Crystal Rose

In Distant Delhi Ornament is but the guiled shore To a most dangerous sea; the beauteous scarf Veiling an Indian beauty. The Merchant of Venice [1596-1597] --William Shakespeare Thieves in the Night Dusk faces with white silken turbans wreathed. Paradise Regained [1671] --John Milton Chandni Chowk, Delhi, India, 1835 It was the shouts and screams that wakened young Rose Windermere. And the light. Like celebratory fireworks, this last illuminated the black-velvet night sky, made all the more terrible and terrifying by the fact that despite its inherent evil, it was strangely beautiful. Its tongues of wild yellow-orange flame cast shadows that danced like unbridled revelers on her bedroom walls, and showers of bright sparks rained like tiny shooting stars through the open windows, to flicker and die upon the hardwood floor. Her mouth forming a small O of wonder, Rose sat up in bed, momentarily mesmerized by the brilliant, blazing light and cinders, not comprehending, at first, their awful significance. Then, slowly, the shouts and screams that echoed from beyond the open windows penetrated her consciousness, just as the acrid smell of billowing smoke permeated her nostrils, and she understood that something was horribly wrong. Confirming her sudden fright was the cacophony she could now also hear ensuing in her father's haveli or mansion, which fronted on Chandni Chowk, the main street and marketplace of Delhi. Her mother's piercing shrieks rang through the house, panicking Rose as she made out the words through the closed door of the bedroom. "God save us! Lord Thornleigh's haveli is on fire!" At that, Rose felt a fist of even greater fear clench her heart and begin to squeeze tightly. Hugo! What had happened to Hugo? Abruptly scrambling from bed, she ran to one of the windows, dragging over a small stool upon which to stand, so that she could see outside. To her utter horror, the mansion next door, where her best friend, Hugo Drayton, and his family lived, was indeed consumed by a conflagration. That was the cause of the wickedly beautiful light and flying sparks that had, only an instant before, so enthralled her. Now, they only appalled her. From their own quarters at the rear of the burning house, the Indian servants who worked at Lord Thorn-leigh's haveli had come running. But although they had formed a bucket brigade from the old stone well in the back garden and were now attempting to douse the lethal flames, it was clear even to the eight-year-old Rose that their battle to save the mansion was futile. The fire must have taken hold swiftly, she thought, and it was now far too advanced to halt. The best that could be hoped for was to prevent it from spreading to the neighboring houses along Chandni Chowk. Even from the window where she leaned upon the sill, Rose could feel the dreadful heat of the blaze, and every now and then, as she watched, a cinder landed upon her, singeing her. But such was her terror over what had befallen Hugo that she scarcely felt the pain, was unaware of the small holes that were being charred into her thin white cotton nightgown. But then, startling her from her rapt fixation on Lord Thornleigh's haveli, the bedroom door was suddenly flung open wide, and Vina, her Indian ayah, appeared, along with several other of the Winder-meres' servants. "Little memsahib! " Vina cried, aghast as she spied Rose at the window. "What are you doing out of bed? You must come away from the window at once! Do you not see how the sparks have burnt you? Your nightgown could catch fire! You could go up in smoke like Lord Thornleigh's haveli! " "Vina, where is Hugo? Is he all right?" Rose asked anxiously, as she allowed herself to be assisted down from the stool and led away from the windowBrandewyne, Rebecca is the author of 'Crystal Rose ', published 2006 under ISBN 9780778322962 and ISBN 0778322963.