Ruby and Maroon

Not possible for the old, heavily bejeweled woman at the next table to sit there with her smiling, courteous greeting without immediately offering something from the plate before her. Meeting the eye, chewing through her smile and immediately motioning and nodding toward the food. Something like shredded coconut with fries on the side that she lifts to her mouth with her fingers. The rings of gold had drawn attention, half a dozen gold bands alone on each wrist and more with stones on her fingers. Hanging directly from the base of her chin too a giant mole that seemed like another adornment in the assembly of her person, an added touch. Early seventies at a pinch. Ruby red nails. Kind of purple-black butterfly brooch on the back of her maroon headscarf. A dowdy old pal the same age sitting opposite, who she casts entirely into the shade with all her finery. One of those fake designer bags, the choc brown, checkered with caramel diamond patterning. Rouged cheeks. A great deal of careful, segmented observation required to take in the full picture. Some kind of green leaf her pal was folding before taking it into her mouth—an echo of the betel leaf was it, that one of the characters in Amitav Ghosh folded into a triangle before presenting to an esteemed friend over a chat? Eye-liner a faint but not ineffective ring of blue-black. This small touch the pal opposite has followed around her own eyes. Safe to assume she had never been a precious beauty. A veritable cascade of necklaces that loop over the whole of her midriff are only revealed when the other rises to go to the bathroom. The chief component of this glorious array is some kind of interconnected gold linkage in three or four bands that lengthen as they fall down from her chest. Another independent chain that might or might not have been of gold—the layers too much to take in without unseemly ogling—carries a large dark stone almost the size of a cigarette packet. During the whole of the sit and the meal the handbag remained looped on her shoulder, half resting on the seat beside her. Other shopping bags on the seat and at her feet, three, four or more; not however the one with her purse and personal belongings. Never in her life has she lost anything of importance, or at least not since girlhood. A generous, keen offer of a morsel not two seconds after the meeting of the eyes. The impulse automatic for her and the others here in the Malay community. One does not sit eating beside another without sharing, certainly not. Yet the beggar passing along past the tables among us was left empty-handed. Rather a sight that one, chin rooted to his chest, staring, nothing to recommend him.