Such a Long Journey Read online

  ‘I don’t know who is “we”. For me you are the only one present here.’

  She ignored that. ‘You have started hiding mail. I wonder what else you are hiding.’

  ‘Nothing! I wanted to think about Jimmy’s letter without getting a thousand suggestions from all the geniuses in this house. That’s all.’

  ‘A thousand suggestions, is it?’ Dilnavaz was stung. ‘For twenty-one years we discuss everything together. Now I am a nuisance? And Jimmy doesn’t even tell the details. How do you know you are doing the right thing?’

  Gustad said the details did not matter, it was the principle, of helping a friend. ‘All this time, it has been Major this and Major that. I said forget him, he is vanished like a thief. But no. Now he writes for help, I say yes, and you are still not pleased.’

  ‘And what if it is something dangerous?’

  ‘Rubbish.’ He pointed to Sohrab. ‘Why is that one grinning like a donkey?’

  ‘Don’t get angry again, Daddy,’ he said, ‘I think you made the right choice, but –’

  ‘Oh! He thinks Daddy made the right choice! Haven’t you told him he is no longer my son?’ Fiercely sarcastic, Gustad bowed his head mockingly. ‘Thank you, thank you sir! Thank you for your approval. Go on. But what?’

  ‘I was just thinking about Jimmy Uncle and your friends talking politics. He always used to say, “Only two choices: communism or military dictatorship, if you want to get rid of these Congress Party crooks. Forget democracy for a few years, not meant for a starving country.”’

  His imitation of the Major’s clipped bass-baritone was very good, and Dilnavaz laughed. Gustad enjoyed it too but was careful to conceal his approval, as Sohrab continued: ‘Imagine if Jimmy Uncle is planning a coup to get rid of our corrupt government.’

  With the saucer of tea in one hand. Gustad supported his forehead in the other. ‘Idiotic-lunatic talk is starting again. Imagine something useful, imagine yourself in IIT!’ He kneaded his forehead. ‘What Jimmy used to say is just a way of talking. Everybody does it when there are droughts and floods and shortages, and things go wrong.’

  ‘I know, I know, I was only joking. But what about the leaders who do wrong? Like the car manufacturing licence going to Indira’s son? He said Mummy, I want to make motorcars. And right away he got the licence. He has already made a fortune from it, without producing a single Maruti. Hidden in Swiss bank accounts.’ Dilnavaz listened intently as Sohrab described how the prototype had crashed in a ditch during its trial, yet was approved because of orders from the very top. She was the self-appointed referee between father and son, her facial expressions registering the scores.

  ‘Good to see your son reads the newspapers,’ said Gustad, finishing the tea in his saucer. ‘He may be a genius, but let me teach him something. Whatever you read in the paper, first divide by two – for the salt and pepper. From what’s left, take off ten per cent. Ginger and garlic. And sometimes, depending on the journalist, another five per cent for chilli powder. Then, and only then, will you get to the truth free of masala and propaganda.’ Dilnavaz was pleased with his impromptu lesson. Her scoreboard updated itself. Gustad leaned back and slid his cup towards the kettle.

  ‘But I heard this from an eyewitness,’ said Sohrab. ‘One of my college friends. His father works at the testing centre.’

  ‘College friend! Filling your head with rubbish and idiotic-lunatic talk. Be grateful this is a democracy. If that Russiawalla was here, he would pack you and your friends off to Siberia.’ He rubbed his forehead. ‘When he talks like this, the blood in my brain begins to boil! If I have a stroke, it will be your son’s fault, I am warning you!’

  She watched, distressed. The vestiges of what had resembled a keen debate (she had half-enjoyed it, hoped it would usher in normalcy) was rekindling last night’s pyre. She signalled to Sohrab to say nothing.

  ‘For the last time, take my advice,’ said Gustad. ‘Forget your friends, forget your college and its useless degree. Think of your future. Every bloody peon or two-paisa clerk is a BA these days.’ He picked up his response to Major Bilimoria and went to the desk for an envelope.

  Dilnavaz motioned to Sohrab to follow her. In the kitchen she selected a lime from her basket and bade him close his eyes. ‘What’s this?’ he protested. ‘What are you doing with the lime?’

  ‘It’s not going to hurt, just makes your brain healthy.’

  ‘What nonsense. My brain does not need any help.’

  She shushed and pleaded that he do it for her sake, it was bad to have too much pride. ‘So many things science cannot explain. And a lime cannot harm you, can it?’

  ‘Oh, OK!’ He closed his eyes resignedly. ‘First Daddy gets dramatic, then you get necromantic. You two drive me crazy.’

  ‘Don’t be rude. And don’t use big-big words.’ She held the lime in her right hand and described seven clockwise circles over his head. ‘Now open your eyes, look hard at it.’ She drew it away from him with a downward motion, towards his feet, and tucked it in a brown paper bag. Later, it would be tossed into the sea. This last step was crucial, Miss Kutpitia had explained; it was imperative not to discard the lime with the garbage.

  Suddenly, everything Miss Kutpitia said seemed imbued with deep wisdom.

  iii

  After the awkwardness at the dinner party, Gustad was uncomfortable when he met Dinshawji on Monday, but the latter put things at ease. ‘Don’t worry about it. Argument is normal when a boy is growing up. You think I have become old without seeing such things?’

  At lunch-time, Gustad did not go to the stairwell where the dubbawalla deposited the tiffin boxes. He would let his lunch return home uneaten, and without his pencilled note to Dilnavaz which, over twenty-one years, was the one constant in their lives, always written and always read, no matter how much they fought or quarrelled. Until today. The daily notes did not say much: ‘My Dearest, Busy day today, meeting with manager. Will tell you later. Love & xxx.’ Or: ‘My Dearest, Dhandar-paatyo was delicious. Aroma made everyone’s mouth water. Love & xxx.’

  Dinshawji approached Gustad’s desk with his packet of sandwiches. Unlike the others, he carried his lunch in his briefcase every morning, usually last night’s leftovers slopped between two slices of bread. He often turned up with gems like cauliflower sandwiches, brinjal sandwiches, French bean sandwiches, pumpkin sandwiches, and ate them cheerfully, soggy bread and all. If he was teased about his epicurean delights, he would say, ‘Whatever my dear domestic vulture gives, I eat without a word. Or she will eat me alive.’

  Dinshawji’s lucky days, like the one today, were those when nothing remained from the previous night. On such days, Alamai fried a spicy omelette in the morning to go between the bread slices. As he unwrapped the paper, the pent-up smell of onion, ginger and garlic issued like a squirt. ‘Come on yaar,’ he said to Gustad. ‘Get your dubba and let’s go to the canteen.’ He wanted to be on time for the daily feature.

  Every day in the canteen, over lunch, their regular group told jokes. They told the perennially popular Sikh jokes (What did the Sardarji runner say, after finishing first in the Asian Games, when asked: ‘Are you relaxing now?’ He said: ‘No, no, I am still Arjun Singh’); they told Madrasi jokes, mimicking the rolled-tongue sounds of South Indian languages (How does a Madrasi spell minimum? Yum-i-yen-i-yum-u-yum); they told Guju jokes, capitalizing on the askew English pronunciations of Gujaratis and their difficulties with vowels, ‘o’ in particular (Why did the Guju go to the Vatican? He wanted to hear pope music. Why did the Guju bite John Paul’s big toe? He wanted to eat popecorn); they told Pathani jokes, about the Pathan’s supposed penchant for rear-entry (A Pathan went to his doctor: ‘Doctor Sahab, in my stomach is a lot of pain.’ So the doctor gave him an enema. The Pathan left in ecstasy, told his friends: ‘Arré, how pleasureful modern science is – belly in pain, but medicine beautifully arse-way rammed.’ The next day, his friends lined up at the doctor’s clinic for enemas).

  The group in the ca
nteen did not spare themselves either, joking about the vast reputation of the Parsi proboscis (What happens when a bawaji with an erection walks into a wall? He hurts his nose). No linguistic or ethnic group was spared; perfect equality prevailed in the canteen when it came to jokes.

  Lunch-time was the highlight of the drab working day. Invariably, Dinshawji was the star performer, the group hanging on to his every word. There were contributions from others too, but these seemed to pale in comparison. Dinshawji stored away everything he ever heard; weeks, even months later, he would bring it forth, refurbished and improved, a brand-new story. It was a necessary bit of plagiarism that no one minded.

  Sometimes, instead of jokes, they had a song-session. If Dinshawji was the star of the comic hour, it was Gustad who shone during the singing. Especially in demand were his renditions of Sir Harry Lauder’s favourites like ‘Roamin’ in the Gloamin” and ‘I Love a Lassie’ which Gustad delivered with a marvellous Scottish brogue. Although the custom was to sing together, everyone fell silent when he sang:

  By yon bonnie banks and by yon bonnie braes,

  Where the sun shines bright on Loch Lomond,

  Where me and my true love will ne’er meet again,

  On the bonnie, bonnie banks of Loch Lomond.

  But they always found the refrain irresistible, and joined in with Gustad, drowning his efforts:

  So ye take the high road and I’ll take the low road,

  And I’ll be in Scotland afore ye,

  But me and my true love will ne’er meet again,

  On the bonnie, bonnie banks of Loch Lomond.

  It was not all jokes and singing in the canteen, though. Sometimes the hour went in passionate argument about matters that concerned the community, such as the Tower of Silence controversy. When the bank clerks and tellers debated the reformers’ proposal to introduce cremation, tempers flared and there were bitter personal attacks. But Dinshawji would manage to end matters on a light note, saying things like: ‘Better that my dear domestic vulture eats me up than the feathered ones. With her I have a guarantee – she at least won’t scatter pieces of my meat all over Bombay.’

  Biting into his omelette sandwich, he reminded Gustad about lunch. ‘Forget it,’ said Gustad. ‘I’m not eating today.’

  Much as Dinshawji enjoyed the canteen, he decided to stick by his friend. ‘Sandwich? Half?’ He held out his packet.

  Gustad said no with his hand. ‘Going for a walk.’

  ‘I’ll also come. I can eat walking-walking. Good for stomach and digestion.’

  On the way out they passed the new typist, Laurie Coutino, daintily raising spoonfuls of gravy-covered rice to her mouth. Laurie Coutino’s person was as impeccably ordered as her desk, with everything in its proper place. She did not like the canteen, and for lunch, her stationery was moved neatly to one side, making room for her napkin and tiffin. Her tongue snaked out and retrieved an errant grain of rice as the two went by.

  ‘What a sweetie,’ whispered Dinshawji. Her legs were crossed, and the short skirt had hiked up a fair but controlled distance. ‘Oooh!’ he moaned softly. ‘Cannot bear this pain! Just cannot bear it! Have to get an intro with her soon.’ He put his hand in his pocket and bunched it towards the groin, all part of the role he liked to play, ever the active candidate or, as the chaps called him, much to his delight, the Casanova of Flora Fountain.

  They emerged under the hot sun, stepping out of the path of a tardy dubbawalla weaving through the crowds at a jog, his crate of lunch-boxes balanced on his head. A gust of wind picked up the sweat streaming down his face and sent it in their direction. Dinshawji instinctively shielded his packet of sandwiches. Exchanging looks of disgust, they wiped the salt spray from their cheeks with white handkerchiefs.

  ‘This is nothing,’ said Dinshawji. ‘One day I had to take the train around eleven o’clock. You ever did that?’

  ‘You know I never take the train.’

  ‘It’s the time of dubbawallas. They are supposed to use only the luggage van, but some got in the passenger compartments. Jam-packed, and what a smell of sweat. Toba, toba! I began to feel something wet on my shirt. And guess what it was. A dubbawalla. Standing over me, holding the railing. It was falling from his naked armpit: tapuck-tapuck-tapuck, his sweat. I said nicely, “Please move a little, my shirt is wetting, meherbani.” But no kothaa, as if I was not there. Then my brain really went. I shouted, “You! Are you animal or human, look what you are doing!” I got up to show him the wet. And guess what he did. Just take a guess.’ ‘What?’

  ‘He turned and slipped into my seat! Insult to injury! What to do with such low-class people? No manners, no sense, nothing. And you know who is responsible for this attitude – that bastard Shiv Sena leader who worships Hitler and Mussolini. He and his “Maharashtra for Maharashtrians” nonsense. They won’t stop till they have complete Maratha Raj.’

  Dinshawji’s narration had brought them to the main intersection of Flora Fountain, where the great traffic circle radiated five roads like giant pulsating tentacles. Cars were pulling out from inside the traffic island and recklessly leaping into the flow. The BEST buses, red and double-deckered, careened dangerously around the circle on their way to Colaba. Intrepid handcarts, fueled by muscle and bone, competed temerariously against the best that steel, petrol and vulcanized rubber threw in their paths. With the dead fountain at its still centre, the traffic circle lay like a great motionless wheel, while around it whirled the business of the city on its buzzing, humming, honking, complaining, screeching, rattling, banging, screaming, throbbing, rumbling, grumbling, sighing, never-ending journey through the metropolis.

  Dinshawji and Gustad decided to walk down Vir Nariman Road. At the corner a pavement artist sat cross-legged beside his crayon drawings of gods and goddesses. He got up now and then to collect the coins left by devotees. Gustad pointed to the dry fountain. ‘For the last twenty-four years, you can count on your fingers the number of days there was water.’

  ‘Wait till the Marathas take over, then we will have real Gandoo Raj,’ said Dinshawji. ‘All they know is to have rallies at Shivaji Park, shout slogans, make threats, and change road names.’ He suddenly worked himself into a real rage; there was genuine grief in his soul. ‘Why change the names? Saala sisterfuckers! Hutatma Chowk!’ He spat out the words disgustedly. ‘What is wrong with Flora Fountain?’

  ‘Why worry about it? I say, if it keeps the Marathas happy, give them a few roads to rename. Keep them occupied. What’s in a name?’

  ‘No, Gustad.’ Dinshawji was very serious. ‘You are wrong. Names are so important. I grew up on Lamington Road. But it has disappeared, in its place is Dadasaheb Bhadkhamkar Marg. My school was on Carnac Road. Now suddenly it’s on Lokmanya Tilak Marg. I live at Sleater Road. Soon that will also disappear. My whole life I have come to work at Flora Fountain. And one fine day the name changes. So what happens to the life I have lived? Was I living the wrong life, with all the wrong names? Will I get a second chance to live it all again, with these new names? Tell me what happens to my life. Rubbed out, just like that? Tell me!’

  It occurred to Gustad he had been doing his friend a grave injustice all these years, regarding him merely as a joker. A friend too, yes, but a clown and joker none the less. ‘You shouldn’t let it bother you so much, Dinshu,’ he said. Never having had to deal with a Dinshawji who spoke of metaphysical matters, the affectionate diminutive was the best he could do, and he wondered what else to say. But the next moment, a man on a Lambretta, travelling down Vir Nariman Road, was hit by a car going in the opposite direction, and the subject of names was forgotten.

  ‘O my God!’ said Dinshawji, as the man flew over the handlebars and landed beside the pavement, not too far from them. A trickle of blood oozed from his mouth. Pedestrians and shopkeepers rushed to his assistance. Dinshawji wanted to go, too, but Gustad could not budge. Overcome by nausea and dizziness, he held on to Dinshawji’s arm.

  Meanwhile, the car had driven away. People
were asking if anyone saw the licence plate. The policeman from the traffic circle came to take charge. ‘Six inches closer,’ said Dinshawji, ‘and his skull would have cracked like a coconut. Lucky he landed in the gutter. What is it, Gustad? Why so pale?’

  Gustad swayed, and put his hand to his mouth as his insides heaved. Dinshawji quickly diagnosed the condition. ‘Tut-tut. No lunch is the problem,’ he chided. ‘An empty stomach is not good to see blood. That’s why soldiers are always fed well before a battle.’ He marched him off to the restaurant at the corner.

  It was cooler inside. They selected a table under a fan, and Gustad wiped the cold sweat from his brow. ‘Better?’ asked Dinshawji. Gustad nodded. The tables were covered with glass under which a one-page menu lay open to scrutiny. The glass was smeared and blotchy, but it magnified the menu. Gustad rested his bare forearms on the table, enjoying the cool surface. The thuuck-thuck, thuuck-thuck, thuuck-thuck of the slow-turning ceiling fan was soothing. Pungent odours wafted streetwards from the kitchen. On the wall behind the cashier was a handwritten sign: Spitting or Playing Satta Prohibited. Another sign, also handwritten, said: Trust in God – Rice Plate Always Ready.

  ‘What fun it would be to take Laurie Coutino to the upper level,’ said Dinshawji, pointing to the air-conditioned mezzanine with private rooms. ‘Money well spent.’ The waiter came with a wet rag in one hand and two water glasses in the other. He held them by the rims, his fingers immersed. They lifted their arms off the table while he rubbed briskly. Now a disagreeable odour, sour and fusty, lingered over the table. Dinshawji ordered. ‘One plate mutton samosas. With chutney. And two Nescafé.’ He raised the glass to his lips. Then the waiter’s fingerprints along the rim reminded him of the way it had been carried, and he lowered it without drinking. ‘Well, Gustad. All these years I knew you, I did not know blood could make you sick.’

  ‘Don’t be silly, blood does not bother me.’ Something in his voice warned that jokes would not be tolerated. ‘It was a great shock. I know that man on the Lambretta. He helped me when I fell from the bus. You remember my accident?’