I Shall Not Hear The Nightingale

by Singh, Khushwant

  When Buta Singh made such statements he excepted himself. But when he added: ‘We have still a lot to learn from the English,’ the implication was that he had done all the learning there was to be done; it was for other Indians to follow his example. In the past these remarks had been directed to the shortcomings of Wazir Chand’s character. Of late Buta Singh had to make his references less pointed because his son and daughter had begun to see a lot of Madan and Sita.

  ‘Some people have boot-licking ingrained in their make-up.’ Buta Singh recalled that he had passed that judgement on Wazir Chand more than once and quickly tried to generalize it, ‘All these magistrates are great lions in their own homes. When it comes to facing the Sahib, you should see them: each anxious to push the other in front. When Taylor is there, they can’t utter a squeak.’

  ‘This has come because of centuries of slavery. Our country has never been free and we have developed a servile mentality. We are frightened of power. Rarely do we get someone who can stand up to it: someone like Shivaji, or Rana Pratap, or our own Guru, Govind Singh.’ Sher Singh’s heroes were the tough men of Indian history who had fought the Muslims.

  Buta Singh acknowledged his son’s compliment. ‘Those were great men called upon by destiny to save their country. I am talking of common people like us. Take this business of getting permission for the procession. Not one of these Hindus, who give battle with their tongues, would face Taylor and get him to revise his decision. They had to come to me.’

  ‘Did he grant them permission?’ asked Sabhrai.

  ‘Of course! Didn’t take a minute. It would have been a little awkward if he had asked me why a Sikh had to speak on behalf of the Hindus.’

  ‘Sikhs have always had to help the Hindus,’ answered his wife proudly. ‘That is nothing new.’

  Buta Singh felt the mantle of ‘Defender of the Hindus’ descend on him. His tone became generous and patronizing. ‘There are other things about these English which one must admire. When Taylor realized his order was a mistake — I pointed that out to him — he did not hesitate one moment to alter it. No personal pride or anything.’

  ‘It isn’t by accident that they are sitting on half the world as rulers,’ joined Sher Singh. ‘Look at the way their delegates come to negotiate with Indians who have been put in jail by his own King’s Viceroy. No personal pride or anything,’ he concluded with his father’s words.

  ‘We Indians have a lot to learn from them.’

  Sher Singh sensed that the remark was directed to him. ‘They too have something to learn from us,’ he said, taking up the challenge.

  ‘What?’

  He did not answer or look up.

  ‘What?’ repeated Buta Singh, ‘can Indians teach Englishmen?’

  ‘Oh, many things. Like . . . like . . . ’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like hospitality . . . tolerance . . . ’

  ‘Rubbish! Ask the eighty million untouchables what they think of the tolerance of the caste Hindus. Ask the Hindus and Sikhs about the tolerance of the Muslims.’

  ‘You can find examples like that everywhere. Most white people are anti-semitic. It’s not only Hitler who has been putting Jews in gas chambers, the Russians have killed many. Everywhere in Europe and America there is prejudice against them and only because they have better brains and talent than the others. We do not have any racial discrimination.’

  ‘No? What is untouchability if not racial?’

  ‘We do not kill our untouchables.’

  ‘Because they have never had the courage to revolt. What religion of the world other than the Hindu — and I include the Sikhs in the Hindus — has degraded humanity in the same way?’

  The friendly family discussion turned into an acrimonious debate. Sabhrai did not like it. ‘Why must you start arguing at home? Don’t you get enough from the lawyers in the courts?’ she asked angrily.

  ‘One must not get things wrong,’ answered Buta Singh lamely and got up. ‘One should be able to see one’s faults and learn from other people. Being contented with one’s lot is not good enough.’

  Sher Singh did not reply. He knew anything he said would irritate his father more and occasion another long sermon. But as soon as Buta Singh left, Sabhrai provoked him into another argument. ‘Why do you have to contradict your father in everything he says?’ she asked him aggressively. ‘It is not nice to argue with one’s elders; you should listen to what they have to say.’

  ‘I wasn’t arguing. I was . . . ’

  ‘Sherji never argues,’ interrupted Beena. ‘Other people argue with him.’

  They started laughing.

  ‘And why are you so much against the English? What have they done to you?’ asked Sabhrai coming back to the subject.

  ‘I am not against them; I am for my own country. If they stayed in England, I would have nothing against them.’

  ‘Is that what you say at your meetings? Do you tell the British Government to go back to England?’

  ‘That, and other things.’

  ‘Well, don’t say them in this house. We eat their salt, and as long as we eat it, we will remain loyal.’

  Sher Singh’s temper shot up. ‘Who eats whose salt? They suck our blood.’

  ‘This is no way to talk, son,’ remonstrated Sabhrai gently. ‘You are welcome to your views, but do not say things which you know may embarrass your father. At least we eat his salt.’

  Sher Singh got up. Sabhrai felt she had upset her son. ‘Tell me, son,’ she asked, putting her hand on his shoulder, ‘what will you get if the English leave this country?’

  ‘I? Nothing. But we will be free.’

  ‘Then what will happen? What sweetmeats will we get?’

  Sher Singh could not answer simple questions like these; at least not in words his illiterate mother could understand. He became lyrical —- ‘Spring will come to our barren land once more . . . once more the nightingales will sing.’

  Chapter III

  In June the sun scorches

  The skies are hot

  And the earth burns like an oven.

  The waters give up their vapours,

  Yet it burns and scorches relentlessly.

  When the sun’s chariot passes the mountain tops,

  Long shadows stretch across the land.

  The cicadas call from the glades,

  And the beloved seeks the cool of the evening.

  If the comfort she seeks be in falsehood,

  There will be sorrow in store for her.

  If it be in truth,

  Hers will be a life of joy.

  Spake the Guru: My life and life’s ending are at the will of the Lord

  To Him have I surrendered my soul.

  The Guru had left out reference to the dust in his description of the month of Asadh (May/June). First there were the devils spiralling their way across the parched land. They were followed by storms which came with blinding fury, flinging dark brown earth in fistfuls in people’s faces. Some summers, as in the summer of 1942, there were no dust-devils or dust storms but only dust. The sky turned from a colourless grey to copper red and a fine hot powder started to fall. It fell gently day after day and covered everything under a thick layer of khaki. It got into the eyes till they hurt; it got into the mouth and one felt the grit between the teeth; if one turned the end of a handkerchief on one’s fingertip inside the ears or nostrils, it came out muddy. Trees stood in petrified stillness with the weight of dust heavy on their leaves. There was neither sunshine nor shadow. The sun had become a large orange disc suspended in an amber sky; its light was dissipated in the atmosphere. It was intensely hot without even a suspicion of breeze anywhere.

  Sabhrai wiped her forehead with a towel and pressed it on the Holy Book. She spread the cover on it and looked up at her family. They were all there including the dog and they were all well and happy. That was enough for her.

  Her husband ran his hand gingerly behind his neck and remarked: ‘I’ve never had prickly hea
t like this before. It feels like a thousand thorns stuck into the back.’

  Sabhrai took no notice of the complaint. They had spent several disturbed nights and everyone’s nerves were a little frayed. ‘Will you say the supplicatory prayer?’ she asked, heaving herself up. ‘Don’t forget to thank Him for Sher’s success at the elections. Also mention Beena’s examination: if the Guru wills she will pass even if her papers have not been good.’

  The family stood up. Buta Singh stepped in front. He shut his eyes and raised his face to the ceiling. With his hands joined across his navel he recited the names of the ten Gurus, the important shrines, and the martyrs. He thanked the Guru for his son being elected President of the Students’ Union and invoked special assistance for his daughter and blessings for the rest of the family. They all went down on their knees, rubbed their foreheads in front of the Holy Book once more, and sat down in their places. Shunno stirred the prasad with a dagger.

  ‘Last night it was like an oven,’ commented Sher Singh. ‘I could not sleep at all. I must have drunk at least twelve tumblers of water but the thirst would not go.’

  ‘It can’t last very long. The monsoon has broken in Bombay and it should be reaching the Punjab in another fortnight. As a matter of fact, Mr Taylor, who is a keen bird-watcher, told me that he had heard the monsoon bird calling. He said this bird comes all the way from Africa with the monsoon winds and wherever it goes the rain is sure to follows Now the college is closed, why don’t you go to the hills for a few days? Sher, you should take Champak and Beena to Simla. You can rent a house for a couple of months; your mother and I will come over later.’ Buta Singh cupped his hands to receive prasad from Shunno.

  ‘I have just taken over the Union and even though the colleges are closed, there is a lot of work to do. Madan said his father has rented a large house in Simla and only he and his sister are going for the present. He suggested our sharing it with them. It may not be a bad idea if Beena and Champak went with them now; I will take off a few days in September before the colleges re-open.’ Sher Singh took his share of the prasad in his cupped hands.

  Before Sabhrai could say anything, Buta Singh agreed that it was a good idea. ‘Of course, I will have to stay in a hotel — Cecil or Clarke’s. In Simla one meets many senior officials of the Punjab Government and the Government of India, and a good address is most important. You come to some arrangement with Wazir Chand’s family: take half the house and pay half the rent. I will see Taylor and discuss summer plans with him.’

  The attitude of Buta Singh and his family to the Wazir Chands had undergone a change. Buta Singh had so completely triumphed over his colleague both in the eyes of the bureaucracy and in the estimation of the local populace that he could afford to adopt a patronizing attitude towards him. Sher Singh and Madan were constantly seeing each other during the elections and there was no doubt in anyone’s mind that Sher Singh’s easy success was in large measure due to Wazir Chand’s son. The opposition that had come from Sabhrai was silenced by Beena’s persistent refusal to go to Sita for help in her studies, and a not too subtle insinuation that her poor performance at the exams was a result of her mother’s attitude.

  The Buta Singhs decided to call on the Wazir Chands to settle the business of going to Simla.

  The arrival of Buta Singh and his family created quite a commotion in Wazir Chand’s house. They had turned up without warning. To emphasize the degree of familiarity that had developed between them, they trooped in without waiting to be announced.

  ‘Anyone there?’ shouted Buta Singh leading the way; Sabhrai, Sher Singh, and Beena followed behind him. They went through the sitting-room into the courtyard. Wazir Chand was lying on his belly on a fiber mattress with only a loin-cloth on his person. A servant was vigorously massaging his buttocks and legs with oil. Beside him seated on a chair was his son Madan shaving himself in front of a mirror placed on a stool; one side of his face was still covered with lather. His mother had just emerged from the lavatory at the far end of the courtyard and was scrubbing her water-jug with ashes. Sita, the only one who was dressed and ready, fled to her room utterly embarrassed.

  ‘Oho,’ said Buta Singh jovially. ‘You are having yourself massaged.’

  Wazir Chand shook off the servant and got up hurriedly. He unwound the dirty dhoti on which he had been resting his chin and wrapped it round his legs; he spread a newspaper across his greasy, hairy chest. Madan wiped off the lather with a towel and stood up; his face looked like a lawn, only half of which had been mown.

  ‘Don’t disturb yourselves,’ protested Buta Singh. ‘This is like our own home. We are always this way.’

  Sher Singh and Beena looked at each other and smiled.

  ‘Sardarji, come into the sitting-room. Oi, ask Sita to come out,’ ordered Wazir Chand.

  ‘I will get her,’ volunteered Beena and rushed away to Sita’s room. Wazir Chand put on a soiled shirt and conducted his guests to the sitting-room. Servants brought in trays of dried fruit and seltzer. Despite Buta Singh’s protests that they had just had breakfast, that this was like their own home, that they would ask for anything they wanted, they were talked into sampling the nuts and drinks placed before them.

  The conversation started with the terrible heat and plans to escape to the hills. Then the women made a group of their own and got into a huddle on one side. Buta Singh and Wazir Chand dropped their voices to a conspiratorial whisper to discuss office gossip and politics. They are getting a hell of a beating these English, aren’t they? Four of their aircraft-carriers have been sunk, the Germans have swallowed most of Europe and Russia, the Japanese have them on the run in the East. How long do you think they can hold out?’

  ‘One can never tell,’ answered Wazir Chand cautiously. ‘So far they seem to be getting the worst of it. But their broadcasts always talk of victories.’

  ‘Don’t believe a word! You think they would be willing to talk of a settlement with us if all were going well?’

  ‘You maintain that the English always win in the end,’ said Wazir Chand with a mischievous smile. ‘Have you begun to change your views?’

  Buta Singh felt cornered. ‘You will agree that so far they have always won the decisive battles. One never knows how things will turn out, they may still turn defeat into victory.’ Buta Singh realized that Wazir Chand had made him contradict himself. He tried to retrieve the situation. ‘What is more important than the fate of the English or the Germans or the Japanese is the future of this country. How can our leaders persuade the English to give us freedom if the Muslims do not side with us?’

  Buta Singh’s zeal in collecting war funds was a popular subject of discussion in magisterial circles. Words like ‘freedom,’ ‘our leaders,’ were new in his vocabulary. Wazir Chand decided to keep Buta Singh on the defensive. ‘What does Taylor have to say about it? You see more of him than anyone else.’

  ‘Sends for me morning and evening,’ complained Buta Singh. ‘You can see he is worried. He is always asking me about British proposals and my views on the Muslim demand for Pakistan. I tell him quite frankly what I think.’

  ‘Your position is different,’ conceded Wazir Chand. ‘You are the only one he really confides in.’

  ‘You are making fun of me,’ said Buta Singh, thoroughly flattered. ‘Believe me, he listens to what I say because he gets things straight from me; I don’t butter my chapatis for him. He has sent for me again this morning.’ Buta Singh glanced at his watch: ‘Actually we came to discuss this matter of sharing the house in Simla; I believe you have rented a large one.’

  ‘Sardar Sahib, it is your house; you are most welcome. What could give us greater pleasure?’

  ‘That is very kind of you, but we must share the rent.’

  ‘No, no,’ protested Wazir Chand, taking Buta Singh’s hands in his. The two magistrates squeezed each other’s hands with great affection. Buta Singh looked at his watch again. The conversation died down.

  Wazir Chand’s wife spoke in a tim
id, low voice: ‘Sherji, you don’t ever come to see us.’

  ‘What a thing to say!’ said Madan before Sher Singh could answer. ‘He is busy being a leader; he has no time for social calls.’ He turned to Buta Singh’s wife and added: ‘Auntie, we are going to ask you for sweets the day Sherji becomes a Minister; he is bound to become one one day. I’ve got sister Champak to promise us that already.’

  ‘If brothers like you wish him well, then he will achieve everything,’ answered Sabhrai. She turned the conversation to what was uppermost in her mind: Madan’s relationship with his wife. ‘How is our daughter-in-law keeping? You get good news of her?’

  ‘She is with her mother and you know how daughters are in their mothers’ homes!’ answered Wazir Chand’s wife.

  Sabhrai was not satisfied. ‘I hope she will be going to Simla. It should be good for her health.’

  Wazir Chand came to his wife’s rescue: ‘Of course! The plans are that Madan will first take up his sisters. After he has made all the arrangements for their comfort, he will go and fetch his wife. By then, I hope I will be there or Sherji or Sardar Sahib. There ought to be some man there all the time. Don’t you think so?’

  ‘Of course, of course,’ agreed Buta Singh. ‘I wish Sher could go now, but he insists on staying here for some time. My own arrangements are a little uncertain. If I go at all, it will only be for a day or two to leave my wife and then to bring her back.’

  They got down to discussing the plans again. Buta Singh and Wazir Chand went out together and after much protesting on either side agreed to share the rent of the house. The chaprasi returned the visiting-card and held up the heavy chick for him to pass under. ‘Go in, Sardarji, the Sahib is waiting for you.’

  Buta Singh put the card back in his wallet, adjusted his tie and coat, and went in. It was dark; all the doors and fanlights were blocked with thick khas fibre thatching. A cool spray came through each time the coolies outside splashed water on them. A pleasant damp smell of fresh earth pervaded the courtroom.

  A table lamp cast a circle of light on a sheaf of yellow files which Taylor was reading. He wore a white open-collar shirt, khaki shorts, and sandals on his feet. A silver tankard of iced beer lay in front of him; froth trickled down its sides and mixed with the beads of frost on the metal. Several feet away on a lower level there was another circle of yellow light under which Taylor’s reader sat quietly turning over case files.