A Suitable Boy(192)

Soon after the term was over, instead of getting a job and contributing to expenses, Varun had, to Arun’s annoyance, fallen ill. He was still somewhat weak, and started at loud sounds. Arun told himself that he really had to have a frank talk with his younger brother in the next week or so about how the world did not owe one a living, and about what Daddy would have said had he been alive.

Meenakshi came in with Aparna.

‘Where’s Daadi?’ asked Aparna, looking around the table for Mrs Rupa Mehra.

‘Grandma will be coming in a moment, Aparna precious,’ said Meenakshi. ‘She’s probably reciting the Vedas,’ she added vaguely.

Mrs Rupa Mehra, who recited a chapter or two from the Gita very early each morning, was in fact dressing.

As she came in, she beamed around the table. But when she noticed Aparna’s golden chain, which Meenakshi in an unthinking moment had put around her neck, the smile died on her lips. Meenakshi was blithely unaware of anything being the matter, but Aparna asked a few minutes later: ‘Why are you looking so sad, Daadi?’

Mrs Rupa Mehra finished chewing a bite of fried tomatoes on toast and said: ‘I’m not sad, darling.’

‘Are you angry with me, Daadi?’ said Aparna.

‘No, sweetheart, not with you.’

‘Then with who?’

‘With myself, perhaps,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra. She did not look at the medal-melter, but glanced across at Lata, who was gazing out of the window at the small garden. Lata was more than usually quiet this morning, and Mrs Rupa Mehra told herself that she had to get the silly girl to snap out of this mood. Well, tomorrow there was a party at the Chatterjis, and, like it or not, Lata would have to go.

A car horn sounded loudly outside, and Varun flinched.

‘I should fire that bloody driver,’ said Arun. Then he laughed and added: ‘But he certainly makes me aware when it’s time to leave for the office. Bye, darling.’ He swallowed a gulp of coffee and kissed Meenakshi. ‘I’ll send the car back in half an hour. Bye, Ugly.’ He kissed Aparna and rubbed his cheek against hers. ‘Bye, Ma. Bye, everyone. Don’t forget, Basil Cox will be coming for dinner.’

Carrying his jacket over one arm and his briefcase in the other, he walked, rather, strode out to the little sky-blue Austin outside. It was never clear until the last moment whether Arun would take the newspaper with him to the office; it was part of the general uncertainty of living with him, just as were his sudden switches from anger to affection to urbanity. Today, to everyone’s relief, he let the newspaper remain.

Normally Varun and Lata would both have made a grab for it, and today Varun was disappointed when Lata did not. The atmosphere had lightened since Arun’s departure. Aparna now became the focus of attention. Her mother fed her incompetently, then called for the Toothless Crone to handle her. Varun read bits of the news to her, and she listened with a careful pretence at comprehension and interest.

All Lata could think of was when and where, in this household of two-and-a-half bedrooms and no privacy to speak of, she would find time and space to read her letter. She was thankful that she had been able to take possession of what (though Mrs Rupa Mehra would have disputed this) belonged to her alone. But as she looked out of the window towards the small, brilliantly green lawn with its white tracery of spider-lilies, she thought of its possible contents with a mixture of longing and foreboding.





7.2


MEANWHILE there was work to be done in preparation for the evening’s dinner. Basil Cox, who would be coming over with his wife Patricia, was Arun’s department head at Bentsen & Pryce. Hanif was dispatched to Jagubazaar to get two chickens, a fish, and vegetables, while Meenakshi – accompanied by Lata and Mrs Rupa Mehra – went off to New Market in the car, which had just returned from Arun’s office.

Meenakshi bought her fortnightly stores – her white flour, her jam and Chivers Marmalade and Lyle’s Golden Syrup and Anchor Butter and tea and coffee and cheese and clean sugar (‘Not this dirty ration stuff’) – from Baboralley, a couple of loaves of bread from a shop in Middleton Row (‘The bread one gets from the market is so awful, Luts’), some salami from a cold store in Free School Street (‘The salami from Keventers is dreadfully bland, I’ve decided never to go there again’), and half a dozen bottles of Beck’s beer from Shaw Brothers. Lata tagged along everywhere, though Mrs Rupa Mehra refused to enter either the cold store or the liquor shop. She was astonished by Meenakshi’s extravagance, and by the whimsical nature of some of her purchases (‘Oh, Arun is bound to like that, yes, I’ll take two,’ said Meenakshi whenever the shopkeeper suggested something that he thought Madam would appreciate). All the purchases went into a large basket which a ragged little boy carried on his head and finally took to the car. Whenever she was accosted by beggars, Meenakshi looked straight through them.