The Moors Last Sigh

Cochin, and at the beginning of a time of war and massacres, they delivered their message to a woman in pain.
    ‘What you see is what there is,’ Flory mumbled under her breath. ‘There is no world but the world.’ And then, a little louder: ‘There is no God. Hocus-pocus! Mumbo-jumbo! There is no spiritual life.’

    It isn’t hard to demolish Abraham’s arguments. What’s in a name? The da Gamas claimed descent from Vasco the explorer, but claiming isn’t proving, and even about that ancestry I have my serious doubts. But as for this Moor-stuff, this Granada-yada, this incredibly loose connection – a surname that sounds like a nickname, for Pete’s sake! – it falls down even before you blow on it. Old leather-bound notebook? Gas! Never seen it. Not a trace. As for the emerald-laden crown, I don’t buy that, either; it’s a fairy tale of the sort we folks love to tell ourselves about ourselves, and, gents & gentesses, it does not wash. Abraham’s had never been a wealthy family, and if you believe that a boxful of gems would have remained untouched for four centuries, then, busters and busterinas, you’ll believe anything. Oh, but they were hair-looms? Well, roll my eyes and strike my brow! What a blank-blank joke! Who in the whole of India cares two paisa about heirlooms if he’s given the choice between old stuff and money in the bank?
    Aurora Zogoiby painted some famous pictures, and passed away in horrific circs. Reason requires that we put the rest down to the self-mythologising of the artist, to which, in this instance, my dear father lent more than just a hand … you want to know what was in the box? Listen: forget about jewelled turbans; but emeralds, yes. Sometimes more, sometimes less. – Not heirlooms, though. – What then? – Hot rocks, that’s what. Yes! Stolen goods! Contraband items! Loot! You want family shame, I’ll tell you its true name: my granny, Flory Zogoiby, was a crook. For many years she was a valued member of a successful gang of emerald smugglers; for who would ever look under the synagogue altar for boodle? She took her cut of the proceeds, kept it safe, and was not so foolish as to spend spend spend. Nobody ever suspected her; and the time came when her son Abraham came to claim his illegal inheritance … it’s illegitimacy you want? Never mind about genetics; just follow the cash.
    The above is my understanding of what lay behind the stories I was told; but there is also a confession I must make. In what follows you will find stranger tales by far than the one I have just attempted to debunk; and let me assure you, let me say to-whom-it-may-concern, that of the truth of these further stories there can be no doubt whatsoever. So finally it is not for me to judge, but for you.
    And as for the yarn of the Moor: if I were forced to choose between logic and childhood memory, between head and heart, then sure; in spite of all the foregoing, I’d go along with the tale.

    Abraham Zogoiby walked out of Jewtown and towards St Francis’s Church, where Aurora da Gama was waiting for him by Vasco’s tomb with his future in the palm of her hand. When he reached the waterfront he looked back for a moment; and thought he saw, silhouetted against the darkening sky, the impossible figure of a young girl capering upon the roof of a storehouse painted in gaudy horizontal stripes, can-canning her skirt and petticoat and uttering familiar sorceries as she challenged him to fight: Step across this line .
‘Obeah, jadoo, fo, fum ,
chicken entrails, kingdom come.’
    Tears filled his eyes; he pushed them away. She was gone.

7
    C HRISTIANS, PORTUGUESE AND JEWS ; Chinese tiles promoting godless views; pushy ladies, skirts-not-saris, Spanish shenanigans, Moorish crowns … can this really be India? Bharat-mata, Hindustan-hamara , is this the place? War has just been declared. Nehru and the All-India Congress are demanding that the British must accept their demand for independence as a precondition for Indian support in the war effort; Jinnah and the Muslim League are refusing to support the demand; Mr Jinnah is busily articulating the history-changing notion that there are two nations in the sub-continent, one Hindu, the other Mussulman. Soon the split will be irreversible; soon Nehru will be back in Dehra Dun jail, and the British, having imprisoned the Congress leadership, will turn to the Leaguers for support. At such a time of upheaval, of the ruinous climax of