Out of India

by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

  Betsy confided a lot in Christine. She needed to have someone to talk to about Har Gopal. “I know it’s ridiculous, ridiculous,” she said and buried her head in her arms, overwhelmed with laughter and happiness. “He’s all wrong—of course he is—and he’s married, and three children.” She hid her face again and her shoulders shook laughing. She tried to but could never quite explain to Christine what it was she loved so much about Har Gopal. His finely drawn features, yes, his dark, dreaming eyes, his sadness, his sensitivity: and also—but how could she tell Christine this?—she loved the shabby clothes he wore, his badly cut cotton trousers and his frequently washed shirt with his thin wrists coming out of the buttoned cuffs. She was positively proud of the fact that he looked so much like everybody else—like hundreds and thousands of other Indian clerks going to offices every morning on the bus and coming home again with their empty tiffin carriers in the evenings: people who worked for small salaries and supported their families and worried. She frowned with the effort of trying to express all this to Christine and said finally that well, she supposed she loved him for being so typically Indian.

  Christine laughed: “But that’s why I like Manny too.”

  Betsy had to admit that Manny too was typically Indian—but in a very different way. Manny was the India one read about in childhood, colored with tigers, sunsets, and princes; but Har Gopal was real, he was everyday, urban, suffering India that people in the West didn’t know about.

  Har Gopal often asked her: “Do you talk about me with Christine?” He wanted to know everything that they said. When she teased and wouldn’t tell, he twisted her wrist or squeezed her muscles till she screamed. He loved practicing these boyhood tortures on her; it was the only way he knew of being playful, for that was how he had played with his friends at school and college. He had never had a woman friend before. But he had had many male friends, and they had had grand times together. He often told Betsy about his friends, and it always put him in a good mood. He had a serious, even melancholy nature, but when he recollected his student days, he became gay and laughed at all the mad pranks they had played together. One of his friends, Chandu, had been a great joker, and how he had teased the masters at school! No one could do anything to him, because his father was an important man in town. Another friend had had the ability to chew up newspapers and even razor blades. They were all crazy about the cinema and went to see the same film over and over again till they knew the lyrics and dialogues by heart. He could still recite great chunks of old films and he did so for Betsy, and he sang the songs for her. She loved his voice, which was sweet and girlish, and the soft expression that came into his eyes when he sang; but he said no no, his voice was nothing, she should have heard Mohan, then she would have known what good singing was. They had all thought that Mohan would surely go into films and become a playback singer, but instead he had got a job in the life insurance corporation. There had been so many friends, and they had all been so close and had thought their friendship was eternal; but now Har Gopal didn’t even know where most of them were. Everyone was married, like himself, and had their own worries and no more time for their friends. But he still thought about them often and wished for the old days back again, or at least to have one friend left with him in whom to confide his thoughts and have a good time together.

  “Well you’ve got me now,” said Betsy, putting her arm around his neck, tender and comradely.

  But he could not feel about her the way he did about his friends. He was, she knew, less fond of her. She excited him, and he was proud to have her, but he did not really, she often suspected, like her. All the loving came from her side, and he accepted it as his due but made no attempt to return it. There was something lordly, almost tyrannical in his attitude to her. When he lounged at his ease in her room, all his shyness and shabbiness—that depressed quality that was so evident in him when he stood with his tiffin carrier at the bus-stop—left him completely, and he became what, as a Brahmin, he perhaps was by nature: an aristocrat for whom the goods and riches of this world were created and whose right it was to be served by others. Betsy was the one who served, and the goods and riches were the things she gave him for which he had developed a taste: English biscuits, raspberry syrup (he never again drank alcohol), tinned peaches.

  He kept some clothes in her room, and when he came to her straight from the office, as he usually did, he would take off his trousers and carefully fold them and then put on his dhoti. He dressed and undressed with delicate precaution, so as never to be seen naked by any human eye, not even his own. Although his lovemaking left nothing to be desired, he never lost his reticence: his manner was always controlled and fastidious, and never for a moment was there any abandon in it. Betsy, on the other hand, was all abandon. She would fling off her clothes, leaving them just where they dropped, and walk around the room naked. Very often she forgot to lock the door, so that the servant or Christine or anyone who came to the flat could have walked in at any time. She didn’t care. Her attitude shocked and at the same time pleased him. In the beginning he could only watch her undressing with his face averted and his eyes half lowered, ashamed of himself and of her, but as time went on, he looked at her boldly and with a strange smile that was perhaps partly appreciation and partly, she sometimes suspected, contempt.

  He never spoke to her about his family. She wanted to know so much about them, but he always completely evaded her questions. If she insisted too much, he became annoyed and refused to speak to her at all and perhaps even went home earlier than usual. So she dared not ask much. But it tortured her to have all this area of his life concealed from her with a deliberateness that suggested she was not worthy to approach it. Why should he feel that way? He was proud of her—she knew he was—otherwise would he parade through the town with her on his arm and greet people he met on the way with such a superior air?

  Sometimes, when she found he was relaxed and in a good mood, she tried to coax him into talking: “Is your wife taller than me? Shorter? The same? Say!” But at once his good mood would disappear and he turned away from her, frowning. Once she asked him half jokingly, “What’s the matter? You don’t think I’m good enough to hear about your family?” But at that he took on such a strange, closed expression that she realized she had stumbled on something near the truth. But she wouldn’t at first believe it; she even laughed at it and said, “My God, what am I—a fallen woman or something?” Still he made no answer, but the expression on his face did not change nor did he make any attempt to contradict or deny. She laughed again, more harshly, even though by now she felt far from laughing. It was ridiculous, something out of Victorian melodrama, but still it was true, it was the way he saw her. She felt so humiliated that she could speak nothing further and tears flowed silently from her eyes: but even as they rolled down her cheeks and her heart heaved with pain at the thought of her humiliation, at the same time—so bizarre were her feelings for him—this very humiliation actually increased, exacerbated her passion for him.

  One day she went secretly to see the place where he lived. She found blocks of tenements set out side by side and surrounded by an area of wasteland on which had sprung up a dusty little bazaar and a shanty colony of thatched huts. As soon as she got out of her taxi, she found herself the center of a group of children who laughed and marveled at her strangeness and followed her closely. She looked around her for a time, then plucked up courage and walked through the doorway that led into the compound of the first block of buildings. It was as lively here as in any street. Children played, and there were some men repairing string beds and a number of itinerant vegetable sellers and a fish seller, all of whom were bargaining with women who suspiciously untied their bundles of money from the end of their saris and complained to one another about dishonest traders; other women called down from the windows that opened in tiers and rows from the tall buildings. Betsy, with her little cluster of attendant children, looked around her and did not know what to do next. Suddenly she wondered
what would happen if he were to come now out of one of those dark doorways and find her standing there. She could almost see the expression of panic and fury that would instantly transform his face, and at the thought of it, she began to panic a little herself and to wish she had not come.

  But then it was too late to retreat. A round little man in an English-style suit came running up to her, calling in an excited voice, “Yes, please, yes, please! You have come to see Mr. Har Gopal?” Betsy did not recognize him, but guessed at once that he must be someone whom they had met and Har Gopal had talked to on one of their evening walks.

  “This way, please,” said the little man, pushing aside all the children and leading her out of the compound. To curious bystanders he explained importantly, “For Har Gopal in C Block.” He strutted in front while the children surged after him and Betsy found herself swept along in the procession. Behind her the women nudged and talked. The little man led her along the street and then turned into the next compound, waving a plump hand over his shoulder at her and calling, “This way, please!”

  Then she saw that the little procession had brought her back to the street where her taxi was waiting. Murmuring apologies that no one heard, she suddenly climbed into it and sat down, and the driver skillfully flicked away the children who at once surrounded the car. Betsy did not dare look out of the window as she was driven away, and she even put her handkerchief up to her face as if she hoped thereby neither to see nor be seen.

  The next time Har Gopal came to the flat he did not talk to her at all but straightaway took his dhoti and a pair of slippers and bottle of hair oil he kept in her bedroom and, grimly determined, wrapped them up in a bundle. “What are you doing?” she cried out in distress. He did not answer but made for the door. She clung to him to prevent him. She begged him to stay.

  “Let me go, please,” he said, but standing quite still and making no effort to release himself.

  “It’s only that I wanted to see where you were.”

  “You came to spy on me. Yes, and now you will laugh at me with your friends because my house is poor and I am poor.” Suddenly he shrieked: “I don’t care! You can laugh, what do I care!”

  “Please don’t,” she said and clung to him tighter, but he shook her off and shouted at her, “And my position? That’s nothing to you what people will say that you come openly to my home—” He sank down to sit on the edge of her bed and covered his eyes with his hands in grief and shame. And Betsy sank down beside him, and she too covered her eyes. What followed was a loud scene, echoing all over the flat, in which he spoke a lot about his position in the world and she lacerated herself with accusations regarding her own selfishness and insensitivity; and when this had gone on for a long time, and she had again and again begged his forgiveness, they were at last reconciled, and she dissolved in tears of gratitude while he was proud and gracious with her.

  Then it was time for him to go home, and on his way out, they had to pass through the sitting room where Christine sat playing ludo with Manny. Those two must have heard every word of what had passed in the other room. Christine delicately kept her eyes fixed on the ludo board, and Manny hummed a tune to himself. Har Gopal’s face took on a tight expression, and his thin body seemed to shrink as he walked through the room; he looked as he did waiting at the bus stop. Only Betsy was entirely free from embarrassment as she ushered her lover out of the flat.

  That night Christine knocked timidly on Betsy’s door. Betsy was lying stark naked on her rumpled bed, reading the Katha-Upanishad. She was wearing her reading glasses and thoughtfully twisting a lock of hair around her finger. She didn’t seem to be a bit shy to be found naked. Her breasts were very much heavier than one would have expected from seeing her dressed. “Yes, come in,” she said and shut her book with her finger inside to hold the page. “I’m sorry, we made an awful lot of noise today, didn’t we?” she said cheerfully.

  Christine sat on the edge of a chair. She was wearing a flowered wrap and looked crisp and fresh and a contrast to Betsy’s room, which was rather untidy.

  “I know it’s none of my business,” said Christine, talking very quickly so as to get it over with, “but I do think you ought to be a bit more careful.”

  Betsy laughed and said, “I wish I were the sort of person who could be careful.”

  “Everyone’s talking you know, Betsy, in the office and everywhere. I mean, good heavens, not that anyone cares about your having an Indian boyfriend—don’t we all?—but he’s so . . . different from the other Indians we all know.”

  “You mean he’s poor.”

  “It’s not that,” Christine said miserably. “But he’s—I don’t know, odd. And there’s something unhealthy about it all—of course it’s absolutely terrible of me to be saying all this and do tell me to shut up if you want to.”

  There was a moment’s pause. Then Betsy said, “It is unhealthy.” She tried to sound detached and dispassionate, but could not keep it up for long. “I suppose all passion is unhealthy. Sometimes I tell you I feel insane—and what’s more—what’s terrible: I revel in it! I glory in it!” She rolled over onto her side to face Christine, and her big breasts fell to that side and her eyes shone behind her flesh-colored glasses.

  Christine was not the only person who tried to warn Betsy. One day her office chief invited her to lunch at his house, and in the kindest manner possible, full of embarrassment and apologies, told her that unless she behaved in what he called a more conventional way he would have to have her sent home. Betsy understood that he had to tell her this and that he was right, but she had no intention of changing. Instead she began to make plans what to do if she were really posted back home. Of course, she would resign immediately; she would stay and get a job locally. She was vague as to what kind of job and did not stop much to wonder whether anyone would employ her; but she knew that, whatever she did, her salary would only be a fraction of what it was now and she would have to change her whole way of life. She didn’t mind that; in fact, she rather looked forward to it. She would have to move out of the flat and go somewhere much cheaper. She thought of herself in some small room in a crowded locality; to get to her, one would have to cross a courtyard and climb up a very dark, very narrow winding staircase. She would be the only European living in the house. Every day Har Gopal would come to visit her. Actually Betsy couldn’t cook, but now she had visions of herself squatting over a little bucket of coal and preparing a meal for him and serving him just like an Indian wife. She might take to wearing a sari. Perhaps she would have a baby, a boy, who would grow up dark and delicate like Har Gopal.

  She neglected her work in the office and was distant with her colleagues. She realized vaguely that something was going on around her and that perhaps steps were being taken against her, but she did not bother to find out what they were. Christine told her that she would be moving out of their joint flat soon; she made up some polite lies that the flat was getting too expensive for her and that she had found another smaller one elsewhere, but Betsy cut her short and said it didn’t matter, that she herself would be moving out too, very soon. She already saw herself in her small room in the house with the winding staircase.

  She even began to make inquiries about the rents to be paid for such places, and about how much money would be needed for the simple, Indian-style life she intended to adopt. All her thoughts were concentrated on this problem. Once, finding herself alone with Manny who was waiting for Christine to get ready, she even asked him, very seriously, “Supposing you only eat dal and rice twice a day—how much would that come to a week?”

  “Only dal and rice!” exclaimed Manny humorously. “And what about a peg of whiskey?”

  “I’m being serious, Manny,” Betsy said impatiently, but it was impossible to make him be serious with her. Ever since she had started her affair with Har Gopal, Manny’s attitude to her had become strange and ambivalent: on the one hand, he was rather more brusque, and even rude with her than he had been before; on the other, he
indulged in sudden spurts of familiarity that extended to, whenever they found themselves alone in a room, pinching her in intimate places.

  He did this now, and at the same time he joked with her: “My two-three pegs a day I must have, otherwise I’m like my car without petrol. Hm? Han?” He encouraged her to laugh with him and drew her close, and his beard nuzzled against her cheek. She struggled to get free, but that made him hold her all the more tightly. She stared into his face, and she saw his light-colored eyes and his red, moist, healthy mouth smiling inside his black beard. She let out a cry. He released her immediately and even gave her a push to get her farther away from him. Christine, zipping her dress, came in and said, “Whatever’s the matter?”

  “It is Betsy,” said Manny. “She thought she saw a snake.” He laughed uproariously.

  Betsy did not speak to Har Gopal about her future plans. She was afraid. She knew that the idea of anyone giving up a job, an assured livelihood, was not one he would ever be able to understand. He himself was very timid about his own job and took good care never to give cause for complaint to his superiors. Not only was he very polite, even deferential, to them in their presence, but he also spoke of them in tones of the highest respect when they were not there and had no chance of ever knowing what he was saying about them. Once, when Betsy spoke with lighthearted disdain of one or two of the top people in her own organization, he rebuked her for doing so, and when she laughed at the rebuke, he frowned and became annoyed with her and said that she had no respect in her nature. The very least, he said, that one owed one’s superiors was respect; and quite apart from that, one should be careful what one said about them because who knew what might not get back to them. But how could anything get back to them, asked Betsy, amused, when there was no one there but he and she, and surely he wasn’t going to go and tell on her, was he? He refused to smile at the idea but only said that in these matters one could never be careful enough. His eyes even roved solemnly for a moment around the room—her bedroom—as if he feared someone might be lurking somewhere listening.