Black Narcissus Read online

  Sister Briony outdid the most stringent Convent rules against extravagance and waste; she made buns out of the end of puddings and glue out of fish bones, rugs out of rags and pillows stuffed with grass cuttings. Everything was used up and she hated to see the others waste anything. ‘Sister, there’s at least another mouthful on that herring.’ ‘Sister Blanche, dear, there’s a whole thread on your sleeve.’

  Now the people were arriving so quickly that they gave her no time to settle her things and make proper arrangements. There was a queue of people; and there was Ayah, who had been told to help her, snipping off bandages right and left and using great dollops of iodine and lint. Some of them had sores and cuts, some were twisted and swollen with rheumatism, but most of them were perfectly well.

  ‘They’ve made a mistake,’ said Sister Briony. ‘Tell them, Ayah. The dispensary is for people who are ill.’

  At first they were sullen and silent. ‘Don’t you want me to dress your hand?’ she asked one woman.

  ‘No, she doesn’t,’ said Ayah. ‘She could do it herself in her own house, but she has been given two annas to have it done and so she must.’

  Sister Briony did not take that in, and soon the sulkiness changed to interest and the interest to delight. ‘What is it they like?’ she asked. She soon found out. When the dispensary bell rang and she interrupted her work to go to it, it was very often: ‘I want to see you make the water pink. Show me the pink water medicine.’

  ‘You had better do it to encourage them to come,’ said Sister Clodagh.

  ‘But it’s such a waste of good permanganate,’ wailed Sister Briony.

  On the east verandah facing the hill and the path was the Lace School, put there until the new room had been built. Three girls had come with a note from the General.

  ‘These girls are to weave and lace and make pretty nice things.’

  Two were State girls, Maili whose name was really Tirtha, and Jokiephul; the third was a plump little Bhotiya called Samya. Now every few minutes Sister Honey’s voice was heard in gentle protest. ‘Oh Joseph dear, come here and tell them not to hold the threads with their big toes.’

  More than thirty children came to school. There was no room for them on the benches, they had to sit on tins and buckets; some were big boys and girls, some were very small, and the smallest of them all sat on a bucket, which must have been painful, because he was such a baby that the seat of his trousers was still cut out, as was the custom for hill babies. Though his hams, fat as white-heart cherries, were pressed on the sharp edge of the bucket, he smiled and squeezed his hands between his knees, waiting for school to begin. He said his name was Om.

  They were all ragged and dirty and sat expectantly in rows.

  ‘They are ready,’ Joseph pointed out.

  ‘But I don’t know what to do with them,’ cried Sister Ruth, who had been given the responsibility of the school. ‘We have nothing unpacked; there’re too many of them and they smell.’

  Joseph began to babble at the children.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she said.

  ‘I’m telling them what you said. There are too many of them and they smell.’

  ‘Don’t do that, you stupid little boy. I didn’t tell you to do that.’ She was almost in tears; she had a pain constantly coming and going and she spoke angrily. He looked at the floor, silent as a boot, and the children watched them stolidly.

  ‘What’s all this, Sister?’ asked Sister Clodagh in the doorway.

  ‘I don’t know what to do with them!’ she cried again.

  ‘I thought you always knew everything,’ said Sister Clodagh.

  ‘It’s not fair to give me so many of them and nothing for them to do,’ she cried hotly.

  ‘Gently, Sister. That’s not the way to speak to me,’ said Sister Clodagh. ‘It certainly seems to be a very large class. You must start with a few of the older ones. Joseph, tell them that we’ll keep the ten oldest ones and the others may run away.’

  He spoke to them and they answered emphatically. ‘They say they will stay,’ said Joseph.

  ‘Tell them they can’t. We can’t have so many to begin with. They must go away.’

  ‘They say they were paid to come and so they can’t go away.’

  ‘Paid? Who pays them?’

  ‘The babu has orders to pay every child who comes to school, so they all want to come.’

  ‘Well!’ said Sister Clodagh, and could say no more.

  Sister Honey came round the partition from the Lace School. ‘Sister, may I?’ Her eyes were on the children. ‘Excuse me, Sister, but may I suggest –’

  Sister Clodagh had this pain too, a gnawing pain low down in her stomach. She felt giddy and weak round the knees. ‘Yes, Sister,’ she said.

  ‘Wouldn’t it be a pity to send them away when they have come?’

  ‘They were paid to come,’ said Sister Ruth.

  ‘Still, if they like it this time they may come again of their own free will,’ said Sister Honey. ‘I think I could amuse them for an hour.’

  ‘What could you do with them? They look very stupid to me,’ said Sister Ruth tartly. ‘Remember they can’t speak a word of Hindustani or English.’

  ‘Joseph can,’ said Sister Honey, putting her hand on his shoulder. ‘You could help me, couldn’t you, Joseph?’

  Joseph turned ebony with pride.

  ‘There is a blackboard,’ said Sister Honey. ‘I’ll draw things in coloured chalk and they can tell me the name for it, and I’ll teach them the English for it. First I’ll ask all their names and ages, if they know them, and make a register.’

  ‘You can’t call that a lesson,’ said Sister Ruth, wishing she had thought of it first.

  ‘You can call it a very sensible idea,’ said Sister Clodagh. ‘Thank you, Sister Blanche. I’ll leave you to deal with them; and you, Sister, had better keep order in the Lace School – if you can.’

  Sister Ruth went quickly away without asking for permission. She had to go away. From a little girl she had always had wild tempers, but lately there was something in them that frightened her herself. When she was angry nowadays, she could not help what she did or what she said, because she did not know. It felt like something dark and wet, flooding her brain, like blood. Often she wondered if it were blood; sometimes she actually felt it seeping into her ears and tasted it. She did not know what it was, but she was frightened of it. She was so frightened that she had told no one about it. When she knew it was coming she went away by herself; it was all right if she went away, if she could – in time.

  Presently she was able to say, almost calmly: ‘It wasn’t fair. It isn’t fair. She didn’t give me a chance.’

  For the rest of the day she felt shaken and ill, and she found herself saying over and over again: ‘She isn’t fair.’

  6

  None of it was fair. There was so much to be done, and work poured in on them before they had time to get ready for it; and they needed time; first of all to become acclimatized to living in the high altitude after months and years of the plains. After the first few days Sister Ruth was always complaining about her headaches; they all had them and felt listless and sick. They had not known they were so tired; and still the patients and the children came, and there was the house and all the unpacking to be seen to.

  They were so tired. The light at Mopu seemed to make the yellowness of their faces more yellow against their wimples; their steps sounded heavy in the clear air. They were not strong enough for the wind; even their clothes seemed grey and discoloured against the whiteness of snow and cloud. Then their unhealthiness broke through their skins in pimples and spots, Sister Ruth had a boil on her finger and, one after the other, they were infected with the mysterious pains and diarrhoea.

  ‘The plumbing must be made to work,’ said Sister Clodagh. ‘I must send for Mr Dean.’

  She did not want to do it; she shrank from seeing him again, which was ridiculous, for what could it matter to her what he said? But they had b
een a fortnight at St Faith’s and there was scarcely a change in it; her plans were being defeated one by one and, remembering the ruined foundations that the Brothers had left, she tightened her lips.

  The clerk that Father Roberts had given them could not work these outstation men, he did not try; they were not Darjeeling men made servile and easy for money to handle, and he was afraid of them. ‘Mr Dean was right,’ said Sister Clodagh. ‘The man’s no use at all.’

  They needed coolies, Mr Dean had all the coolies; they wanted wood, Mr Dean had all the wood and the only saws; he had lime and paint and whitewash and wire netting. He even controlled the ponies that went to the depot, without him they could not stir a hoof.

  ‘It’s no worse than calling in a doctor,’ she told herself. ‘It’s really as a doctor that I’m calling him in.’ Still, she did not want to see him, but at last she wrote to him and asked him to come.

  He had heard the convent bell regulating the hours and smiled to himself; he had not gone up to them but, pulling lazily at his monkey’s tail, he had smiled at that busy punctual bell. When Sister Clodagh’s letter came, he turned it over in his hands thinking how unmistakable it was, with its thick paper, its writing and its set terms. ‘To – Dean Esq. Agent of Mopu Estate’ and finished ‘ Clodagh, C.S.M. Sister-in-Charge.’

  He put it down thoughtfully on his table, pinning it down with his beer mug, and picked it up again; it had a ring of beer on it and he wiped it and put it in his pocket. He tucked his shirt inside his shorts, pulled Feltie over his eyes, and, standing on one leg, put the other across his pony from behind as he would have mounted a bicycle, and galloped up the hill to the Convent.

  ‘I’m afraid we have no beer,’ said Sister Clodagh, ‘but we can offer you some coffee.’

  ‘But can you make it decently?’ he asked suspiciously, and she, without thinking, shook her head. Sister Briony bristled. ‘I don’t trust anyone to make my coffee but myself,’ he said. ‘No. I’ll have what you asked from me. Give me some water.’

  But he was not rude, he was gentle. She found that she and Sister Briony were pouring out their troubles to him.

  ‘– before we are nearly ready,’ cried Sister Briony. ‘Things unpacked all over the place, nothing labelled or locked, and that reminds me; all these good cupboards are standing empty because they have no hinges or the locks are broken; and this clerk, this man of Father Roberts, he’s no use at all. “How can I mend the hinges when I have no screws?” he says. “Then get screws,” I said and gave him four annas; then he brings me half a dozen screws and no change. Screws, dear goodness, that are two annas a packet in the plains.’

  ‘You should get rid of the clerk, I think, don’t you?’ said Mr Dean, not looking at Sister Clodagh. ‘Joseph will make you a better interpreter, and I’ll send you Pin Fong, the carpenter from the factory; he’ll work the men for you and won’t cheat you. You say you want to build a work-room and a school?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Sister Clodagh. ‘We don’t want to do more than is necessary but, after the repairs are done, we want to finish the rooms that have been begun as a large class-room and a work-room for our Lace School. And we want to build a chapel later; we’re using the room at the east end of the corridor, next to our temporary schools, and it’s not very suitable. And Mr Dean, Joseph tells us that the people are being paid to come to the dispensary and the children actually paid to come to school.’

  ‘I expect that was the General’s idea,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, but –’

  ‘He’s a wise man in getting his own way, and he learnt a lesson over St Saviour’s. It’s only until it becomes a habit. Let it become a habit for them to come and they won’t remember the time when they didn’t, and then gradually he’ll leave off paying them and it will gradually become a habit for them not to be paid. They’re not really avaricious, it’s the idea of getting a present. They’re like children, enormously pleased with money, but they don’t really want it; and they have children’s memories too.’

  ‘He told me he was going to order them to come.’

  ‘Then he knew he wasn’t speaking the truth. You can’t order these people. They don’t know what an order is.’

  ‘Then they should learn,’ said Sister Clodagh firmly.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s good for them to do as they’re told. It’s discipline. We all need discipline.’

  ‘Certainly we do,’ said Sister Briony.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You said it yourself. “They’re like children.” Without discipline we should all behave like children.’

  ‘Don’t you like children?’ asked Mr Dean.

  Neither of them answered, and he said to Sister Briony: ‘And that reminds me. May I tell you one thing about your dispensary?’

  ‘Why, yes.’ She looked at Sister Clodagh.

  ‘If you get a bad case, a case that seems to you as if it might be dangerous or even serious, refuse to treat it.’

  ‘Refuse?’ Sister Clodagh began indignantly. ‘But that would be –’

  ‘It would be wise,’ said Mr Dean. ‘If you had a case that went badly or if one of your patients died, you’d have all the people up against you. You must remember that they’re primitive and like children, unreasonable children, and they’ve never seen medicine before. They’ll think it’s a kind of magic. Remember, I’ve warned you.’

  There were quick steps outside and Sister Ruth knocked at the door and came in without waiting for an answer. When she saw Mr Dean she stood staring at him from the middle of the floor and said nothing.

  ‘Well, Sister?’

  She started and then said dramatically: ‘Oh Sister, Sister. They’ve brought in a woman, our first bad case. She was covered in blood, I’ve never seen such a sight. She must have cut a vein or an artery. I think it was an artery because it spurted blood. I had such a time stopping the bleeding. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen bleeding like that, and I really didn’t know how to stop it at all, but I managed to stop it at last.’

  ‘Then it was quite unnecessary of you,’ said Sister Clodagh, ‘when a minute would have fetched Sister Briony, who would have stopped it at once.’

  ‘I said you were to fetch me, if anything came in.’

  After what Mr Dean had just told them, their voices were sharp. Sister Ruth turned pale and said: ‘I was only trying to consider Sister Briony.’

  ‘You might have considered the poor woman, who, by your description, was bleeding to death,’ said Sister Clodagh, dryly. ‘Oh, Sister Briony, you had better go.’

  She had already gone. Sister Ruth looked from Sister Clodagh to Mr Dean. ‘Shall I wait?’ she asked.

  ‘We’re coming ourselves in a moment,’ said Sister Clodagh, repressively. ‘I think we needn’t keep you.’

  As Sister Ruth turned to the door, Mr Dean opened it for her. ‘Good-bye, Sister Ruth,’ he said. ‘I hope your patient does well.’

  She looked up at him, her lashes flickered and she dropped them.

  He asked her: ‘What was the woman’s name?’

  ‘It was difficult to understand. It sounded like Samuel, but it couldn’t be that, could it?’

  ‘Oh, Samuel. She’s a good old lady, one of my best pluckers. I’m very grateful to you, Sister.’

  As she stood in front of him, she was almost painfully aware of him. Her shoulders were not as wide as half his chest; she was fragile and white beside him; his flesh was live and bronze like a Red Indian, and there was so much of it; his shirt was short-sleeved and open at the neck, and torn across the arm-hole, and he wore shorts and no socks. Then his colours and his brilliance swam in front of her, she was pleased to find that her eyes were full of tears. She forced them out and made a choking noise and fled.

  Sister Clodagh said nothing. He shut the door and they began to talk about the repairs.

  He could not attend. He was thinking of her. He had forgotten Sister Ruth, she had pulled that face of anguish at him and he knew it very well by no
w and made a note that he must avoid speaking to her again; he was thinking of Sister Clodagh.

  He looked round the office that was as disembodied as it could have been; it had a desk with writing materials and a shelf of books, an English-Hindi dictionary, religious and school books; a chair for Sister Clodagh and a chair for him and a carpet stool; a green iron safe and a coconut matting on the floor. There was a crucifix but it was like all other crucifixes, and an embroidery frame with a heap of gaudy wools. Was that really her taste? He looked from those childish colours to her face in its narrowing wimple, the forehead and cheek-bones beautiful and intelligent, the mouth fastidious. She looked cold, almost severe, and yet he thought: ‘I believe you’re sensitive. Sensitive and warm.’

  She spoke to him across the desk, stretching to hand him the papers, and her cross fell on the blotting paper. He stared at it; cheap black wood with a white painted line, but a cross to be worn on the breast, a symbol that meant – how much to her? ‘That’s what I don’t understand. How she believes in that and she must or she wouldn’t be here,’ and he wondered very much what had sent her into the Order.

  She raised her eyes to him as she talked. ‘Did you know you have beautiful eyes?’ He nearly said it; the charming phrase came almost automatically, but he did not say it. He sat facing her with a curious blankness in his heart; it was a relief when she began to talk again in her dominant school-mistress tones.

  ‘Will you come over the building with me?’ she was saying. ‘If you’ll take this note-book and write down the items, it will help you not to forget.’