Salman Rushdie Midnight's children Salman Rushdie Midnight's ...

ame clear that they would have to move deeper into the jungle, in search of
higher ground. The rain was too heavy for the boat to be of use; so, still f
ollowing Shaheed's instructions, Ayooba Farooq and the buddha pulled it far
away from the encroaching bank, tied mooring rope around sundri trunk, and c
overed their craft with leaves; after which, having no option, they moved ev
er further into the dense uncertainty of the jungle.
Now, once again, the Sundarbans changed its nature; once again Ayooba Shahe
ed Farooq found their ears filled with the lamentations of families from wh
ose bosom they had torn what once, centuries ago, they had termed 'undesira
ble elements'; they rushed wildly forward into the jungle to escape from th
e accusing, pain filled voices of their victims; and at night the ghostly m
onkeys gathered in the trees and sang the words of 'Our Golden Bengal': '…
O Mother, I am poor, but what little I have, I lay at thy feet. And it madd
ens my heart with delight.' Unable to escape from the unbearable torture of
the unceasing voices, incapable of bearing for a moment longer the burden
of shame, which was now greatly increased by their jungle learned sense of
responsibility, the three boy soldiers were moved, at last, to take despera
te measures. Shaheed Dar stooped down and pkked up two handfuls of rain hea
vy jungle mud; in the throes of that awful hallucination, he thrust the tre
acherous mud of the rain forest into his ears. And after him, Ayooba Baloch
and Farooq Rashid stopped their ears also with mud. Only the buddha left h
is ears (one good, one already bad) unstopped; as though he alone were will
ing to bear the retribution of the jungle, as though he were bowing his hea
d before the inevitability of his guilt… The mud of the dream forest, which
no doubt also contained the concealed translucency of jungle insects and t
he devilry of bright orange bird droppings, infected the ears of the three
boy soldiers and made them all as deaf as posts; so that although they were
spared the singsong accusations of the jungle, they were now obliged to co
nverse in a rudimentary form of sign language. They seemed, however, to pre
fer their diseased deafness to the unpalatable secrets which the sundri lea
ves had whispered in their ears.
At last, the voices stopped, though by now only the buddha (with his one go
od ear) could hear them; at last, when the four wanderers were near the poi
nt of panic, the jungle brought them through a curtain of tree beards and s
howed them a sight so lovely that it brought lumps to their throats. Even t
he buddha seemed to tighten his grip on his spittoon. With one good ear bet
ween the four of them, they advanced into a glade filled with the gentle me
lodies of songbirds, in whose centre stood a monumental Hindu temple, carve
d in forgotten centuries out of a single immense crag of rock; its walls da
nced with friezes of men and women, who were depicted coupling in postures
of unsurpassable athleticism and sometimes, of highly comic absurdity. The
quartet moved towards this miracle with disbelieving steps. Inside, they fo