Night Train to Jamalpur(43)

They were talking about the R.K.

‘Or so he says,’ Claudine shouted, over the sound of her own piano-playing.

‘I doubt he really believes it,’ said Ann. ‘I mean, nobody would, would they?’

‘He has forty temples to the God Shiva in his kingdom,’ said Bernadette.

‘His kingdom! You make him sound like a man in a fairy tale,’ Claudine shouted. ‘I thought it was thirty temples anyway.’

‘What’s ten temples give or take?’ Ann put in.

‘He’s very philosophical anyhow,’ said Bernadette. ‘He has a different attitude towards time.’

‘That’s because he’s got so much flipping money,’ said Ann.

‘He believes that time is circular,’ said Bernadette.

‘Like a clock, you mean?’ said Claudine, still playing.

‘Claudine,’ said Bernadette, ‘you are being simply impossible today.’

As she danced, Ann Poole caught sight of me over Bernadette’s shoulder. ‘Hello, Captain Stringer! Bernadette-ji, it’s your pater.’ They now revolved in the course of their dance, so that it was Bernadette who was looking at me over Ann’s shoulder: ‘Clear off, Dad,’ she said happily.

‘It’s tiffin.’

‘All right – at the end of this number.’

But then Claudine, at the piano, made another mistake and the dancing stopped.

‘For crying out loud!’ said Bernadette.

‘Ever so sorry, loves,’ said Claudine. ‘I’m just so excited, what with the dance coming up, and our new house.’

Over tiffin, I asked Bernadette whether this new house of the Askwiths was the one waiting for them up in Darjeeling, or some other.

‘She found out just today,’ said Bernadette. ‘It’s a new house here in Cal. They only had a flat before.’

‘Where is it?’

‘Park Road South.’

Then it would be an enormous villa, requiring a squad of servants.

Bernadette left the table early. When she’d gone, I asked Lydia: ‘Will the R.K. be at the dance tonight?’

She replied, ‘I’m not his social secretary, Jim’, which of course was not a denial.


III

The Debating Society dance was held at Wright’s Hotel, adjacent to the beautiful St John’s Church, and near enough to the river to make the hot night air brackish. Lydia, Bernadette and I went there in a two-horse tonga with the Pooles. Dougie Poole was already ‘a bit squiffed’ as Margaret cheerfully informed us. She was a pleasant woman, but it was possible that she didn’t have any imagination, and so couldn’t see what her husband was doing to himself.

Uniformed Indians made a guard of honour as we stepped down from our tonga on to the gravelled forecourt of Wright’s. They formed two ranks, and in between them stood William Askwith. As a physical specimen he looked so featureless that he displayed his fine dinner suit almost to advantage.

‘Our host awaits,’ said Margaret Poole, peering through the tonga window.

‘Why’s he the host?’ I whispered to Lydia. ‘He hasn’t bought Wright’s Hotel as well, has he?’

‘He’s president of the Debating Society. You twit.’

Askwith greeted the three of us very graciously, and in the absence of any other tongas rolling up just then, we embarked on a little chit-chat.

‘What does the Debating Society actually debate?’ I enquired.

‘Well, let me see now,’ said Askwith. ‘We had one only last week: “The motor car is the future of passenger transport, and railways must act accordingly.’

‘I hope the motion was defeated.’

‘I’m delighted to say that it was defeated resoundingly, Captain Stringer.’

‘And all those who voted against will be sacked,’ put in Dougie Poole, which Askwith did not like, and tried to ignore. ‘But our gatherings do not always take the form of debates,’ he continued. ‘We have lectures as well. Last month, Mr Joseph Miller from signalling gave us “The Lighter Side of Block Telegraph Working”.’

‘Went down a storm, he did,’ said Dougie Poole.

Askwith inclined his blank white head towards me. ‘Perhaps, Captain Stringer, you would care to entertain us on the subject of . . . Well, how about “Railway Police Work at Home and Abroad”?’

I eyed him. There was no expression on his face; then again, there never could be any expression on his face. The Pooles had already gone into the hotel, and taken Bernadette with them. Askwith was turning to Lydia. ‘You look are looking absolutely lovely, Mrs Stringer.’

Lydia had wrestled the cashmere wrap back off Bernadette; and she wore a short, silvery dress she had been rather uncertain about. She’d been turning over the problem for days: could she carry it off? I thought so, and evidently so did Askwith, but now another tonga was rolling up, with a motor taxi chugging impatiently behind it, so we stepped into the hotel.