Khushwant Singh's Book of Unforgettable Women

by Khushwant Singh

  Yasmeen was up on her feet again to do battle with the Jew. ‘What was new was the advent of Prophet Mohammed (peace be upon Him). He was the greatest of all prophets sent by Allah. That is why we call Him the seal of Prophets—Khatm-un-Nabi. We recognize no one after Mohammed (peace be upon Him).’

  The Jew did not take that lying down. ‘What about the division between Sunnis and Shias? Shias pay greater deference to the Prophet’s cousin and son-in-law Ali, than they do to the Prophet. And what about Muslim sects founded on sub-prophets of their own? The Aga Khans, Ismailies, Bohras, Ahmediyas and many others whose names I can’t even remember? And while we are at it, I would like the lady to enlighten us on why, when Islam talks of giving a fair deal to women, it allows four wives to one man, why many Muslim rulers maintained large harems of women and eunuchs. Why are they forever calling for jehad—holy war—with infidels and fighting against each other?’

  It was degenerating into a pointless wrangle. Professor Ashby put an end to it. ‘I see we are in for another lively debate. Perhaps you can discuss these issues outside the class.’

  The lecture period was over. Yasmeen’s face was flushed with anger and triumph. ‘Don’t you think I put that miserable Jew in his place?’ she asked me as we walked out. Instead of answering her question, I asked her, ‘Yasmeen, why are you so kattar (bigoted)? Muslims are the most bigoted religious community in the world. Their Prophet was the greatest, their religion is the best, Muslims are the most enlightened community, the most God-fearing and righteous of all mankind. If the Jews think, they are God’s chosen people, Muslims think they are the choicest of the chosen. How can you be so narrow-minded?’

  She was taken aback. ‘We are not bigoted,’ she retorted. ‘We follow our religious precepts in letter and in spirit because we know they are the best for humanity. You must give me the opportunity to tell you of the beauty of Islam. You don’t know what you are missing in life.’

  ‘I’m happy in my ignorance,’ I replied. ‘I don’t have much patience with any religion. All I say is try not to injure anyone’s feelings. The rest is marginal. Gods, prophets, scriptures, rituals, pilgrimages mean very little to me.’

  She made no comment.

  Yasmeen had only a week left in Princeton. Having failed to find anything more suitable to give her, I bought her a University ring made of silver with the Princeton emblem on it. At a coffee session one morning when no one was sharing our table, I took it out of my pocket and slipped it on her finger. ‘I see you wear only gold but I could not afford a gold ring. And this being a University ring, no one will comment on it. You could have bought it yourself but I’m giving it to you so that it will remind you of your days with a Bharatiya Hindu boy in Princeton.’

  She took my hand and kissed it.

  A faint blush came over her face. ‘You are a nice boy. I only wish your name was not Mohan Kumar but Mohammed Kareem, or something like that,’ she laughed. ‘I am not as kattar as you think. I am just concerned about your future.’

  During her last week in Princeton, we met every day. We spent the afternoons walking around the campus and shopping. She bought lots of things for her husband and children and her household in Muzaffarabad. She seemed to have plenty of cash and dollar traveller’s cheques. Came her last day, she invited me over for dinner. ‘Have you ever tasted Kashmiri food? It is the tastiest in the world, only very rich. I am a good cook. I can make very good goshtaba. Ever tasted goshtaba?’

  I admitted that I had not.

  ‘You must tell me what you don’t eat,’ she said. ‘You Hindus have so many food fads. I know you don’t eat beef or veal, but believe me, it is the most delicious meat. So many of you are vegetarian; no fish, not even eggs. Some even refuse to eat onions or garlic. How can you make anything tasty without onions or garlic, I ask you?’

  ‘I eat everything except beef. Not that I regard the cow as sacred, but because I have been brought up like that. And let me assure you that pig’s meat, which you will not touch, can be very clean and tasty: ham, bacon, pork are the staple diet of most Europeans and Americans. One reason why I don’t think Islam will spread to the Pacific islands is because their economy is based on the pig. And I know that like the Jews, many Muslims don’t eat shrimps, crabs or lobsters. Muslim tribes living along the Arabian and African coast don’t eat fish because they think fish are serpents of the sea.’

  ‘You are a very argumentative fellow,’ she said patting my cheek. ‘Come as early as you can tomorrow evening and sample my Kashmiri cooking. I don’t drink, but I’ll get some beer for you and put it in the fridge.’

  I swear I had nothing more on my mind than spending a pleasant evening with Yasmeen. Things did not turn out that way. I took her a bunch of dark red roses. She kissed my hands as I gave them to her and embraced me warmly. While I was casually dressed in a sports shirt and slacks, she wore a silk salwar-kameez with gold borders, a gold necklace with a medallion on which was inscribed a verse from the Koran, gold earrings and gold bangles. She had a lot of make-up on and had doused herself with French perfume. Besides beer in the fridge, she had put a half-bottle of Scotch, a tumbler and a pitcher of water on the centre table. ‘You help yourself to Scotch or beer while I say my evening namaaz.’

  She went to her bedroom, put her prayer mat on the floor and stood facing Mecca. I poured myself a Scotch. While I sipped it, I saw her going through her genuflections. She sat a long time on her knees with the palms of her hands open in front of her face as if reading their lines. I could see her lips moving but could not hear what she was reciting. She looked serene. She turned her face one way, then the other, brushed her face with her hands and stood up. She rolled up her prayer mat and tucked it under her bed.

  She went into the kitchen to make sure the goshtaba was cooking nicely and lowered the flame so that it could cook slowly. Then she came and joined me. ‘How’s the drink?’ she asked. ‘Very nice,’ I replied. ‘Would you like one?’

  ‘Toba! It is haraam. You will make me a sinner, will you? You can fetch me a Coke from the fridge.’

  I got out a can of Coke. Before I could open it, she took it from my hand and put it on the table. Then she held my hands in hers and looked into my eyes till I had to lower my gaze, embarrassed. Suddenly, she put her arms round my neck and said, ‘It is our last evening together. Make love to me—something to remember you by for the rest of my days.’

  To say that I was shocked would be an understatement. This was the last thing I had expected of the evening. Besides, Yasmeen had never appeared sexually desirable to me. But she did not give me a chance to protest. She took me by my hand and led me to the bedroom. She took off everything save her jewellery. Her skin was soft but flabby. Her big breasts sagged and she had shaved her pubic hair. None of the girls I had bedded shaved their privates. I was surprised to find that a woman so large who had borne three children, had such a small vagina. It looked vulnerable. While I gazed at her figure, she took off my shirt and pulled down my trousers. She gasped at what she saw. ‘Mashallah! What have you got there? Do all Hindus have organs of this size? It must be their reward for worshipping the phallus.’ She fondled it for a while with her pudgy hands, her lips glued to mine.

  She pulled me over her and stretched her thighs wide to receive me. I entered her. She moaned with pleasure and locked her legs behind my back. She ate up my face with bites and passionate kisses. We came together.

  She lay back exhausted. Then she pushed me off her and went into the bathroom to wash. She came back and put on her kameez. ‘That goshtaba must be ready by now. It must not get overcooked. You wash yourself and I’ll lay the dinner on the table.’

  I did as I was told. She was like a political boss in full command of the situation. We sat down to eat. I noticed she had not put on her salwar. Her kameez hung down to her knees, exposing her broad thighs when she stood up or sat down. I understood that she had not finished with me and expected another session after dinner. I was not sure if I would be up to
it with her. But I let myself in for it by a thoughtless gesture. While she was washing the dishes and I was drying them with a piece of cloth, I put my right hand under her kameez and stroked her huge buttocks. They were like two gourds of a tanpura joined together—massive, rounded, smooth. She smiled and kissed me on the lips. ‘You want to do it a second time? So do I. We will make it different this time.’ That did it.

  For a while we sat holding hands and chatted away. She told me of her daily schedule in Muzaffarabad. ‘With both my husband and I being in politics, we hardly have a moment to ourselves. It is like a public durbar from sunrise to sunset. Wherever we go we are surrounded by men and women with petitions. For me, being here is like being on a holiday. I wish I could extend it but my grant is over and my family will want to know why I am not taking the first flight back to Karachi and home.’

  She stood up and stretched her arms above her head and stifled a yawn. ‘Time for bed,’ she said taking me by the hand and leading me to her bed. She gently pushed me on it. ‘This time you relax and I’ll do all the work!’

  She pulled off my trousers and fondled my limp lingam till it was ready for action. She sat astride my groin, spread her ample frame over me and directed my phallus into her. She was wet and eager and my penis slid in easily. Her breasts smothered my face. She held each in turn and put its nipple in my mouth, urging me to suck it. She kissed me hungrily and noisily on my nose, lips and neck, leaving her saliva on me, while she heaved and thumped me with her huge buttocks. ‘I haven’t had sex for six months. I am famished,’ she said as her movements became more frenzied. ‘Fill me up with all you have, you miserable kafir,’ she screamed. And with a spectacular shudder and a loud ‘ah—ah—ah’ she collapsed on me like a lifeless corpse. She did all the fucking. I was simply fucked.

  ‘Wouldn’t it be nicer if we settled Pak-India problems this way rather than by abusing each other and fighting?’ she asked after a while.

  ‘Sure,’ I replied. ‘And with Pakistan always on top?’

  ‘Of course! Pakistan must always be on top.’

  I was exhausted, and wanted to get away. She clung to me and begged, ‘Please stay the night with me. I’ll feel very lost if you go away. I promise I won’t bother you any more.’

  I agreed to spend the night with her and see her off at the bus stand the next morning. I could not resist asking her a few awkward questions. ‘You must tell me how you square your belief in Islamic values with what you and I have been doing.’

  She paused a long time, staring at me with her large eyes. ‘What I did was sinful,’ she admitted.

  ‘A sin punishable with death by stoning or beheading?’

  ‘You are right. But Shariat law requires two Muslim eyewitnesses to an act of adultery. Nobody can prove it against me. You, not being Muslim, don’t count in a Shariat court.’

  ‘Is that all that matters to you? Doesn’t your conscience bother you?’

  ‘The body has its compulsions which Allah understands. He is Raheem (merciful) and Rahman (compassionate). He will forgive me. On my way back home I will perform an umra at Mecca and Medina.’

  ‘Umra? What is that?’

  ‘The smaller pilgrimage. Hajj is once a year; umra, whenever you can make it. I will pray for forgiveness.’

  ‘And be absolved of all your sins? Like Hindus taking a dip in the Holy Ganga?’

  ‘O shut up!’ she shouted angrily. ‘Don’t spoil my last night with you.’

  She put her head on my right arm and nestled against me. ‘There is an easier way to my being forgiven. If I converted an infidel to Islam, all my sins would be absolved,’ she said.

  ‘Sure! Find another Hindu and convert him to Islam. Not me.’ We were soon fast asleep in each other’s arms.

  Molly Gomes

  It was Sunday. No office. I slept longer than usual. I picked up Molly, carried her to her room and tucked her into her own bed. ‘Sleep as late as you like. It’s Sunday. It will be a late breakfast—early brunch. Take your own time.’

  She mumbled something I couldn’t make out and turned over and went back to sleep.

  I opened the front door, picked up the Sunday papers lying in a heap by the gate and went back to my room. I switched on the electric radiator and got back into bed to read the papers. The bearer brought me tea. In half an hour I had run through the six papers and their colour supplements. There was nothing much to read. I went up to the roof to check the arrangements. The two rexine mattresses were lying next to each other, drenched in dew. I walked around the roof. It was higher than the roofs of the other houses. I could see my neighbours; they could not see me. The rooftops were a forest of TV and dish antennae as far as the eyes could see. While strolling around in the chill morning, it occurred to me that I had missed out on my surya namaskar for many days. I stood facing the rising sun and went through all the motions. I felt the better for it.

  I bathed, changed into a sports shirt and slacks and put on a thick sweater. Molly emerged from her room after ten, freshly bathed and in one of the salwar-kameez sets she had bought the day before. ‘How do I look?’ she asked looking down at her long shirt.

  ‘Very nice! I suggest you wrap a shawl around you. This weather can be very treacherous.’

  She went back and came out with a hand-knitted woollen scarf that barely covered her front. We sat down in front of the electric radiator. I lit my cigar, she lit her cigarette.

  ‘It promises to be a bright, sunny day. The mattresses are on the roof and I’ve got a bottle of herbal oil to put on my skin. We can sunbathe all afternoon till the sun goes down.’

  ‘That will be lovely,’ she replied.

  We had a light brunch of hot Chinese sweet-and-sour soup and ham sandwiches. The servants cleared the table and left for their quarters.

  ‘Come and take a look at the bandobast,’ I said and led her by the hand up the stairs to the roof. The sun was bright and warm. It had dried the dew on the mattresses. A bottle of herbal oil was warming itself in the sun. Molly walked round the roof to make sure that no one could see us.

  ‘You get into a light dressing gown,’ she ordered, suddenly very professional and in command, ‘I’ll get into my working clothes.’

  We waited to let the sun get warmer. When we went up again, it was exactly overhead. There was no breeze. ‘Perfect for sunbathing,’ pronounced Molly. ‘Take off your dressing gown and lie down on your stomach.’

  I did as I was ordered. She took off her cotton nightie and tossed it on the ground. She had not a stitch on her except the gold chain around her ankle. She came over and sat on my back—astride—as if riding a horse. I could feel her pubic hair tickle the base of my spine. With both her hands she kneaded my spine from bottom to top, over and over again. She pressed her thumbs hard into my shoulder blades, then twisted them, rinsing out all the tension. She filled her palms with warm herbal oil, smeared it on my back, and repeated the process: up the spinal cord, behind the neck to the base of the skull, round the ears, down to the shoulders and back to the base of the spine. She got up, stepped over me twice and again sat down on my back, this time facing my feet. She put more oil in her palms and went over my buttocks and between them, circling my anus lightly, then to my thighs, legs, ankles, down to every toe. This went on for almost half an hour. It was very soothing and sensuous. Every inch of my body was aching to be ministered to by her loving fingers. She stood above me and ordered, ‘Turn around.’

  I turned around and lay on my back. I got a worm’s eye view of her thighs and what they concealed. She sat down on my stomach. She ran her fingers round my nipples. I had not realized a man’s nipples could be as sensitive as a woman’s. She poured oil on my chest and with open palms rubbed it into my torso many times. Once again she changed positions; now her buttocks were towards my face. As she stretched forward and back, her pubic hair grazed the line of hair running down from my navel to my groin. She slapped a liberal palmful of oil beneath my testicles and rubbed it into my inner thigh
s, down to the ankles and the feet. She had to lean forward to massage my feet and I had a splendid view of her anus and pubic fluff. I began to react. My penis sprang to full life and slapped against her thigh as it did so. She slapped it down and away. ‘Patience!’ she admonished.

  The massage went on for an hour. I can’t recall ever having experienced anything more pleasurable and sensual—even more than sexual intercourse. She wiped her oily hands against her sides and lay down on her mattress, face down. This time I went over and sat astride her, my balls caressing the small of her back as I moved. Though I had not massaged anyone before, I imitated her. I massaged her body from her neck to her toes, first the rear then the front. I glued my lips to her nipples in turn and slowly entered her. It was heavenly. I stayed inside her a long time, both of us motionless. Then I pulled out and asked her to turn around. She lay on her stomach with her legs wide apart. I positioned myself between her thighs and began to massage her buttocks. Come to think of it, a woman’s buttocks excite a man more than any other part of her body—more than her lips or breasts or her pussy. And Molly’s were beautifully rounded and firm. I found them irresistible and slowly entered her cunt from the rear. She gave a long sigh of pleasure and let me go further and further into her. We did our best to prolong our bliss. Every time I felt I was coming I pulled out and sat still till the crisis had passed. Then we resumed our search for the ultimate truth of bodily existence: at times she pressed into me from above with my hands squeezing and pressing her buttocks to urge her on; then I on top, with her nails stuck into my posterior. When neither of us could hold out any longer, we went at each other like wild animals, tearing and clawing each other’s flesh. The climax was the most prolonged that either of us had experienced in our lives.