‘You!’ said Kalpana Gaur, reviving.
‘Me!’ said Haresh, pleased with his restorative powers.
‘You’re every bit as good-looking as when I used to admire you during Dr Mathai’s lectures on Byron.’
‘And you’re just as charming as when all of us were laying ourselves and our cloaks under your feet.’
A slight tinge of sadness entered the smile on Kalpana Gaur’s face. Since she had been one of the very few girls at St Stephen’s, she had been in natural demand. She was quite pretty too in those days; indeed, perhaps she still was. But for some reason none of her boyfriends remained boyfriends for long. She had a very decided personality and fairly soon took to telling them what they should do with their lives and studies and work. She began to mother them or perhaps brother them (since she was something of a tomboy) – and this sooner or later took the edge off their romantic excitement. They even began to find her vivacity overpowering, and sooner or later edged away from her – with guilt on their side and pain on hers. This was a great pity, for Kalpana Gaur was a lively, affectionate, and intelligent woman, and deserved some recompense for the help and happiness she gave others.
In Haresh’s case, she had never really stood a chance. He was very fond of her at college, but his heart was then – as it was now – with Simran, a Sikh girl, the sweetheart of his adolescence whose family was determined that she should not marry him because he was not a Sikh.
Mutual compliments having been exchanged, Haresh and Kalpana started talking about the old days even before catching up on what had happened to them since they had last written to each other two years ago. Mr Gaur had gone inside; young people, he found, had remarkably little of interest to say.
Suddenly Kalpana Gaur got up. ‘Do you remember my good-looking aunt?’ She sometimes referred to Mrs Rupa Mehra as her aunt although, strictly speaking, she was nothing of the kind.
‘No,’ said Haresh. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever met her. But I remember you used to talk about her.’
‘Well, she’s staying with us at the moment.’
‘I’d like to meet her,’ said Haresh.
Kalpana went to fetch Mrs Rupa Mehra, who had been writing letters in her room.
She was dressed in a brown-and-white cotton sari, slightly crushed – she had been resting half an hour before – and Haresh thought her very fine-looking. His eyes crinkled into a smile as he stood up; Kalpana introduced them.
‘Khanna?’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra, wheels whirring.
The young man, she noted, was well dressed, in a cream-coloured silk shirt and a pair of fawn trousers. He had a pleasant, squarish face. And he was fairly fair.
Mrs Rupa Mehra for once didn’t say much during the ensuing conversation. Although Haresh had been to Brahmpur just a few months ago, it didn’t come up, and nor did any common names, so there was no obvious point of entry for her. Anyway, Kalpana Gaur had steered the conversation towards Haresh’s recent history, and Mrs Rupa Mehra listened with growing interest. Haresh, for his part, was happy to regale Kalpana with some of his recent achievements and exploits. He was an energetic man, with a great deal of optimism and self-confidence, and was not hindered by too delicate a sense of modesty.
Haresh found his work at the Cawnpore Leather & Footwear Company fascinating, and assumed that everyone else would too. ‘I’ve only been at CLFC a year, but I’m establishing a whole new department – and I’ve got them orders that they didn’t have the know-how or the initiative to get themselves. But there’s no future in it, that’s the trouble. Ghosh is the top man, and it’s all family owned, and can’t aspire to anything really. All of them are Bengalis.’
‘Bengali entrepreneurs?’ said Kalpana Gaur.
‘Sounds odd, doesn’t it?’ agreed Haresh. ‘Ghosh is an impressive man, though. Tall, self-made. He has a construction business that he runs from Bombay. This is only one of his interests.’
Mrs Rupa Mehra nodded in approval. She liked the idea of self-made people.
‘Anyway, I’m not a political fellow,’ continued Haresh, ‘and there’s far too much politics among the officers at CLFC. Far too much office politics and not enough work. And three hundred and fifty a month is not much for the kind of work I’m doing. It’s just that I had to find the first job I could when I came back from England. I was broke, so I had no choice.’ The memory did not appear to disturb him.
Mrs Rupa Mehra looked at Haresh anxiously.
He smiled. His eyes now crinkled up almost completely. He had once been promised ten rupees by his college friends to keep his eyes open when he smiled, and he had not been able to earn it.