack above his head, and stepped lightly from the train, bright shoes rapping down the steps to the silent sand of the platform.

I leaned from the window as the train accelerated once more, away from the station. As I passed the doctor walking towards the exit, he turned towards me, smiling still, and shouted above the scream of steam,

“Consider the watch a gift, young man. And good luck!”

I stared back, speechless, as he stopped and stood alone. Half-masked by steam and dust, he raised his arm in a cheerful farewell.

Apologetically, I waved back.

That night, I sold the watch to the stationmaster, and sent two rupees back to my mother, together with a silent promise never to steal again.

On another occasion a businessman from Delhi noticed my interest in the photographs in the newspaper he was reading. I stood in the carriage doorway facing him. Whenever he revealed himself by closing the paper so that he could pass the large pages from one hand to the other, I pretended to stare into space, or out of the window. While he was hidden behind a double page, I squinted at the reverse page, intrigued by pictures of giant airships, and fireballs in the sky.

Eventually tired of my poor charade, he crumpled the paper to his lap, pinning me with an accusatory stare. Before I could turn to run, he spoke softly, asking me if I could read. My grandfather Majik had taught me letters and simple words, but I had never learnt to read. I shook my head dumbly.

Over the next three hours of the journey north, the businessman showed me how the letters became whole words, then sentences, and how the pictures matched the stories.

A few months later, and I could read the papers in Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi, Gujarati, and English. Suddenly, I knew the world to be a far bigger and more confusing place than I could have ever imagined.
Was this what my father had faced? Was he so overcome by the sheer weight of new information and opportunity that he languished still, unable to assimilate or act? Did he lie awake at night, staring up during clear nights at the slow moving Halley’s Comet, ignorant of its purpose, and frightened for his life?



Although leftover newspapers and magazines provided some distraction, time passed slowly on the trains. Fresh scenery on a new route could hold my attention for a few hours, but in the end the monotony of working, sleeping and eating intruded once more. Finding food in particular absorbed many hours in a day. On the trains I scrounged or begged for whatever I could get. Whenever the train reached a station, and my stomach demanded, I jumped clear and found the nearest market.

Fortunately, or perhaps more naturally, the markets were nearly always close to a station. They were a marvel of chaotic enterprise, the noise, the stink and luminosity a compelling contrast to the railways. Between the stalls, I swam through claustrophobic soups of human body odour, freshly cut bouquets and frying spices. After a few hours I was always content to retreat to the familiarity of stations and trains, where the smell of steam and burning coke seared the market fog from my lungs.

For more than a year, this was the fixed pattern of my life. Every few weeks I returned to the station outside Hyderabad, and checked with the stationmaster for any post. A favour he was willing to provide, he said, because I reminded him of his own son in Jaipur.

Whether this were true or not, the stationmaster was consistently friendly, even repeatedly inviting me to stay with him at his apartment in the town. Each invitation was accompanied by him stroking my hair, and sometimes pinching my cheek affectionately, as a father perhaps would to his son. But on each occasion I successfully disappointed him, excusing myself through pressing business or another arrangement. I would smile, and thank him for his kind offers, and explain my predicament. He would always shrug noncommittally,

“Shame, shame. Next time.”

To which I would always agree. The other boys would wink at me, or blow kisses, sniggering and nodding knowingly. One day soon, I had to find a new place to collect my post.


Now I was back again; as the train squealed, scrunched and finally blasted itself to a stop alongside the platform, I leapt from my step in the open doorway, dodged the perspiring passengers dripping in the dust and finally pushed my way through the other boys and stallholders to the central hall.

Straight ahead, an arched doorway braced the town beyond, its oppressive heat anxiously gripping the cream and lemon-shaded dwellings as the sun squeezed towards the horizon in the west.

In a few weeks, the heat of the town would be force-fed by the soaking Indian Ocean monsoons, leaving the hard-packed streets quagmires, and the neat buildings streaked and grey. For now, the town shimmered and shook in its own mirage, and I could see the path from the station all the way down the hill, towards the coloured sheets protecting the stalls in the bazaar.

Ignoring the path, I padded bare foot to the door to the left of the ticket office. A sign read ‘ STATIONMASTER’, signed in white block letters. I knocked twice, waited politely without answer, and entered the office. Amid the piles of timetables, newspapers and various administrative forms on the desk, the sole piece of furniture save a stool, was a white wooden tray. Printed on the front of the box, was the title ‘Majik’. Three older letters lay opened in the bottom of the tray, partially obscured by a new, sealed envelope.

Excitedly, I ripped it open, and sat upon the stool to read. The letter within was written in red ink, apparently with a thick nib and a shaky hand. Even if the calligraphy had been precise, the contorted style would still have been in a fashion I couldn’t have easily deciphered.

While I stared and frowned at the characters, the stationmaster entered the little office. I had never seen him before without his smart black uniform and red-banded cap. Instead of his black polished boots, today he wore dirty brown sandals, equally scruffy brown trousers, and a white linen shirt, with a line of suspicious looking round stains running from beneath his chin to a larger pooled red stain above his rotund stomach. And he stank of spirits.

“ Ahh, my little piece of Majik!” he cried, “Have you come to celebrate my birthday with me? You dear, sweet boy!”

As he spoke, he lurched towards me, swaying from heel to toe. He reached out a hand to my head. He missed the first time, and stumbled forwards, this time close enough to tousle my hair. I flinched without thinking, and he recoiled, his fat face creasing into a feral snarl. His eyes, however, failed to co-ordinate with the countenance, and wallowed independently of each other.

“Don’t insult me boy!” he spat, spraying me with foul smelling slobber. “I have given you everything- your job, a place to call home, my friendship- don’t forget you owe me boy!”

I scrambled to placate him, slipping from the stool and stepping in front of him, with one finger raised in a silent plea for a moment to explain. His eyes tried to focus together on my finger, crossing and rolling in his head, and then he lurched further toward me, shaking his head to dispel the giddiness.

“Don’t you raise your fist to me! I’ll teach you!” and he grabbed my shirt in the podgy ball of his hand, “Mock me, will you? You worthless wretch!”

With his free hand he cuffed me roughly across the head. I raised my arms to protect myself, and edged backwards. Still unsatisfied, he released my shirt and, bunching both fists, closed the gap between us menacingly. The stench from his breath was stronger still, and I turned my face away, arms still above my head to ward off the next blows. Those blows came together with a loose volley of expletives and drunken gasps, bludgeoning my ears and head despite my defense.

“Please! Please listen! That’s not what I meant sir! Please, stop. I am very grateful, really, please?”

He continued swinging, some blows slapping harmlessly, but more battering my head, chest and arms. One solid punch would be enough, I knew. I was scared for my life.

Desperately I scanned the room for escape. His podgy frame blocked the route to the door, and the window was too high. Lacking any options, I gave up attempts at placation, and stood up straight, chin high, and arms by my side. I could feel and hear torrents of adrenaline roaring through my veins and heart. He paused, temporarily surprised at my defiance, and I stole the moment.

I kicked out hard and straight, and the stationmaster’s expression immediately told me that I had found my targets. His hands collapsed to his gut, and his knees buckled. Phlegm flew from his mouth as a silent scream disfigured his face, and his eyes rolled into the back of his head.

Without a second’s delay, I grabbed my letters from the tray, vaulted the choking stationmaster as he fell to all fours, and sprinted from the office.

Out in the hall I pushed and shouted my passage through the crowd. My vision narrowed to the view of the train as it rolled away from the platform, homing in until I was running alongside the billowing iron carriages. Pushing myself faster, despite gasping lungs full of hot steam and muggy smoke, I matched the speed of the car next to me just as the platform ran out.

I leapt for the handles in the nearest doorway, and swung precariously for a moment until my face collided with the coach side. Flattening myself long enough to release one despairing hand, I took a higher hold, and heaved myself up the steps and into the dark shadows of the carriage doorway above.

I collapsed to the floor, heaving and gasping for breath. My heart felt as if it were about to blast itself from my chest. After what felt like hours, but was probably only seconds, my breathing slowed and steadied. The rush of adrenaline decayed, leaving my body raw and worn. Easing my head out of the open door, I risked one last glance back towards the station, and was relieved to find no signs of pursuit, only the swirling sand and smoke, and the shimmering, washed-out figures of individuals standing a few steps back from the track.

Turning back to the dark interior of the first-class carriage, I pushed through the first door, and into the long corridor alongside the private compartments.
It was time to start looking for my father elsewhere. 
 
     
END