River of Fire

by Qurratulain Hyder

  Nirmala and Talat are real buddies. Their gang also includes a dreamy young woman called Champa Begum. It’s an evocative name, reminds one of a Mughal miniature of a fine lady, Persian-style, in peshwaz, standing under a magnolia tree.

  Don’t smile, I’m not being soppy. Santiniketan does this to me.

  Anyway, so this Champa Begum is part of Kamal’s crowd, yet seems a bit of an outsider, an onlooker. You know what I mean.

  Last evening I saw an excellent open-air performance of Quality Street. The venue was the eucalyptus grove, called the Forest of Arden, in Isabella Thoburn College. Chandralekha Pandit played Phoebe, Ranjana Sidhanta was the ‘hero’. The cast included Nirmala, Talat and her elder sister, Tehmina. All of them are themselves residents of Quality Street. Right now, as I’m sitting on the steps of Nirmala’s house facing the river, they are all busy discussing Communist Party politics inside, so I thought I’d scribble a few lines to you . . .

  “Have you finished writing your column?” Nirmala demanded as she jumped over the balustrade. Talat followed her. “Lemme have a dekko, what’s the topic? Talat also wants to become a journalist.”

  Gautam quickly slipped the unfinished letter into his briefcase and mumbled, “I was writing to a relative . . .”

  “Well,” Nirmala dedared, “there are two types of letters one writes from a new place: a) Wish you were here, and b) There’s nothing to write home about. Which kind is it?”

  “Nirmala, don’t be nosy,” Talat rebuked her and added in the same breath, “Cousin Amir went horseback riding at 3 p.m. He phoned from Dilkusha Club—he’ll be here at 4.30 for tea.”

  Kamal emerged from the house and explained to the slightly baffled newcomer, “Our cousin, the dashing naval officer. I told you about him in Calcutta, didn’t I?”

  “Ah, so you all are the huntin’, shootin’, fishin’ types. Being solid middle class, I am overawed!”

  As though on cue, Amir Reza arrived on the scene like Peter Pan. It was uncanny.

  “This is naval precision! He said he will be here on the dot of 4.30 and he is,” said Talat proudly. “Adaab, Bhaiya Saheb.”

  Jamuna Mehri brought tea.

  “Adaab, Bhaiya Saheb!” There was a chorus. Everybody called him Bhaiya Saheb—a colloquial term of respect in U.P.— everybody except Champa. Gautam noticed that she seated herself coyly on the rush mat and poured tea for the handsome young man. She had suddenly become very self-conscious.

  Aha! So this is what it is. Alas, alas—Gautam thought as he watched Peter Pan flash his smile, surrounded by the cast of Arcadia.

  Kamal sat down on the bench near Champa. After a few moments of silence he quoted the eighteenth-century Urdu poet, Mir:

  Le saans bhi aahista

  Ke nazuk hai bohat kaam,

  Aafaq ki is kargah-i-

  Sheesha-gari ka.

  (Breathe softly, for the task of the Universe’s workshop of glassblowers is extremely delicate.)

  “Old Mir Saheb was talking about human relationships.”

  “I am aware of that,” she answered dryly.

  “Are you? In that case why did you deceive poor, harmless Tehmina? Have you any idea how much you have humiliated my good-natured sister? She has become the spurned, rejected fiancé. You are the victorious femme fatale.”

  “You are being melodramatic, Kamal. I did not deliberately humiliate her. She shouted at me that day near the swimming pool as though I were her ayah Susan, and now you are insulting me.” She was coldly furious.

  Kamal ignored her protest. “I put it to you, Champa Baji,” he said in a court-room voice, “would you have fallen head over heels in love and encouraged Amir Reza if he had been a clerk living in a slum in Nakhas?”

  She stared at him, speechless.

  “Mind you, I still think the world of you, but I believe in being truthful. That’s why I keep telling Gautam that he is a bit of a charlatan. Look, Amir is a playboy, he may let you down.”

  “I seem to be surrounded by well-wishers, but I can look after myself, thank you. Earlier you were all hell-bent on turning me into a Party sympathiser, now you’re trying to sort out my emotional life for me. Why can’t you leave me alone?”

  “Champa Baji,” Kamal went on peaceably, “your sole aim in life should not be to become a decorative ballroom dancer. Do something creative, apart from mooning around Chand Bagh.”

  “For instance?”

  “Paint, the way Saulat Rehman and Talat do. Dance, go to Almora and join Uday Shankar’s Cultural Centre. Go along with Kamala and Vimala.”

  “And?”

  “Well . . . write. Discipline yourself a little, attain inner balance . . .”

  “Life is so chaotic, how can you organise it? Besides, are writers very balanced people? I think neither Gautam nor Talat are quite all there. She is writing very stupid short stories, and they’re not honest either. The other day I read Gautam’s column titled ‘These Charming People’ in which he has obliquely called you all sextons of Time’s graveyard, dressed in coat-tails. And he’s added that you all depend on your attractiveness to remain alive. He pretends to be your friend, but makes fun of you in his articles.”

  “Talat is still a kid, and Gautam is a journalist. He has the freedom to write what he likes. Anyway, he is not far wrong— despite our concern for the masses we are, as a class, mournful undertakers of the Past. And Cousin Amir Reza’s passport to success in life are his ravishing good looks.

  “Writers, including my kid sister, may not be all there, but they do achieve a kind of inner equilibrium during the creative process. Just try to bring about an equation between intellect and emotions, then half the battle is won.”

  “I don’t believe in high falutin’ theories.”

  “Ah, Champa Baji, beware of experiments! There is a Danger Zone Ahead!” He rose to his feet, stuck his thumbs in his coat pockets and strode back to Water Chestnut House.

  41. Inder Sabha

  Amir Reza had gone to Mussoorie to meet a friend. On his return to Lucknow he visited Water Chestnut House to say goodbye to the Raizadas—he was leaving for the Eastern Front the following day.

  He found Gautam, Champa, Talat and Kamal as usual, sitting on the terrace facing the river. Gautam was smoking thoughtfully, Champa was knitting, also thoughtfully. The rest were discussing dialectic materialism. Amir Reza greeted them and sat down on the steps near Gautam. M.N. Roy and Trotsky continued to be thrashed out by Hari, Kamal and Talat.

  “Pipe down, yaar,” said Gautam after a while. “Contemplate the river. This is that time of evening for which Mir Anis has said Jhuppata waqt hai, behta hua darya thehra—Dusk falls. The river has stopped flowing.”

  Kamal looked at him and observed gravely: “Your ringlets made you look such a pseud. I’m glad you cut them before coming to Lucknow.”

  “No personal attacks please,” Talat raised her hands.

  “And Gautam Nilambar,” Kamal continued, “if, from the dawn of recorded history, prophets and philosophers and rishis and Sufis hadn’t talked, there would have been horses stabled in the libraries of the world. You should be grateful to god that we talk and you listen. A time shall come when you’ll yearn to hear our voices.”

  “You believe that Time is fatal?”

  “That’s pretty obvious,” Kamal replied.

  The sun went down in the river, Chattar Manzil’s golden domes turned amber, a boat sailed past.

  “Do you believe in the mystery of symbols?” Gautam asked Kamal. “That boat which is passing by, it has a lot of significance.”

  Kamal smiled. Gautam dramatised trivia, making whatever he said seem terribly profound. It had become an attractive mannerism and most people liked his affectations. Good old Gautam.

  “The river is time, flowing,” Gautam went on as he picked up a pebble. “The stone is the symbol of Timeless Become, and the end of the world is as certain and as unimportant as the death of a mouse. In the Upanishads . . .”

  “What does ‘Time
less Become’ mean?” asked Talat. “For goodness sake, don’t be pompous, Gautam Mashter.”

  Amir rose to his feet and said, “Quite right. Let’s go to Mohammed Bagh Club for dinner. And Champa Begum, I’ll teach you the Old Waltz—come along.”

  Talat took him aside and said, “Bhaiya Saheb, Nirmala’s folks have arranged a grand dawat for Gautam. They’ve got Hussaini and his wife over to cook. They couldn’t invite you because you were not in town, now please stay back.”

  “Nirmala’s engagement?” Amir Reza cried jubilantly. “That calls for pink champagne.” He strode in and telephoned Mohammed Bagh Club. In a short while a liveried bearer arrived in a jeep with a basketful of scotch, red claret and liqueur.

  Barrister Raizada looked enormously pleased when he saw the bearer arranging a temporary bar in the veranda under Amir’s supervision, with Hari’s eager help.

  “God bless you, sonny,” he said to Amir. He was an old colleague of Amir’s late-lamented barrister father, Sir Zaki. “As a true Kayastha I love to booze, but can’t afford it any more. I am overwhelmed by your gesture.”

  “My duty, sir,” Amir said, bowing. “My sister Nirmala is getting engaged.” (By this time he had become sufficiently Indianised to call Nirmala his sister.) A bottle of champagne was opened, followed quickly by whisky.

  The atmosphere became emotion-charged. Gautam began to feel uncomfortable, but he joined the old gentleman, Amir and Hari for a round of whisky. Kamal didn’t drink. He sat with the girls on the river steps.

  Mrs. Raizada welcomed them in to the large dining room on the ground floor. The Club bearer properly poured white wine between courses.

  Gautam continued to feel miserable.

  Hari was boisterous. “Hussaini, zindabad!” he shouted and turned to Gautam. “You know, Hussain’s ancestors cooked for King Vajid Ali Shah.”

  Now Talat spoke. “Like Bhaiya Saheb, he has only done his duty. I dunno about your Behraich, Gautam, but in our region when somebody’s daughter gets married, the entire village pitches in to help the bride-to-be’s father. It’s a kind of sacred duty. Hussaini is also very excited that Nirmala Bitiya . . .”

  Kamal was sitting next to her and gave her a kick under the table. Gautam was acutely embarrassed. Hastily he asked Talat, “Why hasn’t Tehmina come for this dinner?”

  “Because of that horrid woman. She telephoned and I told her that both of them are here—Tim knows about the goings-on, old waltz, etc.,” she answered in an undertone. Kamal gave her another nudge.

  “Why are you crushing my toe, Kim?” she asked aloud.

  Kamal felt like fleeing. By this time he had realised that Gautam was not interested in Nirmala. He looked at the radiant faces of the young girl, her parents and brother, and thought it was heart-breaking. All my bloody fault. Why the hell did I have to dabble in match-making?

  Dinner over, they came back to the terrace. The bearer served liqueur, the old barrister excused himself and went upstairs, feeling quite groggy.

  “This house is floating away like a ship, Admiral,” Gautam said tipsily and saluted Amir Reza. “And the Gomti is flowing backward.” A boat passed. The boatman was singing a ghazal from Inder Sabha.

  “This is Lucknow, Gautam Mashter,” said Talat with much feeling, “where even today the common people remember and sing Inder Sabha . . .”

  “Let’s go and see it,” Gautam got up enthusiastically.

  “See what?” asked Kamal soberly.

  “Inder Sabha. It is being staged Out There. Let’s go and catch shadows in our nets!”

  They piled into Amir’s station wagon and drove out in the moonlight till they reached a bridge. They heard voices and looked below. A procession of quaintly shaped barges glided past with people in glittering costumes. Their voices were inaudible. Sometimes they twittered like birds, at others they screeched like off-key violins. Across the river in the woods, dogs barked and jackals howled. The wood on the burning ghat snapped and splintered as it burned.

  The light of the moon became intense with their own faces looking white and blank in its blaze. Faces with no features.

  “Bridges—they have built bridges all over, like houses,” Gautam murmured angrily. They proceeded towards the cantonment. The station wagon stopped with a jerk. La Martiniere College loomed in front of them across the glassy lake.

  “What books, what knowledge, what wisdom they taught me in these noble halls . . .” said Kamal, Hari Shankar and Amir Reza in unison.

  “Why do you read?” they turned to Gautam and asked crossly.

  “It’s no use explaining to him,” said Nirmala, “he is nuts.”

  They approached the Italian Renaissance building and peeped in. The classrooms were dark and hazy. When morning comes students will read there again. The pink, green and blue of the Italian bas-relief on the ceiling gleamed in the half-light of the moon which trickled in through tall windows.

  Zoffany’s portrait of Sally Begum, also called Gori Bibi, the Indian ward of General Claude Martin, hung in a classroom. The General’s adopted son, Zulfiqar Martin, stood by her side. Talat pressed her nose against the window-pane and looked at the portrait. The others walked back to the lake.

  She followed them.

  “Come here, please.”

  Talat turned round. Gori Bibi stood near the water and beckoned to Talat. “Talk to me please,” she was saying, “all day long there is such a lot of noise here. Droves of people chatting and reading books and delivering lectures. No one even so much as looks at me.” She started to cry. Talat was upset.

  “Listen to me, Sally Begum,” she tried to be philosophical in accordance with the gravity of the situation. “You go right on concentrating on the point of eternity. These different patterns of time are in fact—I mean—” she grew more confused and stopped, foolishly. Then she remembered something. “Listen, I always wanted to know. Are you—were you General Martin’s wife or the ‘daughter’ he adopted during the great famine?”

  “Keep guessing,” Gori Bibi replied. “That’s one good thing about the Past, it so easily becomes a Mystery!” Then she vanished.

  “Promise that you will never read again,” Kamal was yelling at Gautam on the lakeside. “A young Englishman, our professor of chemistry, gave up and ran away to the Himalayas. Absconded. Just like that.” He snapped his fingers. “I wonder if he is still alive or whether some man-eater of Kumaon gobbled him up. Or if birds build their nests in his beard while he listens to Narad Muni’s celestial music . . .”

  Om. Om. Om. The sound boomed and resounded in the open moonlit spaces. Hari. Hari. They walked on the shaded path. Champa extended her hand and touched the branch of a kadamb tree. A leaf floated down to the path.

  Vishnu who is in the falling of a leaf. Hari, Hari, Gautam repeated. The General lay asleep in his marble vault. The world passed over him. A large owl flew past. Words emerged from the library and spread all over. Their meanings leered like willo-the-wisps. They climbed the cannon and sat dangling their pencil-thin black legs. The cannon thundered: I was named Lord Cornwallis and accompanied General Claude Martin to Seringapatam. I fired at Tipu Sultan. Now they have invented new weapons . . .

  Kamal who had abruptly left them on the way and disappeared, returned and joined them near the gate of Dilkusha Garden.

  “Where have you been?” Gautam asked, still very indignant.

  “Went across to Farah Baksh and saw the King, then I met the English Resident on the way back. He sat in a palanquin, wearing Indian court dress, pugree and all. I salaamed and he told me that he was going to attend the King’s Coronation.

  “‘Which King?’ I asked. ‘I have just seen one in Farah Baksh.’”

  “‘Oh, that one’?” the Resident said, ‘He is dead. His son is now going to ascend the Throne.’

  “How funny. Isn’t it funny, Hari Shankar? These kings die, too . . .” Kamal finished speaking sadly.

  They entered Dilkusha Gardens. The trees were painted a lustrous yellow. A lig
ht blue wind rose, stirring champa leaves, a peacock slept on the grass. They walked down towards the graves of British officers who fell during the Siege of Dilkusha in 1857. They parted the nettle branches and read the tombstones. Lieut. Paul of the 4th Punjab Rifles, Capt. Macdonald of the 93rd Highlanders, Lieut. Charles Dashwood.

  “Hello. How do you do!” said Lieut. Dashwood, popping up from behind the brambles where he had been playing bridge with his dead comrades.

  “Hello, Charlie,” Gautam offered him a cigarette.

  Nawab Qudsia Mahal emerged from the daisies.

  “Nasiruddin Hyder’s queen—she did herself in,” Champa-Beatrice told Gautam. The Queen sat down on a stone and spread her dazzling silk farshi pajama on the grass.

  “Once a Frenchman brought his balloon out here in these gardens,” the Queen made small talk in order to entertain her visitors. “Such a multitude had assembled here to watch the flight. It was great fun! And the Frenchman went up in this balloon and descended twelve miles outside the city. Have you ever been up in a balloon, like this . . .” she rose in the air and vanished.

  In the great moonlight-filled hollow of the roofless Dilkusha Palace, English wives of King Nasiruddin Hyder danced a mazurka. Champa sat down on the stairs. A seedy European was standing in front, singing the Ballad of Dead Ladies.

  But where are the snows

  Of yesteryear!

  He stopped abruptly and said, “Remember, beautiful women die twice. So get ready to face your first death which will come soon. I am de Russet, King Nasiruddin Hyder’s favourite coiffeur,” he announced. “I, the Barber of Paris, once virtually ruled this kingdom, now nobody even remembers my name. Therefore, be grateful for the time that is still yours.” He vanished.

  Amir Reza came up to her and said, “Let’s go to Chattar Manzil Club and I’ll teach you the Old Waltz.”