Hats and Doctors: Stories Read online

  I began to wonder how such a beautiful girl had come to be there. But Bhola held her by the arm and sat her down on the edge of the bed next to him. He took her in his arms and asked her name, since that was how he had learnt to start such conversations from his friends who had first taken him down this path.

  I don’t remember what name the girl told him. I was looking at her face, big and round like the moon, which shone with a strange sort of innocence. She did not seem an actress on this stage at all. She shrank against Bhola in such a bashful manner as she told him her name that the man in him suddenly awoke. All the way there he had been swearing to me that he would tease and flirt a little with the Grand Hotel lovelies and then we could go home; but the next moment, when the hotel guide returned, the girl slid away from Bhola and he, instead of making some excuse to leave, asked with a good deal of enthusiasm, ‘How much for a shot?’

  ‘Ten rupees.’

  ‘What are you saying, I come here every day.’

  ‘But take a look at the goods.’

  Bhola searched around in his pockets. He must not have had enough money, so he curbed his enthusiasm a little and said, ‘Give it to me straight, yaar; no, let’s go.’

  The guide was a thin, attractive man of medium height. He had a nose like a vulture’s beak, and a vulture-like cruelty gleamed in his eyes. He gazed at Bhola narrowly for a moment and the next instant the matter was settled at five rupees.

  ‘Come on Bakhshi,’ Bhola said as he followed the guide out of the room.

  I got up. All this had happened so fast I was neither able to say anything to Bhola nor could I think of anything to say for myself. I quietly got up to follow him.

  But the guide stretched himself across the doorway, blocking my path. ‘Why don’t you just stay right there!’ he said, rather harshly. ‘I’m going to bring you even more fantastic goods than her.’

  I stopped where I was. On the other side of the door was the great hall of the hotel, with couches and teapoys lined up against three walls and a square space left clear in the middle for dances and balls. To the left, that is, along the back wall, was the bar. It was way past nine, so there were only a couple of lights on in the hall. A door in the back wall led inside to the hotel. The guide had taken Bhola and the beautiful girl through it—perhaps to some other room—and had come back. Another girl was coming out right behind him now. Involuntarily I stepped back and went and sat in Bhola’s place on the cot.

  The guide left the girl in the room and went away: She was skinny and worn out and looked as though she had come directly from Tibbi Gali, the red-light district.

  For a few moments I sat there looking at her quietly. I began to feel intensely disgusted. I had no means of judging what I should do any more. The grandeur of the hotel, my fear of the animal gleam in the eyes of the guide—whose face alone made him look a thug—and the knowledge that my pockets were empty, dominated my thoughts excessively. I asked her the same question as before, without even thinking:

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Mukhtar,’ she said.

  I laughed foolishly, as a pun on her name, which could mean ‘secretary’, occurred to me. ‘Secretary for Water and Dry Land, or for the Heart and Soul?’

  ‘Whichever you prefer!’

  And before I could respond in any way, she smiled and sat down next to me. If my pockets had been full and if I had been a regular visitor to such establishments, I would have stood up, grabbed her by the arm and pushed her out of the room. Then I would have called the guide, scolded him and taken off. But I had never been there before, my pockets were completely empty and I was totally overwhelmed by the guide’s domineering manner, so I sat glued to my seat. I wondered what I had gotten myself into: I should have gone home directly from the hotel on Beadon Road. I looked a bit dejected by then, but I kept smiling and my hand, of its own accord, touched her shoulder.

  I tried to think of a suitable couplet for the occasion. But no matter how hard I tried, I could not recall a single one. I was so nervous that, instead of saying anything, I let my hand slide down, a little below her shoulder, and pressed her arm slightly.

  And then, rather than shrinking from me, she threw herself on top of me, as though she had been waiting for exactly this. Her head dropped on to my shoulder and I felt the unfamiliar touch of her lips in the hollow of my neck.

  Before I could jump up, the guide returned. His entrance accompanied the return of my senses. I got up and told Mukhtar to go outside, and then I repeated what I had said at the Beadon Road Hotel, with a few added embellishments.

  The guide did not say, ‘She’s the only one here right now,’ or ‘I’ll show you a different one right away,’ or anything like that. He looked at me with a gaze so crooked and disdainful it pierced right through my façade to the core. Perhaps his experienced eyes had ascertained the true situation: ‘Why don’t you sit outside!’ The suggestion may as well have been a command—he walked to the door and motioned towards a couch in the hall.

  I felt revived and went and sank into the couch with a sigh of relief.

  I assumed Bhola would not come back for some time, so I stretched my legs out on the couch, pulled my hat down over my ears and reclined almost to the point of lying down. My mind began to wander as I thought about the room where Bhola was closed up with that innocent-looking girl.

  But I could not have been lying there for more than five minutes when Bhola reappeared, coming from an inside door.

  ‘What happened!’ I exclaimed, standing up in confusion.

  ‘That’s it, let’s go.’

  ‘You finished that quickly?’

  ‘What else! She knew I had only paid five rupees, the bitch didn’t let me put my hand anywhere else!’

  I cast a sympathetic glance at Bhola and followed him out of the great hall. Just then a car pulled up in front of the porch. After we had gone some distance, I turned and looked behind me. That same innocent-looking girl had rewrapped her sari, just as a hen ruffles her feathers to tidy up after a roll in the dirt, and was now standing in the verandah outside the great hall with the guide, who was settling a price with a passenger standing next to the car.

  ‘Sir, that—he’s calling for you.’

  The houseboy had hesitated after the word ‘that’. Perhaps he had been about to use the word ‘crazy’, but then had tried to finish the sentence some other way.

  I went into the drawing room. Bhola had finished eating and was sitting up, wiping off his hands on his coat and pants. I looked angrily at the houseboy.

  ‘Sir, I told him to come with me so I could show him where the washbasin was, but …’

  ‘Oh come on, yaar, forget all this hand-washing business,’ Bhola said. ‘Can’t you give me any of your shirts or trousers? This stuff is all ripped up.’

  He got up and started wandering around the room. I turned to the houseboy, ‘Go on, go inside and tell them to send out a shirt and trousers of mine to give to this gentleman.’

  The houseboy was turning away when I added, ‘Listen, don’t bring anything old or torn. Bring something that still has some wear in it.’

  When the houseboy was gone, I asked Bhola, ‘Tell me, my friend, do you remember that whore at the Grand Hotel at all?’

  Bhola hesitated. For a moment it seemed as though he had travelled somewhere far away. His face was completely devoid of emotion. Then, slowly, the light returned; suddenly his eyes shone.

  ‘You’re talking about Shehnaz?’

  ‘I’ve forgotten the name, but you must remember—one night you took me to the Grand Hotel.’

  Bhola’s eyes began to sparkle even more. He said, ‘Yes, yes, that evening when we met that squinty girl Rose in the hotel on Beadon Road first, and then we went to the Grand Hotel.’

  ‘Yes, yes!’

  ‘She is the bitch who ruined me.’

  ‘How?’

  Bhola sat down in front of me. He stretched his legs out on the rug and said:

  ‘You proba
bly remember how the first day we went she took care of me in just two minutes. That really got to me. She seemed so beautiful and innocent—I started having trouble thinking about anything else after that. I thought she’d given me so little time because I hadn’t paid very much for her. But the second time, when I gave her ten rupees for an hour, I lay next to her the entire time, but she didn’t let me touch her even once and, when the time came to do it, it was just two minutes again!

  ‘Then I thought maybe the reason for the distance between us was the scientific aid I was using to avoid getting the clap. It’s only the thinnest rubber membrane, but how can you really satisfy your craving for rice if you eat it with a spoon—even if you eat enough to fill you up! So I gave it up. But she wasn’t a girl from a good family, of course—she was an “evil spirit of Tibbi Gali” … it was all a part of her profession. I sank so low trying to get her to acknowledge my masculinity! I read every page in the book of Tibbi Gali … but I never returned—I stayed below.’

  There was such a wilful gleam in Bhola’s eyes; I stared at him, transfixed.

  ‘Are you thinking I must be crazy?’ he asked suddenly, with a careless laugh.

  ‘No … I … I …’ I did not know what to say.

  ‘Do I seem as though I’m in my right mind?’ he guffawed loudly. Then he said, ‘I’m crazy and there’s no cure for me. I’ve come here by way of Bareilly and Agra. They told me I was fine and let me go, but I know the sickness can never pass from my blood.’

  I had no idea what had got into him. He spoke so intelligently that I suddenly found it all quite difficult to believe.

  Just then the houseboy brought in the clothing.

  Bhola threw it carelessly over his arm and got up to go.

  I wrung my hands and said, more to myself than to him, ‘But, my friend, you had such ambitions, how did you do this to yourself? You were going to be an ambassador!’

  ‘But I am an ambassador! God has made me his representative and sent me here. I roam around all day and send God the news from here.’

  And he turned and went outside. He did not even deem it necessary to thank me or shake my hand as he went.

  The Bed

  Keshi abruptly looked up from his newly wedded wife’s eyes to the cushioned bedstead, in which was framed a round miniature portrait of his mother: she was a lovely woman with sharp features, large eyes and curling lashes. A smile hovered on her slightly parted lips, revealing a row of pearl-white teeth. Suddenly, the outline of his mother’s face was filled in with that of his new bride: how closely the two women resembled one another! Keshi’s mind grew hazy; a shiver ran through his body. He jerked his head back and tried to take his eyes off the picture. It was to no avail. Until a few years ago, he had lain on his mother’s bosom just as he was lying on his wife’s at this moment. The memories of those years came flooding back into his mind. Instead of kissing his bride’s almond eyes and hungry lips, he slid off her body and lay next to her as though utterly exhausted. He stared at the long strings of jasmine buds that hung like a canopy over his head. His hand fell on the jasmine petals that were spread like a thick carpet over the sheet. He wanted to leap from this floral bed and break out of the fragrant nuptial room in which he found himself imprisoned.

  Keshi did not jump off the bed. He lay where he was, still and silent. What would his bride think? It was that fear which kept him on the bed. He shook his head again, even more violently than before. But instead of ridding his mind of the picture of his mother, his head was besieged with myriad incidents that gathered round him like monsoon clouds …

  In this same room, on this same bed, his father and mother are lying side by side; he is lying on the cot in the verandah, staring at them intently. How small, how beautiful his mother looks, lying next to his father.

  His mother is doing her hair in front of the mirror. He stares at her from behind the door. She is as beautiful as the fairies that his ayah tells of in her stories. Seeing his reflection in the mirror, his mother asks him to come to her. He goes and buries his face in her lap. She ruffles his hair with one hand and continues to comb her own with the other.

  What’s wrong with Papa? A man comes to see him every day. He has a pair of snakes with one head that hang around his neck. He puts the tails of the serpents in his ears and touches Papa’s chest with their head. Then he sticks long needles into Papa’s arm. Papa does not cry, but Keshi begins to howl. His mother clasps him to her bosom and takes him to the next room.

  Papa is lying on the floor. He does not move. Everyone is crying. His mother is crying; she kisses him and continues to cry. Women help his mother break all her bangles and then wipe off the vermilion in the parting of her hair. They drag Keshi out of her lap. He shrieks and howls, but no one bothers to comfort him.

  It is the same bed. He is lying in his Papa’s place. His mother is beside him. She is dressed in a plain white sari. The morning sun is peeping into the room, but she sleeps on without a care in the world. He stares at her face. Her features are truly as delicate as a fairy’s. Her eyes are closed, her hair is scattered about her shoulders. She is like the princess who was woken out of a deep sleep by Prince Charming. He edges towards her and kisses her once on the cheek. His mother wakes up. She stretches out her arms and holds him to her bosom and kisses his forehead, his eyes, his lips.

  He lies with his head on his mother’s bosom. She is telling him the story of the prince who crossed the seven seas to marry the princess. She finishes the story and asks him, ‘Will you marry a princess like that too?’

  ‘I will marry you.’

  ‘Silly boy! Do sons ever marry their mothers?’

  She assures him that she will find him a bride just like herself.

  ‘And I’ll have this bed too,’ he says, looking at his mother’s beautiful portrait in the headrest.

  ‘Yes, of course! This bed will be my wedding present to you and your bride.’

  And she clasps him to her bosom.

  ‘What’s the matter? Aren’t you feeling well?’ Suddenly his bride turned over, felt his forehead and ran her fingers through his hair.

  ‘It’s nothing at all.’ Keshi shook his head to break the chain of memories and laughed; it was the kind of laugh that seemed like a long sigh.

  His mother had been true to her word. The bride whom she had chosen for him was an exact image of herself: slender and beautiful. Her eyes were large, her features sharp, her lips soft and her teeth glistened like a row of pearls. Even though a large bed had been sent with the dowry, his mother had fulfilled the promise she’d made years ago and laid out her own precious bed for the consummation of his marriage. And not just the bed, she’d even given up her own bedroom for the bride.

  The bride was bending over him, gazing deeply into his eyes to see if she could find out why his ardour had cooled so suddenly. But she had no way of getting closer to the truth. Bending over him slightly, she caressed his hair with hesitant love.

  For a while Keshi lay still; then he suddenly put his arms around his bride’s neck and drew her close to him. For a long time he stroked her hair, her cheeks and her lips, holding her head to his chest, until the cobwebs were swept out of his mind, and the warmth of his bride’s soft, fair body, lying against him, poured into his veins. He kissed her softly, laid her beside him and lay down with his face buried in her warm breasts. Again and again he felt he should lift up his head and make love to his wife, but he could not bring himself to face the picture. Without raising his head, he picked up the pillow with his left hand and tried to push it in front of the picture. Then he looked up. It seemed as though the picture had grown even bolder now that it was hidden behind the pillow, and the features of some other face began to replace those of his bride’s face. ‘No, no, no,’ he cried out to himself in frustration and again slid off her and lay flat on his back. Then a whirlwind kicked up in his mind. He jumped up and left the bridal chamber.

  The spring full moon was bashfully peering into the verandah thr
ough the venetian blinds. For an instant he stopped in the arch of the verandah and quietly stared at the moonbeams playing on the lawn. The touch of the cool breeze soothed his overwrought nerves. But instead of turning back, he went outside. Phlox and verbena bloomed in the flower beds to the right; the dahlias ahead of him swayed in the breeze, heavy with the weight of their blossoms. Beyond the neatly pruned hedge of henna that bordered the lawn, the marigolds bloomed in their bed, and the heaps of nasturtium blossoms planted round the base of the rambler rose were bathed in moonlight. Keshi wandered along between the rows of flowers without thinking, bending over and looking at their colours, touching them carelessly. These flowers that dazzled the eyes with their gaudy colours in daylight now seemed comforting and peaceful in the cold moonlight, like a balm for strained nerves. The bright yellows and pinks had turned pale white, and the deep crimsons, blues and the mauves were repainted in sombre hues. Keshi stopped by the cottage wall where the jasmine blossomed. In the dark shadow of the wall, the jasmine flowers gleamed like petalled pearls. Earlier, whenever he saw jasmine blooming on moonlit nights, it had always reminded him of a line from a song he had read or heard somewhere and he’d start humming:

  After many days, at last

  The jasmine has blossomed

  My courtyard is filled with fragrance,

  A heavenly fragrance

  But now that his courtyard actually was fragrant, he had completely forgotten that song. Keshi kept walking stiffly back and forth between the cottage and the gate. When he was walking back to the cottage for the second time, he noticed a light in the window of the corner room. His mother had obviously not gone to bed. Perhaps his aunt and other female relations were also awake, discussing him and his bride. What infinite pains his mother had taken in decorating his nuptial bed! The women had cleared the dining room of table and chairs and adorned it to receive the bride. They had carried out all the ceremonies for receiving the new bride, lifting her veil with infinite care. While he sat amongst his friends in the drawing room, they not only rearranged the wedding presents and the furniture which had been received as part of the dowry in his own, adjacent, room, but also decorated his mother’s bedroom for the wedding night. The innumerable guests and the hundreds of odds and ends to attend to had given his mother little time for sleep. He had seen her going constantly in and out of her bedroom with his aunt and a young woman who was a distant cousin of his mother’s, busy in her task of beautifying the bridal suite. There was no limit to his mother’s enthusiasm. It seemed that the sleepless nights, the running about and the endless bother about everything were, in fact, all centred on the embellishment of that one room. Several times he had gone into the room on some pretext or the other to see what his mother and aunt were up to, but each time they had hustled him out; even a casual glance at the bedroom was forbidden until that night.