The Temple Dancer by John Speed Page B

whitewashed walls. Maya meanwhile spread on her bedmat her few
possessions from the cloth shoulder bag she carried. Lucinda compared them
to the piles of clothing and linens heaping from her trunk. "I envy you,
Maya," she said quietly.
    "Do you?" Maya replied, just as softly, without looking up. She pulled
a pair of roughly finished wooden boxes from her bag.
    "What are those?" But Maya hid them underneath the quilted cotton
coverlet without a word. "Aren't we friends?" Lucinda demanded.
    "You are the daughter of my owner," Maya answered without looking up.

    Lucinda looked up, shocked. "No, I'm not!"
    "You deny it? It is your father who bought me!"
    "My father's dead!" Lucinda sighed. "Who told you this?" The look in
Maya's flashing eyes told Lucinda everything. "Slipper. . ." she said.
    Maya muttered something under her breath. "Look, if you want," she
said, pushing the wooden boxes toward Lucinda. Inside the smaller box was
a cloth bag. Out of it spilled a sort of golden net, strung with beads. Lucinda
held it up, spreading her hands. "A headdress?" Maya nodded. "How pretty.
And so heavy!" The beads caught the flickering lamplight; some clear glass,
others white.
    "The person who gave it to me said it belonged to my mother."
    "Ahcha," Lucinda said, gently setting it back. "And this?" Lucinda
started to open the long box.
    "My father's, that person said. Who knows? I like to think so, any„
way.
    As Lucinda lifted the wooden cover, she saw a broken sword. "This is a
farang blade."
    "I think my father might have been a farang. I remember so little, but I
seem to remember the man who lifted me over his head, his face so pale and
his pale eyes. And a white shirt full of ruffles. Only farangs wear shirts like
that."
    "Was your mother a farang as well?"
    A tear slid down Maya's cheek tracing a glistening path. "I remember a
cold night, and a woman pulling me into the forest. I don't remember much
about her, but she wasn't a farang. She wore a sari, wet with blood. I remember that she fell asleep and I could not wake her. I pushed leaves into
the wound beneath her breast. When she stopped bleeding, I thought I had
healed her. But she then grew cold."
    "You poor thing! How old were you?"
    Maya's voice was steady, but now tear after tear spilled down her cheek.
"Two, maybe? Three? I left her there, in the night, on the bare ground.
I spread more leaves over her, like a blanket. She was so beautiful, so still."
A sob escaped her. "I left her," she choked.
    "You were a child!" But Maya covered her face and Lucinda sat silent.
Then a golden glint in the sword box caught her eye. Lucinda lifted out a
golden rial, rudely sawn in two. "What's this?" she asked. But Maya did not
hear her for sobbing, and Lucinda set it down without another word.

    The elephant, too big for the dharmsala stables, stood near one of the
guesthouses, lit by the flames of a small fire. Bits of ash danced like fireflies
into the starlit sky.
    Despite the dharmsala guards, Pathan had stationed his own men at
key points of the compound. He found his way to the fire. Soon Da Gama
and Geraldo came. Da Gama had brought a few sadc.le blankets from the
stables; he and the others sat on them tailor-fashion. All but the mahout,
who squatted on his haunches, keeping his hands pressed against his lips as
if blowing them for warmth, occasionally pushing twigs toward the flames
with his bare toes, as nimble as a monkey's. Each time he did this, Geraldo
blinked in amazement.
    The faces of the men, lit from below, took on an eerie glow. There was
little talk: instead the men focused on the flames, which they watched in
tired, silent fascination.
    Finally, huffing as if at the end of a race, Slipper joined the circle. The
farangs slid apart to make him room, but Pathan and the mahout did not
move. With a number of grunts and sighs Slipper sat and tucked his fat legs
beneath him. He held his pudgy hands toward the flames, and rubbed them