They entered the festooned hall; after the brightness outside, it was rather dark; there were a few groups here and there sitting down to lunch. Along the far wall was their own table for eight, created by joining three small square tables together.
‘The hall is used for everything,’ said Haresh. ‘For dining, for dancing, as a cinema hall, and even for important meetings. When Mr Tomin’—and here Haresh’s voice took on a somewhat reverential note—‘when Mr Tomin came here last year, he gave a speech from the podium there. But these days it is used for the dance band.’
‘Fascinating,’ said Arun.
‘How wonderful,’ breathed Mrs Rupa Mehra.
16.14
Mrs Rupa Mehra was very impressed by all the arrangements. A thick white tablecloth and napkins, several sets of knives and forks, good glasses and crockery, and three flower arrangements consisting of an assortment of sweetpeas.
As soon as Haresh and his party entered, two waiters approached the table, and placed some bread on it, together with three dishes containing curlicues of Anchor butter. The bread had been baked under Khushwant’s supervision; he had learned the technique from the Czechs. Varun, who had been walking a little unsteadily, was feeling quite peckish. After a few minutes, when the soup had not yet arrived, he took a slice. It was delicious. He took another.
‘Varun, don’t eat so much bread,’ chided his mother. ‘Can’t you see how many courses there are?’
‘Mm, Ma,’ said Varun, his mouth full, and his mind on other things. When more beer was offered to him, he accepted with alacrity.
‘How lovely the flower arrangements are,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra. Sweetpeas could never take the place of roses in her heart, but they were a lovely flower. She sniffed the air and took in the delicate colours: pale pink, white, mauve, violet, crimson, maroon, dark pink.
Lata was thinking that the sweetpeas made rather an odd arrangement.
Arun displayed his expertise on the subject of bread. He talked about caraway bread and rye bread and pumpernickel. ‘But if you ask me,’ he said (though no one had), ‘there’s nothing like the Indian naan for sheer delicacy.’
Haresh wondered what other kind of naan there was.
After the soup (cream of asparagus) came the first course, which was fried fish. Khushwant made quite a few Czech specialities, but only the simplest and most staple of English dishes. Mrs Rupa Mehra found that she was facing a cheese-covered vegetable bake for the second time in two days.
‘Delicious,’ she said, smiling at Haresh.
‘I didn’t know what to ask Khushwant to make for you, Ma; but he thought that this would be a good idea. And he has a treat for the second course, so he says.’
Tears threatened to come to Mrs Rupa Mehra’s eyes at the thought of Haresh’s kindness and consideration. Over the last few days she felt she had been starved of it. Sunny Park was like a zoo and Arun’s explosions had been more frequent as a result. They were all staying together in the same small house, some of them sleeping on mattresses laid out at night in the drawing room. Though the Chatterjis had offered to put the Kapoors up in Ballygunge, Savita had felt that Uma and Aparna should be given the chance to get acquainted with each other. Also, she had quite unwisely wished to recreate the atmosphere of the old days in Darjeeling—or the railway saloons—when the four brothers and sisters had shared the same roof and pleasantly cramped quarters with their father and mother.
Politics was discussed. Results had started coming in from those states that had had early elections. According to Pran, the Congress would make a clean sweep of the elections. Arun did not contest the issue as he had the previous evening. By the end of the fish course politics was exhausted.
The second course was occupied mainly by Haresh impressing the assembled company with various facts of Praha history and production. He mentioned that Pavel Havel had praised him for ‘working very hardly’. Although no communist, there was something in Haresh that resembled a cheerfully Stakhanovite Hero of Labour. He told them with pride that he was only the second Indian in the colony, and mentioned the weekly figure of 3,000 pairs to which he had increased production. ‘I tripled it,’ he added, very happy to share his sense of his own achievement. ‘The welt-stitching operation was the real bottleneck.’
A line from Haresh’s tour of the tannery had stuck in Lata’s mind. ‘All the other processes—glazing, boarding, ironing and so on—are optional, of course.’ She remembered it again now, and saw in front of her the soaking pits, where thin men with orange rubber gloves were pulling swollen hides out of a dark liquid with grappling hooks. She looked down at the delicious skin of her roast chicken. I can’t possibly marry him, she thought.
Mrs Rupa Mehra, on the other hand, had moved several miles forward in the opposite direction, aided by a delicious mushroom vol-au-vent. She had decided not only that Haresh would make an ideal husband for Lata but that Prahapore, with its playground and sweetpeas and protective walls, was the ideal place to bring up her grandsons.
‘Lata has been saying how much she has been looking forward to seeing you in your smart new place,’ Mrs Rupa Mehra fibbed. ‘And now that we have seen it you must come for dinner on New Year’s Day to our place in Sunny Park,’ she added spontaneously. Arun’s eyes opened wide, but he said nothing. ‘And you must tell me if there is anything you particularly like to eat. I am so glad it is not Ekadashi today, otherwise I would not be allowed to have the pastry. You must come in the afternoon, that will give you a chance to speak to Lata. Do you like cricket?’
‘Yes,’ said Haresh, attempting to follow the ball of the conversation. ‘But I’m not a good player.’ He passed a puzzled hand across his forehead.
‘Oh, I’m not talking about playing,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra. ‘Arun will take you in the morning to see the Test match. He has got several tickets. Pran also is so fond of cricket,’ she continued. ‘And then you can come over to the house in the afternoon.’ She glanced at Lata, who, for some unknown reason, was looking quite upset.
What can be the matter with the girl? thought Mrs Rupa Mehra, irritated. Moody, that’s what she is. She doesn’t deserve her good fortune.
Perhaps she did not. At the moment her fortune, Lata couldn’t help musing, was somewhat mixed. In immediate terms it consisted of meat curry and rice; Czech sentences floating across from another table followed by a heavy laugh; a Christmas pudding with brandy sauce that Arun took two helpings of and that Mrs Rupa Mehra took three helpings of, her diabetes notwithstanding (‘But it’s a special day’); coffee; Varun silent and swaying; Meenakshi flirting with Arun and bewildering Haresh with a discussion of the pedigree of Mrs Khandelwal’s dogs; suddenly mentioning that her maiden name was Chatterji, to Haresh’s consternation—from which he recovered by plunging into talk of Praha; too much, far too much talk of Praha and Messrs Havel, Bratinka, Kurilla, Novak; the sense of a pair of co-respondent shoes lurking invisibly under a thick white tablecloth; the sudden view of a pleasant smile—Haresh’s eyes disappearing almost entirely. Amit had said something about a smile—her smile—just the other day—yesterday, was it? Lata’s mind wandered off to the Hooghly beyond the wall, the Botanical Gardens on its banks—a banyan tree—boats on the Ganga—another wall near another Praha factory—a field fringed with bamboos and the quiet sound of bat against ball. . . . She suddenly found herself feeling very sleepy.
‘Are you all right?’ It was Haresh, smiling affectionately.
‘Yes, thanks, Haresh,’ said Lata unhappily.
‘We haven’t had the chance to talk.’
‘It doesn’t matter. We’re meeting on New Year’s Day.’ Lata made an attempt at a smile. She was glad that her latest letters to Haresh had been quite non-committal. She was grateful, in fact, that he had hardly spoken to her at all. What could they talk about? Poetry? Music? Plays? Common friends or acquaintances or members of the family? She was relieved that Prahapore was fifteen miles away from Calcutta.
‘That’s a lovely salmon-pink
sari you’re wearing,’ Haresh ventured.
Lata began to laugh. Her sari was a pale green. She laughed with pleasure and for the sheer relief of it.
Everyone else was amazed. What on earth had got into Haresh—and what on earth had got into Lata?
‘Salmon-pink!’ said Lata, happily. ‘I suppose just “pink” isn’t specific enough.’
‘Oh,’ said Haresh, suddenly looking uncomfortable. ‘It isn’t green, is it?’
Varun gave a scornful snort, and Lata kicked him under the table.
‘Are you colour-blind?’ she asked Haresh with a smile.
‘I’m afraid so,’ said Haresh. ‘But I can see nine out of ten colours accurately.’
‘I’ll wear pink the next time we meet,’ said Lata. ‘Then you can praise it without any uncertainty at all.’
Haresh saw the two cars off after lunch. He knew that he would be the topic of conversation for the next fifteen miles. He hoped that each car contained at least one of his supporters. He sensed once again that neither Arun nor Meenakshi wanted to have anything to do with him, but could not see what more he could have done to try to reconcile them to him.
About Lata he felt completely optimistic. He did not know of any rivals. Perhaps the lunch had been too filling, he thought; she had looked a bit sleepy. But it had gone off as well as expected. As for his colour-blindness, she would have had to find out about it sooner or later. He was glad that he had not asked them to come back to his flat for paan—Kalpana Gaur had warned him in a letter that the Mehras did not approve of paan. He had grown to like Lata so much that he wished he had had more time to speak with her. But he knew that it was not she but her family—and especially Ma—who was the target of today’s exercise. ‘Make 1951 the deciding year of your life,’ he had written earlier in the year in one of his Action Points to himself. There were only three days to the new year. He decided to extend his deadline by a week or two, to the time when Lata would return to her studies in Brahmpur.
16.15
Savita had got into the front seat of the Austin; Arun was driving, and she wanted a word with him. Meenakshi sat at the back. The others went back to Calcutta in the Humber.
‘Arun Bhai,’ said the gentle Savita, ‘what did you mean by behaving like that?’
‘I don’t see what you mean. Don’t be a damned fool.’
Savita was the one person in the family who was not daunted by Arun’s bullying tactics. There was to be no summary closure of debate.
‘Why did you go out of your way to be unpleasant to Haresh?’
‘Perhaps you should ask him that question.’
‘I don’t think he was particularly nasty to you.’
‘Well, he certainly said that Praha was a household word in India and that the same couldn’t be said for Bentsen Pryce.’
‘It’s a fact.’
‘He had no call to say it even if it is.’
Savita laughed. ‘He only said it, Arun Bhai, because you had gone on and on about the Czechs and their crude ways. It was self-defence.’
‘I see you are determined to take his side.’
‘That’s not how I see it. Why couldn’t you at least be civil? Don’t you have any regard for Ma’s feelings—or Lata’s?’
‘I most certainly do,’ said Arun pompously. ‘That is precisely why I think this thing should be nipped in the bud. He is simply the wrong sort of man. A shoemaker in the family!’
Arun smiled. When, on the recommendation of a former colleague of his father’s, he had been asked to appear for an interview at Bentsen Pryce, they had had the wisdom instantly to perceive that he was the right sort of man. You either were or you weren’t, reflected Arun.
‘I don’t see what’s wrong with making shoes,’ said Savita mildly. ‘We’re certainly happy to use them.’
Arun grunted.
‘I think I have a bit of a headache,’ said Meenakshi.
‘Yes, yes,’ continued Arun. ‘I’m driving as fast as I can, considering I’m being distracted by my passenger. We’ll be home soon.’
Savita was quiet for a couple of miles.
‘Well, Arun Bhai, what do you have against him that you didn’t have against Pran? You didn’t have much to say about Pran’s accent either when you first met him.’
Arun knew that he was treading on dangerous ground here, and that Savita would take no nonsense about her husband.
‘Pran’s all right,’ conceded Arun. ‘He’s getting to know the ways of the family.’
‘He has always been all right,’ said Savita. ‘It’s just that the family has adjusted itself to him.’
‘Have it your way,’ said Arun. ‘Just let me drive in peace. Or would you like me to pull over and continue this argument? Meenakshi has a headache.’
‘Arun Bhai, this is not an argument. I’m sorry, Meenakshi, I have to have things out with him before he starts working on Ma,’ said Savita. ‘What is it you have against Haresh? That he isn’t “one of us”?’
‘Well, he certainly isn’t,’ said Arun. ‘He’s a dapper little man with co-respondent shoes, a grinning servant and a big head. I have rarely met anyone so arrogant, opinionated or self-satisfied—and with less cause to be.’
Savita merely smiled in reply. This irritated Arun even more than an answer.
‘I don’t know what you hope to achieve by this discussion,’ he said after a few moments of silence.
‘I just don’t want you to ruin Lata’s chances,’ said Savita seriously. ‘She isn’t too certain about things herself, you know, and I want her to make up her own mind, not to have Big Brother deciding everything for her and laying down the law as usual.’
Meenakshi laughed from the back: a silvery, slightly steely laugh.
A huge lorry came towards them from the other side, almost forcing them off the narrow road. Arun swerved and swore.
‘Do you mind if we continue this conference at home?’ he asked.
‘There are hundreds of people at home,’ said Savita. ‘It will be impossible to make you see sense with all the interruptions. Don’t you realize, Arun Bhai, that offers of marriage do not come raining down from the sky every day? Why are you determined to thwart this one?’
‘There are certainly others who are interested in Lata—Meenakshi’s brother for one.’
‘Amit? Do you really mean Amit?’
‘Yes, Amit. I do really mean Amit.’
Savita immediately thought that Amit would be most unsuitable, but did not say so. ‘Well, let Lata decide for herself,’ she said. ‘Leave it to her.’
‘With Ma fussing around her, she won’t be capable of making up her own mind anyway,’ said Arun. ‘And Ma, as anyone can see, has been well wooed by the foreman. He hardly had a minute for anyone else the whole afternoon. I noticed that he didn’t speak much to you, for example.’
‘I didn’t mind,’ said Savita. ‘I liked him. And I want you to behave decently on New Year’s Day.’
Arun shook his head at the thought of Ma’s sudden, unconsulted invitation to Haresh.
‘Please let me out at New Market,’ said Meenakshi suddenly. ‘I’ll join you later.’
‘But your headache, darling?’
‘It’s all right. I have to buy a few things. I’ll come home in a taxi.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes.’
‘We haven’t upset you?’
‘No.’
When Meenakshi had got down, Arun turned to Savita:
‘You have quite needlessly upset my wife.’
‘Oh don’t be silly, Arun Bhai—and don’t refer to Meenakshi as “my wife”. I think she just can’t face going home to a dozen people. And I don’t blame her. There are too many of us in Sunny Park. Do you think Pran and Uma and I should take up the Chatterjis’ invitation?’
‘That’s another thing. What did he mean by talking about Bengalis in that manner?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Savita. ‘But you do it all the time.’
Aru
n was quiet. Something was troubling him.
‘Do you think she got down because she thought we were going to discuss Amit?’
Savita smiled at the thought of such unlikely delicacy on Meenakshi’s part but simply said, ‘No.’
‘Well,’ said Arun, still stung by the fact that Savita of all people was being so uncompromising in this matter of Haresh, and feeling a little uncertain as a result, ‘you’re getting quite a lot of courtroom practice out of me.’
‘Yes,’ said Savita, refusing to be jollied along. ‘Now promise me you’re not going to interfere.’
Arun laughed in an indulgent, elder-brotherly manner. ‘Well, we all have our opinions—you have yours, and I have mine. And Ma can take whichever she likes. And Lata too, of course. Let’s leave it at that, shall we?’
Savita shook her head, but said nothing.
Arun was trying to be winning, but she was not won.
16.16
Meenakshi made straight for the Fairlawn Hotel, where Billy was waiting for her in his room with a mixture of impatience and uncertainty.
‘You know, Meenakshi, this thing makes me very anxious,’ said Billy. ‘I don’t like it a bit.’
‘I don’t believe it makes you anxious,’ said Meenakshi. ‘Certainly not so anxious that it detracts from your wonderful—’
‘—performance?’ finished Billy.
‘Performance. Just the word. Let’s perform. But be nice to me, Billy. I’m sorry I’m late. I’ve had the most awful time and I have a headache as huge as Buddenbrooks.’
‘A headache?’ Billy was concerned. ‘Shall I ask them to get you a couple of aspirin?’
‘No, Billy,’ said Meenakshi, sitting next to him. ‘I think I have a better cure.’
‘I thought women were supposed to say, “Not tonight, dear, I have a headache,”’ said Billy, helping her with her sari.