She asked the nurses to come down and introduce themselves to me. ‘Saar, my name is Mary Joseph. I am Roman Catholic, from Tamil Nadu,’ said the older one. She was a dark, plump woman in her thirties. On her ample bosom she had a gold cross dangling. The younger one introduced herself: ‘I am Ittiara Mathews, sir, from Kottayam in Kerala. I am Syrian Christian.’ She was not as dark, nor as plump as the other nurse. I showed them to their room next to my study. I had two beds put in it. They would occupy the room in turns, depending on their hours of duty. ‘I am the night nurse,’ said the Keralite, ‘so Mary will be here at night; I during the day.’ I told them to tell the cook what kind of food they liked to eat. ‘Saar, anything you eat, we eat,’ replied Mary. ‘Sometimes we like idli-dosa. We can make that ourselves.’
In a couple of days life fell into a pattern. Sonu and the baby slept in one of the bedrooms upstairs. The nurse from Kerala dozed off in an armchair in the same room. The baby’s bawling every four hours was her alarm. I had a bed put in my study for myself. The Tamilian occupied the room next to mine. She was more communicative than the Keralite. She told me she was married and had a child. ‘My husband, he drink, drink, drink all the time. Like a fish. When I say stop he beat me. Not enough money in the house and child to bring up. What to do, saar? So I took course in nursing and after I got my certificate, I told my husband—Mister, you stay here and drink and look after my child. I am taking a job in Delhi and send you whatever I save.’ She looked quite cheerful about it. ‘Saar, one life to live. Not to waste it on a drunkard husband. You agree?’
I agreed.
Sonu would not let me come near her. ‘The doctor said no sex till I have weaned the baby. After six months I will start giving him milk from a bottle and some solids like Farex. Then we’ll see what we can do.’
I had not had proper sex for over six months. Another six months of abstinence would be hard on a lustful man like me.
One evening I had more than my quota of Scotch. Sonu did not touch alcohol as it went into her milk, which was harmful for the baby. My father had taken to eating before sunset and retiring to his room for the night. I waited for the servants to leave and locked the rear entrance which they used. After dinner I took a short stroll in the garden, locked the front gate and came to my study-cum-bedroom. Mary Joseph came to say goodnight to me. I don’t know what came over me. I took her in my arms and kissed her passionately. She did not resist. ‘Saar, somebody may come in. It is not safe.’ I bolted my study from the inside and pushed her on my bed. She was quite willing. She pulled up her white skirt and took off her panties. I tore open her blouse and went hungrily for her large breasts. She stretched her thighs wide apart. As I entered her she exclaimed, ‘Aiy Aiy yo! Saar, you are very big. I like it very much.’ She responded vigorously to my thrusts. We climaxed together.
‘Not safe,’ she said as she got up and re-adjusted her dress. ‘No good if I become pregnant. I am Catholic; no divorce, no illegitimate child. If Jesus forgives me this time, I will get birth control pills for future. Only one life to live, Saar.’
Did I suffer pangs of guilt? I did not. I justified what I did with Mary Joseph the same way Mary Joseph justified her adultery: only one life to live. Sex is important. When denied it becomes more important. The body’s needs come above religious taboos and notions of morality.
Jesus forgave Mary Joseph her transgression. Two days later she had her period. Six days later she was on the pill. Every night it was the same exclamation of surprise and joy—‘Aiy Aiy yo! Saar, you are very big.’ And every night she thrust her hips up at me, matching my desperate rhythm, leaving me in no doubt that she liked it ‘very much’.
Our fun and games did not last long. Apparently I looked more relaxed and cheerful than I had for some time, and Sonu was curious. She had no evidence whatsoever of my infidelity. Of the two nurses, it was the younger Keralite who was more attractive, and she spent the night in Sonu’s room. The Tamilian was fat and shapeless. The gold cross dangling between her breasts was proof that she was a devout Christian and would not have sex with anyone besides her husband. But women have a sixth sense which warns them when their security is threatened. Sonu suspected that there was something wrong going on under her own roof. She did not want to take any chances. A fortnight later she announced that she did not need a day nurse any more and had asked her mother to get her an ayah to keep an eye on the child in the day time. Mary Joseph’s services were dispensed with. Before she left she gave me her visiting card. It had the name and telephone number of her nursing home. ‘Saar, any time you want me, just ring me up and I will come over. Any hotel or friend’s house. Anywhere. I don’t want any money; just you.’
I put her card in my wallet.
Getting rid of the day nurse did not change Sonu’s attitude towards me. I could not understand what had come over her. She found fault with everything I did. Every evening she brought up some topic which ended in an angry exchange of words. I would switch on the TV to avoid her picking a quarrel, and keep it on through the drinks hour and dinner till it was time to go to bed—she to hers and I to mine. In that mood having sex never entered our minds. My thoughts began to stray to Mary Joseph. She was no beauty but she was willing. That made her desirable. I was reluctant to take the initiative. She was not. One afternoon Vimla Sharma buzzed my phone, ‘Sir, your baby’s nurse wants to talk to you. I hope all is well with the child.’
‘Put her on,’ I replied.
It was Mary Joseph. ‘Saar, excuse me for disturbing you in the office. I wanted to enquire about the baby’s health. How is my little baba?’
‘He’s fine. Look, will you be available on this number if I ring up later in the evening?’
‘Yes, saar, for you always available, anytime, anywhere.’
That was what was nice about Mary Joseph. I rang up the Ashoka Hotel to book a room the next day in the name of a business partner in Bombay. The Ashoka had some advantages which other Delhi hotels did not. It was owned by the government and was the largest hotel in the city. It was also very impersonal. Most important of all, it had a third floor with a lift of its own beside the patisserie along the parking lot. Visitors staying on the third floor did not have to go through the large entrance hall with the reception desk, enquiries and the cashier’s counters. There were always people sitting or loitering around in the lobby, people who would recognize you and reach all kinds of conclusions—usually the right ones. For the third floor all you had to do was to pretend you had come to pick up fresh bread, cakes or pastries and go round the shop to the elevator. Room waiters on the third floor knew what businessmen from Bombay, Calcutta and Madras wanted in the way of relaxation when they came to Delhi. They went about their jobs silently, asked no questions, only expected to be tipped handsomely.
I got Mary Joseph on my direct line. ‘Meet me tomorrow evening at five, Mary. Room number three hundred, third floor, Ashoka Hotel. Not in your nurses’ uniform. And don’t ask for me, just knock on the door.’
‘Sure, sure, saar. Okay.’
The next day I left the office at half past four and told the chauffeur he would not be needed till the next morning. From the patisserie I bought some chicken patties and a chocolate cake. I took the small elevator to the third floor. Room No. 300 was open, with the key in the key hole. I put it in my pocket and went in. It was a comfortable single bedroom. A bottle of Scotch and two glasses sat on the table beside the usual basket of fruits and vase of flowers. There were sodas in the fridge. I helped myself to a Scotch-n-soda. The room bearer came in to take orders. ‘I will ring if I want anything,’ I replied. ‘Put the don’t disturb sign on the door and leave it open.’
He had never seen me before, but he knew the drill and departed. A few minutes later there was a gentle knock on the door and in came Mary Joseph. ‘Notice on door says don’t disturb,’ she said with a broad smile. ‘I hope I am not disturbing you, saar.’ She was dressed in in a white cotton sari with gold borders. It suited her more th
an the nurse’s uniform. Like modern girls she wore a backless, sleeveless blouse. She had a cute belly button.
‘Shut and bolt the door behind you. The notice is not for you but for other people,’ I told her.
‘I know, saar. I am not stupid.’
She put her arms round my neck and gave me a gentle kiss on the lips. ‘Saar, I missed you like anything. I said to myself, Saar will never ring you up. He has his memsahib and big, big business to look after. Who will think of one poor nurse after he has had her, one, two, four, five times?’
We sat down on a sofa. ‘Do you like this room?’ I asked her.
‘Very nice,’ she replied. ‘There it was always at night and I couldn’t see you. And always fear in my mind that someone may suddenly come in. Now it is daylight, we can see what we are doing without bothering about anyone. No?’
I took her in my arms and kissed her hungrily. I slipped my hand under her blouse and fondled her big breasts till her nipples became hard. We got up and moved to the bed. First she took off her gold necklace, kissed the cross and laid it reverently on the table. Then she took off her sari, folded it and put it on a chair. She took off her blouse; her breasts tumbled out. She looked down coyly at them. I untied the knot of her petticoat. It fell to the floor. She put her hands between her thighs to cover herself and giggled. I pushed them aside and saw the mass of healthy curling pubic hair. She had very broad thighs, silken soft. ‘You also, saar. Like me. Nothing,’ she pleaded.
I stripped myself of my clothing and we lay down side by side on the bed. ‘Saar, you have the biggest thing I have ever seen. So big no other man has.’
‘How many have you seen?’ I asked her, putting it into her caressing hands.
‘What seen? My husband not half as big. And so quick to finish. In out, in out. Phut. Once his younger brother had me. Also small and very quick quick. The padre of our village church was much better. But he was sorry for doing it. After he finished he asked me to pardon him and made me pray with him to Jesus to ask his forgiveness. Imagine, no, still naked and sweating and kneeling on the floor and praying to God! He made me feel worse than a prostitute who did it without asking for money. Tell me, saar, is it a sin to do it with somebody you like?’
The only way to stop Mary Joseph from talking was to seal her mouth with mine. This I did again and again while I stroked her thighs and pushed three fingers through the springy pubic hair and into her. She was warm and slick. She began to moan with pleasure, ‘Oh! oh! oh! … How can such a nice thing be sin? Tell me, saar, tell me.’ She pulled my hand away and threw her heavy, smooth legs high and wide. I mounted and entered her and glued my mouth to hers. She was more animated than I expected from a woman of her bulk. And when she came she dug her nails into my neck and bit my lips, then collapsed with her arms and legs stretched wide.
‘For me this was heaven,’ she said when she had regained her breath,’ and for you, saar?’
‘Very nice,’ I replied. ‘Let’s get back into our clothes. Shall I order tea or coffee for us?’
‘Coffee for me, saar.’
We washed ourselves together. As I saw her dark, ungainly figure, I could not understand how I could have made love to her. But I had enjoyed every minute of it. I put my clothes on, then sat and watched her dress. First she put her necklace round her neck and again kissed the cross. Then she put on her blouse, then the petticoat and finally—and with surprising swiftness—her sari. I rang for the room bearer and ordered two coffees and a plate of biscuits.
Mary Joseph was in a chatty mood. She wanted to tell me all there was to know about her village, married life, her husband, his brother, her son, the nursing home, the doctors and other nurses. She sensed I was not listening to her. ‘I talk too much, saar,’ she admitted. ‘Everyone calls me chatterbox. I will keep my mouth shut and you do the talking.’
‘I don’t talk very much,’ I told her. She felt she had been reprimanded. The bearer brought coffee and biscuits. I handed him my credit card. I asked him to give it to the cashier and bring me the receipt. A few minutes later he came back for my signature and with the receipt. It was over a couple of thousand rupees for the two hours with Mary Joesph. I gave the bearer a hundred-rupee note as a tip.
‘Let’s go,’ I said to her. I handed her the two boxes with the cake and patties. ‘I bought them for you.’
‘O thank you very much, saar. You should not have bother. This is very expensive—room and all in five star hotel!’ She put her arms round my neck and looked directly into my eyes. ‘Saar, you will see me again, won’t you? Soon? I will pay my share of the room charge.’
‘Don’t be silly. I can afford it, you can’t. And I got as much fun out of it as I hope you did.’
There was so much pleading in her eyes that I could not help committing myself to further meetings, if not in the Ashoka, in some other hotel. I asked her to go ahead of me by the small lift, gave her the number of my car and told her to wait for me. A few minutes later, I followed her, opened the car door to let her in. ‘How did you come to the hotel?’ I asked her.
‘In a three-wheeler. I can’t afford taxis.’
‘You must let me pay for your transport. I can always drop you back home.’
I drove her to the top of the road where her nursing home was and dropped her at the cross roads. ‘When will you ring me up, saar?’ she asked as she got out of the car. ‘Soon,’ I replied, ‘but don’t ring me in the office. They will begin to talk.’
I was back home a little later than usual. Sonu noticed I had driven in myself, and demanded, ‘Where were you driving around without the chauffeur?’
‘I went to the club to have a drink and told him to go home.’
The smell of the whiskey on my breath spared me further questions. I went to see the baby. He had his tiny feet in his hands and was gurgling away, his large eyes wide open to take in the world. He had begun to recognize me and would show his pleasure by knocking both his legs together and slapping his cot with his hands. I tickled him under the chin; he responded with a toothless smile and a ‘gug-gug-gug’. Next to the TV it was the baby who gave me an excuse to avoid getting into an argument with Sonu.
Sonu and I were drifting apart. She never tired of nagging and needling me. We hardly had any sex. I kept out of her way and ignored her when she decided to pick a fight. This infuriated her. So she picked on my father.
Father was a God-fearing and self-effacing man who never raised his voice against anyone. He kept to himself. He went every day to the gurudwara in the mornings and the Sai Baba temple in the evenings. He had his meals in his room where he pored over books on religion—the Upanishads, the writings of Jiddu Krishnamurti—and listened to tapes of the sermons of Sai Baba, Swami Chinmayananda and others. He came only twice a day to the portion of the house we occupied. In the mornings he sat with me for a few minutes and then spent half an hour with baby Ranjit. He stayed a little longer in the evenings, when he did nothing but baby talk with Ranjit. He had become Ranjit’s favourite adult. As soon as he heard my father’s footsteps, Ranjit would start on a loud ‘Dada Dada Dada’. He would stretch out his arms to be picked up. He would smack his grandfather’s face with his tiny hands, pull off his glasses, tug at his moustache. My father loved it and gently remonstrated with him, ‘Beta, you’ll break my glasses. Will you buy me another pair?’ When Ranjit learnt to crawl, he would come scuttling on all fours to where my father was sitting and haul himself up. The two would rock in a tight embrace for some time, then Ranjit would resume knocking off Father’s glasses and pulling his moustache. He would gather his spit in his mouth and blow bubbles into his grandfather’s face. Father loved that too. ‘Mera nunha munna,’ he would say. ‘What will you be when you grow up?’ Ranjit would reply by slapping his face more vigorously and shouting ‘Dadadada’.
Sonu did not approve of their closeness. ‘Pitaji, you are spoiling him,’ she would say. ‘He gets too excited when you are around and refuses to go to bed.’
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p; My father kept his peace. Many a time when grandfather and grandchild were deeply involved with each other, Sonu would shout, ‘That’s enough! Ayah, put the baby to bed. It’s very late for him.’ As the ayah tried to pick him up from his grandfather’s lap Ranjit would fight back and howl. Sonu would storm in, pluck the child roughly from his grandfather’s lap and hand him over to the ayah. Ranjit’s howling would get louder as he hit the ayah with his fists. You could hear him calling for his ‘Dada’ between sobs till sleep overcame him. My father would quietly walk away to his room.
It made me angry, very angry. But I did not open my mouth.
‘There must be some discipline in the house,’ Sonu would say. ‘The baby must be taught to eat and go to bed on time. I can’t have him spoilt for other people’s pleasures.’
I would switch on the TV, pour myself a Scotch. I would continue to watch the screen and drink. Most of our evenings were spent in this manner.
My father sensed that Sonu did not like his living in the house. One day he told me, ‘Puttar, I want to go to my ashram for a few days. The weather is nice—not too cold, not too warm. I need to be with myself for a while. Can you book me a seat on a bus?’
‘Pitaji, I will drive you to Haridwar. I also want a short break. The sight of the Ganga lifts my spirits.’
I told Sonu of Father’s decision to leave for Haridwar. Far from being remorseful, she said, ‘That will be good for the baby. He won’t be mollycoddled and will learn to be independent of people.’
I decided to take my father to Haridwar on Poornamashi, the day of the full moon. It fell on a Saturday, when the office closed at midday. Father was ready with his luggage when I reached home that afternoon. Baby Ranjit was asleep. My father gazed at the child’s face for a long time. He could not hold back his tears. He murmured a silent prayer as he left. Sonu made a gesture of touching his feet before we drove out of the house. Four hours later we drove into his ashram.
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