....viii. THE EDWARD-JONESES

The Joneses, as they were called, were our neighbours in Burdwan, where Mr. Jones and my dad were drivers on the local trains. The year I did not attend Oak Grove School because of a broken arm that did not heal properly, I would watch Miss Mabel Edward- Jones take her dogs for a walk every evening. She was a punctual person who, I heard, had been a nurse before she joined her brother's family to take care of his four children, his wife having died.

The dogs were a magnificent pair of Rampur hounds, the aristocrats of the railway colony. It caused quite a stir when, on one of her walks, Miss Jones returned without the male dog. She had let it off the leash in an isolated area and it did not return. It never did. Speculation was it had been bitten by a poisonous snake in deep underbrush, and did not emerge.

The Joneses had a lot of misfortune. The second son was born with a club foot, which was never treated. In those days in India club footed babies or children were not operated on. The older son was a good-natured boy, who was notorious for stealing. He progressed to halting freight trains by tampering with signals and looting them. He was eventually caught and imprisoned, where he died by falling off a truck that was transporting a group of prisoners. I prefer to think he jumped off a fast-moving truck in a bid for freedom. One time in Jhajha this lad ran away from home and lived at large in the community, sleeping and eating wherever he could. He began to show the effects of this style of hard living, so another friend and I decided to take him home by force. We took him by surprise and frog-marched him home, with an arm up his back. The father was in his front garden. "Mr. Jones", said I, "we've brought Jackie home." "Tie him to that tree" said Mr. Jones, "I'm going to whip him." We released the boy immediately and away Jackie ran.  Perhaps there were other Anglo-Indian boys like Jack Edward-Jones, in cities most likely, but Jackie was unique in railway colonies. He was always on the prowl to pinch what he could, and always friendly and generous. He would squat with Indians in the bazaar and fit in, spending whatever money he had, probably more at home with them than he was in the Anglo-Indian community.