Breathless in Bombay Read online

  Before the Arab could recover, Badshah reared again. He neighed and reared, and neighed and reared, and at the side the ocean growled. The tide was in. It was rushing in toward the shore. Badshah reared again, higher this time. Let no man misjudge him. Let no man abuse his master. Let no man think he’d let that pass. And let the skies be witness to that.

  The victoria tilted farther and the Arabs landed on one another. The girls and the elder boy landed on the mother, and the father landed on top of them, his white robe sliding over his knees, exposing his hairy legs to the sky.

  It took them five minutes to sort themselves out. Get a head out of a chin, an elbow out of an eye. Someone had lost his glasses; someone had gotten scratched on the face: it hurt, therefore the howling. The father had lost a sandal. By now a sympathetic animal lover had escorted it to the sea. The younger boy scratched and fought his way out. His mother howled and petted him. He tried to get away from her vigorous caresses. The elder sisters blamed him. The father threatened them with dire consequences; he used loud, vituperative language to get that across. The elder son groped for his glasses and clutched one of his mother’s breasts instead. She slapped him hard. He looked at her dazed and dumbfounded.

  Dismayed as he was by the sight of his toppled victoria, Chacha moved over to comfort Badshah. He held his head and stroked him, looking into his eyes. His old partner appeared sedate now, unaware of the chaos he’d caused.

  The Arabs extricated themselves, grumbling and swearing. Up front, on the seat, the bubble jar had smashed. The soapy water trickled down and formed a foamy puddle on the road. The mother almost slipped on the puddle, but her daughters steadied her in time. She glared at them, as if their help was unnecessary. The father looked at Chacha, and his eyes went to the whip. But then he became aware of the crowd: too many eyes and all so hostile.

  Waving his arms, raving like a madman about a lost sandal and about a dying and diseased horse, the Arab paced the road in search of a taxi. He flagged down two. The first taxi driver pulled over obediently. The second driver—a surly-faced opportunist—said he’d take them only if the Arab agreed to pay a hundred rupees, not a paisa less, for he would have to take his cab all the way round, in the opposite direction. The Arab agreed, for he could sense a collective unruliness, a unity in the crowd that could turn nasty. Barking instructions, he hurried his family into the waiting cabs.

  With mixed feelings of rage and relief, Chacha watched them exit. He cooled down slightly when he saw the younger Arab girl. She shot Badshah an apologetic look. Then she looked at Chacha and her eyes went toward the victoria—to its tilted calash, its raised seat. Behind her, the father screamed. Quickly she disappeared into the taxi.

  As the vehicles took off, the Arab spat at Chacha and, sticking his head out, raised his middle finger several times over. Chacha shook his fist and stood glaring till the taxis were out of sight. Then he turned to his victoria. Strange it looked, his fallen chariot.

  “Come, brothers,” he requested the onlookers. “Please lend me a hand.”

  Willingly they came forward: the bhelpuriwalla, the chaiwalla, the chana-singwalla, and the ice-creamwalla. Together they heaved and restored the victoria to its original position. Badshah shook his neck, as if shedding off a bad memory. The helpers asked Chacha what had transpired, and he poured out his outrage. Listening to him, they clicked their tongues and shook their heads disapprovingly; then they melted into the night.

  Chacha saw there were footmarks all over the seats. He took a cloth and began wiping off the marks, rubbing in slow, swiping movements. He felt sad as he realized he’d missed out not only on the fare but also on the baksheesh he’d been offered earlier.

  Of what use is money if this is what it does? he thought. If it makes animals out of human beings and reduces animals to slaves? He thought of all those who had cheered Badshah, who had bet on him and won each time. He thought about the bookies who had refused to give good odds, knowing Badshah was unbeatable, and the owners who led him in proudly and posed with his trophies. Where were they when Badshah needed them? It is better to be poor and grateful than to be rich and forgetful, he thought, giving the seat a final swipe, up and down, and at the sides, too.

  A breeze had started, a sharp breeze with the sting of salt water. It made Chacha realize that he should be getting back. It was too late for another fare. Besides, he wasn’t up to it.

  There were people seated all along the seafront. They were looking into the dark, as if fastened on to some speck of hope that only they could see. They sat in silence, hearing the drumming of the ocean over their own heartbeat. None appeared keen to leave the bosom of the Queen.

  Chacha looked to his left, at the Hilton, where the Arabs would sleep that night, in air-conditioned rooms, on soft, clean beds with sink-in pillows and rich quilts. He looked to his right, toward Chowpatty, the food stalls, where middle-class families tucked into plates of bhelpuri, ragda pattice, and sevpuri or mashed obsessively at bricks of frozen kulfi.

  His eyes wandered farther—down to the beach, where children ran squealing onto the sands, their hands raised, and his heart ached for Zulfi. Six, and she hadn’t seen the beach yet.

  He looked at the place where he stood. Could he be center, dead center? If so, all would be justified; the Queen Mother would have spoken. Not quite, he realized. A little to the left would have been perfect, but it didn’t matter, for nothing in life is precise, nothing perfect. It’s up to you to tilt the odds. And if the odds tilt in your favor when you need them, then so much the better.

  He walked over to Badshah and stroked his head. Bringing his palm lower, he opened it and said, “See, partner; see what Rani Ma has given you: your retirement bonus, and mine, too, and a life for bithiya, and freedom, perhaps, for beti.” And with that, he opened his palm just a little more, to show Badshah what he’d found in between the seats. And Badshah blinked, no different from how he usually did, for what was important to him was Chacha’s voice, his touch, his presence, and not this silly little rock that twinkled and shone with a million eyes.

  Chacha hoisted himself up, took the reins, and set off at a leisurely pace. Overhead, the sky settled into a canopy of darkness. Behind him, the necklace gleamed, a burning river of halogens. At the side, the ocean lapped, a quivering mass of velvet.

  As he pulled out of the drive and took a right, Chacha began whistling a tune: “Bekaraar karke humein yun ne jaaiye, aap ko hamari kasam laut aaiye.” As he whistled away, it dawned on him that he was whistling not out of joy but out of a feeling of sadness, the poignancy of leaving his turf after a long and tiring race. The worst was he did not know whether he’d won or lost the race.

  Turning his back on the drive, joining a narrow stream of traffic, Chacha wondered what had happened to his integrity, his honor, which he had spoken about so freely with the bubblewalla? Was it as fragile as the bubbles that were sent his way? Did it have to burst in the face of necessity? In the face of hardship?

  He looked at Badshah, who was trotting along calmly. How long would his old partner pull the weight of their collective burden? How long before he collapsed at the side of the road, unable to hoist himself up? Chacha shivered, thinking of it.

  He thought of Simran, the fire in her eyes when she spoke of Zulfi—and the hatred and venom she felt for Amir Jawaab and Bhikoo Bhadva. How long before she did something drastic? Before she killed them, or herself and Zulfi? She might—if Chacha’s promise to her remained unfulfilled.

  Instinctively Chacha’s hand went to the bulge in his pocket. He felt a warmth and a promise there. The promise of three lives saved.

  In his early days, Chacha had worked for a few months as a diamond polisher, before the flames and the dust had brought on an attack of asthma; then he’d been advised to work outdoors.

  So he knew the value of what he held and the price it could fetch: Simran’s freedom, perhaps; Zulfi’s schooling for sure; and, with a little luck, a small plot in the countryside, where he could ke
ep Badshah and maintain him the way champion horses deserved to be maintained. Chacha’s eyes filled with tears thinking of the inevitable, Badshah’s last days. But at least they would be under an open sky—with the clouds, the stars, and God as witness.

  Stuck in a traffic jam—some commotion caused by a rich sahib having parked his car brazenly—Chacha wondered about Simran, how he’d negotiate her freedom. He would have to talk to Mussabhai. He would have to tell him what Simran and the little girl meant to him. He was sure that Mussabhai, too, would have a heart, somewhere, deep down, under that criminal mind of his. And why, Chacha was ready to make a payment; he was ready to pay the price for two lives that mattered. He would have to reach Mussabhai through Hausangbhai, good old Hausangbhai, whom everyone knew and liked. Thinking of Hausangbhai made Chacha feel hungry. He rubbed his belly and allowed his mind to dream. This time for himself. For his stomach.

  IT WAS LATE BY THE TIME he pulled into the area. The power had gone and the only light was from the traffic. A cacophony of horns rose to greet him and beyond that a stunned, stupefied darkness. What foul luck, he thought, just when I thought I’d buy myself a meal and take something for Simran and Zulfi, too.

  He decided to leave the victoria in a side lane. It would be too difficult to navigate in the dark. Using an old lock and chain, he tied it to a lamppost. He patted Badshah, saying, “Give me a few minutes, old-timer. I will see what the position is, when the lights are expected.”

  He sauntered into the area. Lights or no lights, it was busy as ever, a flame that could not stop burning lest it extinguish itself.

  He went past the movie theater, outside of which waited groups of youth, smoking cigarettes, drinking chai, contemplating the women who solicited.

  He went past the timber stores, unloading in the dark, and past the handcart pushers, who waited for a load, waited half the night, for a run, so they could earn and eat by morning.

  He walked past the auto shops, dark and greasy and where there was always night, always some stolen part being bought or traded, and talk of vehicles being dismantled before they were traced. And past the mujra parlors, their music silent, their customers evicted onto long, frail balconies, and past the mujrawallis, flirting expertly with the customers, so that they might hold their interest till the lights returned.

  He went past the kebabwallas crouched over their ovens, slapping marinades, stirring the coals, and turning the skewers in the nick of time. And past the pav-bhajiwallas, churning their vegetables on black, greasy pans, and around them their customers waiting, with gaunt faces and cavernous mouths.

  He walked past the brothels, lit by candles . . . the women outside, on the steps, their faces tired and unsure. And past the eunuchs standing in clusters, their bones and lips gleaming.

  He walked farther into the lane and heard someone call. It was Hausangbhai, sitting on the steps of his restaurant. Hausangbhai in his traditional nightwear: a white silken undershirt, cut at the shoulders, and striped green pajamas, loose and flared. In his hand was a bottle of beer.

  “Arrey, Sawari, what are you doing strolling in the dark, like a young man bent on pleasure? Come and have some beer with me. Come and join me for berry biryani, if you don’t have some mischief in mind, that is.”

  Chacha laughed, for it was not his habit to drink. But his mouth turned moist thinking of the biryani, its tender meat, its saffron rice, its roasted almonds, its cashews, its spices, and the onion rings, so fresh, tingling, and good for his sinuses. But no—Badshah was alone, facing the warm, blinding lights of the traffic, and he’d be hungry, too, after the ride.

  So Chacha said, “Not now, Hausangbhai. I will wait till the lights come back . . . till I can bring Badshah in, and dry him and feed him. Meanwhile, if you could keep three packets of biryani ready, two normal, with normal spice, and one with less oil and less spice, why, I would be grateful.” Then he added in a low, embarrassed voice, “And please don’t mind, but I will pay you later.”

  Hausangbhai rose with effort. He was a big man with thick arms that poured out of his undershirt. His arms were dark and pimpled and had shrubs of hair sprouting up in places. He came toward Chacha, dragging his feet noisily, and, placing an arm around him, said, “Arrey, Chacha, what do you think? I am such a baniya or what, that I am going to ask you for money? We both know how much you love your bithiya. How much you dream for her and her future. You are a good man, Sawari, and I tell you what, you can stay in my stable as long as you like. You and that champion horse of yours. And don’t you worry about any rent increase, huh. Or about my selling and asking you to go. No two-bit builder is going to scare me. I am not going to take his money or his threats. And if ever he gets tough, why, I will just speak to Mussabhai.”

  Hearing this from a man like Hausangbhai, a man so down on his luck and yet so strong, Chacha began to cry. He wept softly on Hausangbhai’s shoulder—there, in the dark, out in the open—while all around people milled and moved around, conducting business as usual.

  Hausangbhai let Chacha cry, for he assumed that the old horseman was weeping out some strange and terrible sorrow, which was deeply rooted and which needed expression. Probably he was crying for his bithiya and for the life she could not lead, or for his horse, whom he loved as much, or simply for a day that had proved too rough and too overwhelming. And Hausangbhai knew, for he had been through such days, when everything appeared bad and insurmountable, when fate itself drew swords against you and the hands of God seemed irrevocably crossed.

  After some time, Chacha stopped crying. He looked up sheepishly and whispered to Hausangbhai, “Thank you, Hausangbhai, for being so kind. Thank you for your piety.”

  And Hausangbhai said, “Chaal, worry not, Sawari, come back, and I will keep your biryani ready, nice and hot, just the way you like it, and some kheema, too. And, if you don’t find me here, you know where I will be—in the biryani, cut up and cooked by Haola for not charging.”

  And both of them laughed, and then there was silence, a hot, crazy silence, the kind that exists between men who had seen too much and who didn’t need to say much, either, to be understood. If Chacha drank, Hausangbhai would have offered him the bottle. And they would have both sat drinking till the power came back, till Haola had gotten tired of heating up the food and retired to bed resigned to the ways of men who would be boys—and many bottles later Chacha would have reached into his pocket, pulled out the stone, and placed it before Hausangbhai’s dim, disbelieving eyes, and the two would have chuckled over it, dreamt over it, and planned feverishly like rogues on a binge.

  But since that wasn’t possible, since Chacha didn’t drink and he had Badshah to think of first, Hausangbhai looked up at the half-derelict buildings, the partial moon, the frail antennas, penciled against a pitiless, black sky and he said, “The power should be here any moment, any moment now.”

  And Chacha replied, stroking his beard, “Let’s hope so. What more can we do anyway?”

  HARAAMI

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  HARAAMI: AN EXQUISITE HINDI WORD, explicit, therapeutic, and useful—because it is able to take multiple forms. Quite plainly, it means “of bad blood, ill descent.” To use it as such you have to add venom. But haraami can also be delivered with affection, to describe a mischievous person—in which case you pucker your lips and say, “Bahut haraami hain sala,” meaning, “a real scoundrel he is, an affable rogue.”

  Rohit was a haraami, the harsher kind, spelled “low-down.” He worked at the ad agency where I worked. He was tall, thin, good-looking, with a boyish face and hazy eyes. I soon realized that the haziness was induced by three joints of grass, enjoyed at different times of the day—one in the morning, one at midday, followed by a third, mid-afternoon or early evening, depending on the kind of pressures we faced. No complaints with that. Everybody in advertising smoked, except the accountants, the peons, the chauffeurs, and the managing directors. The latter preferred alcohol, which suited us fine, because we didn’t want them hitting us for
stash, bad enough that they’d monopolize half the nice-looking girls in the agency, get to sleep with them, too. But that didn’t make them haraamis; it just made us dream of owning an ad agency, of having a permanent hotel room booked for extemporary stints in the sack.

  Rohit was crying the day I found him. He was huddled over the phone, clutching the receiver and pleading into it. Transparent tears rolled down his face, onto the boss’s mahogany table. It was just as well the boss wasn’t there. The table had come at a price, rescued from an old solicitor’s firm that had gone broke. No idea why Rohit decided it was the place to have a breakdown. Long back, a Chivas ad had legitimized tears for the sensitive male; it had shown a broken bottle of Chivas and a headline that read: “Ever seen a full-grown man cry?” Years later, the Bombay Times came in with their own version of the sensitive, emoting man—the metrosexual, they called him. He did everything the girls did: looked after his hair, his wardrobe, his toes, his complexion, his nails, his eyelashes. He even cried—like them.

  I confess I was fascinated by Rohit crying. I wanted to ask him if he was a metrosexual, if he was that modern. So I waited for him to finish the call. Then I tapped him eagerly on the shoulder but chickened out seeing his face strained and damp with tears. “We can go somewhere. Talk. Can’t be all that bad,” I said, more concerned now and less curious.

  We went to the spot behind the agency. It was a tiny corner off Warden Road, looking out onto the sea. Being part of a private road, it was undiscovered, quite scenic, and full of horizon. We sat there—on a jagged brick wall—gazing at the Arabian Sea, a quivering mass of silver, gleaming under the evening sun.