Show Business (23 page)

Yet when his parents have finished with him, Ashok is defiant. “Mehnaz is the woman of my heart,” he declaims. “I will not let her down.”

“Why don't you talk this over with her?” Godambo is surprisingly reasonable. “She may well prove more sensible than you. When are you seeing her next?”

“Tomorrow evening,” Ashok replies. “She was supposed to join a show in Bombay, but I persuaded her not to. Dad, I'm not sure I can live without her.”

“Don't be so sure she can't live without you,” Godambo says meaningfully.

Next scene: Godambo with our heroine, in her lower-middle-class home. Peacock-green walls, peeling ceiling, plastic-covered sofa, garish calendars of androgynous deities. “Miss Mehnaz, I enjoyed your performance at the Cultural Evening last night,” he says gutturally. “I would like to engage you for a very special occasion.”

Mehnaz is all pretty and obliging.

“You see, my son is getting married,” Godambo goes on. “And we are celebrating it in a big way, as befits an alliance between two of the city's biggest families. I would like to have an entertainment show worthy of the occasion. And I would like you to sing and dance for my son's wedding.”

“Your son?” Mehnaz asks.

“Ashok Banjara,” Godambo says with pride. “Why, do you know him?”

“And he is … getting … married?”

“Yes, to Lalaji Chhoturmal's daughter, Abha,” Godambo replies. “Ashok has liked her for a long time. You see, they were in the same school, and of course we know the family very well.”

“Of course.” Mehnaz's tone is dull.

“So—will you come for the event? Three weeks from now. I hope you are free, and I would of course be happy to double your fee on this happy occasion.”

“No,” Mehnaz says quietly. “No, I am afraid I cannot accept your invitation, Sethji. You see, I have a prior commitment in Bombay. In fact, I am leaving tonight.”

“I am most disappointed,” Godambo says, but he cannot conceal the gleam of triumph in his bulging eyes.

It is later, at dusk; Ashok is waiting at a palm grove near the beach, wearing jeans and a troubled expression. He looks at his watch, then up at the darkening sky. Studio stars twinkle at him. He sings plaintively:

Where are you, my love?
I wait for light from the stars above.
You have taken my heart
And hid it from view,
Now no one can start
To rid me of you.
Wh-e-e-re are you, my love?

There is, of course, no answer.

Song finished, and with one more futile look at his watch, Ashok leaps into his two-seater sports car and drives to Mehnaz's house. “Where is she?” he demands of her poor but dignified parents, as the calendars flap omnisciently on the walls.

“She has gone to Bombay,” replies the mother. “And she specifically told me to tell you, if you came by, that she has nothing to say to you. Except to give you this.” She puts a crumpled envelope into Ashok's hand. Out of it emerges a silver bracelet, with the image of a dancing goddess on a medallion at its clasp.

“But I gave her this,” Ashok protests in dismay.

“And she is giving it back to you,” Mehnaz's father, Ramkumar, replies. “She doesn't want it anymore.”

“I don't understand.” Ashok's eyes are hot with tears. “I don't know what's come over your daughter, but you can tell her I shall always keep this bracelet for her—till the day she comes back to me.”

“I shall tell her,” replies the kindly mother, “but she isn't coming back, Ashok. She has gone to make her career in Bombay.”

Sad, portentous music. The screen intercuts two sets of images: one of Ashok's wedding ceremony, complete with demure bride dripping with gold, sneezy guest dripping with cold, and overweight mother-in-law dripping with tears, the other of elegiac soft-focus shots showing Mehnaz in Bombay, gazing wistfully at the horizon, her sari billowing in the sea breeze, and singing the refrain of Ashok's song:

Where are you, my love?
I wait for light from the stars above.
You have taken my heart
And hid it from view,
Now no one can start
To rid me of you.
Wh-e-e-re are you, my love?

It is some years later. Ashok is seated on a dhurrie on the floor, taking music lessons from a maestro with a harmonium. “Very good,” says the maestro, Asrani, an actor seen more often in the role of stock comedian. “Now once again: sa-ri-ga-ma-pa-da-ni-sa.” He tosses his head back with a tonal flourish as he runs through the scale. “Now you.”

Ashok dutifully echoes his guru: “Sa-ri-ga-ma-pa-da-ni-sa.”

“Not bad,” says the maestro. “But there is something missing.” He taps his belly, producing a percussion note like a cork being pulled out of a bottle, and resumes. “Sa-ri-ga-ma-pa-da-ni-sa.”

Ashok also tosses his head. “Sa-ri-ga-ma-pa-da-ni-sa.”

“You're getting it,” says the maestro. “See, it's simple:

Sa, sambar,
a Southie dish,
Ri,
what the Frenchies call our rice;
Ga,
gaga, as the Bongs are about fish,
Ma,
mother, ain't her cooking nice?
Pa,
the man always served first,
Da,
daal, the food for healthy chaps,
Ni, nimbu pani
for our thirst,
and that brings us back to
sa—saag paneer
perhaps?

Ashok's brow unfurrows in comprehension. “You're hungry,” he says.

“I thought you'd never get it,” sighs the maestro. “Music may be the food of love, but the love of music requires food. Let's eat.”

As they wrap themselves around the contents of a
thali
served by uniformed menials, Ashok asks the maestro how good he really is. “Really, not bad at all,” replies his instructor, professionally noncommittal. “What made you want to take up singing?”

The camera lingers in close-up on Ashok's poignantly inexpressive face. “A friend left me once, some years ago,” he says, a faraway gaze in his eyes. “When she left, I felt she had taken the music out of my life. I decided to replace her somehow within myself.”

”Wah, wah,”
responds Asrani heartily. It is not clear whether his appreciation is for the sentiment or the food.

There follow a couple of scenes that establish Ashok in conventional domesticity: scenes involving his dutiful wife and beautiful children. (Note: to be fleshed out if Mr. Banjara accepts the role.) Meanwhile, Mehnaz goes from success to success. She is shown dancing in overflowing halls to standing ovations, receiving prizes and awards, and being featured on posters and in neon lights. (Note: at least one very good song here showing Ms. Elahi dancing, with five costume changes to mark her progress and establish different occasions.)

In some scenes Mehnaz is accompanied by her manager, Pranay, an energetic operator who is seen organizing backstage, berating auditorium managers, arranging for Mehnaz to be garlanded. One day, as Mehnaz emerges fresh from a stage triumph, Pranay clasps her in a joyous embrace. “Wonderful!” he exclaims. “I say, Mehnaz, why don't you and I do something?”

“What?” she asks innocently.

“Get married.”

Mehnaz averts her exquisite face so only the camera can see the pain in her eyes. “I am sorry, Pranay, but I cannot.”

“Why not? Do you have a better friend than me in the whole world?”

“No, of course not, Pranay,” says Mehnaz. “You're a wonderful friend, and a great manager. It's not you. I shall never marry—anybody.”

Pranay is bewildered. “But why?” “I gave my heart once to a man, many years ago,” she says. “I cannot love anyone else ever again.” “Who is this man?” asks Pranay angrily.

Mehnaz does not answer. But in the very next scene the man in question is about to give his first public performance as a singer. And he is introduced fulsomely to a large audience by none other than his own father, Old Mr. Anti-Entertainers himself, Seth Godambo.

“As you know, my son's profession is business,” Godambo orates. “And in this domain he has worked with me to create a place for himself in this community as an upstanding citizen. But what is not so widely known is that he also has a musical soul. And he has kindly agreed today, under the able guidance and instruction of Pandit Asrani”—the maestro, his mouth full of
paan,
takes an affable bow— “to sing for you today, all in the cause of charity, of course.” Godambo nods, and on cue, the extras break into thunderous applause.

His aesthetic inclinations thus rendered respectable, Ashok launches into his lament:

Where are you, my love?
I wait for light from the stars above.
You have taken my heart
And hid it from view,
They have kept us apart
And rid me of you.
Wh-e-e-re are you, my love?

Where she is, is right there, for, unnoticed by the singer, Mehnaz Elahi has slipped into the audience, and she listens to him sing with tears glistening in her eyes.

The show is over, and Ashok is standing, palms joined in respectful
namaskar,
as a succession of elders and strangers congratulate him on his performance. Abha and Godambo are in another part of the hall, conversing animatedly. Suddenly the look of distant politeness on Ashok's face vanishes as a soft voice cuts through the hubbub near him. “You sang beautifully, Ashok.” Our hero looks up in shock at Mehnaz standing among the throng, which considerately melts away.

“You! What are you doing here?”

“I'm supposed to be dancing on this stage tomorrow,” she says. (Note: perhaps we ought to give her a stage name as well, to explain why Ashok hasn't heard of her coming.) “I got here early and thought I would look at the auditorium. And I heard you.”

Their eyes meet, and it is obvious even to the villagers in the twenty-five-paisa seats that nothing has changed between them. “Why did you leave me that day, without even a word?” he asks urgently. “Because you were getting married to someone your parents had arranged and you didn't even tell me,” Mehnaz replies. “Me? But—that's not true!” Ashok exclaims. “You mean you're not married?” she asks. “To Lala Chhoturmal's daughter?” Ashok admits he is, “but only because you left me …”

Before they can go much further, Abha calls, “Ashok?” She walks up to them. “Ashok, some people there are waiting to see you, friends of Daddy's,” she announces. “Come along now.” There is time for the women to exchange a formal
namaskar
before Abha drags her husband away. Mehnaz stares after them for a long moment, then turns and leaves.

The next evening: another Mehnaz dance, another song with a familiar echo:

My heart beats for you,
I'd perform feats for you,
You are the landlord of my soul;
My eyes light for you,
I'd gladly fight for you,
Without you I don't feel whole.

At the end, as the rapturous audience files out, Ashok battles his way backstage. Mehnaz is in her dressing room removing an earring when Ashok enters and shuts the door behind him. “You dropped a piece of jewelry, Mehnazji,” he says quietly. He stretches out his hand; in it sparkles the silver bracelet with the dancing goddess rampant at the clasp.

Mehnaz looks at it for a long time, her hands frozen in their earlier position at her earlobe. “So you really did keep it for me,” she says at last.

“All these years,” breathes Ashok.

She reaches out a hand to take it from him, and his own closes on hers.

“Mehnaz, I have waited so long for you.”

She doesn't move. “You haven't waited,” she says. “You're a married man.”

“That—that was for my parents,” Ashok pleads. “For society. Besides, you had left me. What could I do?”

“I only left you when I learned about your marriage,” she says.

“That couldn't be,” Ashok responds. Then it strikes him. “Who told you I was getting married?”

“Your father, of course,” replies Mehnaz. “Wasn't it you who sent him to me …?”

And then, as the enormity of the deception, and of their own mistakes, dawns on them, explanations give way to a clinging embrace. Mehnaz tries to resist, but Ashok is insistent. “So many wasted years to make up for,” he says. She succumbs, and as they fall upon the bed the camera focuses on the ceiling fan whirring rhythmically above.

The next few scenes show the progress of the relationship, including one more flowery song in a rose garden. But gardens are public places, and their chlorophyllous clinch is seen by Pranay, who grits his teeth in jealous fury. “Can't give her love to any man, huh?” he snarls. “We'll see about that.”

It is evening at Ashok's home. Abha confronts him quietly, with all the deference of the traditional Hindu wife. “You are not home very often these days, my husband,” she says. “Daddy says you are not at the office much either. Is something the matter, Ashok?”

“It doesn't concern you,” Ashok replies disingenuously.

“I believe it does,” Abha insists. “It is that dancing girl, isn't it? You've been seeing her.”

“Who told you that?”

“Does it matter? But it
is
true.” Abha sobs.

“Look, Abha, I don't mean to hurt you. But this is a woman to whom I gave my heart before I married you.”

“I am the woman to whom you gave your vow. What about me and our child? If your heart was already pledged, you had no right to plight it to me.”

“I'm sorry,” Ashok says, looking it.

“This came for you today.” Abha extends a scrap of paper. “Oh, Ashok, please stop what you're doing. I'm frightened.”

On the paper, in a minatory scrawl, are the words “KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF MY WOMAN OR YOU'RE A DEAD MAN.”

“There must be some mistake,” Ashok says. “Mehnaz has no one else.”

“Oh, Ashok, please stop it,” Abha pleads tearfully. “Promise me you won't see her again.”

“I can't.” Ashok looks miserable. “I'm sorry.” And two faces, one tear-stained, the other anguished, stare devastated into the camera.