Mistress

The face. Yes, let’s begin with the face that determines the heart’s passage. It is with the face we decode thoughts into a language without sounds. Does that perplex you? How can there be a language without sounds, you ask. Don’t deny it. I see the question in your eyes.

I realize that you know very little of this world I am going to take you into. I understand your concern that it may be beyond your grasp. But I want you to know that I would be failing in my intentions if I did not transmit at least some of my love for my art to you. When I finish, I believe that you will feel as I do. Or almost as I do.

Trust me. That is all I ask of you. Trust me and listen. And trust your intelligence. Don’t let someone else decide for you what is within your reach or what is beyond you. You are capable of absorbing this much and more, I assure you.

Look at me. Look at my face. The naked face, devoid of colour and make-up, glitter and adornments. What do we have here? The forehead, the eyebrows, the nostrils, the mouth, the chin, and thirty-two facial muscles. These are our tools and with these we shall fashion the language without words. The navarasas: love, contempt, sorrow, fury, courage, fear, disgust, wonder, peace.

In dance as in life, we do not need more than nine ways to express ourselves. You may call these the nine faces of the heart.

In time, each one of them would remember it differently. But for as long as they lived, it wouldn’t ever fade: the memory of that moment of grace. Of light that tripped down the aluminium staircase, casting as its shadow a white radiance, of a breeze that had cooled itself over the pools speckling the river bed. Of Chris waiting, an isle of stillness on that busy railway platform.

He stood, oblivious to the curious glances, the urchins who stood
around him with hungry eyes and open palms, the vendors who beseeched him to try their wares. He stood unaware that his baggage blocked the way to the staircase, making people mutter and grumble as they stumbled over his bags.

Chris looked around, whorls of light captured in his hair, the weight of what seemed to be a giant violin case listing his body to one side. As if to compensate, his mouth was drawn into a thoughtful, lopsided line.

They stood there for a moment, looking at him. Then he raised his eyes and saw them as they paused at the top of the staircase. Old man, young woman and not-so-young man. Hesitant, unsure, eclipsing the path of light and stilling the flow of feet.

The line mellowed into a curve, a gesture so transparent with gladness and so untainted by all that was to come later that they felt, each one of them, as if a moth’s wing, soft and ethereal, had brushed their souls. It was a caress so brief and so enchanting that they ached for it the instant it was over.

Such was the grace of that moment.

Then, as if to stake the first claim, the young woman stepped forward. ‘Hello, you must be Christopher Stewart,’ she said. ‘I am Radha. Welcome.’

Her hand stretched towards him even as Chris folded his hands in a namaste as his guidebook had suggested he do when greeting women in India.

She dropped her hand as if reproached. He reached for her hand as if to apologize. With that fumble of gestures, manners and awkward beginnings, Chris planted himself in a new land.

‘Hi, I’m Chris. Pleased to meet you, Ra-dha.’ He spoke her name softly, lingering over the syllables, committing them to memory, savouring each cluster of sounds.

Radha shivered. Ra-dha was a feathery trail at the base of her spine. To break the spell, she turned to the not-so-young man. ‘This is Shyam,’ she said.

The not-so-young man beamed and stretched out his hand.

‘Sham,’ Chris almost yelped, feeling as though he had slipped his fingers into a mangle. What sort of name was that? For that matter, what nature of beast was this, he wondered, as he extricated his fingers from the handshake. Behind his back, he clenched and
unclenched his nearly numb fingers slowly.

Oblivious to Chris’s discomfort, the not-so-young man protested, ‘Sham, I am no sham. It’s S-h-y-a-m.’

But Chris had already moved towards the old man. ‘And you, sir,’ he said slowly. The old man knew some English, he’d been told. ‘You must be Mr Koman.’

The old man nodded. Chris smiled, uncertain. In the few days he’d been in India, he had already encountered the nod and was still unable to decipher if it meant a yes or a no.

Radha moved closer to the old man. ‘Uncle,’ she said. ‘This is Christopher Stewart.’

Chris said slowly, unsure how much the old man would understand, ‘Your friend Philip Read has told me a great deal about you. I am honoured that you agreed to meet me.’

The old man took both his hands in his and smiled. The warmth of his gaze ate into him. Chris let his eyes slide over the old man’s face, examining each feature surreptitiously for some familiar line or curve. He saw crow’s feet crinkling the eyes beneath bushy eyebrows. He saw how the high cheekbones stretched the old man’s skin, giving it an almost youthful countenance and then he saw the dimple in the chin and he felt a flaring within. He let his eyes settle on the clasp of their hands.

Hello, he mouthed. Hello, old man from across the seas. Hello, maybe father. Hello, hello, hello …

BOOK 1

Kandaalethrayum kowthukamundithine, pandu
Kandilla jnan evam vidham kettumilla

How beautiful it is to look at, never
have I seen or heard of anything like it

—Nalacharitam [First Day]
Unnayi Warrier

Sringaaram

L
ove. Let us begin with sringaaram.

Do we know other words for it?

Or do we know it by the widening of the eye, the arching of eyebrows, the softness of the mouth that curves, by that swelling of breath from each nerve-end wanting to cup a contour?

We have words for this flooding that can sweep away all other thoughts. Pleasure, longing, lust …we call it by so many names. It is human to do so. To give a name to everything and everybody, to classify and segregate. For only then can we measure the extent of this need to know, to conquer, to hold this wondrous being, this creature that suffuses every moment with a strange and inexplicable yearning.

Look around you and tell me, what else is love?

Could it be this month?

August.

There are flowers everywhere. Balsam and hibiscus. Yellow trumpet-shaped flowers and the tiny, delicate ari-poo in the hedges. Marigolds, chrysanthemums, countless hues that shape our needs. The undergrowth is dense. Snakes slither through unkempt land. This is an untamed month, wild and wilful. Rain pours, so does sunshine.

The harvested fields stare at the skies with a forlorn vacantness: the past and the future. The present is the harvest that lies in homes, in wood-walled manjas, golden and plump. Love lives in the present. All else is memory and hope.

There are no fruits. Neither cashew apple nor jackfruit, mangoes nor palm fruit. Perhaps in some untended part of the garden, a pineapple rests, nestling among ash-green swords. The fruit of the month is paddy. Kernels filled with the sweet fullness of plenty. This is how sringaaram feels.

The skies are lit up with the moon. A night orchestra plays: crickets with malaccas strung on their wings, the frog with the rattle in its throat, the hooting owl, the rustle of palm leaves, the wind among trees.

During the day, high up in the skies, the crested lark sings. The vanampaadi. From heaven’s doors, a trail of the unknown, caressing the soul, stoking desire, propelling needs into words …

Love for the unknown. That, too, is the face of sringaaram.

Radha

We walk up the staircase, two to a row. Chris and his cello; Uncle and I; Shyam and the red-shirted railway-porter laden with bags.

Chris pauses at the top of the staircase and then walks towards the railing.

Beyond the railway lines is the riverbank. Or what is left of it. Most of the sand has been carted away to build homes. The river, when it is swollen with the monsoon rain, creeps into the houses that line the riverbank. Mostly, though, the Nila is a phantom river, existing only in the memories of those who have seen it when in full spate, swift and brown and sweeping into its waters all that dared stem its flow.

Chris stands there and takes a deep breath. I try to see the view as he is seeing it: the gleaming line of water, the many pools that dot the river bed, the herons fishing, the treetops and the tall grass that grows alongside the river, ruffled by a breeze, the distant hills and the clear blue skies, and I know fear. Already, in these few minutes of being with him, the familiar is endowed with a new edge.

I look at him. With every moment, the thought hinges itself deeper into my mind: What an attractive man.

It isn’t that his hair is the colour of rosewood—deep brown with hints of red—or that his eyes are as green as the enclosed pond at the
resort. It isn’t the pale gold of his skin, either. It is the way he’s combed his hair back from his forehead: a sweep of order that gives up midway and tumbles into disorderly curls. It is the strength of his body and the length of his fingers, that belies what seems to be a natural indolence. It is the crinkling of his eyes and his unhurried smile that throws his face into asymmetrical lines. It is the softness of his mouth framed by a brutish two-day stubble. It is how he appears to let order and chaos exist together without trying to separate one from the other. He looks as if he doesn’t give a damn what anyone thinks of him.

I see Chris turn to speak to Uncle. ‘Philip told me about this view. He said I should stand here at the fourth pillar on the bridge and what I saw would make me want to never leave.’

Uncle goes to stand alongside Chris.

When they had clasped hands at the foot of the staircase, there had been a peculiar silence, resonant with secret words they spoke to each other in a language that neither I nor anyone else had ever heard before. But Shyam, Sham as Chris calls him, broke that moment of grace with a carelessness that is so typical of him.

‘What is this?’ he asked, pointing to the instrument that Chris carried on his back. ‘A violin’s grandfather?’

‘I don’t think it’s a violin.’ I tried to interrupt Shyam before he made an ass of himself. ‘I’ve seen it in films and a few times at musical performances. I can’t remember what it’s called, though,’ I hastened to add. Was it a cello or a double bass? I wasn’t sure.

Chris drew his hands from Uncle’s and stepped into the conversation with the ease of one walking into a familiar room. ‘This is a cello,’ he laughed.

‘A what?’ Shyam asked. ‘Did you call it a cello?’ He turned to include me in the sweep of his joke. ‘When you get to the resort, I’ll show you our cellos,’ he said with a broad wink.

Chris looked puzzled. He searched my face for an explanation. How could I tell him that Shyam was referring to the hot cases that kept the food warm in the buffet at the resort? It trivialized the magnificence of the instrument. I turned away in embarrassment. He wasn’t just a sham, he was an uncouth boor, this husband of mine.

Now, he walks to where Uncle and Chris stand drinking in the view, and says, ‘It’s a pity that you can’t see the resort from here.
Haven’t you seen enough of this? The view from the resort, I promise you, is even better. But first, I have something to show you. Come along.’

The two men prise themselves away and, with a look that I read as resignation on Chris’s face and as long-suffering on Uncle’s, follow Shyam. He leads them to a yellow board slung on the side of the staircase. ‘Now this is what I can’t tire of looking at,’ he says, flicking a dried leaf off its frame.

‘Near-the-Nila,’ he reads. ‘A river retreat with everything you wished for and more. A/c and Non A/c cottages and rooms. Multicuisine and Kerala Speciality Restaurants. Ayurvedic Massages and Cultural Extravaganzas. Business or Pleasure, Near-the-Nila knows your needs better than anyone else.’ He pauses. And then, darting an earnest glance at Chris, he says, ‘This is what I hope will make you want to never leave. In fact …’

I can’t stomach any more of this Near-the-Nila promotion. I nod to the porter and we begin the descent to the other side of the platform where the car is parked.

‘Who is he?’ the porter asks. ‘Has he come to study kathakali?’ Mohammed the porter is as much a fixture at the Shoranur railway station as the Non-veg Refreshment Room and the SLV newsstand. For as long as I can remember, Mohammed has carried our bags. It is part of the ritual of every journey. When I was a child, Mohammed took our bags, brought the biriyani parcels and then went with me to the newsstand to buy a comic. Later, when I was a grown-up and travelling to Bangalore where my college was, he would guard my bags while I bought a magazine.

These days I hardly go anywhere and seldom come to the railway station. But Mohammed had spotted me as I walked in and had rushed to my side, to fetch and carry as always.

‘No, no,’ I say, suppressing a smile at the thought of Chris studying kathakali. ‘He’s a writer. He’s come to meet Uncle. And he will be staying at the hotel.’

Retreat and resort are words that have no room in Mohammed’s vocabulary.

‘What’s that thing on his back?’ he asks, gesturing towards the cello.

‘That’s a musical instrument,’ I say.

‘How does he play it? Do you know? Does he keep it on a table or does he prop it against a wall?’

The cello is going to be part of many a discussion, I realize.

I smile and unable to resist mischief, I say, ‘I think he holds it between his legs.’

Mohammed flushes and looks away.

‘Here, Mohammed,’ I say, pressing a few notes into his palm. ‘Some tea money.’

Mohammed pockets it carefully. He clears his throat and looks into the middle distance. Both of us know what the money is for.

‘Ah, here they are,’ Shyam says, opening the car door. ‘Porter, put the bags in,’ he orders.

‘So how much will that be?’ he asks, drawing out his wallet.

Mohammed lets the lungi he had hitched up when carrying the bags fall to its proper length. Then he crosses his legs as a measure of humility, and scratches his head to suggest ignorance.

‘In which case, this should suffice,’ Shyam says, drawing out two ten-rupee notes.

For a fleeting second, Mohammed’s eyes meet mine. The twenty I had given him earlier was part payment, paid in advance.

Mohammed’s mouth twists into a half smile. I can see contempt in the curl of his lips and I cringe. He rubs the notes between his fingers and I worry that he will say something caustic. But he holds his tongue and, as if they were five-hundred-rupee notes, he folds the money with great care, thrusts it into the pocket of his shirt and walks back to the station.

Chris looks at the car and asks, ‘How do we all fit in?’

Shyam pats the bonnet of the car. ‘This, my friend,’ he says, ‘is an Ambassador, the first car to be manufactured in India.’

I steel myself to show no emotion. When Shyam set up Near-the-Nila, all the staff who worked there and even I, mistress of the property, though only in name, were given a sheet with all that we were supposed to know. Everything a foreign tourist would ask about: Ayurveda, kathakali, kalarippayatu, Kerala cuisine, the Thrissur pooram, Mangalore tiles and, although the car is manufactured in West Bengal, the Ambassador.

Shyam pauses. He wants me to describe the car’s features. I pretend not to understand. He sighs and begins, ‘The Ambassador, like I was
telling you, was the first car to be manufactured in India. It’s fuelled by diesel, which makes for unparalleled economy in running costs. Petrol in India costs a great deal. This car has a fuel tank that can hold forty-two litres. It costs about US $42 to fill her up full tank. Not much by your standards, but that’s monthly wages for a labourer here. The Ambassador has an easy cold start and 9

” diameter brake drums for effective braking.’ Shyam mimics with his hand the motion of the brake.

Three more lines and he will be finished. Hurry up, I want to tell Shyam. Can’t you see Chris doesn’t care whether it has a five-speed gearbox or independent front suspension?

‘The suspension is what makes an Amby, as we call it, perfect for Indian roads. Now, I could get a Japanese or a Korean car or even a Ford, but in ten years, while my Amby will still run, these new cars will be scrap.’

Chris wipes his forehead and asks, ‘But how do we all fit in?’

Uncle, who hasn’t uttered a word for a while now, beckons to the driver of an autorickshaw. Chris says, ‘I’ll go with him. Problem solved, right?’

He opens the rear door of the car and lays his cello carefully on the seat.

Shyam doesn’t say anything. I know he isn’t pleased. There was so much more he had planned on telling Chris.

Uncle turns to me and says, ‘We’ll be at the resort before you. Where do I take him?’

‘Cottage No. 12,’ I say. ‘But first, do take him to the restaurant for breakfast. We’ll meet you there.’

I know that Shyam wants Chris to have the best cottage, the one closest to the river and farthest away from the main building. Chris, Shyam hopes, will include a glowing account of Near-the-Nila in the travel book he is writing.

So we drive to the resort, Shyam and I wedged in the front seat with the driver.

In the back lies the cello, a proxy passenger, foreign and aloof and stirring in me much of what I have steeled myself to never feel again.

I turn to glance at Shyam’s face. Shyam is handsome. His skin is
light and smooth; though he shaves every morning, by late noon, a bluish shadow appears, hinting at facial hair that he keeps ruthlessly under control. His features are even and chiselled; his body straight and supple; his hair jet black, abundant and neatly combed. He looks like a popular Malayalam film star. An action hero. Shyam knows that other women look at him. That he incites interest and perhaps even lust. I, however, feel nothing for him except perhaps a habitual annoyance.

I see that Shyam is upset with how the morning has progressed and suddenly I feel a pang of pity for him.

The car ride back to the resort is usually one of the highlights for him. Down the main road, and then Shyam would point to a stack of chimney towers by the river and say, ‘That used to belong to Radha’s family. The oldest tile factory in the region.’

‘This,’ he would say, pointing to a modern three-storey building, ‘used to be a cinema house. Murugan Talkies. It belonged to Radha’s grandfather. Some years ago, it burned down and this came up instead.’

And so the list would continue. A shopping complex. A rice mill. A row of houses. A rubber plantation. A mango orchard. A line of coconut trees …all of which my family own or once owned.

Then it would be his turn. This was the moment he waited for, when he could point out his trail of acquisitions, leading up to Near-the-Nila. And sometimes, me. He has been cheated of this, I think now.

Everyone in Shoranur knows everything about us. It is only with strangers that Shyam knows the measure of his triumph.

I pat his arm and say, ‘Don’t be upset. There will be more opportunities.’

Shyam’s eyes bore into mine. ‘What are you saying? What makes you think I am upset? I’m just annoyed. Who does he think we are? His porters? To follow with his bags and his silly buffalo of an instrument …’

‘Ssh …’ I try to calm him down.

Shyam has an exaggerated sense of self-worth. Or perhaps it isn’t as exaggerated as it is reduced. He sees slights where none are intended. And for this, too, ‘Radha’s family’ is to blame.

Suddenly I know what it is I feel for Shyam. Neither pity nor
even affection. Just responsible.

‘I know, I know,’ I say.

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