“Have you been told what you are expected to do here?”

“I have some idea, yes…”

“Hmm…” He looked at me curiously. I didn’t understand his intent. “Are you good with kids?” he asked after a pause.

“We often took care of younger girls in the orphanage.”

“Here you have to focus on her education and development. Be a stimulating companion. The rest of it, Kaveri and Chanda will manage.”

“Yes Sir. Is there anything specific you want me to focus on?”

“Her teachers in Bangalore always complained about her handwriting. It is quite bad. Other than that… I don’t know. She is too young.”

I nodded.

“What the fu…” he stopped short, probably remembering the child’s presence there. “I don’t think one should worry so much about the education of a five-year old…”

My heart sank at that. He didn’t really want me there, then? “How would people like me can get a job, then?” Would making a joke out of it help?

I wasn’t prepared for the way he guffawed. Loud, unselfconscious, almost crude! Surely, I hadn’t been that funny.

“Besides I would be a lousy father,” he said, “If I ignored just how competitive the world out there is. And she isn’t getting exposed to that here.”

If it mattered so much to him, why did he need to shift to this plantation? Shouldn’t he have continued living in Bangalore? “I will do my best, Sir.” It wasn’t my place to ask all those questions.

“I am going to be away during the day. Will be back only late in the evening. Annie must be fed in time.” We had finished eating and were about to get up. I nodded. But she had an aayah. He had just reminded me of that. Why should I worry about feeding her? Then I realized that he wasn’t finished. “But you wait for me for dinner.”

I was taken aback by the request, and in the matter-of-fact manner it was put up. Was it an honor? Or was it an insult to presume that I must wait for him if ordered? Before I could decide, he added, in his by now familiar reluctant tone, “I mean, please. If you don’t mind.”

Pleasantries did not come naturally to him.

—

I was disappointed in Mr. Roychowdhury. I had expected him to be a tall, dark, handsome gentleman. He was short and stocky. Although fair-skinned, he was not handsome by any means. Now don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t hoping to seduce him or anything like that. I knew better than that. He had a daughter, for God’s sake. In fact, if I were looking to seduce him, I wouldn’t have wanted him to be tall, dark and handsome at all. I am as plain a woman as one can be. For myself, if I were ever to wish for a man, my wished would be modest. But for a rich employer, I had expected someone else.  So, yes, I was disappointed. Not only with his looks, but also his manners. That was a something rough and crude about him. Probably I was expecting more of the genteel manners of Father Jacob. Probably my expectations from the outside world were all screwed up.

But there was one positive aspect of this disappointment. I didn’t feel intimated by him the way I would have felt with a tall, dark, handsome gentleman. And that was going to be my undoing.  But I am getting ahead of myself.

—

At dinner he questioned me incessantly. But while the questions about my education and hobbies sounded mechanical, he grew really interested when I told him that I knew nothing about my family.

“Nothing at all? Who had brought you to the orphanage?”

“I don’t know.”

“You must have asked someone?”

“Nobody knew. I was… I was left at the church steps…”

“How old were you?” He was frowning!

“They guessed I was a newborn. Probably a day-old.”

“Don’t’ you wonder…”

“I have always shared my room with at least ten other girls at the orphanage. I wonder what having a room to myself would be like. But you don’t wonder about it, do you?”

“No,” he replied with a barely perceptible smile.

“We don’t question or wonder about what has always been the way of our lives.”

“Are you mad at me? For asking these personal questions?” he sounded uncharacteristically gentle and genuine.

“You are trusting me with your daughter. You have the right to know whatever you want to know about me.”

“I tend to be insensitive at times. I have no right to pry in your personal life…”

“I have no personal life that you cannot find out about by writing to Father Jacob. Or anyone at the orphanage.”

“Nobody has such transparent life.” The moment of gentility was past. He was his sour self again.

“There is nothing in my life that Father Jacob doesn’t know about.”

“Yeah? He has a list of all your boyfriends and…”

“I haven’t had any boyfriends or relationships. And I won’t.”

“You won’t?”

“I won’t, unless I am sure I am getting married and stay in it for life.”

“Stay for life? You are one of those who believe in in ‘till death do us apart’?”

“I do.”

“Do you know about the divorce rates around the world?”

“That doesn’t make it a lesser sin. People live in sin all the time. It’s still a sin.”

“Unbelievable!” he groaned.

I had gone too far! “My religious beliefs are my own though. If you are worried about Ananya, you don’t need to be. My task is limited to her education – the secular education I mean.”

“Hmmm…” he didn’t seem to have heard me. All of a sudden he had withdrawn to a world of his own. He did not speak for the rest of the dinner. Even when I wished him good night, he only nodded absent-mindedly without as much a throwing a glance at me. To think that he had ordered me to wait for him at dinner.

—

Protim

She was scrawny the first time I had seen her. But the comfortable lifestyle, good food and mountain air was suiting her well. Her figure had filled up. And in just the right way. Her cheeks had grown full and rosy. The walks on the mountain roads had increased her stamina and strength.  Her face could not be called beautiful, but she looked refreshed and youthful. A pleasant, sweet aura was present around her

Her improving physique wasn’t the only thing that impressed me. I knew very well that Ananya was an average student. Still Sarah worked with her diligently. She didn’t seem to mind if a spelling needed to be repeated several times for her student. Or if a sum needed to be explained over and over. She had infinite patience. Probably the life in orphanage had done that to her. From waiting in line for food, to putting up with whimsical wardens and teachers, she had learned to take life as it came. I had found out quite a bit about her through our dinner conversations. Her patience showed there too. If she was annoyed by my inquisitiveness, she bore it well. I felt boorish imposing myself of her like that. But I had grown so tired of staying silent that I just couldn’t resist the urge to talk to someone who would understand. But would she understand? Would she care too?

Why would she? I was an obnoxious, employer whom she has to tolerate, just like she tolerated those patrons of orphanage with their noses in the air, or the old, wizened sisters with their ancient notions of how to raise orphan children.

And yet – I couldn’t seem to stop myself from asking her to share my table at dinner and from blabbering on while she sat donning a polite silence, or mumbling the requisite acknowledgements.

—

To be continued