by Amitav Ghosh
No one suggested that, Dr Mishra, Mrs Verma said sharply. She could feel her temper rising.
Oh, no, you didn’t suggest that, Dr Mishra snapped. What did you suggest, then, Verma?
Dr Verma quietly collected a few plates and went into the kitchen.
Can I suggest something, then? Dr Mishra went on, talking at the empty chair. Why don’t we give them a more realistic picture of our culture’? Why don’t we show them how all those fancily dressed-up brides are doused with kerosene and roasted alive when they can’t give their grooms enough dowry? Why don’t we show them how rich landlords massacre Untouchables and raze their villages to the ground every second day? Or how Muslims are regularly chopped into little bits by Hindu fanatics? Or maybe we could just have a few nice colour pictures of police atrocities? That’s what ‘our culture’ really is, isn’t it, Verma? Why should we be ashamed of it?
Typical! Mrs Verma exploded. Absolutely typical! Just like 1936.
1936? Dr Mishra turned to her at last, in bewilderment. Why 1936? You weren’t even born then.
So what if I wasn’t born then? That doesn’t mean I don’t know about it.
About what?
Mrs Verma’s face was suffused with blood now. She pounded her fist on the table. Don’t lie, she shouted. You know perfectly well what: 1936 – the second socialist conference in Meerut. Don’t think we’ve forgotten, for we haven’t. What was your little crowd doing there, do you remember? Do you remember how you lectured us about revolutionary theory and class struggle; about historical necessity and Leninist party organization? Do you remember how you talked about technology and the Scientific Temper and building a new rational world by destroying the superstitions of the peasants? And then, when we said surely there was more to socialism than just that, that in the villages we talked of socialism as hope, do you remember how you laughed? You laughed and said: Comrades, leave your villages for a while; peasants can’t lead peasants; go and study your theory. And, after all that, where were you when the crunch came? Who fell over themselves in their hurry to join the Congress in 1947 so that they wouldn’t have to waste any time in getting their fingers into all that newly independent money? Who broke the Praja Socialist Party when the real socialists were away, struggling in the villages? Who sabotaged Lohia? Don’t think we’ve forgotten. We’ve forgotten nothing. We know your kind inside and outside, through and through: we’ve heard your sugary speeches and we’ve seen the snakes hidden up your sleeves; we’ve seen you wallowing in filth with the Congress while High Theory drips from your mouths; we’ve heard you spouting about the Misery of the Masses while your fingers dig into their pockets; we’ve watched you while you were snarling over bribes with your Congress gang-mates, so we know exactly where your cynicism comes from. It comes from the rottenness within: those who’ve been dipped in pitch see nothing but blackness everywhere. So please don’t give me any clever lectures about India and Indian society, Dr Murali Charan Mishra, for my father gave me the measure of your kind when I was still a schoolgirl.
Dr Mishra laughed. It was a frightening thing about him that, though he often seemed to be on the verge of losing his temper, he never actually did so.
Murali Charan Mishra was my father, he said.
Same thing, she snapped, her chest heaving.
Dr Mishra smiled: Anyway, it’s all much clearer now. What you really want to do is climb on to the sand-dunes and let the Algerians know about your father’s Lohia-ite socialism. But to come back to the point: what do you want to put up for this get-together? Some kind of village festival perhaps, since you’re so enamoured of rural socialism? Or maybe one of those song-and-dance plays about gods and demons and mythological heroes?
Mrs Verma shook her head.
But, please, do remember, Dr Mishra went on, that your audiences will be made up of your own Algerian colleagues, who are rational, scientifically trained people. I, for one, wouldn’t like to give them the impression that the whole of India is still in the Middle Ages, still wallowing in ghosts and ghouls and demonology. I’d like them to know that some of us at least are in the modern mainstream.
Mrs Verma smiled secretly across the room at Hem Narain Mathur’s dusty old bookcase. She had her answer ready.
Mrs Verma settled back in her chair and rested her hands demurely on the rim of her plate. Please, forgive me, Doctor-sahb, she said. I shouldn’t have shouted at you like that.
He watched her suspiciously: Yes?
The fact is, she said, looking at her nails, that I do have a plan.
Wonderful! Dr Mishra exclaimed. He broke a matchstick in half and began to pick nervously at his teeth. A village masque, I suppose. Some kind of Ram Li la. Why, we can clear out a stage on a sand-dune and put up a few idols and images and give them a full-scale puja with chanting Brahmans, mantras and all the rest of it. I’m sure your fellow rural socialists will be delighted by a nice, gaudy spectacle of medieval superstition flaunting itself on a sand-dune. But, please, Mrs Verma, you’re welcome to dance about on the sand scattering holy water on the date palms, but don’t ask me to do it. I’m too old.
I wasn’t really thinking of anything like that, Mishra-sahb, she said. I was thinking of something else.
What? He was suddenly wary.
Well, she paused for a moment. What do you think of Tagore? I know you don’t much care for medieval villagers, but you can’t have any objection to Rabindranath Tagore. Apart from everything else, he got all the most modern literary awards in all the most modern cities, you know.
Dr Mishra laughed: Very good, Mrs Verma; you’re learning. Go on.
Well, people here do sometimes ask about Tagore. Surely it would be appropriate to give them a glimpse of his work? You can’t object to that, after all.
What exactly did you have in mind?
Chitrangada. Mrs Verma allowed herself to smile: My father did a translation from the Bengali. I still have it.
Dr Mishra reached into his pocket, though his hands were still unwashed after the meal, and pulled out his pipe. Chitrangada? he said, twisting the stem. Could you just remind me what it’s about?
It’s a dance drama.
That’s nice, said Dr Mishra. A dance drama. Of course there’s no shortage of dancing girls here – you and old Miss K. and my own bouncy young wife. Go on.
To tell you the truth, I don’t really remember it very well myself now. My father read it to me when I was a girl. It’s based on a legend from the Mahabharata I think. Chitrangada is the king of Manipur’s daughter; she’s been brought up like a man, and she’s a great hunter and warrior and all that, but she’s not – well, very pretty. Then one day Arjuna goes to Manipur and she sees him – handsome, a great hero and warrior – so naturally she falls in love with him. She goes to him and declares her love, but he turns her away. Then she gets very depressed because she thinks he can’t possibly love a woman who looks like her. So ugly, you know. So she goes to the gods and asks them to give her the gift of beauty for just one year. They do, and Arjuna falls in love with her, and they sort of get married, I think, but she doesn’t tell him who she is. But as the year passes Arjuna hears more and more about the heroism of Chitrangada, and he longs to meet her and is half in love with her, though he doesn’t even know who she is. Chitrangada sees all this and she learns finally that appearances don’t matter, so at the end of the year, when her beauty is gone, she stands before him and says something like: I’m no beautiful flower, I’m not perfect, my clothes are torn and my feet are scarred and so on, but I can give you the heart of a true woman. Then Arjuna, too, sees that beauty is only deception, an illusion of the senses.
Well, said Dr Mishra sardonically, that makes it much clearer. I can see now why you want to play Chitrangada, but who did you have in mind for Arjuna? Verma? Do you really think it would suit him to dress up as a hero, in a sort of mini-dhoti, and dance around with bows and arrows? He’s short-sighted, you know; he might hit Chitrangada with those arrows.
Mrs Ve
rma turned quickly away, blushing furiously. Of course I wasn’t going to play Chitrangada, she said. We could ask some of the younger doctors and their wives to come up from Ouargla or Ghardaia.
She looked him over appraisingly. Actually, Mishra-sahb, she said, there’s a part that’ll be perfect for you.
Which?
Madana, the God of Love. I can just see you – hovering above the dunes, showering love on the Sahara.
Dr Mishra rose and paced the floor while she watched apprehensively. All right, Mrs Verma, he said at last. I’ll take up your challenge. I’ll play Madana if you can fill the other roles. But there’s a condition: since it’s we who are putting it on for our Algerian colleagues, you’ll have to find Indians to play the parts.
Mrs Verma nodded.
Have you thought of the other problems? Who’s going to sing? Who’s going to dance? Where are you going to get the music? And it must be a very long play – are you going to stage the whole of it?
That’s easy, said Mrs Verma. We won’t do the whole thing; just a few scenes. And don’t worry about the music; that’s an advantage with this play really. My father gave me a record years ago. We can just play that – we won’t even have to talk. We don’t have to dance, either; we can just mime the scenes. We can explain the plot beforehand through an interpreter. I’m sure Miss K. and Mrs Mishra will help me make the costumes. Even you could do something; you could help me choose the right scenes. I’ll give you the script.
You mean your father’s Hindi translation?
Yes, she said. I’ll lend it to you, but you must be very careful with it. To me that’s the most precious of all the things he left me.
Tell me, Mrs Verma, Dr Mishra said curiously, how did your father learn Bengali?
Oh, he learnt when he was in college in Calcutta. He loved Tagore’s poetry.
Dr Mishra gestured to his wife to get up. When they were at the door, he turned to Mrs Verma, smiling grimly. All right, he said, the bet’s on, then. If you do somehow manage to put it together, I’ll admit defeat and you can give a speech instead of me. But if you don’t you’ll have to apologize in public for everything you’ve said tonight.
Yes, I accept, Mrs Verma said at once, looking directly into his eyes. I have nothing to worry about.
But soon she was very worried; it didn’t seem as though she would ever be able to find a cast. And every morning at the hospital there was Dr Mishra, solicitously asking after the progress of her plan, grinning, like a school bully gloating over the break-up of a rival gang. She had come perilously close to accepting defeat simply to put an end to those questions and those grins.
Then one morning there was Arjuna, lying unheroically on a hospital bed, his oddly irregular eyebrows raised at her in surprised inquiry.
That was encouraging enough to hold a rehearsal and start work on the costumes. But, as Dr Mishra had said while he was being measured for his halo, it’s no use without a Chitrangada.
She had had no answer.
And then, like a gift from Madana …
So do you think, Mrs Verma asked Kulfi anxiously, you’ll be able to do Chitrangada? It won’t be difficult at all really – all you’ll have to do is dress up in a nice sari and pose on stage. You won’t have to say anything because the record will be playing off-stage. It’ll just be a set of tableaux really.
They turned left, and a broad square ringed with low bungalows sprang up and hung before them on a pall of dust.
Kulfi tossed her head: It’ll be easy. I haven’t acted before, but I do see a lot of films and, I must say, I don’t know why but in al-Ghazira my husband’s colleagues used to keep telling me, at every party I went to, Why, you look just like Hema Malini, Mrs Bose. I don’t know why you say that, I used to tell them …
And luckily, said Mrs Verma, you’ll have a nice Arjuna.
I hope so, Kulfi said, frowning. Who is he?
You’ll meet him in a minute.
Mrs Verma pushed open a steel gate. That’s our house, she said, waving proudly at a thick-walled colonial bungalow, surrounded by tenaciously green patches of garden. She led Kulfi down a brick-lined path, past dusty casuarinas and doggedly blooming bushes of bougainvillaea to a low, deeply shaded porch. Then her eyes fell on a snapped clothes-line at the other end of the garden and she rushed off with a cry to rescue the scattered clothes from the dust.
Peering at the veranda which led on to the porch, and the darkness of the rooms beyond, it was evident at once to Kulfi that Mrs Verma took good care of her house: the veranda was spotless, the curtains in the windows were clean and bright, and there were calendars on every wall. She took a step towards the veranda and caught the sound of a muffled voice somewhere inside. Craning forward, she squinted into the shadows.
The darkness rippled and a moment later Kulfi sprang back, shrieking.
A short, stout man dressed in a scarlet knee-length dhoti had appeared on the veranda. Bits of tinsel were dotted about his chest and there was a white flower entwined in the sacred thread of his Brahminhood. Above it, like a rainswept rock framed by the setting sun, his bald head shone against a noisily spinning halo that seemed to grow out of the back of his neck.
Poised to run, Kulfi stole another quick look. He was peering at her in short-sighted confusion, his narrowed eyes hugely enlarged by his thick glasses. Kulfi choked back a scream.
Folding his hands, he bobbed his head and at once the halo slipped, grazing his glistening scalp. Namaste, he said, wincing, and pushed the halo hurriedly back into place. Don’t pay any attention to all this – he waved a deprecating hand at his clothes – it’s only because I’m Madana.
Madana? Kulfi whispered hoarsely.
Yes, he said, hitching up his dhoti and advancing upon her, the God of Love. And you?
Kulfi began to back away rapidly, watching his every move. Then, to her relief, Mrs Verma was beside her, her arms full of clothes.
So Madana’s found Chitrangada? she said, laughing. That old curtain really suits you, Dr Mishra; you should wear it more often.
Dr Mishra was suddenly acutely self-conscious. Never mind, he growled, crossing his hands over his tinselly chest.
What? said Mrs Verma. I can’t hear you.
Will you please make me known to this lady? Dr Mishra shouted over the whirring of his halo.
Mrs Verma smiled and waved, magician-like, at Kulfi. This, she said, is my Chitrangada.
Dr Mishra stared, and Kulfi lowered her head shyly. Did you create her, Mrs Verma? he said. Or did Madana drop her from the sky?
Actually, Mrs Verma said, she appeared out of Driss’s café. She and her husband are passing through – they’re tourists.
I see, Dr Mishra said, examining Kulfi suspiciously. Well, I suppose we should take our touring Chitrangada in and introduce her to her Arjuna.
Led by Dr Mishra they went into a large cool room which had its twin functions unmistakably indicated by a dining-table at one end and a circle of sofas at the other. Otherwise, except for a few calendars and a papier-mâché Taj Mahal, the room was clinically bare. But it was that very bareness which seemed to shine a spotlight on a far corner of the room where a battered old bookcase stood propped against the wall, reigning, somehow, in spite of its rickety shelves and frayed dustcovers, over every other object in the room.
As they entered Dr Mishra gestured at a young man who was rising awkwardly from a sofa. Well, Arjuna, he said drily, here’s your Chitrangada.
Turning on his heels, his arms spread out, he said: May I introduce you to our very own avatar of Arjuna? Mr Jyoti Das.
Jyoti Das had not seen them yet, but his hands were already folded and he was smiling in polite expectation. Then his eyes found Kulfi, and the smile vanished from his face and he swallowed and clutched at his throat.
Mrs Verma dropped her armful of clothes on a chair and bustled forward. How are you feeling now? she asked him kindly. He shook his head in an effort to take his eyes off Kulfi, failed, and sank wordlessly back on t
o the sofa.
He’s not been well, you know, Mrs Verma confided to Kulfi. We met him quite by chance a couple of days ago, when he was brought to the hospital with a mild case of heatstroke. He’d been here a few days already and apparently he’d spent all his time at the bus station watching the buses from the border come in, and on the dunes, where he was looking for a vulture. Just imagine – a vulture! Are you a corpse, I said, that you’re looking for a vulture in this blazing sun?
Jyoti Das moistened his lips mechanically and, without taking his eyes off Kulfi, he said: Not any old vulture, Mrs Verma. I thought I’d spotted a lappet-faced vulture. I had to find it – none has been reported from these parts for decades.
Mrs Verma shrugged: A vulture’s a vulture, whatever its face. Anyway, you’d better get up now; you have to go to Miss K.’s for lunch.
But Jyoti Das stayed as he was, his eyes riveted on Kulfi.
Kulfi tossed her head. She swept past Mrs Verma and went across to the bookcase, swaying her hips. She saw him turning, following her with his eyes, his young boyish face contorted with the clumsy, painful longing of a virgin rebelling too late against his condition. Inclining her head slightly, she gave him a tight little smile and with his gaze lapping thirstily at her back she began to flip languidly through a calendar.
I see good things, Dr Mishra said, watching them shrewdly from the other end of the room. It looks as though Madana’s going to have some success at last.
While Mrs Verma rang the hospital, her husband began dismantling Dr Mishra’s battery-operated halo.
Can’t you make it a little quieter? Dr Mishra said. They’ll think Madana is a kind of helicopter if it goes on like this.
Mrs Verma put the phone down and clapped her hands. All right now, she said. We all have to hurry. There’s a lot to do today.
What? said Dr Mishra.
Mrs Verma nodded at Jyoti Das and said: The two of you have to go to Miss K.’s for lunch. She’s expecting you; she’s saved up a whole cauliflower, and she borrowed a tin of pineapples from me this morning. And after that you have to come back here for a rehearsal. We can do it properly, with costumes and everything, now that we have our Chitrangada.