A Fine Balance (44 page)

The card game had gradually become quite boisterous. Om was smacking his cards down with gusto, accompanied by fanfares. “Tan-tan-tana-nana!” he sang at his next turn.

“Is that all?” said Rajaram. “So much noise for that? Only a small obstacle! Beat this if you have the strength!”

“Hoi-hoi – wait for my chance,” said Ishvar, trumping the hand and making the other two groan. The onlookers provided a chorus of approval for his smart play.

Before long, an audience-monitor came over to investigate. “What is this nonsense? Show some respect for the Prime Minister.” He threatened to withhold their money and snack if they did not behave themselves and pay attention to the speech. The cards were ordered put away.

“… And our newly formed flying squads will catch the gold smugglers, uncover corruption and black money, and punish the tax evaders who keep our country poor. You can trust your government to fulfil the task. Your part in this is very simple: to support the government, support the Emergency. The need of the hour is discipline – discipline in every aspect of life, if we are to reinvigorate the nation. Shun all superstitions, don’t believe in horoscopes and holy men, only in yourself and in hard work. Avoid rumours and loose talk if you love your country. Do your duty, above all else! This, my brothers and sisters, is my appeal to you! Jai Hind!”

The eighteen on stage rose as one to congratulate the Prime Minister on a most inspiring speech. Another brisk round of fawning commenced. At the end of it, the party official who would officially thank the Prime Minister went smirking and simpering to the microphone.

“Oh, no!” said Om. “One more speech? When do we get our snack?”

After the stock acknowledgements and hackneyed tributes were exhausted, the speaker pointed dramatically at the sky towards the far end of the field. “Behold! Yonder in the clouds! Oh, we are truly blessed!”

The audience looked up and around for the source of his rapturous seizure. There was no whirring helicopter this time. But on the horizon, floating towards the field, was a huge hot-air balloon. The canopy of orange, white, and green drifted across the cloudless blue sky in the silence of a dream. It lost some height as it neared the crowds, and now the sharp of sight could recognize the high-hovering face behind dark glasses. The figure raised a white-clad arm and waved.

“Oh, we are twice blessed today in this meeting!” the man sang into the microphone. “The Prime Minister on stage with us, and her son in the sky above us! What more could we ask for!”

The son in the sky, meanwhile, had started throwing leaflets overboard. With a flair for the theatric, he first released a single sheet to tantalize the audience. All eyes were riveted on it as it swooped and circled lazily. He followed this with two more leaflets, and waited, before getting rid of the lot in fluttering handfuls.

“Yes, my brothers and sisters, Mother India sits on stage with us, and the Son of India shines from the sky upon us! The glorious present, here, now, and the golden future, up there, waiting to descend and embrace our lives! What a blessed nation we are!”

Down to earth floated the first few leaflets, containing the Prime Minister’s picture and the Twenty-Point Programme. Once again, the children had fun running after them to see who could capture the most. The hot-air balloon cleared the airspace, leaving the field to the helicopter for a final assault.

This time it was flying much lower than before. The risk paid off in accuracy: a grand finale of rose petals showered the stage. But the Prime Minister’s eighty-foot cutout began to sway in the tempest of the helicopter’s blades. The crowd shouted in alarm. The figure with outstretched arms groaned, and the ropes strained at their moorings. Security men waved frantically at the helicopter while struggling to hold on to the ropes and braces. But the whirlwind was much too strong to withstand. The cutout started to topple slowly, face forward. Those in the vicinity of the cardboard-and-plywood giant ran for their lives.

“Nobody wants to be caught in the Prime Minister’s embrace,” said Rajaram.

“But she tries to get on top of everyone,” said Om.

“Shameless boy,” said his uncle.

They hurried to the refreshments, where an endless line was being kept in order by security men. A shortage of cups prevented it from moving faster. The snack – one pakora per head – had run out. The servers’ hands grew ungenerous with the diminishing supply of tea. They began doling out half-cups. “It’s not less tea,” they explained to those who protested the stinginess. “It’s just more concentrated.”

While the queue crawled forward, ambulances swept past the edge of the field, sirens blaring, come to collect the casualties of the eighty-foot Prime Minister’s collapse. After an hour of waiting, Ishvar, Om, and Rajaram were still at the back of the line when the tea was depleted. Simultaneously, there was an announcement: the buses would be leaving in ten minutes. Frantic about being stranded, everyone abandoned the quarrel with the tea-dispensers and rushed to the departure area. They were paid four rupees each as they boarded the bus.

“Why four?” asked Ishvar. “They told us five when we came.”

“One rupee for bus fare, tea and snack.”

“We didn’t even get tea and snack!” Om thrust his face furiously before the other’s. “And they said the bus was free!”

“Heh? You want free bus ride? Your father’s Divali or what?”

Om tensed. “I’m warning you, don’t take my father’s name.”

Ishvar and Rajaram coaxed him onto the bus. The man laughed about someone looking like an insect and talking like a tiger.

They sat glumly through the return journey, thirsty and tired. “What a waste of a day,” said Ishvar. “We could have stitched six dresses. Thirty rupees lost.”

“And how much hair I would have collected by now.”

“Maybe I should visit Dinabai when we get back,” said Ishvar. “Just to explain. Promise her we’ll come tomorrow.”

Two hours later, the bus stopped in unfamiliar surroundings. The driver ordered everyone off. He had his instructions, he said. As a precaution, he rolled up his window and locked himself in the cabin.

The hutment dwellers rattled the door, spat on it, kicked the sides a few times. “You indecent people!” shouted the driver. “Damaging public property!”

A few more blows were rained on the bus before the crowd moved on. Ishvar and Om had no idea where they were, but Rajaram knew the way. There was thunder, and it began raining again. They walked for an hour. It was night in the slum when they arrived.

“Let’s eat something quickly,” said Ishvar. “Then I’ll go and pacify Dinabai.”

While he pumped up the Primus stove and struck a match, the darkness was torn to shreds by a terrifying shriek. It seemed neither human nor animal. The tailors grabbed their hurricane-lamp and ran with Rajaram towards the noise, towards Monkey-man.

They found him behind his shack, trying to strangle his dog. Tikka was on his side, his eyes bulging, with Monkey-man’s knees upon him. The dog’s legs pawed the air, seeking a purchase to help him flee the inexplicable pain around his neck.

Monkey-man’s fingers squeezed harder. His insane screams mingled with Tikka’s fearful howling. The terrible harmony of human and animal cries continued to rend the night.

Ishvar and Rajaram succeeded in prying loose Monkey-man’s fingers. Tikka struggled to stand. He did not run, waiting faithfully nearby, coughing, pawing at his face. Monkey-man tried to grab him again but was foiled by others who had gathered.

“Calm down,” said Rajaram. “Tell us what’s wrong.”

“Laila and Majnoo!” he wept, pointing to the shack, unable to explain. He tried to lure back the dog, making kissing sounds. “Tikka, Tikka, come my Tikka!”

Seeking pardon, the beast approached trustingly. Monkey-man got in a kick to his ribs before the others pulled him back. They raised the lantern and looked inside the shack.

The hissing light fell on the walls, then found the floor. They saw the monkeys’ corpses lying in a corner. Laila and Majnoo’s long brown tails, exuberant in life, seemed strangely shrunken. Like frayed old rope, the tails draggled on the earthen floor. One of the creatures had been partially eaten, the viscera hanging out, dark brown and stringy.

“Hai Ram,” said Ishvar, covering his mouth. “What a tragedy.”

“Let me look,” said someone trying to push through the crowd.

It was the old woman who had shared her water with Om on the first day, when the tap was dry. The harmonium player said she should be let through immediately, she could read entrails as fluently as a swami could read the Bhagavad Gita.

The crowd parted, and the old woman entered. She asked that the lantern be brought closer. With her foot she nudged the corpse till the entrails were better exposed. Bending, she stirred in them with a twig.

“The loss of two monkeys is not the worst loss he will suffer,” she pronounced. “The murder of the dog is not the worst murder he will commit.”

“But the dog,” started Rajaram, “we saved him, he is –”

“The murder of the dog is not the worst murder he will commit,” she repeated with grim forcefulness, and left. Her audience shrugged, assuming that the old woman, despite her fierce demeanour, was a little disoriented and upset by the event.

“I’ll kill him!” Monkey-man began wailing again. “My babies are dead! I’ll kill that shameless dog!”

Someone led Tikka to safety while others tried to talk sense into Monkey-man. “The dog is a dumb animal. When animals get hungry, they want to eat. What’s the point of killing him? It’s your fault for locking them in together.”

“He played with them like brother and sister,” he wept. “All three were like my children. And now this. I’ll kill him.”

Ishvar and Rajaram led Monkey-man away from his shack. Comforting him would be easier if the gory little bodies were out of sight. They entered Rajaram’s shack, then quickly marched out again. The bundles of hair all over the place, like macabre hairy little corpses, were not something Monkey-man could tolerate in his present condition. So they went into the tailors’ shack, and gave him a drink of water. He sat with the glass in his hands, whimpering, shaking, muttering to himself.

Ishvar decided that dropping in on Dinabai now was out of the question, it was too late. “What a day it’s been,” he whispered to Om. “We’ll explain to her tomorrow.”

They stayed with Monkey-man past midnight, letting him grieve for as long as he liked. A burial was planned for Laila and Majnoo, and they convinced him to forgive the dog. The question of livelihood was raised by Rajaram: “How long will it take you to train new monkeys?”

“They were my friends – my children! I don’t want any talk of replacing them!”

He was silent for a while, then, oddly enough, broached the subject himself. “I have other talents, you know. Gymnastics, tightrope walking, juggling, balancing. A new act without monkeys is possible. I’ll think later about what to do. First, I must finish mourning.”

D
ina displayed her displeasure when Maneck returned late from college. And this on his very first day, she thought. Nobody believed in punctuality anymore. Perhaps Mrs. Gupta was right, the Emergency wasn’t such a bad thing if it taught people to observe the time.

“Your tea was ready over an hour ago,” she said, pouring him a cup and buttering a slice of Britannia Bread. “What kept you?”

“Sorry, Aunty. Very long wait at the bus stop. I was late for class in the morning as well. Everybody is grumbling that the buses seem to have disappeared from the road.”

“People are always grumbling.”

“The tailors – they finished work already?”

“They didn’t come at all.”

“What happened?”

“If I knew, would I look so worried? Coming late is like a religion for them, but it’s the first time they’ve been absent for the whole day.”

Maneck bolted the tea and went to his room. Kicking off his shoes, he sniffed the socks – a slight smell – and put on his slippers. There were some boxes left to unpack. Might as well do it now. Clothes, towels, toothpaste, soap went into the cupboard. A nice odour came from the shelf. He breathed deeply: reminded of Dina Aunty, she was lovely – beautiful hair, kind face.

The unpacking finished, he was at a loss for things to do. The umbrella hanging from the cupboard caught his eye. He opened it, admired the pagoda shape, and pictured Dina Aunty walking down the street with it. Like the women at the racecourse in
My Fair Lady
. She looked much younger than Mummy, though Mummy had written they were the same age, forty-two this year. And that she had had a hard life, many misfortunes, her husband dying young, so Maneck was to be kind to her even if she was difficult to get along with.

That would explain Dina Aunty’s tone, he thought, the hard life. The way she talked, her voice sounding old, having endured a vast range of weather. Her words always sharp – the words of a tired, cynical person. He wished he could cheer her up, make her laugh once in a while.

The little room was getting on his nerves. What a bore this was, and the rest of the academic year was going to just drag on and on. He picked up a book, flipped through it, tossed it back on the desk. The chessmen. He arranged the board and made a few mechanical moves. For him, the joy had seeped out of the plastic shapes. He tumbled them back into the maroon box with its sliding top – from the prison of their squares into the prison of the coffin.

But he, at least, had escaped his prison, he thought, had seen the last of that bloody hostel. His only regret was not being able to say goodbye to Avinash, whose room remained locked and silent. Probably still hiding at his parents’ – it would be foolhardy to return while the Emergency regime governed the campus and people continued to disappear.

Maneck remembered the early days with him, when their friendship was new. Everything I do is chess, Avinash had once said. Now he was under a serious check. Had he castled in time, protected by three pawns and a rook? And Dina Aunty, playing against her tailors, making her moves between front room and back room. And Daddy, attempting to take on the soft-drink opponents who did not observe the rules of the game, who played draughts using chess pieces.