As it turned out, Geoffrey Brown brought the only edibles for our Christmas feast—a real plum pudding, with a pitcher of sauce on the side; some herring; and Christmas crackers from the Smith factory in England. (He would accept no money for these, though he allowed Nei-Nei Down to pay for the beef, after vehement debate.)
He had brought two sets of themed Christmas crackers, which were all the rage. They were little noisemaking toys. The first was called “Mrs. Brown’s Luggage,” and the crackers came cunningly packaged inside what appeared to be a steam trunk. That and the play on his own name, Brown, was, I thought, a terribly clever choice. I pointed it out to the others.
“Usually, we open with Christmas crackers to create a festive mood,” said British Grandfather. “But I think tonight we shall save them for the end.”
“Yes, Mrs. Brown’s Luggage,” said Nei-Nei Down. “Trunks . . . suitcases . . . leaving one’s home. The baby Jesus had no place to rest his head, either. Very clever,” she said, grinding her teeth at Geoffrey in what was supposed to pass for a smile. She would never, ever forgive him for keeping Grandfather out so late that one night.
“I also brought these crossword-puzzle crackers,” Geoffrey hastily pointed out, pushing them toward her. These were cunningly wrapped in black-and-white-patterned paper, to resemble a crossword. “There are small puzzles inside.”
“Uncle Chachi loves crossword puzzles!” I chimed in. Of all the fans of this latest craze, there was no greater fan than my Uncle Chachi.
That seemed to mollify Nei-Nei to some degree, for Uncle Chachi, normally cool to Geoffrey Brown, if not aggressively hostile like Nei-Nei, could not conceal his delight and obviously wanted to open the crackers right away—but he deferred to British Grandfather. Christmas was, after all, the Englishmen’s holiday.
Nei-Nei was much distracted by the disaster of her cooking. The roast, though we had baked it for hours, still bled at the center, and poor Grandfather, sawing away, could barely slice it into portions. The so-called Yorkshire pudding was a gluey mess, and inside the chestnut stuffing, the chestnuts, a complete puzzlement to Nei-Nei nestled in their hard brown shells, crunched against our teeth. We made our way through each course with grim determination, concentrating as much as possible on the tinned cranberry jelly, the herring, and the pudding. Only Nei-Nei’s chicken rice, made with egg and vegetables, tasted as it should, but because it was merely a side dish, she had not prepared enough. I noticed that Nei-Nei herself pushed the rice away with one hand, dumping a large spoonful onto poor, bewildered Dawid’s plate.
When she offered some to Brown, he demurred. “I don’t eat chicken rice,” he said. “Never saw the point of it.” There was a silence. We gawked at him. I didn’t dare look at Nei-Nei’s face. Didn’t eat chicken rice! He might as well have spit on the Singapore flag.
“But I’m sure yours is delicious,” he added. Still, he didn’t touch it. He praised the roast and the pudding. But I noticed that he himself ate nothing but bread and butter.
“A true English Christmas!” British Grandfather agreed. At each new course, he offered another toast. “To the cook!” “To the empire!” “To Singapore!” and finally, with the puddings, tearfully, “To memories of Christmases past!”
At last it was time to open the Christmas crackers. It seemed a shame to ruin them, they were so beautiful, and had they come from anyone other than Geoffrey Brown, Nei-Nei would have exclaimed over them, too. I wondered, somewhat exasperated, when she would get over her foolish prejudice against this working-class white Englishman. It seemed as stupid as despising a man because he was a Jew, or because he came from Malaya and his skin was a shade darker or yellower than ours. My nei-nei was above all this, yet she had not spoken more than two or three sentences to my lovely, helpful Geoffrey all night.
It was a small act of revenge, therefore, that when I paired the Christmas crackers—it took two people to pull them—I made Nei-Nei share hers with my suitor. We called Danai and Sanang to join as well, and the table seemed instantly more festive with the addition of these two.
“Will it be very loud?” asked Danai. “Will it sound like dynamite?”
“Does it burn the fingers?” asked Sanang.
I did not want to admit that these same worries had been in my mind. Now, the whole table began shouting out questions. “How do you hold it? Will what’s inside come spilling out?”
British Grandfather and Geoffrey Brown explained the inner workings of Christmas crackers, while Uncle Chachi pretended to be an expert on these as well. Uncle Chachi was my pulling partner, and he kept issuing dire warnings and strange advice.
“You might want to wrap your hand in a napkin as I am doing, Aggie, like so. Be careful. Be very careful. Never mind what they say, I have heard of Christmas crackers exploding into flames.”
At the count of Ready, Steady, Go, we all pulled, and the crackers made a satisfying Bang! Nei-Nei Down let out a yelp of fright. Grandfather roared with laughter. Little bits of colored confetti came flying out and settled onto the table like red and green and pink snow. After a moment, little Danai said in a trembling voice, “Mine didn’t work.”
Dawid, her partner, looked guilty. “I must have done something wrong,” he murmured. If the world had ended, I’m sure Dawid would have taken the blame for that as well.
“No worries.” Geoffrey stepped in briskly. “There’s always a few that don’t go off. —They say it’s good luck. You’re the lucky one!” He came round the table to Danai and reached for the box of Mrs. Brown’s Luggage crackers. “May I?” he asked.
Geoffrey looked down into Danai’s face with his usual bright, friendly gaze, his smile quirking up one corner of his mouth. “Ready?” he asked her. He held out one end of the cracker to her. The girl raised one thin hand, and then hesitated.
She lowered her head. “I can’t do it with everyone watching,” she whispered.
We all pretended to look away. The cracker went off with a sharp snap.
“Huzzah!” cried Grandfather.
Geoffrey did not reclaim his seat, but made his farewells standing near Danai. He looked like an actual knight in shining armor, with the gaslight flickering around his golden hair.
I walked him to the palace door, leaving the others behind a moment.
Geoffrey reached into his coat pocket. He tossed a sprig of mistletoe into the air, caught it, and kissed me. Of course, we never made any public display of affection in front of my relations. We contented ourselves with stolen kisses, a squeeze of the hand, a lingering look.
“I will be back,” Geoffrey promised. “Whatever else may happen, you can count on that.”
Back at the dining-room table, we gathered up our mottoes from the torn Christmas crackers and read them aloud—mostly treacly sentimental sayings—and tried on our little paper hats. The Christmas crackers left an acrid scent lingering in the air. It reminded me of Deepavali, when Omar Wahlid had strapped explosives across his body and set out to blow up the palace. I thought I must be the only one thinking of this, but British Grandfather said in a shaky voice, “That was a bad night. A terrible night for us all.”
With our silly crepe paper hats on, the tips of the hats drooping, we looked like inmates at an imbecile institution, or an inebriate asylum. What a foolish holiday Christmas was! I thought. So much waste. The roast still sat in the middle of the table, congealing in its red juices, and at a gesture from Nei-Nei Down, Sanang and Danai began to clear the table, bearing the roast away like a corpse.
We had already opened our Christmas gifts that morning—small gifts but extravagances, given our circumstances. My salary at Kahani’s had after all done little to change matters, and wintertime was an expensive season. With the late monsoons came more rain damage, more needed repairs. But Grandfather had insisted on presents. Nei-Nei and I had each received bottles of perfume. The servants also were given gifts, and Dawid, a ha
ndsome engraved pen. I had no idea where the money for all this munificence had come from. Surely not from Grandfather’s pension—which went to our necessities. Nor from Nei-Nei’s household money, of which a lavish portion had gone toward this Christmas feast.
Unlike Deepavali, which went on for days, or the Chinese Spring Festival, which lasted for at least three, Christmas struck me as a rather flimsy holiday, like the crackers we had just opened—noisy but short-lived. I wondered if the Christians felt disappointed when night fell, and thought that I must remember to ask my friend Bridget about it.
We sat in an almost sullen silence. I had the anxious feeling that this miasma could turn, at any instant, into a group depression. Even British Grandfather looked to be at a loss.
Dawid cleared his throat. “Now we will sing Christmas songs,” he announced. Dawid and I knew the songs from our many Christmas choral recitals at the Raffles School. He started with “Silent Night.” British Grandfather instantly joined in, and Uncle Chachi mouthed the wrong words, while the rest just hummed along. We sang “The First Noel,” and “O Come, All Ye Faithful.”
Grandfather’s eyes were shining with happiness, bluer than blue. This was the British Grandfather I remembered, fierce and happy, the center of attention, the leader of our small band. We switched to “Good King Wenceslas,” and then I saw that Grandfather was not smiling at all, but weeping. Nei-Nei laid one hand on his shoulder. The rest of us dragged slowly to a silent halt, and only Dawid went on obliviously singing for a few lines, alone:
“Sire, the night is darker now,
And the wind blows stronger.
Fails my heart, I know not how . . .”
Then there was silence, interrupted only by the sound of Grandfather’s hiccupping breaths.
“Oh, this is so foolish,” said Grandfather after a moment, mopping his eyes. “A silly child’s song . . .” He shook his head. “Forgive me. I look in the mirror,” Grandfather went on, “and I am simply—amazed. Who is that old man? Who can he be? Indeed, it is not I, not the I who lives inside my head. When I dream at night, I can run and my legs and heart are strong. And yet, I am swept back into the past by a few children’s songs.” Now he did smile, and his smile had the temporary brilliancy of a rain-washed sky.
“Inside every old man lies the heart of a ten-year-old boy. Brave . . . unstoppable. The defender of field mice!”
Nei-Nei Down put her fingers up to her mouth. Her eyes shone out at British Grandfather. “You are still our great defender,” she said.
Soon afterward, the Singapore aunties and uncles came by for a late-night visit, along with unattached cousins twice and three times removed. All were somewhat bewildered by the evidence of a Christian holiday—they had come, in fact, because everything was closed on Christmas and there was nothing left to do but to go visiting. Otherwise, it was an ordinary day, and their ordinariness came as a great blessing.
Nei-Nei brought out plates of halwa and her much-loved almond crescent cookies dusted with sugar, and these rendered the plum pudding less overwhelming. It became merely another sweet, just as the evening became merely another evening.
In a shadowy corner of the room, British Grandfather and Uncle Chachi took up their usual game of Congkak—a game played with boards and tamarind seeds. I saw them watching Nei-Nei Down weave gracefully among the guests. Her hair was pinned up, a few gray wisps trailing down. She wore a silver-embroidered kebaya, an embroidered Peranakan blouse over a long embroidered skirt, which she had inherited from her mother. She looked quite youthful, moving around the room, serving sweets. Her figure was still as slim as a young girl’s.
“I wonder,” said Uncle Chachi, “if we will ever get our cup of tea.”
British Grandfather folded his arms. “The closest ones come last,” he said. “That is an immutable law with women.”
Uncle Chachi made a move on the Congkak board. He frowned. “Ah, I am going to lose,” he said. “Again.”
“You don’t pay proper attention,” Grandfather chided him.
Uncle Chachi glanced at the plum pudding. “All I want is a cup of tea,” he said, still eyeing Nei-Nei Down. “And a little peace and quiet, perhaps.”
“I know what you want,” Grandfather said. His voice snapped out, like the crack of a whip. Never, not even in my most disobedient childhood, had I heard this in his voice. “But you will have to wait your turn.”
Uncle Chachi was helping himself to a serving of plum pudding when British Grandfather spoke. He stopped with his plate hanging in midair, the glistening pudding suspended from a silver jelly server. I thought he would make some joke about his sweet tooth. But Uncle Chachi’s face turned gray. He lowered the plate to the table and set down the jelly server.
“I have always wanted what was best for the family,” he said. “Only that. Always that.”
“Oh, Charles,” said British Grandfather, in a changed voice. “—We have been the best of friends, haven’t we?”
The two old men embraced each other tearfully. Christmas certainly was a very strange holiday.
TEN
Never Well Since
There is in the science of homeopathy a remedy based on the symptom “never well since.” The cure was Natrum muriaticum—an attenuated tincture of sea salt—indicated also, Uncle Chachi declared, for Grandfather’s desire to be alone, his harping on the past, his forgetfulness, headaches, sore throat, and general weakness.
Uncle Chachi believed in homeopathy, like many men of his generation who had been educated in England. King George himself, he pointed out, turned to homeopathic remedies, as did the entire royal family in times of need. I think Uncle Chachi never altogether forgave himself for allowing allopathic doctors to treat my parents and brother during the 1918 flu pandemic. Homeopathy, he swore, would have kept them alive. And it was true, statistically speaking, that more homeopaths survived in 1918 than those who consulted the doctors and went to the hospitals.
Grandfather was never well again after Christmas. He woke the day after our feast with a parched throat, fever, and a burning desire to be out in the fresh air—even when the monsoon poured down around him. He was constantly begging poor Danai to wheel him outside, or at least to seat him by an open window, while Nei-Nei scurried around wrapping his throat in scarves, wheeling him inside, and slamming all the windows closed.
After a few days of Uncle Chachi’s remedies and Nei-Nei’s dosing with bitter herbs and winter soups, Grandfather seemed to rally a little—but not entirely. “Never well since.” Some days his memory seemed shattered; he thought we in the palace were running a boarding school, and Nei-Nei Down, he said, was too harsh a mistress. He asked me for recitations, and I tried to oblige, dredging up all the old poems I could remember from childhood, though the pieces he requested were hopelessly old-fashioned. Nor could he for the life of him understand why I was not better schooled in Latin and Greek.
“What kind of a madhouse are we running here?” he would demand.
We ran in circles around him. Old Sanang roused herself to incredible efforts. Many nights, I would find her sitting upright in a chair outside his room, fighting off sleep, listening for any signs of distress within. Sanang had once been a renowned seamstress, driven into poverty by arthritis. Her knotted hands worked now to embroider new handkerchiefs for British Grandfather, her rescuer. She provided a fresh handkerchief each day, though Grandfather had a great fondness for the paper ones called Kleenex, the kind the movie stars used to remove cold cream from their faces. Still, the pile of embroidered handkerchiefs grew.
Dawid visited the candy stalls in Little India and brought sacks of candy to tempt Grandfather—to no avail. Danai ended up the secret beneficiary of these candies. Nei-Nei Down managed to be everywhere at once—in the kitchen barking out orders, napping fitfully in a folding cot by the side of Grandfather’s bed, harassing the local herbalists and healers and hawkers, ch
astising Grandfather as if he were doing all this deliberately, dying just to spite her.
I saw very little of Geoffrey during this time, for Nei-Nei was a fearsome dragon at the gate, and she carefully supervised which visitors were allowed. The worse Grandfather got, the fewer visitors she admitted, turning away even old friends and admirers. Poor Geoffrey did not stand a chance.
Once when he came to call, she locked all the doors and drew down the shades. Humiliated for his sake, I escaped through a back window and took Geoffrey for a walk in our garden, explaining that Grandfather’s current illness—which I tried to make light of in the early days—did not permit him the pleasure of visitors.
As we came back from our short stroll, we spied Nei-Nei Down standing in the circular front drive, studying Brown’s Pierce-Arrow. Before our very eyes, my grandmother did a shocking thing. She glanced quickly right, then left, and kicked the side of Geoffrey Brown’s car. It was no accident. It was a vicious little kick, made by her small slippered foot. I expected Geoffrey to be outraged, or at the very least offended. But Geoffrey just seemed amused. Perhaps the tiniest bit chagrinned. That’s how perfectly even his temper was. “She thinks I am not good enough for you,” he said. “She’s right.”
“She is not,” I said, “right. —And she’s a terrible snob.” I was embarrassed for her—for all of us.
“Perhaps I’ll win her over in the end,” Geoffrey said musingly. “Though I doubt it.”
Grandfather’s slump infected us all with gloom. It did not help matters that we had entered into the second monsoon season, a particularly unrelenting one. I woke to the sound of rain and slept to the sound of raindrops battering the palace roof, seeking admittance. Poor Nei-Nei went around like a bedraggled bird, her hair and skirts askew. She sloshed through the garden in knee-high gutta-percha boots, looking for peonies to rescue, but they, too, had slumped against the eternal downpour. Only Uncle Chachi and Dawid maintained their good humor. At the dinner table, they kept up a running dialogue that none of the rest of us had the heart to enter.