Enchanted Evening (40 page)

Fortunately, they had forgotten the humans who had scuttled out of it and were crouched in hiding watching, horrified, the destruction of their car, not daring to creep out until some time after the herd had abandoned their battered enemy and moved off into the jungle. The trembling refugees were picked up by a bus not long afterwards, and taken on to the next outpost of civilization.

Mother continued to believe that these stories, together with the black milestones, were an elaborate leg-pull, a belief strengthened by the fact that on checking up, she discovered that there was always a good deal of traffic on that road, including buses that ran at intervals of an hour and served both the forest and Dâk bungalows as well as the occasional small village. So that when we started out on the last leg of our journey to Ooty we were both in the best of spirits.

For a long way our road ran through typically South Indian scenery, and it was almost mid-morning by the time we left the lush greenery and flat cultivated fields of village India and began to twist and turn up the low slopes that would eventually take us to the cool blue heights of the Nilgiri Hills.

We were driving up a short steep slope towards the crest of a low ridge when I became aware of movement higher up on the slope and immediately ahead of us. I was trying to make out what it was when Mother, looking to her right, gave a gasp of horror and said: ‘There's a black milestone!' in almost the same moment that I said: ‘There's a tiger!' Mother, still staring to her right, not only did not hear what I said, but had begun to slow down as we came out on a straight stretch of road on which, directly in front of us, a tiger was crossing.

I have yet to see a live one in any zoo that looked as magnificent as this one. It not only looked enormous, but its colouring was brilliant – bright golden red, chalk white and ebony black. It strolled across the road, not making the least effort to hurry, and merely turned its head and gave us a cold stare, as though to say: ‘Gatecrashers, I presume!' before walking haughtily and unhurriedly into the jungle.

I have never felt so small. Or so scared. That creature looked quite large enough to turn our tiny Baby Austin over with one swipe of its paw; and as Mother slowed, I began frantically winding up the windows on my side and imploring her to ‘hurry,
hurry
!' The tiger (who had made no attempt to hurry) averted its gaze and removed itself into the scrub. But I was afraid that it might change its mind and come back and attack us, and continued to urge Mother to step on it and to wind up her window. Mother obediently stepped on the accelerator and asked me what was I getting into such a panic for? One black milestone didn't necessarily mean there were elephants nearby. ‘Not elephants,' I said. ‘That tiger.' ‘What tiger?' said Mother.

Believe it or not, she hadn't even
seen
the tiger! It had crossed the road right in front of us, so close that we could have almost reached out and touched it, but she had been so hypnotized by the sight of that black milestone that she had slowed down, still staring at it. She had been quite sure that the whole story of the milestones was a leg-pull, and, seeing one, had been so startled at finding it was true that she couldn't focus on anything else.

*   *   *

I am thankful to say that we saw no more tigers, and not a single elephant on the rest of our drive through the Mysore Ditch. Later on Mother was invited by His Highness of Mysore to attend a
keddah,
which is an elephant drive in which a herd of wild elephants will be located and driven very slowly and cautiously, so that they do not become scared and break back, by men on the backs of tame elephants, through the jungles of the Mysore Ditch towards an enormous enclosure somewhere in the forest, where they are trapped and led away to be tamed and turned into working elephants. Kipling has written a wonderful description of a
keddah
in a story called ‘Toomai of the Elephants', which is one of the tales in
The Jungle Book.
You should read it – if you haven't already done so.

I would have given anything to be invited to watch a
keddah,
but alas, only a very few white people get the chance, and I wasn't as lucky as Mother. However, she took a lot of photographs, and described it all to me, which I suppose was the next best thing to seeing one myself. Nowadays, when engines and electricity have almost eliminated man and animal power, and the once-great forests of the world are falling with frightening speed to the assaults of chain-saws, I don't suppose there can be all that much need for working elephants, except for use on ceremonial occasions, and very soon, if it has not happened already, the world will have witnessed its last
keddah.
However, I did have one more jungle experience during that summer in Ootacamund.

A syndicate had been formed to run a series of ‘walks' through the Mysore Ditch on elephants' backs. You either spent the previous night in a nearby forest bungalow, or got up in the small hours in order to reach the starting point by first light. Sitting in rough-and-ready
howdahs
on the back of pad-elephants, parties of four to six sightseers would start off at a word from the
mahout,
who would be sitting on his animal's neck with a knee tucked under each of the leathery fan-like ears, and away they would go, to drift silently through the fringe of the Mysore Ditch and see, in their natural habitat, the birds and beasts who inhabited that long strip of almost virgin jungle.

Those who were lucky might even see a tiger or a panther, though these Lords of the Jungle were apt to retire to some remoter spot for the day. The curious thing about those elephant-back walkabouts was that the other denizens of the jungle never appeared to notice any difference in smell or appearance between a tame elephant and a wild one, and never seemed to spot the clusters of humans on their backs. You would have thought that a
mahout
and half a dozen assorted sightseers would, between them, have given off the odd whiff of danger, and that the scent of the elephant lines would have clung about the tame ones. But apparently not. Your elephant drifted happily through the jungle, and not a bird or a mammal turned its head to look. I never saw another tiger (to tell the truth, I didn't want to. Twice was enough – it is very scary indeed to be in the presence of a wild tiger stalking through his own territory, take it from me). But I did see a leopard walking through the rustling grass as though he owned the place, a whole herd of bad-tempered wild buffalo, several kinds of deer, some of whom stopped and stared – not at us but at the leopard, who ignored them – and several nilgai, the big, blue bulls of the Indian forests. Monkeys of course, and any number of birds: peacocks by the score, and the beautiful and brilliantly feathered jungle-cocks, tree-creepers, woodpeckers, the black, long-tailed king-crows, and a dozen other species of bird life.

*   *   *

Bets and her baby, Richard, were in Ooty for the hot weather, as were many other people we had known in Hyderabad, and Mother spent most of her time sketching. Myself, I didn't find Ooty very paintable. It looked more like one of the midland counties of England, green and misty, with rolling downlands and a distant fringe of blue hills. I think that is why, when the Raj ended, so many people to whom this spelt instant retirement chose to spend their later years there. Ooty, to them, was the ‘blue remembered hills' of the Housman poem and they thought – most of them wrongly – that it would always be like home to them.

I suppose it is because I didn't take to the place that I have almost no recollection of it. I can't even see it in my mind's eye, and all that remains of it is a memory of long avenues of eucalyptus, that decorative tree that Australians call ‘wattle' and that legend says was brought to Ooty some time before the nineteenth century by a home-sick Ozzie who thought it might flourish there. Too right. It took to Ooty with enthusiasm, and it is sad to hear that India has been cutting down those beautiful blue-gum trees left and right. I am told that soon there will be none left.

The only thing I remember about Ooty is leaving it briefly to attend a party in Mysore. I'm quite sure Mother must have been asked too, because the invitation came from
Larla
Begum, and I am equally certain that Mother would have attended if she possibly could. But for some fairly pressing reason she was unable to accept. So I went by myself; and spent a fantastic few days in Mysore. For the Begum had asked us down to attend the festivities connected with the marriage of the Heir Apparent, a joyous event for which the old Maharajah, His Highness Sir Sri Krishnaraja Wadiyar Bahadur of Mysore, was throwing a truly magnificent party.

I had attended a good number of Indian weddings before, but never anything to compare with this one. All Mysore was
en fête.
Its palaces, temples and public buildings, and many of the private houses, were outlined in fairy-lights which were switched on as soon as darkness fell, so that night after night during the few days of celebration the city glittered like the diamond mines in Walt Disney's
Snow White.
I did not attend any of the special functions or dinners at which the old Maharajah was present, for His Highness was an orthodox Hindu. His caste did not permit him to eat with Europeans, though when it came to kingship and the good of his state he was broadminded enough to appoint a Muslim friend and fellow student of his boyhood as his Chief Minister. However, I was never made aware of being left out of anything and I remember every day as being planned out ahead and full of interest.

My first day began with a visit to the elephant lines, where the elephants who would be walking in the wedding processions were ‘having their make-up put on' – literally! It was an enchanting sight, for the great creatures seemed to know exactly what was going on, and would hold out their trunks to make it easier for their make-up men to paint elaborate patterns on them. What's more, they appeared to appreciate the whole thing, and I was only sorry that no one gave them a full-length looking glass before which they could admire themselves.

The only trouble was caused by an endearing baby elephant, recently born in the lines, who was obviously becoming a spoilt brat, adored by both humans and elephants. He was deliberately naughty, and getting away with it every time. Well, not every time. When he knocked over yet
another
pot of paint, one of his elders and betters, losing patience, caught him by his little tail, hauled him close, and slapped him hard. Whereupon he bolted, squealing, to his Mum, who made a fuss of him, and then – most unexpectedly – gave him a good slap herself. At which all the
mahouts
laughed. I could have spent hours watching them.

I was taken to endless parties, one with the bridegroom's sisters, where for the first time I met Shri, the youngest sister, I believe, whom I was later to know well. She can't have been more than ten or eleven at the time, but she was an enchanting child and, I was to discover, very much better educated than I was.

Then there was another party after which the guests were taken to a wing of the palace where, in a series of gorgeously decorated rooms, the wedding presents were displayed. You've never seen such a collection of dazzling jewellery and bits of expensive bric-à-brac: though had I been asked to choose one item for myself I would have picked a sari. There must have been dozens of these, because I remember a whole very long table being given up to saris alone, every one of them a triumph of the weaver's art, and one of them designed by a genius. It's the only one of all those hundreds of glittering wedding presents that I can still remember quite clearly.

It was a Benares sari of silver gauze, hand-woven from every shade of silver you can imagine, from the brightest to the dullest, in a design of ostrich feathers. The silver changed colour as the light moved on it, and in some lights the feathers looked almost real, and as if they would move if a breeze blew on them. It was a fantastic piece of imaginative craftsmanship – and oh, how I coveted it!

There were any number of parties on the night of the wedding, and the Begum told me that it would be taken as a great compliment by the host and hostess of the one I would be attending if I wore Indian dress for the occasion. When I said that I was sorry, but I hadn't got such a thing, she laughed and said that needn't bother me, because she and the girls would be only too pleased to lend me anything I needed, which they did. Between them they produced endless gorgeous saris and bodices and any number of slippers and sandals and made-to-order-in-Paris high-heeled shoes for me to choose from, and we all had an uproarious time trying them all on and deciding which one we liked best. I tried on so many that I can't remember which we finally chose, but I do remember fancying myself no end in the winning number, and feeling exactly like Cinderella must have done before she arrived at that ball. The Begum's
ayah
and the one that had been temporarily put in charge of me for the duration of my visit smoothed my hair flat with some coconut oil and pulled it back from my ears into a knot of black silk that looked as though it was real hair, once the join between that and my own was concealed by a little wreath of jasmine flowers. They painted my eyes with kohl – most becoming! – and when they had finished making up my face, one of them added a
tilak,
a red caste mark between the eyebrows, as a final touch. And when I arrived at the party everyone pretended they didn't recognize me.

With the news that the
shadi
had been concluded and the procession was on its way, we all crowded out under the arches of the main entrance to the palace to watch it arrive. It was a really wonderful show against a night sky that was bright with fireworks, shower upon shower of gold and silver, bright pink, blue and viridian stars. The head of the procession took some time to reach us, headed by a double rank of men in gold-embroidered, bright-sashed uniforms and turbans, carrying flaming torches. Between them marched bands and prancing, wonderfully caparisoned horses, followed by more squads of marchers: men blowing on flutes, and priests and holy men in saffron-yellow and bright orange robes, the occasional elephant, painted all over with brilliant designs and draped in heavy, gold-embroidered housings – bearing, I presume, various senior officials of state or members of the family in gold or silver
howdahs.
It was difficult to make out faces in the flare of smoke from the torches.