Mr Sampath-The Printer of Malgudi, the Financial Expert, Waiting for the Mahatma (14 page)

‘Myself – I don’t believe in leaving the children to professional hands.’

Srinivas addressed the children generally: ‘You all do it wonderfully well. You must all do it again for me another day.’ The children giggled and ran away, out of sight, and the printer’s wife withdrew from behind the door. The printer put away the harmonium and sat back a little, sunk in thought. The children’s voices could be heard nearly at the end of the street: they had all run out to play. The wife returned to the kitchen, and the evening sun threw a shaft of light through the bamboo-trellis, chequering the opposite wall. A deep silence fell upon the company. Srinivas took the envelope out of his pocket and gave it to the printer, who glanced through it and said: ‘It’s my duty to see that
The Banner
is out again. Please wait. I will see that the journal is set up on a lino machine and printed off a rotary and dispatched in truck-loads every week. For this we need a lot of money. Don’t you doubt it for a moment. I am going to make a lot of money, if it is only to move on to the main building and get that man down here to live as
my
tenant. And if ever I catch him playing the harmonium here, I will – I will –’ He revelled in visions of revenge for a moment, and then said: ‘A friend of mine is starting a film company and I’m joining him. Don’t look so stunned: we shall be well on our way to the rotary when my first film is completed.’

‘Film? Film?’ Srinivas gasped. ‘I never knew that you were connected with any film –

‘I’ve always been interested in films. Isn’t it the fifth largest industry in our country? How can I or anyone be indifferent to it? Come along, let us go, and see the studio.’

‘Which studio? Where is it?’

‘Beyond the river. They have taken five acres on lease.’

His fur cap and scarf and a coat hanging on a peg were in a moment transferred on to his person. They started out. Sampath stopped a bus on the trunk road. The bus conductor appeared very deferential at the sight of him and found places for him and Srinivas. As the bus moved, Sampath asked the conductor: ‘What sort of collection have you had today?’

‘Very good, sir,’ he said, leaning forward.

‘Tell your master that I travelled in his bus today.’

‘Yes, sir.’ Sampath turned to Srinivas and said: ‘This is almost our own service, you know.’

‘You have printed for them?’ Srinivas asked.

‘Tons of stuff – every form in their office.’

‘What will they do now?’

‘They will wait till my rotary is ready.’

‘Why, sir?’ the conductor asked, ‘Is your press not working now?’

‘Old machines: they are worn out,’ he said easily.

The bus stopped at the stand beyond Market Square. They got down. Sampath waved his arm. An old Chevrolet came up, with its engine roaring above the road traffic and its exhaust throwing off a smoke-screen. They took their seats. The driver asked: ‘Studio, sir?’ The car turned down Ellaman Street, ground along uneven sandy roads, and then forded the river at Nallapa’s mango grove. People were relaxing on the sands, children played about, the evening sun threw slanting rays on the water. A few bullock-wagons and villagers were crowding at the crossing; the bulb-horn of the taxi rasped out angrily, the driver swore at the pedestrians till they scattered, and then the wheels of the taxi splashed up the water and drenched them. Srinivas peeped out and wished that his friend would put him down there and go forward. He was seized with a longing to sit down on the edge of the river, dip his feet in it, and listen to its rumble in the fading evening light. But the Chevrolet carried him relentlessly on till, half a mile off, it reached a gateway made of two coconut tree-trunks, across which hung the sign ‘Sunrise Pictures’. They got out of the car. Sampath swept his arms in a circle and said: ‘All this is ours.’ He indicated a vast expanse of space enclosed with a fencing of brambles. Groups of people were working here and there; sheets of corrugated iron lay on a pile; some hammering was going on.

They moved through the lot and reached a brick hutment with a thatched roof. A man emerged from it. He let out a cry of joy on seeing Sampath: ‘I was not sure if you were coming at all.’ The orange rays of the setting sun from beyond the bramble fencing touched him and transfigured for a second even that rotund, elderly man, in whose ears sparkled two big diamonds,
and whose cheeks came down in slight folds. He was bald and practically without eyebrows, and his spectacle frames gleamed on his brow.

‘This is our editor,’ began Sampath, and Srinivas added: ‘I’ve met him before at your press. Is he not Mr Somu – the district board president?’

‘Yes; I relinquished my office six months ago. It is too hard a life for a conscientious man.’

‘How is that bridge over Sarayu?’ asked Srinivas.

‘Oh, that!’ The other shook his head gloomily. ‘Somehow the function never came off Srinivas looked at the printer questioningly. The printer read his thought at once and hastened to correct it: ‘Not due to me. I printed his speech and delivered the copies in time.’

‘Oh, what a waste the whole thing proved to be! I must somehow clear off all that printed stuff; gathering too much dust in a corner of the house,’ said Mr Somu and added: ‘Why keep standing here? Come in, come in.’ He took them in. They sat round a table on iron chairs. Sampath said by way of an opening: ‘The editor wanted to see the studio.’

‘I never knew that there was a studio here,’ added Srinivas.

‘There is no encouragement for the arts in our country, Mr Editor. Everything is an uphill task in our land. Do you know with what difficulty I acquired these five acres? It was possible only because I was on the district board. I’ve always wanted to serve Art and provide our people with healthy and wholesome entertainment.’ And Srinivas felt that Mr Somu could really still keep his bridge speech, which might serve, with very slight modifications, for the opening of the studio. ‘I’m sparing no pains to erect a first-class studio on these grounds.’

‘He has an expert on the task, who is charging about a thousand rupees a month.’

‘Come on, let us go round and see –’

They rambled over the ground, and Mr Somu pointed out various places which were still embryonic, the makeup department, stage one and two, processing and editing, projection room and so forth.

‘When do you expect to have it ready?’

‘Very soon. The moment our equipment is landed at Bombay. Well, I am entirely depending upon our friend Sampath to help me through all this business, sir. I want to serve people in my own humble way.’

In Kabir Lane the old stove-enamelled blue board had been taken down. In its place hung the inscription ‘Sunrise Pictures (Registered Offices)’. Over Sampath’s door shone the brass inscription ‘Director of Productions’. The director was usually to be found upstairs in Srinivas’s garret. Somu was also to be found there several hours a day. Sampath had planted a few more chairs in Srinivas’s office, because, as he said, it was virtually the conference room of Sunrise Pictures.

A young man in shirt-sleeves, clad in white drill trousers, of unknown province or even nationality, whose visiting card bore the inscription ‘De Mello of Hollywood’ was the brain behind the studio organization. He called himself C.E. (chief executive), and labelled all the others a variety of executives. He was paid a salary of one thousand rupees a month, and Somu had so much regard for him that he constantly chuckled to himself that he had got him cheap. Sampath, too, felt overawed by the other’s technical knowledge, and left him alone, as he roamed over the five acres, from morning to night, supervising and ordering people about, clutching in one hand a green cigarette tin. In addition to raising the studio structure and creating its departments, De Mello established a new phraseology for the benefit of this community. ‘Conference’ was one such. No two persons met, nowadays, except in a conference. No talk was possible unless it were a discussion. There were story conferences and treatment discussions, and there were costume conferences and allied discussions. Lesser persons would probably call them by simpler names, but it seemed clear that in the world of films an esoteric idiom of its own was indispensable for its dignity and development. Kabir Lane now resounded with the new jargon. They sat around Srinivas’s table, and long stretches of silence ensued, as they remained stock still with their faces in their palms,
gazing sadly at paperweights and pin-cushions. One might have thought that they were enveloped in an inescapable gloom, but if one took the trouble to clarify the situation by going three miles across the river and asking De Mello he would have explained: ‘The bosses are in a story conference.’

And what story emerged from it? None for several days. The talk went round and round in circles and yet there was no story. A few heavy books appeared on the table from time to time. Srinivas suddenly found himself up to his ears in the affair. Sampath piloted him into it so deftly that before he knew where he was he found himself involved in its problems, and what is more, began to feel it his duty to tackle them. It took him time to realize his place in the scheme. When he did realize it his imagination caught fire. He felt that he was acquiring a novel medium of expression. Ideas were to march straight on from him in all their pristine strength, without the intervention of language: ideas, walking, talking and passing into people’s minds as images like a drug entering the system through the hypodermic needle. He realized that he need not regret the absence of
The Banner
. He felt so excited by this discovery that he found himself unable to go on with the conference one afternoon. He suddenly rose in his seat, declaring: ‘I’ve got to do some calm thinking. I will go home now.’ He went straight home, through the blazing afternoon. At Anderson Lane he saw his wife sitting in front of Ravi’s block, along with his mother and sister. A cry of surprise escaped her at the sight of him. She left their company abruptly.

‘What is the matter?’ she asked eagerly, following him into their house and closing the main door. He turned on her with amusement and said: ‘What should be the matter when a man returns to his own house?’ She muttered: ‘Shall I make coffee for you? I have just finished mine.’

‘Oh, don’t bother about all that; I’ve had coffee. Get me a pillow and mat. I’m going to rest.’

‘Why! Are you ill?’ she asked apprehensively, and she pulled a pillow out of the rolls of bedding piled in a corner. The beds fell out of their order and unrolled on the floor untidily. She felt abashed, muttered ‘careless fool’, and engaged herself in rolling them up and rearranging them, while Srinivas took off his
upper-cloth and shirt and banyan and went to the bathroom. In the little bathroom a shaft of light fell through a glass tile on the copper tub under the tap and sent out a multi-coloured reflection from its surface. He paused to admire it for a moment, plunged his hands into the tub, splashed cold water all over his face and shoulders. As he came out of the bathroom he hoped that his wife would have spread out the mat for him. But he found her still rolling up the beds.

‘Where is my mat?’ he cried. ‘I have no time to lose, dearest. I must sleep immediately.’

‘Why have you splashed all that water on yourself like an elephant at the river-edge?’

‘I found my head boiling – that’s why I have to do a lot of fresh thinking now.’ He paused before the mirror to wipe his head with a towel and comb back his hair. After that he turned hopefully, but still found her busy with the beds. He cried impatiently: ‘Oh, leave that alone and give me a mat.’ She shot him a swift look and said: ‘The mat is there. If you can’t wait till I put all this back … I hate the sight of untidy beds.’ She went on with her work. Srinivas picked up a mat and spread it in a corner, snatched a pillow and lay down reflecting: ‘How near a catastrophe I have been.’ He looked on his wife’s face, which was slightly flushed with anger. He felt he had come perilously near ruining the day. He knew her nature. She could put up with a great deal, except imperiousness or an authoritarian tone in others. When she was young a music master, who once tried to be severe with her for some reason, found that he had lost a pupil for ever. She just flung away her music notebook, sprang out of the room and bade farewell to music. Everybody at her house respected her sensitiveness, and even Srinivas’s mother was very cautious in talking to her. Srinivas had, on the whole, a fairly even life with her, without much friction, but the one or two minor occasions when he had seemed to give her orders turned out to be memorable occasions. His domestic life seemed to have nearly come to an end each time, and it needed a lot of readjustment on his part later. He respected her sensitiveness. He told himself now: ‘Well, I shot the shaft which has hurt her and brought all that blood to her face.’ He rebuked himself for the slightly authoritative tone he had adopted in demanding the mat. ‘It’s the original
violence which has started a cycle – violence which goes on in undying waves once started, either in retaliation or as an original starting-ground – the despair of Gandhi –’ He suddenly saw Gandhi’s plea for non-violence with a new significance, as one of the paths of attaining harmony in life: non-violence in all matters, little or big, personal or national, it seemed to produce an unagitated, undisturbed calm, both in a personality and in society. His wife was still at the beds. He felt it his duty to make it up with her. He asked: ‘When does Ramu return from school?’

‘At four-thirty,’ she replied curtly.

‘Come and sit down here,’ he said, moving away a little to make space for her. She looked at him briefly and obeyed. Her anger left her. Her face relaxed. She sat beside him; he took her hand in his. She was transformed. She sat leaning on him. He put his arm around her and pressed his face against her black
sari
. A faint aroma of kitchen smoke and damp was about her. He told her softly: ‘I’m taking up a new work today.’ He explained to her and concluded: ‘Do you realize how much we can do now? I can write about our country’s past and present. A story about Gandhiji’s non-violence, our politics, all kinds of things.’ He chattered away about his plans.

‘This seems so much better than that paper!’ she exclaimed happily. ‘I’m sure more people will like this – that
Banner
was so dull! You will not revive it?’

‘Can’t say. When Sampath gets a new machine with the money he is going to make –

‘Why should you bother about it?’ she asked. ‘Will this bring you a lot of money?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said.

‘We must have a lot more money to spend,’ she said. ‘We must go and live in a better house,’ she pleaded.

‘I don’t know, I don’t know,’ he said, looking about helplessly. ‘I don’t know if I would care to live elsewhere. I like this place.’ And he smiled weakly, realizing at once what a hopeless confusion his whole outlook was. He could not define what he wanted. They went on talking till the boy knocked on the door and cried at the top of his voice: ‘Mother! Mother! Why have you bolted the door?’ ‘Oh, he has come,’ she cried, and ran up and opened the door. The boy burst in with a dozen inquiries. He flung his cap
and books away and let out a shout of joy on seeing his father, and threw himself on him. His mother attempted to take him in and give him his milk and tiffin, but he resisted it and announced: ‘In our school there was a snake today –’

‘Oh, really!’

‘But it didn’t bite the masters,’ he added.

‘Then what else did it do?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I didn’t see it. A friend of mine told me about it.’ His mother took him by his hand and dragged him into the kitchen. Srinivas shut his eyes tight with almost a sense of duty. But his wife presently came out of the kitchen and said: ‘Take me out this evening. Let us go to the market.’

‘Oh, but –’ Srinivas began. The boy became irrepressible. ‘Oh, don’t say but, Father, let us go, let us go, ask him, Mother. Don’t let him say “but”, Mother. Let us go to a cinema.’ His mother said: ‘Yes, why not? I will finish the cooking in a moment and be ready.’

‘All right,’ Srinivas said, unable to refuse this duty.

All night his head seethed with ideas and would not let him snatch even a wink. Haifa dozen times he interrupted a possible coming sleep to get up, switch on the light, and jot down notes. He got up late next day and rushed to his office. He knew no peace till he was back at his untidy table. He seized his rose-coloured penholder, dipped it in the inkpot, and kept dipping it there, as if excavating something out of its bed. The sheets before him filled up, and he became unconscious of the passing of time, till he heard a car stop and the shout from below: ‘Editor!’ He concluded a sentence he had begun, and put away his pen as footsteps approached.

Somu and Sampath sat in their chairs. ‘We have just come from the studio – took a few test shots with the camera.’ Sampath pointed at Somu and said: ‘They have taken five hundred feet of our friend entering the studio. He makes such a fine screen personality, you know.’ Somu tried to blush and remarked: ‘It’s a good camera, sir, it has cost us forty thousand.’

‘Forty thousand!’ Srinivas exclaimed. The scales of value in this world amazed him. All calculations were in terms of thousands. ‘Where do they find all this money?’ he wondered.

‘Everything is ready,’ Sampath said. ‘Camera at forty thousand; De Mello costing a thousand rupees a month, and other executives spending ten thousand in all – all waiting; but where is the story?’ Srinivas felt that he was somehow responsible for keeping the great engines of production waiting. Sampath added: ‘If we have a story ready –’

‘We can go into production next month.’ Somu confessed: ‘I have tried to jot down a few ideas for a story. I don’t know if it will look all right.’ He fumbled in his pocket, but Sampath, stretching out his arm, prevented the other from bringing out his paper, saying at the same time: ‘Well, Editor, we rely upon you to give us something today.’

Srinivas cleared his throat and said: ‘Here is an outline. See if you can use it.’ He read on. The others listened in stony silence. The hero of the story was one Ram Gopal, who had devoted his life to the abolition of the caste system and other evils of society. His ultimate ambition in life was to see his motherland freed from foreign domination. He was a disciple of Gandhi’s philosophy, practising
ahimsa
(non-violence) in thought, word and deed, and his philosophy was constantly being put to the test till in the end a dilemma occurred when through circumstances a single knife lay between him and a would-be assailant; it was within the reach of both; it was a question of killing or getting killed …

Srinivas had not decided how to end his story. The other two listened in grim silence. Somu looked visibly distressed. He looked at Sampath as if for help in expressing an opinion. ‘It is a beautiful story, Editor. I wish I had the press so that we might print and broadcast it.’

‘You see,’ Srinivas explained. ‘This is the greatest message we can convey, the message of Gandhiji in terms of an experience. Don’t you agree?’

‘Yes,’ Sampath replied a little uncomfortably. Somu fidgeted in his seat. There was an uncomfortable pause, and Sampath said: ‘But we need something different for films.’

‘Do you mean to say that this cannot be done in a film?’ Srinivas asked as calmly as he could. He felt slightly irritated by this cold reception, but told himself: ‘Take care not to be violent in discussing a story of non-violence. They are entitled to their
view.’ Somu cleared his voice and ventured to mutter within his throat: ‘You see, we must have romance in the story.’

‘Romance!’ Srinivas gasped. ‘What sort of romance?’

‘You see, we are bound to engage a leading lady who will cost us at least two thousand a month, and we have got to give her a suitable role.’

Sampath said: ‘Of course, the type of subject you think of needs much skill and experience in making. Only Russians or Americans would be able to tackle it. I have just been glancing through a book by Pudovkin. De Mello lent me his copy. There is a great deal in it for us to learn, but it will take time. You see, our public –’

‘Don’t abuse the public, please,’ said Srinivas.

‘We have got to be practical in this business …’

Srinivas was amazed at the speed with which they seemed to imbibe ready-made notions (including Pudovkin, whom everyone in the studio mentioned at least once a day: it was a sort of trade-mark).

‘I would like to see that book myself,’ Srinivas said. ‘Yes, I will bring it down tomorrow,’ Sampath said. ‘You will see what our difficulties are. After all, we are making a start. After we have made three or four films we shall perhaps gain confidence enough to take up a subject like yours, but now we have to move on safe ground.’ Somu kept up an accompanying murmur, stamping his approval on all that Sampath was saying. Srinivas saw their point, their limitations and their exigencies. He merely said: ‘Well, I was viewing it differently. Let us consider the question afresh.’ Somu sat up, his face beamed with relief. He quickly plunged his hand into his pocket and brought out a roll of paper and his spectacle case. He put his glasses on and read too quickly for Sampath to check him:
‘Krishna Leela
– the boyhood of Krishna and his friends, up to his killing of the demon
Kamsa
–’ He looked up to add: ‘I was talking to my grand-aunt, you know how our people are a treasure-house of stories, and she mentioned these stories one by one. You see, we can do wonderful camera tricks, and Krishna will always be popular with our audience. Or if you don’t like it’ – he went on to the next –‘the burning of Lankha by the Monkey-god Hanuman; the disrobing
of Draupadi by the villainous gambler Duryodhana; the battle of Kurukshetra, and teaching of Bhagavad Gita; the pricking of the vanity of Garuda – the Divine Eagle, who served as God’s couch …’ And so he continued for over twenty subjects, all from the epics and mythology. The grand-aunt, like all grand-aunts, was really a treasure-house, and Somu did not hesitate to draw on it to its fullest capacity.