Copyright © Lakshmi Raj Sharma
First American ebook edition published 2012 by Publerati, LLC.
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cover design by Tracey Tucker.
Publerati ISBN 10: 0985050446
ISBN 13: 978-0-9850504-4-3
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Acknowledgements
I am indebted to a number of people without whom these stories would never have been possible. It is impossible to mention each one here.
Bandana, my wife, is behind every little success that I have as an author. She virtually brought me up as a writer.
Dhruv, my etymologist son, played no little role in listening patiently and intelligently to a number of these stories as they progressed.
I am indebted to Mohammad Saleem for translating one of these stories into Urdu. I am also grateful to him for always being so willing to help.
The students of the Amaranatha Jha Hostel of the University of Allahabad deserve special thanks as it was for them that I wrote plays and discovered, in the process, that I could scribble a few lines of fiction.
But the one whom I cannot leave out is Caleb Mason of Publerati. It was he who accepted these stories for publication and gave me a kind of reassurance in myself. His comments have meant the world to me.
A Passage to Sri Lanka
I can hardly believe now that I had accompanied Vikram Parmar to Sri Lanka. Nor would you. I would normally never have taken the risk, but Vikram possessed the art of drawing you out. A trip with Vikram even up to the Civil Lines of our town, Allahabad, was not free from danger. And I had had the misfortune of going to another country with him. But then we were in a university hostel, and examinations were just over. We had to do something to revive ourselves.
I often wonder why Vikram had chosen me for the horrendous trip. Perhaps because he had already annoyed most of our batchmates by making them the butt of his very unusual practical jokes. I can never forget that tug-of-war scene when Vikram and Shantanu were pulling each other’s … and how Shantanu had yelled out for help in agony. The only reason that Vikram had given me for this rather odd behavior was that Shantanu had refused to let him drink up his tonic. Other batchmates were annoyed with Vikram for other reasons. A common one was that he often changed the settings of their alarm clocks and hence made it difficult for them to wake up at the desired time. Tarun Chaturvedi couldn’t tolerate Vikram because of the manner in which he pronounced Tarun’s surname, making “Chatur” sound like the Hindi equivalent of “bum.”
Vikram came to my room that morning with a sheepish face, half expecting that I would turn down his offer. He wore nothing above his shorts and I noticed that his chest didn’t have a single hair on it. It was this that had made me coin the simile, “As spick and span as Parmar’s chest.”
“Yes?” I enquired.
“I know,” he said, “that I’ve come to a person who’ll reject my proposal. And yet there’s an iota of hope in my heart. You’re the only one who just might agree.”
“Sit down,” I said, “and tell me what trick you’re up to this time.”
“Come on Anoop! You know you are the one person I can never trick or joke around with. For some reason, you’re the one I’ve always wanted to be good to. You’re not like the rest.”
“Why?” I inquired anxiously. “What’s so different about me?”
“When everyone else is annoyed with me, yours is the only room I can enter. You’re so loving!”
“All right, all right,” I said trying to stop him from coming too close. “Out with your business. Do you need some money?”
“You take some from me, Anoop. Have I ever asked you for money? You ought to know that I have enough in the bank to purchase a bungalow.”
I suddenly remembered that his parents had died, leaving him a great deal of wealth. I changed the topic lest he become maudlin about his misfortunes.
“Like some tea?” I asked.
“Anoop, you make the tea while I tell you about the most wonderful adventure we are heading for.”
I began to make the tea with my ears wide open. I was worried that I was moving towards some embarrassing situation or the other.
“Yaar, my limbs feel rusted after the exams. My soul craves for an adventure and this time you’ll be my partner-in-greatness.”
“I see Don Quixote needs a Sancho Panza,” I said, little realizing that my words would soon come true.
“Call me what you will, but don’t say no.”
I don’t know why I decided to take the risk without knowing what the entire thing was about. I never made that kind of mistake either before or after that. Was it because I had started imagining that I was growing into a mollycoddle and had to prove that no such thing was happening to me?
“I promise,” I said.
“Then we’re off to Ceylon. I’ll be an Indian prince from Ranipur State and you’ll be my private secretary. We’ll fly to Colombo.”
It took me some time to finally accept his proposal. My first reaction was to go back on my word. But then he used all his skills of persuasion. (If you saw him persuading me you’d think there was something gay about our relationship.) Besides, he even had a logical point to convince me with.
“Anoop, you’re a stage actor but you actually don’t have any faith in drama. When you have to act out a part in real life you’re gone. This is where I never fail and you theatre people always do. Isn’t acting on stage a pointless sham?”
“Okay, suppose we go to Sri Lanka, as Prince and Secretary, what do we gain?”
“There’s a thrill in such an impersonation. We read so much crime fiction and see films where all this happens. Don’t you admire the hero for his daring? I assure you the world would love you for it.”
Whether the world loved me for it or not, I had decided that I’d plunge into this unique experience. I had always been correct to the point of a fault, and perhaps this was the reason why I had never been in the limelight.
“Done,” I said shaking hands with the Prince who seemed amazed at my decision. He got up and hugged me tightly. We sat on my bed and decided the date and other details.
My other batchmates warned me of the disaster I was heading for. But I had sealed myself off from all good advice. I began to believe that it was only their jealousy (due to my free trip) that made them talk thus.
In accordance with Vikram’s plans I wrote to my parents that I’d be reaching home ten days later, for vacation, as I was accompanying a friend to his farm. Without waiting for the reply, we flew off to Sri Lanka.
Whatever Vikram may have been, he was large-hearted. He took me to the five-star Viceroy Hotel. I had never known such luxury. We had a suite of rooms to ourselves. I was beginning to fear that Vikram was planning to make this a kind of honeymoon trip with me. He was capable of anything. But fortunately that never occurred to him. He had more ambitious schemes in mind. The manager and staff of the hotel were taking pains to keep His Royal Highness, and the Secretary, comfortable. Vikram never forgot to point out to them, at every step, that their hotel was not good enough. From his complaints you’d think he was living in a cowshed. The manager was at his wit’s end trying to make amends for whatever was unsatisfactory. Due to Vikram’s fastidious behavior, we got a grand treatment at the Viceroy. But for two young men of our age was that luxury sufficient in itself? Certainly not. It only made us, particularly Vikram, conscious that our lives needed romance.
Fortune seemed to smile on Vikram when during dinner, in the dazzling Victoria Dining Hall, the manager made the following announcement:
“Ladies and gentlemen. We have amidst us, this evening, a very distinguished personality. I feel honored in introducing to you a prince from India, His Royal Highness, Vikram Parmar of Ranipur State.” At that moment the orchestra resounded with, “He’s a jolly good fellow,” and the other guests gave Vikram a big hand.
Winking at me, Vikram gave a wicked smile, which I only half returned. I feared that we were getting a little more attention than was ideal for us. Just then, people got up to dance and Vikram looked around for a partner. I couldn’t show any such desire because my only business was to attend to His Royal Highness. Then, Vikram and I noticed that a stunningly beautiful girl was looking towards us in a meaningful way. Vikram smiled at her and she immediately returned the smile. Vikram took the second step forward. He lifted his hand towards his forehead as a raja would to salute a superior. The girl made an inviting gesture. Vikram got up smartly and, forgetting my existence, sailed across towards her table. I could see that the next step would be the beginning of a dance, which it was. I didn’t know that Vikram could dance so well. They seemed to be the only ones on the floor. Vikram forgot everyone else apart from his Sri Lankan beauty. I tried to enjoy the scene for some time, but being a mere spectator could be tiring. Real drama proved to be so much like stage drama. It was aimed only to promote the hero. The others were there just to help the situation to boil to a crisis.
I began to think of India, our hostel, and my parents. I wondered how my parents would have reacted if they got to know of my new role. But, then, my earlier uneventful existence had needed this change. Till when could I lag behind? Perhaps in our next adventure I’d be the prince and he my secretary. No, I corrected myself, Vikram was not the type who’d play second fiddle. So long as I was with him, I had to dance to his tunes. It was wiser to return to my previous detached relationship with him. Such a friend was bound to put you to some loss or the other in ultimate terms, even if the terms of loss were not financial.
When I came out of my reverie, I found that Vikram was dancing with the girl pressed hard to himself. She seemed to have already become his princess. Was she so gullible, I wondered. Before long a tall man, who was the girl’s father, entered with three or four others. The girl introduced Vikram to him and he seemed pleased with his daughter’s prize catch. There was much hand-shaking and then the girl and the men went out, Vikram following close behind. Vikram returned to me soon after and told me that this girl, Alice, was the daughter of a political leader, named Andrew Goonewardene. Goonewardene was an M.P. with a promising future in the politics of Sri Lanka.
“You mustn’t let this affair go any further,” I said to Vikram.
“This is only the beginning. Now we’ll see Sri Lanka like VIPs,” he said, not fearing the consequences.
True enough, the next week passed off in great luxury and excitement. I began to believe that my erstwhile near-ascetic way of life had been quite unavailing. I began to see sense in what Epicurus had preached.
Andrew Goonewardene was truly delighted. Vikram seemed a handsome and befitting match for Alice. He encouraged his daughter to go around with us and introduced Vikram to several distinguished people. He even gave out that his daughter was getting engaged to Vikram, the prince from India. Due to increasing political assassinations and vendetta, it would be safer for members of his family to go out of his country and live safely. And Alice had been a favorite child. This prince was God sent.
All good things must come to an end. Our Sri Lankan pleasures could be no exception. Goonewardene’s political wisdom came to his aid. He contacted someone in India to find out about Vikram and Ranipur State. Goonewardene was informed that there was neither such a state nor such a prince. The prince had turned out to be a picaro. Goonewardene was politically too astute to allow himself to be made an ass. Before we realized what had happened, we found ourselves in jail. It was a real comedown from the five-star hospitality we had received thus far. I felt like pulling out Vikram’s hair. But what was the use. I had decided to accompany Vikram myself; I too was guilty of succumbing to temptation. What would my parents think when they got to know what their son had been up to, or where he was currently residing? It was all so distressing.
The guards outside our cell walked up and down all the time. One of them had a strange habit. He would call Vikram towards himself and slap him hard saying, “Prince from India? Ha! Come I’ll give you a royal treatment.”
Vikram was not one to swallow all this for too long. He had an idea and it did not take him long to act upon it. He gave the guard a letter for Goonewardene, saying that if Goonewardene didn’t pay heed to the letter he’d be the loser.
Next morning the shrewd Goonewardene arrived at the prison to meet Vikram.
“Yes, now what is it that you would tell me?” he asked never looking at Vikram’s eyes. Vikram remained phlegmatic and spoke with no fear or hesitation.
“Listen to me carefully. You have already punished us for our mischief. You may be able to punish us a little more by keeping us here for a few more months, or years at best. But you can do nothing beyond that.”
“Go on,” said Goonewardene, “Come to the point.”
“Yes I’m coming to the point. Your daughter, Alice Goonewardene, and I have been exceedingly close to each other during these last seven or eight days. She has even spent two nights in my bed. You’ve made the mistake of making our relationship public. If I want to tarnish your image and destroy your political career, all I’ve got to do is to give out to the press that Goonewardene, the leader of the downtrodden, the poor and the helpless, wants a prince as a son-in-law. He refuses to wed his daughter to a simple graduate who does not own a princedom, even after the daughter has been using the poor fellow for her pleasures. But in case you decide to take back your case and help us return to India, I’ll not think of your daughter again, leave alone talking about whatever she and I did together (under your supervision).”
Goonewardene saw reason in what Vikram said. He decided to take back the case provided we returned to India by the first flight. We did that. It was wiser to leave Alice and her wonder land to Goonewardene and his politics.
Marriages are Made in India
Lady Anne Ridley was getting strange thoughts about India and her prospective Indian daughter-in-law as she sat in a British Airways plane at Heathrow. A number of Indians, mostly newly rich Punjabis, had boarded the aircraft. Would Harmeet Ahuja also be like one of these women, who spoke loud enough to create a commotion and peered into each other’s bags? Why couldn’t Henry choose an English bride? Or if he had to be so unconventional, surely he could have found a French or an American girl. What would the Richardsons say when Harmeet stepped into their Addington Park mansion? Or worse still, Lady Crowfoot’s scornful looks would be so difficult to avoid. Anne wondered if she hadn’t clung to her family’s nobility for too long. She could, perhaps, claim to be more progressive than her neighbors. Why must we English hanker after every tradition without any regard for the moss that has grown round it? How was she to meet Harmeet’s parents? Would she be able to convince them that she was actually happy with the forthcoming alliance? Surely she wasn’t making a mistake in visiting India before the marriage? Would her beloved Charles have approved of her trip, were he alive? Even if he didn’t, wasn’t it necessary to warn Harmeet of Henry’s temperamental nature? The idiot that her darling son was! Lady Ridley remained glued to these thoughts as they succeeded each other in question after question.
The flight took off even as Lady Ridley’s co-passengers gave her the creeps. It was best not to think too much about them, she decided. She had to be careful lest she displeased the Indian community even before she opened out before it. Anne had often feared, pointlessly, that she was advancing towards catatonia.
“Are you going up to Delhi?” she asked the lady who sat next to her.
“Meerut. Near Dilli.”
“How long were you in Britain?”
Before the lady could reply, her husband seized the conversation, interfering doggedly with her attempt to talk.
“One month,” he said, throwing his voice across without it being broken by the barrier of his bulky wife. “Our son works in London. He is doing very good business. When others have closed their shops every evening, his store is still open. English people like his shop very much.”
“Oh, that’s awfully nice, isn’t it?”
“We have four houses in Meerut. We are well known there. Ask anyone about Seth Jungamal, and he will tell you that I am…” An announcement about breakfast interrupted the man, dashing to the ground his eagerness to complete his and his family’s history. His attention was diverted towards his meal. Breakfast delivered, he began to concentrate on it. Anne noticed that Jungamal was having problems with an English meal.
“Isn’t it so difficult to eat in the plane?” she asked without meaning a word of it.
“No-o-o-o” was all Jungamal replied, as he finally decided the order in which he would eat. He would begin with bacon and eggs, proceed to marmalade on toast, then have baked beans and mushrooms followed by cheese and fruit juice.
Lady Ridley hoped that her daughter-in-law wouldn’t be like this fathead. Surely Henry saw something in her when he decided to marry her during his visit to India with Uncle Terry.
It was all her brother’s fault. If Terry hadn’t fallen in love with India and stayed on, Henry would never have got the opportunity of seeing Harmeet. Terry had encouraged Henry in the matter. After all he had to justify his own choice of an Indian wife. How they had advised Terry against marrying Kiran. Charles, particularly, was upset about the things that would be said among the lords and barons of Croydon. The whole of Addington Park would be overflowing with gossip. Wouldn’t the word spread through Surrey itself, Charles had feared. Why, even London would not remain entirely indifferent to the forthcoming event. The Crosses and the Norberrys, who came every Sunday, would carry back tales to London. Who could have imagined that one day Anne Ridley herself would be visiting India to confront her own daughter-in-law? Kiran had probably seen the advantage in getting her niece married to Henry. How could poor old Henry ever have managed it all by himself?
Lady Ridley had never liked Kiran and would probably be unable to love Harmeet at first sight, unless Harmeet’s father belonged to a radically different background and had brought up Harmeet in a different way. She had seen some good Indian families in Croydon; and Terry had always maintained that the best Indians were as good as the best anywhere. She had to keep her fingers crossed that Harmeet had taken after her (probably well-bred) father. She had taken pains to avoid meeting Kiran in Delhi, where she would be received by Harmeet’s parents (one of whom was still Kiran’s sister).
Noticing that Mrs. Jungamal had passed on most of her breakfast to her husband, Anne asked whether she disliked English food. The lady almost gave out that she detested it but then noticing that her husband was wiping clean a second round, said that it was “very tasty.”
Jungamal soon became the center of attention when he allowed four or five packets from the overhead bin above his seat to follow each other onto his head. He and his wife kept putting them back but they refused to obey, as if they had found a magnetic pull in his head. The couple panicked even more because these packets contained china crockery, which was expensive.
An air hostess, noticing Lady Ridley’s discomfiture, informed her that there was a vacant seat at the back, and that she could transfer herself there if she liked. Anne wondered if she might offend the Jungamals by doing so immediately. She waited for some time. When Mrs. Jungamal went to the toilet, leaving her husband snoring with loudspeakers on his nose, she quickly went to the vacant seat.
Anne had better luck this time. She found herself sitting next to a rather pleasant young Indian. He smiled at her as she settled into her new surroundings. Her reciprocation to his smile was so warm that he could not help beginning a dialogue with her.
“Your first visit to India?”
“No I’ve been to India several times. Your country is so beautiful and so varied. I can visit India again and again,” she said though she wasn’t exactly in love with India during this visit.
“What makes you visit India so often?” he asked, trying to even her score of questions.
“My brother lives in India and both of us enjoy exploring the subcontinent. We like trekking in the hills.” Her earlier memories of the Himalayas transported her away briefly, from the unpleasantness of the present visit. He merely nodded in approbation.
“Are you settled in Britain?” she asked thinking of his near-British accent.
“I’ve been living there for the past five years.”
“Where in Britain?”
“I’m at Oxford,” he said with a certain polish, quickly adding, “I teach International Relations.”
Lady Ridley suddenly grew self-conscious. She may have been the widow of Sir Charles but she sometimes felt that she had not kept up with the advancement of knowledge. The presence of an intellectual could easily disturb her. She began to wonder whether she would’ve been happier in Jungamal’s company. With the likes of Jungamal there was a certain lightness in the air. This man’s company, however, had its own advantage. In fact this chance meeting seemed to have been rather welcome in a way. It soon helped Anne Ridley to feel better about the forthcoming marriage.
“Are you going to meet your family, Mr..…” she asked trying to find out his name.
“Parimal Joshi’s my name. Yes I intend to stay with my parents.”
“I’m Anne Ridley,” she said as they shook hands with broad, prolonged, though insipid smiles. Anne felt that an Indian, like Joshi, could readily adapt to his environment. This man had acquired a very British manner of speech, of shaking hands, of shrugging shoulders, and even smiling. That was a happy pointer when she thought in terms of her future daughter-in-law. Maybe Harmeet would also acquire British ways after getting the right exposure. Anne had heard that Indian women made good and lasting wives. She might not leave poor old Henry in a lurch at least before the gloss of her wedding dress had faded. Then she thought of Kiran. Yes, Kiran had