Byron said, ‘What happened after that really makes one feel bad. If only Marco Polo had gone to your ex-boss instead.’
‘It wouldn’t have been of any use,’ I said. ‘He wouldn’t have taken a case of collusion between husband and wife.’
‘Perhaps not, but he could have suggested some other route,’ Byron said.
‘Perhaps,’ I said.
‘Anyway, what’s the use of crying over spilt milk? Let me tell you what happened...’
Having more or less finalized things in Calcutta, Marco Polo went back to his job. He scraped together five hundred rupees somehow and sent it to Lisa, promising to send her the rest in the near future. There was no way of writing and finding out what was happening; there wasn’t even a friend who could keep him informed.
Susan did write once, informing him that she had bought another car. And that what he was anxious about was also progressing, but the attorney had asked for more money. He borrowed the money and sent it to Susan’s address.
That was when disaster struck. The police arrested him. His Italian connection had suddenly alerted the authorities once again, and everyone knew what the relationship between Italy and the Allies was at that time.
Till the last day of the war, Marco Polo remained a prisoner, going straight back to Italy in disgust afterwards. In no shape to worry about anything else, he somehow kept body and soul together doing odd jobs on the Riviera.
One day it occurred to him that there was a major discrepancy in the balance sheet of his life—a large sum in the ledger was lying in a suspense account in an accursed city of the east. His desolate soul was afire with deep resentment.
He started looking for a job—first in a hotel in Rangoon, where he was taken on with a handsome salary, thanks to the lack of suitable candidates. But he hadn’t left the Italian Riviera to live in Rangoon. After working there for some time, he started looking for another job.
This time it was Calcutta. The manager’s post in Shahjahan Hotel was vacant. Finding someone with his qualifications and credentials, the owners took him on with due respect.
But where was Susan? And what about the divorce?
The woman who had set wartime Calcutta on fire had disappeared somewhere in the jungle of humanity. He enquired at the attorney’s office, but they refused to divulge anything. The old attorney had, in the meantime, sold his share to his partner and departed for the other world. He enquired at the court. No divorce order had been issued in his name.
Byron stopped.
‘And then?’ I asked.
‘Then I was summoned—and I’m still trying,’ he said.
I looked at the clock—it was late, time to go.
‘Ask him not to be impatient,’ said Byron. ‘Something is bound to turn up soon. Now that you’ve got to know him quite well I might call upon you for help.’
‘Considering it was you who got me my job, you don’t have to hesitate to ask.’
He embraced me affectionately and said, ‘Don’t bring all that up.’
Many thoughts milled about in my head that night. Try as I might, I couldn’t sleep—though I had never set eyes on Susan or Lisa, whenever I shut my eyes their figures rose before me.
Where was Susan now? Was she passing her days in hardship in a dingy room in an unknown alley of the city, or had she bid adieu to restaurants and music forever to enjoy the fruits of retirement? Surely she no longer lived at that Theatre Road house—if she did, Byron would have tracked her down ages ago and solved Marco Polo’s problems. Where was she today, her marital tangle unresolved? Did she ever think of the man who had sacrificed so much for her, who had been prepared to sacrifice so much more?
I felt genuinely sad thinking about Marco Polo’s personal life, so full of pain, but I also looked at it from the other point of view. How strange the world is, I mused. So many people had a tough time simply staying alive, and those who didn’t have to worry about their next meal cooked up fashionable problems, tired of their boring pleasures. But then it occurred to me that I had no right to be judgemental—if it hadn’t been for the problems of life, half the joys of staying alive might have been lost. It was because there was sorrow, because there were worries, because there was poverty, that life hadn’t become shallow and monotonous. None of us is interested in the history of happiness in this world. The great souls of the world whom we revere were all baptized in sorrow—none of them was nurtured in comfort or was a slave of Mammon.
When I arrived at the hotel early next morning, the previous night’s thoughts hadn’t quite disappeared, which was why the contrast seemed amazing. Even a few moments ago I was surrounded by slums, open drains and dustbins. But here? Garbage was generated here too, only I could never figure out where it disappeared. Here they had perfected the art of sweeping away from view whatever was unseemly and offensive. The enormous effort involved in this process of staying perpetually beautiful could be understood only if one visited Shahjahan Hotel early in the morning.
At an hour when most people in this city were still in bed, the carpets at Shahjahan were being cleaned with vacuum cleaners. The tired cleaners having finished scrubbing the floors squatted on it, resting briefly. They can do nothing till one in the morning, since people sit in the lounge and the bar late into the night. The hotel is named Shahjahan, but the bar-and-restaurant is christened Mumtaz. I don’t know what the historical Mumtaz was like, but I am sure our Mumtaz is lovelier, much more mysterious. She sleeps all day, reserving her sport for the night. But Calcutta Police is not amused. Nor is the excise department a connoisseur. They keep a watch over Calcuttans like children, under the impression that staying up late will make them ill. Normally, curfew is at ten, but it has been extended to midnight after much pleading. A little before the appointed hour, the head barman hangs up the small notice normally kept in the corner: BAR CLOSES AT TWELVE TONIGHT.
The guests suddenly seem to wake up from their slumber: time to start winding up. Of course, the canny ones never worry—they simply gesture to the barman.
The waiters know the sign. ‘How many pegs, sir?’ they ask.
The customer calculates—if one could swallow half-an-hour with each peg, eight pegs would see the night metamorphose into the light of dawn. The bar had to close down at twelve, but there was no problem in staying on and consuming drinks ordered before the deadline. Tobarak Ali, who serves the eight pegs, puts up the ‘BAR CLOSED’ notice and disappears rubbing his eyes, only to reappear at the bar after his night’s sleep, rewrapping the red badge on his right arm. There he finds his customer, having exhausted his supplies long ago, glancing at his watch in anticipation, waiting for the bar to reopen.
I walked through the main gate and entered the lobby. Mr Bose was on duty at the counter, cradling the telephone in his left hand and probably taking down a message with his right. He jerked his head at me as if to say, ‘Go straight to the kitchen, there’s something you have to do there.’ What did I have to do? Who would tell me what I had to do? By then Mr Bose was hunched over the piece of paper, saying, ‘Yes, yes, this is Sata Bose from the Shahjahan reception. You can’t get Karabi Guha on the phone right now—if there’s something you want to tell her, leave a message with me, I’ll make sure she gets it as soon as she wakes up.’
Mr Bose’s expression made it clear that the person at the other end of the phone wasn’t happy with the reply. ‘I understand perfectly,’ he said, ‘but unless there are special instructions we don’t disturb guests while they’re asleep. ABC...what kind of name is that? You mean Miss Guha will know who it is? But our custom is to take down the full name, address and telephone number—no, no, please don’t be angry, it’s up to you how much you want to tell us. I’ll let her know Mr ABC had telephoned.’
Without waiting for the telephone saga to be completed, I set off towards the kitchen.
‘Sack them, sack them!’ Even from a distance, I could hear Marco Polo bellowing. Inside, I found the sweepers lined up, their heads bowed, quaking wi
th fright. They looked as though they had been lined up before a firing squad at a military camp—and were waiting for the general to give the command to fire.
‘Is there a dirtier hotel anywhere in the universe?’ Marco Polo asked at the top of his voice.
All of them stood silent, their eyes on the floor. Goaded by their silence, Marco Polo roared, ‘Have all the ex-students of the deaf-and-dumb school taken jobs in this hotel? Why don’t you speak?’
His probing eyes started sweeping the place like a searchlight, coming to a halt at the point where the steward stood. He fired another cannonball: ‘Jimmy, have you joined the Gandhi party? Have you taken a vow of silence?’
The steward, whose own authority I had some experience of, seemed to have turned into a worm. ‘Quite true, it really is very dirty, as you said...’ he stuttered.
‘And you’re the steward of a hotel through whose kitchen rats as big as crocodiles run about in the daylight.’
At last I understood what the matter was. Two rats had been scurrying about on the kitchen floor under the manager’s gaze, and hence the present scene. He would not spare anybody.
Marco Polo emitted a cloud of smoke from his pipe, turned around and said, ‘My dear fellows, the way you’re going, the way you keep the stores and kitchen in a mess, I wouldn’t be surprised if next week I saw elephants instead of rats in here.’
The sweepers had started mopping the floor carefully by then. The steward called the head cook and told him, ‘I’ll be here immediately after lunch—I want to see everything spick and span. Nobody should leave today, I want to see everyone here.’
As he was about to turn away, pipe in hand, Marco Polo spotted me. A pleasant smile flitted across the face of the same person who had hit the roof only a moment ago. The steward obviously didn’t care for such unexpected good fortune being showered on me, as his dirty look and expression indicated. But I had no time to waste on that, as Marco Polo clapped me on the shoulder and said, ‘Come along.’
Now I saw him in a different light—he was no longer only my lord and master, the manager of Shahjahan Hotel. I had discovered him the night before. Inside the man hardened by the blows of life I had unearthed that little child who had lost everything in an earthquake in that Arab town, who had been given everything by the Italian priests, and whom Calcutta had once again robbed of everything. I could now see all of him, up close. And like a magician, he, too, transformed himself—who’d have believed that the same man was taking his employees to task after spotting a couple of rats?
Why was he looking at me like that? Perhaps he was under the impression I knew everything, and yet couldn’t be entirely sure—who knows how much Byron had told this chap and how much he had held back. I was feeling uncomfortable, too. To overcome the sense of unease, I said, ‘I went to Mr Byron’s house last night, sir.’
‘I hope the place wasn’t hard to locate?’
‘Oh no...I didn’t know the neighbourhood, but I did have the address.’
‘I hope that neighbourhood remains unfamiliar all your life. My dear young man, always try to stay away from sinful temptations. I don’t want to preach to you, but believe me, we usually create our own sorrows.’
I kept quiet and he continued to look probingly at me. I gulped and said, ‘I met Mr Byron last night, he asked me to tell you not to lose patience.’
‘Patience! Was a more patient human ever brought up on earth?’ I couldn’t make out whom the question was addressed to, but for the first time it seemed to me that the man whom I’d thought was made of stone was actually a big slab of ice which was beginning to melt. The man with whom I was supposed to have an employer-employee relationship, forgot for a moment who I was and said, ‘I hardly know you to speak of, but you look as though you don’t know this world. Be very careful.’
I did not say anything, but I could only thank my stars. I have found undeserved, unwarranted love from people on so many occasions—and having received it, my craving for it has increased even more. That day, too, there was no lack of such affection.
‘I have to admit you’re not a bad typist,’ said Marco Polo, fingering the chain around his neck.
I accepted his praise with bowed head—what could be better than having pleased him in such a short time? I had had a taste of what life without a job could be like, especially for someone who had once been employed. Mr Bose had once laughed and said, ‘The fellow who’s never had a job and the fellow who’s lost his job are like the virgin and the widow; neither has a husband, but only the widow knows the difference.’
As Mr Bose would have put it, I had lost one husband and found another. Even without my trying, the words emerged, ‘Nice of you to say so, sir.’
Marco Polo’s round eyes danced with merry mischief as he said, ‘Your years at the high court haven’t taught you to size people up—I’m not nice at all.’
Seeing me look uncomfortable, he changed the subject. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m quite scared of that neighbourhood of yours—I’ve been there a few times, but to tell you the truth, if a bull were to chase me, I would rather jump into the river to save my life than run into a building on Old Post Office Street.’
I smiled.
‘Where do you live?’ he asked.
‘Howrah,’ I said.
‘Where on earth is that?’
‘It’s to the west of the Ganga,’ I explained, ‘beyond the station.’
It looked as though he didn’t know there was solid ground beyond Howrah Station—as though that was where land ended and the sea began.
Mr Bose had already hinted to me the proposal that Marco Polo now made. ‘This is not your ordinary office,’ Mr Bose had said, ‘with a ten-to-five life, half-day on Saturdays and full holiday on Sundays. If there’s any chance of getting a permanent position here, someday the boss will order you to renounce your relationship with the world and take shelter in Shahjahan Hotel.’
To save my job I was prepared to live in any building in the world.
Divining my feelings, Mr Bose had said, ‘As far as I can tell you’re going to be eating off Shahjahan Hotel for a long time yet. I can guess from Jimmy’s behaviour—he’s quite soft on you now, and he tailors his behaviour to the boss’s attitude.’
Mr Bose’s prophecy came true as Marco Polo lit a Burma cigar and said, ‘You’ll have to take an important decision. Your predecessor, Rosie, used to live here—it suited the management. I wouldn’t have to hurry and finish off everything by five—and all important letters could be attended to immediately. I have to admit I’ve never seen a secretary as wonderful as Rosie—not only did her fingers race over the typewriter keyboard like the Delhi Mail, the smile never left her face. She was completely ungrudging, and she never felt unhappy about working.
‘One time the poor girl had to take dictation at midnight—not from me, but from a guest. He was leaving early in the morning for London, and a letter simply had to be delivered on the way to Karachi. He neither had a typewriter, nor could he type. He came to me at eleven that night. “Where will I find a stenographer at this hour?” I asked. He was insistent—Calcutta’s such a big city, nothing is impossible here if you try.
‘So I thought of Rosie. Believe you me, that night she typed till nearly three o’clock. I didn’t know that, I’d simply put her to work and gone off to sleep. She didn’t tell me anything either the next morning—but later I received a letter from England from the guest, in which he wrote, “Your secretary rescued me that night like an angel. I have no idea how to thank her—or you. She typed till three in the morning, and then, without the slightest show of irritation, said good morning to me after completing her work and went to her room,”’ Marco Polo proudly completed his secretary’s tale.
‘You’d better move in, too,’ he added.
Without waiting for my assent, he left the room, saying, ‘I’ve told Jimmy already, he must have made all the arrangements. Tell him to see me if there’s any problem.’
He proceed
ed towards the counter to examine the billing register. First uncomprehendingly, and then with gradually dawning realization, I flopped down on a chair. Who knew what the stars were conspiring—depriving me of my home or providing me a new one?
I used to have a name of my own, which I lost at the High Court. I had an address, which I’d managed to preserve against all odds, even saving enough money to get a letterhead printed. In the European style, it carried only the address on the right hand side and, in a daze of self-importance, I’d even spent twelve annas on a rubber stamp with my name and address. I’d used that stamp unstintingly all over the place, proudly broadcasting my lineage! Now both had become redundant on the same day. Anyone who was sucked into the enormous black hole of Shahjahan Hotel could have neither name nor address—he could only be a nameless, kinless, unknown traveller at the inn.
Writing names in the register, Mr Bose raised his head and said, ‘I’ve heard already.’ There was a foreigner standing before him. As soon as the bearer ran up from a distance, Mr Bose instructed, ‘Suite number one.’
The bearer picked up one of the countless keys hanging on the board and saluted. The foreigner arranged his blond hair and, twirling the key in his right hand, went upstairs.
Bose whispered, ‘He’s come alone, but he’s taken a double room; our best suite, which costs two hundred and fifty rupees a day—and that, too, bed and breakfast only.’
I didn’t know yet what the term bed-and-breakfast meant—now I learnt that it implied that only breakfast would be served along with board; other meals were extra. Tourists who travelled around all day preferred the bread-and-breakfast rate, and the hotel wasn’t unhappy either, since it meant less trouble.
‘He isn’t very old,’ I said. ‘Must be very rich...’
‘My foot!’ Mr Bose laughed. ‘He does have a job, but you can’t book suite number one at Shahjahan on that salary.’
‘Maybe he’s here on behalf of his company,’ I said.
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