The Hope Factory (27 page)

She was busy ironing, but her attention was focused on ignoring the steady, poisonous drip of Shanta’s grumbles. Kamala concentrated so hard and with such a sense of victory that when she finally looked down, the shirt was burnt. Shanta had her back to her; she hadn’t seen. Quickly, Kamala folded the shirt and thrust it to the bottom of the pile of ironed clothes.

Upstairs she scurried, before anyone could notice, and buried the burnt shirt right at the back of Anand-saar’s clothes cupboard, praying it would not be discovered until weeks later, when everyone had forgotten who had done the ironing on that particular day.

But when she heard Vidya-ma’s voice raised in anger, Kamala knew her plan had failed. The three of them in the kitchen eyed one another.

“Go,” said Shanta to Thangam.

“No,” said Thangam. “What does she want this time? You go,” she said to Kamala, who vigorously shook her head. Thangam sighed. “Coming, amma!” she called, but she had barely hidden her accounts books away when Vidya-ma burst into the kitchen. “Have I lost my voice, or have you all lost your hearing?” she cried. “I’ve been shouting and shouting! What is wrong with you all?”

Kamala expected to see the burnt shirt flying like a wartime
military banner, but no, fortunately Vidya-ma’s hands were empty; she was upset about something else. Kamala lowered her eyes prudently to the curd rice she was mixing for the grandfather.

“I simply cannot find my dupatta,” Vidya-ma said. “I have looked and looked. Where is it? Peacock blue with gold weave. Where is it?”

Kamala did not open her mouth. She had seen that dupatta just the previous day, in the ironing pile. Shanta had pulled it out and could not resist fingering it, her harsh face softened by an unusual yearning. “So pretty. This must be very expensive, no? Very expensive.” By rights, that dupatta should have gone upstairs with the other ironed clothes. It was not in the current pile of laundry either; its glorious colors were too bright to miss. Could Shanta have been tempted? She too seemed frozen where she stood, next to the stove.

“Don’t worry, amma,” said Thangam. “We will find it.”

“You’d better,” said Vidya-ma. “I’m not having my things missing, on top of everything. Find it right away!”

Kamala put the curd rice, lime pickle, and a plate on a tray and left the room; by the time she returned with the empty dishes, Thangam had smoothly produced the dupatta. “Where did you find it?” Kamala whispered, but Thangam, instead of implicating Shanta, merely said: “Under that pile of laundry, where else?” and would say no more.

Kamala knew it was useless to pursue the question. Her mind traveled, unbidden, to the Diwali party, to the end of that strange and glorious night.

It was close to the dawn. The lights were out in much of the house; Anand-saar and Vidya-ma had retired for the night. The messy aftermath of the party had been tidied. The kitchen was the only area that was still brightly lit. Kamala was spending
the night and was to sleep alongside Shanta and Thangam on a bedroll. Their work was finally done; Narayan lay fast asleep in the darkened storeroom; in a couple of hours, Kamala would rouse him and send him home. She herself would follow as soon as she could.

Kamala felt her face fold downward with fatigue, her ears buzzing, a rush of relief through her body. Thangam was inspecting the almost empty bottles of soft drinks and alcohol that lay on the kitchen table.

“Did you see him, sisters?” Thangam asked, referring to the film star. “Did you see how splendid he looked? What do you fancy, sister?” She glanced at Kamala.

“Is it permitted?” Kamala asked, eyeing the bottles on the table.

“Why not?” Thangam shrugged carelessly. “We were asked to throw these away, were we not? What difference does it make if we dispose of them in our stomachs or in the dustbin outside?”

Kamala made her way over to the table and, after some hesitation, chose the dark brown cola that was usually advertised by a pretty actress who always seemed to be enjoying herself when she drank it. She poured herself a glass and, on impulse, added two ice cubes to it from the bag that lay melting in the sink. She sipped it gratefully; her budget rarely left room for such luxuries.

“Are you not having any yourself, sister?” she asked Thangam.

“I will,” said Thangam. She poured a little of the soft drink into a glass. Then she picked up a bottle of whiskey and poured the leavings into the same glass. “Ah,” she said. “What a man he was.”

Kamala glanced uncertainly at Shanta. But the cook was
leaning against a counter and did not meet her gaze. Thangam filled a second tumbler with a similar concoction and handed it to Shanta.

Kamala hastily took a sip of her own drink in an effort to hide her shock. To drink alcohol as a female meant that you were very rich or very poor—in either case beyond the confines of ordinary respectability and dignity.

Thangam swallowed her whiskey and cola, and switched on the kitchen television. The screen was very small and the remote control had long since stopped working, but none of them cared. By a strange coincidence, their own personal film star, the hero of the party just finished, appeared on the screen, in a song and dance they had seen him perform a hundred times before. Thangam watched mesmerized, her empty glass in her hand. She set it down and began to move along with the actor, her steps in perfect timing, her arms raised, her breasts and hips thrusting forward in a manner that grew increasingly provocative.

“Come, sister.” Thangam waved a hand, but Shanta merely emptied her own glass and walked over to the drinks, collecting Thangam’s glass en route. This time, she filled them both with only alcohol.

After finishing a third drink, Shanta joined in Thangam’s dancing, her face transformed, their bodies moving in full enjoyment, oblivious to their audience. “Will you not join us, sister?” Thangam asked Kamala at one point.

“Nay, I thank you,” said Kamala, scrupulously polite, careful to display neither bemusement or disgust. “My back hurts too much.”

Shanta turned to Kamala—but with none of her usual hostility. “He is a good lad, your son,” she said, smiling, leaning close, her words smelling of the sour-sharp whiff of alcohol.
“Yes,” said Kamala, not knowing if she should feel repelled or happy. She would have said more, but Thangam was already making a lewd comment about the film star that caused Shanta to double up in laughter. When they had finally lain down, the three of them, to sleep, Kamala realized that this was not the first time they had done this, these two. None of this was new to either. Not the late-night drinking, not Thangam’s lewd dancing and comments, and not the manner in which Shanta too began to unravel before her very eyes, giggling foolishly, her hair unwinding, her laughter turning coarse and free.

And on the heels of that awareness came another—that this, then, was the inexplicable liaison that existed between these two women, which Kamala had sensed but never before understood. This was what kept them united despite all the daytime bickering, this unseemly core of secretive understanding that was absent in her own relationships with either. It was nothing she would ever discuss with anyone else; it still raised odd feelings of discomfort within her when she thought of it. She had, for the most part, pushed it out of her mind.

THE FOLLOWING MORNING, ANAND-SAAR
summoned her to his study.

“Me?” said Kamala. “Why does he wish to see me? Why do you suppose?”

“I do not know,” said Thangam. “You might find out if you deign to go meet him.”

Kamala made her way to the study, a dozen guilty thoughts flying like scared crows through her mind. That shirt? Could he have found it already and known through some mysterious investigative process that it was her hand that had done
the scorching? Or, worse, did he wish to speak to her about the computer?

If Thangam obsessed about Vidya-ma’s wardrobe and liked to play with her lotions and cosmetics when their mistress was away, Kamala had her own, very different set of fascinations about the house. Occasionally she might linger in Vyasa’s room, examining his things, wishing them for her son. But the true object of her secret fantasies was in the upstairs living room, on the table next to the window. This computer was used by the children and Vidya-ma, and here, every single day, Kamala felt herself grow greedy with desire.

This complicated gadget, with its little alphabet keys and shiny screen, the big box that rested under the desk and hummed—this was magic. Somehow, she would see to it that Narayan’s education would lead him to this, to mastery over the computer and the tapped incantations that allowed the screen to glow to life and hum under the fingertips. To master that knowledge would make his future soar. Sometimes when the family went out and in the hallowed silence of their absence, while Thangam drank tea in the kitchen and listened to Shanta’s diatribes, Kamala would give in to her urges and press down on the keys, in imitation of the movements she had seen the children make. Most of the time nothing happened; the screen lay black and blank. Only once had she gotten a response; she pressed a key, the screen sprang to cheerful life, and in the shock of it Kamala realized that the computer had not been switched off and kept ready for her play; it had been left on; the black screen had been deceptive. With trembling hasty fingers, she had turned the main power switch off and watched in agony as the screen pinged back into darkness like something killed.

Four hours passed on that dreary day before the family returned from their outing. She waited tensely for the first scream of discovery, for them to notice the meddling that had destroyed the computer, but nothing happened. When she ventured upstairs after a few minutes, Valmika was at the computer, typing. Her tampering had not been noted; the machine had somehow, like a compliant lover in a secret affair, managed to keep Kamala’s flirting concealed.

Now, she fretted. Had Anand-saar learned of her computer-meddling?

“Come in,” said Anand-saar. “Kamala, I am very happy with the care you are taking of my father. You are responsible and reliable.” He hesitated. “Are you facing any problems?”

“No, saar,” said Kamala. She did not say: Actually, sir, Vidya-ma is so angry and she directs all her anger big and small at whoever stands around at that moment; Shanta is Ravana’s progeny, a veritable she-demon; Thangam is consumed by her own problems right now; and I would indeed appreciate it if I could manage to leave work at the time I am supposed to each day. “No problems, saar,” she said.

“Good, good,” said Anand-saar. “But, I wanted to talk to you about Narayan.”

Kamala rushed into nervous speech. “I’m so sorry, saar. Pingu was the one that called him in…. I will tell him, saar, tell him to wait outside.”

“Kamala.” Anand-saar spoke patiently. “That is no problem. He is very smart. How old is he?”

“Twelve running, sir.”

“And is he working hard at school?”

Kamala told him truthfully that Narayan was the most clever boy imaginable and, mendaciously, that he was very diligent at his studies.

“Good,” said Anand-saar. “I am pleased to hear that. Education is the only way he will progress in life. Which school is he attending?”

“The government school, saar,” said Kamala and was not at all surprised when Anand-saar frowned.

“That is not good. He will learn nothing there,” he said. “Now, I feel that education is very important. It is the only way our children can progress in life…. I work with a small trust that helps to educate young boys and girls. Would you like me to sponsor Narayan’s education?”

In an instant, transformational moment, Kamala’s opinion of her employer shifted from tolerant indifference to passionate, astonished devotion.

“We can place him in an English-medium school close by—and tutor him in English so he can catch up,” said Anand-saar. “But he must work hard and prove himself worthy.”

“He dreams of working on the computer, saar,” Kamala said.

“Oh, wonderful,” said Anand-saar. “That is good. If he is keen, I can see to his training. But, Kamala, you in turn must see that Vidya-ma is happy with your work …”

“I will, saar,” said Kamala. And the fierceness of that promise, a resolution made on the altar of Narayan’s future, hardened within her like tempered steel.

Later, in the kitchen, she said quietly to Thangam, “It was good news!”

“Really.” Thangam looked at her with sharp, assessing eyes. “Has he increased your salary?”

“No, no, nothing like that,” said Kamala. “But he is going to sponsor Narayan’s education.”

Thangam nodded, already losing interest.

Kamala walked home, thinking about how she would advertise
such good news: especially making sure to tell that complacent mother of the stolid, hard-studying Ganesha across the way about the prospective brilliance of Narayan’s academic future. And that, thought Kamala, was the miracle of the young. They could fulfill your deepest wishes in a manner that you could not predict.

IT SEEMED HE WAS EXPECTED
, but where was his father-in-law? The profusion of marble Italian nymphs in Mr. Sankleshwar’s reception room remained silently unhelpful on the subject. The receptionist had asked him to wait and then retreated into some inner sanctuary. Anand ignored the magazines on the glass table; he checked his watch. It wasn’t like Harry Chinappa to be late. He would give him five minutes more and then call.

The door to the inner office opened; Harry Chinappa stood framed in the doorway, a file in his hands, a smile of great cordiality upon his face.

“My dear boy,” said Harry Chinappa. “There you are.”

“I have been here for a while,” said Anand.

“Excellent. I thought to myself,” said Harry Chinappa, “that it is not like Anand to be late. Now, to more important matters … Anand, you know me, I’m not one to interfere, but I do not want to see you making a grievous mistake…. Mr.
Sankleshwar has arranged a very beautiful property for you—I think it is extremely suitable.”

“What?” said Anand. “No, that’s okay.” He was instantly annoyed; he perceived that he had been enticed here on false pretenses—Harry Chinappa had not given up on making him buy something from Sankleshwar. “I told you. I have no need. I have already proceeded with that Landbroker.”