Miss Timmins' School for Girls (27 page)

“But Ayi forgave him,” I told them.

“But that was Shalini's mistake. Always forgive and move on. But you can tell that she did not forget. She should have left him right away. I went and told her, before she left for Indore. Dada said this could be her home, and yours.”

I saw how we might have been, my ayi and me, staying on the edges of the big house, the daughter, and the daughter of the daughter, of a failed marriage. I would have to be subservient to my cousins, and Ayi would have to peel the potatoes in the evening as the Bhabhis fried bhajiyas.

“I am glad she did not,” I burst out. “I am glad I did not have to grow up in this cruel place.”

“Let her be,” I heard a Bhabhi say as I stormed off. “Naturally, she is upset. Poor girl.”

I walked towards the little market at the end of the road, my blood curdling at the thought of this wizened man, my own father, consorting with flabby women and prostitutes while my mother waited at home with me.

My Bombay father was always going somewhere. I remembered the house, dark and full of shadows in the evening, lit only by the kitchen tubelight and the dim light of a table lamp beside the sofa in the bedroom where my mother waited for her husband to come home for dinner, the picture of wifely duty. He often arrived after nine. She would not eat until he did, and so she was always in a bad mood. Or at least that is what I thought then, because Baba would put me on his knee and say, “You must tell your mother. A modern woman does not need to wait for her husband. She should take a half-hour nap in the afternoon and eat dinner with you. That way she can be rested and happy when I come home.” He would say this loudly, while my mother sat in a huff on the sofa in the drawing room, where the lights were now bright. Sometimes she refused to eat and would go to bed in tears. Sometimes I could hear Baba shouting from the bedroom. In contrast, the Indore house was always calm, at least on the surface.

There was only one photograph from my parents' wedding, a black-and-white image of them going around the fire. She is leading, looking down, tense, smothered in garlands and jewels. It is Baba behind her who shines, his face beaming like the sun, confident, radiant.

I saw the sailor tall and lean, his white hat on the nightstand as he dallied with the Admiral's wife. Deep, delicious afternoons of desire. Like Pin and me. But instead of Pin, I suddenly saw Merch, of the lean and lanky body.

I understood then. Growing up, I modeled myself after Ayi. I would be like her—once the blot was gone—wise and graceful and as ordered as the inner drawer. But in actual fact, it was Baba and I, we were the ones cut from the same silk cloth. Given to the temptations of the flesh. Wanting more than was put on the plate.

I must have walked for an hour. The outside of the walk is a blur. I remember staring at a display of push-up bras, I remember wandering around the field across the street, where the madwoman who was said to have lost her son in a bullock-cart tragedy ranted. But the inside of the walk has stayed with me to this day. I felt that my mother was with me. She told me all the things she wanted to say to me that night. Courage, she said. Be braver than me. Be stronger than me. Be happier than me. Of course, she did not say be more beautiful than me, since that would never be possible.

I did not wait for the family carpool to gather, but took a rickshaw to the hospital, and found my father alone in the room, napping on the armchair beside her bed.

He looked grave and distant, like a minor manager in a transport company. We walked around the large playing field near the hospital. It was filled with brisk evening walkers and game-playing boys shouting “Out!” The word echoed in my mind until it found its logical place.

“We must get Ayi out of here,” I said. “We must take her back to Indore.” After all, we knew that people could stay in comas for years, and then suddenly come out and lead perfectly normal lives. The household was abuzz with case histories and stray stories of a similar nature.

“She should be with us, yes,” said Baba.

“Let us have no truck with them. No truck with the Chitnis family,” I said, and burst into a semi-hysterical giggle. Baba looked at me with concern, and then finally cracked a smile.

We were walking on a narrow road lined by bougainvillea falling over bungalow walls. “I have been thinking the same thing, Charu, but I was not thinking of bringing it up so soon. But you are absolutely right. No more trucks, as you so rightly put it.”

I wondered if he guessed that I was in possession of the whole truth, such as it was. Not tragic, not magic, not epic. An affair and an allegation, and he had taken us into hiding.

School was to start in two days. I had not given my resignation, but planned to go up to Panchgani and inform them that due to family duties I could no longer teach. I also planned to tell the Woggle what I had seen on table-land.

We made plans to take Ayi to Indore by ambulance. We would bring a hospital ayah with us to take care of her until we could find someone local. As I said these things, I imagined myself bowed and thin in the morning, getting Ayi ready, cooking breakfast for Baba, and then going to some teaching job, my blob as big as my face.

Baba knew my thoughts.

“Charu, I will take her back,” he said to me in Marathi. Then he cleared his throat and went back to English. “You go back to your school. That is your duty now. I am sure your mother would agree.”

I looked down at my hands, folded on my lap. As much as I wanted to go back to Panchgani, I was afraid. I could go back to playing chess with Baba. And after a while, marry a thirty-five-year-old Maharashtrian Brahmin whose wife had died in childbirth and left a baby with a hole in her heart.

“It is time for us to let you go,” said Baba, in a “this is final” voice. I saw him, Ayi at his side with jasmine in her hair, the two of them gently placing a paper boat into a gushing brown river and then turning around and walking away.

“I will come with you and settle her in, and then go back to the school. I will go tomorrow and tell Miss Wilson,” I said.

“No,” said Baba firmly, and he was not so often firm. “I can look after her very well. I will take her alone. Of course you will come and stay with us when you can get away from your work. There will always be a home for you with us. But now you should go and make your life.” And then he paused and patted my back. “Make a good life, Charu. Make your ayi proud.”

And so Ayi Baba left for Indore, and I decided to go back to Panchgani for the winter term.

The next day, the
Times of India
reported that Miss Shirley Nelson had refused counsel in the matter of the murder of her blood child, and had neither denied nor admitted her guilt.

Because of her failure to deny the act, a guilty plea has been entered on her behalf for the murder of her daughter, Moira Prince, by the Additional Magistrate of Satara. She will be tried in the High Court there. The court will appoint counsel for her if none is retained by the accused party.

“I will put myself into the hands of my God,” she was quoted as saying in all four of the newspapers I read.

Twenty-seven

Winter Term

O
n the first day of winter term, it was October 1, a Tuesday, I remember, a group of Panchgani schoolboys told their master they saw the teacher with the mark coming down from table-land—“Looking, don't know, just weird”—on the night of the murder. The master, Mr. Samuel, spoke of it to his girlfriend, Malti Innis—“The boys said she looked sort of crazy”—who knew it was her bounden duty to tell the acting principal Miss Wilson, who in turn informed Inspector Wagle.

Inspector Wagle interrogated the boys in disbelief. “What were you doing there? Can you describe her in detail? Do you know exactly at what time? Are you sure it was her? Are you sure it was her?”

But the boys were firm. They saw the teacher with the mark on her face running down from table-land. They had just turned the corner from the park. They said it was sometime between twelve and one. Yes, they were breaking the rules, they were doing a wrong thing, but still, they did see her. Why would they make it up? They were as shocked as the inspector himself. Why didn't he just ask her? They shrugged and left, not really caring, in the end.

On the third day of the winter term, I was summoned by Inspector Wagle and questioned about my activities on the night of August 27, 1974. I was called into his office in the two-room police station.

It was the Prince in me that said no.

It was as if Pin had died and left me her eyes. Suddenly, sometimes, I was beginning to glimpse the world through the eyes of my first love.

The Princely eye cut deeper than the wry Charu eye.
Just tell the inspector you were not even on table-land that night. That's what he wants to hear anyway. Just walk away and let her fry for it. She deserves it. Who would treat their own daughter like that? Evil bitch.

“They are just schoolboys,” I said, looking the Woggle full in the eye. “And it was a monsoon night.” I knew it was my word against theirs. I had not lied yet. I had only castled first, as Baba always said I should. Shored up my position.

The Woggle looked happy and relieved at my implied challenge of the boys' observations.

“And they had gone to purchase illicit liquor. They might have been inebriated. Will not stand,” he said, nodding energetically. His hearty inspector smile—the “it is all under control now” smile—returned to his fat face.

He dropped his voice a little, so I would understand he was making an off-the-record remark. “It is their own white matter,” he said. “We should not poke our heads into it.”

“Far white,” I could not resist replying, tilting my head with a winning smile.

He looked up at me, his plump face puzzled. He was wearing a military-green long-sleeved pullover with his khakis. I could not see how it stretched over his stomach because I was seated across his massive desk in the center of his office. The detention cell was next door.

“When we heard that you were often with that strange boy Merch and his lot, I told Janaki, this will not bode well for Charu. She is too innocent. They are wastrels, or worse.”

I concentrated on a blot of red paan spit on a corner of the whitewashed wall behind his desk.

Woggle had begun to connect the dots. He had drawn a line from Merch and the hippies to me. The line would soon lead to the Prince.

And then, like my father, I would spend my whole life hiding from people who knew. All those who knew the truth. The truth that I had been up on table-land on the night of the murder, and the truth that I had lied about it. Then they would look at me and say, she did it, she had an affair with the white woman and then pushed her down the cliff. A sleazy, slinking type of life. I would walk with a bent head, like Baba.

The blot on the wall became the blot on my face, which became the blot on my world. I felt the cold terrazzo tiles as I sat on the floor of the Indore house, reciting my tables.

“Yes,” I said, “I was on table-land on the night of August twenty-seventh.”

Although I sometimes used to dream of becoming a lawyer, my only contact with the criminal or legal world was from movies. That moment I had an image of a lady lawyer who wore a gown and wig and said, ‘Yes, milord.” I wondered if I should say I wanted a lawyer. But that would make me guilty.

I decided to charge in with Tai's Sword of Innocence instead.

“I did go up to table-land that night, but I saw no one there. So I came down.” Then I remembered that the boys said they had seen me wild and muttering. “I mean, I walked down,” I added, for dignity.

“What would you say was the exact duration of your time on table-land?” said the Woggle gruffly, avoiding my eyes.

I found the “would you say” part a bit ominous. Next thing I knew, I could be in the detention room next door. I imagined myself in a Western, calling my father from a telephone horn in the sheriff's office.

Nelson had her God to help her. I must wield my own weapon. I polished my Sword of Innocence. I knew I had a better chance of finding the truth and freeing Nelson than the clueless Woggle.

“Moira Prince came to see me the night of her death,” I said. “She said she had come to know something terrible beyond imagination. She did not tell me what it was. She was very disturbed. She said she was planning to go to table-land and jump off the edge. I calmed her down, and then she left. I did not know anything about the letter. After she left, I attempted to sleep. I fell into a shallow sleep, but I dreamt that she was jumping off the cliff. I awoke with a start, hurriedly put on my raincoat and rushed to table-land. I walked around near the edge and saw nothing. So I left. Then I had to rush to Kolhapur because of my mother.”

“And at what time would you say you were on table-land? And for how long?”

“I ran up in a hurry and forgot to wear my watch,” I said, and this, at least, was absolutely true. I had gone up in nothing but the raincoat. “I was up for I think about half an hour, maybe forty-five minutes. I started near the lake and walked around it, though not to the far side. I did not go right to the edge, since it was slippery and I am afraid of heights. I kept to the borders, looking for her.”

“And you saw nothing?”

“I saw nothing,” I said firmly.

“Would you estimate that you were on table-land between twelve and twelve-thirty?”

I did not know what time I had turned and walked back. The autopsy estimated Moira Prince's death to have occurred between 12 and 2 a.m. And the girls had reported seeing both Nelson and Prince alive near midnight. The boys saw neither the girls, nor Nelson coming down. The boys saw me. That made sense, since I was the last person to come down. I could have come down by one.

Pin must have jumped as soon as I left.

“So would you say you were on table-land between twelve and twelve-thirty?” said the Woggle again, showing that he was a man who wanted to do his duty, however unpleasant it might be.

“I know it was later, because I fell into a sleep after Miss Prince left my room. I do not know how long I slept. The bazaar was dark when I walked up. It must have been past midnight,” I said.

“So you would say that you were up on table-land between twelve and one?” persisted the Woggle.

“Or it might even have been between one and two,” I said.

“You will have to make an official statement,” he said in a firm but kind voice. “And did you go up to the needle?”

“No,” I said, “I did not go right up to the needle.”

I had not gone up to the needle. If I had gone to the needle, I would have walked down with Pin, and she would still be her wild self. I wanted to fall to the ground and rend my clothes and tear my hair and shout woe is me.

The Woggle harrumphed in embarrassment. “You should have informed me of your actions earlier,” he said.

I could end up in the hospital room in Vai beside Nelson. Day after day, she would sit upright and read
The Pilgrim's Progress
, and I would curl up in my nightie and read Harold Robbins, and soon I would end up in jail for the rest of my life.

“I was delayed due to a family emergency,” I said. “Since I did not see anyone up there at all, I thought it could wait a few days. You see, my mother was in a coma, critical condition.” My voice did genuinely wobble as I said this.

“So sorry to hear,” said Inspector Woggle gravely, but he did not invite me to dinner, or even to tea, he just shook his head—regret or disbelief, I did not know which.

He called Mr. Kirloskar, the typist from the bank next door, to type out my statement and be the witness. “Since you did not see anything of importance, perhaps it will not be necessary for you to be a witness,” the Woggle said. “Will depend on the lawyer. However, you need to inform us of your whereabouts if you leave Panchgani to attend to family matters.” He spoke without looking directly at me.

“Due to the circumstances—you know we cannot keep that white woman in a hospital for too long—the proceedings will be speeded up. The first court date has been set for December first,” he informed me.

I had two months to get to the truth. Miss Nelson might fancy martyrdom, but I wanted to know the truth. For Pin's sake, and for mine.

A
s soon as I entered the green iron gates of the school, I was asked to see Miss Wilson. Miss Wilson called me into her office, which was the same as Miss Nelson's office, though it felt suddenly less cold and hushed, but that could have been because the rain had stopped and tourist couples in bright sweaters were buying chappals and channa in the bazaar.

“Don't you think it would be better, Miss Apte, if you did—um—not teach for a while?” said Miss Wilson patting her straggly curls nervously. “I think your heart is not in it at this time.” I am fated, I thought with her pointed collar in front of me, I am fated to sit across the table from white women and be told frightening things.

Then I surveyed the scene with a Princely eye and thought, No, she cannot really frighten me. The worst has happened already.

I could not bear to be in the school anymore. Miss Henderson looked past me, rearing her head and sniffing like a nervous filly. I would have been glad to obey Willy, to never come back to the school again. But I could not.

It was an affair and an allegation that had felled my father. It was the same for me, though my affair could be argued to be more illicit than his, and my accusation could be murder instead of shampoo and underwire bras. I was at the crossroads, and my father was pointing the way. He had retreated, so I could not.

“I think I should finish
Macbeth
with the tens, Miss Wilson,” I said earnestly, showing a concern for the unformed minds that I most definitely did not possess. “It will not be fair if I do not finish it for them. After all, it is for their I.S.C. exams.”

“Oh, please, don't worry about that, Miss Apte. Miss McCall said she would rather like to try her hand at
Macbeth
. A perfect fit, don't you think?”

Was she saying my teaching was of a lesser quality because I was not white?

She saw I was distressed and blushed, and began to explain. “Oh, you taught it most wonderfully from everything I gather. I hear the girls quoting
Macbeth
. You did most certainly capture their imaginations. I only meant, you know, it is after all about Scotland, and Miss McCall is Scottish. Grew up where it takes place, that sort of thing. Nothing personal at all.”

On a personal level I would have loved to loll around with the hippies and do drugs all day and all night, instead of just all night, which is what I was doing now. But I knew the mystery was in the school, and so that was where I must stay.

And they had lost a lot of teachers.

“You must be so shorthanded now, with three teachers gone. Are you sure you don't need a stopgap Hindi teacher?” I asked. The disappearance of the Hindi teacher was another mystery, connected, surely, to the first one.

“Oh, don't worry, we are all pitching in,” she said with a forced jollity, as though they were all filling up a hole in the hockey pitch.

“Mrs. Paranjpe has offered to teach Hindi to the seniors.” Mrs. Paranjpe was Maharashtrian Christian, a combination I had never come across before, a short and stout woman who chewed paan. She lived somewhere below the bazaar and taught Marathi and, for a brief time, French, until an entire class failed French in the I.S.C., and French was struck off the list of offered languages.

Rumor had it that her husband, who never missed the gymnastics competition and loved to leer at lithe young bodies, had offered to teach sports “in lieu of the demised teacher,” he had added smirking. Miss Wilson had refused.

But now, with me gone, there would be a fourth teacher missing, and I could see Miss Wilson waver in her resolve. She considered me thoughtfully and gravely: I might be as innocent as I looked after all.

“I went to Hindi medium school for some years,” I added to strengthen my case, and it was true, I had when we first moved to Indore. Baba had started talking to me in English, so I could “keep up with the language.” It became a habit, and now we always spoke English with each other, and Marathi with Ayi.

“Well,” said Willy after a long pause. “Thank you, yes, it would be quite helpful. You could teach Hindi to the fives, sixes, and sevens. Let me see.”

She got up and walked to a large chart on the wall. A complex chart in three colors, dotted with gleaming bronze drawing pins. Teachers cross-referenced with subjects and classes. She began to shift the drawing pins around, then stand back and rub her chin and stare, and then go back and change a few more, like a general moving armies. I wondered if she was old enough to have been a Wren in the war.

“We could switch their classes around so they are back-to-back,” she said. “And sometimes we could do two grades together. You could read a story or have a debate. Something like that might be quite interesting for them. I think we could do it by having you come in for a few hours, let us see.” She again rearranged the drawing pins. “Yes, we could do Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. From ten to twelve-thirty. Would that be convenient?”