A Suitable Boy, Page 25

  Lata and Savita usually let their mother have her say, but today Lata protested:

  ‘Ma, I don’t agree at all. He’s the Prime Minister of India, not just of the Hindus. What’s the harm if he has two Muslim Ministers in his Cabinet?’

  ‘You have too many educated ideas,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra, who normally revered education.

  Mrs Rupa Mehra may have also been upset because the older women were making no headway in persuading Mahesh Kapoor to agree to a recitation of the Ramcharitmanas in Prem Nivas on the occasion of Ramnavami. The troubles of the Shiva Temple in Chowk weighed upon Mahesh Kapoor’s mind, and many of the largest landlords that his Zamindari Abolition Bill would dispossess were Muslim. He felt that he should at least stay clear of exacerbating the situation.

  ‘I know about all these Muslims,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra darkly, almost to herself. At that moment she did not think of Uncle Shafi and Talat Khala, old friends of the family.

  Lata looked at her indignantly but said nothing. Savita looked at Lata, but said nothing either.

  ‘Don’t make big-big eyes at me,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra fiercely to her younger daughter. ‘I know facts. You don’t know them like I do. You have no experience of life.’

  Lata said, ‘I’m going to study.’ She got up from Pran’s rocking chair, where she had been sitting.

  Mrs Rupa Mehra was in a belligerent mood. ‘Why?’ she demanded. ‘Why must you study? Your exams are over. Will you be studying for the next year? All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. Sit and talk to me. Or go for a walk. It will be good for your complexion.’

  ‘I went for a walk this morning,’ said Lata. ‘I’m always going for walks.’

  ‘You are a very stubborn girl,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra.

  Yes, thought Lata, and, with the faintest shadow of a smile on her face, went to her room.

  Savita had observed this little flare-up, and felt that the provocation was too small, too impersonal, to upset Lata in the ordinary course of things. Clearly, something was weighing on her heart. The phone call from Malati which had had such an acute effect on her also came to Savita’s mind. The two and two which she put together did not quite make four, but the pair of swan-like digits sitting side by side were still quite disquieting. She was worried for her sister. Lata seemed to be in a volatile state of excitement these days, but did not appear to wish to confide in anyone. Nor was Malati, her friend and confidante, in town. Savita waited for an opportunity to talk to Lata alone, which was not easy. And when she did, she seized it at once.

  Lata was lying on the bed, her face cupped in her hands, reading. She had finished Pigs Have Wings and had gone on to Galahad at Blandings. She thought that the title was appropriate now that she and Kabir were in love. These three days of separation would be like a month, and she would have to distract herself with as much Wodehouse as possible.

  Lata was not overjoyed to be disturbed, even by her sister.

  ‘May I sit down here on the bed?’ asked Savita.

  Lata nodded, and Savita sat down.

  ‘What’s that you’re reading?’ asked Savita.

  Lata held up the cover for quick inspection, then went back to her reading.

  ‘I’ve been feeling a bit low today,’ said Savita.

  ‘Oh.’ Lata sat up promptly and looked at her sister. ‘Are you having your period or something?’

  Savita started laughing. ‘When you’re expecting you don’t have periods.’ She looked at Lata in surprise. ‘Didn’t you know that?’ It seemed to Savita that she herself had known this elementary fact for a long time, but perhaps that wasn’t so.

  ‘No,’ said Lata. Since her conversations with the informative Malati were quite wide-ranging, it was surprising that this had never come up. But it struck her as entirely right that Savita should not have to cope with two physical problems at the same time. ‘What’s the matter, then?’

  ‘Oh, nothing, I don’t know what it is. I just feel this way sometimes—lately, quite a lot. Maybe it’s Pran’s health.’ She put her arm gently on Lata’s.

  Savita was not a moody person, and Lata knew it. She looked at her sister affectionately, and said: ‘Do you love Pran?’ This suddenly seemed very important.

  ‘Of course I do,’ said Savita, surprised.

  ‘Why “of course”, Didi?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Savita. ‘I love him. I feel better when he’s here. I feel worried about him. And sometimes I feel worried about his baby.’

  ‘Oh, he’ll be all right,’ said Lata, ‘judging from his kicking.’

  She lay down again, and tried to go back to her book. But she couldn’t concentrate even on Wodehouse. After a pause, she said:

  ‘Do you like being pregnant?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Savita with a smile.

  ‘Do you like being married?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Savita, her smile widening.

  ‘To a man who was chosen for you—whom you didn’t really know before your marriage?’

  ‘Don’t talk like that about Pran, it’s as if you were talking about a stranger,’ said Savita, taken aback. ‘You’re funny sometimes, Lata. Don’t you love him too?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Lata, frowning at this non sequitur, ‘but I don’t have to be close to him in the same way. What I can’t understand is how—well, it was other people who decided he was suitable for you—but if you didn’t find him attractive—’

  She was thinking that Pran was not good-looking, and she did not believe that his goodness was a substitute for—what?—a spark.

  ‘Why are you asking me all these questions?’ asked Savita, stroking her sister’s hair.

  ‘Well, I might have to face a problem like that some day.’ ‘Are you in love, Lata?’

  The head beneath Savita’s hand jerked up very slightly and then pretended it hadn’t. Savita had her answer, and in half an hour she had most of the details about Kabir and Lata and their various meetings. Lata was so relieved to talk to someone who loved her and understood her that she poured out all her hopes and visions of bliss. Savita saw at once how impossible these were, but let Lata talk on. She felt increasingly sad as Lata grew more elated.

  ‘But what should I do?’ said Lata.

  ‘Do?’ repeated Savita. The answer that came to her mind was that Lata should give Kabir up immediately before their infatuation went any further, but she knew better than to say so to Lata, who could be very contrary.

  ‘Should I tell Ma?’ said Lata.

  ‘No!’ said Savita. ‘No. Don’t tell Ma, whatever you do.’ She could imagine her mother’s shock and pain.

  ‘Please don’t tell anyone either, Didi. Anyone,’ said Lata.

  ‘I can’t keep any secrets from Pran,’ said Savita.

  ‘Please keep this one,’ said Lata. ‘Rumours get around so easily. You’re my sister. You’ve known this man for less than a year.’ As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Lata felt bad about the way she had referred to Pran, whom she now adored. She should have phrased it better.

  Savita nodded, a little unhappily.

  Although she hated the atmosphere of conspiracy that her question might generate, Savita felt that she had to help her sister, even guard her in some way.

  ‘Shouldn’t I meet Kabir?’ she asked.

  ‘I’ll ask him,’ said Lata. She felt sure that Kabir would not have any reservations about meeting anyone who was basically sympathetic, but she did not think he would enjoy it particularly. Nor did she want him to meet anyone from her family for some time yet. She sensed that everything would become troubled and confused, and that the carefree spirit of their boat ride would quickly disappear.

  ‘Please be careful, Lata,’ said Savita. ‘He may be very good-looking and from a good family, but—’

  She left the second half of her sentence unfinished, and later Lata tried to fit various endings to it.

  3.16

  Early that evening, when the heat of the day had somewhat died down, Savita went to vis
it her mother-in-law, whom she had grown to be very fond of. It had been almost a week since they had seen each other. Mrs Mahesh Kapoor was out in the garden, and rushed over to Savita when she saw the tonga arrive. She was pleased to see her, but concerned that she should be jolting about in a tonga when she was pregnant. She questioned Savita about her own health and Pran’s; complained that he came over very rarely; inquired after Mrs Rupa Mehra, who was due to come over to Prem Nivas the next day; and asked Savita whether either of her brothers was by any chance in town. Savita, slightly puzzled by this last question, said that they weren’t. Mrs Mahesh Kapoor and she then wandered into the garden.

  The garden was looking a bit dry, despite the fact that it had been watered a couple of days previously; but a gulmohur tree was in bloom: its petals were almost scarlet, rather than the usual red-orange. Everything, Savita thought, appeared more intense in the garden at Prem Nivas. It was almost as if the plants understood that their mistress, though she would not overtly complain about a weak performance, would not be happy with less than their best.

  The head gardener Gajraj and Mrs Mahesh Kapoor had been at loggerheads for a few days now. They were agreed upon what cuttings to propagate, which varieties to select for seed collection, which shrubs to prune, and when to transplant the small chrysanthemum plants to larger pots. But ever since the ground had begun to be prepared for the sowing of new lawns, an apparently irreconcilable difference had emerged.

  This year, as an experiment, Mrs Mahesh Kapoor proposed that a part of the lawn be left unlevelled before sowing. This had struck the mali as being eccentric in the extreme, and utterly at variance with Mrs Mahesh Kapoor’s usual instructions. He complained that it would be impossible to water the lawn properly, that mowing it would be difficult, that muddy puddles would form in the monsoons and the winter rains, that the garden would be infested with pond herons feeding on water beetles and other insects, and that the Flower Show Judges’ Committee would see the lack of evenness as a sign of lack of balance—aesthetically speaking, of course.

  Mrs Mahesh Kapoor had replied that she had only proposed an unevenness for the side lawn, not the front lawn; that the unevenness that she proposed was slight; that he could water the higher parts with a hose; that the small proportion of the mowing that proved difficult for the grand, blunt lawnmower dragged by the Public Works Department’s placid white bullock could be done with a small foreign-made lawnmower that she would borrow from a friend; that the Flower Show Judges’ Committee might look at the garden for an hour in February but that it gave her pleasure all the year round; that level had nothing to do with balance; and, finally, that it was precisely because of the puddles and the pond herons that she had proposed the experiment.

  One day in late December, a couple of months after Savita’s wedding, when the honey-scented harsingar had still been in blossom, when the roses were in their first full flush, when the sweet alyssum and sweet william had begun to bloom, when those beds of feathery-leafed larkspur that the partridges had not gobbled down almost to the root were doing their best to recover in front of the tall ranks of equally feathery-leafed but untempting cosmos, there had been a tremendous, almost torrential rainstorm. It had been gloomy, gusty and cold, and there had been no sun for two days, but the garden had been full of birds: pond herons, partridges, mynas, small puffed-up grey babblers in their chattering groups of seven, hoopoes and parakeets in a combination that reminded her of the colours of the Congress flag, a pair of red-wattled lapwings, and a couple of vultures, flying with huge twigs in their mouth to the neem tree. Despite their heroism in the Ramayana, Mrs Mahesh Kapoor had never been able to reconcile herself to vultures. But what had truly delighted her had been the three plump, dowdy pond herons, each standing near a separate small pool, almost entirely motionless as they gazed at the water, taking a careful minute over every step they made, and thoroughly content with the squelchiness of their environment. But the pools on the level lawn had quickly dried up when the sun had emerged. Mrs Mahesh Kapoor wanted to offer the hospitality of her lawn to a few more pond herons this year, and she did not want to leave matters to chance.

  All this she explained to her daughter-in-law, gasping a little as she spoke because of her allergy to neem blossoms. Savita reflected that Mrs Mahesh Kapoor looked a bit like a pond heron herself. Drab, earthy-brown, dumpy unlike the rest of the species, inelegant, hunched-up but alert, and endlessly patient, she was capable of suddenly flashing a brilliant white wing as she rose up in flight.

  Savita was amused by her analogy, and began to smile. But Mrs Mahesh Kapoor, though she smiled in response, did not attempt to find out what Savita was so happy about.

  How unlike Ma she is, thought Savita to herself as the two continued to walk around the garden. She could see resemblances between Mrs Mahesh Kapoor and Pran, and an obvious physical resemblance between her and the more animated Veena. But how she could have produced such a son as Maan was still to Savita a matter of amusement and amazement.

  3.17

  The next morning Mrs Rupa Mehra, old Mrs Tandon and Mrs Mahesh Kapoor met in Prem Nivas for a chat. It was fitting that the kind and gentle Mrs Mahesh Kapoor should have acted as host. She was the samdhin—the ‘co-mother-in-law’—of both of the others, the link in the chain. Besides, she was the only one whose own husband was still living, the only one who was still mistress in her own house.

  Mrs Rupa Mehra loved company of any kind, and this kind was ideal. First they had tea, and matthri with a mango pickle that Mrs Mahesh Kapoor had herself prepared. It was declared delicious all round. The recipe of the pickle was analysed and compared with that of seven or eight other kinds of mango pickle. As for the matthri, Mrs Rupa Mehra said:

  ‘It is just as it should be: crisp and flaky, but it holds together very well.’

  ‘I can’t have much because of my digestion,’ said old Mrs Tandon, helping herself to another.

  ‘What can one do when one gets old—’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra with fellow-feeling. She was only in her mid-forties but liked to imagine herself old in older company; and indeed, having been widowed for several years, she felt that she had partaken of at least part of the experience of old age.

  The entire conversation proceeded in Hindi with the occasional English word. Mrs Mahesh Kapoor, for instance, when referring to her husband, often called him ‘Minister Sahib’. Sometimes, in Hindi, she even called him ‘Pran’s father’. To refer to him by name would have been unthinkable. Even ‘my husband’ was unacceptable to her, but ‘my this’ was all right.

  They compared the prices of vegetables with what they had been at the same time the previous year. Minister Sahib cared more for the clauses of his bill than for his food, but he sometimes got very annoyed when there was too much or too little salt—or the food was too highly spiced. He was particularly fond of karela, the bitterest of all vegetables—and the more bitter the better.

  Mrs Rupa Mehra felt very close to old Mrs Tandon. For someone who believed that everyone in a railway carriage existed mainly to be absorbed into a network of acquaintance, a samdhin’s samdhin was virtually a sister. They were both widowed, and both had problematical daughters-in-law.

  Mrs Rupa Mehra complained about Meenakshi; she had already told them some weeks ago about the medal that had been so heartlessly melted down. But, naturally, old Mrs Tandon could not complain about Veena and her fondness for irreligious music in front of Mrs Mahesh Kapoor.

  Grandchildren were also discussed: Bhaskar and Aparna and Savita’s unborn baby each made an appearance.

  Then the conversation moved into a different mode.

  ‘Can’t we do something about Ramnavami? Won’t Minister Sahib change his mind?’ asked old Mrs Tandon, probably the most insistently pious of the three.

  ‘Uff! What can I say, he’s so stubborn,’ said Mrs Mahesh Kapoor. ‘And nowadays he is under so much pressure that he gets impatient at every little thing I say. I get pains these days, but I hardly worry about them, I’m worr
ying about him so much.’ She smiled. ‘I’ll tell you frankly,’ she continued in her quiet voice, ‘I’m afraid to say anything to him. I told him, all right, if you don’t want the whole Ramcharitmanas to be recited, at least let us get a priest to recite some part of it, maybe just the Sundar Kanda, and all he said was, “You women will burn down this town. Do what you like!” and stalked out of the room.’

  Mrs Rupa Mehra and old Mrs Tandon made sympathetic noises.

  ‘Later he was striding up and down the garden in the heat, which is good neither for him nor for the plants. I said to him, we could get Maan’s future parents-in-law from Banaras to enjoy it with us. They are also fond of recitations. That will help cement the ties. Maan is getting so’—she searched for the proper word—‘so out of control these days. . . .’ She trailed off, distressed.

  Rumours of Maan and Saeeda Bai were by now rife in Brahmpur.

  ‘What did he say?’ asked Mrs Rupa Mehra, rapt.

  ‘He just waved me away, saying, “All these plots and plans!”’

  Old Mrs Tandon shook her head and said:

  ‘When Zaidi’s son passed the civil service exam, his wife arranged a reading of the whole Quran in her house: thirty women came, and they each read a—what do they call it? paara; yes, paara.’ The word seemed to displease her.

  ‘Really?’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra, struck by the injustice of it. ‘Should I speak to Minister Sahib?’ She had a vague sense that this would help.

  ‘No, no, no—’ said Mrs Mahesh Kapoor, worried at the thought of these two powerful wills colliding. ‘He will only say this and that. Once when I touched upon the subject he even said: “If you must have it, go to your great friend the Home Minister—he will certainly support this kind of mischief.” I was too frightened to say anything after that.’

  They all bewailed the general decline of true piety.

  Old Mrs Tandon said: ‘Nowadays, everyone goes in for big functions in the temples—chanting and bhajans and recitations and discourses and puja—but they don’t have proper ceremonies in the home.’