12.26
OUT on the lawn, everyone was introduced to everyone else. Savita found herself engaged in a slow and deliberate conversation with Mr Shastri. She found him very interesting. He was telling her about a woman lawyer at the Brahmpur High Court, who was very successful in criminal practice despite the fact that she had had to overcome the reservations of clients, colleagues and judges.
Pran was feeling a bit exhausted, but Savita had insisted on seeing Charlie Chaplin ‘once more before I become a mother and see everything differently’; her grandfather’s Buick, a little the worse for having been requisitioned, had been sent to fetch them. Lata had gone off to one of those evening rehearsals so dreaded by Mrs Rupa Mehra; the director had said that it was necessary to make up for the rehearsals lost because of the student agitation.
Savita was looking happy and energetic, and eating with great appetite the club speciality: small goli kababs, each with a raisin in the middle. The more she talked to Mr Shastri, the more she thought that it would be very interesting to study law.
Pran walked towards the low wall that separated the Subzipore Club lawn from the sands and the river. He looked over it at the brown water and the few slow boats plying silently along. He was thinking that soon, like his father, he would be a father too, and he was doubtful that he would make a good one. I’ll be too worried for my child’s own good, he thought. But in a while he reflected that Kedarnath’s perpetual air of anxiety had not had a damaging effect on Bhaskar. And, he reflected, thinking with a smile of Maan, one can be too carefree as well. Since he was feeling a little out of breath, he leaned against the wall and watched the others from a few yards away.
Mrs Rupa Mehra had started when she heard Dr Durrani’s name. She could hardly believe that her father had known him so well as to invite him for bridge. After all, it had been Dr Kishen Chand Seth to whom she had gone for advice in extremis, and who had told her to get Lata out of Brahmpur as soon as possible in the face of the Durrani threat. Had he deliberately not told her of the acquaintance? Or was it of very recent standing?
Dr Durrani was sitting next to her now, leaning forward slightly in his cane chair, and she was compelled by both politeness and curiosity to swallow her astonishment and talk to him. In response to a question from her, he mentioned that he had two sons.
‘Ah, yes,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra, ‘one of them rescued Bhaskar at the Pul Mela. What a terrible business. How brave of him. Do have another chip.’
‘Yes. Kabir. I fear, though, that the, er, acuity of his, um, um, insight –’
‘Whose? Kabir’s?’
Dr Durrani looked startled. ‘No, er, Bhaskar’s.’
‘Has suffered?’ asked Mrs Rupa Mehra anxiously.
‘Er, quite.’
There was a silence; then Mrs Rupa Mehra asked, ‘And where is he now?’
‘In bed?’ asked Dr Durrani, presenting a question in lieu of a reply.
‘Isn’t it rather early for him to go to bed?’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra, puzzled.
‘As I, er, understand, his mother and er, grandmother, are quite strict. They tuck him up at, er, seven or so these days. Doctor’s orders.’
‘Oh,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra. ‘We have been talking at cross purposes. I meant, what is your son Kabir doing? Was he involved in these recent student activities?’
‘Only after the, er, lamentable, er, injury to that boy…’ He shook his head and his eyelids squeezed themselves together. ‘No, well, he has other interests. At the moment he is, er, rehearsing in a play… er, is something the matter? Dear Mrs Mehra?’
Mrs Rupa Mehra had nearly swallowed some nimbu pani the wrong way.
In order to cover her embarrassment, Dr Durrani tried to pretend that nothing was amiss. He kept on talking – hesitantly, of course – about this and that. When Mrs Rupa Mehra had partially recovered from the shock, she found him discussing the Pergolesi Lemma in a courtly and sympathetic manner.
‘It was my paper on that, er, Lemma which my, um, wife nearly destroyed,’ he was saying.
‘Oh, why?’ asked Mrs Rupa Mehra, seizing upon the first two sensible syllables on hand in order to show that she had been following him.
‘Ah,’ said Professor Durrani. ‘Because my wife is, er, mad.’
‘Mad?’ whispered Mrs Rupa Mehra.
‘Yes, er, quite mad. It seems that the film is, er, about to, er, er, commence. Shall we go in?’ asked Dr Durrani.
12.27
THEY entered the dance-hall of the club, where, in the cold or rainy seasons, the weekly films were screened. It was much pleasanter in the open air, for the hall was inevitably crowded; but these days there was the risk of a sudden evening shower.