Spiral Road Read Free Page B

any plans for us to live together. She’s exasperated by the way I’ve remained vague and shifty about this.
    Amelia’s justified in accusing me of indecisiveness. ‘You dither so much, Masud!’ she said to me once. And then lost her temper when I agreed.
    ‘Your problem is that you don’t passionately believe in anything! You don’t seem to have any need for anchorage.’
    An accurate assessment, I thought. ‘I’m an emotional Bedouin,’ I said limply.
    But Amelia hasn’t stopped telling me how much she appreciates my patience with Angela and Skye. Maybe that’s the reason she keeps her discontent under control.
    Recently, we’d been arguing over travel plans. We intended to go overseas together. Turkey, Syria and Jordan, I suggested.
    Italy and France, she insisted.
    And then, after not hearing from my brother for more than a year, I received a lengthy email from him, advising me about our father’s failing health and the ongoing saga of Uncle Musa’s profligacy. Zia was worried. Abba was struggling to recognise people and his speech had deteriorated to such an extent that it was difficult to understand what he meant. There were times when he was unexpectedly articulate and precise about the past. Such moments were followed by periods of silence, as Abba returned to the confusion of the present.
    ‘Bangladesh?’ Amelia sounded dubious.
    ‘It’s one of the safest of the Islamic countries,’ I said light-heartedly. ‘If you prefer, we could meet somewhere else. Istanbul or Amman?’
    To my relief, Amelia pulled out altogether. I would have had an impossible time explaining her to Ma.
    Our honour was in danger of being tarnished again, Zia had warned in his email, like a stuffy guardian of familial values. Then he concluded, officiously, intervention is necessary.
    T HERE’S A HAUNTING tale about the oldest item in our family jewellery collection. A twenty-two carat gold armlet, studded with a hundred tear-shaped rubies,had been presented to my great-grandmother Hasina by Abdul Ghani, the then Nawab of Dhaka.
    Abdul Ghani first glimpsed Hasina at a wedding at Ahsan Manzil, that palatial building on the banks of the Buriganga River. It was customary for the impulsive Nawab to peek into the great hall where female guests gathered on formal occasions. He was a curious man and an aesthete—a lover and patron of North Indian classical music and painting. He was known to be a poet of some merit, dedicating his verses to those women he found attractive. A harmless idiosyncrasy, one could say. But not in Hasina’s case. Befitting her name, my greatgrandmother was renowned for her beauty.
    An aide informed the Nawab that Hasina was married, to a zamindar ’s son, and had already borne him four children. At the time she was only twenty-one. So it was in despair that the Nawab sent her the armlet as a gift. It was accompanied by an explanatory note: each ruby, he said, was intended to represent a bloodied tear he’d shed over his unrequited love for her.
    ‘Begum Hasina, I beg you not to lose the armlet or give it away ,’ the Nawab wrote. ‘ Keep it close to you as a token of my love. I’ve asked a holy man to bless it. ’
    Ismael Alam was infuriated by the Nawab’s behaviour and sought to confront him and return the armlet. But Hasina was so moved by the aristocrat’s gesture that she insisted on keeping the present and writing to her admirer. My great-grandmother was a wilful woman, prone to bouts of temper. She resisted Ismael Alam’sinstruction to stop all communication with the Nawab. Hasina raged, abused anyone who dared to enter her room, smashed furniture and set a part of the house on fire. She went on a hunger strike until her husband withdrew his demand. With great reluctance and growing anger, Ismael Alam acquiesced, but insisted that his wife deposit the armlet in the family’s safe, which stood in a corner of his room. In return, my greatgrandfather showered her with jewellery of