Cutty Sark was moored. The beefy arms of its settee and chairs recall the late thirties β ultramodern Kashmiri Grand Rapids. It has turquoise lace curtains, red Oriental carpets, and plenty of brass bric-a-brac and Air France ashtrays to make it real homey.
A shampoo? Very good for the nerves. I make for you very cheap. This afternoon I will bring you swatches. We were gliding by the floating gardens on the A-One Enterprise , my very own shikara, when Abdullah the capmaker not to be confused with Abdul the houseboy and camera bearer came abreast in his boat. Memsahib, you like to buy beautiful Kashmiri hats? Opening a large, dingy cloth bundle, Abdullah, who was wearing one of his own beanies, pulled out a kaleidoscopic array of Juliet caps intricately embroidered with gold and silver thread, paillettes, pearls, and bright beads.
I popped a couple onto my head, but they were for women with a larger cephalic index. You like to buy knives? A nice dagger? A shooting stick? Abdul shooed away the munitions dynasty, and for a few minutes all was silence save for the sucking of the oars in silt. In some of the channels the vegetation is so lush you feel as if you were rowing in a thick minestrone. From time to time a drab river woman, crouched like a frog on the prow of her unpainted punt, would pole rapidly toward us. The brief tranquillity was rent by the appearance of A.
First of all, the Shalimar. They say that until the couple could get their union legalized she was a commoner Nur used to brew and peddle Shalimar perfume, though probably not for Guerlain. However, this may be purely gossip. The Shalimar was parched and seedy, its principal attraction the mosaic tree of life motif on its marble columns. The chinar leaves inlaid there are ubiquitous in Kashmiri folk art, as indeed are those bulbuls, who, for my part, can have the Shalimar.
On our return to the A-One Enterprise we passed a languid young Sikh sitting under a tree β it may have been a chinar for all that I, a nonbotanist, know β embroidering a doily. You will not find their like anywhere. General Sir Claude Auchinleck.
