‘Aren’t you Bose’s assistant?’ she asked with a slight smile.
‘Yes, ma’am. He’s asking for you.’
‘Bose is asking for me?’ She seemed a trifle irritated.
‘Mr Agarwalla and Mr Pakrashi are also there,’ I said.
‘Oh, I see.’ She seemed to have gauged the importance of the matter. Just as a brand-new car has an effortless rhythm of its own as it comes to life, Karabi, too, rose from her chair with a unique rhythm all her own.
Back at the counter, I saw William standing alone. ‘The meeting’s probably begun,’ he said. ‘They’ve all gone inside.’
The two of us rushed off. ‘Mr Agarwalla himself called for me?’ asked Karabi. ‘He said nothing to me when I spoke to him over the phone at three o’clock.’
The Pakrashis and Agarwalla had occupied a table in the banquet hall by then, while Bose-da had drawn the microphone from the corner of the room and placed it before the chief guest. The respected chief guest had flown to Calcutta only for the noble cause of serving mankind; dressed in national attire, he rose and, adjusting the cap on his head, said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen.’
Karabi looked at him and chuckled. ‘Good god! So that’s who it is. No wonder he was being given the royal treatment this afternoon.’
Before I could hear any more, the speech began. ‘Calcutta’s illustrious citizens, I congratulate you for the pains that you have taken to spend your precious time here this evening. All these days, we have been thinking only of our nation, but now the time has come to think of man in a wider context. Especially since a son of this very Calcutta has said, “man is above all, nothing transcends man”.’
Reporters were sitting at a separate table, taking down the main points. Suddenly they put their pencils down and exchanged glances. The famous writer Nagen Pal was seated next to the chief guest. He rose and whispered something in the latter’s ear. The chief guest paused and said, ‘The leading light of Indian literature, Nagen Pal, has just reminded me that the poet Chandidas had nothing to do with Calcutta. But my point is that Mr Das was born in Bengal, and who can think of Bengal without Calcutta?’
There was mild applause. The speaker continued, ‘The main problem of the world is that of food—particularly rice. The amount of rice produced in the world is not enough to provide a square meal for every person in it.’ Taking out a piece of paper, he started throwing statistical figures at the gathering.
Karabi was still standing by the door. ‘What a bore,’ she said. ‘How long do I have to wait here?’
‘You can go to Mr Agarwalla as soon as the speech is over.’
Karabi grimaced. ‘You think he’ll ever finish?’
‘Well, this isn’t a soapbox, it’s a banquet hall, the speech is bound to end soon.’
Meanwhile, the speaker droned on, ‘The key to the success of human civilization lies in distributing scarce resources in proportion with people’s needs. People around the world and all of us here in India—the country of the Buddha, Ramakrishna, Vivekananda, Tagore, Mahatma Gandhi—have to make sacrifices. We will not use rice at any of the banquets of this society. Besides, twenty of our members have announced they will not eat rice at home either for the next few years. Among them are Mr Agarwalla, Mr...’ He rattled off the names.
Karabi chuckled. ‘What kind of place is this? Does everyone here have diabetes?’
‘Meaning?’ I whispered.
‘How can Agarwalla have rice? He’s diabetic. I have syringes and insulin stacked in my room too. When he spends the night here, he takes a dose himself.’
Every table had a menu card or two. Everyone was studying it. A short, squat, roguish character seated at a table with three friends summoned me. I approached with measured steps and bowed before them. Transferring the memo pad and menu to my left hand from my right, I whispered, ‘Yes, sir?’
‘Is this a vegetarian dinner?’ he asked.
‘No, sir,’ I replied. ‘There are several non-vegetarian items as well.’
‘That’s not what I’m talking about,’ he snapped. ‘Maybe there’s a rice crisis—so drinking stuff made from it looks bad. But what about other kinds of liquor?’
I didn’t know what to say. Bose-da was close by. He appeared in an instant and, nudging me aside, said, ‘Excuse me, sir, I will request Mr Langford or Mr Agarwalla to explain.’
Crossing his legs, the gentleman said, ‘Never mind Langford, ask Agarwalla to see me.’
Walking off towards Agarwalla, Bose-da said, ‘Dangerous man, this Phokla Chatterjee. His real name is R.N. Chatterjee, used to be a boxer. Someone knocked his front teeth out. Alcoholic. His eyes are perpetually red, his crew-cut looks like a wire brush.’
Apparently, Chatterjee’s presence is enough to make a party a smash hit. At least, that’s what many people believe. He is invited to every cocktail and party in town. Only movie parties are a strict no-no. He had thrown up on actress Sreelekha Devi once at this hotel—Sreelekha Devi now refuses to attend a party where he’s invited.
Agarwalla stood up as Bose-da approached him. ‘Mr Chatterjee is asking for you,’ Bose-da said.
‘Oh my lord,’ Agarwalla exclaimed and set off towards Chatterjee’s table.
Phokla Chatterjee said, ‘Agarwalla, what kind of joke is this? You aim to serve humanity, but you’re forcing so many of God’s creatures to suffer. There is no liquor on the menu.’
The chief guest was still speaking. Agarwalla was in a spot. Phokla Chatterjee grabbed his hand and said, ‘Don’t try to run away. I can create a scene right now. I don’t care for any president or chief guest.’
Agarwalla said, ‘My dear fellow, we were very keen on serving cocktails. But the chief guest was unwilling. He refused to give a speech if alcohol was going to be served.’
Phokla uttered an obscenity. ‘So the bugger’s going to be a disapproving aunt. You mean to tell me he’s acquired that round shape without drinking?’
Agarwalla tried damage control. ‘For them drinking in public is...’
Phokla rose. ‘I get it. Fine, I’m going to drink privately. I’m off to Mumtaz.’
Bose-da said, ‘The bar’s open till ten, you’ll get anything you want.’
‘Pass me some cash. Forgot my wallet. Better still, tell them to add my bill at the bar to yours over here.’
‘All right,’ said Agarwalla. Heading off towards the bar, Phokla Chatterjee muttered, ‘Damn it, I had two other cocktail invitations. Who’d have come to listen to sermons if I’d known it was going to be dry?’
‘Tell them at the bar to not ask him for money,’ Bose-da instructed me.
By the time I returned after settling Phokla at the bar, the chief guest was congratulating the people present for the memorable precedence they had set by pledging their love to all mankind. He had no doubt that the road to success for Indians lay in love, devotion and compassion.
And so to dinner. Or, given the time by the clock, you could call it supper. Since there was no rice, the cost was two and a half rupees more. Thirty bearers and the five of us had our hands full trying to serve 300 guests.
In the midst of all this, the chief guest shouted at me, ‘So many of you, and yet you can’t serve the guests in time.’
I was silent. Agarwalla said, ‘In India five people can serve five hundred.’
Performing surgery on the chicken, Madhab Pakrashi said solemnly, ‘This is supposed to be English service.’
‘It’s becoming obvious that in many respects the West is falling behind us.’
Nagen Pal addressed the chief guest, ‘Sir, why don’t you write a book, Decline and Fall of the West?’
‘I could. The publishers of Nehru’s Discovery of India have requested me several times.’
I had often seen the chief guest’s pictures in the papers and read his speeches. So I didn’t take his rebuke to heart. The respected gentleman had initially said he was vegetarian but would eat eggs. The aroma of chicken probably made him change his mind. ‘Is the chi
cken tender?’ he asked Pakrashi.
‘Quite...I’ve been all over the world, but you can’t beat Calcutta chicken for tenderness and taste,’ Pakrashi replied with a smile.
The chief guest said, ‘Get me a plate of chicken.’
I held out a tray to him. Without wasting words, he emptied it on his plate. Abandoning his fork and knife, he grabbed a piece with his hands and started crunching the bone. At the sound, foreign consuls sitting at nearby tables turned his way in surprise. Wiping his nose with the handkerchief in his left hand, he declared, ‘I started this the last time I was abroad. They were stunned. That half-foreign Bombay writer Miss Postwalla tried to stop me, but I’m a pure Indian, why should I bother? I ate the stew with my hands and licked my fingers too.’
The dessert service had started. Taking two ice creams for himself, the chief guest observed, ‘These help digestion, I’m going to have them later. Get me some more chicken quickly, preferably boneless.’ As I retreated in search of chicken, I heard him telling Nagen Pal, ‘This is a foreign concern, don’t hold back. These fellows will wring us out with their charges, make fat profits, send them abroad in the form of foreign exchange. Make the most of it. Don’t worry, I am fully equipped. Digestives, soda, mint, I have them all, don’t worry at all.’
As I extended another plate of chicken towards him, he said, ‘Doesn’t quite sate the appetite without a little rice. But what to do, we have to make these sacrifices for India, for the world.’
Agarwalla belched and said, ‘I must say your speech was wonderful.’
The chief guest belched even more grotesquely. ‘True. But even better than that was tonight’s menu. These buggers do wring every last penny out of you, but they give you great stuff. That’s why foreign firms are doing so well in India.’
Karabi had organized things meanwhile. Everything had been arranged for Madhab Pakrashi’s guests to stay in Agarwalla’s guest house. But she hadn’t been able to return to her quarters—she had had to dine with the others at Agarwalla’s request. I ran into her as she got up to make her way out. She looked down the hall and smiled. Gomez’s band had struck up by then. The advantage of the music was that you couldn’t hear at one table what was being said at the next. Everyone felt safe in the privacy this afforded.
Karabi said, ‘I couldn’t get over this chief guest of yours! The suite had been reserved for him tonight. He asked for a photograph to see what I look like! He said it wouldn’t look good for him to spend the night here—he’d go back to his regular place—but he had no objection to a few hours’ rest in my room.’ She laughed out loud. Before I could comprehend what she had just said, she quickened her steps and said, ‘Goodbye. I’d better go and make arrangements for the respected guest.’
8
The implication of ‘making arrangements’ for the respected guest was not difficult to gauge from Karabi’s forlorn yet resigned expression. The guests left one by one. Discussing humanitarianism with her husband, Mrs Pakrashi climbed into a waiting car. Mr Agarwalla and his English guest didn’t linger either. The only person to stay behind was the honourable chief guest who wanted to revive his tired body, exhausted in the line of duty, in the quiet, cool refuge of suite number two. It was not a long sojourn though—he left soon enough, in fact even before the date on the calendar had changed. His hasty departure, as witnessed from the reception counter, is well-preserved in the album of my memories. Finding no resemblance between the furtive figure darting past me and his photographs in the newspapers, I was taken aback for a moment. Perhaps all news was about suppressing part of the truth; perhaps this was how the illustrious names of remarkable people were written in the pages of history.
I am not a cynic. I have faith in the greatness of man. Yet, when in moments of leisure I relive the events of that night, I cannot help question my inherent faith. I recall Karabi seeing off the distinguished guest, glancing at me on the way in the manner, I thought, of a sophisticated hostess. But after he was gone, on her way back, she paused for a moment. I still cannot fathom why she looked at me like that. I wasn’t experienced enough at the time to comprehend everything, but in dark Karabi’s eyes I discerned a fatigue accumulated over a lifetime. I didn’t understand much, but her hurt eyes seemed to think that I had grasped it all; my silence seemed to publicly insult her tortured body.
As she stood before me, weary to the bone, I couldn’t help noticing how the grace and poise I had witnessed earlier in the evening when I had gone to summon her had deserted her. For some reason she felt like a kindred soul. She asked, ‘How much longer?’
I smiled. ‘A long way—I have to be up all night.’
‘Poor thing,’ she said softly, and almost staggered towards her room.
I still feel embarrassed thinking of the events of that night. The intelligent, experienced reader will forgive this naïve employee of Shahjahan Hotel. For a moment that night I felt I wasn’t a ‘poor thing’ at all. I was extremely fortunate. By God’s grace, I had been born as myself, and not as Karabi Guha. I felt that in his scheme of creation, God had made men the more fortunate species. Whoever the creator of women might be, he had not been partial to them. The same thought was to occur to me once more the day Mrs Pakrashi told Karabi, ‘I wonder how God could have created a woman like you!’
But that was a few days later. There were still a few days to go before Madhab Pakrashi’s guests arrived to enjoy the hospitality of suite number two. In the meantime someone else arrived at the hotel, someone I became well-acquainted with: Connie. If it had not been for her I wouldn’t really have become familiar with Shahjahan Hotel. Rather, if Connie is omitted from this memoir, there wouldn’t be much left in the sum total of my experiences at Shahjahan. Even now when I meet a woman I don’t know, or when I have to form an opinion about someone, I try to bring Connie to mind. She no longer seems a flesh-and-blood creature to me, she’s more like a dream. I do not know how exactly to describe her. It was as if she shone with an incandescent light; her dazzle a momentary flash, like that of a camera, illuminating briefly, with great clarity, the darkness of this urban jungle.
It was from Marco Polo that I first heard of Connie. He came to the counter one day with her photograph. Rosie was sitting next to me, clipping her nails and saying, ‘This nail-clipper’s blunt.’
‘Why don’t you use a blade?’ I said.
Sticking her tongue out, she said, ‘What kind of young man are you? When a young lady tells you her nail-clipper’s blunt, you should be running out to buy her a new one, instead of which you merely tell her to use a blade!’
‘My dear girl, this young man has given you good advice. You won’t have any trouble with a blade.’ Both of us jumped at Marco Polo’s voice—we hadn’t seen him come. Smiling, he said, ‘Rosie, I need the airlines letter right away—if they introduce a new service to Calcutta, we’ll need many more rooms. The letter’s in my office, please fetch it quickly.’
Rosie hurried away from the counter. Marco Polo turned to me. ‘Now to business. Strictly speaking, this isn’t your job—it’s Rosie’s. But I have heard from Jimmy that she can’t stand women; it gets her back up when she hears another woman is coming to Shahjahan.’ He handed me a photograph, and said with a laugh, ‘Young men shouldn’t be looking at these pictures, either, but since you work for a hotel, it’s different. The ideal hotel worker is neither masculine, nor feminine!’
The girl in the photograph, as he had said, was a blue-eyed beauty with platinum hair. ‘I want you to put an advertisement in the papers: CONNIE, THE WOMAN, IS COMING.’
Many of you must have seen that advertisement in the leading dailies.
Later that day, Bose-da handed me a heap of photographs and said, ‘You’d better learn how to display pictures too—you’ll soon be juggling many roles.’
The photographs were all of Connie. I arranged them as artistically as I could on the two boards near the entrance, with the caption ‘Connie is Coming’.
Bose-da was very pleased. ‘
Wonderful, a real artist’s touch—looks like you used to arrange pictures of half-naked cabaret dancers at the Shahjahan in your previous life.’
I smiled. ‘I don’t believe in rebirth—it’s just that pupils learn faster if the teacher’s good.’
Bose-da read the advertisement again: ‘Connie is coming. Coming, yes, but do you know from where?’ Then, answering his own question, he went on, ‘Many people think these beauties arrive straight out of the blue to the cabaret at Shahjahan. She’s just conquered the Middle East and is doing a show in Persia—from there it’ll be straight to Shahjahan.’
He was in a good mood. He told me that Connie was charging a lot. ‘Cabaret girls usually do,’ he said. ‘If they knew how much, many top-notch barristers and surgeons flaunting FRCS degrees would breakdown in despair. All their pride and commitment and expertise would be ground to dust under the feet of the dancing beauties of the cabaret!’
‘That sounds more like a football metaphor than a dance one,’ I interrupted.
‘Right you are. What else do these dancing queens do but play football with the male brain? Guests often come up to the counter and ask how much the girls are paid,’ he warned me. ‘Your standard reply should be, “I am sorry, I don’t know.” The cabaret documents are absolutely confidential.’
Bose-da had already filled me in on cabaret dancers. Their engagements were normally fixed six to eight months beforehand. There were special companies in Paris that arranged these performances. In hotel parlance, these were called ‘chain programmes’. The cabaret girls danced their way around the world, marking out a few select cities in which to perform. Starting their journey eastwards or westwards, they moved ahead, doing two-week programmes here and three-week ones there. Before the programme in one city ended, the dancer’s photographs were sent on to the next venue and ads were released. In this fashion, they eventually made their way back home.
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