The Sleeping Dictionary (36 page)

AND SO MY days went: I arrived more or less by six o’clock, worked all the morning, and after a simple Indian lunch that Manik made for me, I went out to Bow Bazar, a neighborhood filled with merchants from many countries, with synagogues and churches. It was in this area, filled with jostling people of all races speaking languages I’d never heard, that Mr. Lewes had recommended I locate a furniture maker.

Mr. Chun, a wizened old carpenter originally from Shanghai, was delighted to take my order for bookcases; and I was warm with pride at directing a project. Within a few days, Mr. Chun had sketches of an ingenious design with pegs allowing the shelves to be heightened or reduced according to whim.

Mr. Lewes liked the design as much as I did and chose to have the bookshelves made in mahogany. After we looked over the estimate for cost and drawings, he began giving me ideas of how the books should be arranged. I made notes but then felt duty-bound to give him some bad news: that dozens of his most precious acquisitions had pages falling out or covers that had separated from their broken spines.

“If I had a book press, I could use it to glue new covers to the books,” I suggested. “I could also replace some of the cracked spines. The covers that are only slightly torn can be mounted on linen.”

“Where did you learn these ideas of book preservation?”

“Last weekend, I visited the Asiatic Society and the National Library and spoke to some gentlemen there about how they care for their books and manuscripts.” Seeing his eyebrows go up, I added, “I’m sorry, sir, perhaps I should not have gone without asking your permission?”

He shook his head. “Not at all, and you’ve made me quite
interested. I should like to see some of these examples you’re describing.”

I went with him to the library, where I switched on the electric light. Although I’d asked Jatin to dust each day, the space still was a musty den. I explained how I had been airing a few dozen books daily, brushing off the mildew in the garden. He looked at the books I had set aside with the worst covers and after leafing through a few, said that he preferred that they be rebound by a professional bookbinder. He must have seen my face fall, for he added, “It is not such a necessity with books that aren’t so old. And I’m not opposed to your setting up a book press. You can air the books now, while the weather is fair, and spend the next rainy season working on such repairs.”

If he was talking about the next rainy season, it meant I’d still have work in eight months. This was a good sign for me, but I worried again that he didn’t have an understanding of the books’ conditions. I said, “Humidity will ruin the books if you keep them inside the whole monsoon. They still need air and brushing, as long as rain isn’t falling directly on them.”

“The only way around the damp weather is air-conditioning. Have you heard of it?” His eyes held the same spark that I’d noticed when I’d agreed to investigate his library.

“Yes. Some of the picture houses and hotel ballrooms have it—but isn’t it terribly expensive?”

“As more sophisticated machinery is being developed and shipped to India, the cost is dropping. Air-conditioning has gone into trains and even some private homes in this city.”

I nodded, trying not to reveal how decadent and slightly lunatic I thought he was. Cooling books was an extravagance I could not comprehend. Heat could make people very sick or even die: I’d seen that in my village. And it was supposed to be even more difficult for Europeans to bear India’s heat.

“Whilst I research air-conditioning, there are some small cedar boxes I had made to protect the oldest and most valuable books. You will find them as you continue unpacking. I saw you have already
found the oldest book in my library, the Portuguese sailor’s account dating to 1465.”

“I was afraid to open that one.” I made a face, remembering the fragility of its cover.

“It’s good you didn’t. But it’s one I’d like to have worked on by a professional bookbinder. I don’t have a specific name; I heard the best district to find someone is near Presidency College in North Calcutta.”

“Do you mean College Street?” I had been reading maps and walking everywhere on my weekends off.

“Yes. But you must be very careful there.” His eyes lingered on me overly long, and he added, “It’s a hotbed of terrorism.”

I nodded, all the while thinking this was another example of irrationality. College Street was where Presidency College and many other educational institutions lay: the city’s font of education, bookselling, and publishing. I’d already put it on my list for future exploration, because of all the books I might find—and because it might be a neighborhood Pankaj would visit, too.

CHAPTER

21

People tell me the modern woman is aggressive. I wonder if this is true. But if it is, she has a good reason for it, and her aggression is only the natural outcome of generations of suppression. The first taste of liberty is intoxicating, and for the first time in human history, a woman is experiencing the delights of this intoxication . . .

—Vijayalakshmi Pandit writing in
Amrita Bazar Patrika
, May 15, 1938

T
he next morning, I boarded a tram that rattled and pitched its way out of central Calcutta north to College Street. A lively mix of people surrounded me as I looked away from a round baby who seemed to be the same age as my Kabita. It still hurt to look at babies, to remember all I had given up in order for us both to live.

I gazed out the window, trying to distract myself with the view of North Calcutta. People were visible in the streets, sleeping, chatting, washing themselves, scrambling eggs, and frying puris. Children
played on the curb, as if blissfully unaware that their homes had no walls or roofs. They did not miss what they had never known.

I disembarked near Presidency College, slinging over my shoulder the heavy bag that held a few memoirs and histories all published after 1900. I hoped to determine the bookbinder’s skills before committing older, more fragile and valuable books into his hands. Mr. Abhinash Sen was recommended to me by librarians I had visited at both the Asiatic Society and the Imperial Library. He was supposed to be tops, yet not overly priced.

Sen Bookbindery and Publishing was on a lane off College Street. The reception room was simple and clean, with an altar to Krishna in one corner and a framed picture of Gandhiji on the wall, draped with a fresh jasmine garland. I waited at the counter for some time before noticing a small silver bell. I rang it, and a thin young fellow in a wrinkled shirt and dhoti came out from behind a doorway. I told him I had come to see Mr. Sen with a half dozen books.

“It’s Haresh you need. Wait. He shall come shortly.” And then the young man vanished.

As I studied the price list for various services that was posted on the wall, the door behind me opened. I turned, expecting to see the missing Haresh but instead found myself looking at a pretty young woman carrying a large stack of books in her arms.

“Hallo! Have you been waiting long?” she greeted me in Bengali.

“Yes,” I replied, not hiding my irritation. “If you want books repaired, it may take a while! The fellow called Haresh is not here.”

The girl’s brown eyes widened. “Oh, that crazy fellow is just across the street having his tea!”

I did not hide my irritation. “Well, he may have all the time on earth to do his job, but I came from downtown and have been waiting twenty minutes already.”

“That’s terrible! I will scold Haresh when he comes.”

I looked at her in confusion, and she grinned, showing dimples on both sides.

“Haresh works for my father. He’s good with the books but bad with his schedule. Father tolerates him because he is talented and has been with us so long. I’m the eldest daughter of the house: Supriya Sen.”

“I’m Kamala Mukherjee.” I spoke hesitantly, for the Brahmin surname, especially, felt like a lie. “I am the clerk for a private library and have brought in some books.”

She nodded, looking pleased. “I’m so glad you waited. Kamala-didi, you must come with me upstairs, it will be more pleasant than this room.”

“That is very kind of you,” I said, surprised she was being so friendly.

“It’s time for lunch anyway,” she said. “Will you eat with us? It will give you a chance to meet my father.”

The last time a stranger invited me to eat with her, it was Bonnie, and that tea had brought on the lowest point of my life. As I hesitated, I saw Supriya’s lips tighten. I knew her family name was Sen, which put her in the doctors and writers caste that was just below my pretend caste. Maybe she thought I regarded myself above dining with her.

I smiled and said, “I would like that so much.”

Supriya led me up a narrow staircase to the residential quarters. Her mother, Mrs. Promilla Sen, immediately invited me to call her Mashima, or mother’s sister. But although I smilingly thanked her, I knew she could never have actually been my kin; her rounded figure, and the thick ivory bangles and fineness of her cotton Murshidabad sari made it clear that she was quite prosperous. There had been nobody like Mrs. Sen in Johlpur.

Mrs. Sen—I had to remind myself hard to think of her as Mashima—bade me to sit down on a cushion and released a stream of questions. From which branch of the Mukherjee clan did I come from? Was I at Bethune College with Supriya? How had I learned about their business, and why was I so thin?

I answered that my people were from the coast of Bengal and
not connected to any of the important local Mukherjees. I’d been educated at a girls’ school in the countryside but left early due to the death of my parents. I had come to the city recently and taken a position organizing the private library for a senior ICS officer who also wrote essays about old Indian books. I chose my words carefully. If they learned that I was unmarried, with a child abandoned just a month earlier, they would no doubt throw away the teacup I’d drunk from and send me and my books packing.

“To work for an Englishman must be loathsome!” Supriya said after peppering me with questions about my job.

“Not at all,” I said. “I enjoy all the books, and Mr. Lewes is very polite and asks my opinions. It’s because he trusts me that I was able to investigate book restoration and come here. Truly, the only ones telling me what to do are the books! They have been neglected so long that they need a friend.”

“Then it is like the romantic novel
Jane Eyre
!” Supriya declared. “Only instead of taking care of children, you have books, which are much more interesting.”

At this, her mother scolded her, saying the windows were open and half the neighborhood could hear that the Sens’ oldest girl didn’t want children. But Supriya just laughed and asked me how much I earned per month. When I told, she shot a defiant glance at her mother. “Why won’t Baba pay me? I work hard organizing his accounts. Look at Kamala; how lucky she is! I should like to quit this family to become a working lady.”

Before her mother could even answer, there was a sound of clattering on the stairs and more voices, female and male. Two young ladies came up along with a little boy in a sailor suit.

Supriya quickly made introductions. “That’s my baby brother, Nishan. My younger sister, Sonali—she’s the one with specs and the serious expression—always picks him up at the Hindu School for boys on her way back from Loreto House. Now they’re home, we can call downstairs for Baba to come and eat. Bina, fetch him!” she directed a young maidservant.

“And what about me?” The other young woman was unwinding a scarf from her head, revealing a long, lustrous fall of hair. “I’m the guest. You should have introduced me first!”

“You are no guest; you are my third daughter.” Mashima pinched the newcomer on her cheek. “Kamala, this is our dear Ruksana Ali. Her father is the doctor who cared for us when he lived in our neighborhood. Now he is at Calcutta Medical College Hospital.”

“Where Netaji was treated,” Supriya said. “Thank God he is off his sickbed and in charge of the Congress Party. Now we will finally have change in India; you mark my words.”

“My family supports Krishak Praja, the Farmers’ Party,” Ruksana said to me. “Its leader, Mr. A. K. Fazlul Huq, could well be the governor of Bengal someday.”

“Because he’s a Muslim, and there are so many more of you than us,” Sonali said mischievously.

Ruksana’s eyes narrowed. “Mr. Huq is very good at building coalitions between all religions. And we have our choice. There’s the Muslim League party; we like this one better.”

“Why be in a peasants’ party when you are so far from the country?” Sonali said.

“It’s about landworkers’ rights. We should all be thinking about it,” Supriya interrupted.

Mashima said in a placating tone, “Please, my daughters, don’t frighten Kamala with all your politics. She surely doesn’t care.”

I had been following this conversation closely—how amazing to hear them talking about peasants having a voice in politics.

“Ma, you must vote in the next election,” Supriya said. “I worry that our Netaji can’t stay in charge of control in Congress. His ideas about modernizing are so different from what Gandhiji advises. There’s a division of opinion inside the Congress Party that could ruin everything.”