They all bewailed the general decline of true piety.
Old Mrs Tandon said: ‘Nowadays, everyone goes in for big functions in the temples — chanting and bhajans and recitations and discourses and puja — but they don’t have proper ceremonies in the home.’
‘True,’ said the other two.
Old Mrs Tandon continued: ‘At least in our neighbourhood we will have our own Ramlila in six months’ time. Bhaskar is too young to be one of the main characters, but he can certainly be a monkey-warrior.’
‘Lata used to be very fond of monkeys,’ reflected Mrs Rupa Mehra vaguely.
Old Mrs Tandon and Mrs Mahesh Kapoor exchanged glances.
Mrs Rupa Mehra snapped out of her vagueness and looked at the others. ‘Why — is something the matter?’ she asked.
‘Before you came we were just talking — you know, just like that,’ said old Mrs Tandon soothingly.
‘Is it about Lata?’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra, reading her tone as accurately as she had read her glance.
The two ladies looked at each other and nodded seriously.
‘Tell me, tell me quick,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra, thoroughly alarmed.
‘You see, it is like this,’ said Mrs Mahesh Kapoor gently, ‘please look after your daughter, because someone saw her walking with a boy on the bank of the Ganga near the dhobi-ghat yesterday morning.’
‘What boy?’
‘That I don’t know. But they were walking hand in hand.’
‘Who saw them?’
‘What should I hide from you?’ said Mrs Mahesh Kapoor sympathetically. ‘It was Avtar Bhai’s brother-in-law. He recognized Lata but he didn’t recognize the boy. I told him it must have been one of your sons, but I know from Savita that they are in Calcutta.’
Mrs Rupa Mehra’s nose started to redden with unhappiness and shame. Two tears rolled down her cheeks, and she reached into her capacious handbag for an embroidered handkerchief.
‘Yesterday morning?’ she said in a trembling voice.
She tried to remember where Lata had said she’d gone. This was what happened when you trusted your children, when you let them roam around, taking walks everywhere. Nowhere was safe.
‘That’s what he said,’ said Mrs Mahesh Kapoor gently. ‘Have some tea. Don’t get too alarmed. All these girls see these modern love films and it has an effect on them, but Lata is a good girl. Only talk to her.’
But Mrs Rupa Mehra was very alarmed, gulped down her tea, even sweetening it with sugar by mistake, and went home as soon as she politely could.
3.18
Mrs Rupa Mehra came breathlessly through the door.
She had been crying in the tonga. The tonga-wallah, concerned that such a decently dressed lady should be weeping so openly, had tried to keep up a monologue in order to pretend that he hadn’t noticed, but she had now gone through not only her embroidered handkerchief but her reserve handkerchief as well.
‘Oh my daughter!’ she said, ‘oh, my daughter.’
Savita said, ‘Yes, Ma?’ She was shocked to see her mother’s tear-streaked face.
‘Not you,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra. ‘Where is that shameless Lata?’
Savita sensed that their mother had discovered something. But what? And how much? She moved instinctively towards her to calm her down.
‘Ma, sit down, calm down, have some tea,’ said Savita, guiding Mrs Rupa Mehra, who seemed quite distracted, to her favourite armchair.
‘Tea! Tea! More and more tea!’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra in resistant misery.
Savita went and told Mateen to get some tea for the two of them.
‘Where is she? What will become of us all? Who will marry her now?’
‘Ma, don’t over-dramatize things,’ said Savita soothingly. ‘It will blow over.’
Mrs Rupa Mehra sat up abruptly. ‘So you knew! You knew! And you didn’t tell me. And I had to learn this from strangers.’ This new betrayal engendered a new bout of sobbing. Savita squeezed her mother’s shoulders, and offered her another handkerchief. After a few minutes of this, Savita said:
‘Don’t cry, Ma, don’t cry. What did you hear?’
‘Oh, my poor Lata — is he from a good family? I had a sense something was going on. Oh God! What would her father have said if he had been alive? Oh, my daughter.’
‘Ma, his father teaches mathematics at the university. He’s a decent boy. And Lata’s a sensible girl.’
Mateen brought the tea in, registered the scene with deferential interest, and went back towards the kitchen.
Lata walked in a few seconds later. She had taken a book to the banyan grove, where she had sat down undisturbed for a while, lost in Wodehouse and her own enchanted thoughts. Two more days, one more day, and she would see Kabir again.
She was unprepared for the scene before her, and stopped in the doorway.
‘Where have you been, young lady?’ demanded Mrs Rupa Mehra, her voice quivering with anger.
‘For a walk,’ faltered Lata.
‘Walk? Walk?’ Mrs Rupa Mehra’s voice rose to a crescendo. ‘I’ll give you walk.’
Lata’s mouth flew open, and she looked at Savita. Savita shook both her head and her right hand slightly, as if to say that it was not she who had given her away.
‘Who is he?’ demanded Mrs Rupa Mehra. ‘Come here. Come here at once.’
Lata looked at Savita. Savita nodded.
‘Just a friend,’ said Lata, approaching her mother.
‘Just a friend! A friend! And friends are for holding hands with? Is this what I brought you up for? All of you — and is this—’
‘Ma, sit down,’ said Savita, for Mrs Rupa Mehra had half risen out of her chair.
‘Who told you?’ asked Lata. ‘Hema’s Taiji?’
‘Hema’s Taiji? Hema’s Taiji? Is she in this too?’ exclaimed Mrs Rupa Mehra with new indignation. ‘She lets those girls run around all over the place with flowers in their hair in the evening. Who told me? The wretched girl asks me who told me. No one told me. It’s the talk of the town, everyone knows about it. Everyone thought you were a good girl with a good reputation — and now it is too late. Too late,’ she sobbed.
‘Ma, you always say Malati is such a nice girl,’ said Lata by way of self-defence. ‘And she has friends like that — you know that — everyone knows that.’
‘Be quiet! Don’t answer me back! I’ll give you two tight slaps. Roaming around shamelessly near the dhobi-ghat and having a gala time.’
‘But Malati—’
‘Malati! Malati! I’m talking about you, not about Malati. Studying medicine and cutting up frogs—’ Mrs Rupa Mehra’s voice rose once more. ‘Do you want to be like her? And lying to your mother. I’ll never let you go for a walk again. You’ll stay in this house, do you hear? Do you hear?’ Mrs Rupa Mehra had stood up.
‘Yes, Ma,’ said Lata, remembering with a twinge of shame that she had had to lie to her mother in order to meet Kabir. The enchantment was being torn apart; she felt alarmed and miserable.
‘What’s his name?’
‘Kabir,’ said Lata, growing pale.
‘Kabir what?’
Lata stood still and didn’t answer. A tear rolled down her cheek.
Mrs Rupa Mehra was in no mood for sympathy. What were all these ridiculous tears? She caught hold of Lata’s ear and twisted it. Lata gasped.
‘He has a name, doesn’t he? What is he — Kabir Lal, Kabir Mehra — or what? Are you waiting for the tea to get cold? Or have you forgotten?’
Lata closed her eyes.
‘Kabir Durrani,’ she said, and waited for the house to come tumbling down.
The three deadly syllables had their effect. Mrs Rupa Mehra clutched at her heart, opened her mouth in silent horror, looked unseeingly around the room, and sat down.