But they were disappointed: far from shunning Shireen, her fellow Parsis accorded her a warm welcome; soon they were observed to be chatting with each other in a fashion so cordial as to leave no doubt that the seths had reconciled themselves to her remarrying outside the community.
By this time Shireen too had received compensation for her late husband’s losses from the opium crisis of two years before. Most of it she had already remitted to Bombay to pay off his debts; in addition she had sent large sums to her two daughters. But even after these disbursements the monies that remained still amounted to a sizeable fortune, amounting to tens of thousands of silver dollars.
Those in the know were well aware that Shireen was a wealthy woman and many were surprised when she did not join the bidding. Later, when she went to congratulate Seth Hormuzjee Rustomjee he even asked her why she had refrained from making a bid. Shireen’s answer was that she had decided to wait until the slopes of ‘Peaceful Mountain’ were made available to buyers.
Why?
The air was more salubrious there, Shireen explained, and it was her intention to endow a public hospital, in the name of her late husband, Bahram Moddie.
*
At the end of the bidding it emerged that one tract of land, consisting of lot numbers 16 to 20 had been reserved by an unnamed buyer: this being one of the largest acquisitions of the day, there was much excited comment.
Afterwards, when the spectators had dispersed and Mr Dent’s servants were serving champagne to the successful bidders, Mr Morrison was besieged with questions about the buyer’s identity. His protests to the effect that he was not at liberty to say found little purchase with the gathering. The clamour quickly grew so loud that he threw up his hands and cried: ‘This much I can certainly tell you, gentlemen, that the purchaser is amongst us now. If he should wish his name to be known then he will reveal it himself.’
At this a hush fell. It lasted until Mr Burnham, who was dressed in deep mourning, stepped forth and turned to face the gathering. ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he said. ‘I am grateful to Mr Morrison for being so scrupulous in respecting my request for confidentiality. It was not in order to create a mystery that I asked him to withhold the name of the purchaser. It is because to reveal it would require another announcement, one that I had deemed unbecoming for a time of bereavement. But it strikes me now that no one would have been more gratified by this disclosure than my late, beloved wife so there is perhaps no reason to delay it any longer.’
Here Mr Burnham stopped to gesture to Zachary who went to stand beside him. Placing a hand on his shoulder Mr Burnham continued: ‘Ladies, gentlemen, I am pleased to announce that the purchaser of lots 16 to 20 is a new entity, created just this week — the firm of Burnham and Reid.’
A round of applause broke out now and Mr Burnham paused until it had died away: ‘It would be remiss of me,’ he went on, ‘if I were to omit to mention another collaboration that we have entered into just this day, an association that will, I am certain, greatly strengthen our new company.’
Now Mr Burnham again made a beckoning gesture, at which another man stepped forward to join him and Zachary. This caused something of a stir — for when this man, who was dressed in an impeccably cut suit, turned to face the assembly he was seen to be Chinese.
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ said Mr Burnham, ‘it gives me the greatest pride to announce that from this time on the firm of Burnham and Reid will be working closely with our good friend, Mr Leonard Chan.’
Now, taking Zachary’s wrist in his right hand and Mr Chan’s in his left, Mr Burnham hoisted up their arms and held them aloft in triumph.
*
One of the few spectators to remain in the godown was Baboo Nob Kissin who was looking on from a dark corner at the back. When the three men made their gesture of triumph his heart flooded over with the joy that comes from seeing a mighty endeavour brought to its intended conclusion. Tears came into the gomusta’s eyes as he recalled the day he had first beheld Zachary, on the Ibis: that he should have been transformed so quickly from an ingenuous, good-natured boy, into a perfect embodiment of the Kali-yuga, seemed to Baboo Nob Kissin nothing less than a miracle; he marvelled to think that a creature as humble as himself should have played a part in bringing about the change. He knew of course that his role in promoting the ascendancy of the triumphant trio was but a small one — yet he was certain also that when the day of reckoning arrived, and the Kalki avatar manifested itself on earth, he would not be denied the credit for having advanced the coming of the pralaya by at least a decade or two. To be awarded that much credit would be enough for him; he wanted no worldly reward or recognition for being the first of his compatriots to recognize that it was their assigned destiny to serve the Kalki’s chosen precursors, to be their faithful gomustas in hastening the end of the earth.
It occurred to him also that it was the Ibis, that marvellous vehicle of transformations, that had launched him on the path of destiny and he was seized by an uncontrollable urge to clasp his eyes once again upon that vessel of blessed memory. In a swirl of saffron, he ran outside — but only to be confronted with yet another miracle: the Ibis, which had for the last several days been at anchor off East Point, was gone.
*
In Deeti’s shrine, high up on the slopes of the Morne Brabant, at the south-western corner of Mauritius, there was a special chamber for that episode of Maddow Colver’s life that came to be known as ‘the Escape’. This part of the ‘memory-temple’ was especially beloved of the Fami Colver, particularly the young ones, the chutkas and chutkis, laikas and laikis: every year, during the Gran Vakans, when the family made its annual pilgrimage to the ‘memory-temple’, they waited breathlessly for that moment when Deeti would point to the stylized image of a sampan, with six figures seated inside: Serang Ali, recognizable by his blood-red mouth; Jodu with his three eyebrows; Neel, with his journals; Raju, in his fifer’s hat; Kesri, who, by convention, was always drawn with a bundook — and of course, the patriarch himself, Maddow Colver.
‘Ekut, ekut!’ Deeti would cry, and that great horde of bonoys, belsers, bowjis, salas, sakubays and other relatives would follow her finger as she traced the path of Jodu’s sampan as it edged across the bay, from the Kowloon side, to draw up beside the Ibis, which was all but empty, with the second mate away at the land auction, and the sailors either ashore or asleep.
There vwala!
Her finger would come to rest on Serang Ali: You see him, this gran-koko with a head teeming with mulugandes? This is the great burrburiya who had once again thought up the plan for their escape.
You see now, how he vaults on deck, with Jodu and Maddow behind him? In a matter of minutes the crew are locked up in the fo’c’sle and then Kesri, Raju and Neel come aboard too.
In a trice the sails are hoisted and filling with wind, and by the time the auction ends the schooner is long out of sight …
Epilogue
In embarking on the task of writing a history of the Ibis community, the author had hoped to include an account of the materials on which his narrative is largely founded: that is to say Neel’s archive, by which is meant not only his notes and jottings but also the extensive collection of books, pictures and documents that he accumulated during the years in which he ran a printshop in Shanghai, in partnership with Compton (Liang Kuei-ch’uan).