Her arms were also pleasing. The attractive roundness of her shoulders made itself apparent through the baggy, badly stitched blouse she wore. Her hair was thick and long, with the smell of coconut oil rising from it. Her plait, thick like a whip, would thump against her back. But the length of her hair made her unhappy as it got in the way of the games she played; she had invented various ways of keeping it under control.
Sarita was free of all worry and anxiety. She had enough to eat twice a day. Her mother handled all their household affairs. Every morning Sarita filled buckets of water and took them inside; every evening she filled the lamp with one paisa’s worth of oil. Her hand reached habitually every evening for the cup with the money, and taking the lamp, she’d make her way downstairs.
Sarita had come to think of her visits to hotels and dimly lit places with rich men, which Kishori organised four or five times a month, as jaunts. She never gave any thought to the other aspects of these jaunts. She might even have believed that men like Kishori came to all the other girls’ houses too and that they also went on outings with rich men. And what happened on Worli’s cold benches and Juhu’s wet beaches, perhaps happened to all the other girls as well. On one occasion she even said to her mother: ‘Ma, Shanta’s quite old now. Why not send her along with me too? The rich men who just came took me to eat eggs and Shanta loves eggs.’ Sarita’s mother parried the question. ‘Yes, yes, some day I’ll send her along with you. Let her mother return from Pune, no?’ Sarita relayed the good news to Shanta the next day, when she saw her coming out of the bathroom. ‘When your mother returns from Pune, everything will be alright. You’re going to come with me to Worli too!’ Sarita began to recount the night’s activities as if she was reliving a beautiful dream. Shanta, two years younger than Sarita, felt little bells ring through her body as she listened to Sarita. Even when she’d heard all Sarita had to say, she was unsatisfied. She grabbed her by the arm and said, ‘Come on, let’s go downstairs where we can talk.’ There, near the urinal where Girdhari the merchant had laid out dirty coconut husks to dry on gunny sacks, the two girls spoke till late about subjects that made them tingle with excitement.
Now, as she changed hurriedly into her blue georgette sari behind a makeshift curtain, she was aware of the cloth tickling her skin, and her thoughts, like the fluttering of a bird’s wings, returned to riding in the motor car. What would the rich men be like this time; where would they take her? These, and other such questions, didn’t enter her mind. She worried instead that the motor would run only for a few short minutes before their arrival at the door of some hotel. She didn’t like to be confined to the four walls of hotel rooms, with their two metal beds, which were not really meant for her to fall asleep on.
She put on the georgette sari, and smoothing its creases, came and stood for a moment in front of Kishori. ‘Take a look, Kishori, it’s alright from the back, no?’ Without waiting for a reply, she moved towards the broken wooden suitcase in which the Japanese powder and rouge were kept. She took a dusty mirror, wedged it between the window rods, and bending down, put a mixture of rouge and powder on her cheeks. When she was completely ready, she smiled and looked at Kishori, her eyes seeking appreciation.
She resembled one of those painted clay figures that appear during Diwali as the showpiece in a toy shop, with her bright blue sari, lipstick carelessly smudged on her lips, onion pink powder on her dark cheeks.
In the meantime, her mother arrived. She did Sarita’s hair quickly and said, ‘Listen, darling, speak nicely to the men and do whatever they ask. They are important; they’ve come in a motor car.’ Then addressing Kishori, she said, ‘Now, hurry up, take her to them. Poor fellows, I don’t know how long they’ve been left waiting.’
In the main market, a yellow car was parked outside a long factory wall, near a small board that read, ‘It is forbidden to urinate here’. Inside, the three young Hyderabadi men waiting for Kishori held their handkerchiefs to their noses. They would have liked to park the car ahead somewhere, but the factory wall was long and the stench of urine drifted down its entire stretch. When the young man who sat at the wheel caught sight of Kishori at the street corner, he said to his two other friends, ‘Well, brothers, he’s come. It’s Kishori and… and…’ He fixed his gaze on the street corner. ‘And… and… well, she’s just a little girl! You take a look… that one, man… the one in the blue sari.’
When Kishori and Sarita approached, the two young men sitting in the back removed their hats and made room for her in the middle. Kishori reached forward, opened the door and swiftly installed Sarita in the back. Closing the door, he said to the young man at the wheel, ‘Forgive me, we were delayed; she was at one of her friends’ places. Well, so?’
The young man turned around and looked at Sarita, then said to Kishori: ‘Alright, but listen…’ He slid across the seat and appeared at the other window. Whispering in Kishori’s ear, he said, ‘She’s not going to kick up a fuss, is she?’
Kishori placed his hand over his chest in reply. ‘Sir! You must have faith in me.’ Hearing this, the young man took two rupees out of his pocket and handed them to Kishori. ‘Go, have fun!’
Kishori waved them off and Kafayat started the engine.
It was five in the evening. Bombay’s bazaars were clogging with traffic from cars, buses, trams and pedestrians. Sarita was lost between the two young men. She would keep her thighs clamped tightly together, place her hands over them and start to say something, then mid-sentence, fall into silence. What she would have liked to say to the young man driving was, ‘For God’s sake, let it rip. I’m suffocating in here.’
For a long time, no one said anything. The young man at the wheel continued to drive and the two young Hyderabadis in the back, under their long, dark coats, suppressed their nervousness at being so close to a young girl for the first time, a young girl whom, for at least a while, they could call their own and touch without fear or danger.
The young man at the wheel had been living in Bombay for the past two years and had seen many girls like Sarita, both in daylight and at night. His yellow car had hosted girls of various shade and quality and so he felt no great nervousness now. Of his two friends who had come from Hyderabad, one, who went by the name of Shahab, wanted a full tour of Bombay. And it was with this in mind that Kafayat — the young owner of the car — out of friendship, asked Kishori to organise Sarita. To his other friend, Anwar, Kafayat said, ‘Listen, man, if there ends up being one for you too, what harm is there?’ But, Anwar, less assertive, never overcame his shyness enough to say, ‘Yes, get one for me too.’
Kafayat had never seen Sarita before — it had been a while since Kishori had brought a new girl. Despite this, Kafayat showed no interest in her, perhaps because a man can only do one thing at a time and he couldn’t drive as well as turn his attention to her. Once they’d left the city and the car came on to a country road, Sarita jumped up. The car’s sudden speed and the gusts of cold air that came in lifted the restraints she had put on herself until now. Bursts of electricity ran though her entire body. Her legs throbbed, her arms seemed to dance, her fingers trembled and she watched the trees race past her on both sides.