River of Fire

by Qurratulain Hyder

  He began to laugh. “Champa, we are the foreigners out here, Ashley and Craig, etc., are the natives.”

  She giggled, feeling hollow inside.

  Slowly, it turned into a routine. On Saturday afternoons he took her out of town, drove around autumnal woods, had tea and dinner in country inns and dropped her back at her digs by nightfall. Sometimes she picked him up in her Mayflower and took him out. She dutifully asked him about Nirmal’s health but never went to see her at the sanatorium on the hill.

  57. La Paloma

  The Nazrul Aid Variety Programme of the London Majlis of Indian Students was coming to an end. Finally, they began the Indian national anthem. Roshan slipped out through a back door of the Scala theatre, and found Amir waiting for her in the foyer.

  “Despite my warnings you haven’t stopped mixing with the wrong set.”

  “And I have told you so many times, Amir, that I am not interested in their politics. Some of them are very good friends of mine and it’s great fun meeting them. Please don’t shadow me like the CID or FBI.”

  “Let’s go to the Istamboul for dinner,” he said peaceably.

  In the restaurant a Continental musician began playing La Paloma on the accordian. “I’m going to Spain next week, with my Bengali friends,” Roshan informed Amir sweetly.

  “Is this bunch of snooty Indian Bengalis and crazy East Pakistanis more important to you than me?”

  “No.”

  “Then?”

  “Perhaps you want to be more Catholic than the Pope. I have no such problem—I am native-born, a daughter of the soil . . .”

  This unexpected remark rendered him speechless. They did not have the usual quarrel, instead, he told her he wanted to take her to his father’s grave which he always visited when he went to the Continent. “I remember, when my father died, they had trouble finding a Muslim maulvi. Then, luckily, they got hold of two Albanian hojas who said the funeral prayers and buried him . . . One should always die in one’s own country.” He fell silent, for he suddenly remembered her caustic remark. Then he spotted a friend and called him over to their table, and told her he was soon shifting to a larger flat in Amala Roy’s block.

  “Attiya also lives there—so it will now be known as Lucknow colony,” the friend chuckled.

  Roshan wrote to him from Cordoba and quoted much Iqbal. Isherwood’s Berlin had vanished. She motored through the Rhine valley and visualised all Germany as Vicky Baum’s Germany, and all Austria as Dodie Smith’s Austria. She would have liked to go to Switzerland and offer fateha at his father’s grave, but he hadn’t given her the cemetery’s exact location.

  She bought a lot of presents for all her friends and on her return, first went to Chelsea. She walked down the corridor to Amala’s ground-floor flat, and found her and Nargis Cowasjee laughing their heads off over some incident the previous evening. “Oh, here comes Doña Spinoza!” Amala cried. “Let’s go and say hello to Attiya.”

  This building in Chelsea seemed to be inhabited by eminently successful women: Nargis was a rich heiress and fashion designer, Amala was a career diplomat and dancer who invited celebrities like Dylan Thomas and Louis MacNiece to her parties. Attiya Hosain was an author, and her collection of short stories, Phoenix Fled was lying near the pineapple basket on Amala’s window.

  “A rare combination of beauty and intellect. You know, there used to be a saying that if you went to India and did not see the Taj in Agra and Attiya in Lucknow, you had seen nothing . . .” Amir had once told her when he was lecturing her on the superiority of U.P. culture.

  He had recently shifted to this building, and because good girls did not visit bachelors in their dens, she handed the gift she had brought for Amir to the janitor as she was leaving. “Shall I keep it for him, Miss, or would you like to give it yourself? The Captain has gone to Karachi on home leave.”

  “Keep it for him,” she said quietly, and gave Mr. Jenkins the little present she had brought for him. The kindly old janitor was overwhelmed—but he also understood the depth of disappointment and sorrow in her voice.

  58. Autumn Journal

  Auburn leaves float around like useless thoughts. Autumn has come to the forest of Hazelmere, young lovers walk across the wood, trampling dry twigs underfoot. They emerge on the other side and are confronted by decrepit pensioners sitting in a row on benches, waiting for nothing. The pensioners see the young couples through thick glasses and continue to wait for nothing.

  She had obtained her Tripos. Before sailing for Pakistan she went through the woodlands and cast a last look at the glowing red oaks. She stopped her car in front of the old red-roofed church, attracted by the quaint engravings on the gravestones. She pushed the heavy door and went in. The chapel was hollow and empty. She touched the cold, grey stone of the font. Old Testament stained-glass faces scowled at her through faint multi-coloured rays. She read the brass plates which bore names of Gallant Englishmen Born in this Parish who fell at Cawnpore and Waziristan, defending the Empire. She yawned and dropped a few coins in the charity box.

  “Hello, my child,” the aged vicar said to her in a mild, quivering voice. He had quietly emerged from the cherry orchard and limped towards her.

  “Good afternoon, sir.” She smiled respectfully, dropped some more shillings in the box, and came out.

  You move on and reach the Unreal City. You find your friends assembled in the Chicken Inn, discussing the morning’s news. The most awful things are happening around the world—why should you bother when today’s headlines are tomorrow’s waste paper? Crowds are milling in Bond Street, enjoying the sunny weekend. Who are you to refuse to be a part of this ordinariness?

  She drove on to King’s Road and parked the Mayflower in the courtyard of Amala’s block. Someone was playing the mridangam in Amala’s studio flat, Talat Reza was singing.

  Through the window the room looked like a cosy little stage-set seen from the back row of a club-theatre. The play was written by a favourite author, say Cocteau or Anouilh, or even Tennesee Williams, and the scene was absurdly peaceful. She would not disturb this peace. They are there, happy and safe and intact. I was merely an interloper. I shall send them picture postcards from Cairo, she decided, it’s the simplest thing in the world, sending picture postcards from Cairo. She lit a cigarette and kept sitting in the car.

  Feroze was addressing Talat. “O happy boatman of the Ravi, blah—blah—Prince Salim had said—do you remember when we played Anarkali in Kailash Hostel, autumn of 1946? We had a full moon painted on the backdrop for that scene . . .”

  Talat remained silent and motionless.

  “You look like a mouse that has drunk a pint of liquid lead,” remarked Feroze, after a pause.

  Talat spoke: “Do you know what happens when a mouse drinks up a bottle of liquid lead? It stands up on its tail and starts making a speech. Or it begins to sing, like yours truly in Anarkali singing as Dilaram—At the edge of the carpet of moonlit water, Jamshyd’s goblet in my beloved’s hands blah . . . blah . . .”

  Ramanna Pillai sat crosslegged before his drum, deep in meditation. The two Dutch-Indonesian boys from Surekha’s troupe dozed on the wooden floor.

  Roshan rang the bell. Pillai opened the door and grinned. She came inside. “I heard you singing, Talat Apa,” she said apologetically. “I hope I’m not disturbing your rehearsals.”

  Obviously they were getting ready for a show.

  “Roshan Ara Kazmi, you are welcome,” Talat replied solemnly and burst into another song like a character in a nautanki. Because it was the time of flowers, we went into the glade singing, and lo! The caravan of spring had passed—AIR Lucknow composition, sung by Talat Mahmud. When was it, Feroze?”

  “1945,” Feroze replied promptly, “which year has fled for evermore, like all previous years . . .”

  “I’ve never heard this song again. Some day I’ll compile a list of all the lovely songs I’ve heard only once, that keep haunting me. Whatever happens to them? Where do they go? Like those
very old film songs whose records have vanished, their composers and singers dead and forgotten. Only snatches of tunes remain. What a terrible thing to happen—the death of a song . . .”

  The telephone rang in the gallery.

  “That was Gautam—wanted to know if he could bring an American ballerina as his guest this evening,” Surekha announced.

  “American ballerina?” Talat was astonished. “What about Princess Champa, Act II?”

  “Curtains,” Surekha answered in a tone of finality, and began practicing her famous leap in the air. Then she added, “He’s back in circulation.”

  Talat turned towards Amala who had studied elocution at RADA—“Recite that bit from your friend MacNiece’s Autumn Journal—I loved my love with a platform ticket.”

  Amala dropped the Bharatanatyam costume she was taking out of the wardrobe, stepped forward, stood ramrod straight like a schoolgirl with her arms down, and began reciting mechanically:

  I loved my love with a platform ticket.

  A handbag, a pair of stockings of Paris Sand. I loved her long

  I loved her between the lines and against the clock, Not until death

  But life did us part. I loved her with peacock’s eyes and the wares of Carthage.

  With blasphemy, camaraderie, and bravado and lots of other stuff. And so to London and down the ever-moving stairs.

  She sat down on the floor. “Why is this evening so depressing? Do you remember once, at nightfall, we sat on the steps of my house on Fyzabad Road and a group of mysterious sanyasins wandered in? They demanded dakshina, muttered something in some strange language and disappeared in the shadows of the champa trees. We were so scared—

  “Have you noticed how mournful some evenings are? When day and night touch each other, when we are laughing in brightly lighted rooms, the black unlit hours sing underneath in the hinterland of our separate private sorrows. Those sanyasins meet us on lonely roads, they curse us and disappear into the shadows. I have heard them weeping aloud on pitch dark nights.”

  “My mother says,” Talat replied in a small voice, like a child, “my mother says, even if one dies at high noon one will be surrounded by twilight. So, every evening, one’s soul foresees those last moments when day meets the final night, and that’s why we feel depressed.”

  “As a performing artist,” Surekha addressed Roshan gravely, “I would like to tell you the reality. It’s all a question of props. Stage scenery, backdrop, curtains, footlights. Only the empty stage remains in the end.”

  “Corny,” said Talat briefly.

  Nargis Cowasjee entered the room, back from Lidhurst after visiting Nirmala. She had gone there with her English fiancé, and on the way they had picked some heather leaves in the Hazelmere woods. She gave a few to Roshan—“Congrats on getting your Tripos, and best of luck, my dear.”

  “Time to leave for Comedy Theatre, Madam,” Pillai announced respectfully.

  “This is always my Zero Hour. Trring goes the third bell and the curtain rises and we start all over again. What would happen if the curtains of the world’s stages continue rising and there was no more me to dance?” Surekha uttered ruefully as she picked up her make-up kit.

  The sound of the mridangam rose higher and higher Na—dir-dam-ta-na-di-re-na—chanted Talat with two South Indian ladies sitting with Pillai and Ranganathan at one end of the stage. Surekha arrived like a shaft of lightning and began her ‘Tillana’.

  Now I am dancing as usual, she said to herself, then Amala and Ram Gopal will dance. The show must go on. The question is, why the hell should it go on? Kir-tik-tam-tit-tam; kir-tik-tai-tit-tai. I’ve got to dance on TV tomorrow, on Monday I’m flying to Holland to dance before Queen Juliana. The river is flowing; Dheem-ta-na-di-re-na, tana-di-re-na.

  The show must—

  The hall was empty. Surekha’s English classmates from RADA lingered near the exit, talking. A number of press correspondents waited to interview the famous dancer.

  “Dance . . . is my life . . .” she began soulfully.

  “Good God, Surekha,” Talat shuddered and longed for tea. She sat down on a sofa and dozed. This little pig went to market, this little pig stayed ay home, this little pig had a bit of meat and this little pig had none. This little pig said, Wee, Wee, Wee, I can’t find my way home. Dheem-ta-na-di-re-na—

  Gautam floated past, gallantly carrying the American ballerina’s cloak on his arm.

  59. A Bunch of Heather Leaves

  “On Monday, 1st Zee Qaad, 1374 A.H. Syed Amir Reza Abidi was married, telephonically, to Miss Alema Khatoon,” Kamal announced in a court-room voice. “The bridegroom had not seen the young lady before she reached Karachi from Allahabad.”

  The audience reacted appropriately. House-guest Chandra who had come from Washington D.C., rushed in from the garden. Talat and Surekha stopped making Swedish salad. The news was electrifying and unexpected. Hari spilled the tea he was drinking. He had come from New York, and was on his way to Cairo. Gulshan sat at the dining table, talking lazily to Hargobind Rai Tughyan Bhagalpuri, visiting Urdu novelist. He pointed towards Hari and said, “This fellow and Gautam are a pair of Ibn Batutas . . .”

  “A pair of what?”

  “Ibn Batutas.”

  “Gautam is also Huinsang—often comes from China,” Kamal added from his corner in the garden room. It was a pleasant Sunday morning and everybody was feeling marvellous.

  Champa turned up—as though it was the last act and the entire cast had assembled for the curtain call. She, too, looked radiant. Gautam had revived his friendship with her after all these years, and it was like old times again. However, her arrival dampened the high spirits of The Gang. Hari regarded her thoughtfully: how she had changed over the years! Now she reminded one of studio flats, the Latin Quarter, music festivals at Salzburg. Her golden brown complexion was glowing, she carried a bunch of heather leaves in her hand. She must have picked them up while strolling through the woods with Gautam in the morning, he thought, and with deep anguish remembered his sister who was lying in the hospital, only just alive. He had lost faith in God long ago—there was ample evidence to prove the non-existence of any sort of deity.

  “What’s happened to them? They’ve all become tongue-tied,” Tughyan Saheb whispered to Gulshan.

  “They are suffering from a surfeit of awareness, they are thought-addicts,” Gulshan responded indifferently.

  They greeted Champa formally. Hari Shankar brought her a cup of tea. “Hi, Champa Baji.”

  “Hi, Hari.”

  “Heather leaves! Sure sign of good luck according to the natives of this island.”

  She registered the taunt in his voice, and smiled politely.

  He tried to make amends. Flopping down on the carpet he said earnestly, “I was meaning to contact you about something, glad to meet you here. See, there is a vacancy in the Indian quota at the U.N. Shall I try for you?”

  It was very illogical, but all of sudden she felt that the end was near at hand. The room began whirling madly. Chandra, who wore a multicoloured sari, became a Chinese lantern, Hari and Kamal produced strange noises like ventriloquists’ puppets. Tughyan Saheb was a huge duck clucking away in low key. Her eyes brimmed over. I’ll go bonkers, she thought.

  Tughyan Saheb noticed her tears. (He was an ex-Communist turned Sufi.) “My Pir Saheb says, Submit to the will of God and hope for the best.”

  “Kamal— what has Tim written?” Talat shouted in exasperation. “How?”

  “Telephonically. Look, before he left he told me that as a member of the defence services of his country, he could not marry Roshan because she had foolishly become a high security risk. There were classified reports against her to the effect that she was a close ally of Red Indians. Communists were bad enough, Indian Communists—god forbid.”

  “Doña Spinoza a Commie? That’s a joke!” said Talat incredulously.

  “Anyway, so he asked me to write to Amma to find a nice, uncomplicated girl, preferably a graduate of Karamat
Hussain Muslim Girls’ College, Lucknow, or Muslim Girls’ College, Aligarh or Lady Irwin College of Home Science, Delhi. As soon as possible, that is, before Moharrum.”

  Champa sat in the doorway, playing with Surekha’s black Persian cat.

  There was another round of tea. Kamal cupped his cigarette in his hand like a truck-driver, closed one eye, knocked off the ash with a jerk. More suspense. At last he began, “The situation at present is this: most of the eligible bachelors have gone over to Pakistan, the girls are in India. So the bachelors travel to India on leave and bring back wives from there, or they get married over the phone. My mother found the girl, she had graduated from I.T. College and her family lives in Allahabad. Therefore my father sent the paigham to her father in customary florid Urdu: if your honour graciously accepts this lowly person’s humble nephew in your sonship . . . , etc.

  “Begam Ejaz said loftily: We are in no hurry. We have a lot of other excellent proposals, they are under consideration.” Then he addressed Gulshan, Surekha and Chandra. “The tradition among us Moz-lems is that the proposal always goes from the boy’s side and the girl’s people act very high and mighty. There is a saying that till the boy’s folk come pleading a minimum number of many times to the girl’s house, that until the threshold is worn down, her parents won’t say ‘yes’. It’s called larkey walon ne dehleez ki mitti ley daali.

  “However, Tehmina writes that things being what they are today, Bhaiya Saheb was married to the Hon’ble Mr. Justice Ejaz’s eldest daughter within a month.”

  “But over the telephone, yaar, for goodness’ sake!” exclaimed Hari Shankar.

  “You know that Urdu saying, Hum Dilli, tum Agre, to kaise baje gi bansuri.1 Now, a maulvi and two witnesses sit near the phone in Pakistan, likewise in India. The respective maulvis read out the marriage contract over the trunk-line and off goes the bride to Pakistan. Since Bhaiya Saheb is in the defence forces he couldn’t get a no objection certificate to go to Bharat, therefore . . .”