Misselthwaite

Chapter Three - 'Leaving India'

July, 1910
Bombay, India

I SAY MY GOODBYES TO THE SUN.

India itself seems to be there to see me off as I jostle about the bullock cart, weaving between the flat-topped roofs and crowds of people that swarm the port-side city of Bombay. Here, far from Bangalore, it is an open riot of colour and smells that demand my constant attention. A warm, heady breeze blows in from the water, carrying with it smoke and spices, shouts and laughter, sweat and perfume. It is almost enough to smother the scent of open drains and the alarming amount of bodies that amble about in grimy, soiled linens.

Beside me, noses upturned, sit Mrs. Crawford and her eldest (and most atrocious) child, Basil.

For almost two months I have been reliant on their hospitality. Situated minutes from the harbour, and many miles from Bangalore, the Crawfords had insisted I join them as soon as I'd been declared free of illness. I owed my thanks to Mr. Crawford, a clergyman and fellow Englishman, and his impassioned belief in helping the less fortunate. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, he had said as I'd shown up on his doorstep with my meager belongings.

Officer McGrew, having escorted me to Bombay personally, had assured me the stay would be temporary.

Until passage to England can be arranged, Miss Lennox...

Those few days had turned into months, and with each passing dawn I felt the strain my presence placed on the Crawford children. The aforementioned Basil in particular was persistent in his efforts to make my stay as uncomfortable as possible. He relished regaling me with blown up tales of an uncle I had just learnt I possessed. It was with him that I was to end up. My lack of knowledge of the man provided Basil with endless entertainment.

"Your uncle is an old, hunchbacked man!" Basil had declared one morning, mercilessly knocking over a square of blocks his younger brother had spent a good half hour constructing. "He hates children and frightens them away. He's a lord, but he lives in a desolate Yorkshire manor in the middle of nowhere! Oh, how miserable you'll be!"

I had clucked my tongue, a smug expression lighting my face. "Well, luckily for my uncle, I'm not a child."

Unused to being thwarted by his four younger siblings, Basil had flown into an unbridled temper tantrum. "Everyone's afraid to go near him! Archibald Craven's his name. I've never heard anything so terrible!"

With that, he kicked one of the wooden blocks in my direction. The square, pointed thing had sailed clean past my head, instead colliding with the prized ivory elephant that Mrs. Crawford kept displayed on the family bureau. There was the smallest of thunks as the carving hit the hard-packed floor of the bungalow, colliding, ever so unfortunately, trunk-first. A great hush fell over the room, followed by a sharp intake of breath from Basil as the two of us realised the animal's trunk had come free from its body.

Before either of us could react, Mrs. Crawford had come flying into the room like a woman called to arms.

"It was her!" cried Basil, pointing toward me without hesitation. Being the outsider I was, there was nothing I could say to persuade his mother otherwise. Mrs. Crawford, bemoaning the loss of her most-prized possession, had scooped up the two pieces without a word, wearing the most pinched face I had ever seen on a woman. Behind her, smiling gaily, was Basil.

Something rode me in that moment; be it pure resentment for the boy, or the the fact that something he'd said earlier struck a chord. Whatever it was, the words that had then spilled from my mouth were done so with conviction - consequences be damned.

"What a wretched child you are, Basil Crawford. I think India will rejoice when the time comes for you to leave it."

How was I to know then that the said leaving of the Crawford's eldest child would also mean my own? That my uncle would ultimately pay for the Crawfords passage to England so that I might have a chaperone on the voyage 'home'. If I had, perhaps I would have chosen my words with more care. Perhaps this jaunt in the bullock cart down to the harbour might not have been so unpleasant.

I am aware that my disregard for Basil (however well-deserved) is the source of Mrs. Crawford's suddenly frosty disposition. However, I also suspect I am also serving some sort of quiet punishment for the ivory elephant.

Whatever the reason, Mrs. Crawford no longer attempts to be a sort of 'mother' to me, and although I cannot say I will miss her attention, I am beginning to imagine just how stifling her flippancy will be on the fortnight-long journey we are about to embark on.

---

Our ship is called the Cortona and it is the first steamer I have ever laid eyes upon.

Mrs. Crawford, Basil and I are to share a berth in first class, a clear indication of my new uncle's wealth. It is something Mrs. Crawford is unable to ignore as she preens around the room, becoming warmer and more gracious as the seconds pass. I must admit that I, too, have fallen under the charm of such temporary opulence.

It is enough to get me thinking about Archibald Craven, and how my opinions of him might have begun to change - surely a man as wretched and cross as Basil proclaims wouldn't bother himself to such extent over a girl he's never met?

As Mrs. Crawford bemoans an aching knee, she stays within our cabin as Basil and I set out to see off India.

Basil, too, was born here, but there is a stark difference in the way we say goodbye. Though I am content to find a place against the rails and watch as what has become my heart and soul promises to slip from view, Basil careens around the deck, disregarding lavish ladies and straight-postured soldiers.

Within long-cast gazes and downcast eyes I yearn to find someone who feels the same as I do of this leaving. For sixteen years India has cradled me, kissed me with its heat and inspired a passion within me I'm not sure would have been nurtured had I been born in England. I think of its colours, its vibrancy, and how a girl so entranced by them yearned to pick up a paintbrush.

But most of all, I think of Chita. I hope she is comfortable and at rest, content in the knowledge that she'll always be remembered by the girl she loved amidst an absence of love; however far that girl may be from Bangalore.

In response, the turquoise water of the harbour glimmers.

I soak in the sights for what might be the last time; revelling at how the water looks as if it were an alive thing, undulating beneath the swarms of tugs and pulls that ride upon it. I watch the ships that have already docked; flabbergasted ladies and their children in awe at their first glimpse of the empire's jewel.

Though I am leaving for an adventure of my own, I can't help but wish I could trade places with them.

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