Professor Chandra Follows His Bliss

by Rajeev Balasubramanyam

  He trampled across the grass, a privilege accorded only to dons, and out the college gate (the Gate of Humility, as it was called). Gonville & Caius was an oddity in that it was split in half by the road and, as was his habit, Chandra barely noticed the tourists and cyclists as he crossed Trinity Street before bounding up the wooden spiraled staircase to his rooms on the third floor.

  Ram Singh, his PhD student, was sitting on the landing staring at his iPhone, which was how all his students seemed to fill up those long hours when they weren’t asleep.

  “Sorry, Ram,” said Professor Chandra. “My bad.”

  “It’s all right, Professor. I was late too.”

  “Good, very good…What the hell is that?”

  The book under Ram Singh’s arm was called Statistics for Dummies.

  “Just a little light reading.”

  Chandra unlocked the door and sighed. Why on earth a PhD student at the top-ranked university for economics in the country should be reading such foolishness was beyond him. But this was the root of the problem. Popular books sought to storm the intellectual barricades by “de-jargonizing” the discipline, a well-intentioned but absurd idea. You couldn’t learn in three hours what it had taken others years to master. Whether the public liked it or not, knowledge still mattered. Economics was still the province of experts and not, as his thirty-four-year-old son, Sunny, was fond of saying, “all common sense,” as if any Tom, Dick, or Bengali could become Clifford H. Doyle Professor at Cambridge.

  “So how was Delhi?” asked Chandra as he pottered about his rooms sweeping books off the sofa, making coffee and watering his spider plant, something the bedder had neglected to do.

  “Delhi was Delhi,” said Ram Singh. “Usual stuff. Beer’s getting expensive.”

  “And the fieldwork?”

  “Fieldwork was damn good. Got most of the data. Just a question of…” Ram tapped his Dummies book.

  “Well, not much for us to talk about then,” said Chandra. “Good to see things are ticking along.”

  “There’s still the question of Brazil.”

  Ram Singh’s thesis was supposed to be a comparison between Gujarat’s economic performance and that of what he insisted on referring to as “TROI.” He would just slip it into conversation: “If you look at TROI’s average growth rate,” and Chandra’s mind would hurtle in the direction of Agamemnon and a thousand ships before remembering it meant “The Rest of India.”

  “Brazil, yes,” said Chandra.

  This had been a point of contention between them for months. They both knew that the reason Brazil had suddenly become of such importance to the thesis was because Ram Singh’s girlfriend, a Miss Betina Moreira, had returned to São Paulo a year ago.

  Ram needed Chandra’s backing for extra research funding and, thus far, Chandra had been resistant. It crossed his mind that Ram might have been one of his betrayers. After all, only last month Chandra, misquoting Churchill, had told him that if he had “only a few more brain cells he would be a halfwit.”

  “Well,” he said, “if you can get the money, why not? It would alter your thesis dramatically, of course, not to mention the workload, but if you feel it’s necessary…”

  “You mean you’ll write me a reference, sir?” said Ram.

  “Well, I suppose you could use it as an example of what could really go wrong—Brazil’s credit rating is about to go to junk, as you know.”

  Ram Singh was taking notes and smiling broadly, which Professor Chandra pretended not to notice.

  “And of course,” he continued, “consider the impact of the World Cup and the Olympics and so on. All that will make a difference.”

  Ram licked his lips at the mention of the World Cup, with which his last “research trip” had coincided.

  “Try to focus on the nineties for your first few chapters. Then bring in Modi. That should be enough for now.”

  “Thank you, Professor,” said Ram, almost bowing. “And my family send their regards.”

  “Oh, do they?” said Chandra. “Very good.”

  “Yes, my parents insist you visit next time you’re in Delhi. And I’m sure you’d love the dogs. I always miss them the most.”

  “Dogs, yes,” said Chandra, who hated anything with a tail. “Splendid.”

  “And, sir…” Only the subcontinentals called him “sir,” even the ones who addressed their other tutors by their first names. “I forgot to add my commiserations, about the Nobel, I mean. I hope you aren’t letting it trouble you too much.”

  “Oh, I’d forgotten all about that. If awards were all I were in it for…”

  “Yes, of course,” said Ram Singh, who was in it for the money. “I quite agree.”

  “Well, good of you to stop by.”

  This was hardly any way to end a scheduled supervision, as if Ram had merely popped over to return an extension cord for a lawnmower. There were some who might even have called it unprofessional, but those same bureaucratic harpies would have been unaware that Chandra had all but financed his student’s conjugal visit to Brazil two years ago.

  “I’ll get to work asap, sir,” said Ram, pronouncing it “ay-sap.”

  Ram saw himself out while Chandra switched on his computer and stared at the ever-increasing pile of books on his desk. Remembering the coffee, he poured milk into his “Keep Calm and Study Economics” mug, a gift from his eldest daughter, Radha, before she cut him out of her life, and reflected that he really ought to have offered Ram a cup. But it was Ram who had brought up the Nobel, a clear sign that there was nothing of any consequence left to say.

  The bloody Nobel. They always made that same face, as if trying to persuade a two-year-old to put a gun down.

  Chandra shifted to the sofa and put his feet on the coffee table. When things had been at their worst with Jean, he had begun shifting his entire life into these rooms: the pictures of his children, the “standing” desk at which he never stood. He had spent several nights on the red Chesterfield sofa, conducted more than one supervision in his dressing gown and slippers. But since Jean had moved to Colorado, Chandra had begun to spend most of his evenings at home, spurning dinner invitations in favor of watching TV or reading novels he wouldn’t have dared take into the SCR, as it slowly dawned on him that he was not only divorced now—that oh-so transgressive, Middle English word—but also alone, a word far less exotic. That cottage in Grantchester, with its black thatched roof and seventeenth-century beams that used to be filled with children and laughter, was now the dark retreat of a tragic recluse, an Indian Miss Havisham with an Emeritus Professorship and a takeaway menu.

  Sometimes he wondered if it wasn’t all a giant con, the gaggle of letters after his name, the dinners with Angela Merkel and Narendra Modi, the notes of admiration from Gordon Brown and Larry Summers. They were like those fake Oscar statues bought at pound shops and given to employees, inscribed with “World’s Greatest Photocopier” or “Best Lightbulb Changer in the Galaxy.” When he died only his writing would remain, until it was rendered obsolete when the oil and coal ran out and the species established its first settlement on Mars.

  Professor Chandra was the foremost trade economist in the world, could phone any finance minister in any country at any time and have them take his call. And yet, what if he had only convinced himself that the world envied him? What if, in reality, they felt sorry for him with his swollen ego and his Savile Row suits and his sculpted tri-continental accent?

  His wife was long gone now, his children too. Had he won the Nobel, life would have continued exactly as before except there would have been precisely nothing to look forward to. He seemed to have read every book worth reading in his field now, so his professional life consisted only of seeking to outdo his competitors and gaining the recognition he so richly deserved and—here came the killer blow—already had.

  Putting his c
offee down, Chandra stomped out of his rooms, not certain where he was going, knowing only that the alternative was to sit on the sofa until lunchtime, hating his life.

  On Trinity Street he turned left, heading for the Copper Kettle, hoping an early glass of wine might speed the trawl of the morning. Undergraduates were cycling to their first lectures of the day, cigarettes in their mouths, college scarfs around their necks. Outside King’s, tourists from Boston, Tokyo, and Hong Kong were unfurling giant Nikons in order to capture that famous five-hundred-year-old chapel.

  Situated in the middle of the city, as if designed to hog all the sunlight, King’s was Chandra’s least favorite college. It was the intellectual equivalent of a Disney princess, fluttering its eyelashes at tourists who didn’t know any better, the ones who asked questions like, “Where’s the university?” until someone pointed at King’s, after which they would take several dozen pictures before going home satisfied they had “seen Cambridge.” Of course, it boasted an illustrious roll call when it came to economics—Kaldor, Joan Robinson, J. K. Galbraith, Keynes himself—but now it was filled with half-witted undergraduates who were convinced that the Africans they sacrificed their gap years to help owed their poverty entirely to men like Chandra. But this was the way it was nowadays: those who had a proper education used it for knavery, while those who lacked one did not think it important.

  Professor Chandra reached Mr. Simms Olde Sweet Shoppe and went inside, even though he had already made his weekly purchase. He was welcomed by a young female assistant wearing an apron and tortoiseshell glasses whom he was convinced he had never laid eyes on before until she said, “Morning, Professor Chandra.”

  “Good morning.”

  “And how are we today?”

  “Oh, can’t complain,” said Chandra, a lie of grotesque proportions.

  “So what can I get for you?”

  His usual order was two hundred grams of gummy bears which he would make last all week, but today was an emergency.

  “Fifty grams of chocolate-covered gummy bears, please.”

  “Of course,” said the woman, and began filling a paper bag from a jar behind her.

  “Cold, isn’t it?” she said, putting his order on the counter.

  “Terrible,” replied Chandra, handing her a five-pound note after which his phone started to ring from inside his jacket and he began his usual routine of slapping each of his pockets in turn and muttering, “More technology, more problems,” until he finally located it and said, “Yes?”

  “Sir,” said an Indian voice on the other end, “you have expressed an interest in a Samsung Galaxy J5 smartphone with sixteen gigabytes of internal storage. This is a follow-up call to confirm your interest in purchasing a smartphone.”

  “I have no such interest,” he replied, accepting his change.

  “Sir—”

  Chandra, who as always could not seem to cancel the call, no matter how many buttons he hit, returned the phone to his inside pocket even though he could still hear that plaintive whine of “sir” from inside, as if a pixie were trapped beneath his lapel.

  “Thank you,” he called to the assistant, and walked outside into the winter sunlight.

  The Copper Kettle and a fine Rioja were only meters away, but Chandra had noticed a student eyeing him from the other side of the road. He recognized her at once. The imbecile. She had looked hurt initially, but now she was smiling in that post-ironic way that always baffled Chandra. After his meeting with the Master, he supposed he owed her an explanation.

  He was crossing the road when he heard the shop assistant call out, “Professor!” and looked back to see her holding his gummy bears.

  “Oh,” he said, and turned, but now the imbecile was shouting, “Watch out!”

  He turned again, but it was too late.

  The bicycle had already swerved, its brakes locking, the rider able to do nothing other than throw up his hands while the handlebars wrapped themselves around Professor Chandra’s waist from behind like the horns of a ferocious beast, and the helmeted head collided with his back, causing them both to tumble through the air and onto the tarmac, the Professor first, the young cyclist next, the bicycle on top of both.

  For what felt like minutes, all he could see was blackness, and it crossed his mind that he might be dead, though this seemed unlikely. There was blood in his mouth, and he could hear voices. Someone was pulling the bicycle off him. When he opened his eyes there was a crowd of faces peering down at him.

  Professor Chandra had never thought he would die in Cambridge. He had always imagined himself in India, perhaps by a river, surrounded by weeping grandchildren instead of jubilant colleagues, idiotic students, and tourists, some of whom were taking pictures.

  “Professor?” exclaimed a narrowly post-pubescent voice. “Have you been in an accident?”

  “Of course I’ve been in a bloody accident,” he wanted to say—only an undergraduate could ask so perfectly stupid a question—but his mouth was too full of blood.

  As he lay waiting for the medics to arrive it seemed that half the student body had gathered to watch this final indignity of Professor P. R. Chandrasekhar’s distinguished life. Some were crying, though he suspected others were concealing smirks of triumph. Even now, he found it hard to believe these people had nothing better to do than mock him for his failure to join the ranks of those Nobel laureates whose names he had committed to memory and would recite like a mantra in moments of extreme frustration. But of course that wasn’t true: all they saw was an old man bleeding in the middle of the road. How could they know how miserably he had failed at life?

  “C’est la vie,” he told himself, fighting to shake off the oxygen mask that covered his nose and mouth. “C’est la bloody vie.”

  PROFESSOR CHANDRA AWOKE the next morning in a private room with a series of dull-to-sharp aches across his body. His ribs were bruised, his left wrist sprained from trying to break his fall, and his spinal cord traumatized, a word that made no sense but necessitated his immediate removal to the operating theater to have his vertebrae realigned. He had also suffered a “silent” heart attack, which explained much about his earlier mood. There were “Get well soon” cards from his secretary, a few colleagues and most of his Inter-national Economics group, an email from Jasmine in Col-orado and his brother in Delhi (a rare event), but nothing from Sunny, or his eldest daughter, Radha, though this was nothing new: there had been no word from her for two thorny years.

  Jasmine, however, had included a short poem which made him smile:

  Daddy, we’re thinking of you in your hospital smock

  Don’t do this again, you gave us all a shock

  Look left then right before crossing the road

  You’ve got to be careful now, you’re getting…

  Look after yourself till you’re back to your best

  Keep smiling and get plenty of rest

  Keep your cholesterol down but your spirits high

  And if you must have bacon, please don’t fry.

  He wondered if the word “die” had been in there originally, but the gesture made him smile nonetheless. Jean had written a few lines too, implying, with that mixture of directness and euphemism unique to the Northern English, that this was bound to happen sooner or later and had he been able to think about anything other than work the accident might not only have been avoided but everybody else’s lives could also have been far less torrid affairs. But she was relieved he wasn’t dead, and she cared about him, albeit in a way that would baffle most psychologists and was entirely devoid of sympathy or affection.

  When the nurse came she averted her eyes, as if pitying his loneliness. All the other rooms were probably filled with relatives and flowers and out-of-tune songs strummed on hand-painted guitars. It wasn’t until a full day later that his son called from the lobby of the Mumbai Oberoi. Like Jean, Sunny be
lieved Chandra to be entirely responsible for his fate, though he took a different line, arguing that it was the result of something called “synchronistic necessity.”

  “It’s all about the mind, Dad,” said Sunny. “We create our own reality.”

  Sunny ran his own school in Hong Kong called the Institute of Mindful Business, a hugely successful enterprise that emphasized “positive thinking” and “financial karma,” the result of an ideology best described as “capitalist mysticism.” Sunny always wore the same black suit with a Nehru collar, white T-shirt, and sneakers. He wore glasses too, though as far as Chandra knew, his eyesight was excellent, and there were times when his voice took on a distinctly Indian inflection not unlike his father’s. As much as Chandra hated to admit it, Sunny and he had become rivals. One of the reasons he’d wanted to win the Nobel so badly was to shut his son up for good.

  “Sunny,” said Chandra, “if you tell me to think positive I’m hanging up now, I swear it.”

  “I’m glad to hear you sounding so upbeat, Dad.”

  “Have you heard from Radha?”

  “Not lately.”

  “So she doesn’t know?”

  “She knows.”

  “So you have heard from her?”

  “I messaged her.”

  “Tell her to call me, Sunny.”

  This was the arrangement the others had made behind his back. They knew where Radha was but, in deference to her wishes, were sworn to secrecy. He had responded with apoplexy at first, but the whole family had proved resolute, Jasmine included. Chandra had no number for her. She would not reply to his emails. Even now, with him in hospital, the deal was unbreakable.

  “I could be dead,” said Chandra. “I could be dead and my eldest daughter wouldn’t care.”

  “You’re not dead, Dad.”

  “But Radha doesn’t know that.”