This was awkward; first from Vinod and now from Detective Patel, the doctor had learned something. In both cases, the subject of the lesson was the acceptance of something unsatisfying.
“If you ever come to Canada,” Farrokh blurted out, “I would be happy to be your host—to show you around.”
It was the deputy commissioner’s turn to laugh. “It’s much more likely that I’ll see you when you’re back in Bombay,” Patel said.
“I’m not coming back to Bombay,” Dr. Daruwalla insisted. It wasn’t the first time he’d spoken his thoughts so unequivocally on this subject.
Although Detective Patel politely accepted the statement, Dr. Daruwalla could tell that the deputy commissioner didn’t believe him. “Well, then,” Patel said. It was all there was to say. Not “Good-bye”; just “Well, then.”
Not a Word
Martin Mills again confessed to Father Cecil, who this time managed to stay awake. The scholastic was guilty of jumping to conclusions; Martin interpreted Danny’s death and his mother’s request that he come to her assistance in New York as a sign. After all, Jesuits are relentless in seeking God’s will, and Martin was an especially zealous example; the scholastic not only sought God’s will, but he too often believed that he’d spontaneously intuited what it was. In this case, Martin confessed, his mother was still capable of making him feel guilty, for he was inclined to go to New York at her bidding; Martin also confessed that he didn’t want to go. The conclusion Martin then jumped to was that this weakness—his inability to stand up to Vera—was an indication that he lacked the faith to become ordained. Worse, the child prostitute had not only forsaken the circus and returned to her life of sin, but she would almost certainly die of AIDS; what had befallen Madhu was an even darker sign, which Martin interpreted as a warning that he would be ineffectual as a priest.
“This is clearly meant to show me that I shall be unable to renew the grace received from God in ordination,” Martin confessed to old Father Cecil, who wished that the Father Rector were hearing this; Father Julian would have put the presumptuous fool in his place. How impertinent—how utterly immodest—to be analyzing every moment of self-doubt as a sign from God! Whatever God’s will was, Father Cecil was sure that Martin Mills had not been singled out to receive as much of it as he’d imagined.
Since he’d always been Martin’s defender, Father Cecil surprised himself by saying, “If you doubt yourself so much, Martin, maybe you shouldn’t be a priest.”
“Oh, thank you, Father!” Martin said. It astonished Father Cecil to hear the now-former scholastic sound so relieved.
At the news of Martin’s shocking decision—to leave the “Life,” as it is called; not to be “One of Ours,” as the Jesuits call themselves—the Father Rector was nonplussed but philosophic.
“India isn’t for everybody,” Father Julian remarked, preferring to give Martin’s abrupt choice a secular interpretation. Blame it on Bombay, so to speak. Father Julian, after all, was English, and he credited himself with doubting the fitness of American missionaries; even on the slim evidence of Martin Mills’s dossier, the Father Rector had expressed his reservations. Father Cecil, who was Indian, said he’d be sorry to see young Martin leave; the scholastic’s energy as a teacher had been a welcome addition to St. Ignatius School.
Brother Gabriel, who quite liked and admired Martin, nevertheless remembered the bloody socks that the scholastic had been wringing in his hands—not to mention the “I’ll take the turkey” prayer. The elderly Spaniard retreated, as he often did, to his icon-collection room; these countless images of suffering, which the Russian and Byzantine icons afforded Brother Gabriel, were at least traditional—thus reassuring. The Decapitation of John the Baptist, the Last Supper, the Deposition, which was the taking of Christ’s body from the cross—even these terrible moments were preferable to that image of Martin Mills which poor old Brother Gabriel was doomed to remember: the crazed Californian with his bloody bandages awry, looking like the composite image of many murdered missionaries past. Perhaps it was God’s will that Martin Mills should be summoned to New York.
“You’re going to do what?” Dr. Daruwalla cried, for in the time it had taken the doctor to talk to Vinod and Detective Patel, Martin had not only given the St. Ignatius upper-school boys a Catholic interpretation of The Heart of the Matter; he had also “interpreted” God’s will. According to Martin, God didn’t want him to be a priest—God wanted him to go to New York!
“Let me see if I follow you,” Farrokh said. “You’ve decided that Madhu’s tragedy is your own personal failure. I know the feeling—we’re both fools. And, in addition, you doubt the strength of your conviction to be ordained because you can still be manipulated by your mother, who’s made a career out of manipulating everybody. So you’re going to New York—just to prove her power over you—and also for Danny’s sake, although Danny won’t know if you go to New York or not. Or do you believe Danny will know?”
“That’s a simplistic way to put it,” Martin said. “I may lack the necessary will to be a priest, but I haven’t entirely lost my faith.”
“Your mother’s a bitch,” Dr. Daruwalla told him.
“That’s a simplistic way to put it,” Martin repeated. “Besides, I already know what she is.”
How the doctor was tempted. Tell him—tell him now! Dr. Daruwalla thought.
“Naturally, I’ll pay you back—I won’t take the plane ticket as a gift,” Martin Mills explained. “After all, my vow of poverty no longer applies. I do have the academic credentials to teach. I won’t make a lot of money teaching, but certainly enough to pay you back—if you’ll just give me a little time.”
“It’s not the money! I can afford to buy you a plane ticket—I can afford to buy you twenty plane tickets!” Farrokh cried. “But you’re giving up your goal—that’s what’s so crazy about you. You’re giving up, and for such stupid reasons!”
“It’s not the reasons—it’s my doubt,” Martin said. “Just look at me. I’m thirty-nine. If I were going to be a priest, I should have already become one. No one who’s still trying to ‘find himself’ at thirty-nine is very reliable.”
You took the words right out of my mouth! Dr. Daruwalla thought, but all the doctor said was, “Don’t worry about the ticket—I’ll get you a ticket.” He hated to see the fool look so defeated; Martin was a fool, but he was an idealistic fool. The idiot’s idealism had grown on Dr. Daruwalla. And Martin was candid—unlike his twin! Ironically, the doctor felt he’d learned more about John D. from Martin Mills—in less than a week—than he’d learned from John D. in 39 years.
Dr. Daruwalla wondered if John D.’s remoteness, his not-thereness—his iconlike and opaque character—wasn’t that part of him which was created not upon his birth but upon his becoming Inspector Dhar. Then the doctor reminded himself that John D. had been an actor before he became Inspector Dhar. If the identical twin of a gay male had a 52 percent chance of being gay, in what other ways did John D. and Martin Mills have a 52 percent chance of being alike? It occurred to Dr. Daruwalla that the twins had a 48 percent chance of being unalike, too; nevertheless, the doctor doubted that Danny Mills could be the twins’ father. Moreover, Farrokh had grown too fond of Martin to continue to deceive him.
Tell him—tell him now! Farrokh told himself, but the words wouldn’t come. Dr. Daruwalla could say only to himself what he wanted to say to Martin.
You don’t have to deal with Danny’s remains. Probably Neville Eden is your father, and Neville’s remains were settled many years ago. You don’t have to assist your mother, who’s worse than a bitch. You don’t know what she is, or all that she is. And there’s someone you might like to know; you might even be of mutual assistance to each other. He could teach you how to relax—maybe even how to have some fun. You might teach him a little candor—maybe even how not to be an actor, at least not all the time.
But the doctor didn’t say it. Not a word.
Dr. Daruwalla Decides
“He’s confused, anyway,” Dr. Daruwalla replied.
“A thirty-nine-year-old man shouldn’t still be finding himself,” John D. declared. The actor delivered the line with almost perfect indignation, never hinting that the matter of “finding himself” was at all familiar to him.
“I think you’d like him,” Farrokh said cautiously.
“Well, you’re the writer,” Dhar remarked with almost perfect ambiguity. Dr. Daruwalla wondered: Does he mean that the matter of whether or not they meet is in my hands? Or does he mean that only a writer would waste his time fantasizing that the twins should meet?
They were standing on the Daruwallas’ balcony at sunset. The Arabian Sea was the faded purple of John D.’s slowly healing lower lip. The splint on his broken pinky finger provided the actor with an instrument for pointing; Dhar liked to point.
“Remember how Nancy responded to this view?” the actor asked, pointing west.
“All the way to Iowa,” the doctor remarked.
“If you’re never coming back to Bombay, Farrokh, you might give the deputy commissioner and Mrs. Patel this apartment.” The line was delivered with almost perfect indifference. The screenwriter had to marvel at the hidden character he’d created; Dhar was almost perfectly mysterious. “I don’t mean actually give it to them—the good detective would doubtless construe that as a bribe,” Dhar went on. “But perhaps you could sell it to them for a ridiculous sum—a hundred rupees, for example. Of course you could stipulate that the Patels would have to maintain the servants—for as long as Nalin and Roopa are alive. I know you wouldn’t want to turn them out on the street. As for the Residents’ Society, I’m sure they wouldn’t object to the Patels—every apartment dweller wants to have a policeman in the building.” Dhar pointed his splint west again. “I believe this view would do Nancy some good,” the actor added.
“I can see you’ve been thinking about this,” Farrokh said.
“It’s just an idea—if you’re never coming back to Bombay,” John D. replied. “I mean really never.”
“Are you ever coming back?” Dr. Daruwalla asked him.
“Not in a million years,” said Inspector Dhar.
“That old line!” Farrokh said fondly.
“You wrote it,” John D. reminded him.
“You keep reminding me,” the doctor said.
They stayed on the balcony until the Arabian Sea was the color of an overripe cherry, almost black. Julia had to clear the contents of John D.’s pockets off the glass-topped table in order for them to have their dinner. It was a habit that John D. had maintained from childhood. He would come into the house or the apartment, take off his coat and his shoes or sandals, and empty the contents of his pockets on the nearest table; this was more than a gesture to make himself feel at home, for the source lay with the Daruwallas’ daughters. When they’d lived at home, they liked nothing better than wrestling with John D. He would lie on his back on the rug or the floor, or sometimes on the couch, and the younger girls would pounce on him; he never hurt them, just fended them off. And so Farrokh and Julia never chastised him for the contents of his pockets, which were messily in evidence on the tabletop of every house or apartment they’d ever lived in, although there were no children for John D. to wrestle with anymore. Keys, a wallet, sometimes a passport… and this evening, on the glass-topped table of the Daruwallas’ Marine Drive apartment, a plane ticket.
“You’re leaving Thursday?” Julia asked him.
“Thursday!” Dr. Daruwalla exclaimed. “That’s the day after tomorrow!”
“Actually, I have to go to the airport Wednesday night—it’s such an early-morning flight, you know,” John D. said.
“That’s tomorrow night!” Farrokh cried. The doctor took Dhar’s wallet, keys and plane ticket from Julia and put them on the sideboard.
“Not there,” Julia told him; she was serving one of their dinner dishes from the sideboard. Therefore, Dr. Daruwalla carried the contents of John D.’s pockets into the foyer and placed them on a low table by the door—that way, the doctor thought, John D. would be sure to see his things and not forget them when he left.
“Why should I stay longer?” John D. was asking Julia. “You’re not staying much longer, are you?”
But Dr. Daruwalla lingered in the foyer; he had a look at Dhar’s plane ticket. Swissair, nonstop to Zürich. Flight 197, departing Thursday at 1:45 A.M. It was first class, seat 4B. Dhar always chose an aisle seat. This was because he was a beer drinker; on a nine-hour flight, he got up to pee a lot—he didn’t want to keep climbing over someone else.
That quickly—by the time Dr. Daruwalla had rejoined John D. and Julia, and even before he sat down to dinner—the doctor had made his decision; after all, as Dhar had told him, he was the writer. A writer could make things happen. They were twins; they didn’t have to like each other, but they didn’t have to be lonely.
Farrokh sat happily at his supper (as he insisted on calling it), smiling lovingly at John D. I’ll teach you to be ambiguous with me! the doctor thought, but what Dr. Daruwalla said was, “Why should you stay any longer, indeed! Now’s as good a time to go as any.”
Both Julia and John D. looked at him as if he were having a seizure. “Well, I mean I’ll miss you, of course—but I’ll see you soon, one place or another. Canada or Switzerland… I’m looking forward to spending more time in the mountains.”
“You are?” Julia asked him. Farrokh hated mountains. Inspector Dhar just stared.
“Yes, it’s very healthy,” the doctor replied. “All that Swiss… air,” he remarked absently; he was thinking of the airline of that name, and how he would buy a first-class ticket to Zürich for Martin Mills on Swissair 197, departing early Thursday morning. Seat 4A. Farrokh hoped that the ex-missionary would appreciate the window seat, and his interesting traveling companion.
They had a wonderful dinner, a lively time. Normally, when Dr. Daruwalla knew he was parting from John D., he was morose. But tonight the doctor felt euphoric.
“John D. has a terrific idea—about this apartment,” Farrokh told his wife. Julia liked the idea very much; the three of them talked about it at length. Detective Patel was proud; so was Nancy. They would be sensitive if they felt the apartment was offered to them as charity; the trick would be to make them think they were doing the Daruwallas a favor by looking after and “maintaining” the old servants. The diners spoke admiringly of the deputy commissioner; they could have talked for hours about Nancy—she was certainly complex.
It was always easier, with John D., when the subject of conversation was someone else; it was himself, as a subject, that the actor avoided. And the diners were animated in their discussion of what the deputy commissioner had confided to the doctor about Rahul… the unlikelihood of her hanging.
Julia and John D. had rarely seen Farrokh so relaxed. The doctor spoke of his great desire to see more of his daughters and grandchildren, and he kept repeating that he wanted to see more of John D.—“in your Swiss life.” The two men drank a lot of beer and sat up late on the balcony; they outlasted the traffic on Marine Drive. Julia sat up with them.
“You know, Farrokh, I do appreciate everything you’ve done for me,” the actor said.
“It’s been fun,” the screenwriter replied. Farrokh fought back his tears—he was a sentimental man. He managed to feel quite happy, sitting there in the darkness. The smell of the Arabian Sea, the fumes of the city—even the constantly clogged drains and the persistence of human shit—rose almost comfortingly around them. Dr. Daruwalla insisted on drinking a toast to Danny Mills; Dhar politely drank to Danny’s memory.
“He wasn’t your father—I’m quite sure of that,” Farrokh told John D.
“I’m quite sure of that, too,” the actor replied.
“Why are you so happy, Liebchen?” Julia asked Farrokh.
“He’s happy because he’s leaving India and he’s never comi
ng back,” Inspector Dhar answered; the line was delivered with almost perfect authority. This was mildly irritating to Farrokh, who suspected that leaving India and never coming back was an act of cowardice on his part. John D. was thinking of him, as he thought of his twin, as a quitter—if John D. truly believed that the doctor was never coming back.
“You’ll see why I’m happy,” Dr. Daruwalla told them. When he fell asleep on the balcony, John D. carried him to his bed.
“Look at him,” Julia said. “He’s smiling in his sleep.”
There would be time to mourn Madhu another day. There would be time to worry about Ganesh, the elephant boy, too. And on his next birthday, the doctor would be 60. But right now Dr. Daruwalla was imagining the twins together on Swissair 197. Nine hours in the air should be sufficient for starting a relationship, the doctor thought.
Julia tried to read in bed, but Farrokh distracted her; he laughed out loud in his sleep. He must be drunk, she thought. Then she saw a frown cross his face. What a shame it was, Dr. Daruwalla was thinking; he wanted to be on the same plane with them—just to watch them, and to listen. Which seat is across the aisle from 4B? the doctor wondered. Seat 4J? Farrokh had taken that flight to Zürich many times. It was a 747; the seat across the aisle from 4B was 4J, he hoped.
“Four J,” he told the flight attendant. Julia put down her book and stared at him.
“Liebchen,” she whispered, “either wake up or go to sleep.” But her husband was once again smiling serenely. Dr. Daruwalla was where he wanted to be. It was early Thursday morning—1:45 A.M., to be exact—and Swissair 197 was taking off from Sanar. Across the aisle, the twins were staring at each other; neither of them could talk. It would take a little time for one of them to break the ice, but the doctor felt confident that they couldn’t maintain their silence for the full nine hours. Although the actor had more interesting information, Farrokh bet that the ex-missionary would be the one to start blabbing. Martin Mills would blab all night, if John D. didn’t start talking in self-defense.
A Son of the Circus Page 75