The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (12 page)

Remove the Curtain of your Heart and see the Beloved sitting inside yourself. Close your Ears to the Outside and hear the Cosmic Sound going on within you.

M
IRA, POET-SAINT OF
R
AJASTAN

“W
hen they shake their heads, Evelyn, they don’t mean no, they mean
yes
.”

“Well, not quite,” said her husband. “They mean
yes if that’s what you want it to be
.”

“Don’t complicate things, Douggy. You’re confusing her.” Jean turned back to Evelyn, leaning across the aisle. “You see it of course in shops and things in England, but in India it’s sort of symptomatic of the whole subcontinent, of their philosophy—of their very Indianness.” She sank back in her seat to let a passenger pass. Dinner was finished and people were making their way to the toilets. They stood in a queue, exposed in their need. Jean Ainslie leaned over again. “It’s an acceptance of karma.”

“Plus a strong sense of hospitality,” said Douglas. “Pleasing the visitor to their country—”

“You can’t ask a straight question, like how long is something going to take,” said Jean. “It’ll take as long as you want it to take—”

“And if you get rattled it only makes it worse,” Douglas shouted over his wife’s head. He was sitting in the seat next to hers. “You just have to go with the flow—”

“We’ve learnt that, haven’t we, darling?”

“Learnt it on our first trip—”

“Trekking in the Himalayas—a wonderful experience, wasn’t it, Douggy?”

“Wonderful.”

“Extraordinary.”

The retirement company had put Evelyn together with the Ainslies; it was their policy, apparently, to arrange for people to travel on the same flight if it was at all possible. Evelyn felt relieved to have made friends so soon, and with such a pleasant couple. The Ainslies were obviously seasoned travelers; they seemed to have been everywhere. What an indomitable pair! Even in their sixties they had still been driving around Europe in their camper van. In comparison, Evelyn’s life seemed timid and dwindled.

“Our other visit, we did the Golden Triangle,” said Douglas. “Delhi, Agra, Jaipur—”

“We even went to Jaisalmer,” said his wife. “That was in the days before anybody went there—”

“Miles away in the Thar Desert—”

“Nowadays of course it’s full of coach parties, but then it was quite extraordinary, wasn’t it, Doug?”

“Fantastic.” He beamed across at Evelyn. “Well, you only have the one life, haven’t you?”

Evelyn was about to reply that in India it seemed you didn’t, but she couldn’t recall the details of the conversation with Beverley. It sounded so ludicrous now; she would only make a fool of herself.

“A couple of vagabonds, that’s us,” said Jean.

Suddenly, Evelyn missed Hugh so fiercely it took her breath away. Hugh’s smiling face, that awful old jumper he refused to throw out, Hugh’s skin flayed by the wind as they tacked out of Chichester Harbor.
“Ready, old girl?”
Evelyn ducked as the boom swung around. He called both Evelyn and his boat (the
Marie-Louise
) “old girl,” and with the same exasperated affection. She and Hugh had been vagabonds, too, in their way, clinging together in this disorienting world with their children mutating into strangers.

“All you need is an open mind,” said Jean.

“And a cast-iron gut,” said Douglas.

This, of course, was one of Evelyn’s greatest worries. What if she fell ill with dysentery or hepatitis? Typhoid, even? Some health tips had been included in the brochure—always eat peeled fruit, only drink boiled water—but the very mention of digestive disorders set her tummy fluttering. She already felt queasy, even though she had only consumed a British Airways dinner of chicken Provençal and apple crumble.

When she tentatively voiced her fears, Douglas said: “Don’t you worry, Evelyn. Everyone gets Delhi belly—”

“It’s part of the Indian experience,” said his wife.

“You should see their loos! Talk about the Black Hole of Calcutta—”

“Doug, stop it! You’re alarming her.” Jean turned back to Evelyn. “Don’t mind him. He’s always had a wacky sense of humor.” On her fingers, Jean ticked off the items they had packed. “Water purification tablets, mozzie nets, Senokot …”

Evelyn drifted off. She thought of safe old Britain, left behind them as they hurtled through the night. Of course nothing was safe, she had realized that: your husband, your home, your money—all could be stripped away. But to fly across the world! The bravado with which she had signed the acceptance form, that startling burst of rebellion, had long since disappeared.

“The thing is, I haven’t traveled much on my own,” she said. “Since my husband died—”

“Ha! Count yourself lucky,” said Jean. “Honestly, Doug can be more trouble than he’s worth, always rushing up to people and talking to them in pidgin English, always dragging me off to see some old ruin or other. Sometimes one just wants to relax, don’t you think?”

“Oh yes, I—”

“But I’m not really a beach person, am I, Doug? I mean, people said why don’t we retire to Spain or Portugal, somewhere like that, but there’s nothing to
do
, is there? I mean, imagine a lot of old biddies sitting around knitting—we’d die of boredom wouldn’t we, darling?”

Evelyn was silent. Implicit in this, of course, was her own status as an old biddy.
I’m not really!
she wanted to cry. She thought of Hugh’s hands. Of course she missed his face, his voice, the whole Hughness of him—the smell of his skin, his barks of laughter—but it was his hands she missed just now … his forefinger rubbing a smudge of earth off her face when she straightened up from her weeding; his hand slipping into hers at night, when she turned over in bed. Sometimes they laced their fingers like teenagers. She longed for him to be beside her, the bigness of him, shifting in his seat. She longed for him so much that her ribs ached.

“How did you hear about this place?” asked Jean. “Our son suggested it—he makes documentaries for the BBC.”

“How nice,” said Evelyn. She was going to say that her manicurist suggested it, but hearing Beverley’s voice in her head—
“What a hoot!”
—made her miss her.

“Adam knows us so well—”

“That’s our son—”

“He knew this was just our sort of place. We’ve always been adventurous, haven’t we, Doug?”

Douglas nodded. “Though we’d draw the line at bungee-jumping.”

“You’re as young as you feel,” said Jean.

“Young people are drawn to India, aren’t they?” said Evelyn. “Theresa, my daughter—you may have seen her in the departure lounge—she goes to ashrams.” Of course, Theresa was no longer young. She was forty-nine. Theresa’s own children, if she had had any, would be grown up now. This gave Evelyn a scooped-out feeling. “Has your son had any children?”

Jean shook her head. “Of course there’ve been plenty of girls who’ve been keen enough, but he hasn’t found the right one yet.” There was a silence. Jean closed her eyes and sank back in her seat.

Later, Evelyn tried to sleep but her old heart went pitter-patter. How could she cope with the terrors ahead when even the idea of catching a connecting flight filled her with dread? Beyond lay the unknown—a void.

Lead us, heavenly Father, lead us

O’er the world’s tempestuous sea;

Guard us, guide us, keep us, feed us,

For we have no help but Thee.

All her life Evelyn had sat in a pew, boxed in by certainties, mouthing the words alongside first her parents and then her husband. One by one they had deserted her, leaving her among strangers.

On the third day He rose again …

Where were they now? The cabin lights were dimmed; for these hours of the night she and the other souls were in the care of the captain, whose disembodied voice warned them of turbulence ahead. Evelyn sat there, her seat belt securely buckled. Under the blanket her hands sought each other. Her fingers laced together. Round and round she pushed her wedding ring; nowadays it moved easily on her finger.

Across the aisle Jean Ainslie was asleep. Her mouth hung open, slackly. Sleep aged her; only the blanket, rising and falling, showed that she wasn’t already a corpse. Evelyn thought: These people will be my last new friends, this couple and whoever is there awaiting me at the hotel. She thought: I must make the strange into the familiar. Have I got the courage to do this, at my time of life?

She knew, of course, that she had no choice. Wherever she went, this was what she had to do now. Even if she came home again, which she might, this same situation would face her.

The Indian gentleman on her left side, to whom she hadn’t talked, was snoring. His head lolled an inch from her shoulder. Evelyn shifted in her seat, trying to find a comfortable position. Her joints were stiffening.

“Try this.”

Douglas leaned across his sleeping wife. He passed an object to Evelyn.

“It’s a neck cushion,” he said. “I’ve blown it up for you.”

“But you can’t—”

“Go on, take it. Makes all the difference.” He smiled at her, his face illuminated by the reading light. The beam shone down onto his thick white hair; it reminded her of the heavenly ray piercing through the clouds in her
Child’s Book of Bible Stories
. “Sweet dreams,” Douglas said. “See you in India.”

Break the boundaries of limited mind and body. Experience bliss throughout yourself and around yourself. Find yourself in the Ultimate.

S
WAMI
P
URNA

R
azia was still sulking. Her sulks could last for weeks; this one had. It was now the beginning of October and Minoo, usually an amiable man, was losing patience.

“Please, my dear love, my lotus blossom—” He tried to put his arms around her but she pulled away.

“What did I do wrong, to be married to a duffhead like you? You and that man, in cahoots together, wheeling and dealing behind my back, and I—silly me—I was thinking we could sell this place and enjoy a peaceful old age—”

“Please keep your voice down—”

“They’re all deaf—”

“But isn’t it going swimmingly?” asked Minoo.

“Swimmingly?” Razia hoisted her sari over her shoulder. “Always they’re complaining—the heat, the mosquitoes, the food—”

“No more complaints than is usual—”

“But those guests, they
left
! Now we’re stuck with these ones, day in and day out; you have no consideration, I’m worn down to the bone, look at me, oh I should have listened to my family!”

Minoo nearly added:
I should have listened to mine
. He didn’t care to voice this, however; it would only inflame things further. His stomach churned; arguments with his wife affected his digestive organs.

“A
prosperous
old age!” snapped Razia.

“Aren’t we making a good profit now? Look at the figures. Sonny said that within three years—”