Difficult Daughters (13 page)

‘Would you like something to eat or drink? The bearer here is very nice.’

More people to see. ‘No, no,’ stammered Virmati, ‘it’s all right.’

Harish sat next to her and held her hands. ‘Why are you so nervous, darling?’ he asked. ‘Do you feel you should not be with me?’

Virmati remained silent.

‘Though that’s a question I dare not ask,’ the Professor continued, playing with a little ring she was wearing on her finger, twisting it, pulling it on and off. ‘You have been too cruel to me once already. Once? Why, more than once.’ He laughed, and carried her hand to his mouth.

‘If you don’t like the way I think, then go away,’ said Virmati pettishly, putting her arms firmly down by her sides.

The Professor slid down so he could look into her eyes, her head was so bent. ‘It’s not in my power to like or dislike, Viru. Whatever you do, I must accept. But for God’s sake do not put me through that misery again!’ His voice had become husky with pleading, so low she had to strain to hear him. He lay down his head in her lap, his arms around her waist.

Virmati sat the way she was. The Professor lowered his hands, and began to caress the round caps of her knees. Feeling the weight of the Professor’s head, and the proximity of his moving hands, the muscles in Virmati’s legs grew tense and she shifted uneasily.

The Professor tightened his grip. His hands inched higher.

‘Don’t,’ she whispered. ‘Please.’

‘Why? Aren’t you mine? And I yours? Body and soul, heart and mind? I worship you, Viru, I want to express it, that’s all.’ The Professor got up and pressed his lips to her throat, her ears, her chin, her lips, murmuring endearments while his breath came faster. He seemed to be in a trance. Dazed, Virmati didn’t think it would be fair to bring up the fact of his existing wife and children. But this wasn’t right either.

‘Then marry me,’ she said, trying to push him away. ‘Marry me and make it clear to everybody.’

‘I will, I will, darling, I will. Just give me time.’

His hands held her face, stroked her hair, pushed her against the pillows, wandered lightly over her body, still so tight and miserable. They drew light circles on her skin, loosened the drawstring of her salwar, opened the hooks of her kameez.

She cried afterwards, but not much. He dried those tears while she thought, he was right, she was meant to be his, what was the point in foolishly denying it on the basis of an outmoded morality? The words recalled Swarna Lata, and she smiled.

The Professor looked at her lovingly. ‘Good girl,’ he said as he traced the tears from her cheek with his thumb and forefinger.

Their meetings continued along these general lines, though not as much time was spent on the preliminaries.

*

The eve of Diwali. The Professor was in Lahore for two days, an exercise which had caused much grief in his own home, for of course they saw through the flimsy excuses he made. The girl had bewitched him, his madness was not yet over, rather it seemed to be increasing every day.

The day before, he had spent hours in Anarkalli, going to all the sari shops, choosing the best possible sari that his fifty-rupee budget would allow. An exquisite sari draped around an exquisite body like his Virmati’s would be a mighty reflector of his taste. Finally he chose a heavy south Indian silk, with the traditional small orange, black and red checks, and a border of black and gold. It would set off her fairness to perfection, he thought. He could hardly wait to see her in it.

In the parcel he made, he enclosed a small red lipstick. Coty’s. He liked a little make-up on women. Virmati always wore kaajal, emphasizing her eyes, but an added touch of lipstick would supplement the original high colour of her lips.

*

On Diwali evening, the 31st of October that year, the couple found themselves strolling in Anarkalli, like so many others. Everything around them was vibrating with life and glitter, the men and women in new silk, the shops in lights. Virmati was wearing the sari with small checks, the palla draped modestly around the back of her head and her shoulders. Her face glowed. This was the first Diwali they had spent together, and she saw it as a step towards public statement, matrimony and the fruition of love. The Professor looked upon her with the eyes of a Pygmalion. My Galatea, he thought, and in a burst of desire snaked a hand under her light shawl, around her smooth elbow, pressing her breast at the same time.

‘Aren’t the lights wonderful, darling?’ he asked.

‘Yes,’ she said breathlessly.

The Professor gently increased the pressure of his hand. Virmati’s step faltered. ‘Are you all right, darling?’ he asked. Her momentary loss of balance allowed his thumb to rub across her nipple. He could feel how erect it was beneath the soft material of her blouse.

By now they were passing a shoe shop. ‘Bhalla Shoe Company’ it said, in bright lights on the front, which was lit with thousands of electric bulbs and had life-sized portraits of two ladies perched on a map of India. They represented unity between the Hindus and the Muslims, and had the motto ‘Unity, Industry and Freedom’ written under them.

‘Oh, look‚’ said Virmati, edging closer to have a better look, and incidentally disentangling herself from the Professor. ‘What good thoughts these people have. And such a noble message on Diwali. If everybody thought like this, there would be unity in our country today.’ Tears came to her eyes at the thought, and she looked so appealing that the Professor felt that the whole crowd would soon be looking at Virmati rather than at the display.

‘Come this way, Viru,’ he said. ‘This vulgar and meaningless display of unity is too much to stomach.’

Virmati felt a coldness come over her. ‘How do you know it is meaningless?’ she asked, half objecting, half pleading.

‘These are banias. Do you think with all their taboos there is any scope for unity? They write this in the window, but I’m sure if you ask Messrs Bhalla if they would partake of a meal at the house of their Muslim neighbour they would be horrified.’

‘But surely you don’t have to eat in another person’s house to be friendly with them?’ cried Virmati.

The Professor looked at Virmati a little impatiently. ‘Can’t you see, it’s not only a question of eating. It’s a question of trust. Take Syed. He knows I am a vegetarian and when I come to visit him, he especially prepares food for me with his own hands. It’s a labour of love. Were I to reject it, I would be saying that no matter what you do for me, there are certain things I cannot accept because of who you are. Now is that right, my love?’

Virmati was getting confused. She tried to remember what she had been saying, and persisted with her argument. ‘But what has that got to do with the message in the shoe shop. Even if we don’t eat in each other’s houses, tolerance is still possible.’

The Professor laughed elegantly and indulgently at Viru’s arguments. ‘I see Lahore has made you an idealist,’ he said.

Virmati was silent. Were her thoughts idealistic, and not worth taking seriously?

By this time they had reached Bhojwani’s, the biggest and oldest bookshop in Lahore. It was famous throughout the Punjab for its up-to-date arrivals in the arts and the sciences. Librarians patronized it, and as both owner and son were graduates of English Literature from Government College, those sections were particularly fine. On entering, the Professor’s face lit up and he withdrew his hand from Virmati’s elbow.

Looking around, Virmati could see why. Bookshelves lined the high-ceilinged room from top to bottom. In the middle was a large rectangular pillar, also lined with books. Two ladders leaned against the walls, and in the corner was a staircase going up to the second-hand section.

The Professor dived into this paradise with an ‘I’ll just look around, darling’, emerging fifteen minutes later to ask the attendant if the owner was around.

‘One moment, sir.’

The owner appeared, a Sindhi gentleman. Tall, fair, middle-aged, round glasses, with an I-love-books air.

‘I have a small budget from my college,’ murmured the Professor to Mr Bhojwani senior.

‘Ah, sir, which college?’ asked the man. He recognized most of the institutional book-buyers who came to his shop, but the Professor was new to him.

‘AS College, Amritsar,’ said the Professor, with a slight hint of defensiveness.

Virmati, standing behind him, recognized that tone. Throw in a further note of apology, and it became the tone he used when they discussed marriage. He’s like that about other things also, she noted, dispassionately.

‘Ah, good place,’ responded Mr Bhojwani, professionally.

As they bought and sold, discussed prices, lists and future transactions, Virmati wandered to the doorway of the shop. Though it was crowded outside, there were not many people in the bookshop. Few, it seemed, associated Diwali with the buying of books, even though it was the day of Saraswati as well as Lakshmi. She turned her head and saw the Professor’s distinguished-looking head, hair brushed back from high forehead, suit immaculate and English, glasses earnest and gleaming, and felt enclosed in a cocoon of exclusivity. Feeling her glance upon him, the Professor looked up at her and smiled. She smiled back, brushing away that feeling of irritation over the Hindu and Muslim question, blanking out her observation at his apologetic tone about his college.

*

December, 1940. Congress leaders in the satyagraha movement are arrested on a daily basis. Their names appear in the papers, and if their prison centres are changed their names appear again. Various Muslims, Hindus, and Sikhs continue to declare the Partition scheme fantastic and un-Nationalistic, while the Muslim League presses on with its demands. Food adulteration in Lahore persists without check, think the bitter inhabitants, while the city is declared to be the most expensive in the whole of Punjab. German efforts to bury London under mountains of rubble continue, and money, goods, arms, men flow out of India to support the war.

That year, the Roerich exhibition was one of the major culture events of the season. Its inauguration by Sir Douglas Young, Chief Justice of Punjab, specially attended by the Punjab premier, Sir Sikander Hyatt Khan, provided a mingling ground for Indian and British celebrities. The exhibition, in a wing of the Lahore Museum, was a father-son affair, with both Professor Roerich and his son Svetoslav displaying paintings on opposite walls. Comparisons, contrasts, and an occasion for a wealth of commentary by art lovers. Of course the Professor made it a point to come to Lahore while it was on, and of course he took Virmati to see it with him. Excitement filled Virmati at the idea. What would she wear?

‘Your Diwali sari‚’ said Harish.

She would also wear red on her lips, from the lipstick she had squashed while trying to wrench the cover off. She would drape the sari over her head, because he said it framed her face like a Madonna’s. He would look at her with that look in his eyes. She blushed now, thinking of it, and then she blushed at her thoughts.

At the museum the paintings were mostly mountains and portraits. People were walking about, talking softly, staring at the paintings, standing back, going forwards, even writing little notes about them. The Professor, on entering the gallery, assumed the same intent look he wore on entering bookshops. He made towards the table which had the brochures. Left to herself, Virmati gave a quick glance around. Vivid, majestic, bright, I do like them, she thought. Imagine painting so many scenes of our mountains, and him a Russian. Maybe they reminded him of home.

Slowly, they started circulating. Alternating his gaze between brochure and painting, the Professor pinned Virmati to him with his low voice, telling her just what to look for, what to admire, what to criticize. Virmati listened, looked, wondered. Of course, all that the Professor was saying must be true, he was older and so much more refined and civilized. He knew.

‘Notice‚’ he was saying, ‘notice that in almost every picture there are unobtrusive symbols that represent love, peace, or a sense of humanity. See, there is Lord Buddha, there is Christ, there is a Cross hidden in the peaks of that mountain. Now what do you think that means?’

Virmati tried hard to think what it might mean. Her mind registered nothing but blankness. Why would the painter want to put a Cross on a mountain? She could not conceive.

‘Perhaps he is trying to imply that we should live peacefully on earth?’ the Professor suggested, with a glance at Virmati.

‘Oh, how clever!’ exclaimed Virmati. Her own imagination was a literal one.

‘But a little obvious, I think,’ went on the Professor. ‘The function of the artist is different from that of the propagandist. Here he is being prescriptive.’

Virmati wondered why the Professor, of all people, should disapprove of that, then suppressed the thought. ‘But perhaps with a war on, he might think it important to say this?’ she ventured timidly.

The Professor looked pleased. ‘A very timely reflection,’ he said.

‘And it says here,’ said Virmati, encouraged, seizing the brochure from the Professor’s hand, ‘that Set – Shet – how do you say it?’

‘Sv, it’s Svet-o-slav.’

‘Yes. Here it says he is exhibiting at –’ Virmati skipped Milwaukee and said, ‘America also.’

‘True.’

‘There also people must be liking the message. So many people dying, it is frightening. And it has been going on for so long!’

‘Darling, you are so sweet,’ caressed the Professor, putting his arm around her for a moment. ‘But the true test of great art is its ability to express the inner realities of life, those realities that don’t change according to time and place, that have a universal application.’

‘Ah,’ said Virmati.

By now they had been at the exhibition for almost forty minutes. The Professor glanced at the gold watch on his wrist. There was not much time left. He guided Virmati out of the hall, and hailed a tonga.

The evening raced to its expected climax in Syed Husain’s guest room. There was some pressure for hurry, as Virmati had to be back by eight. Her sense of guilt, her fear of her family, her terror of being exposed, prevented her from ever taking the risk of squeezing through the bars of the hostel gate as Swarna did, though the Professor did urge it a few times.