‘Haresh, have you made up your mind?’ said Simran’s sister in Punjabi. She was three years older than Simran, and her own marriage had been an arranged one — to a Sikh officer in the army.
‘What choice do I have?’ replied Haresh. ‘I have to think of someone else sooner or later. Time is passing. I am twenty-eight. I’m thinking of her good too — she will refuse everyone whom your parents suggest until she knows that I’m married.’
Haresh’s eyes grew moist. Simran’s sister patted him on the shoulder.
‘When did you make up your mind that this girl might suit you?’
‘At Kanpur Station. She was drinking that chocolate drink — you know, Pheasant’s.’ Haresh, noticing the look on Simran’s sister’s face, realized she wished to be spared the exact details.
‘Have you made any proposal?’
‘No. We have agreed to write to each other. Her mother arranged the meeting. They are in Lucknow at the moment, but they didn’t seem keen to see me here.’
‘Have you written to your father?’
‘I’ll write to him tonight, when I get back to Kanpur.’ Haresh had chosen a train that would enable him to meet Mrs Rupa Mehra and her daughter as if by chance at Lucknow Station.
‘Don’t write to Simran just yet.’
Haresh said in a hurt voice: ‘But why? I’ll have to say something sooner or later.’
‘If nothing comes out of this you will have hurt her for nothing.’
‘She’ll wonder if she doesn’t hear from me.’
‘Write as you always write.’
‘How can I do that?’ Haresh baulked at the deception.
‘Don’t say anything that isn’t true. Just don’t touch on this.’
Haresh thought for a while. ‘All right,’ he said at last. But he felt that Simran knew him too well not to sense from his letters that something had begun to happen in his life, not just in hers, that could draw the two of them apart.
9.20
The conversation turned after a while to Simran’s sister herself. Her young son Monty (only three years old) wanted to join the navy and her husband (who was crazy about the boy) was taking this decision extraordinarily badly. He treated it as a vote of no confidence in himself, and was, it seemed to her, sulking as a result. She herself attributed Monty’s preference to the fact that he enjoyed playing with boats in his tub, and had not yet arrived at the model-soldier stage.
Monty, incidentally, had difficulty pronouncing certain words, and just the other day had said (talking in English instead of Punjabi) while splashing around in his favourite element after one brief pre-monsoon shower, that he wanted to go to ‘the miggle of the puggle’. This Simran’s sister took as being symptomatic of his intrinsic sweetness. She hoped that in years to come he would order his men ‘into the heart of backle’. Monty sat through all this with a look of offended dignity. From time to time he tugged at his mother’s fingers to get her to stop prattling.
Since he wasn’t feeling hungry, Haresh decided to forgo lunch and went to see the twelve o’clock show of a film instead. Hamlet was playing at the local cinema hall. He enjoyed it, but Hamlet’s indecisiveness irritated him.
He then had a good haircut for a rupee. Finally, he had a paan and went off to the station in order to catch the train back to Kanpur — and, he hoped, to meet Lata and her mother, both of whom he had become quite fond of. That he was successful in this pleased him greatly; that they did not wave to him as the train moved out did not distress him unduly. The coincidence connecting Brahmpur Station and Lucknow Station he took as a propitious sign.
On the two-hour train journey back to Kanpur, Haresh took out a blue writing pad from his portfolio (‘H.C. Khanna’ was embossed on the top of each page) and a cheap white scribbling pad as well. He looked from one to the other, then to a woman sitting opposite him, then out of the window. It was getting dark. Soon the train lights came on. Finally he decided that it would not do to write a serious letter in a jolting train. He put away the writing pad.
At the top of his scribbling pad, he wrote: ‘To Do’. Then he crossed it out and wrote: ‘Points to remember’. Then he crossed that out and wrote: ‘Action Points’. It occurred to him that he was behaving as stupidly as Hamlet.
After he had listed his correspondence and various work-related items, his thoughts moved to more general matters, and he made a third list, under the heading, ‘My Life’:
1. Must catch up with news and world affairs.
Haresh felt he had not come off well on this account during his meetings with the Mehras. But his work kept him so busy that sometimes he hardly had time even to glance at the papers.
2. Exercise: at least 15 minutes each morning. How to find the time?
3. Make 1951 the deciding year of my life.
4. Pay off debts to Umesh Uncle in full.
5. Learn to control temper. Must learn to suffer fools, gladly or not.
6. Get brogue scheme with Kedarnath Tandon in Brahmpur working properly.
This he later crossed out and transferred to the work-related list.
7. Moustache?
This he crossed out, and then rewrote together with the question mark.
8. Learn from good people, like Babaram.
9. Finish reading major novels of T.H.
10. Try to keep my diary regularly as before.
11. Make notes of my five best and five worst qualities. Conserve latter and eradicate former.
Haresh read over this last sentence, looked surprised, and corrected it.
9.21
It was late when he got back to Elm Villa. Mrs Mason, however, who sometimes complained when Haresh came late for meals (on the grounds that it would upset the staff), was very welcoming.
‘Oh, you look so tired. My daughter has been telling me how busy you have been. And you didn’t leave word that you would be gone for more than a day. We prepared lunch for you. And dinner. And lunch again today. But no matter. You’re here, back at last, and that’s the main thing. It’s mutton. A good, hearty roast.’
Haresh was glad to hear it. Mrs Mason was bursting with curiosity, but refrained from asking questions while he ate his dinner. He had eaten nothing since morning.
After dinner Mrs Mason turned to Haresh to speak.
‘How is Sophie?’ interposed Haresh deftly. Sophie was the Masons’ beloved Persian cat, an unfailing subject of animated discourse.
After five minutes of the Sophie saga, Haresh yawned and said, ‘Well, goodnight, Mrs Mason. It was very kind of you to keep my dinner warm for me. I think I’ll turn in.’
And before Mrs Mason could veer the conversation around to Simran or the two visitors, Haresh had gone to his room.
He was very tired, but he kept awake long enough to write three letters. The rest he was forced to leave unwritten till the next day.
He was about to write to Lata when, sensing Simran’s eyes on him, he turned to a shorter and easier letter — a postcard in fact.
It was to Kedarnath Tandon’s son Bhaskar.
Dear Bhaskar,
I hope all is well with you. The words you want, according to a Chinese colleague of mine, are wan (to rhyme with ‘kaan’) and ee (to rhyme with ‘knee’). That will give you, in order of powers of ten: one, ten, hundred, thousand, wan, lakh, million, crore, ee, billion. A special word for ten to its own power you will have to invent for yourself. I suggest bhask.