Last Labyrinth Page 2

  ‘I am not going any further,’ I said.

  ‘Are you tired?’ drawled Aftab.

  ‘Of Mr. Nizamuddin and his friends, yes.’

  He let out a little sigh which, I came to realize, signified a laugh, a sob, a smirk, from some other world. ‘Anuradha will keep you company,’ he said.

  After they were gone, Anuradha said, ‘You can smoke now.’ I lit a cigarette, thinking of K at my father’s funeral. My mind wandered touching on stray irrelevant images: the banks of the Ganga at Haridwar where I stood clasping the urn of my father’s ashes; the odd stranger in the hospital, the messenger of Shani, who had somehow slipped into my room that Saturday morning and whom I had refused a coin and whose curse I still carried; Geeta in the study with her brother’s commandant, silently crying; my mother’s room and the stain of acetone. From that stain on the carpet it flew to the woman who had been left behind to keep me company. My eyes travelled up from her feet and thigh and belly — she had a fine figure — to her face. She was looking down at me, serious, speculative, her black eyes blacker.

  ‘Sit down,’ I said.

  She did not sit down.

  There was a silence broken by the prolonged whistling of a locomotive. On the heels of the whistle, quite out of the blue, she said, ‘You are here to grab his business, aren’t you?’

  I looked up sharply. Her face was in shadow but the eyes stood out. She looked only worried.

  ‘I don’t grab anything,’ I said.

  ‘You can give it any name you like but isn’t it his business that you are after?’

  ‘What if I am?’

  ‘He does not know about it.’

  ‘Shall I inform him?’

  I could not help a laugh. I was at last getting a rise out of them, getting a handle on them.

  ‘I wish you would leave him alone,’ she said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because he is no match for you. And...’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘In a way, you are no match for him.’

  ‘No?’ She took a couple of steps and sat down next to me. I could smell her perfume. The locomotive hooted some more and let out steam. Sound travelled far at that hour. Her face was no longer in shadow. She had the features of women one saw in Moghul miniatures. I was fascinated.

  ‘There is another reason,’ she said.

  ‘Reason for what?’

  ‘Why you should leave him alone.’

  I waited, turning the cigarette in my fingers.

  ‘I don’t think it is his business that you want.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘No. I don’t know what you want,’ she went on, indifferent to my little barbs, ‘but it is not his business.’

  ‘You sound like Mr. Thapar.’

  ‘Please don’t make fun of me.’

  Those words of Anuradha — words that, no doubt, were also a warning — I failed to hear them in the dargah’s deafening silence. Instead, I thought I would bend the moment to my advantage. I thought I would explain to her how things stood and get her on my side. In the battlefield that I believed the world to be there were always sides, yours and the other man’s, and you had to break them loose from the other man’s side and bring them to your own before you could launch the final blow.

  I told her then, in my special brand of candour and cunning, how it was in Aftab’s interest to hand me his business; how he was neither suited for it nor did he seem much interested; how he could do so much more with the cash that he would get. And, finally, I gave her the most formidable argument of them all. In business, as elsewhere, I told her, it was the survival of the fittest.

  ‘He is not organized enough to survive,’ I said.

  In reply, she put her hand on my arm. A strand of her hair had come loose and she was laughing.

  ‘You take yourself so seriously,’ she said.

  I felt rage whipping at the end of my spine and shooting up to the skull, to some dark hollows where the serpents slept, just waiting to be stirred. But her hand was there on my arm. How was I to push it away? What was I to do with it? She had said what she had set out to say. Her laughter, too, had ended. And yet the hand was there, light and soft, transmitting its perfumed warmth. There was a solitaire on the second finger. A moon-beam broke on it: violet, orange, and blue. The fire started to subside. The snakes continued to sleep. I thought of the mehndi on her palm.

  ‘I saw mehndi on your hands,’ I said.

  She took a while to understand.

  ‘Oh.’ And, releasing my arm, she looked at her hands. ‘I have been to a wedding,’ she said. ‘Why?’

  She had long tapering fingers. There were glass bangles on her wrist. I wanted to hold that hand. Inflamed with sudden desire, I felt absurd amidst that procession of tombstones. The feeling passed.

  Aftab’s soft voice approached in the distance. Amjad Mian stood before us and looked down, from me to Anuradha and back. I could not see his eyes.

  ‘I am going back to the hotel,’ I told Aftab.

  ‘Where is the hurry?’

  ‘I need to sleep.’

  He looked at Anuradha, then at me. ‘We shall drop you, then,’ he said.

  I stood in my room, high above the city of Delhi. I had been undressing. What had thrown me off was Anuradha’s perfume on my arm. It was a peculiar perfume, something I had never come across. There was raat-ki-raani in it and a touch of summer earth after rain. But there was something else as well, something rare and dense, something that might have been known only to Scheherzade and the seraglios of the Moghul. It was fine, exotic stuff meant to lift one’s spirits. Why, then, did it make me sad?

  I looked at myself in the mirror: lean, crow-footed, greying. I could not, then, see the hunger but there was the boredom and the fed-up-ness, endless depths of it.

  That evening was a failure, an unmistakable defeat. Survival of the fittest made no sense to her as it had ceased to make sense to my father.

  I awoke in the middle of the night, depressed, the taste of tranquillisers in my mouth. My first thought was of Anuradha. I thought of her as she had been in the dargah, sitting close to me, her hand on my arm. And I also thought of the moves I still had to make to capture Aftab’s business.

  Visit us in Benaras, Aftab had said. I knew I would have to. My business with him was not yet over.

  3

  How far I have travelled from that morning I took over my first plant. We went to the Elephanta Caves that morning, my father and I. In the evening we walked this beach. To my left, diagonally across the window, I can see the mound, where honeymooning couples pose for photographs, and where my father had stood that evening struggling with words. Was it the visit to Elephanta that had turned him on? Or, was it a deeper turbulence?

  ‘Let us keep the launch to ourselves,’ he had said. It was a mild morning. Tourists crowded the Gateway, taking pictures. As we sped through the Colaba harbour he pointed out the different ships. There was Vikrant, the aircraft carrier, with no sign of the aircraft. Sailors, polishing the cannon of a frigate, waved to us as we went past. My father waved back. We made a detour because he wanted to look at the reactor at Trombay. As we approached the great phallic dome we fell silent.

  Crossing the pier at Elephanta my father said to K who also accompanied us, ‘The first time I came here was when I learnt Som’s mother had cancer.’ K looked guilty as though he had personally been responsible for my mother’s death.

  I thought of them, my parents, one tall the other short, getting off the boat in silence. How did they cross the pier? In silence? Small talk? Laughter? Did they hold hands? It meant the same thing: that time was running out. I must have been fourteen at the time. Men came from the city, from the factories, even from distant towns, professional cheer-uppers. My father did not prohibit them. He sat quietly, patiently, a lock of grey hair on his forehead, listening to their drivel, his mind in fever. Only K knew of its total confusion. It was to him that my father made those absurd suggestions. Lung transplant was one of
them, using his own lung. Exasperated, one day K had shouted back at him, ‘Don’t be ridiculous. Throw out all those gods and goddesses and she might have a chance.’

  On the island of Elephanta we sat on a bench in a grove of tamarind. My father plucked a fern and chewed upon it and watched a trio of ratings walk by, in step, in spite of themselves. Waving the fern he said. ‘Of late, you know, I have been wondering about causes. Causes of things, things that happen to men, to objects.’ His comment was addressed to neither of us in particular. He did not continue. We moved on to the great cave, cooler and darker than the groves of tamarind.

  We stared at the Trimurti: heavy lipped Brahma; Rudra with snakes and a third eye; Vishnu almost effeminate. Probably, the same troubadour in different garbs, sent to foul up men’s understanding. Coming out, on the edge of a cliff, we met the ratings again. My father fell into conversation with them. They were dark, full of laughter, respectful. They came from the Vikrant where they worked on the planes. ‘You fly them?’ my father said excitedly. They were embarrassed. They were mechanics as anyone, except my father, could see. ‘Never mind,’ he said. ‘You will fly them one day.’ He explained to them the history of the caves and the geology of the island on which we stood. He pointed out to them the Buddhist burial mounds. He was a master of such things. On parting, smiling shyly, the ratings gave him a picture of Christ. It changed colour when he shifted it in his hands.

  4

  I have had a tiff with Mr. Thapar and another with Geeta. They cannot understand why I hate her so but, then, nor do they know how desperately I had once loved her and, in the terrible loneliness of my heart still do. They know I had something to do with her and they think they know all. But what do they know of thoughts and sensations that no words can capture, that would burn the very paper they are written on? What do they know of the Anuradha that I knew, or of Gargi, or of Lal Haveli, that sepulchral, sensual den of Aftab’s amidst the labyrinths of Benaras.

  Even my dreams are not free of them. Strange murky shapes fl oat through their tangled web. Animals and wheels of fire and brilliant suns blazing away in dark starless skies. I see myself grotesque, naked, my face distorted as if in a funny mirror. Anuradha, my poor Anuradha, walking shoeless across a burning desert. Gargi sitting in the middle of nowhere reading a book, throwing a cowrie shell, and saying to me: ‘She is your shakti.’

  At times, my mother takes Gargi’s place. ‘Don’t,’ she cries, ‘don’t,’ as my arm sweeps across a tableful of gods.

  The peon came to the dormitory one morning and led me through sun-drenched corridors, holding me by the hand, even though I was fifteen. I knew she was dead. We went to the quarters of the Housemaster. The Housemaster looked very solemn and also held my hand.

  It was winter. I was dressed for athletics. The peon, the Housemaster and I, spiked shoes and all, went to the Headmaster’s house. In single file. There was a grove of guavas in the Headmaster’s yard and I remember the sharp smell of ripening guavas. The Headmaster sat on the verandah in his dressing gown, reading a newspaper. He peered at us from above the rims of his glasses. That was his habit even though he was quite young. Then he called for his wife. All four of us sat in a circle in cane chairs, the peon stood at the back.

  ‘I have bad news for you, Bhaskar,’ the Headmaster said.

  I started to cry. The Headmaster said, ‘Your father has suggested that you don’t come for the funeral.’

  The Headmaster’s wife led me inside and gave me hot milk and cream biscuits. It was a ritual of sorrow. She stood watching as I sipped the milk. She was a young woman, firm and shapely. She wore a night dress over which she had thrown a dressing gown. Arms folded, she stood watching me through soft warm eyes. I lifted my gaze from the floor and looked at her, begging her to explain the meaning of it all. She stepped forward, close enough so that I could smell the sleep filled odour of her body. She passed her hand through my hair, starting from the forehead and going all the way to the nape of the neck. She, too, had probably been to a wedding and there was mehndi on her palm. And while she pushed the hair away from my forehead I was mesmerized by these hieroglyphs of a new world, a world of wild erotic instincts. That night as I lay in the dormitory I had thought not of my dead mother but the Headmaster’s wife. I went back to her next day to request her to persuade her husband to let me go home for a few days. My mother’s funeral was over but I wanted to meet my father. ‘Must you go?’ she said, searching my face.

  I nodded, keeping back, not tears but a great roaring hollowness. ‘I understand,’ she said, ‘I shall speak to my husband.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘Thank you.’

  My father stood in the airport lobby, dapper as ever, arms at the back, talking to Mr. Thapar. Mr. Thapar noticed me; my father did not. When he did, he came forward, brisk and businesslike. He shook my hand. He said, ‘I did not want to disturb your studies.’ He looked into my eyes and, perhaps, saw what the Headmaster’s wife had seen and put his arm around me. We drove to the cottage where she had spent her last days. There were mourners on the patio. Mr. Thapar took care of them. My father and I went to her room. It gave out her perfume as it had always done. We stood on opposite sides of the bed, totally unable to communicate. Then he moved to my side. I was fifteen but nearly as tall as him. He put his hands on my shoulders. I thought he was going to embrace me. But he simply clutched at my shoulders kneading them with a jerky desperate motion that I did not understand. I looked into his face and saw the uncontrollable trembling of the mouth. Tears rolled down his face. His chest heaved with muffled sobs as the chests of grown men do when they cry. I saw his tears and the heaving of his chest but I did not cry. Behind my eyes, and in the cavities of my skull, the same strange hollowness roared endlessly.

  Seven years later, coming back from Elephanta, walking on this beach, my father brooded. Of late, he had often been like that. Long silences interrupted by momentary elation. K watched him warily. As dusk fell and the sky darkened, the storm over my father’s brooding broke. His hair blowing in the breeze he said, ‘I believe in science, yes, but science cannot solve the problem of the causes. Not many realize this paradox. We assume that the immediate stimulus to an occurrence is its cause, don’t we?’ He looked at me. ‘There are processes in our plant that use certain methods for providing heat. But the same heat could be provided by totally different means. Theoretically, you could concentrate the light of the sun, or even of a star that died a million years ago, and actuate some of our processes. Or, you could say that the scientist who developed the process is the cause, or the workers, or Thapar or I. Or, maybe, my mother who bore me or her father. You see how complicated it gets... Then there are causes behind causes, especially periods... So, you see, I have been wondering...’

  He fell abruptly silent and blushed like a boy caught in a prohibited act. At another time he might have broken off at this point. But whatever it was, he had it badly on his mind. ‘You see,’ he began, ‘you see, I have been wondering if there couldn’t possibly be a First Cause.’

  He fell silent again. The three of us walked up and down the deserted beach. In the sky above stars had begun to come out. He started again.

  ‘Have you noticed the fundamental unity in the construction of the universe, K? Great galaxies oscillate, so does the minutest particle of quartz. It is the same cell that is the building block of every living animal. Everything happens in cycles. Birth, Growth, Decline and Death. Couldn’t there be a First Cause that would explain everything, whose nature might lie behind the natures of all the rest? I spoke of heat. All light could have a First Cause too. So could all sound. So could all love. Hate. Anger. They, too, are energies, aren’t they?’ He looked around, a little uncertain, at the empty beach, at the dark sea, then carried on defiantly. ‘Of course, they are. So is all thought. The mystics say as much.’

  ‘But what is the evidence?’ I said, irritated.

  Father kicked at a ball of seaweed. ‘Evidence, of course, is important. If
only the mystics could offer their evidence of God like the scientists do! What do you think, K?’

  ‘Can you have evidence of such things?’ said K.

  ‘I wish I could run an experiment and find out,’ said my father.

  ‘Why don’t you?’ K said.

  As usual, he committed nothing beyond the territory of medicine. And, there, too, he had reservations.

  ‘You, Som, what do you think?’

  ‘Such understanding is beyond me,’ I laughed. ‘Maybe, I too should run an experiment.’

  I felt superior, more in control. No, totally in control, of whatever furies lurked among the savage stars or at the bottom of the sea that roared to the right of us. I had the conceit of youth because I slept ten hours, had more money than I knew of, had laid half a dozen women, because I had done all these, I felt certain I shall never get the boot. And, therefore, I was condescending. I patronized him, my father, while he struggled with the weight of the centuries. I patronized him even though I knew I hadn’t the right.

  ‘But, surely, you want to understand, Som,’ my father said. It was almost a rebuke.

  He had surprised me. I had always thought of him as a businessman, a chemist, perhaps brilliant, who by a fluke — Mr. Thapar had been the fluke — became a businessman. I had never imagined that he was concerned with anything other than the mystery of the molecule. What was this? This chatter about a First Cause?

  Coming back after cremating him, I wandered about the empty house. I went up to his room. His spectacles lay near the night-light, the ends crossed, just as he always kept them. At the end of the room, near the wardrobe, lay the half-packed suitcase meant for his journey to Brussells, a journey that he would have undertaken at roughly that hour. From the wall his photograph with my mother, taken right after their wedding, stared down at me. He used to have short hair then. But the determined chin was there. And so, paradoxically, was the bewilderment in the eyes.