THE SUNSET CLUB

by Khushwant Singh

  Baig changes the subject. ‘Did you watch the parade on TV? I never miss it.’

  ‘Nor do I,’ says Sharma. ‘Grand display. Makes you feel proud of being Indian.’

  ‘It is the same thing year after year, crores of rupees down the Yamuna,’ snarls Boota.

  ‘It is not the same year after year,’ protests Baig. ‘This is the first time our prime minister was unable to attend as he was in hospital after heart surgery. It is the first time we have had the president of Kazakhstan as our honoured guest.’

  ‘Did you notice how bored he looked?’ asks Boota. ‘Most of the time he had his eyes shut as if falling off to sleep.’

  ‘Arrey bhai,’ protests Baig, ‘he did not have his eyes shut. He is Mongoloid; they have narrow eyes like the Chinese.’

  ‘Boota, does it never occur to you that this is one event in the year that everyone across the country watches every year? It generates a feeling of oneness in people of diverse religions, languages and races,’ says Sharma raising his voice.

  ‘Okay, okay bhai, you win. Two against one. Happy Ganatantra Divas to both of you,’ responds Boota in a voice loaded with sarcasm.

  ‘So what’s new?’ asks Baig.

  ‘What’s new is that last night I had a wet dream. You are a hakeem. I wanted to ask you if it is okay for a man of my age to have wet dreams.’

  Before Baig can reply Sharma breaks in: ‘That’s because you have dirty thoughts. What you can’t do, you imagine you are doing. I bet you can’t even get an erection any more. Anyhow, who was it who wet your pajamas?’

  ‘I won’t tell you. You know her very well. And I sought Hakeem Sahib’s opinion, not yours,’ Boota snaps back.

  Baig ponders over the matter before he replies, ‘You must be constipated. Constipation often induces night discharge of semen.’

  Boota is taken aback. ‘I’ve always had problems with my stomach. I have been taking laxatives since I left college.’

  ‘You have a problem of gas in the stomach?’ asks Baig.

  ‘Yes, lots. I can’t do anything about it.’

  Boota tells Baig only half the truth. The truth is that Boota does not want to do anything about it because he enjoys farting. His wife’s death relieved him from the bondage of good manners. When alone, he lets himself go—bhoom, phatas, phuss. And he revels in inhaling the stink he produces. ‘My stomach is full of gas till the evening. When I take Scotch it seems to subside,’ he adds.

  ‘I don’t like telling you this, but you could not have been a great performer. People who have gas problems don’t make great lovers. They rarely succeed in bringing a woman to her climax. Am I right?’

  Boota winces. He recalls that in his earlier years in college in England, he often came in his trousers while kissing girls passionately. Even later it was only when he was a little drunk that he lasted fifteen to twenty minutes, and once in a while brought a woman to a climax.

  ‘Talk about something else,’ says Sharma. ‘Don’t always have sex on your mind. It’s bad for your health, particularly when you are old and can’t do anything.’

  ‘Okay bhai, we will postpone it till tomorrow evening. Let’s talk about God and life hereafter of which we know nothing,’ replies Boota.

  By that time the sun has gone down behind Bara Gumbad. It has begun to turn chilly. Lights on footpaths have been switched on, Bara Gumbad lit up. Baig’s servant puts a shawl on his master’s lap. ‘Sahib, it is getting cold. We better go home,’ he says in a tone of authority. ‘See, most people have already left.’

  All three get up. Sharma says, ‘Cheerio,’ Boota says, ‘Sleep well,’ Baig says, ‘Allah Hafiz—God protect you.’ They go back the way they came.

  Sharma gets back to his ground-floor apartment followed by Dabboo Three and his servant. Dabboo Three announces their return with a couple of barks, Sharma’s sister Sunita lets them in with her usual words of welcome: ‘You are back.’ Sharma makes no response. He puts his walking stick in its usual corner and sits down in his padded armchair. There is a roaring log fire in the grate—he likes to keep warm. His servant takes off his shoes and slips his woollen bedroom slippers on to his feet.

  ‘Who-who was there?’ asks Sunita.

  Sharma’s temper rises. ‘How many times have I told you not to say who-who? One who is enough.’

  Sunita protests, ‘I did not go to Balliol. I was in Hindu College. Who-who for kaun-kaun. What is so wrong with it?’

  ‘It is not English and when speaking English, use English; when speaking Hindi, speak Hindi. Don’t make a khichdi of both.’

  ‘Achha bhai, who was there?’

  ‘Boota and Baig.’

  ‘What did you talk about?’

  ‘This and that.’

  Sunita senses he is not in a mood to talk to her. ‘I hope that Boota does not barge in. He is always one for a free drink. He also uses dirty language. His servant says he doesn’t bathe for two-two, three-three days. He must smell.’

  ‘Again two-two, three-three days! You will never learn.’

  Sunita decides to end the debate. ‘You take it from me, this is the kind of English we Indians will speak—Hinglish.’

  Pavan pours out whisky, soda and two cubes of ice in a tumbler and places it on the side table beside his master’s chair. A bowl of peanuts is already there. Sunita turns her back and joins the servants, their wives and children to watch a serial on Zee TV.

  Sharma takes a couple of sips of whisky–soda, stretches his legs and shuts his eyes. He goes over Baig’s analysis of Boota’s wet dream. He has never suffered from constipation. As a matter of fact, he often boasted to Boota how his stomach worked like clockwork: two motions every morning, one before and another after breakfast. Every time, he announced it to everyone around in French, using two words he had picked up in his six years spent in Paris: deuxieme fois—second time. And yet, his first intimate contact with a female was little short of a disaster. It was monsoon time. He was later than usual working in his office to dispose of some urgent files to be sent to his minister. By the time he finished, it was dark. As he was leaving the Secretariat building he saw one of his lady deputy secretaries in the crowd, waiting for the rain to stop. He had often exchanged flirtatious dialogue with her.

  ‘Lakshmi, can I give you a lift? It’s drizzling,’ he asked. She beamed a smile and replied, ‘Please. I don’t want to get drenched.’ A chaprasi opened his umbrella and escorted the two to Sharma’s office car. Sharma was tired. He sat with his legs stretched and his right arm resting on the back of the seat above Lakshmi’s head. By accident his arm fell on her shoulder. She turned her face to him and kissed him on his lips. He was taken aback but responded passionately. They kept their lips glued together for a long time. He got a hard erection. He could not hold back and slipped his hand up to the middle of her thighs. ‘Not today,’ she whispered, ‘I am not well. I have my periods.’ He did not know anything about periods and thought she was making excuses. He pushed his hand further, found a padded obstruction, oozing blood. ‘I told you so, darling. Be patient. You can have as much of it as you like after we are married.’

  That is as close as Sharma ever got to having sex. Later in the evening he went to consult Boota on the subject. ‘I thought she was making excuses to keep me off till I marry her. But she was really wounded and bleeding.’ The only comment Boota made on his friend’s misadventure was, ‘Phuddoo! Chootia! How old are you?’

  Sharma feels drowsy, his head droops on his chest. Sunita notices it and asks, ‘Will you eat here or at the table?’

  ‘Here.’

  His servant brings a bowl of boiled rice, dal, a couple of karelas, and puts the food beside the bowl of peanuts. Sharma does not relish the food his sister gives him but has stopped complaining, because she then reminds him of the adage he often uses—‘simple living, high thinking’. So she gives him a tasteless but belly-filling bhojan. Sharma gulps down the whisky, gobbles up the food, goes to the bathroom to rinse his mouth, urinates and goes
to bed. His evenings have become deadly boring.

  Boota returns home to a brightly lit fire, his single malt whisky, soda and bucket of ice cubes on a tray. He pours himself a double Patiala in a crystal cut-glass tumbler he uses only for himself, adds ice and soda. He munches some wasabi peas and cashewnuts, then fills his mouth with whisky and rolls it round with his tongue before letting it trickle down his throat. He wants to see if he can feel it go down to his intestines. When his stomach is clean, he can; when it is not, he cannot. He switches on the TV for a few minutes, watches cheetahs chasing deer, and some Australian wrestling with crocodiles and pythons, then switches it off, shuts his eyes and lets his mind drift back to his affairs with women in his younger days. He was never a great performer but the variety he performed with is impressive: whites, browns, blacks, Canadians, Americans, Germans, French, and of course Indians from all communities and parts of the country: Christians, Jews, Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs. Only a few encounters have stayed in his mind, others have faded from his memory.

  One, particularly, keeps repeating itself. He was staying with friends in England. They had a young, attractive, English governess for their daughter. It was Christmas time. His hosts and their daughter had gone calling on friends. He was lying on a sofa when the governess brought him a glass of sherry. They exchanged ‘Merry Christmas’ greetings with light kisses on each other’s cheeks. That was the prelude. The hosts returned with a couple of their friends for the Christmas feast—roast turkey, French wine, pudding loaded with rum, followed by cognac and Drambuie. Everyone was a little tipsy by the end of the evening. He bade them goodnight and returned to his bedroom on the top floor, which was next to that of the governess. Some minutes later he heard her footsteps going into her bedroom. Sleep would not come to him. He tiptoed to her bedroom. She made room for him as if expecting him. He laid himself on her and glued his lips to hers. She opened her thighs to let him in. He entered her. They lay in silence for what seemed like divine eternity. At long last he came with violent jerks and pumped half a gallon of his semen into her without bothering about the consequences. Mercifully there were none. He concluded that those who found English women cold had never sampled one. They continued to meet in different places and made love every time.

  Boota’s wife had kept an excellent table. She consulted a lot of cookery books: French, Italian, Chinese and Indian. She spent a good half-hour instructing the cook how to go about preparing various recipes. He turned out to be a master craftsman in the art of cooking. She had gone eight years ago but the cook was still with him and gave him a gourmet dinner every evening. Boota relishes good food, a glass of French wine, followed by a digestive Underberg. He swallows a dozen pills prescribed for his age for various ailments. Then he switches off for the night. He sleeps fitfully as he has to get up two or three times to empty his bladder. Nevertheless, he is up by 4 a.m. to start the day’s work.

  By the time Baig’s Mercedes-Benz gets to Nizamuddin, street lights have been switched on. Hazrat Nizamuddin’s shrine, which allows worshippers of all communities, has in its complex tombs of the poets Amir Khusrau and Mirza Ghalib, as well as bazaars all around, which attract large crowds. Baig’s car leaves the main Delhi–Agra road to enter the elite residential area, Nizamuddin West. The headlights of his car catch the two marble slabs on either side of the gates. One in English reads ‘Baig Manzil’, the other in Arabic ‘Hada bin Fazl-e-Rabbee—this by the Grace of God’. On top of the house is a circular marble slab with the numerals 786 in Arabic. God has certainly been good to the Baig family. The double-storeyed mansion is brightly lit. People refer to it as Baig’s daulat khana—abode of wealth; he calls it ghareeb khana—house of poverty.

  Begum Sakina awaits him in the veranda. He is helped to his armchair in the sitting room. A coal fire is glowing, his armchair has a small pillow to cushion his large frame, a moorha (cane stool) in front to rest his feet, a bottle of Black Label Scotch, a tumbler, ice bucket and a plate of shaami kababs on the side table. Sakina Begum sees him settle down comfortably, orders two of her maids to press his legs and retires to the neighbouring room from where she can see him as well as the saas–bahu TV serials to which she is addicted. She does not approve of his drinking as the Koran forbids consumption of alcohol to Muslims. But she refrains from reminding her husband about it.

  Baig pours himself a generous peg; his servant adds soda and two cubes of ice. He takes a big swig of the whisky–soda, bits of shaami kabab, and stretches his legs out on the moorha. The maids sit on their haunches on either side of the moorha and begin to press his legs. That’s all they do during the day for the Begum Sahiba and have become expert masseuses. First his feet. They press the insteps with their thumbs; then by turn every toe with their thumbs and index fingers. Then his legs with their palms. And back to his feet. They do not stop till told to do so. Baig is transported to another world. What more would he get in paradise than good Scotch and houris pressing his limbs: Paradise is a man-made fantasy; this is for real. He recalls Mirza Ghalib’s lines: ‘We know the truth about Paradise: it is a good idea to beguile the mind.’ However, he knows that these pleasures will also not last very long as old age robs life of the fun of living.

  Ghalib was a man after Baig’s own heart: hard drinker, lover of women, only prayed on Fridays, never fasted during Ramadan. And yet, not only Muslims but all Urdu-knowing people of the world swear by his name as one of the greatest poets of all time. Baig recalls one of his favourite Ghalib couplets:

  Where are the frivolities of yesteryear?

  Where has your youth fled?

  Where indeed had his youth fled? He recalled the early days of his married life. He was eighteen, Sakina sixteen. They had played together as children, teased each other in their early teens. He had noticed her bosom take shape and her buttocks get rounder. They had got down to real business on the first night they were left alone. She had called him Barkoo Bhaiyya and he had called her Sakki. Overnight, he became Janoo—sweetheart—and she became Begum.

  What a volcano of passion she had in her little frame! They were at it every time they were on their own—at times, six times in one day. She found him too heavy and suggested she come on top. He found that even pleasanter and lay on his back with his massive circumcised penis up like the Qutub Minar. She mounted him, directed his erect member inside her till it disappeared between her thighs. She did most of the work, kissing his eyes, his lips, heaving up and down. It was her groaning with ecstasy that brought him to a climax. What bliss it was! As expected, she was pregnant by the second month. She had morning sickness and went back to her parents for a week’s break.

  That was too long for Baig. Sex had become compulsive. So he took her maids to bed in turn: one when she brought his early morning cup of tea, the other when she brought him the glass of hot milk he took before retiring for the night. The girls took it as a part of their duty. He didn’t have any qualms of conscience. He repeated the exercise whenever his wife was far gone in her pregnancy and went to her parents for the delivery.

  Occasionally he visited courtesans in Chawri Bazaar to watch their mujra and dance. The evening ended with his having sex with one of them. He tipped them handsomely. Sakina had a woman’s sixth sense about her husband’s infidelities but never questioned him. As long as he did not bring in a second wife, it was okay by her. That was the way of nawabs, rajas and rich businessmen. He was both a nawab and a man of substance.

  Baig’s reverie is disturbed by his wife’s gentle query, ‘Khana?’

  ‘Haan,’ he mumbles in reply.

  Whisky, soda and tumbler are removed along with the side table. A larger table is brought with a couple of plates on it. Sakina Begum joins him.

  ‘What was the gup-shup about this evening?’ she asks.

  ‘Not for your ears, Begum. That Sardar uses language not proper in polite society. Most of it is about his exploits with women.’

  ‘Chheeh! Chheeh! Why do you talk to him?’

  ‘He can
be quite entertaining. Knows a lot of Urdu poetry.’

  Dinner is laid on the table by a relay of servants: mutton biryani flavoured with saffron, three kinds of mutton and chicken curries, baghaara baigan (aubergines cooked in Hyderabadi style), chapattis and naans. Every night it is a royal feast. Sakina piles biryani on his plate till he says ‘bas—enough’. Mutton curry? Chicken curry? She heaps his plate till he raises his hand to say no more. Sakina spreads a napkin on his lap and hands him his plate. He waits for her to fill her plate and sit down. ‘Bismillah,’ he intones. They eat with their fingers: spoons and forks rob food of its taste.

  Every evening large quantities of food are removed from the table. It is never wasted because the entire staff of six servants and their families are fed. So are beggars from Nizamuddin who cluster round the entrance gate. For dessert there is phirni covered with silver varq in an earthen cup, kulfi, ice cream and a variety of fruits of the season. Both take phirni—this time scooped up with spoons. The fruit goes untouched.

  A servant brings a jug of warm water, soap, towels and a basin. They wash their hands, rinse their mouths and spit the contents into the basin. Baig lets out a loud dakar (belch) to express thanks for the delicious meal. The servants remove the table and put back the side table with a box of Romeo y Julieta cigars, clipper and lighter on it. Baig clips the end of his cigar and lights it. Sakina disapproves of smoking as much as of drinking, and quietly retires to another room.

  It takes nearly half an hour for Baig to finish his Havana cigar, each costing around five hundred rupees. It is worth every paisa as it gives him time to digest his dinner. He tosses the butt into the grate of dying embers and growls ‘chalo—let’s go’. Two servants help him go to the bathroom to brush his teeth, urinate, change into his night kurta-pajama and get on his bed. He takes two pinches of digestive chooran made of pomegranate seeds. He switches on his table lamp, reads a few couplets of Ghalib which he knows by heart. By then he is heavy with sleep. He switches off the table lamp, lays his head down on his pillow and begins to snore. That is one reason Sakina has given up sharing his bedroom. She sleeps in the next room where her husband’s snoring does not disturb her, yet assures her all is well with the world.