straightaway. There could never be anything between them other than their mutual respect.
Only one street from the mission, a hand gripped her around the elbow. She whirled to face who accosted her in the street.
The man looking down at her took her speech away. So many years had gone by. It could not be. Her Uncle Harish, Papa’s brother. Her heart tore in two, and she dropped to the ground to touch his feet in respect. To see a member of her family after so long brought tears to her eyes.
He took a step back, and she rose to look upon his face. The last time she had seen his dark eyes, they had been filled with tears for her. Papa and Uncle had shaken her awake in the middle of the night. Uncle had removed the long string of pearls that at thirteen years old she had worn even to bed. His words from that night came back to her, “These wedding jewels must be given back to the groom’s family.”
Then Papa and Uncle had bundled her into a bullock cart and taken her from her home to another village, to abandon her like a shameful thing at an ashram for Hindu widows. She had not even been allowed to say good-bye to her mother.
Now Uncle Harish stared down at her in this busy Amritsar bazaar. Turmoil filled his gaze. What was he doing so far from their family home in Madras? His eyes widened as if he watched the dead come to life. “It is you, is it not? Eshana?”
She yearned to embrace him. “Yes, Uncle, it is I, your niece.”
“We had thought you dead all these years. The women at the ashram informed us you had left one day. We had asked them this when your mother demanded news of you.”
At the mention of her mother her heart leaped. Amma had demanded news of her?
Uncle’s gaze took in her sari, not the coarse white cotton of a widow, but the exultant shade of mimosa yellow. Her hair ran in all its glory, a thick plait down to her waist.
He dropped his manacle hold around her elbow as if the touch of her stung his hand. “What is this vile thing you are doing, not dressed as a proper widow? You should be in the temple in constant prayers for your deceased husband, not prancing about the bazaar.”
Eshana looked around her. This was not the place for such a discussion. She could not explain to him here that despair no longer shackled her, but that Christ had set her free. And Dr. Kaur would be waiting for her to discuss Chandra’s case. If the unhappy past did not lie between her uncle and herself like an abscess, she could have invited him to the mission. But something held her back from telling him where she lived.
She placed tentative fingers on his arm, but he jerked a step back, his gaze wide with fear and yet with sadness. “Uncle, I cannot speak with you now. It is my dearest wish to explain to you the wondrous joy in my life. May I come to you tomorrow and tell you all?”
He shook his head, quivering. “I cannot be having you come to my place of business. Surely you would not wish such bad luck upon me.” His face contorted with the jumble of emotions. “But for your mother’s sake, I will meet you here tomorrow and I will listen.”
His face hardened, just as it had that early dawn when she was thirteen years old and he and her father had left her at the ashram. His shoulders had heaved with his sobs then. But as he turned from her today his shoulders sat rigid as he stalked away.
She ran along the bazaar and at the corner turned to look behind. Uncle Harish stood not far off, his eyes following her. The look of his gaze did not hold the love he used to have for her, but something else, as if he held her in contempt. Or was it fear?
FIVE
Jai Kaur looked up from examining Chandra, when Eshana burst into the clinic at the mission. She nodded to him while a wavering lamp of a smile lit her eyes. Yet something in her manner disturbed him. She breathed hard as if she had been running, and her gaze darted to the window.
He put up a hand to stroke his beard. “Is there someone you are expecting?”
“No.” He had never before seen her so flustered, but she left the window and stood beside him. “Please, Doctor, tell me what you think of our patient.”
He turned to view the girl from the temple who in a sleepy state paid them little attention. “You were wise to keep her on the intravenous fluid. As I have said before, you would make a fine physician, Eshana.”
“As we have discussed many times, there is no opportunity for me to study to be a doctor.” Though her answer came quietly, her eyes shone.
“Why not? I have heard there are several Christian hospitals training women to be doctors. Women practitioners are needed in our land when most women refuse to be treated by a male doctor.”
“I am already knowing this. But with Miriam’s dying words she meant for me to take her place in this mission. It is not only love for Miriam that is spurring me on, but love for my Lord.”
Her eyes clouded, and he had no wish to bring back the sorrow of Miriam’s death. He too remembered the horror of the Jallianwalla Bagh massacre.
Together he and Eshana examined the girl’s sutures. He softened his voice for both the drowsy patient as well as Eshana’s emotions. “I am familiar with your religion. I have read many of Sundar Singh’s writings about this Christian god, Yeshu.”
“I too have read much of Sundar’s work.” Her voice brightened. “He is a great, holy man of India, a Christian sadhu. What did you think of Sundar’s experience when he was praying as a young Sikh man, ‘if there be a God, reveal Thyself’?”
Jai had been about to answer, relishing the idea of discussing the differences of his Sikh theology versus her Christianity when Laine Harkness rushed into the room and strode toward Eshana.
Eshana’s expression mirrored the strain on her English friend’s face. “Something has happened.”
“Didn’t Geoff come by last night to talk to you?” The English nurse did not speak in her usual jocular manner.
“There was no need for Geoff to be concerned. No one knows Chandra is here, and as soon as she—”
“The police will most likely know any time now. I’ve been given the bad news. The authorities visited my matron at the hospital. Someone recognized me, but she’s been good enough to send me away. I’ve got tickets for the train, but it won’t be long before the police work out that I’m often here at the mission.”
Jai pushed forward. “Are you saying they are looking for Eshana? Why have you put her in such a dangerous predicament? This is another instance of your British Raj mentality, do as you please and leave Indians to suffer the consequences.”
Eshana placed her palms together and beseeched him. “Please, my friend. It was I who urged Laine to help me rescue the girl.”
With effort he calmed his voice. “You must get the girl away. Better still take her back to the temple. If they find her here, your life will be forfeit.”
The nurse spoke in that tone she no doubt used in the hospital wards. “Dr. Kaur, I assure you, I am not leaving Eshana.”
The flame of anger within him lowered, though it still flickered. “Then you must hurry, before it is discovered Eshana was involved.”
“Wait.”
