by Mahesh Rao
“You’ve lost more weight,” her mother said.
Dimple took a box off one of the chairs and sat down.
“Good journey? You’d better rest for a couple of hours. And then what are your plans? A few children have volunteered to distribute my pamphlets, but it’s the first time for a couple of them. I think I’ll go with them part of the way. You should come too; it’s your first day back; it will give us a chance to spend some time together.”
“I’m really tired,” said Dimple. “And I’m getting a headache. I don’t think I’ll be able to walk around for that long.”
Her mother nodded, her mouth crimped with disappointment.
“Have some rest then. We’ll speak later.”
She picked up a box of the pamphlets and went into her bedroom.
A few years earlier Dimple would pretend to take an interest in her mother’s politics, but her move away from home had given her the confidence to bat away all overtures. Dimple’s mother regarded the English-speaking snobs who had run India for so many decades with a violent contempt. She could barely control her voice as she spoke of them, their staggering arrogance, their vanity and greed. They were traitors whose supremacy had been ruinous, and even though she was only a teacher in a small hill town, she intended to fix them. And for that she would use their own glittering weapon: English.
She impressed upon her students the importance of their own culture and traditions. But she also made it clear that to unseat the hateful patricians they would have to be able to expose and disgrace them in the language that had allowed them to reign. As she made each point, she enclosed her fist with her palm, her eyes bright, the strands of her thin hair plastered to her temples.
She raced through Shakespeare and Wordsworth, she skimmed over Dickens, but where she exacted a punishing concentration was in her grammar and oral classes. Her declaration echoed in the little schoolroom with its view of tin rooftops jumbled on the slopes: the most powerful ammunition in the world was correct communication. They had all heard the English of complacency; now she was tuning it for action.
Dimple had never intended to unseat any patricians. Her greatest desire for most of her life had been to escape that brittle voice with its terse injunctions. But she was profoundly grateful to her mother for her insistence on the importance of English. Her proficiency had helped her steal into a distant world and had offered her a choice of new identities.
Even while still at school, Dimple had tried out different manners of speech, sometimes unconsciously, absorbing syntax and vocabulary from American sitcoms, online makeup tutorials, travel blogs, advertising copy on fliers, romance novels. It was only after her move to Delhi that she realized the value of her advantage, as she watched people her age sputter and pause, return to Hindi, drum up some more courage, recall another nimble English phrase, hear it emerge from their lips, the words hesitant and mangled, and eventually clam up in public. She came to regard the English language as her savior and, whether she liked it or not, her mother was the prophet who had led her there.
She had not eaten for hours, and before that she had only crunched on a couple of mints. She walked into the dark kitchen. Its one small window looked out on to whatever was hanging on the clothesline, a dimness made up of the faint flowers on a sheet or the threadbare check of a towel. She opened one of the cupboards and saw packages of biscuits stacked high. She suspected that her mother rarely cooked now; she had always hated the waste of time that it entailed. Bodies needed fuel, and she now probably received most of hers from the biscuits that she bolted down only when a dizzy spell reminded her that she hadn’t eaten. They were the cheapest kind, full of sugar and artificial flavorings, packed in thin shiny paper. Dimple closed the cupboard door; she had not realized that it was possible to feel so alienated by a packet of biscuits.
But her mother had obviously made an effort today. A ball of dough had been left on a tray to breathe, covered with a clear plastic bowl. Boiled cauliflower cooled in a pan on the gas ring. She could almost taste it from where she stood; cooked to a mush, it would slither down her throat.
She left the kitchen; the smell of the cauliflower was making her stomach turn. From her bedroom window she could see straight into the verandah of the house next door, wedged a little way down the same hill. A pregnant woman paced its length, caressing her belly, crooning to her unborn child. She had been in the year below Dimple at school, a skinny little thing with oily plaits, chapatis smeared with pineapple jam in her lunchbox on most days. Reaching the end of the verandah, she turned and stood still, fingers spread wide across her bulge, eyes closed as she sang. It was her third pregnancy or possibly the fourth. Her husband was a jawan in the army, and every time he came home on leave he seemed to impregnate her. She looked joyful and healthy, her hair long and thick, still oily. She opened her eyes and looked startled to see Dimple standing at the window. She raised her head. Dimple ducked down and crouched on the bed. She had no idea why she should behave like this, like a sneak, a spy, her heart racing.
* * *
—
POTS OF MARIGOLDS lined the steps from their front door to the road. Dimple made her way up the hill, her gaze sweeping from shop fronts to windowsills to open doorways, looking at the changes but also keenly aware that she was being noticed too. The Good Luck Beauty Parlor had now become a unisex establishment and plastered to the window were photographs of men running their fingers through their glossy locks. A few steps farther up, the clock repair shop was selling cell phone accessories. The sign advertising “Kailash Wonder Balm” still swung over the pharmacy, even though no one in the town had ever been able to find it and avail themselves of its extraordinary properties.
Away from the smog-shrouded lights of Delhi, she could see it all so much more clearly. She had never known or desired Fahim—he had always been a mirage; how strange it now seemed that he had managed to singe his way through her thoughts for so long. Perhaps he had behaved badly, extending her only a deft insincerity, but she had seized on him for her own ends too. The idea of a boyfriend of consequence had seemed so enticing, someone to moor her to that shifting world, a man by her side as she walked into clubs and restaurants in her new clothes with the slits and the silk straps. And she was finally able to admit to herself that she had been thrilled at the idea of breaking the news to her mother: a Muslim boyfriend. Even now, her face grew warm, her cheeks felt an exquisite tingle.
Night after night, her mother would laboriously scroll through the long messages she received on her phone and then deliver a précis.
“By 2050 the Muslim population of India will have overtaken the Hindus.
“There is a hit list of Hindu temples in the state. They plan to damage idols and desecrate the temples, one by one, in a systematic way.
“Good-looking Muslim boys are sent out by mullahs to snare decent Hindu girls, to dishonor them and then make them convert to Islam.”
And Dimple pictured herself interrupting her mother with a nonchalance that could never come to pass, saying that she ought not to say such things anymore, now that her daughter’s boyfriend—potentially a son-in-law—was Muslim. And, in fact, it was her daughter who had seduced the good-looking Muslim boy, entertained him, captivated him, and, she might as well be frank, had her way with him.
It was difficult to predict what the exact reaction would be. Dimple pictured long minutes of disbelieving silence, a choking, spluttering rage, hands trembling as they looked for a hard edge to grip, a chair being knocked over in fury. Her mother had given her the occasional smack on the leg or a rap on her palms with a ruler, but could she turn decidedly violent? Was she capable of lunging in fury, grabbing Dimple by the hair, and dragging her into the street, closing her hands around a human throat?
She was so caught up in the fantasy that she had to remind herself that there was no Muslim boyfriend, no horrifying transgression that she could lay at her moth
er’s feet. The worst Dimple had done was to stretch out the period since her last visit to eighteen months and call her mother with decreasing regularity.
She arrived at the lakeshore where the vendors were setting up their stalls, laying out socks and scarves in jewel colors, now that the weather was turning. A man was fussing with his easel, the lake a churn of blue flecks on his canvas. Behind her there was a series of pops as children took their turns at the balloon shooting range.
She knew that she had let Ania down. All the time wasted, the energy expended, the long nights of advice. Perhaps it was true that a real friendship with someone like Ania was impossible. Dimple would always fall short, no matter how much she learned. She would put the stress on the wrong syllable, buy an offensive dress, admire a terrible painting, reveal a crude fact about her upbringing, be tasteless, improper, or coarse in a hundred different ways. It was a question of information, and people like her would never have enough: a crucial nugget would always be withheld.
Or perhaps Ania was the one at fault. Dimple had never forgotten the Sunday when she had waited outside the gates for the film crew in her best dress, believing what the girls at school had told her. Were all her friendships doomed to end in some kind of deception? Had Ania decided to pursue an interesting experiment knowing all along that Fahim had no interest in her? Her scalp prickled.
She dismissed the thought as nasty and uncharitable, and as a form of penance, sent Ania a series of messages, which said nothing at all. When she looked up from her phone, the man had finished stippling the blues on his canvas and was dabbing little spots of orange to make a boat. Behind her, a balloon popped.
A group of schoolgirls walked by in their uniforms, a jumble of whispers and laughs and linked arms. She remembered sitting by the lake many years ago, hearing the conversation of a few older girls drift down to her from where they stood.
“As dry as month-old mutton bones.”
“Like a coconut husk, and the same color too.”
“And smelly, like rotting fruit.”
It was a few minutes before she realized that the girls had been discussing her mother’s vagina.
She felt a stab of guilt when she remembered that she had been far more upset with her mother than with the girls. She had felt that her mother deserved the opprobrium for her failure to be more conventional, more feminine. She remained obsessed with her political projects and continued to wear the same old snuff-colored saris, allowed her greasy hair to stay stuck to her scalp, ignored the dark down on her sallow cheeks. If she had not been her mother, if the girls had ever allowed Dimple into their huddle, she would probably have nodded in agreement too.
A woman had sat down on the bench next to Dimple. With a toothpick she was picking out pieces of fruit from a plastic bag and chewing them with great satisfaction. She found a new toothpick and offered a slice of apple to Dimple, who smiled and shook her head.
Dimple stood up, and the lake looked exactly the same as it always had: the same curls of smoke drifting over the shore, the same ring of dark hills, the same silvery light. She was caught by surprise because all day she had been so focused on noticing the changes. But it remained the place where at anytime there might be a jovial slap on the back, a greeting shouted from across the lane, an inquisitive face at the window. When she was younger Dimple would often hire a boat and pedal it to the middle of the lake, as far as possible from the day-trippers and honeymooners. The boat was in the shape of a swan, painted white. And they would drift in the blue, the girl and the swan, looking out at the crests of the surrounding hills.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
THE WEDDING RECEPTION had been held in a castle near Salisbury, complete with flaming torches and a horse-drawn carriage. At first, Fahim’s heart had thrilled at the extravagance. He’d felt that it was a vindication of his headlong dash into marriage with Mussoorie and a mark of her family’s acceptance, since they were paying the bill. But it had turned out to be an odd affair. The venue was too large for the number of guests, and they huddled at the foot of a large staircase, looking up at the vaulted ceiling. Sudden drafts gusted through the reception room. The air smelled of mildew.
At dinner the conversation had depressed him, as it settled on a series of inconsequential niceties. He had come to England to get to know her family, but it appeared that they barely knew one another. There were polite inquiries about jobs and vacations. Waitresses brought salmon smothered in sauce. Wineglass stems were fingered, phones checked. Within days of the reception Fahim was having to fight off the realization that he had made an appalling mistake. His insomnia had returned, and he used it as an excuse to explain the sudden interruption to his and Mussoorie’s sex life. The truth was that he had lost all desire for his new wife. He could barely admit to himself that she had deceived him. His own meticulous duplicity made it even harder to stomach.
* * *
—
THEY HAD FIRST met at a senior bureaucrat’s garden party in Delhi, a gray afternoon, overcast but warm, standing around wondering when the speeches would end. Fahim had once been told that people at these parties were never asked what they did since everyone either already knew or simply assumed that it would be significant. Nevertheless, he asked her what she did.
Looking him straight in the eye, she said: “Whatever I’m asked.”
She had made numerous trips to India, but this was her most involved visit: she was writing an intimate history of the Maharajahs of Somwari and, apart from her forays to Delhi, was spending much of her time in residence at their palace, interviewing the family and exploring their personal archives. The Somwari clan were politically active and owned vast tracts of land—and as a result, often failed to recall that they could not act like they were in charge of a sovereign principality.
“I know they have a bit of a reputation,” she said, “but they do an awful lot of good work. It’s been terrific getting to see this other side to them.”
At first he wrote her off as another white girl who had arrived in India with memsahib fantasies, eyes ablaze at the thought of palanquins and peacock feathers. But she seemed to have more substance than that. Her knowledge of Indian history was impressive, and she appeared to have traveled widely in remote districts of Rajasthan and Gujarat. And most impressive of all, she had gained access to places that it would normally take years to infiltrate. Part of this was obviously the result of fawning half-wits desperate for attention from an attractive Englishwoman. But Fahim was beginning to be convinced that there was far more to Mussoorie Hughes.
One evening she invited him as her date to a party at the mansion of a retired brigadier. She seemed completely in her element, gently flirting with the septuagenarian army crowd, beating an almost ceremonial retreat when their wives interceded. There was no clue that she was visiting the country to research her book—she acted as though she had grown up in the care of this company.
At one point, she walked past him on the verandah and whispered into his ear, “Come with me.”
He followed her through the foyer and up the stairs, into a room with a heavy wooden door.
“I just needed a break,” she said, reaching for her cigarettes. “They’re sweet but it can all get a bit much.”
She led him into a dimly lit study, made even gloomier by the greenish tinge of its cabinets’ glass panes. Someone had been applying a muscle relaxant—the tube was still on the sofa—and the room reeked of synthetic camphor.
“Christ, got to let some air in. There’s a lovely balcony where no one will disturb us,” she said.
“You seem to know your way around here very well,” he said.
“Oh, I’m always in and out of this house. Adorable of them, they’ve sort of adopted me.”
They squeezed onto the tiny balcony and balanced their drinks on the rail. It would take only one expansive gesture to send them crashing to the ground below, possibly finishing
off some frail field marshal. Fahim watched her blow smoke into the air, her eyes not leaving his face.
“So, Mussoorie?”
“It’s the first thing anyone asks me here. I was wondering what took you so long.”
“You’re named after the place?”
“It was my parents’ favorite hill station. They’ve always loved everything about India, but Mussoorie was always the most special.”
She leaned forward and kissed him. She tasted of tobacco, vodka, ice—and a delicious licentiousness that he had not encountered before. He slipped his hand under her blouse, she leaned back, her arm knocked against the rail. The two glasses shook but did not fall.
He learned that two of her ex-boyfriends had been at Sandhurst, and she gave the impression of having been a regular at military balls. It was a natural assumption that her background had the upper-class solidity of the high-ranking officers that she had known. One uncle had been an Olympic skier, another had been caught doing something unsavory in Kenya. From the books he had read, it all seemed typical of a certain kind of Briton who gravitated toward the former colonies.
He studied pictures of her on society websites, clutching a champagne glass with a few other apple-cheeked blondes in satin dresses. In one “Around Town” column, she was described as “the India-born writer and beauty, who was the toast of the party for being able to read palms and give frighteningly accurate insights.”
He saw Mussoorie whenever possible, encouraging her to spend more time in Delhi. After the debacle with Ania, he felt that there was a great urgency to this new alliance, a perfect opportunity to propel himself forward. Fahim’s insomnia was worse than ever. He would sit up at night, carrying his humiliation in his stomach like an ulcer.
“Never hold a grudge,” his mother would warn him, “it will kill you first.”
He was making every attempt; he knew she was right. And in any case, what would a grudge held against Ania Khurana achieve? She would spring up every few days in the papers, on social media, and, if he was lucky enough to be invited, at some cocktail party, where he would watch her refuse canapés while she pretended not to have seen him. He was convinced that he was now the butt of jokes shrieked across the Khurana pool on those lazy Saturday afternoons.