Miss Timmins' School for Girls (24 page)

Twenty-four

Foreign Dispatches

K
aka's was not a nice place for young lady teachers. It was the cheapest restaurant in Panchgani. The main dining room was noisy with the clanking of plates and pots and waiters shouting orders to the kitchen. Farmers from the valley in white cloth caps, mochis in dhotis, and peons in khaki pants sat sipping chai under the watchful glare of the owner, Kaka.
Ladys and familys up the stairs
, said the sign above the cash counter. The upstairs waiter, a cheeky child with a grimy napkin slung over his shoulder, shouted our order to the downstairs waiter. Merch had barely lit his cigarette when two steaming plates of bright yellow dal fry were smartly slapped down before us.

As always, I forgot about the blot when I was facing him.

“I wish I could just run away,” I said to him.

The mist drifted in through the open window and swirled around us. We could not see the street below, only faint blurs of yellow and blue raincoats gliding by.

Merch was swiping the last of his dal neatly with a piece of pau bread. He was a gentlemanly eater, slow and methodical. He finished his bite, and then sat back and drank half his glass of water.

“We
could
go across the Sahara, you know,” he said, a shy smile lighting his eyes, “but it would have to be in a pink car. With green stars.”

I had come in from Kolhapur that morning. I had planned to go directly to school from the bus stop. But instead I had found myself walking towards Merch's room. The rain was coming down in a steady drizzle. A white cloud of mist hung over the town so that I felt I was wandering alone in the world. I was glad, because I did not want to run into anyone just yet.

Merch's door was bolted from the outside, and so I waited under the tree, staring into space, thinking of nothing. I waited for a drop of rain to trickle down my nose, and caught it with my tongue. Finally, he came walking up the lane, in jeans and the usual rust sweater, a large black umbrella mushrooming above him. I realized that he never wore a raincoat.

“Aha,” he said with an excited laugh. “Charu on a weekday.”

I followed Merch demurely up the stairs and held his books while he pulled the squeaky bolt from the door. Snakes of memories slid out from every corner, wound themselves around my ankles. How could I enter the room when I could still see her lounging on the bed? I saw “our” counterpane spread out on his bed and felt a red flush of shame spread up to the roots of my hair. I wondered if he had washed it before he had spread it. I wondered if he knew.

The Prince and I had started taking an unused counterpane kept in Merch's bottom drawer and spreading it over the bed before we made love. His room had dusty corners, but his cupboard was neat, everything ironed and piled in the right categories, down to the socks and hankies. I felt guilty, opening his cupboard and going through his things.

“Let's not do this, Pin,” I said. “He might not like it.”

“Do you think he will like our female discharges across his clean sheets then?” she asked, mocking. She knew I recoiled from brass tacks. “Maybe he would,” she said, laughing. “With Merch, you never know. And anyway, can you imagine him ever being angry with you?” I could not.

“He may be the Mystery Man, but once he loves you, you can do anything. He'll always understand,” Pin assured me.

“So you think he loves me?” I was surprised. But once she said it, I knew it to be true.

“But aren't you the princess?” she asked. She seemed to think I should know it.

“And you, doesn't he love you too?” I said to her, for I myself was sure of it.

“I suppose you could say he does. But I am such a Scorpio. I bite people I love.”

I saw a demon pop out of her head and pause above her curls, but then it passed, and she bared her teeth, lunged at my shoulder, and bit it, holding my naked arms pinned against my breast. “And I eat them all up before dinner,” she said, continuing the nibble up the ridge of my shoulder all the way down the collarbone.

And so we always made love on the faded green counterpane smelling of soap. Before we left the room, we would fold it and put it back in the same spot, under the clean sheets and towels.

It was hard for me to step over the threshold, and perhaps he sensed it. “Coming to Kaka's for lunch?” he asked. “They make the best dal fry in Satara District.” He left his books on the table, and we floated back down into the mist.

Those first days were so raw we walked on eggshells towards each other.

I had come to Panchgani planning to pull Nelson from the gallows. I planned to tell someone—anyone, perhaps Wilson, maybe even the Woggle—that I had seen Nelson leave table-land while Pin was still alive, but I was unclear about who, what, and how, and not willing to think clearly on the consequences this would have for me.

But I allowed the heavy mantle of responsibility to blow off my shoulders as I sat atop the world with Merch. We decided to go on a bilingual journey. Every word and phrase we said would mean something in two languages at the same time. We laid out our phrases like a road map: far white luggage, we could say, after hey bug. What lovely, we could exclaim after we passed paddy fields. And if by chance there was an accident, we could say “tout le monde” (which means “broken head” in Marathi).

“Prepare the car,” I told him gaily as I gathered up my things. “We will depart at dusk.”

“First stop, Casablanca,” Merch called after me as I climbed down the steep stairs and walked to school alone.

There were three Ambassador cars parked in the school compound. Fathers and mothers and ayahs holding baby brothers were milling around.

I came upon Miss Wilson leading a plump dark man in his forties out of the Principal's office.

“Oh, how nice to see you, Miss Apte,” said Miss Wilson. “I do hope your mother is better.”

She turned and introduced me to the man. “Mr. Bhansali, meet Miss Apte, a new teacher. She has been teaching English and English literature to Nandita this past term.”

Mr. Bhansali held out his hand, and when I tentatively offered mine, he pumped it with purpose. The school was pale and shrunken around his vigorous male presence.

“Nandita has a gift for language,” I said, feeling I needed to enter the conversation.

“Thank you. She will be pleased you said that. She thinks very highly of you,” he said, and then turned to Miss Wilson.

“And please, do let me know if there is anything more I can do. I have complete confidence in Miss Nelson, and in all of you,” he said, his voice smooth and reassuring. “As I told you, I can use my contacts if necessary.” His smile was measured, like his daughter's.

“I will stop by the police chowki and speak to the inspector and will bring Nandita back for questioning,” he said. “But of course, that may not be necessary.” And then he winked at her. Miss Wilson, quite unused to being winked at by grown men, flushed and let out a nervous giggle.

The school was as chaotic as a beehive without a queen. Grave groups of parents were being escorted down the stairs and through the corridors and dorms by white teachers with red faces and brown teachers with white faces. They were fielding anxious queries with terse, tense statements. The girls, unbound, were squealing and jumping between them, tearing around the school in urgent, excited tangents.

I had pictured myself receiving the school news from Miss Henderson with the comfort of tea and Shrewsbury. But when I peeped into her dorm, I saw that she was otherwise engaged. I caught sight of her face as she was placating a father. He wore a white bush-shirt with blue diamonds embroidered down the sides. His black hair was gleaming and as polished as his shoes.

“I put my daughters here because I want them to get good convent education. Speak good English, you know. But we have to live in this society. I cannot have them exposed to scandals,” he said, gesticulating with both hands, truculent as a turtle.

“Mr. Shah,” said Miss Henderson severely. “We are not a convent here. You should know that, with three daughters here. We are not a Catholic school. This is a Protestant missionary school. We are not nuns, I'll have you know.”

Mr. Shah looked confused for a minute or two, but then he got his bluster back.

“These foreigners think they can come here and disrupt our ways,” he said contemptuously. He seemed to have forgotten that he himself had placed his daughters with these foreign women to learn their foreign language and culture. To his credit, he had perhaps never thought of the culture.

“We are all very upset about these events, Mr. Shah, and have tried to shield the girls. That is why we requested that you pick them up,” said Miss Henderson. Her face was puffy, her eyes swollen and red-rimmed. The corners of her lips were lifted in a strained smile.

“But of course, if you feel you have lost confidence, there are many other schools in Panchgani, you know, even a Hindu school. Perhaps your family would be more comfortable in Sanjeevan. It is behind Sandy Banks. They have holidays for Diwali and everything,” she said in the severe voice she used with girls caught whispering after lights out.

Mr. Shah was furious. “Are you trying to tell me to take my children out of your school?” he bellowed.

Poor Miss Henderson took a step back, and stuttered, “No, no, I only meant—”

Mr. Shah drew himself up. He was the same height as Miss Henderson, perhaps even a bit shorter, but he seemed to tower over her, becoming suddenly a powerful man. I saw the white side retreating across the chessboard in disarray before my very eyes.

“You
may
tell me to take my children out of the school if you want,” he said, nodding his head vigorously from side to side. “Yes, you can go ahead. Although they are very good girls, I will take them out. You can tell me that.” He paused for breath before the punch line. “But kindly refrain from telling me where I
can
or
should
put them. I would advise you not to do that. I will put them in a Hindu school or a Muslim School or a Christian School—wherever I like. But that will be my business.”

I felt it was kinder to leave Hendy then. All these men in the school. Never had there been so many men in the dorms.

I walked all the way down to the hospital and found Sister Richards sitting in her dispensary rolling cotton swabs, listening to Radio Ceylon. Sudden gusts of wind blew a patter of rain on the tin roof. I realized that the hospital was an outpost of the school, as surely as the school was an outpost of the empire. No male voices penetrated the enclave. The only sign of the chaos that reigned abroad was a red flask on the dispensary table.

“I always felt it,” Sister sniffed. “Felt there was something fishy about your precious Miss Nelson. Too saintly. I've seen the world. When you go through a war, you know a thing or two.” She eyed her flask longingly, but decided against taking a sip.

“No wonder that child acted up,” she said, twisting her lips. “With that kind of mother. Keeping her here, not telling her.”

“But Sister, Miss Prince didn't even know that Miss Nelson was her mother,” I said, trying to reason with her.

“Don't you believe that, child. She could feel the pull of her own blood,” said Sister, taking a discreet sip from her flask. “Blood always knows.”

Sister must be right. It made sense. No wonder Pin could not leave the school. No wonder she hated Nelson so much. I saw Pin bound in a lasso and dragged through the dust behind Nelson riding an irreproachable white steed. Everything seemed to be coming at me from a distance. I wanted to grab the flask and take a swig of rum and wipe my mouth with the back of my hand.

“Are you staying here now?” called Sister as I walked towards my room.

Yes, I was about to say, for that was what I had planned. But the smell of the room brought back my yesterday self. I smelled little Charu Apte, the bobbing virgin, in a tight chudidar. “No,” I shouted out in a voice whose vehemence and loudness surprised me. “No, I am just taking a few things for the holidays,” I said, more placatingly. I sat on my bed.

The room looked just the same as it had on the first day. I had done nothing to make it mine. Just makeup on the dressing table, books on the shelves, and a bright counterpane that my ayi had sent in a neatly wrapped parcel, together with a bottle of pickle that had leaked onto a corner of the counterpane. Though I sent it to the dhobi three times, the smell of methi inserted itself into the room forever after, dueling with the disinfectant and dirty socks.

Two hospitals, I thought firmly—even two hospitals is one too many. I got up with a sudden burst of energy, pulled out my black metal trunk from under the bed, and began to throw my things into it.

One might, like Clint Eastwood, prefer to die beside a fast-running river, but the truth is that all the big things happen in a cesspit of bright lights, disinfectant, and pain. You are born, you give birth, you die, all in a hospital. And furthermore, everything happens in threes. Three witches below, three gods above. The Holy Trinity; Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. The world is held aloft by the magic number three. It was fitting, then, that the season of my rebirth was a three-hospital monsoon, although I would have preferred if fate had granted me three palaces.

The first was the hospital of desire, this room, where my body first awoke to passion; the second, the hospital from which I had just left the sweet shelter of my mother and walked out into the world alone; and the third, Vai Hospital, where Miss Nelson was being kept in custody. The role of this last one is harder to know. It keeps changing still.

I swept through my room like a maniac. I threw my books, my clothes, my towels, my sheets, my photos, my letters into the trunk. Then I took down the small brown suitcase from above the cupboard and put in a few things I might need in Kolhapur. I shoved the trunk under the bed and locked it, deciding I would come back for it another day; in a week, perhaps.