Bengal Nights/La Nuit Bengali

4

Each morning I awoke with renewed astonishment. My folding bed was placed next to the door and when I opened my eyes it was to discover a strange room with a high, barred window, green-painted walls, an enormous wicker chair, two stools near a desk, several engravings nailed to the wall next to the book­ case. It always took me some minutes to gather my thoughts, to grasp where I was and to interpret the muffled sounds that came through the open window or the corridor outside the large door, which I closed at night with a wooden bar. I would part the soft mosquito-net that surrounded my bed and go out into the court yard to wash; in the middle was a steel hut cov­ered by a cement tank, into which the servants poured buckets of water every night. This makeshift shower was not lacking in either novelty or charm. I would fill a pitcher and empty it over myself, shivering from head to foot; it was winter and the flagstones of the courtyard were icy cold. I was proud of my courage. The others always brought a bucket of warm water with them and when they discovered that I always used the water from the tank, they could not hide their surprise and admiration. For several days the household talked of nothing but my cold morning bath. I waited for Maitreyi to compliment me in her turn. I saw her very early each morning, wearing a simple white sari, her feet bare.

One day at breakfast she spoke to me directly for the first time since I had arrived in the house.

"In your country it must be very cold. That is why all of you are white ... "

As she said the word 'white', her voice took on an inflection of envy and melancholy and her gaze fell for a few moments on my partly uncovered arm, which was resting on the table. I was surprised and enchanted to discover this jealousy, but I was unable to prolong our conversation. Maitreyi drank her tea and listened; whenever I turned towards her, she would only nod in agreement.

We hardly ever spoke together. I caught glimpses of her in the corridor, I heard her singing, I knew that she spent much of the day in her room or on the terrace - and I was intrigued by this creature who seemed both so near and so distant.

I had the impression that I was constantly observed, not from suspicion but from fear that I might not be comfortable in my new surroundings. When I was alone in my room, able to laugh at the things I found strange and incomprehensible, I was sent a constant stream of cakes and fruit, tea and carefully prepared coconuts. These offerings were brought by a servant who was naked to the waist, revealing the thick growth of hair on his chest. Only with him did I dare try out my Hindustani. I would watch him as he sat outside my door, cross-legged and motionless, staring at my belongings with avid curiosity.

Then, returning my gaze as I sat at my desk, he would fire a battery of questions at me. Was my bed comfortable enough? Did the mosquito net protect me? Did I like the fresh milk? Did I have brothers and sisters? Was I homesick? And I knew that in a room on the floor above, Mrs Sen and women whom I had never met were waiting for a verbatim report of my answers.

Maitreyi seemed proud and aloof. At meal-times I often caught on her lips a smile that was distant and malicious. She always left the table first, to go and chew pan in the next room, where I would hear her bursting into peals of laughter and talking Bengali. When we were with others, she never spoke to me. When we were alone, it was I who dared not speak. I was frightened of violating some part of the obscure ceremonial that governs the behaviour of an Indian. I preferred to pretend that I had not seen her, and retire to my room.

I thought of her sometimes as I smoked my pipe, wondering what she thought of me or what kind of soul lay hidden behind that curious face of a thousand expressions: there were days when she was so beautiful I could not stop looking at her. Was she stupid, like all young girls, or genuinely simple, a primitive, as I imagined all Indian girls to be?