Of Marriageable Age (38 page)

Aunt Sophie came to Fairwinds to take matters in hand. A week after her arrival Fiona disappeared. All efforts to find her failed.

Mrs Lindsay announced she could not bear India a day longer, could not face her friends and acquaintances, could never live down the shame. And then there was David. He was the heir to a fortune, and too foolish, too emotional, to be left on his own. He must be taken in hand; a suitable alliance must be found, and in his guilt he would comply. She took a ship back to England, planning to buy a London house and settle there and then send for her husband. The Admiral, accompanied by Aunt Sophie, Joseph and Khan, followed after six months. Fairwinds was boarded up, deserted, the garden given back to nature.

30

CHAPTER THIRTY

NAT

London, 1969

H
AVING MADE
the commitment to return home, Nat had second thoughts. He wasn’t so sure he could actually keep the commitment. He envisaged himself walking through the village street, climbing into a rickshaw, buying oranges at a market stall, leaning over a patient to dress a wound in his father's surgery, and it all seemed impossible, the stuff of dreams; it had never happened, could never happen, not to him, not to Nat. He closed his eyes and tried to bring back that moment of truth soon after Henry's first visit when he had known, simply
known,
that he had to go back, that this, his London life, was the dream. That his life here was the surrogate and India the real. But that moment had flown, and Nat could no longer bring it to mind, and furthermore, he did not want to. Going back to India was to cross an abyss too deep, too dangerous for words; not even in his mind could he make that leap. The more he thought of India the more the fear grew.

He thought of his father, and his father's hopes for him. Doctor had given his life to the service of the poor and there was no trace left in him of that grasping, hungry little worm called selfhood. Doctor's life began in service and ended in service, and should the lowliest ragged beggar drag himself dying to Doctor's door at midnight, then Doctor would be there for him, and either fight to ward off death or be with him till death arrived, whichever was more appropriate.

In his youth, Nat would have jumped to his feet to stand by his father through the hours to fight or to wait for death, and those hours had not seemed difficult, nor wasted, nor diminishing. But thinking of it now filled Nat with something near panic; he could not! This was the life his father had chosen for himself but it was grossly unfair to expect his son to do the same. Such sacrifice of selfhood must come voluntarily, or not at all. Doctor apparently had no personal needs whatsoever. But Nat knew all too well his own needs, needs that demanded satisfaction without cease.

But his commitment to return was binding and he could not back out. Keeping his given word was one of the sacred duties Doctor had upheld so well that Nat could no more go back on a promise than he could cut off his own hand.

He needed a valid excuse not to go, but there was none. There had been no problem getting leave from work. Summer was a quiet time for catering with hardly any Indian weddings or other celebrations, so Bill Chatterji was closing his business anyway for two months and going to his maternal relations in Maharashtra, and Nat could not lie and tell Henry he couldn't get leave when he could.

What he could do was work out some kind of a compromise that would satisfy everyone's wishes and not break any promises, and Nat spent the last weeks before his departure thinking out just such a compromise. He wrote a long letter to his old friend Govind Bannerji, explaining the situation. Sealed the envelope, addressed it, stamped and posted it. There! That done, Nat felt much, much better.

B
Y THEIR LAST
night in London, which he spent with the Baldwins, he was feeling quite satisfied with himself, and even looked forward to India. Seek and you will find, he thought. He could kill two birds with one stone: visit his father, and make the most of what India had to offer.

The following morning Sheila drove them to Heathrow. They were flying via Colombo instead of via Bombay because, Henry said, changing planes at Bombay was always such chaos since you didn't only change planes, you changed airports and they'd have to take a bus from Bombay International to Bombay National, whereas Colombo airport was international, thus much easier for passengers in transit.

They were well on their way to Colombo, cruising somewhere over the Middle East, about an hour after the Abu Dhabi stop, before Nat told Henry that he would not, after all, go to the village right away, but first spend a few weeks in Ceylon.

'I need some time to myself, Henry. I feel utterly exhausted in body and mind. I've been going on full power for years and now I'm absolutely burned out. All I can do right now is just lie on the beach and, well, recover. Find myself again.'

'That’s your freedom for you, lad. Saps a man's strength.'

'Look, Henry, if you're going to be judgmental then we can stop this conversation right here and you just go on alone and don't bother explaining to Dad. But…'

'Don't say a word more, Nat. I understand. When can I tell Doctor to expect you?'

'Well . . .' Nat hesitated, for Henry did little to conceal his disapproval. Damn Henry. Why did he always have to lay a guilt trip on him, Nat?

'Well?'

'Henry, to be honest, I can't give you a fixed date. I thought after Ceylon I'd travel around a bit. See a bit of India, you know. When people ask me about the Taj Mahal it's a bit embarrassing to admit I've never seen the damn thing! I'd like to see Delhi, Kashmir, the Himalayas. Maybe Nepal. The usual. There's plenty of time. And then I plan to visit the Bannerjis in Bangalore. After that I’ll come to the village.'

'I see. The usual tourist trail. I suppose you'll also take in a few gurus standing on their heads in caves and some fakirs sleeping on nail beds. Hope you've got your camera. Well, Nat, go ahead, you won't find me standing in your way. I'll tell your dad and pass your love on to him. Nat sends his love but he's up looking at the Taj Mahal; he'll drop in before he flies back to London.'

Henry reached up and pressed the button for service and a pretty, chocolate-skinned stewardess at once appeared, bending over Nat to smile at Henry, showing teeth as white and flawless as pearls, which unaccountably gave Nat a twinge of jealousy.

'May I help you?' she asked Henry sweetly, and Nat, who hadn't been asked, smiled up at her and asked for a beer to accompany Henry's orange juice. Nat had an aisle seat which he found very pleasant, since it offered him a much better view of the stewardesses moving up and down with such elegant ease, despite the wraps of their saris, which emphasised the roundness of their hips and showed silky brown inches of bare skin between skirt and blouse. They brought back memories which alarmed him as much for the lump they brought to his throat as for their very vagueness. Bangalore girls; the loveliest in the world. Well, it wouldn’t be long before he’d see them again, in person. He hoped Govind would be there; but yes, by now he’d be back and a CEO in the family business. Govind would help him find those girls.

Bangalore seemed as far away as the village — Bangalore, and the laughing, teasing yet discreet Bannerji sisters and the intangible fragrance that to Nat contained the essence of their womanhood, wafting around them as an invisible shield, protecting, upholding, the aura of their dignity, like the sheen on an untouched peach.

Nat squirmed uncomfortably in his seat. He thought of Woman, as he'd once adored her, from afar, never knowing her. But thoughts of women, as he'd known them, kept interfering, lewd pictures: of lascivious, lustful, wanton, carnal, dissolute, lecherous, horny, beckoning… women. He nipped at his beer, closed his eyes, smiled, and gave himself up to the pictures. Sometimes he opened his eyes just a slit and watched the splendid smiling Ceylonese stewardesses swaying up and down the aisle and in his mind he stripped them and had them join the orgy. He wondered if he might get to know one or two of them when they landed at Colombo; if he got a chance he'd have a go. Surely after such a long flight they'd have a few days' break . . . a few days on the beach with a stewardess . . . he'd never had an Indian girl yet, nor, of course, a Ceylonese. It would be nice to penetrate that aura of purity. As long as Henry hovered in the wings he'd have to lie low, but once he'd gone on to Madras Nat would circle in for the kill . . . sunny beaches, sea and surf sang their siren song, and Nat knew he would have company, delicious company.

With a sidewards glance he checked that Henry was asleep. Then he smiled at a passing stewardess and crooked his finger. She bent low to hear what he had to say.

31

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

SAROJ

Georgetown, 1968

T
HROUGH THE MIST
Saroj saw a familiar face: Dr Lachmansingh, smiling down at her. She was floating somewhere in space. Light as air, like a feather, bodiless.

'What… where am I? Where's Ma?'

'It's all right, you're here in the Mercy Hospital.' Dr Lachmansingh's voice was low and soothing.

Saroj remembered the blood.

'What happened? All that blood . . .'

'It's nothing serious. The lining to your womb just got a little too thick so all the blood rushed out. It's all right. Now listen: we're going to give you a D and C, clean out your insides a little. You lost quite a bit of blood so we're going to have to replace it. Your parents are here right now downstairs, having their blood group determined. One of them will have blood matching yours, and will donate blood for you. It's a routine procedure.'

Questions, anxieties crowded her mind. What had caused it? Why her? Why exactly then, at that particular moment? But she was too tired to ask her questions, too tired to think, even. Saroj floated off, into a far off space, a far off time, and dwelt there for an eternity.

When she awoke the room was full of shadows.

Voices. Through the space, through eternity, floating voices, both familiar. Ma, Dr Lachmansingh, talking. Somewhere in the room, behind the bed.

'A slight problem, Mrs Roy . .

A nurse came in through the mist, bustled around the bed. Silence. The nurse left. Again, the voices...

‘…a rare blood group, Mrs Roy and — er — this is, ahem, rather unusual, but neither your blood nor that of your husband… matches…’

'I understand,' said Ma, so calmly she could be talking of the weather.

'That means we need another donor — maybe your two elder children?'

The silence that followed was too long. When Ma broke it her voice trembled slightly, yet was clear, calm and defiant, as if Ma was telling Dr Lachmansingh: this is all the explanation you'll get. Putting him in his place.

'But their blood may not match either… they will want to know why… ask questions…’

'Well… we'll have to go to the blood bank then but you understand: it's a rare group, so…’

Ma's voice now was brisk, decisive, as if she'd figured everything out and made up her mind. 'No, doctor, I have another plan that will save a lot of time and trouble. I will bring somebody with the matching blood.'

Her voice sank. Conspiratorially she continued, 'But please, let this be very discreet… my husband must not know — do you understand? And Saroj; she would be devastated. She must not find out. Never. Just a minute…’

So calm, so serene. As always. Ma, wearing her mask of absolute dispassion. Unmoved. Cold. So far away. Through the distance, each word came to Saroj and etched itself into her mind with the piercing sharpness of a scalpel on untouched skin. No more fuzziness. No more mist.

She heard the slapping of Ma's tiny leather sandals against the soles of her feet as she walked around to the window side of the bed. She could feel Ma's eyes on her face, as if she'd sensed wakefulness. She tried to pull Saroj's hair free but she was lying on it so she stroked her cheek once and rose from the bedside. Saroj kept her eyes closed, pretending sleep.

Once more Ma spoke to Dr Lachmansingh: 'Doctor, can we perhaps talk somewhere else?'

They left the room.

Saroj fought to stay awake, stay conscious, to think, to reflect, hold on to her mother's admission of deep, shameful, unforgivable, scandalous betrayal, but it was her own mind that betrayed her, waving white, feather-like tendrils over her, enclosing her once again and carrying her off into the swirling mists of unknowing.

G
REY MISTS PARTED
; somewhere in a corner a naked bulb burned and she blinked, then turned her head to avoid the glare. Soft hands pushed the hair out of her face.

'Ma . . .' she murmured, and a soft voice said, 'Yes, dear, it's me.' And Saroj saw Ma before her, leaning forward over her in the half-light, but something was wrong… The fragrance? Something… She rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand. Yes, it was Ma, bent over her… No, it was… It was herself! Her own face, her own long hair drawn forward in a single plait heavy on the bedsheet. Her own face… But no, an older, a weary, worried Saroj… The face was near, and it was her own…
Ma is me… we are one…

'Ma . . .' she groaned, and closed her eyes and drifted off to some far heaven.

Other hallucinations came and went. She saw the four-armed Shiva with the cobra around his neck and the moon in his piled-up hair. Shiva disappeared and Nataraj came, Nataraj dancing on the ugly little ego-monster, a majestic, divine, cosmic dance. Gods and goddesses in a heavenly sphere, translucent and shining and lit from within by a cool blue light. Kali with her necklace of skulls, drooling blood. She was outside her body, swirling somewhere far from earth. She heard a holy song from a region beyond time and space and her mind was as wide and endless as the universe itself.

I'm dead! Yet I’m alive! How can that be?

T
HE MISTS PARTED AGAIN
. She was all there, back on earth, trapped in her body on the hospital bed, back from her journey beyond the cloud of unknowing, bringing with her a wealth of confusion, memories mixed with hallucinations.