Journey to the End of the Earth PDF

3 Journey to the end of the Earth Tishani Doshi Before you read If you want to know more about the planet’s past, present and future, the Antarctica is the place to go to. Bon Voyage! EARLY this year, I found myself aboard a Russian research vessel —...

3 Journey to the end of the Earth Tishani Doshi Before you read If you want to know more about the planet’s past, present and future, the Antarctica is the place to go to. Bon Voyage! EARLY this year, I found myself aboard a Russian research vessel — the Akademik Shokalskiy — heading towards the coldest, driest, windiest continent in the world: Antarctica. My journey began 13.09 degrees north of the Equator in Madras, and involved crossing nine time zones, six checkpoints, three bodies of water, and at least as many ecospheres. By the time I actually set foot on the Antarctic continent I had been travelling over 100 hours in combination of a car, an aeroplane and a ship; so, my first emotion on facing Antarctica’s expansive white landscape and uninterrupted blue horizon was relief, followed up with an immediate and profound wonder. Wonder at its immensity, its isolation, but mainly at how there could ever have been a time when India and Antarctica were part of the same landmass. Part of history Six hundred and fifty million years ago, a giant amalgamated southern supercontinent — Gondwana — did indeed exist, centred roughly around the present-day 18 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 Antarctica. Things were quite different then: humans hadn’t arrived on the global scene, and the climate was much warmer, hosting a huge variety of flora and fauna. For 500 million years Gondwana thrived, but around the time when the dinosaurs were wiped out and the age of the mammals got under way, the landmass was forced to separate into countries, shaping the globe much as we know it today. To visit Antarctica now is to be a part of that history; to get a grasp of where we’ve come from and where we could possibly be heading. It’s to understand the significance of Cordilleran folds and pre-Cambrian How do geological granite shields; ozone and carbon; phenomena help evolution and extinction. When you think us to know about about all that can happen in a million the history of years, it can get pretty mind-boggling. humankind? Imagine: India pushing northwards, jamming against Asia to buckle its crust and form the Himalayas; South America drifting off to join North America, opening up the Drake Passage to create a cold circumpolar current, keeping Antarctica frigid, desolate, and at the bottom of the world. For a sun-worshipping South Indian like myself, two weeks in a place where 90 per cent of the Earth’s total ice volumes are stored is a chilling prospect (not just for circulatory and metabolic functions, but also for the imagination). It’s like walking into a giant ping-pong ball Journey to the end of the Earth 19 Reprint 2024-25 devoid of any human markers — no trees, billboards, buildings. You lose all earthly sense of perspective and time here. The visual scale ranges from the microscopic to the mighty: midges and mites to blue whales and icebergs as big as countries (the largest recorded was the size of Belgium). Days go on and on and on in surreal 24-hour austral summer light, and a ubiquitous silence, interrupted only by the occasional avalanche or calving ice sheet, consecrates the place. It’s an immersion that will force you to place yourself in the context of the earth’s geological history. And for humans, the prognosis isn’t good. Human impact Human civilisations have been around for a paltry 12,000 years — barely a few seconds on the geological clock. In that short amount of time, we’ve managed to create quite a ruckus, etching our dominance over Nature with our villages, towns, cities, megacities. The rapid increase of human populations has left us battling with other species for limited resources, and the unmitigated burning of fossil fuels has now created a blanket of carbon dioxide around the world, which is slowly but surely increasing the What are the average global temperature. indications for the Climate change is one of the most future of hotly contested environmental debates humankind? of our time. Will the West Antarctic ice sheet melt entirely? Will the Gulf Stream ocean current be disrupted? Will it be the end of the world as we know it? Maybe. Maybe not. Either way, Antarctica is a crucial element in this debate — not just because it’s the only place in the world, which has never sustained a human population and therefore remains relatively ‘pristine’ in this respect; but more importantly, because it holds in its ice-cores half-million-year-old carbon records trapped in its layers of ice. If we want to study and examine the Earth’s past, present and future, Antarctica is the place to go. 20 Vistas Reprint 2024-25  Students on Ice, the programme I was working with on the Shokalskiy, aims to do exactly this by taking high school students to the ends of the world and providing them with inspiring educational opportunities which will help them foster a new understanding and respect for our planet. It’s been in operation for six years now, headed by Canadian Geoff Green, who got tired of carting celebrities and retired, rich, curiosity-seekers who could only ‘give’ back in a limited way. With Students on Ice, he offers the future generation of policy-makers a life-changing experience at an age when they’re ready to absorb, learn, and most importantly, act. The reason the programme has been so successful is because it’s impossible to go anywhere near the South Pole and not be affected by it. It’s easy to be blasé about polar ice-caps melting while sitting in the comfort zone of our respective latitude and longitude, but when you can visibly see glaciers retreating and ice shelves collapsing, you begin to realise that the threat of global warming is very real. Antarctica, because of her simple ecosystem and lack of biodiversity, is the perfect place to study how little changes in the environment can have big repercussions. Take the microscopic phytoplankton — those grasses of the sea that nourish and sustain the entire Southern Ocean’s food chain. These single-celled plants use the sun’s energy to assimilate carbon and synthesise organic compounds in that wondrous and most important of Journey to the end of the Earth 21 Reprint 2024-25 processes called photosynthesis. Scientists warn that a further depletion in the ozone layer will affect the activities of phytoplankton, which in turn will affect the lives of all the marine animals and birds of the region, and the global carbon cycle. In the parable of the phytoplankton, there is a great metaphor for existence: take care of the small things and the big things will fall into place. Walk on the ocean My Antarctic experience was full of such epiphanies, but the best occurred just short of the Antarctic Circle at 65.55 degrees south. The Shokalskiy had managed to wedge herself into a thick white stretch of ice between the peninsula and Tadpole Island which was preventing us from going any further. The Captain decided we were going to turn around and head back north, but before we did, we were all instructed to climb down the gangplank and walk on the ocean. So there we were, all 52 of us, kitted out in Gore-Tex and glares, walking on a stark whiteness that seemed to spread out forever. Underneath our feet was a metre-thick ice pack, and underneath that, 180 metres of living, breathing, salt water. In the periphery Crabeater seals were stretching and sunning themselves on ice floes much like stray dogs will do under the shade of a banyan tree. It was nothing short of a revelation: everything does indeed connect. Nine time zones, six checkpoints, three bodies of water and many ecospheres later, I was still wondering about the beauty of balance in play on our planet. How would it be if Antarctica were to become the warm place that it once used to be? Will we be around to see it, or would we have gone the way of the dinosaurs, mammoths and woolly rhinos? Who’s to say? But after spending two weeks with a bunch of teenagers who still have the idealism to save the world, all I can say is that a lot can happen in a million years, but what a difference a day makes! 22 Vistas Reprint 2024-25  Reading with Insight 1. ‘The world’s geological history is trapped in Antarctica.’ How is the study of this region useful to us? 2. What are Geoff Green’s reasons for including high school students in the Students on Ice expedition? 3. ‘Take care of the small things and the big things will take care of themselves.’ What is the relevance of this statement in the context of the Antarctic environment? 4. Why is Antarctica the place to go to, to understand the earth’s present, past and future? For more information on Students on Ice visit www.studentsonice.com Journey to the end of the Earth 23 Reprint 2024-25  4 The Enemy Pearl S. Buck Before you Read It is the time of the World War. An American prisoner of war is washed ashore in a dying state and is found at the doorstep of a Japanese doctor. Should he save him as a doctor or hand him over to the Army as a patriot? Dr Sadao Hoki’s house was built on a spot of the Japanese coast where as a little boy he had often played. The low, square stone house was set upon rocks well above a narrow beach that was outlined with bent pines. As a boy Sadao Who was had climbed the pines, supporting Dr Sadao? himself on his bare feet, as he had seen Where was his men do in the South Seas when they house? climbed for coconuts. His father had taken him often to the islands of those seas, and never had he failed to say to the little brave boy at his side, ‘‘Those islands yonder, they are the stepping stones to the future for Japan.’’ ‘‘Where shall we step from them?’’ Sadao had asked seriously. ‘‘Who knows?’’ his father had answered. ‘‘Who can limit our future? It depends on what we make it.’’ 24 Vistas Reprint 2024-25  Sadao had taken this into his mind as he did everything his father said, his father who never joked or played with him but who spent infinite pains upon him who was his only son. Sadao knew that his education was his father’s chief concern. For this reason he had been sent at twenty-two to America to learn all that could be learned of surgery and medicine. He had come back at thirty, and before his father died he had seen Sadao become famous not only as a surgeon but as a scientist. Because he was perfecting a discovery which would render wounds entirely clean, he had not been sent abroad with the troops. Also, he knew, there was some slight danger that the old General might need an operation for a condition for which he was now being treated medically, and for this possibility Sadao was being kept in Japan. Clouds were rising from the ocean now. The unexpected warmth of the past few days had at night drawn heavy fog from the cold waves. Sadao watched mists hide outlines of a little island near the shore and then come creeping up the beach below the house, wreathing around the pines. In a few minutes fog would be wrapped about the house too. Then he would go into the room where Hana, his wife, would be waiting for him with the two children. But at this moment the door opened and she looked out, a dark-blue woollen haori1 over her kimono. She came to him affectionately and put her arm through his as he stood, smiled and said nothing. He had met Hana in America, but he had waited to fall in love with her until he was sure she was Japanese. His father would never have received her unless she had been pure in her race. He wondered often whom he would have married if he had not met Hana, and by what luck he had found her in the most casual way, by chance literally, at an American professor’s house. The professor and his wife had been kind people anxious to do something for their few foreign students, and the students, though bored, had accepted this kindness. Sadao had often told Hana how nearly he had not gone to Professor Harley’s house that night — the rooms 1 haori: a loose outer garment worn over the kimono. The Enemy 25 Reprint 2024-25 were so small, the food so bad, the professor’s wife so voluble. But he had gone and there he had found Hana, a new student, and had felt he would love her if it were at all possible. Now he felt her hand on his arm and was aware of the pleasure it gave him, even though they had been married years enough to have the two children. For they had not married heedlessly in America. They had finished their work at school and had come home to Japan, and when his father had seen her the marriage had been arranged in the old Japanese way, although Sadao and Hana had talked everything over beforehand. They were perfectly happy. She laid her cheek against his arm. It was at this moment that both of them saw something black come out of the mists. It was a man. He was flung up out of the ocean — flung, it seemed, to his feet by a breaker. He staggered a few steps, his body outlined against the mist, his arms above his head. Then the curled mists hid him again. ‘‘Who is that?’’ Hana cried. She dropped Sadao’s arm and they both leaned over the railing of the veranda. Now they saw him again. The man was on his hands and knees crawling. Then they saw him fall on his face and lie there. ‘‘A fisherman perhaps,’’ Sadao said, ‘‘washed from his boat.’’ He ran quickly down the steps and behind him 26 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 Hana came, her wide sleeves flying. A mile or two away on either side there were fishing villages, but here was only the bare and lonely coast, dangerous with rocks. The surf beyond the beach was spiked with rocks. Somehow the man had managed to come through them — he must be badly torn. They saw when they came toward him that indeed it was so. The sand on one side of him had already a stain of red soaking through. ‘‘He is wounded,’’ Sadao exclaimed. He made haste to the man, who lay motionless, his face in the sand. An old cap stuck to his head soaked with sea water. He was in wet rags of garments. Sadao stopped, Hana at his side, and turned the man’s head. They saw the face. “A white man!” Hana whispered. Yes, it was a white man. The wet cap fell away and there was his wet yellow hair, long, as though for many weeks it had not been cut, and upon his young and tortured face was a rough yellow beard. He was unconscious and knew nothing that they did for him. Now Sadao remembered the wound, and with his expert fingers he began to search for it. Blood flowed freshly at his touch. On the right side of his lower back Will Dr Sadao be Sadao saw that a gun wound had been arrested on the reopened. The flesh was blackened with charge of powder. Sometime, not many days ago, harbouring an the man had been shot and had not been enemy? tended. It was bad chance that the rock had struck the wound. ‘‘Oh, how he is bleeding!’’ Hana whispered again in a solemn voice. The mists screened them now completely, and at this time of day no one came by. The fishermen had gone home and even the chance beachcombers would have considered the day at an end. ‘‘What shall we do with this man?’’ Sadao muttered. But his trained hands seemed of their own will to be doing what they could to stanch the fearful bleeding. He packed The Enemy 27 Reprint 2024-25 the wound with the sea moss that strewed the beach. The man moaned with pain in his stupor but he did not awaken. ‘‘The best thing that we could do would be to put him back in the sea,’’ Sadao said, answering himself. Now that the bleeding was stopped for the moment he stood up and dusted the sand from his hands. ‘‘Yes, undoubtedly that would be best,’’ Hana said steadily. But she continued to stare down at the motionless man. ‘‘If we sheltered a white man in our house we should be arrested and if we turned him over as a prisoner, he would certainly die,’’ Sadao said. ‘‘The kindest thing would be to put him back into the sea,’’ Hana said. But neither of them moved. They were staring with a curious repulsion upon the inert figure. ‘‘What is he?’’ Hana whispered. ‘‘There is something about him that looks American,’’ Sadao said. He took up the battered cap. Yes, there, almost gone, was the faint lettering. ‘‘A sailor,’’ he said, ‘‘from an American warship.’’ He spelled it out: ‘‘U.S. Navy.’’ The man was a prisoner of war! ‘‘He has escaped.’’ Hana cried softly, ‘‘and that is why he is wounded.’’ ‘‘In the back,’’ Sadao agreed. They hesitated, looking at each other. Then Hana said with resolution: “Come, are we able to put him back into the sea?” “If I am able, are you?” Sadao asked. “No,” Hana said, “But if you can do it alone...” Sadao hesitated again. “The strange thing is,” he said, “that if the man were whole I could turn him over to the police without difficulty. I care nothing for him. He is my enemy. All Americans are my enemy. And he is only a common fellow. You see how foolish his face is. But since he is wounded…” “You also cannot throw him back to the sea,” Hana said. “Then there is only one thing to do. We must carry him into the house.” “But the servants?” Sadao inquired. 28 Vistas Reprint 2024-25  “We must simply tell them that we intend to give him to the police — as indeed we must, Sadao. We must think of the children and your position. It would endanger all of us if we did not give this man over as a prisoner of war.” “Certainly,” Sadao agreed. “I would not think of doing anything else.” Thus agreed, together they lifted the man. He was very light, like a fowl that had been half-starved for a long time until it is only feathers and skeleton. So, his arms hanging, they carried him up the steps and into the side door of the house. This door opened into a passage, and down the passage they carried the man towards an empty bedroom. It had been the bedroom of Sadao’s father, and since his death it had not been used. They laid the man on the deeply matted floor. Everything here had been Japanese to please the old man, who would never in his own home sit on a chair or sleep in a foreign bed. Hana went to the wall cupboards and slid back a door and took out a soft quilt. She hesitated. The quilt was covered with flowered silk and the lining was pure white silk. “He is so dirty,” she murmured in distress. “Yes, he had better be washed,” Sadao agreed. “If you will fetch hot water I will wash him.” “I cannot bear for you to touch him,” she said. “We shall have to tell the servants he is here. I will tell Yumi now. She can leave the children for a few minutes and she can wash him.” Sadao considered a moment. “Let it be so,” he agreed. “You tell Yumi and I will tell the others.” But the utter pallor of the man’s unconscious face moved him first to stoop and feel his pulse. It was faint but it was there. He put his hand against the man’s cold breast. The heart too was yet alive. “He will die unless he is operated on,” Sadao said, considering. “The question is whether he will not die anyway.” Hana cried out in fear. “Don’t try to save him! What if he should live?” “What if he should die?” Sadao replied. He stood gazing The Enemy 29 Reprint 2024-25 down on the motionless man. This man must have extraordinary vitality or he would have been dead by now. But then he was very young — perhaps not yet twenty- five. “You mean die from the operation?” Hana asked. “Yes,” Sadao said. Hana considered this doubtfully, and when she did not answer Sadao turned away. “At any rate something must be done with him,” he said, “and first he must be washed.” He went quickly out of the room and Hana came behind him. She did not wish to be left alone with the white man. He was the first she had seen since she left America and now he seemed to have nothing to do with those whom she had known there. Here he was her enemy, a menace, living or dead. She turned to the nursery and called, “Yumi!” But the children heard her voice and she had to go in for a moment and smile at them and play with the baby boy, now nearly three months old. Over the baby’s soft black hair she motioned with her mouth, “Yumi — come with me!” “I will put the baby to bed,” Yumi replied. “He is ready.” She went with Yumi into the bedroom next to the nursery and stood with the boy in her arms while Yumi spread the sleeping quilts on the floor and laid the baby between them. Then Hana led the way quickly and softly to the kitchen. The two servants were frightened at what their master had just told them. The old gardener, who was also a house servant, pulled the few hairs on his upper lip. “The master ought not to heal the wound of this white man,” he said bluntly to Hana. “The white man ought to die. First he was shot. Then the sea caught him and wounded him with her rocks. If the master heals what the gun did and what the sea did they will take revenge on us.” “I will tell him what you say,” Hana replied courteously. But she herself was also frightened, although she was not superstitious as the old man was. Could it ever be well to 30 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 help an enemy? Nevertheless she told Yumi to fetch the hot water and bring it to the room where the white man was. She went ahead and slid back the partitions. Sadao was not yet there. Yumi, following, put down her wooden bucket. Then she went over to the white man. When she saw him her thick lips folded themselves into stubbornness. “I have never washed a white man,” she said, “and I will not wash so dirty a one now.” Hana cried at her severely. “You will do what your master commands you!” There was so fierce a look of resistance upon Yumi’s round dull face that Hana felt unreasonably afraid. After all, if the servants should report something that was not as it happened? “Very well,” she said with dignity. “You understand we only want to bring him to his senses so that we can turn him over as a prisoner?” “I will have nothing to do with it,” Yumi said, “I am a poor person and it is not my business.” “Then please,” Hana said gently, “return to your own work.” At once Yumi left the room. But this left Hana with the white man alone. She might have been too afraid to stay had not her anger at Yumi’s stubbor nness now sustained her. “Stupid Yumi,” she mutter ed fiercely. “Is this anything but a man? And a wounded helpless man!” In the conviction of her own superiority she bent impulsively and untied the knotted rugs that kept the Will Hana help the white man covered. When she had his wounded man breast bare she dipped the small clean and wash him towel that Yumi had brought into the herself? steaming hot water and washed his face carefully. The man’s skin, though rough with exposure, was of a fine texture and must have been very blond when he was a child. The Enemy 31 Reprint 2024-25  While she was thinking these thoughts, though not really liking the man better now that he was no longer a child, she kept on washing him until his upper body was quite clean. But she dared not turn him over. Where was Sadao? Now her anger was ebbing, and she was anxious again and she rose, wiping her hands on the wrong towel. Then lest the man be chilled, she put the quilt over him. “Sadao!” she called softly. He had been about to come in when she called. His hand had been on the door and now he opened it. She saw that he had brought his surgeon’s emergency bag and that he wore his surgeon’s coat. “You have decided to operate!” she cried. “Yes,” he said shortly. He turned his back to her and unfolded a sterilized towel upon the floor of the tokonoma2 alcove, and put his instruments out upon it. “Fetch towels,” he said. She went obediently, but how anxious now, to the linen shelves and took out the towels. There ought also to be old pieces of matting so that the blood would not ruin the fine floor covering. She went out to the back veranda where the gardener kept strips of matting with which to protect delicate shrubs on cold nights and took an armful of them. But when she went back into the room, she saw this was useless. The blood had already soaked through the packing in the man’s wound and had ruined the mat under him. “Oh, the mat!” she cried. “Yes, it is ruined,” Sadao replied, as though he did not care. “Help me to turn him,” he commanded her. She obeyed him without a word, and he began to wash the man’s back carefully. “Yumi would not wash him,” she said. “Did you wash him then?” Sadao asked, not stopping for a moment his swift concise movements. “Yes,” she said. He did not seem to hear her. But she was used to his absorption when he was at work. She wondered for a 2 tokonoma: a niche or an alcove in a Japanese home for displaying a flower arrangement, kakemono, or other piece of art. 32 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 moment if it mattered to him what was the body upon which he worked so long as it was for the work he did so excellently. “You will have to give the anesthetic if he needs it,” he said. “I?” she repeated blankly. “But never have I!” “It is easy enough,” he said impatiently. He was taking out the packing now, and the blood began to flow more quickly. He peered into the wound with the bright surgeon’s light fastened on his forehead. “The bullet is still there,” he said with cool interest. “Now I wonder how deep this rock wound is. If it is not too deep it may be that I can get the bullet. But the bleeding is not superficial. He has lost much blood.” At this moment Hana choked. He looked up and saw her face the colour of sulphur. “Don’t faint,” he said sharply. He did not put down his exploring instrument. “If I stop now the man will surely die.” She clapped her hands to her mouth and leaped up and ran out of the room. Outside in the garden he heard her retching. But he went on with his work. “It will be better for her to empty her stomach,” he thought. He had forgotten that of course she had never seen an operation. But her distress and his inability to go to her at once made him impatient and irritable with this man who lay like dead under his knife. The Enemy 33 Reprint 2024-25  “This man.” he thought, “there is no reason under heaven why he should live.” Unconsciously this thought made him ruthless and he proceeded swiftly. In his dream the man moaned but Sadao paid no heed except to mutter at him. “Groan,” he muttered, “groan if you like. I am not doing this for my own pleasure. In fact, I do not know why I am doing it.” The door opened and there was Hana again. “Where is the anesthetic?” she asked in a clear voice. Sadao motioned with his chin. “It is as well that you came back,” he said. “This fellow is beginning to stir.” She had the bottle and some cotton in her hand. “But how shall I do it?” she asked. “Simply saturate the cotton and hold it near his nostrils,” Sadao replied without delaying for one moment the intricate detail of his work. “When he breathes badly move it away a little.” She crouched close to the sleeping face of the young American. It was a piteously thin face, she thought, and the lips were twisted. The man was suffering whether he knew it or not. Watching him, she wondered if the stories they heard sometimes of the sufferings of prisoners were true. They came like flickers of rumour, told by word of mouth and always contradicted. In the newspapers the reports were always that wherever the Japanese armies went the people received them gladly, with cries of joy at their liberation. But sometimes she remembered such men as General Takima, who at home beat his wife cruelly, though no one mentioned it now that he had fought so victorious a battle in Manchuria. If a man like that could be so cruel to a woman in his power, would he not be cruel to one like this for instance? She hoped anxiously that this young man had not been tortured. It was at this moment that she observed deep red scars on his neck, just under the ear. “Those scars,” she murmured, lifting her eyes to Sadao. But he did not answer. At this moment he felt the tip of his instrument strike against something hard, dangerously 34 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 near the kidney. All thought left him. He felt only the purest pleasure. He probed with his fingers, delicately, familiar with every atom of this human body. His old American professor of anatomy had seen to that knowledge. “Ignorance of the human body is the surgeon’s cardinal sin, sirs!” he had thundered at his classes year after year. “To operate without as complete knowledge of the body as if you had made it — anything less than that is murder.” “It is not quite at the kidney, my friend,” Sadao murmured. It was his habit to murmur to the patient when he forgot himself in an operation. “My friend,” he always called his patients and so now he did, forgetting that this was his enemy. Then quickly, with the cleanest and most precise of incisions, the bullet was out. The man quivered but he was still unconscious. Nevertheless he muttered a few English words. “Guts,” he muttered, choking. “They got...my guts...” “Sadao!” Hana cried sharply. “Hush,” Sadao said. The man sank again into silence so profound that Sadao took up his wrist, hating the touch of it. Yes, there was still a pulse so faint, so feeble, but enough, if he wanted the man to live, to give hope. “But certainly I do not want this man to live,” he thought. “No more anesthetic,” he told Hana. He turned as swiftly as though he had never paused and from his medicines he chose a small vial and from it filled a hypodermic and thrust it into the patient’s left arm. Then putting down the needle, he took the man’s wrist again. The pulse under his fingers fluttered once or twice and then grew stronger. What will “This man will live in spite of all,” Dr Sadao and his he said to Hana and sighed. wife do with the The young man woke, so weak, his man? blue eyes so terrified when he perceived The Enemy 35 Reprint 2024-25 where he was, that Hana felt compelled to apologise. She herself served him, for none of the servants would enter the room. When she came in the first time, she saw him summon his small strength to be prepared for some fearful thing. “Don’t be afraid,” she begged him softly. “How come... you speak English…” he gasped. “I was a long time in America,” she replied. She saw that he wanted to reply to that but he could not, and so she knelt and fed him gently from the porcelain spoon. He ate unwillingly, but still he ate. “Now you will soon be strong,” she said, not liking him and yet moved to comfort him. He did not answer. When Sadao came in the third day after the operation, he found the young man sitting up, his face bloodless with the effort. “Lie down,” Sadao cried. “Do you want to die?” He forced the man down gently and strongly and examined the wound. “You may kill yourself if you do this sort of thing,” he scolded. “What are you going to do with me?” the boy muttered. He looked just now barely seventeen. “Are you going to hand me over?” For a moment Sadao did not answer. He finished his examination and then pulled the silk quilt over the man. “I do not know myself what I shall do with you,” he said. “I ought of course to give you to the police. You are a prisoner of war — no, do not tell me anything.” He put up his hand as he saw the young man was about to speak. “Do not even tell me your name unless I ask it.” They looked at each other for a moment, and then the young man closed his eyes and turned his face to the wall. “Okay,” he whispered, his mouth a bitter line. Outside the door Hana was waiting for Sadao. He saw at once that she was in trouble. “Sadao, Yumi tells me the servants feel they cannot stay if we hide this man here any more,” she said. “She tells me that they are saying that you and I were so long in 36 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 America that we have forgotten to think of our own country first. They think we like Americans.” “It is not true,” Sadao said harshly “Americans are our enemies. But I have been trained not to let a man die if I can help it.” “The servants cannot understand that,” she said anxiously. “No,” he agreed. Neither seemed able to say more, and somehow the household dragged on. The servants grew more watchful. Their courtesy was as careful as ever, but their eyes were cold upon the pair to whom they were hired. “It is clear what our master ought to do,” the old gardener said one morning. He had worked with flowers all his life, and had been a specialist too in moss. For Sadao’s father he had made one of the finest moss gardens in Japan, sweeping the bright green carpet constantly so that not a leaf or a pine needle marred the velvet of its surface. “My old master’s son knows very well what he ought to do,” he now said, pinching a bud from a bush as he spoke. “When the man was so near death why did he not let him bleed?” “That young master is so proud of his skill to save life that he saves any life,” the cook said contemptuously. She split a fowl’s neck skillfully and held the fluttering bird and let its blood flow into the roots of a wistaria vine. Blood is the best of fertilisers, and the old gardener would not let her waste a drop of it. “It is the children of whom we must think,” Yumi said sadly. “What will be their fate if their father is condemned as a traitor?” They did not try to hide what they said from the ears of Hana as she stood arranging the day’s flowers in the veranda near by, and she knew they spoke on purpose that she might hear. That they were right she knew too in most of her being. But there was another part of her which she herself could not understand. It was not sentimental liking of the prisoner. She had come to think of him as a prisoner. She had not liked him even yesterday when he The Enemy 37 Reprint 2024-25 had said in his impulsive way, “Anyway, let me tell you that my name is Tom.” She had only bowed her little distant bow. She saw hurt in his eyes but she did not wish to assuage it. Indeed, he was a great trouble in this house. As for Sadao, every day he examined the wound carefully. The last stitches had been pulled out this morning, and the young man would, in a fortnight be nearly as well as ever. Sadao went back to his office and carefully typed a letter to the Chief of police reporting the whole matter. “On the twenty-first day of February an escaped prisoner was washed up on the shore in front of my house.” So far he typed and then he opened a secret drawer of his desk and put the unfinished report into it. On the seventh day after that, two things happened. In the morning the servants left together, their belongings tied in large square cotton kerchiefs. When Hana got up in the morning nothing was done, the house not cleaned and the food not prepared, and she knew what it meant. She was dismayed and even terrified, but her pride as a mistress would not allow her to show it. Instead, she inclined her head gracefully when they appeared before her in the kitchen, and she paid them off and thanked them for all that they had done for her. They were crying, but she did not cry. The cook and the gardener had served Sadao since he was a little boy in his father’s house, and Yumi cried because of the children. She was so grieving that after she had gone she ran back to Hana. “If the baby misses me too much tonight, send for me. I am going to my own house and you know where it is.” “Thank you,” Hana said smiling. But she told herself she would not send for Yumi however the baby cried. She made the breakfast and Sadao helped with the children. Neither of them spoke of the servants beyond the fact that they were gone. But after Hana had taken morning food to the prisoner, she came back to Sadao. “Why is it we cannot see clearly what we ought to do?” she asked him. “Even the servants see more clearly than we do. Why are we different from other Japanese?” Sadao did not answer. But a little later he went into the room where the prisoner was and said brusquely, “Today 38 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 you may get up on your feet. I want you to stay up only five minutes at a time. Tomorrow you may try it twice as long. It would be well that you get back your strength as quickly as possible.” He saw the flicker of terror on the young face that was still very pale. “Okay,” the boy murmured. Evidently he was determined to say more. “I feel I ought to thank you, Doctor, for having saved my life.” “Don’t thank me too early,” Sadao said coldly. He saw the flicker of terror again in the boy’s eyes — terror as unmistakable as an animal’s. The scars on his neck were crimson for a moment. Those scars! What were they? Sadao did not ask. In the afternoon the second thing happened. Hana, working hard on unaccustomed labour, saw a messenger come to the door in official uniform. Her hands went weak and she could not draw her breath. The servants must have told already. She ran to Sadao, gasping, unable to utter a word. But by then the messenger had simply followed her through the garden and there he stood. She pointed at him helplessly. Sadao looked up from his book. He was in his office, the other partition of which was thrown open to the garden for the southern sunshine. “What is it?” he asked the messenger and then he rose, seeing the Will Dr Sadao be man’s uniform. arrested on the “You are to come to the palace,” the charge of man said. “The old General is in pain harbouring an again.” enemy? “Oh,” Hana breathed, “is that all?” “All?” the messenger exclaimed. “Is it not enough?” “Indeed it is,” she replied. “I am very sorry.” When Sadao came to say goodbye, she was in the kitchen, but doing nothing. The children were asleep and she sat merely resting for a moment, more exhausted from her fright than from work. The Enemy 39 Reprint 2024-25  “I thought they had come to arrest you”, she said. He gazed down into her anxious eyes. “I must get rid of this man for your sake,” he said in distress. “Somehow I must get rid of him.” (Sadao goes to see the General) “Of course,” the General said weakly, “I understand fully. But that is because, I once took a degree in Princeton. So few Japanese have.” “I care nothing for the man, Excellency,” Sadao said, “but having operated on him with such success…” “Yes, yes” the General said. “It only makes me feel you more indispensable to me. Evidently you can save anyone — you are so skilled. You say you think I can stand one more such attack as I have had today?” “Not more than one,” Sadao said. “Then certainly I can allow nothing to happen to you,” the General said with anxiety. His long pale Japanese face became expressionless, which meant that he was in deep thought. “You cannot be arrested,” the General said, closing his eyes. “Suppose you were condemned to death and the next day I had to have my operation?” “There are other surgeons, Excellency,” Sadao suggested. “None I trust,” the General replied. “The best ones have been trained by Germans and would consider the operation successful even if I died. I do not care for their point of view.” He sighed. “It seems a pity that we cannot better combine the German ruthlessness with the American sentimentality. Then you could turn your prisoner over to execution and yet I could be sure you would not murder me while I was unconscious.” The General laughed. He had an unusual sense of humour. “As a Japanese, could you not combine these two foreign elements?” he asked. Sadao smiled. “I am not quite sure,” he said, “but for your sake I would be willing to try, Excellency.” The General shook his head. “I had rather not be the test case,” he said. He felt suddenly weak and overwhelmed with the cares of his life as an official in times such as these when repeated victory brought great responsibilities all over 40 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 the south Pacific. “It is very unfortunate that this man should have washed up on your doorstep,” he said irritably. “I feel it so myself,” Sadao said gently. “It would be best if he could be quietly killed,” the General said. “Not by you, but by someone who does not know him. I have my own private assassins. Suppose I send two of them to your house tonight or better, any night. You need know nothing about it. It is now warm — what would be more natural than that you should leave the outer partition of the white man’s room open to the garden while he sleeps?” “Certainly it would be very natural,” Sadao agreed. “In fact, it is so left open every night.” “Good,” the General said, yawning. “They are very capable assassins — they make no noise and they know the trick of inward bleeding. If you like I can even have them remove the body.” Sadao considered. “That perhaps would be best, Excellency,” he agreed, thinking of Hana. He left the General’s presence then and went home, thinking over the plan. In this way the whole thing would be taken out of his hands. He would tell Hana nothing, since she would be timid at the idea of assassins in the house, and yet certainly such persons were essential in an absolute state such as Japan was. How else could rulers deal with those who opposed them? He refused to allow anything but reason to be the atmosphere of his mind as he went into the room where the American was in bed. But as he opened the door, to his surprise he found the young man out of bed, and preparing to go into the garden. “What is this!” he exclaimed. “Who gave you permission to leave your room?” “I’m not used to waiting for permission,” Tom said gaily. “Gosh, I feel pretty good again! But will the muscles on this side always feel stiff?” “Is it so?” Sadao inquired, surprised. He forgot all else. “Now I thought I had provided against that,” he murmured. He lifted the edge of the man’s shirt and gazed at the healing The Enemy 41 Reprint 2024-25 scar. “Massage may do it,” he said, “if exercise does not.” “It won’t bother me much,” the young man said. His young face was gaunt under the stubbly blond beard. “Say, Doctor, I’ve got something I want to say to you. If I hadn’t met a Jap like you — well, I wouldn’t be alive today. I know that.” Sadao bowed but he could not speak. “Sure, I know that,” Tom went on warmly. His big thin hands gripping a chair were white at the knuckles. “I guess if all the Japs were like you there wouldn’t have been a war.” “Perhaps,” Sadao said with difficulty. “And now I think you had better go back to bed.” He helped the boy back into bed and then bowed. “Good night,” he said. Sadao slept badly that night. Time and time again he woke, thinking he heard the rustling of footsteps, the sound of a twig broken or a stone displaced in the garden — a noise such as men might make who carried a burden. The next morning he made the excuse to go first into the guest room. If the American were gone he then could simply tell Hana that so the General had directed. But when he opened the door he saw at once that there on the pillow was the shaggy blond head. He could hear the peaceful breathing of sleep and he closed the door again quietly. “He is asleep,” he told Hana. “He is almost well to sleep like that.” “What shall we do with him?” Hana whispered her old refrain. Sadao shook his head. “I must decide in a day or two,” he promised. But certainly, he thought, the second night must be the night. There rose a wind that night, and he listened to the sounds of bending boughs and whistling partitions. Hana woke too. “Ought we not to go and close the sick man’s partition?” she asked. “No,” Sadao said. “He is able now to do it for himself.” But the next morning the American was still there. Then the third night of course must be the night. The wind changed to quiet rain and the garden was full of the 42 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 sound of dripping eaves and running springs. Sadao slept a little better, but he woke at the sound of a crash and leaped to his feet. “What was that?” Hana cried. The baby woke at her voice and began to wail. “I must go and see,” But he held her and would not let her move. “Sadao,” she cried, “what is the matter with you?” “Don’t go,” he muttered, “don’t go!” His terror infected her and she stood breathless, waiting. There was only silence. Together they crept back into the bed, the baby between them. Yet when he opened the door of the guest room in the morning there was the young man. He was very gay and had already washed and was now on his feet. He had asked for a razor yesterday and had shaved himself and today there was a faint colour in his cheeks. “I am well,” he said joyously. Sadao drew his kimono round his weary body. He could not, he decided suddenly, go through another night. It was not that he cared for this young man’s life. No, simply it was not worth the strain. “You are well,” Sadao agreed. He lowered his voice. “You are so well that I think if I put my boat on the shore tonight, with food and extra clothing in it, you might be able to row to that little island not far from the coast. It is so near What will the coast that it has not been worth Dr Sadao do to fortifying. Nobody lives on it because in get rid of the storm it is submerged. But this is not man? the season of storm. You could live there until you saw a Korean fishing boat pass by. They pass quite near the island because the water is many fathoms deep there.” The young man stared at him, slowly comprehending. “Do I have to?” he asked. “I think so,” Sadao said gently. “You understand — it is not hidden that you are here.” The Enemy 43 Reprint 2024-25  The young man nodded in perfect comprehension. “Okay,” he said simply. Sadao did not see him again until evening. As soon as it was dark he had dragged the stout boat down to the shore and in it he put food and bottled water that he had bought secretly during the day, as well as two quilts he had bought at a pawnshop. The boat he tied to a post in the water, for the tide was high. There was no moon and he worked without a flashlight. When he came to the house he entered as though he were just back from his work, and so Hana knew nothing. “Yumi was here today,” she said as she served his supper. Though she was so modern, still she did not eat with him. “Yumi cried over the baby,” she went on with a sigh. “She misses him so.” “The servants will come back as soon as the foreigner is gone,” Sadao said. He went into the guest room that night before he went to bed himself and checked carefully the American’s temperature, the state of the wound, and his heart and pulse. The pulse was irregular but that was perhaps because of excitement. The young man’s pale lips were pressed together and his eyes burned. Only the scars on his neck were red. “I realise you are saving my life again,” he told Sadao. “Not at all,” Sadao said. “It is only inconvenient to have you here any longer.” He had hesitated a good deal about giving the man a flashlight. But he had decided to give it to him after all. It was a small one, his own, which he used at night when he was called. “If your food runs out before you catch a boat,” he said, “signal me two flashes at the same instant the sun drops over the horizon. Do not signal in darkness, for it will be seen. If you are all right but still there, signal me once. You will find fresh fish easy to catch but you must eat them raw. A fire would be seen.” “Okay,” the young man breathed. 44 Vistas Reprint 2024-25  He was dressed now in the Japanese clothes which Sadao had given him, and at the last moment Sadao wrapped a black cloth about his blond head. “Now,” Sadao said. The young American, without a word, shook Sadao’s hand warmly, and then walked quite well across the floor and down the step into the darkness of the garden. Once — twice... Sadao saw his light flash to find his way. But that would not be suspected. He waited until from the shore there was one more flash. Then he closed the partition. That night he slept. “You say the man escaped?” the General asked faintly. He had been operated upon a week before, an emergency operation to which Sadao had been called in the night. For twelve hours Sadao had not been sure the General would live. The gall bladder was much involved. Then the old man had begun to breathe deeply again and to demand food. Sadao had not been able to ask about the assassins. So far as he knew they had never come. The servants had returned and Yumi had cleaned the guest room thoroughly and had burned sulphur in it to get the white man’s smell out of it. Nobody said anything. Only the gardener was cross because he had got behind with his chrysanthemums. But after a week Sadao felt the General was well enough to be spoken to about the prisoner. “Yes, Excellency, he escaped,” Sadao now said. He coughed, signifying that he had not said all he might have said, but was unwilling to disturb the General further. But the old man opened his eyes suddenly. “That prisoner,” he said with some energy, “did I not promise you I would kill him for you?” The Enemy 45 Reprint 2024-25  “You did, Excellency,” Sadao said. “Well, well!” the old man said in a tone of amazement, “so I did! But you see, I was suffering a good deal. The truth is, I thought of nothing but myself. In short, I forgot my promise to you.” “I wondered, Your Excellency,” Sadao murmured. “It was certainly very careless of me,” the General said. “But you understand it was not lack of patriotism or dereliction of duty.” He looked anxiously at his doctor. “If the matter should come out you would understand that, wouldn’t you?” “Certainly, Your Excellency,” Sadao said. He suddenly comprehended that the General was in the palm of his hand and that as a consequence he himself was perfectly safe. “I can swear to your loyalty, Excellency,” he said to the old General, “and to your zeal against the enemy.” “You are a good man,” the General murmured and closed his eyes.” “You will be rewarded.” But Sadao, searching the spot of black in the twilighted sea that night, had his reward. There was no prick of light in the dusk. No one was on the island. His prisoner was gone — safe, doubtless, for he had warned him to wait only for a Korean fishing boat. He stood for a moment on the veranda, gazing out to the sea from whence the young man had come that other night. And into his mind, although without reason, there came other white faces he had known — the professor at whose house he had met Hana, a dull man, and his wife had been a silly talkative woman, in spite of her wish to be kind. He remembered his old teacher of anatomy, who had been so insistent on mercy with the knife, and then he remembered the face of his fat and slatternly landlady. He had had great difficulty in finding a place to live in America because he was a Japanese. The Americans were full of prejudice and it had been bitter to live in it, knowing himself their superior. How he had despised the ignorant and dirty old woman who had at last consented to house him in her miserable home! He had once tried to be grateful to her because she had in his last year nursed him through 46 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 influenza, but it was difficult, for she was no less repulsive to him in her kindness. Now he remembered the youthful, haggard face of his prisoner — white and repulsive. “Strange,” he thought. “I wonder why I could not kill him?” Reading with Insight 1. There are moments in life when we have to make hard choices between our roles as private individuals and as citizens with a sense of national loyalty. Discuss with reference to the story you have just read. 2. Dr Sadao was compelled by his duty as a doctor to help the enemy soldier. What made Hana, his wife, sympathetic to him in the face of open defiance from the domestic staff? 3. How would you explain the reluctance of the soldier to leave the shelter of the doctor’s home even when he knew he couldn’t stay there without risk to the doctor and himself? 4. What explains the attitude of the General in the matter of the enemy soldier? Was it human consideration, lack of national loyalty, dereliction of duty or simply self-absorption? 5. While hatred against a member of the enemy race is justifiable, especially during wartime, what makes a human being rise above narrow prejudices? 6. Do you think the doctor’s final solution to the problem was the best possible one in the circumstances? 7. Does the story remind you of ‘Birth’ by A. J. Cronin that you read in Snapshots last year? What are the similarities? 8. Is there any film you have seen or novel you have read with a similar theme? The Enemy 47 Reprint 2024-25  5 On The Face Of It Susan Hill Before you read This is a play featuring an old man and a small boy meeting in the former’s garden. The old man strikes up a friendship with the boy who is very withdrawn and defiant. What is the bond that unites the two? SCENE ONE Mr Lamb’s garden [There is the occasional sound of birdsong and of tree leaves rustling. Derry’s footsteps are heard as he walks slowly and tentatively through the long grass. He pauses, then walks on again. He comes round a screen of bushes, so that when Mr Lamb speaks to him he is close at hand and Derry is startled] MR LAMB: Mind the apples! DERRY: What? Who’s that? Who’s there? MR LAMB: Lamb’s my name. Mind the apples. Crab apples those are. Windfalls in the long grass. Who is Mr Lamb? You could trip. How does Derry get into his DERRY: I....there....I thought this was garden? an empty place. I didn’t know there was anybody here.... 48 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 MR LAMB: That’s all right. I’m here. What are you afraid of, boy? That’s all right. DERRY: I thought it was empty....an empty house. MR LAMB: So it is. Since I’m out here in the garden. It is empty. Until I go back inside. In the meantime, I’m out here and likely to stop. A day like this. Beautiful day. Not a day to be indoors. DERRY: [Panic] I’ve got to go. MR LAMB: Not on my account. I don’t mind who comes into the garden. The gate’s always open. Only you climbed the garden wall. DERRY: [Angry] You were watching me. MR LAMB: I saw you. But the gate’s open. All welcome. You’re welcome. I sit here. I like sitting. DERRY: I’d not come to steal anything. MR LAMB: No, no. The young lads steal....scrump the apples. You’re not so young. DERRY: I just....wanted to come in. Into the garden. MR LAMB: So you did. Here we are, then. DERRY: You don’t know who I am. MR LAMB: A boy. Thirteen or so. DERRY: Fourteen. [ Pause] But I’ve got to go now. Good-bye. MR LAMB: Nothing to be afraid of. Just a garden. Just me. DERRY: But I’m not....I’m not afraid. [Pause] People are afraid of me. MR LAMB: Why should that be? DERRY: Everyone is. It doesn’t matter who they are, or what they say, or how they look. How they pretend. I know. I can see. MR LAMB: See what? DERRY: What they think. MR LAMB: What do they think, then? DERRY: You think.... ‘Here’s a boy.’ You look at me...and then you see my face and you think. ‘That’s bad. That’s a terrible thing. That’s the ugliest thing I ever saw.’ You think, ‘Poor boy.’ But I’m not. Not poor. Underneath, you are afraid. Anybody would be. I am. When I look in the mirror, and see it, I’m afraid of me. On the Face of It 49 Reprint 2024-25 MR LAMB: No, Not the whole of you. Not of you. DERRY: Yes! [Pause] MR LAMB: Later on, when it’s a bit cooler, I’ll get the ladder and a stick, and pull down those crab apples. They’re ripe for it. I make jelly. It’s a good time of year, September. Look at them....orange and golden. That’s magic fruit. I often say. But it’s best picked and made into jelly. You could give me a hand. DERRY: What have you changed the subject for? People always do that. Why don’t you ask me? Why do you do what they all do and pretend it isn’t true and isn’t there? In case I see you looking and mind and get upset? I’ll tell....you don’t ask me because you’re afraid to. MR LAMB: You want me to ask....say so, then. DERRY: I don’t like being with people. Any people. MR LAMB: I should say....to look at it.... I should say, you got burned in a fire. DERRY: Not in a fire. I got acid all down that side of my face and it burned it all away. It ate my face up. It ate me up. And now it’s like this and it won’t ever be any different. 50 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 MR LAMB: No. DERRY: Aren’t you interested? MR LAMB: You’re a boy who came into the garden. Plenty do. I’m interested in anybody. Anything. There’s nothing God made that doesn’t interest me. Look over there....over beside the far wall. What can you see? DERRY: Rubbish. MR LAMB: Rubbish ? Look, boy, look....what do you see? DERRY: Just....grass and stuff. Weeds. MR LAMB: Some call them weeds. If you like, then....a weed garden, that. There’s fruit and there are flowers, and trees and herbs. All sorts. But over there....weeds. I grow weeds there. Why is one green, growing plant called a weed and another ‘flower’? Where’s the difference. It’s all life.... growing. Same as you and me. DERRY: We’re not the same. MR LAMB: I’m old. You’re young. You’ve got a burned face, I’ve got a tin leg. Not important. You’re standing there.... I’m sitting here. Where’s the difference? DERRY: Why have you got a tin leg? MR LAMB: Real one got blown off, years back. Lamey-Lamb, some kids say. Haven’t you heard them? You will. Lamey-Lamb. It fits. Doesn’t trouble me. DERRY: But you can put on trousers and cover it up and no one sees, they don’t have to notice and stare. MR LAMB: Some do. Some don’t. They get tired of it, in the end. There’s plenty of other things to stare at. DERRY: Like my face. MR LAMB: Like crab apples or the weeds or a spider climbing up a silken ladder, or my tall sun-flowers. DERRY: Things. MR LAMB: It’s all relative. Beauty and the beast. DERRY: What’s that supposed to mean? MR LAMB: You tell me. DERRY: You needn’t think they haven’t all told me that fairy story before. ‘It’s not what you look like, it’s what you are inside. Handsome is as handsome On the Face of It 51 Reprint 2024-25  does. Beauty loved the monstrous beast for himself and when she kissed him he changed into a handsome prince.’ Only he wouldn’t, he’d have stayed a monstrous beast. I won’t change. MR LAMB: In that way? No, you won’t. DERRY: And no one’ll kiss me, ever. Only my mother, and she kisses me on the other side of my face, and I don’t like my mother to kiss me, she does it because she has to. Why should I like that? I don’t care if nobody ever kisses me. MR LAMB: Ah, but do you care if you never kiss them. DERRY: What? MR LAMB: Girls. Pretty girls. Long hair and large eyes. People you love. DERRY: Who’d let me? Not one. MR LAMB: Who can tell? DERRY: I won’t ever look different. When I’m as old as you, I’ll look the same. I’ll still only have half a face. MR LAMB: So you will. But the world won’t. The world’s got a whole face, and the world’s there to be looked at. DERRY: Do you think this is the world? This old garden? MR LAMB: When I’m here. Not the only one. But the world, as much as anywhere. DERRY: Does your leg hurt you? MR LAMB: Tin doesn’t hurt, boy! DERRY: When it came off, did it? MR LAMB: Certainly. DERRY: And now? I mean, where the tin stops, at the top? MR LAMB: Now and then. In wet weather. It doesn’t signify. DERRY: Oh, that’s something else they all say. ‘Look at all those people who are in pain and brave and never cry and never complain and don’t feel sorry for themselves.’ MR LAMB: I haven’t said it. DERRY: And think of all those people worse off than you. Think, you might have been blinded, or born deaf, or have to live in a wheelchair, or be daft in your head and dribble. 52 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 MR LAMB: And that’s all true, and you know it. DERRY: It won’t make my face change. Do you know, one day, a woman went by me in the street — I was at a bus-stop — and she was with another woman, and she looked at me, and she said.... whispered....only I heard her.... she said, “Look at that, that’s a terrible thing. That’s a face only a mother could love.” MR LAMB: So you believe everything you hear, then? DERRY: It was cruel. MR LAMB: Maybe not meant as such. Just something said between them. DERRY: Only I heard it. I heard. MR LAMB: And is that the only thing you ever heard anyone say, in your life? DERRY: Oh no! I’ve heard a lot of things. MR LAMB: So now you keep your ears shut. DERRY: You’re....peculiar. You say peculiar things. You ask questions I don’t understand. MR LAMB: I like to talk. Have company. You don’t have to answer questions. You don’t have to stop here at all. The gate’s open. DERRY: Yes, but... MR LAMB: I’ve a hive of bees behind those trees over there. Some hear bees and they say, bees buzz. But when you listen to bees for a long while, they humm....and hum means ‘sing’. I hear them singing, my bees. DERRY: But....I like it here. I came in because I liked it....when I looked over the wall. MR LAMB: If you’d seen me, you’d not have come in. DERRY: No. MR LAMB: No. DERRY: It’d have been trespassing. MR LAMB: Ah. That’s not why. DERRY: I don’t like being near people. When they stare....when I see them being afraid of me. MR LAMB: You could lock yourself up in a room and never leave it. There was a man who did that. He was On the Face of It 53 Reprint 2024-25  afraid, you see. Of everything. Everything in this world. A bus might run him over, or a man might breathe deadly germs onto him, or a donkey might kick him to death, or lightning might strike him down, or he might love a girl and the girl would leave him, and he might slip on a banana skin and fall and people who saw him would laugh their heads off. So he went into this room, and locked the door, and got into his bed, and stayed there. DERRY: For ever? MR LAMB: For a while. DERRY: Then what? MR LAMB: A picture fell off the wall on to his head and killed him. [Derry laughs a lot] MR LAMB: You see? DERRY: But....you still say peculiar things. MR LAMB: Peculiar to some. DERRY: What do you do all day? MR LAMB: Sit in the sun. Read books. Ah, Do you think all you thought it was an empty this will change Derry’s attitude house, but inside, it’s full. towards Books and other things. Full. Mr Lamb? DERRY: But there aren’t any curtains at the windows. MR LAMB: I’m not fond of curtains. Shutting things out, shutting things in. I like the light and the darkness, and the windows open, to hear the wind. DERRY: Yes. I like that. When it’s raining, I like to hear it on the roof. MR LAMB: So you’re not lost, are you? Not altogether? You do hear things. You listen. DERRY: They talk about me. Downstairs, When I’m not there. ‘What’ll he ever do? What’s going to happen to him when we’ve gone? How ever will he get on in this world? Looking like that? With that on his face?’ That’s what they say. 54 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 MR LAMB: Lord, boy, you’ve got two arms, two legs and eyes and ears, you’ve got a tongue and a brain. You’ll get on the way you want, like all the rest. And if you chose, and set your mind to it, you could get on better than all the rest. DERRY: How? MR LAMB: Same way as I do. DERRY: Do you have any friends? MR LAMB: Hundreds. DERRY: But you live by yourself in that house. It’s a big house, too. MR LAMB: Friends everywhere. People come in.... everybody knows me. The gate’s always open. They come and sit here. And in front of the fire in winter. Kids come for the apples and pears. And for toffee. I make toffee with honey. Anybody comes. So have you. DERRY: But I’m not a friend. MR LAMB: Certainly you are. So far as I’m concerned. What have you done to make me think you’re not? DERRY: You don’t know me. You don’t know where I come from or even what my name is. MR LAMB: Why should that signify? Do I have to write all your particulars down and put them in a filing box, before you can be a friend? DERRY: I suppose...not. No. MR LAMB: You could tell me your name. If you chose. And not, if you didn’t. DERRY: Derry. Only it’s Derek....but I hate that. Derry. If I’m your friend, you don’t have to be mine. I choose that. MR LAMB: Certainly. DERRY: I might never come here again, you might never see me again and then I couldn’t still be a friend. MR LAMB: Why not? DERRY: How could I? You pass people in the street and you might even speak to them, but you never see them again. It doesn’t mean they’re friends. On the Face of It 55 Reprint 2024-25 MR LAMB: Doesn’t mean they’re enemies, either, does it? DERRY: No they’re just....nothing. People. That’s all. MR LAMB: People are never just nothing. Never. DERRY: There are some people I hate. MR LAMB: That’d do you more harm than any bottle of acid. Acid only burns your face. DERRY: Only.... MR LAMB: Like a bomb only blew up my leg. There’s worse things can happen. You can burn yourself away inside. DERRY: After I’d come home, one person said, “He’d have been better off stopping in there. In the hospital. He’d be better off with others like himself.” She thinks blind people only ought to be with other blind people and idiot boys with idiot boys. MR LAMB: And people with no legs altogether? DERRY: That’s right. MR LAMB: What kind of a world would that be? DERRY: At least there’d be nobody to stare at you because you weren’t like them. MR LAMB: So you think you’re just the same as all the other people with burned faces? Just by what you look like? Ah....everything’s different. Everything’s the same, but everything is different. Itself. DERRY: How do you make all that out? MR LAMB: Watching. Listening. Thinking. DERRY: I’d like a place like this. A garden. I’d like a house with no curtains. MR LAMB: The gate’s always open. DERRY: But this isn’t mine. MR LAMB: Everything’s yours if you want it. What’s mine is anybody’s. DERRY: So I could come here again? Even if you were out....I could come here. MR LAMB: Certainly. You might find others here, of course. DERRY: Oh.... MR LAMB: Well, that needn’t stop you, you needn’t mind. DERRY: It’d stop them. They’d mind me. When they saw me here. They look at my face and run. 56 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 MR LAMB: They might. They might not. You’d have to take the risk. So would they. DERRY: No, you would. You might have me and lose all your other friends, because nobody wants to stay near me if they can help it. MR LAMB: I’ve not moved. DERRY: No.... MR LAMB: When I go down the street, the kids shout ‘Lamey-Lamb.’ But they still come into the garden, into my house; it’s a game. They’re not afraid of me. Why should they be? Because I’m not afraid of them, that’s why not. DERRY: Did you get your leg blown off in the war? MR LAMB: Certainly. DERRY: How will you climb on a ladder and get the crab apples down, then? MR LAMB: Oh, there’s a lot of things I’ve learned to do, and plenty of time for it. Years. I take it steady. DERRY: If you fell and broke your neck, you could lie on the grass and die. If you were on your own. MR LAMB: I could. DERRY: You said I could help you. MR LAMB: If you want to. DERRY: But my mother’ll want to know where I am. It’s three miles home, across the fields. I’m fourteen. but they still want to know where I am. MR LAMB: People worry. DERRY: People fuss. MR LAMB: Go back and tell them. DERRY: It’s three miles. MR LAMB: It’s a fine evening. You’ve got legs. DERRY: Once I got home, they’d never let me come back. MR LAMB: Once you got home, you’d never let yourself come back. DERRY: You don’t know....you don’t know what I could do. MR LAMB: No. Only you know that. DERRY: If I chose.... MR LAMB: Ah....if you chose. I don’t know everything, boy. I can’t tell you what to do. On the Face of It 57 Reprint 2024-25 DERRY: They tell me. MR LAMB: Do you have to agree? DERRY: I don’t know what I want. I want....something no one else has got or ever will have. Something just mine. Like this garden. I don’t know what it is. MR LAMB: You could find out. DERRY: How? MR LAMB: Waiting. Watching. Listening. Sitting here or going there. I’ll have to see to the bees. DERRY: Those other people who come here....do they talk to you? Ask you things? MR LAMB: Some do, some don’t. I ask them. I like to learn. DERRY: I don’t believe in them. I don’t think anybody ever comes. You’re here all by yourself and miserable and no one would know if you were alive or dead and nobody cares. MR LAMB: You think what you please. DERRY: All right then, tell me some of their names. MR LAMB: What are names? Tom, Dick or Harry. [Getting up] I’m off down to the bees. DERRY: I think you’re daft....crazy.... MR LAMB: That’s a good excuse. DERRY: What for? You don’t talk sense. MR LAMB: Good excuse not to come back. And you’ve got a burned-up face, and that’s other people’s excuse. DERRY: You’re like the others, you like to say things like that. If you don’t feel sorry for my face, you’re frightened of it, and if you’re not frightened, you think I’m ugly as a devil. I am a devil. Don’t you? [Shouts] [Mr Lamb does not reply. He has gone to his bees.] DERRY: [Quietly] No. You don’t. I like it here. [Pause. Derry gets up and shouts.] I’m going. But I’ll come back. You see. You wait. I can run. I haven’t got a tin leg. I’ll be back. [Derry runs off. Silence. The sounds of the garden again.] 58 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 MR LAMB: [To himself] There my dears. That’s you seen to. Ah....you know. We all know. I’ll come back. They never do, though. Not them. Never do come back. [The garden noises fade.] SCENE TWO Derry’s house. MOTHER: You think I don’t know about him, you think. I haven’t heard things? DERRY: You shouldn’t believe all you hear. MOTHER: Been told. Warned. We’ve not lived here three months, but I know what there is to know and you’re not to go back there. DERRY: What are you afraid of? What do you think he is? An old man with a tin leg and he lives in a huge house without curtains and has a garden. And I want to be there, and sit and....listen to things. Listen and look. MOTHER: Listen to what? DERRY: Bees singing. Him talking. MOTHER: And what’s he got to say to you? On the Face of It 59 Reprint 2024-25 DERRY: Things that matter. Things nobody else has ever said. Things I want to think about. MOTHER: Then you stay here and do your thinking. You’re best off here. DERRY: I hate it here. MOTHER: You can’t help the things you say. I forgive you. It’s bound to make you feel bad things....and say them. I don’t blame you. DERRY: It’s got nothing to do with my face and what I look like. I don’t care about that and it isn’t important. It’s what I think and feel and what I want to see and find out and hear. And I’m going back there. Only to help him with the crab apples. Only to look at things and listen. But I’m going. MOTHER: You’ll stop here. DERRY: Oh no, oh no. Because if I don’t go back there, I’ll never go anywhere in this world again. [The door slams. Derry runs, panting.] And I want the world....I want it....I want it.... [The sound of his panting fades.] SCENE THREE Mr Lamb’s garden [Garden sounds: the noise of a branch shifting; apples thumping down; the branch shifting again.] MR LAMB: Steady....that’s....got it. That’s it... [More apples fall] And again. That’s it....and.... [A creak. A crash. The ladder falls back, Mr Lamb with it. A thump. The branch swishes back. Creaks. Then silence. Derry opens the garden gate, still panting.] DERRY: You see, you see! I came back. You said I wouldn’t and they said....but I came back, I wanted.... 60 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 [He stops dead. Silence.] Mr Lamb, Mr....You’ve..... [He runs through the grass. Stops. Kneels] Mr Lamb, It’s all right....You fell....I’m here, Mr Lamb, It’s all right. [Silence] I came back. Lamey-Lamb. I did.....come back. [Derry begins to weep.] THE END Reading with Insight 1. What is it that draws Derry towards Mr Lamb inspite of himself? 2. In which section of the play does Mr Lamb display signs of loneliness and disappointment? What are the ways in which Mr Lamb tries to overcome these feelings? 3. The actual pain or inconvenience caused by a physical impairment is often much less than the sense of alienation felt by the person with disabilities. What is the kind of behaviour that the person expects from others? 4. Will Derry get back to his old seclusion or will Mr Lamb’s brief association effect a change in the kind of life he will lead in the future? On the Face of It 61 Reprint 2024-25  How about... using your imagination to suggest another ending to the above story. 62 Vistas Reprint 2024-25  6 Memories of Childhood Zitkala-Sa and Bama Before you read This unit presents autobiographical episodes from the lives of two women from marginalised communities who look back on their childhood, and reflect on their relationship with the mainstream culture. The first account is by an American Indian woman born in the late nineteenth century; the second is by a contemporary Tamil Dalit writer. Gertrude Simmons Bonnin, born in 1876, was an extraordinarily talented and educated Native American woman who struggled and triumphed in a time when severe prejudice prevailed towards Native American culture and women. As a writer, she adopted the pen name ‘Zitkala-Sa’ and in 1900 began publishing articles criticising the Carlisle Indian school. Her works criticised dogma, and her life as a Native American woman was dedicated against the evils of oppression. Bama is the pen-name of a Tamil Dalit woman from a Roman Catholic family. She has published three main works: an autobiography, ‘Karukku’, 1992; a novel, ‘Sangati’, 1994; and a collection of short stories, ‘Kisumbukkaaran’, 1996. The following excerpt has been taken from ‘Karukku’. ‘Karukku’ means ‘Palmyra’ leaves, which with their serrated edges on both sides, are like double-edged swords. By a felicitous pun, the Tamil word ‘Karukku’, containing the word ‘karu’, embryo or seed, also means freshness, newness. Reprint 2024-25 I. The Cutting of My Long Hair..........ZITKALA-SA The first day in the land of apples was a bitter-cold one; for the snow still covered the ground, and the trees were bare. A large bell rang for breakfast, its loud metallic voice crashing through the belfry overhead and into our sensitive ears. The annoying clatter of shoes on bare floors gave us no peace. The constant clash of harsh noises, with an undercurrent of many voices murmuring an unknown tongue, made a bedlam within which I was securely tied. And though my spirit tore itself in struggling for its lost freedom, all was useless. A paleface woman, with white hair, came up after us. We were placed in a line of girls who were marching into the dining room. These were Indian girls, in stiff shoes and closely clinging dresses. The small girls wore sleeved aprons and shingled hair. As I walked noiselessly in my soft moccasins, I felt like sinking to the floor, for my blanket had been stripped from my shoulders. I looked hard at the Indian girls, who seemed not to care that they were even more immodestly dressed than I, in their tightly fitting clothes. While we marched in, the boys entered at an opposite door. I watched for the three young braves who came in our party. I spied them in the rear ranks, looking as uncomfortable as I felt. A small bell was tapped, and each of the pupils drew a chair from under the table. Supposing this act meant they were to be seated, I pulled out mine and at once slipped into it from one side. But when I turned my head, I saw that I was the only one seated, and all the rest at our table remained standing. Just as I began to rise, looking shyly around to see how chairs were to be used, a second bell was sounded. All were seated at last, and I had to crawl back into my chair again. I heard a man’s voice at one end of the hall, and I looked around to see him. But all the others hung their heads over their plates. As I glanced at the long chain of tables, I caught the eyes of a paleface woman upon me. Immediately I dropped my eyes, wondering why I was so keenly watched by the strange woman. The man ceased his mutterings, and then a third bell was tapped. Every 64 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 one picked up his knife and fork and began eating. I began crying instead, for by this time I was afraid to venture anything more. But this eating by formula was not the hardest trial in that first day. Late in the morning, my friend Judewin gave me a terrible warning. Judewin knew a few words of English; and she had overheard the paleface woman talk about cutting our long, heavy hair. Our mothers had taught us that only unskilled warriors who were captured had their hair shingled by the enemy. Among our people, short hair was worn by mourners, and shingled hair by cowards! We discussed our fate some moments, and when Judewin said, “We have to submit, because they are strong,” I rebelled. “No, I will not submit! I will struggle first!” I answered. I watched my chance, and when no one noticed, I disappeared. I crept up the stairs as quietly as I could in my squeaking shoes, — my moccasins had been exchanged for shoes. Along the hall I passed, without knowing whither I was going. Turning aside to an open door, I found a large room with three white beds in it. The windows were covered with dark green curtains, which made the room very dim. Thankful that no one was there, I directed my steps toward the corner farthest from the door. On my hands and knees I crawled under the bed, and huddled myself in the dark corner. From my hiding place I peered out, shuddering with fear whenever I heard footsteps near by. Though in the hall loud voices were calling my name, and I knew that even Judewin Memories of Childhood 65 Reprint 2024-25 was searching for me, I did not open my mouth to answer. Then the steps were quickened and the voices became excited. The sounds came nearer and nearer. Women and girls entered the room. I held my breath and watched them open closet doors and peep behind large trunks. Some one threw up the curtains, and the room was filled with sudden light. What caused them to stoop and look under the bed I do not know. I remember being dragged out, though I resisted by kicking and scratching wildly. Inspite of myself, I was carried downstairs and tied fast in a chair. I cried aloud, shaking my head all the while until I felt the cold blades of the scissors against my neck, and heard them gnaw off one of my thick braids. Then I lost my spirit. Since the day I was taken from my mother I had suffered extreme indignities. People had stared at me. I had been tossed about in the air like a wooden puppet. And now my long hair was shingled like a coward’s! In my anguish I moaned for my mother, but no one came to comfort me. Not a soul reasoned quietly with me, as my own mother used to do; for now I was only one of many little animals driven by a herder. II. We Too are Human Beings..........BAMA When I was studying in the third class, I hadn’t yet heard people speak openly of untouchability. But I had already seen, felt, experienced and been humiliated by what it is. I was walking home from school one day, an old bag hanging from my shoulder. It was actually possible to walk the distance in ten minutes. But usually it would take me thirty minutes at the very least to reach home. It would take me from half an hour to an hour to dawdle along, watching all the fun and games that were going on, all the entertaining novelties and oddities is the streets, the shops and the bazaar. The performing monkey; the snake which the snakecharmer kept in its box and displayed from time to time; the cyclist who had not got off his bike for three days, and who kept pedalling as hard as he could from break of 66 Vistas Reprint 2024-25 day; the rupee notes that were pinned on to his shirt to spur him on; the spinning wheels; the Maariyaata temple, the huge bell hanging there; the pongal offerings being cooked in front of the temple; the dried fish stall by the statue of Gandhi; the sweet stall, the stall selling fried snacks, and all the other shops next to each other; the street light always demonstrating how it could change from blue to violet; the narikkuravan huntergypsy with his wild lemur in cages, selling needles, clay beads and instruments for cleaning out the ears — Oh, I could go on and on. Each thing would pull me to a stand-still and not allow me to go any further. At times, people from various political parties would arrive, put up a stage and harangue us through their mikes. Then there might be a street play, or a puppet show, or a “no magic, no miracle” stunt performance. All these would happen from time to time. But almost certainly there would be some entertainment or other going on. Even otherwise, there were the coffee clubs in the bazaar: the way each waiter cooled the coffee, lifting a tumbler high up and pouring its contents into a tumbler held in his other hand. Or the way some people sat in front of the shops chopping up onion, their eyes turned elsewhere so that they would not smart. Or the almond tree growing there and its fruit which was occasionally blown down by the wind. All these sights taken together would tether my legs and stop me from going home. And then, according to the season, there would be mango, cucumber, sugar-cane, sweet-potato, palm-shoots, gram, palm-syrup and palm-fruit, guavas and jack-fruit. Every day I would see people selling sweet and savoury fried snacks, payasam, halva, boiled tamarind seeds and iced lollies. Gazing at all this, one day, I came to my street, my bag slung over my shoulder. At the opposite corner, though, a threshing floor had been set up, and the landlord watched the proceedings, seated on a piece of sacking spread over a stone ledge. Our people were hard at work, driving cattle in pairs, round and round, to tread out the grain from the Memories of Childhood 67 Reprint 2024-25 straw. The animals were muzzled so that they wouldn’t help themselves to the straw. I stood for a while there, watching the fun. Just then, an elder of our street came along from the direction of the bazaar. The manner in which he was walking along made me want to double up. I wanted to shriek with laughter at the sight of such a big man carrying a small packet in that fashion. I guessed there was something like vadai or green banana bhajji in the packet, because the wrapping paper was stained with oil. He came along, holding out the packet by its string, without touching it. I stood there thinking to myself, if he holds it like that, won’t the package come undone, and the vadais fall out? The elder went straight up to the landlord, bowed low and extended the packet towards him, cupping the hand that held the string with his other hand. The landlord opened the parcel and began to eat the vadais. After I had watched all this, at last I went home. My elder brother was there. I told him the story in all its comic detail. I fell about with laughter at the memory of a big man, and an elder at that, making such a game out of carrying the parcel. But Annan was not amused. Annan told me the man wasn’t being funny when he carried the package like that. He said everybody believed that they were upper caste and therefore must not touch us. If they did, they would be polluted. That’s why he had to carry the package by its string. 68 Vistas Reprint 2024-25  When I heard this, I didn’t want to laugh any more, and I felt terribly sad. How could they believe that it was disgusting if one of us held that package in his hands, even though the vadai had been wrapped first in a banana leaf, and then parcelled in paper? I felt so provoked and angry that I wanted to touch those wretched vadais myself straightaway. Why should we have to fetch and carry for these people, I wondered. Such an important elder of ours goes meekly to the shops to fetch snacks and hands them over reverently, bowing and shrinking, to this fellow who just sits there and stuffs them into his mouth. The thought of it infuriated me. How was it that these fellows thought so much of themselves? Because they had scraped four coins together, did that mean they must lose all human feelings? But we too are human beings. Our people should never run these petty errands for these fellows. We should work in their fields, take home our wages, and leave it at that. My elder brother, who was studying at a university, had come home for the holidays. He would often go to the library in our neighbouring village in order to borrow books. He was on his way home one day, walking along the banks of the irrigation tank. One of the landlord’s men came up behind him. He thought my Annan looked unfamiliar, and so he asked, “Who are you, appa, what’s your name?” Annan told him his name. Immediately the other man asked, “Thambi, on which street do you live?” The point of this was that if he knew on which street we lived, he would know our caste too. Annan told me all these things. And he added, “Because we are born into this community, we are never given any honour or dignity or respect; we are stripped of all that. But if we study and make progress, we can throw away these indignities. So study with care, learn all you can. If you are always ahead in your lessons, people will come to you of their own accord and attach themselves to you. Work hard and learn.” The words that Annan spoke to me that day made a very deep impression on me. And I studied hard, with all my breath and being, in a frenzy almost. Memories of Childhood 69 Reprint 2024-25 As Annan had urged, I stood first in my class. And because of that, many people became my friends. Reading with Insight 1. The two accounts that you read above are based in two distant cultures. What is the commonality of theme found in both of them? 2. It may take a long time for oppression to be resisted, but the seeds of rebellion are sowed early in life. Do you agree that injustice in any form cannot escape being noticed even by children? 3. Bama’s experience is that of a victim of the caste system. What kind of discrimination does Zitkala-Sa’s experience depict? What are their responses to their respective situations? 70 Vistas Reprint 2024-25  NOTES..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................