Rhamon/Chapter 2

by Heluiz Chandler Washburne

Chapter II

Cooking Supper

Rhamon's mother quickly stripped off his wet clothes and wrapped him in a warm blanket. Then he made himself comfortable in a corner of the houseboat and watched her cook the evening meal over a little charcoal fire.

First she lit one or two small pieces of charcoal and blew on them until they were glowing

She put a pot of rice over the burning coals

red. Then she placed other pieces on top and kept on blowing. Soon the fire was going and she put a pot of rice over the burning coals.

Rhamon's mother was little and very pretty. Her large dark eyes were half shaded by long, black lashes. Big silver rings were fastened through her ears, and from these hung many silver bangles that touched her shoulders. She wore heavy silver bracelets around her slender wrists.

Below her baggy white trousers silver anklets clinked when she walked. She even wore rings on her toes, for she always went barefoot. While she worked she sang, and Rhamon loved to listen. Her voice made music like the soft lapping of the water and the throbbing song of the bulbul bird.

While the rice was boiling, Rhamon's mother made the chuppaties for supper. She pulled off a little wad of the dough she had mixed, and spread it out into a thin round cake. Then she rolled it up, twisted the roll around and patted it out flat once more. It was ready to be cooked then, so she dropped it on a dry hot griddle and set it over the fire. When the fire grew low she added more charcoal and blew on it to keep it hot. While the first chupatti was cooking she rolled out the next one. But always she watched theone on the fire. When it began to curl around the edge and turn brown, she quickly flopped it over to cook on the other side.

Rhamon liked these hot chupatties, and it made him hungry to smell them cooking. When supper was ready his mother set a tray before him on the floor. On it were a bowl of rice, a plate of the fish Rhamon had caught, and a second bowl filled with curded milk. Using his fingers and bits of chuppati to scoop up his food, he soon had finished it all. Subro, squatting beside him on the floor, had another tray. And while they ate, Rhamon's mother cooked more chuppaties.

That night when the sun went down, Rhamon watched the mountains change from gold to deep rose, then purple. And finally as night crept over the valley, they seemed to be draped in velvety blackness. Then he watched the stars come out one by one in the dark sky. Rhamon never felt alone when the stars were shining. The big moon slid up from behind the mountains and made a yellow path across the water to his very window.

Lying in his narrow bed, Rhamon listened to the night sounds—the evening call of the bulbul, the splash of the water against the boat, and the cry of the heron from the reed beds in the river. Before he went to sleep he watched for the one light that gleamed from a lonely temple on the top of a nearby hill.