1977 (35 page)

you’d kindly book a room —”

“I have already told Colonel Smalley I can’t be bothered with that. You must speak to

Management tomorrow. I have other things to deal with. All I want to know is about the

shears. Have you dealt with the question of the shears?”

Mrs Bhoolabhoy stood over her, like something formidable created by a new disturbance in

the Himalayas where the gods and goddesses of Hindu mythology were supposed to have

originated.

“Shears?”

“Shears. Shears. Shears!” Mrs Bhoolabhoy raised her arms and made motions.
Snick-snick
.

“Shears!” she shouted. “Kindly I give permission for your
mali
to use mower, shears,

watercan. But this morning when I am telling my
mali
to cut the verges he says there are no

shears because your
mali
has taken them away somewhere. I will not have my property taken

off the premises.”

“I know nothing about your shears, Mrs Bhoolabhoy,” she said, though guessing where

they were: with Joseph up at the church.

“You know nothing about shears. Colonel Smalley knows nothing about shears. Colonel

Smalley is even telling me he knows nothing about a
mali
because he says you do not have a

mali
only I have
malis
. Dear God! Am I crazy or is everybody else crazy? Who has been using

my mower and shears and watercan for weeks if not your
mali
?”

“I suggest we discuss this elsewhere and at some other time, Mrs Bhoolabhoy. I am in the

middle of my lunch.”

“I am not discussing it. I have not time to discuss trivial matters. I am simply saying that

the shears must be brought back. I have more important things to do than argue about

shears.”

She waddled away, leaving behind her a trail of sandalwood perfume which, to Lucy, was

like the pungent smell of her own smouldering outraged dignity. When Mrs Bhoolabhoy had

banged her door shut Lucy poured a glass of water and then continued very slowly to eat her

meal. She did not look at the two business men. An Englishman, of course, would have

intervened. Midway through Mrs Bhoolabhoy’s tirade he would have risen quietly, come

across and said, “Mrs Smalley? My name’s Smith. We me at HE’s garden party last year. Can

I be of any assistance?” And she would have indicated just by a look how grateful she was to

be reassured of the help and protection of a gentleman whose intervention would have

deflated Mrs Bhoolabhoy, reminded her of her place and sent her silent away to repent, to

repent.

But that was at another season and in a distant country. She found it difficult to raise the

glass of water without betraying an unsteadiness of hand which she felt the two Indian

business men were watching out for, as if for further evidence that times for them had

changed for the better and that their own old humiliations were being adequately paid for by

new.

One of them called the bearer, causing her to start. Prabhu came in, gave them a bill which

was checked through item by item before being paid in small bills peeled off a thick wad of

larger ones. When they had gone she asked for her own bill to sign and said she’d have her

coffee in the lounge. She sat for a long time on one of the wicker chairs, drinking the coffee,

trying to work out the best way of explaining operation
mali
to Tusker who had obviously

found out about it by having a similar row with Mrs Bhoolabhoy. Poor Tusker. Poor silly

Tusker. He hadn’t been cross about Mr Turner. He had come right away to book him a

room. And what had just happened to her had happened to him, only more so, because

there had been that ridiculous argument about whose
mali
was whose. Poor Tusker. Yes,

poor silly Tusker. Maddening, aggravating Tusker. Unpredictable Tusker. She bent her head,

supporting it with a hand across her eyes, elbow supported by the chair and arm, and smiled,

because she couldn’t help seeing the funny side of it.

IT WAS FOUR O’CLOCK when she got back to The Lodge. Ibrahim was waiting,

squatting on his hunkers below the verandah.

“Colonel Sahib gone out with Bloxsaw,” he announced.

The tea tray was prepared. In the kitchen there was evidence that for lunch Tusker had

boiled himself an egg. The gin bottle was still at the level she had left it. There were still

plenty of eggs in the fridge. There were some mixed herbs in the cupboard. There were two

tins of tomato soup, bread, milk. On second sniff the butter didn’t seem too bad.

“I shan’t need you again this evening, Ibrahim. I’ll make the tea when Burra Sahib comes

home and we’ll probably have an omelette this evening. Some soup first. Yes, that will be

nice. How are we for beer?” They checked. “Good. Tonight I can cope. Tomorrow we shall

need all our energy. Somehow or other we have to conjure up dinner for four. But I think

that may be fun, don’t you? I shall have to be up early. Really quite early because I’m going

to have my hair done and while I’m having my hair done you will have to go to the bazaar

and buy things for salad, and get hold of a chicken which somehow we must roast and then

have cold. Oh, and some mayonnaise from Jalal-ud-Din’s. And they have anchovies, don’t

they? We could make a small hors d’oeuvre. Hard-boiled eggs, sliced, anchovies. And

tomatoes. Perhaps some ladies fingers cooked, but cold and in french dressing. Mustard, do

we have mustard? If we don’t Jalal-ud-Din’s will. Oh, and tinned corn. Sahib likes tinned

corn. Where are the little hors d’oeuvres plates, Ibrahim?”

He opened a cupboard and showed her.

“They’ll have to be washed. Dear me, how busy we’re going to be.”

“Memsahib?”

“What is it, Ibrahim? Salt, how are we for salt?”

“Chicken very difficult.”

“What nonsense. There are always hundreds of chickens.”

“First to be killed though. Then plucked.”

“Yes, of course. Can’t you get that done by the man you buy it from?”

“Perhaps, Memsahib. But then cooked. This stove not good for cooking. From this stove

only burnt offering.”

“Does it have to be?” She absent-mindedly reached for a glass and poured another small

gin. He offered her the lime bottle. She observed his parched lips. She got down another

glass, poured a small measure in and give it to him. He took it.

“Memsahib, it is forbidden.”

The glass was very steady in his hand. Her own, tipping in lime was not.

“God will forgive us, Ibrahim. Cheers.”

“Salaam.”

He had good eyes.

“I am beholden to you, Ibrahim, for looking after us.”

The eyes melted.

“And you see,” she went on, bustling about the kitchen, bending, stooping, looking into

this and that, opening drawers, “Burra Sahib has for the moment and for quite inexplicable

reasons taken against having anything to do with the hotel kitchen and the dining-room. So

we’re going to have to try to cope for a while, because I’ve rather taken against them too. We

could have savoury. Cheese on toast.”

“Anchovies on toast better, Memsahib. Anchovies for savoury, not with hors d’oeuvres.

Eggs and anchovies not good mixture. Much wind is resulting.”

“Yes, that is good advice. But what of the chicken?”

She straightened up from a stooping position, felt giddy, reached for support.

Ibrahim was there. He assisted her to the stool. “Memsahib not to worry about the chicken.

Ibrahim will make pukka arrangements.”

“Thank you, Ibrahim. I really am sorry to put upon you. But Burra Sahib and I have these

sudden social commitments. And, silly me, I seem to have overdone things before we’ve

even started. I’ll be perfectly all right in a moment.”

She accepted the glass of water he gave her and let him assist her to the bedroom. “I’ll have

a little nap, then I’ll be right as rain. Well I’ll have to be. There’s the dinner tomorrow

evening that you’re going to help us with, and a day or two later a visitor, an English visitor.

Tomorrow morning I’ll give you a list of things to buy. Meanwhile could you do something

about the shears?
Mali
must have taken them to the churchyard and Mrs Bhoolabhoy is very

cross with me.”

She was aware of him helping her to sit on the edge of the bed and take off her shoes; then,

as she lay down, of the sound of the curtains being drawn.

It was dark when she woke. For a moment she thought it must be the middle of the night,

but light was coming into the bedroom from the living-room and Tusker’s bed was empty.

Someone had covered her with a light blanket and she was fully clothed. She reached for her

bedside clock. It wasn’t quite eight o’clock. She had slept for nearly four hours. She put her

shoes on and tottered into the bathroom, splashed her face, combed her disordered hair and

dabbed cologne on her temples.

“Tusker?” she called lightly as she went into the living-room.

Ibrahim came in from the verandah. “Sahib not in.”

“Not in? Whatever can have happened to him?”

“No, no Memsahib, nothing happening. Sahib came back for tea, now gone out again. He

has left a note.” He went to the escritoire and brought her an envelope marked
Luce
. “I make

tea?”

“Thank you, yes, I could do with a cup of tea.”

She fetched her spectacles and sat at the escritoire, switched on the lamp, turned the

envelope over to open it and found something written on the back :

“Thought I’d dine at the Club tonight so booked a table when out for my walk. Couldn’t

wake you. So gone on. Table’s for 8 pm but I’ll hang on until 8.30ish in case you want to join

me. Otherwise back about eleven. The enclosed is the clear statement you asked for.” It was

signed T, and marked 7.30 pm. Perhaps it was Tusker, not Ibrahim, who had covered her

with the blanket.

She got her ivory paper-knife and slit the envelope. In it were two sheets of paper, fairly

densely written. When she had finished reading them she began to read them again.

“Tea, Memsahib.” Ibrahim placed the tray on the Kashmiri carved wood table. “Then I

fetch tonga?”

“Tonga?”

“Tonga to take Memsahib to the Club?”

“No, Ibrahim. I’m not feeling up to dining out.”

“I make supper?”

“No, I had such a heavy lunch. And I have an early start tomorrow. I shan’t eat again

today. May I have my morning tea at seven instead of seven-thirty? Just mine. Sahib’s at his

usual time. I must be off by eight-fifteen.”

“Yes, Memsahib. Memsahib?”

“What, Ibrahim?”

“Shears are returned to Bhoolabhoy
mali
.”

“Oh, yes. I’d forgotten. Thank you.”

“Burra Sahib now knows about
mali
?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps. Why do you ask?”

“Prabhu says there was much trouble today with Bhoolabhoy memsahib over use of tools.

That she is shouting first at Burra Sahib and then at you, Memsahib, and telling Burra Sahib

Joseph is not her
mali
but Sahib’s and Memsahib’s.”

“Well. Perhaps she did. But she would be wrong, wouldn’t she, Ibrahim? Joseph is
your

mali
.”

“I give him the push?”

“The push? Why?”

He put his hands behind his back. “I cannot afford to pay Joseph unless Memsahib pays

me to pay him, especially as rise not yet forthcoming. If Burra Sahib now knows truth and

gives
hukm
that no more money is to be spent on garden and Memsahib not to pay a single

paise for what Mrs Bhoolabhoy should be paying for, then it will be kinder to Joseph for me

to give him what is owing to date and the push, and leave garden to go jungly.”

“I think, Ibrahim, that whatever he says Sahib would not like to see the garden go jungly

again. In any case I do not wish it to go jungly. I have no intention whatsoever of letting it

go jungly. It is as much my garden as it is Colonel Sahib’s or Mrs Bhoolabhoy’s. And I don’t

want to discuss the garden tonight. Perhaps you’d just leave out the makings of Sahib’s

cocoa in case he wants it. I shan’t have any myself tonight.”

When Ibrahim had gone for the night she drank her tea, now lukewarm. To occupy herself

she began to write out Ibrahim’s shopping list. When she had done that she put a batch of

records on the old radiogram and waltzed, fox-trotted, quickstepped round the room with an

invisible partner until the batch ran out. Then she made herself a cup of coffee, put a coat

on and sat out on the dark verandah, wanning her chilled hands round it.

“Bloxsaw? Bloxsaw?” she called sofdy. No answer. Ibrahim had put him in the garage for

the night. Come back, little Sheba, she murmured.

The lights from the Shiraz made the middle of The Lodge’s garden darker because of the

contrast between the part where the light reached and the part where it didn’t. Down to the

left Smith’s was dimly lit. But there were more night-illuminations in Pankot than there had

been in the old days, and this made the stars look farther away. The outline of the hills was