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A Suitable Boy

Vikram Seth


  Mrs Rupa Mehra sat stunned, her heart beating dangerously fast. She was used to rereading her letters a dozen times, examining for days from every possible angle some remark that someone had made to someone else about something that someone had thought that someone had almost done. So much news—and all so sudden and substantial—was too much to absorb at once. Meenakshi’s miscarriage, the Kakoli-Hans nexus, the threat of Amit, the non-mention of Haresh except in an unfavourable passing remark, the disturbing attitude of Varun—Mrs Rupa Mehra did not know whether to laugh or to weep, and immediately asked for a glass of nimbu pani.

  And there was no news of her darling Aparna. Presumably she was all right. Mrs Rupa Mehra recalled a remark of hers, now family lore: ‘If another baby comes into this house, I will throw it straight into the waste-paper basket.’ Precocity appeared to be the fashion among children these days. She hoped that Uma would be as lovable as Aparna, but less trenchant.

  Mrs Rupa Mehra was dying to show Savita her brother’s letter, but then decided that it would be far better to break the various bits of news to her one by one. It would be less disturbing to Savita, and more informative for herself. Without knowing either Arun’s strong opinions or Varun’s apparent indifference, where would Savita’s own judgement in the matter of Amit lie? So! thought Mrs Rupa Mehra grimly: this must have been behind his gift to Lata of his incomprehensible book of poems.

  As for Lata—she had been taking an unnecessary interest in poetry these days, even attending an occasional meeting of the Brahmpur Literary Society. This did not bode well. It was true that she had also been writing to Haresh, but Mrs Rupa Mehra was not privy to the contents of those letters. Lata had become cruelly possessive of her privacy. ‘Am I your mother or not?’ Mrs Rupa Mehra had asked her once. ‘Oh, Ma, please!’ had been Lata’s heartless reply.

  And poor Meenakshi! thought Mrs Rupa Mehra. She must write to her at once. She felt that a creamy cambric was called for, and, her eyes moist with sympathy, she went to get the writing paper from her bag. Meenakshi the cold-hearted medal-melter was replaced for a while with the image of Meenakshi the vulnerable, tender, broken vehicle for Mrs Rupa Mehra’s third grandchild, who she felt was bound to have been a boy.

  If Mrs Rupa Mehra had known the truth about Meenakshi’s pregnancy or her miscarriage, she would doubtless have been less than sympathetic. Meenakshi, terrified that her baby might not be Arun’s—and, in milder counterpoint, concerned by what a second pregnancy would do to her figure and social life—had decided to take immediate action. After her doctor—the miracle-working Dr Evans—had refused to help her, she went for advice to her closest friends among the Shady Ladies, swearing them first to secrecy. She was certain that if Arun heard about her attempt to free herself from this unwanted child, he would be as unreasonably angry as he had been when she had liberated herself from one of his father’s medals.

  How unfortunate, she thought desperately, that neither the jewellery theft nor Khandelwal’s dogs had shocked her foetus out of her.

  Meenakshi had made herself quite sick with abortifacients, worry, conflicting advice and tortuous gymnastics when one afternoon, to her relief, she had the miscarriage of her dreams. She phoned Billy immediately, her voice unsteady on the line; when he asked anxiously if she was all right, she was able to reassure him. It had been sudden and painless, if alarming and, well, horribly messy. Billy sounded miserable for her sake.

  And Arun, for his part, was so tender and protective of her for days afterwards that she began to feel that there might be at least something to be said for the whole sorry business.

  15.2

  Had wishes been horses, Mrs Rupa Mehra would have been riding at this very moment on the Calcutta Mail, and would soon have been questioning everyone she knew in Calcutta and Prahapore about all they had been doing or thinking or planning or professing. But, quite apart from the cost of the journey, there were compelling reasons for her to remain in Brahmpur. For one thing, baby Uma was still very little, and needed a grandmother’s care. Whereas Meenakshi had been by turns possessive of Aparna and perfectly happy to ignore her (treating her mother-in-law as a kind of super-ayah while she traipsed about Calcutta, socializing), Savita shared Uma with Mrs Rupa Mehra (and with Mrs Mahesh Kapoor when she visited) in a natural, daughterly way.

  Secondly—and as if there had not been drama enough in the letter she had received from Arun—this evening was the performance of Twelfth Night. It was to be held in the university auditorium immediately after the Annual Day ceremonies and tea, and her own Lata would be in it—as would Malati, who was just like a daughter to her. (Mrs Rupa Mehra was well disposed towards Malati these days, seeing in her a chaperone rather than a conniver.) So would that boy K; but thank God, thought Mrs Rupa Mehra, there would be no more rehearsals. And with the university break for Dussehra in just a couple of days, there would be no great possibility of chance meetings on campus either. Mrs Rupa Mehra felt, however, that she must remain in Brahmpur just in case. Only when, for the short Christmas vacation, the whole family—Pran, Savita, Lata, Lady Baby and materfamilias—visited Calcutta would she desert her reconnaissance post.

  The hall was packed with students, alumni, teachers, parents and relatives together with smatterings of Brahmpur society, including a few literary lawyers and judges. Mr and Mrs Nowrojee were there, as were the poet Makhijani and the booming Mrs Supriya Joshi. Hema’s Taiji was there together with a knot of a dozen giggling girls, most of them her wards. Professor and Mrs Mishra were present. And of the family, Pran of course (since nothing could have kept him away, and he was indeed feeling much better), Savita (Uma had been left with her ayah for the evening), Maan, Bhaskar, Dr Kishen Chand Seth and Parvati.

  Mrs Rupa Mehra was in a high state of excitement when the curtain went up to a sudden hush from the audience, and to the strains of a lute that sounded rather like a sitar, the Duke began: ‘If music be the food of love, play on—’

  She was soon entirely carried away by the magic of the play. And indeed, there was no major mischief, other than some incomprehensible bawdy and buffoonery, in the first half of the play. When Lata came on, Mrs Rupa Mehra could hardly believe that it was her daughter.

  Pride swelled in her bosom and tears forced themselves into her eyes. How could Pran and Savita, seated on either side of her, be so indifferent to Lata’s appearance?

  ‘Lata! Look, Lata!’ she whispered to them.

  ‘Yes, Ma,’ said Savita. Pran merely nodded.

  When Olivia, in love with Viola, said:

  ‘Fate, show thy force. Ourselves we do not owe:

  What is decreed must be; and be this so!’

  —Mrs Rupa Mehra nodded her head sadly as she thought philosophically of much that had happened in her own life. How true, she thought, conferring honorary Indian citizenship on Shakespeare.

  Malati, meanwhile, had the audience charmed. At Sir Toby’s line, ‘Here comes the little villain—How now, my nettle of India?’ everyone cheered, especially a claque of medical students. And there was another great round of applause at the interval (which Mr Barua had placed in the middle of Act III) for Maria and Sir Toby. Mrs Rupa Mehra had to be restrained from going backstage to congratulate Lata and Malati. Even Kabir-as-Malvolio had so far proven to be innocuous, and she had laughed with the rest of the audience at his gecking and gulling.

  Kabir had donned the accent of the officious and unpopular Registrar of the university, and—whether this would prove beneficial for Mr Barua’s future or not—it increased the present enjoyment of the students. Dr Kishen Chand Seth, in fact, was Malvolio’s only supporter, insisting loudly in the interval that what was being done to him was indefensible.

  ‘Lack of discipline, that is the trouble with the whole country,’ he stated vehemently.

  Bhaskar was bored with the play. It was nothing like as exciting as the Ramlila, in which he had obtained a role as one of Hanuman’s monkey-soldiers. The only interesting part of this play so far had been Mal
volio’s interpretation of ‘M, O, A, I’.

  The second half began. Mrs Rupa Mehra nodded and smiled. But she nearly started from her chair when she heard her daughter say to Kabir: ‘Wilt thou go to bed, Malvolio?’ and she gasped at Malvolio’s odious, brazen reply.

  ‘Stop it—stop it at once!’ she wanted to shout. ‘Is this why I sent you to university? I should never have allowed you to act in this play. Never. If Daddy had seen this he would have been ashamed of you.’

  ‘Ma!’ whispered Savita. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘No!’ her mother wanted to shout. ‘I am not all right. And how can you let your younger sister say such things? Shameless!’ Shakespeare’s Indian citizenship was immediately withdrawn.

  But she said nothing.

  Mrs Rupa Mehra’s uneasy shufflings, however, were nothing compared to her father’s activities in the second half. He and Parvati were seated a few rows away from the rest of the family. He started sobbing uncontrollably at the scene where the disowned sea-captain reproaches Viola, thinking her to be her brother:

  ‘Will you deny me now?

  Is’t possible that my deserts to you

  Can lack persuasion? Do not tempt my misery

  Lest that it make me so unsound a man

  As to upbraid you with those kindnesses

  That I have done for you.’

  Loudly sobbed Dr Kishen Chand Seth. Astonished necks swivelled swiftly towards him—but to no effect.

  ‘Let me speak a little. This youth that you see here

  I snatched one half out of the jaws of death,

  Relieved him with such sanctity of love,—

  And to his image, which methought did promise

  Most venerable worth, did I devotion.’

  By now Dr Kishen Chand Seth was gasping almost asthmatically. He started pounding the floor with his stick to relieve his distress.

  Parvati took it from him and said, rather sharply: ‘Kishy! This isn’t Deedar!’—and this brought him heavily back to earth.

  But not much later, the distress of Malvolio—cooped up in an inner chamber and driven from bewilderment almost to madness—evoked further distress, and he began to weep to himself as if his heart would break. Several people around him stopped laughing and turned to look at him.

  At this, Parvati handed him back his stick and said, ‘Kishy, let’s go now. Now! At once!’

  But Kishy would have none of it. He managed to control himself at last, and sat out the rest of the play, rapt and almost tearless. His daughter, who had no sympathy whatsoever with Malvolio, had grown increasingly reconciled to the play as he made more and more of a fool of himself and finally came to his undignified exit.

  Since the play ended with three happy marriages (and even, Indian-movie-style, concluded with the last of four songs), it was a success in the eyes of Mrs Rupa Mehra who had, miraculously and conveniently, forgotten all about Malvolio and the bed. After the curtain calls and the appearance of shy Mr Barua to calls of ‘Producer! producer!’ she rushed backstage and hugged Lata, and kissed her, make-up and all, saying:

  ‘You are my darling daughter. I am so proud of you. And of Malati too. If only your—’

  She stopped, and tears came to her eyes. Then she made an effort to control herself, and said, ‘Now get changed quickly, let’s go home. It’s late, and you must be tired after talking so much.’

  She had noticed Malvolio hanging around. He had been chatting to a couple of other actors, but had now turned towards Lata and her mother. It seemed that he wanted to greet her, or at any rate to say something.

  ‘Ma—I can’t; I’ll join you all later,’ said Lata.

  ‘No!’ Mrs Rupa Mehra put her foot down. ‘You are coming now. You can clean off your make-up at home. Savita and I will help you.’

  But whether it was her own newfound thespian confidence or merely a continuation of Olivia’s ‘smooth, discreet, and stable bearing’, Lata simply said, in a quiet voice:

  ‘I am sorry, Ma, there is a party for the cast, and we are going to celebrate. Malati and I have worked on this play for months, and have made friends whom we won’t see until after the Dussehra break. And please don’t worry, Ma; Mr Barua will make sure I get home safely.’

  Mrs Rupa Mehra could not believe her ears.

  Now Kabir came up to her and said:

  ‘Mrs Mehra?’

  ‘Yes?’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra belligerently, all the more so because Kabir was very obviously good-looking, despite his make-up and curious attire, and Mrs Rupa Mehra in general believed in good looks.

  ‘Mrs Mehra, I thought I would introduce myself,’ said Kabir. ‘I am Kabir Durrani.’

  ‘Yes, I know,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra rather sharply. ‘I have heard about you. I have also met your father. Do you mind if my daughter does not attend the cast party?’

  Kabir flushed. ‘No, Mrs Mehra, I—’

  ‘I want to attend,’ said Lata, giving Kabir a sharp glance. ‘This has nothing to do with anyone else.’

  Mrs Rupa Mehra was suddenly tempted to give both of them two tight slaps. But instead she glared at Lata, and at Kabir, and even at Malati for good measure, then turned and left without another word.

  15.3

  ‘Well there are many possibilities for riots,’ said Firoz. ‘Shias with Shias, Shias with Sunnis, Hindus with Muslims—’

  ‘And Hindus with Hindus,’ added Maan.

  ‘That’s something new in Brahmpur,’ said Firoz.

  ‘Well, my sister says that the jatavs tried to force themselves on to the local Ramlila Committee this year. They said that at least one of the five swaroops should be selected from among scheduled caste boys. Naturally, no one listened to them at all. But it could spell trouble. I hope you aren’t going to participate in too many events yourself. I don’t want to have to worry about you.’

  ‘Worry!’ laughed Firoz. ‘I can’t imagine you worrying about me. But it’s a nice thought.’

  ‘Oh?’ said Maan. ‘But don’t you have to put yourself in front of some Moharram procession or other—you one year, Imtiaz the next, I thought you said?’

  ‘That’s only on the last couple of days. For the most part I just lie low during Moharram. And this year I know where I will spend at least a couple of my evenings.’ Firoz sounded deliberately mysterious.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Somewhere where you, as an unbeliever, will not be admitted; though in the past you have performed your prostrations in that shrine.’

  ‘But I thought she didn’t—’ began Maan. ‘I thought she didn’t even allow herself to sing during those ten days.’

  ‘She doesn’t,’ said Firoz. ‘But she has small gatherings at her house where she chants marsiyas and performs soz—it really is something. Not the marsiyas so much—but the soz, from what I hear, is really astonishing.’

  Maan knew from his brief incursions into poetry with Rasheed that marsiyas were laments for the martyrs of the battle of Karbala: especially for Hussain, the grandson of the Prophet. But he had no idea what soz was.

  ‘It’s a sort of musical wailing,’ said Firoz. ‘I’ve only heard it a few times, and never at Saeeda Bai’s. It grips the heart.’

  The thought of Saeeda Bai weeping and wailing passionately for someone who had died thirteen centuries before was both perplexing and strangely exciting for Maan. ‘Why can’t I go?’ he asked. ‘I’ll sit quietly and watch—I mean, listen. I attended Bakr-Id, you know, at the village.’

  ‘Because you’re a kafir, you idiot. Even Sunnis aren’t really welcome at these private gatherings, though they take part in some processions. Saeeda Bai tries to control her audience, from what I’ve heard, but some of them get carried away with grief and start cursing the first three caliphs because they usurped Ali’s right to the caliphate, and this enrages the Sunnis, quite naturally. Sometimes the curses are very graphic.’

  ‘And you’ll be attending all this soz stuff. Since when have you become so religious?’ asked Maan.

&
nbsp; ‘I’m not,’ said Firoz. ‘In fact—and you’d better not tell anyone I said this—but I’m not a great fan of Hussain. And Muawiyah, who got him killed, wasn’t as dreadful as we make him out to be. After all, the succession was quite a mess before that, with most of the caliphs getting assassinated. Once Muawiyah set things up dynastically, Islam was able to consolidate itself as an empire. If he hadn’t, everything would have fallen back into petty tribes bickering with each other and there’d be no Islam to argue about. But if my father heard me say this he’d disown me. And Saeeda Bai would tear me apart with her own lovely soft hands.’

  ‘So why are you going to Saeeda Bai’s?’ said Maan, somewhat piqued and suspicious. ‘Didn’t you say you weren’t exactly made welcome there when you happened to visit?’

  ‘How can she turn back a mourner during Moharram?’

  ‘And why do you want to go there in the first place?’

  ‘To drink at the fountain of Paradise.’

  ‘Very funny.’

  ‘I mean, to see the young Tasneem.’

  ‘Well, give my love to the parakeet,’ said Maan, frowning. He continued to frown when Firoz got up, stood behind his chair, and put his hands on Maan’s shoulders.

  15.4

  ‘Can you imagine,’ said old Mrs Tandon: ‘Rama or Bharat or Sita—a chamar!’

  Veena looked uncomfortable at such an outright statement of the feelings of the neighbourhood.

  ‘And the sweepers want the Ramlila to continue after Rama’s return to Ayodhya and his meeting with Bharat and the coronation. They want all those shameful episodes about Sita put in.’

  Maan asked why.

  ‘Oh, you know, they style themselves Valmikis these days, and they say that Valmiki’s Ramayana, which goes on and on about all these episodes, is the true text of the Ramayana,’ said old Mrs Tandon. ‘Just trouble-making.’

  Veena said: ‘No one disputes the Ramayana. And Sita did have a horrible life after she returned from Lanka. But the Ramlila has always been based on the Ramcharitmanas of Tulsidas, not Valmiki’s Ramayana. The worst of all this is that Kedarnath has to do so much of the explaining on both sides and has to shoulder most of the trouble. Because of his contact with the scheduled castes,’ she added.