May 1967 Diyatalāwa
Lakshmi leant over the sink in the kitchen of Hemachandra Mudalali’s house, rinsing the used lunch plates and stacking them on the draining board. After sweeping the kitchen floor and wiping the tabletops, she served the leftover rice and curry into a tin plate and sat on a small stool in a corner of the room.
It was now four months since she started work as a servant at the Hemachandra Mudalali residence. She had come to Hemachandra Mudalali’s directly here from the Salvation Army home for unmarried girls, a week after she had given birth to Daniel. Reaching into her jacket she pulled out the black and white picture of her son that the matron of the Salvation Army home had given her. Tears coursed down her cheeks. ‘Aiyoo, my child, my child.’
Hemachandra Mudalali’s wife Hamine stood at the kitchen door. ‘What are you crying about? Are you sick?’ She glanced at the picture in Lakshmi’s hands and shook her head. ‘The child will be well looked after. It is a good thing that Tea-maker Aiya had connections with the Salvation Army.’
Lakshmi leapt to her feet. The tin plate on her lap slipped off, sending the rice and pieces of fish sliding across the cement floor of the kitchen. ‘Why are you talking of Tea-maker Aiya and Periamma as if they did some good thing?’ tears tore out of her. ‘They wanted to get rid of me. They used me as a servant and then when I was in trouble threw me away. They dropped me off five months pregnant like a bag of dirt at the Salvation Army hostel. I begged them to let me stay in the estate. I said I would work for them without any pay. But no, they wanted me out of their life.’
Hamine shook her head. Her hand was firm on Lakshmi’s shoulder. ‘They are good people, Lakshmi. We have known them a long time. We gave you this job because Mrs Rasiah asked us to. You could not stay on the estate after what happened.’
Lakshmi slid the photograph back into her blouse. ‘No! They just wanted an excuse to get rid of me. They didn’t want their daughter to be friends with me. I know. I heard them. They even sent her to Colombo to study to separate us. And after I got pregnant, they refused to tell her what had happened to me, even where I was.’
Hamine shook her head. ‘Lakshmi, listen to me. Shiro is a bright young girl. Mudalali and I have seen her grow up. She needed to study in Colombo. It was not about you.’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘How do you know that they didn’t tell her where you were?’
Lakshmi looked at the floor, scuffing the coir mat with her bare toes. ‘Shiro Chinnamma sends letters to Appu and he brings them to me. I give him letters to post to her. He made me promise that I will not tell her where I am.’ Frightened, she stared at Hamine. ‘Please don’t tell Tea-maker Aiya or Periamma. I don’t want to get Shiro Chinnamma into trouble.’
‘I guess a letter once in a while doesn’t matter. But you must never tell her that you are here. If she comes here, we must tell Tea-maker Aiya.’
To never see Shiro Chinnamma again would break her heart, but what options were there? ‘I will never tell her.’
‘Lakshmi, I know you are sad about your son, but we like having you here.’ Hamine smiled. ‘In fact, you being able to read and write English is like having a secretary at home for Mudalali. And you read the English papers and tell the news to us also. Before you came, the Sunday paper would lie unopened all week on the table in the sitting room.’ She stopped and chortled. ‘Mudalali wanted to impress people that came to visit. I felt bad to tell him that an unopened English newspaper folded and creased as it had been in the shop with the original rubber band around it is hardly evidence of our interest in world news.’ She reached out and touched Lakshmi’s hand.
‘Lakshmi, you were the one who refused to see Mrs Rasiah when she came. She was very upset. Who do you think sends you the money and clothes through Appu every month?’
Hamine walked to the door, then turned and looked at Lakshmi. ‘Well, tomorrow is Sunday. You will feel better when you have visited your son. Go and visit, but don’t get too attached to the child. You know he’ll be adopted out soon.’
Lakshmi stood at the kitchen sink. Hemachandra Mudalali and his wife Hamine, were kind to her. They had no children and the work wasn’t hard. Lakshmi’s lips twisted in a grimace. She earned more here than a tea plucker and only did as much cooking and cleaning as in the line room for her family, probably even less, in much more comfort. She looked at the wood burning fireplace and the sink with the tap and compared it with the years she had spent cooking in the back veranda of the line room and standing in line for a pot of clean water from the common tap. No, her life was better here.
Yet, there was a time when she had hoped for better things. A home of her own, a husband who loved her. But it was an unreasonable dream for now.
Periamma, Lakshmi clasped the edge of the sink as the face once so beloved swam into her consciousness. Just a few old clothes and rupees sent through Appu. It was the way of the plantations, after all. The coolies used as unpaid servants, abused, raped and then thrown into the drain. Her parents had been right – once a coolie, always a coolie. She was on her own. She thought of Shiro Chinnamma’s monthly letters. Shiro Chinnamma was still a dreamer, getting ready for her university entrance examination but still the same girl that she was when they had sat together by the stream. Shiro Chinnamma begged Lakshmi to tell her where she was. But telling her would bring her there and that would make Hemachandra Mudalali and Hamine angry. No, that wasn’t worth the risk. Not yet.
The little room next to the kitchen was her room. In it was a little bed and a trunk with all her belongings. Lakshmi sat on the bed and unlocked the trunk. Pulling out Shiro’s last letter she started reading:
‘You remember Watakälé superintendent Aiya? We are friends now! Can you believe it? A white superintendent and a brown native girl! We meet in our place. No one knows, well, no one but you. And there’s more. I write to him monthly too, except I have to address it to ‘Ann Ashley-Cooper’. I ask him to do things like kiss the eagle! Ha, ha. I think I’m a little in love with him. But of course, that is crazy! Sri Lankans and white people can’t be together, ever!’
Shiro Chinnamma’s letters were all like this, full of bits of news and exclamation marks. Lakshmi skimmed down to the end of the letter. Tears filled her eyes as she read:
‘When I get married, I will adopt Daniel. Then you can live with me and we can both be mothers to him.’
There was no doubt that Shiro meant it. But Lakshmi couldn’t wait so long. Daniel may be adopted out any day. The lady who organised the adoptions had said that she had never seen such a fair Eurasian baby. She had also commented on his blue eyes.
Hemachandra Mudalali paid her monthly salary direct into a savings account in the post office, but that was not enough. It would cost a lot to get a small house and get her son Daniel back from the orphanage. And it had to be done quickly, before someone adopted him.
Appu, when he visited her last month, had given her an address of a woman here in Diyatalāwa. He had said that this woman, Malar, may be able to help her. He didn’t tell her how or why. Tomorrow was Sunday, her day off. She would go see this woman, then visit her son in Nuwara-Eliya.
‘Lakshmi, it looks like rain,’ Hamine yelled from the upstairs bedroom window. ‘Take the clothes in.’
‘Yes, Hamine,’ Lakshmi picked up the laundry basket and ran out to the backyard. Heavy drops of cold rain fell on her face and neck. Lakshmi shivered.
***
It was seven in the morning and Hemachandra Mudalali and Hamine were still asleep. The morning breakfast of kiribath and seenisambol was ready and on the dining table. Hamine would take care of lunch. Lakshmi shut and locked the back door of the house. She drew her multi-coloured woollen jumper tight around her. The ever-present morning mist of the tea plantations surrounded her with fingers of damp and cold. Thin rays of sunlight struggled through. She raised her face to their caress.
Leaving the garden, she secured the wooden cross bar across the garden gate. Last week the milk delivery man had left the gate ajar and two of the egg laying hens had wandered out into the street. Hamine had insisted that Lakshmi and Hemachandra Mudalali walk the streets looking for them. They were never found. The hens probably ended up as chicken curry by that evening.
Lakshmi pulled the crushed piece of paper out of the pocket of her blouse and looked at the address. Number 32, Gemunu Street. That was a small road off the main highway, towards the army training camp. She walked quickly. That area of town would be crowded today. Sunday morning was pola time, the market day, when all the locals brought their vegetables and fruit for sale and the traders had pavement displays of clothes, jewellery and all sorts of incense and other treasures. The population of Diyatalāwa increased about tenfold on pola days, transforming the sleepy country town into a busy market town that could rival Nuwara-Eliya.
Lakshmi pushed past women carrying baskets of vegetables and bull carts laden with coconuts, thambili and multi-coloured boxes woven from the coconut palm leaf. She stopped at a display of baby clothes. No, she shouldn’t waste her money. Apparently people donated clothes and money to the Nuwara-Eliya orphanage. The children there, including her son Daniel, were always well dressed and clean.
The shouts of vendors describing their wares and the loud chatter of people bargaining with them for the best price rose in volume as she pushed through the crowd. The smell of ripe Jak fruit tickled her nose. Hamine loved ripe Jak. She must remember to buy some on her way back.
A group of uniformed soldiers approached her. Her movement to the edge of the road into the drain was automatic. Cursing, she stepped back. These were soldiers from the army encampment in Diyatalāwa, not British Periadorai or estate employees. There was no need to behave like a plantation coolie. The men laughed. One pointed at her and said something that sounded like ‘vesi’. The laughter grew louder. Lakshmi scurried down Gemunu Street. Surely she must have heard wrong? Why would they think she was a vesi, a prostitute?
Number 32 was painted in small letters on a fence made of six foot high roofing sheets. It clashed with the other houses in the street, which had front fences of rows of canna plants and jasmine bushes. There was a wide gate also of the same material. Lakshmi walked up to it, half expecting it to be padlocked. The gate was shut but not padlocked. It swung open with a loud squeak. Shutting the gate behind her, Lakshmi hesitated, shifting from foot to foot. What was she doing here? And who was this Malar? How could she help her make money? Well, no use standing here.
Number 32 was an old fashioned brick single story house set in a garden with rose bushes, daisies and other colourful flowers Lakshmi didn’t recognise. A wide gravel path led to the front veranda. Two cane chairs and a small table stood there. Lakshmi took a deep breath and walked up the path to the front of the house.
The front door swung open. A middle aged man in the brown uniform of the Sri Lankan army stepped out from the front door of the house. He held his army cap under his arm and was buttoning his coat. He was followed by a woman dressed in a pale green cotton sari. Lakshmi stepped behind a tree. The woman looked about the age of Periamma, maybe a little younger. Her black hair was slicked back in a bun and her lips a red slash in her dark face. Lakshmi watched while she fluttered the eyelashes of her kohled eyes at the man, who shook hands with her and handed her an envelope. The woman smiled and slipped it into her sari blouse. The man turned and strode down the path and out of the gate.
The woman had half turned towards the front door when she saw Lakshmi. She bent towards her. ‘Who are you and what are you doing here?’ she snapped in Tamil.
Lakshmi recognised the rough, guttural accent. This was an Indian Tamil woman like herself. What should she say? But Appu had sent her, and he was a good man. At least she should talk with this woman.
‘What do you want?’ the woman repeated.
Lakshmi stepped out from behind the canna plants and took a couple of steps toward the woman. ‘Are you Malar – Amma?’ she stammered. ‘Appu Aiya from Watakälé sent me to see you, Amma.’
‘Hm, Watakälé Periadorai Appu sent you, heh?’ The woman gestured to Lakshmi to come closer. Lakshmi climbed the two steps to the polished cement of the veranda, slipped her sandals off and stood barefooted. The woman looked Lakshmi up and down like examining a cow or goat on sale at the market. ‘Yes, I am Malar. Come in and tell me what you want.’
Lakshmi followed Malar through the front door and into the sitting room, then stopped dumbfounded, gaping at the rich furnishings. A red velvet covered sofa and two matching chairs, all with thick, carved wooden arms, stood around a brown and red carpet. The two windows had what looked like thick red velvet curtains tied back with black cord. Along the walls were three and four shelved glass fronted cabinets with plates, bowls, dishes and statues in glass and white porcelain. Hamine had a few of these types of things. That was how Lakshmi knew what they were. Hamine cleaned and dusted them all herself, telling Lakshmi repeatedly how expensive and precious they were because they were all imported from England. She used words like Royal Doulton and Wedgewood, which were apparently written on the bottom of the pieces. To Lakshmi they had looked no different to the regular plates and dishes they used in the kitchen.
This woman, Malar, had cupboards full of them. Malar walked through a back door and down a red carpeted corridor. Lakshmi followed. There were two closed doors on either side of the corridor and Lakshmi could hear voices and laughter from behind one door.
The kitchen at the end of the corridor was completely different from the sitting room. It was a simple room. A wooden table with four rattan chairs stood in the middle. On one side was a wood-fired stove, the sink, a cupboard of plates and other bits and pieces. On the other side was a large chest of drawers. Malar pointed to a chair and sat opposite Lakshmi. A book that looked like a factory ledger lay on the table between them. Opening it Malar looked across it at Lakshmi. ‘So you want a job? I can do with more girls like you. Tell me your name. How old are you?’
‘My name is Lakshmi, Amma. I am about twenty-three years old,’ Lakshmi stammered.
‘You must call me Malar.’ She scribbled something on the book. ‘Have you had any children?’
‘I had a baby four months ago Amm – Malar,’ she whispered.
‘You have given him away?’
Why did Malar want all these details? ‘He is in the Salvation Army orphanage in Nuwara-Eliya.’
‘Who is the father?’
Lakshmi couldn’t take it any longer. ‘Am – Malar, please help me. My child, Daniel, I must take him out of the orphanage. Make a home for him. Please, please help me. I will work for you.’ Her voice broke on a sob, ‘I have the Sundays free. I will do anything. Please.’
Malar stood up and walked around the table. Her hand was gentle on Lakshmi’s head. Lakshmi’s sobs subsided. ‘This Daniel. Your son,’ Malar’s voice was soft. ‘He is the child of a Periadorai? A white man?’
Lakshmi nodded. Her body trembled with remembered pain and horror. ‘And this man, the father, did you go to him willingly or did he force you?’
‘He forced me.’ The memory was still a shaft through her soul.
‘You are working somewhere already?’
‘Yes,’ Lakshmi whispered, ‘At Hemachandra Mudalali’s place.’
‘But you want a lot of money fast, right?’
‘Yes,’ Lakshmi raised her head and looked into Malar’s eyes. A tear formed in the corner of Malar’s eyes and slipped down her cheek. ‘Lakshmi, I too had a child by a British Periadorai. But he didn’t throw me away. He bought this house for me. Got the furniture and all the things you saw. He paid for me to bring up the boy.’
Lakshmi followed Malar’s eyes to a colour picture on top of the refrigerator. It was of a young man about Lakshmi’s age, maybe a little older. He was dressed in a blue suit and stood in front of a red brick building. Lakshmi could see that he was fair, a little like Daniel.
‘That is my son, Jega. He is studying in England. He will come back soon as Dr Jega Jayaseelen. His father in England is paying. He will be a doctor. A specialist, he tells me, whatever that is.’
A sob rent Lakshmi’s body. ‘You are lucky.’
‘Lucky?’ Malar’s lips twisted. ‘Taken from the line rooms at fifteen and kept as a slave by the British Periadorai. Then when he went to England and brought his wife back. I was thrown out by her. She hit me. Called me a prostitute. She was a white pissasu – a devil. I was pregnant with my son.’
‘But at least your son’s father looked after you?’
Malar nodded. ‘So that is why Watakälé Periadorai’s Appu sent you to me. He knows what happened.’
Lakshmi watched as Malar wiped her face on the end of her sari and sat down at the table, picking up her pen again.
‘Lakshmi, do you know what type of work the girls do here in my house?’
Just then a short, dark and chubby woman dressed in a red blouse and long black skirt came down the corridor into the kitchen. ‘Malar, the army man gave me an extra two hundred rupees.’ She giggled.
Malar glanced at Lakshmi and then addressed the other woman. ‘You can keep it. And here’s the rest of your payment for today.’ She handed a few folded notes to her. Lakshmi recognised them as hundred rupee notes. The woman counted it and laughed. ‘Nice. I can go shopping at the pola markets.’ She left by the back kitchen door. The laughter hung in the air between Malar and Lakshmi.
Lakshmi remembered the army men she had passed on the road, their mocking laughter and the word they had used – vesi. The truth dawned on her. This was a whorehouse. It provided women to the army camp. Yes, she wanted money, but to sell her body? To go through that pain and shame over and over again? No. She couldn’t do it. She pushed back her chair and stood up. ‘Malar, I am sorry. I can’t, I shouldn’t have come.’ Even as she spoke she realised that she had said the last few words in English.
‘You speak English?’ Malar gasped.
Lakshmi nodded, her hands grasping the edge of the table.
‘Lakshmi, sit down. You want to make money? I can do that for you. Let me help you.’ Her eyes met Lakshmi’s. ‘You don’t have many choices, girl. You are young and pretty.’ Her eyes roved over Lakshmis body. ‘You look after your hands and your nails.’ She looked at Lakshmi’s mouth. ‘You don’t chew betel and have good teeth.’
What am I doing? Lakshmi pulled the chair back and sat down. The world slowed down around her. She was about to agree to be a prostitute. What would Periamma say if she knew? Why think of her? She didn’t care about her. Anger boiled up in her heart and spilled over.
‘I’ll do it.’
Malar nodded. She bent and wrote in the ledger then turned the book around to Lakshmi. ‘Sign here. I will set up appointments for you on Sunday, your day off. It is the busiest day of the week. On a good day, you can get through five or even six appointments. I will pay you two hundred rupees for one session. Like you saw, whatever else you make is yours. The men who come to you will pay you well if you are good.’
Lakshmi picked up the pen and signed her name in English. Lakshmi Ramen. It was an act of defiance and a renunciation of all that the Rasiahs stood for. To use the manners Periamma had taught her and the English she had learnt to earn money as a vesi.
Malar smiled. ‘That’s better. Now I will give you a medicine you have to take. This will keep you from getting pregnant. If something still happens, we will see to it.’
There was a sharp knock on the front door. Malar glanced at the clock on the wall over the drawers. ‘Goodness, it’s ten o’clock. Sumi was supposed to be here.’ She bit her lip. ‘Lakshmi, when did you have your periods?’
‘I just finished. Why?’
‘Would you like to start work today? This is an important client and the girl he asked for hasn’t come. I think he will like you.’
Lakshmi glanced down at her white cotton blouse and threadbare skirt. ‘I am not ready …’
Malar interrupted her with a hoarse chuckle. ‘Don’t worry, girl. Clothes are the last thing on their minds when they come here.’ Grasping Lakshmi by her hand, she dragged her to the nearest bedroom door, opened the door and pushed her in. ‘There’s a nightdress on the bed. Take all your clothes off and put it on. Pull your hair down. And from today, when you are working, you will be called Devi.’
Lakshmi stood by the bed. She picked up the lace nightdress. It felt like she was out of her body, watching herself take her clothes off and put on the lace attire, changing from Lakshmi with the dream of a better life into Devi the prostitute. She pulled her hair free of the tight knot and let it cascade down her back. She sat on the edge of the bed and waited.
Daniel, my child, this is for you.
She heard a male voice, speaking in accented British English. ‘A new girl, you say? Better than Sumi? Well, I’ll expect a bang for my bucks. Let’s see what she has to offer.’
The door opened and Lakshmi stared into the white skinned face. The expression of arrogant lust in his eyes made her shudder. Bile rose in her throat. Her breathe caught in her chest.
His hands reached for her. Lakshmi muffled a scream as his lips came down on hers.