Secondly – and as if there had not been drama enough in the letter she had received from Arun – this evening was the performance of Twelfth Night. It was to be held in the university auditorium immediately after the Annual Day ceremonies and tea, and her own Lata would be in it – as would Malati, who was just like a daughter to her. (Mrs Rupa Mehra was well-disposed towards Malati these days, seeing in her a chaperone rather than a conniver.) So would that boy K; but thank God, thought Mrs Rupa Mehra, there would be no more rehearsals. And with the university break for Dussehra in just a couple of days, there would be no great possibility of chance meetings on campus either. Mrs Rupa Mehra felt, however, that she must remain in Brahmpur just in case. Only when, for the short Christmas vacation, the whole family – Pran, Savita, Lata, Lady Baby and materfamilias – visited Calcutta would she desert her reconnaissance post.
The hall was packed with students, alumni, teachers, parents and relatives together with smatterings of Brahmpur society, including a few literary lawyers and judges. Mr and Mrs Nowrojee were there, as were the poet Makhijani and the booming Mrs Supriya Joshi. Hema’s Taiji was there together with a knot of a dozen giggling girls, most of them her wards. Professor and Mrs Mishra were present. And of the family, Pran of course (since nothing could have kept him away, and he was indeed feeling much better), Savita (Uma had been left with her ayah for the evening), Maan, Bhaskar, Dr Kishen Chand Seth and Parvati.
Mrs Rupa Mehra was in a high state of excitement when the curtain went up to a sudden hush from the audience, and to the strains of a lute that sounded rather like a sitar, the Duke began: ‘If music be the food of love, play on –’
She was soon entirely carried away by the magic of the play. And indeed, there was no major mischief, other than some incomprehensible bawdy and buffoonery, in the first half of the play. When Lata came on, Mrs Rupa Mehra could hardly believe that it was her daughter.
Pride swelled in her bosom and tears forced themselves into her eyes. How could Pran and Savita, seated on either side of her, be so indifferent to Lata’s appearance?
‘Lata! Look, Lata!’ she whispered to them.
‘Yes, Ma,’ said Savita. Pran merely nodded.
When Olivia, in love with Viola, said:
‘Fate, show thy force. Ourselves we do not owe:
What is decreed must be; and be this so!’
- Mrs Rupa Mehra nodded her head sadly as she thought philosophically of much that had happened in her own life. How true, she thought, conferring honorary Indian citizenship on Shakespeare.
Malati, meanwhile, had the audience charmed. At Sir Toby’s line, ‘Here comes the little villain – How now, my nettle of India?’ everyone cheered, especially a claque of medical students. And there was another great round of applause at the interval (Which Mr Barua had placed in the middle of Act III) for Maria and Sir Toby. Mrs Rupa Mehra had to be restrained from going backstage to congratulate Lata and Malati. Even Kabir-as-Malvolio had so far proven to be innocuous, and she had laughed with the rest of the audience at his gecking and gulling.
Kabir had donned the accent of the officious and unpopular Registrar of the university, and – whether this would prove beneficial for Mr Barua’s future or not – it increased the present enjoyment of the students. Dr Kishen Chand Seth, in fact, was Malvolio’s only supporter, insisting loudly in the interval that what was being done to him was indefensible.
‘Lack of discipline, that is the trouble with the whole country,’ he stated vehemently.
Bhaskar was bored with the play. It was nothing like as exciting as the Ramlila, in which he had obtained a role as one of Hanuman’s monkeysoldiers. The only interesting part of this play so far had been Malvolio’s interpretation of ‘M, O, A, I’.
The second half began. Mrs Rupa Mehra nodded and smiled. But she nearly started from her chair when she heard her daughter say to Kabir: ‘Wilt thou go to bed, Malvolio?’ and she gasped at Malvolio’s odious, brazen reply.
‘Stop it – stop it at once!’ she wanted to shout. ‘Is this why I sent you to university? I should never have allowed you to act in this play. Never. If Daddy had seen this he would have been ashamed of you.’
‘Ma!’ whispered Savita. ‘Are you all right?’
‘No!’ her mother wanted to shout. ‘I am not all right. And how can you let your younger sister say such things? Shameless!’ Shakespeare’s Indian citizenship was immediately withdrawn.
But she said nothing.
Mrs Rupa Mehra’s uneasy shufflings, however, were nothing compared to her father’s activities in the second half. He and Parvati were seated a few rows away from the rest of the family. He started sobbing uncontrollably at the scene where the disowned sea-captain reproaches Viola, thinking her to be her brother: