‘Oh, I haven’t made up my mind yet about staying,’ she said firmly. ‘I don’t know whether I’m going to like it here. It’s kind of a corny country, don’t you think?’ She frowned down at the coloured pictures of the Red Fort and the Qutb Minar. ‘All this old stuff, I mean, what’s the point? In the States we’ve got everything new, and after all, I’ve grown up there. This will be an experience, but I don’t figure I’m going to want to stay here too long.’
She was quite firm about it; and on reflection, Tossa thought, she was quite capable of demanding to be taken back again when India palled, and getting her own way, too. Dorette had made her plans; but so might Anjli, and there was a good deal of Dorette in Anjli, enough to make the struggle a dangerously even one if it ever came to that. And yet…
‘Do you really think,’ said Anjli suddenly, her cheek turned to the window, where the blinding light clung and quivered as it touched her lips, ‘she’ll be glad to have me? She’s old, and she hated it when he married Mommy.’
‘But you’re not Dorette, you’re you… partly her son. You’re her only grandchild. She’ll be glad,’ said Tossa with certainty.
It was the nearest they had come, in all that long and tedious journey, to asking and giving sympathy; and even now Tossa felt herself to be on thin ice. Very aloof, very independent, this child; she’d be infuriated if you tried to mother her, when she’d managed for so long without any mothering. Not the clinging kind, Anjli; except, of course, in a predatory fashion to Dominic’s arm when the slimmest chance offered. Inscrutable, dangerous and to be respected, that was Satyavan Kumar’s daughter. Tossa didn’t know whether to be sorrier for the grandchild or the grandmother. Somehow, between these two, the face of the father eluded her imagination; for it had never entered Dorette’s head to show her a photograph of Satyavan. Probably she hadn’t even kept one, once the man himself was out of her life.
Anjli, her cheek against the sun-warmed glass, watched the baked, thirsty land revolve beneath them, presenting a changing, circling pattern of white buildings, radiating roads, scattered green trees dispersed in a rose-red landscape. The palette of North India, apart from the hills, is a wonderful range of reds and oranges and browns, glittering with drought. In winter the green of foliage looks faded and silvery against it, and the violent crimsons and purples of early flowering trees explode like fireworks.
‘Look, Delhi!’
Dominic awoke, and came to lean across them both and peer down with them at the fabled city, older than Alexander, eight cities superimposed upon one another, overlapping, showing faintly through like a palimpsest. The radiant light picked out minarets, domes, pompous white office blocks, the superb sweep of the King’s Way, ruled across New Delhi in rose-pink, lined on either side with vivid grass and the embroidered mirror-glitter of water, clustering green of parks, the spinning wheel of Connaught Place with all its radial roads straight as arrows. For some moments they had a perfect sketch-map before them, then the plane settled lower and selected its way in to the international airport, and they were left with a narrowing circle of the south-western cantonment, ruled in rectangular blocks, gathering, solidifying, growing to lifesize.
Anjli, gazing dubiously down at the city of which she was mortally afraid, settled her brow artfully against Dominic’s arm and counted, shrewdly, her blessings. Never look too far ahead; now is what matters. Because there isn’t any tomorrow, and you can’t make much capital out of yesterday, it slips through your fingers; but now is something there’ll always be, even if it changes its shape.
Dominic saw the tense line of her mouth and cheek, and didn’t move his arm. They watched Delhi come up to meet them, a floating city, red and white, wonderful.
The touch-down was brisk and gentle and indifferently expert. And at Palam Ernest Felder was waiting for them.
He was fifty years old, but looked younger because of his springy step and dapper carriage. They said he had given Dorette her first chance in films, years ago, and stayed a close friend of hers ever since, though by all accounts at one time he would have liked to be more to her than a friend. He had been the minor celebrity then, and she the raw beginner; now she was the reigning star of the old, wholesome school of sweet family entertainment, and he was still a minor celebrity, perhaps a rung or two lower down the ladder than when they had met, but still a director of mild distinction. Or was it co-director this time? Dorette had mentioned an Indian director who was sharing the responsibility with him on this co-production.
He met them as soon as they crossed the apron of sand-brown earth and entered the airport buildings. A large, muscular hand reached for Dominic’s, acknowledging the male as automatically in charge. A shaggy, brindled grey head inclined punctiliously, a weathered, philosophical face, lined with humour and self-indulgence, beamed welcome at them all. A very well-kept body, athletic and lean, made the most of a beautifully-cut grey suit.
‘Mr Felse? I’m Felder. Dorrie wired me to look out for you. Miss Barber, you’re very welcome to India. I hope you’re not too tired after the journey?’ He turned to Anjli, and contemplated her long and fondly, while she stared back at him unblinkingly and let her small hand lie limply in his. ‘And you must be Dorrie’s little girl. Well, well, I haven’t seen you since you were knee-high to a kitten.’
Anjli, on her dignity, looked down her nose and said: ‘How do you do, Mr Felder!’ in her best party tones. But he looked kind and easy-going, and his voice recalled America in this alien land, and she could not help warming to him. ‘It’s sure nice to have somebody here who belongs,’ she said, for once without calculation, and her passive fingers stirred and gripped confidingly.
‘Girlie, you’re going to have no trouble at all that way, not while my bunch are here just outside town. Film people I bet you know, and film people are the same the world over, even when you’ve got ten sorts together, the way we have here. I’ve got ’em all laid on for you, a real party, so Delhi’s going to feel like home. I’ve got the boys outside with the truck, you don’t have to do a thing but just hand over to us, and we do everything.’
‘It’s really very kind of you,’ said Tossa, and meant it, ‘but I suppose we ought to contact Mr Kumar as soon as possible, oughtn’t we?’
‘So you ought, my dear, so you ought. But it’s coming on evening, and you’ve all three just been rushed across the world, and it’s my belief you need tonight to unwind and put your best moods and faces on ready for the moment of truth.’ Bless him, he wasn’t going to pretend for a moment that anything about this was easy or normal. He knew his Dorette from long since, and had learned to approach the crises she created with caution and philosophy. ‘Now I know she won’t have wired him exactly when to expect you, or why would she hand things over to me? Yes, I know she wrote him a warning, three, four weeks ago, but that’s the size of it. I know my girl! That cost her plenty. Now before you go to him you’ve got to have a roof over your heads that you don’t owe to him, and friends right there behind you, so you can say simply: “Look, here I am. Am I welcome?” and if not, well, all right, then, that’s that, goodbye. Sorry you’ve been troubled, and no hard feelings. We’re not beggars, are we, honey? We’ve got places of our own to go to, and feet of our own to stand on. Right?’
He was looking at Anjli. There was a bloom of colour flooding the honey of her cheeks, and she looked tall and grave and very independent. ‘Right!’