A Suitable Boy

  Haresh, who liked order, did not disapprove of this at all. He was happy to be working in a well-organized, well-lit, well-knit environment, and was determined to do his best for the company.

  Because he had been started off at the foreman level and granted permission to live in the colony, a number of rumours had begun to do the rounds among the workmen. These were enhanced when he was invited to tea with Mr Khandelwal. The first rumour was that the fair, compact, well-dressed Haresh Khanna was actually a Czech, who for purposes best known to himself had decided to pose as an Indian. The second was that he was Mr Khandelwal’s brother-in-law. Haresh did nothing to dispel these rumours, as he found both of them helpful when he wanted to get things done.

  Haresh took an hour’s leave on the day that he had to go to Calcutta for tea with the Chairman. When he arrived at the huge house on Theatre Road—the ‘Praha Residency’ as it was popularly known—he was saluted smartly by the guards. The immaculate lawn, the five cars in the drive (including the Austin Sheerline that he had bodily halted a few days before), the palms lining the drive, the grand mansion itself, all impressed him greatly. The only thing that troubled him a little was that one palm tree was slightly out of line.

  Mr Khandelwal greeted him in a friendly manner, in Hindi. ‘So you have become a Prahaman. Very good.’

  ‘It is because of your kindness—’ began Haresh.

  ‘You’re quite right,’ said Mr Khandelwal, instead of making some self-deprecating rejoinder. ‘It was my kindness all right.’ He laughed. ‘Those crazy Czechs would have got rid of you if they could. Come in, come in. . . . But it was your qualifications that did it. I heard about that pair of shoes.’ He laughed again.

  Haresh was introduced to Mrs Khandelwal, a strikingly attractive woman in her late thirties, dressed in a gold-and-white sari. A diamond nose-stud and diamond earrings and a charming and lively smile added to the dazzling effect.

  Within a few minutes she had sent him off to repair a tap that was not working in the bathroom. ‘We must get it going before the other guests arrive,’ she said in her most charming manner. ‘I hear you are very good with your hands.’

  Haresh, slightly puzzled, went to do as he was bid. It was not a test of any kind—either of the Pavel Havel kind or of his vulnerability to her smile. It was simply that when something needed to be done, Mrs Khandelwal expected everyone around her to do it. When she wanted a handyman, she seized upon any man who was handy. All Indian Prahamen had learned that they could be called upon at any time to do the Queen’s bidding. Haresh didn’t mind; he liked putting things right. He took off his jacket, and wandered through the huge house with a servant until he came to the erring tap. He wondered who these important guests were.

  Meanwhile, the guests themselves were on their way. Meenakshi was quite looking forward to it all. After the yawn that was Brahmpur it was good to be back in Calcutta. Aparna had become a little more placid by spending a few days with her grandmother Mrs Chatterji (which is where she had been parked this evening as well); and even the shiftless Varun (who was also out this evening) was a welcome homecoming sight after the Brahmpur baby smells and the Rudhia relatives and the doddering Maitras.

  This evening was to be a grand one: tea with the Khandelwals; two cocktail parties to follow (at at least one of which she was bound to meet Billy—what would he say, she wondered, when she laughingly told him her news?); then dinner and dancing. She was curious about the Khandelwals, with their grand house and six dogs and five cars, and she was very interested in meeting the upstart cobbler who had designs on Luts.

  The lawns and flowers of the Praha Residency were more than impressive, even for a season when almost nothing bloomed. Mrs Khandelwal, who was an obsessive woman, would have thought nothing of transplanting Kew to Calcutta if it had suited her ends.

  Haresh was back in his jacket by the time he was introduced to the tall young gentleman and his elegant wife, both of whom appeared to be appraising him from a height that was not merely literal. The moment he heard his host’s words—‘Arun Mehra—from Bentsen Pryce’—he realized why. So this was Lata’s Calcutta brother.

  ‘Very pleased to meet you,’ said Haresh, shaking Arun’s hand in perhaps too firm a grip. This was his first real meeting with a brown sahib. They had never been a part of his life. When he had lived for a while in Patiala he had often wondered why people made such a fuss about the young man from Imperial Tobacco or Shell or some other foreign firm who was based in the town or travelling through, not realizing that for a mere trader such a member of the comprador classes was a man important beyond his years; he could dispense and revoke agencies, he could make or break one’s fortune. He invariably travelled around in a car with a chauffeur, and a car with a chauffeur in a small town was a great thing.

  Arun for his part was thinking: short; a bit brash; something about his manner of dressing that’s a bit flashy; has too good an opinion of himself.

  But they all sat down to tea, and the opening moves of the conversation were made by the women. Meenakshi noticed that the Rosenthal service in white and gold too perfectly matched her hostess’s sari. Typical of these people! she thought. They try too hard.

  She looked around the room for something to praise. She couldn’t very well praise the heavy furniture, most of which was in rather overdone taste, but there was a Japanese painting that she quite liked: two birds and a bit of calligraphy.

  ‘That’s a lovely painting, Mrs Khandelwal,’ said Meenakshi. ‘Where did you get it?’

  ‘From Japan. Mr Khandelwal went on a trip there—’

  ‘From Indonesia,’ said Mr Khandelwal. It had been given to him by a Japanese businessman at a conference in Djakarta that he had attended on behalf of Praha India.

  Mrs Khandelwal flashed her eyes at him, and he quailed.

  ‘I know what you got and when,’ said Mrs Khandelwal.

  ‘Yes, yes—’ said her husband in rather a worried tone.

  ‘Nice furniture!’ said Haresh, in the belief that this was the kind of small talk that needed to be made.

  Meenakshi looked at him and forbore from comment.

  But Mrs Khandelwal gazed at him with her sweetest, most charming expression. He had provided her with an opportunity to say what she had been waiting to say. ‘Do you think so?’ she asked Haresh. ‘It has been done by Kamdar’s—Kamdar’s of Bombay. Half our rooms are decorated by them.’

  Meenakshi looked at the heavy corner settee—in dark, solid wood with dark-blue upholstery. ‘If you like this sort of thing, you can always get it in Calcutta,’ she said. ‘There’s the Chowringhee Sales Bureau, for instance, for old-fashioned furniture. And if you want something more modern in style, there’s always Mozoomdar. It’s a little less’—she paused for a word—‘a little less ponderous. But it depends on your taste. These pakoras are delicious,’ she added by way of compensation, helping herself to another one.

  Her bright laugh tinkled across the china, though there was nothing very obviously humorous in her previous remarks.

  ‘Oh, but I think,’ said Mrs Khandelwal, oozing charm, ‘I do think that the quality of workmanship and the quality of wood at Kamdar’s is unbeatable.’

  And the quality of distance, thought Meenakshi. If you lived in Bombay, you’d be importing your furniture from Calcutta. Aloud she said: ‘Well, Kamdar’s is Kamdar’s, of course.’

  ‘Do have some more tea, Mrs Mehra,’ said Mrs Khandelwal, pouring it out herself.

  She was exquisitely charming, and believed in winning people over—including women. Though she suffered from some insecurity because of her past background, she was never aggressive with them. It was only where sweetness didn’t work that she gave vent to fury.

  Mr Khandelwal appeared to be getting impatient. After a little while he excused himself to get a breath of fresh air. He came back a minute or two later, smelling of cardamoms and looking happier.

  Mrs Khandelwal viewed him with suspicion when he returned, but he look
ed completely innocent.

  Suddenly, without warning, three large Alsatians bounded into the room, barking frenetically. Haresh was bewildered and almost spilled his tea. Arun jumped up. Khandelwal was perplexed; he wondered how they could have got in. Only the two women remained cool. Meenakshi was used to the vicious Cuddles and was fond of dogs. And Mrs Khandelwal turned on them in a low, commanding hiss:

  ‘Sit down! Down, Cassius, down—down—Crystal—down, Jalebi!’

  The three dogs sat down in a line, trembling and silent. Each of them knew that if they disobeyed, Mrs Khandelwal would have thought nothing of whipping them unmercifully there and then.

  ‘See—’ said Mrs Khandelwal, ‘see how sweet he is, my Cassius, look at him, my little pet—how unhappy he looks. He didn’t mean to disturb anyone.’

  ‘Well,’ said Arun, ‘I’m afraid my wife is in rather a—a—well, a delicate state, and these sudden shocks—’

  Mrs Khandelwal, horrified, turned on her husband. ‘Mr Khandelwal,’ she said in a tone of absolute authority, ‘do you know what you have done? Do you have any idea?’

  ‘No,’ said Mr Khandelwal in fear and trembling.

  ‘You have left the door open. That is how these three beasts have entered. Take them out at once and close the door.’

  Having dispatched the dogs and her husband, she turned—dripping concern—towards Meenakshi.

  ‘My poor Mrs Mehra, I cannot apologize enough. Have another pakora. Have two. You must build up your strength.’

  ‘Excellent tea, Mrs Khandelwal,’ said Haresh bravely.

  ‘Do have another cup. We get our own blend directly from Darjeeling,’ said Mrs Khandelwal.

  13.31

  There was a pause, and now Haresh decided to beard the lion.

  ‘You must be Lata’s brother,’ he said to Arun. ‘How is Lata?’

  ‘Very well,’ said Arun.

  ‘And your mother?’

  ‘Very well, thank you,’ said Arun, with some hauteur.

  ‘And the baby?’

  ‘The baby?’

  ‘Your niece.’

  ‘Flourishing, no doubt.’

  There was another pause.

  ‘Do you have any children?’ asked Haresh of Meenakshi.

  ‘Yes,’ said Meenakshi. ‘A girl.’

  This cobbler, she decided, would make a very poor rival to Amit.

  Arun turned to Haresh and said: ‘What is it you do exactly, Mr Khanna? I understand you’ve been taken on by Praha in some sort of position. A managerial position, I presume.’

  ‘Well, not managerial,’ said Haresh. ‘I am in a supervisory position at the moment, though my previous job was managerial. I decided to take this job because it has more of a future.’

  ‘Supervisory?’

  ‘I am a foreman.’

  ‘Ah! A foreman.’

  ‘Praha usually starts people on the shop floor, not even in supervisory jobs.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Arun took another sip of tea.

  ‘James Hawley offered me a managerial job—’ began Haresh.

  ‘I could never understand why the Cromarty Group hasn’t moved its head office to Calcutta,’ said Arun in a distant manner. ‘Puzzling that they should wish to remain a provincial concern. Ah well.’

  Meenakshi felt that Arun was being too unfriendly. ‘You’re from Delhi originally, aren’t you, Mr Khanna?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, indeed,’ said Haresh. ‘And I went to St Stephen’s College.’

  ‘And then, I understand, you went to England for your education. Was that to Oxford or to Cambridge?’

  ‘I went to the Middlehampton College of Technology.’

  There was silence for a few seconds, only interrupted by Mr Khandelwal’s return. He was looking even happier. He had an arrangement with the watchman to keep a bottle of whisky and a glass for him at the gate, and he had mastered the art of gulping down a peg in five seconds flat.

  Arun continued his conversation with Haresh: ‘What plays have you seen recently, Mr Khanna?’ Arun named a few that were running in London.

  ‘Plays?’

  ‘Well, since you’ve come from England, I presume you would have taken the opportunity to visit the theatre.’

  ‘I didn’t have much of an occasion to see plays in the Midlands,’ said Haresh. ‘But I did see a large number of films.’

  Arun received this information without comment. ‘Well, I expect you visited Stratford; it’s not far from Middlehampton.’

  ‘I did,’ said Haresh, relieved. This was worse than Novak, Havel and Kurilla put together.

  Arun began to talk about the restoration of Anne Hathaway’s cottage, and by slow degrees moved from the provinces to post-war reconstruction work in London.

  Meenakshi talked about friends of hers who were doing up a mews off Baker Street.

  From there the conversation moved to hotels. At the mention of Claridges, Mr Khandelwal, who always booked a suite there whenever he visited London, said:

  ‘Oh, yes, Claridges. I have a good relation with Claridges. The manager always asks me, “Is everything to your satisfaction, Mr Khandelwal?” And I always say, “Yes, it is all to my satisfaction.”’ He smiled, as if at a private joke.

  Mrs Khandelwal looked at him with suppressed anger. She suspected that his trips to London had a carnal as well as a business element to them, and she was right. Sometimes she would phone him up in the middle of the night to ensure that he was where he had said he would be. If he complained, which he rarely dared to do, she would tell him that she had mixed up her time zones.

  ‘What do you like best about London—when you do happen to go there?’ asked Arun, turning to Haresh.

  ‘The pubs, of course,’ said Haresh. ‘No matter where you go you bump into a pub. One of my favourites is that wedge-shaped pub near Trafalgar Square—the Marquis of Anglesey—or is it the Marquis of Granby?’

  Mr Khandelwal looked somewhat interested, but Arun, Meenakshi, and Mrs Khandelwal gave a collective shudder. Haresh was behaving like a real bull among the Rosenthal.

  ‘Where do you buy toys for your daughter?’ asked Mrs Khandelwal quickly. ‘I am always telling Mr Khandelwal to buy toys from England. They make such good gifts. People are always being born in India and I don’t know what to give them.’

  Arun quickly, and with accuracy and aplomb, gave the names of three toyshops in London, but ended with a hymn to Hamleys:

  ‘I always believe, though, Mrs Khandelwal, that one should go for the tried and tested stores. And really, there still is nothing to compare with Hamleys. Toys from top to bottom—nothing but toys on every floor. And it’s done up beautifully at Christmas. It’s on Regent Street, not far from Jaeger’s—’

  ‘Jaeger’s!’ said Mr Khandelwal. ‘That’s where I bought a dozen sweaters last month.’

  ‘When were you last in England, Mr Mehra?’ asked Haresh, who was feeling left out of the conversation.

  But something appeared to have got stuck in Arun’s throat, because he took a handkerchief out of his pocket and began to cough, pointing with his left hand to his Adam’s apple.

  His hostess was all solicitude. She ordered a glass of water for him. The servant brought in a thick tumbler of water on a stainless steel thali. Seeing Meenakshi’s horrified look, Mrs Khandelwal shouted at the servant.

  ‘Is this how you have learned to bring water? I should send you back to the village.’ The steel platter contrasted dreadfully with the gold-and-white tea service. Meenakshi looked still more horrified at the public outburst of her hostess.

  When Arun had recovered, and the drift of the conversation was about to change, Haresh, feeling that Arun might appreciate his interest in him, repeated his question:

  ‘When was the last time you were in England?’

  Arun went red, then collected himself. There was no escape for him. He had to answer the question.

  ‘Well,’ he said with as much dignity as he could muster, ‘as it happens, it might surprise you to
learn that I’ve never actually had the opportunity to go there—but of course we’re going in a few months’ time.’

  Haresh was startled. He would never have dreamed of asking Arun whether he had ever been to England. He felt like laughing, but dared not do so. His eyes, however, disappeared in an expression of amusement. His host and hostess looked startled too.

  Meenakshi began to talk quickly about bridge, and how they simply had to have the Khandelwals over sometime. And after a few minutes of polite conversation the Mehras looked at their watches, exchanged glances, thanked their hosts, got up, and left.

  13.32

  Meenakshi was right. Billy Irani was at the second of the two cocktail parties they went to that evening. Shireen was with him, but Meenakshi managed with some light flirtatious banter to draw him aside in an amusingly public way.

  ‘Do you know, Billy,’ she said, softly and laughingly, in a voice that did not carry, and with an expression that indicated that they were making small talk, ‘do you know that I’m expecting?’

  Billy Irani looked nervous. ‘Yes, Arun mentioned it to me.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Well—should I congratulate you?’

  Meenakshi laughed tinklingly, her eyes cold.

  ‘No, I don’t think that’s a good idea. You might be congratulating yourself in a few months.’

  Poor Billy looked rather haunted.

  ‘But we were careful.’ (Except that once, he thought.)

  ‘I’ve been careful with everyone,’ countered Meenakshi.

  ‘Everyone?’ Billy looked shocked.

  ‘I mean, with you, and with Arun. All right, let’s change the subject, here he comes.’

  But Arun, who had spied Patricia Cox and was determined to be gallant to her, walked past them with a nod. Meenakshi was saying: