Three Bargains: A Novel (17 page)

Anyway, Pandit Bansi Lal would never access whatever special connections he had with God for Madan or his family. Every time they were in each other’s company, and it was regularly, since Avtaar Singh had other dealings besides those of a religious nature with him, the pandit looked pained and uncomfortable, as if Madan were an illegal squatter in Pandit Bansi Lal’s own house.

“Snakes have no shit hole, all the crap stays inside,” his grandfather once said in those early years, when he had come across Madan sobbing in the corner of their room after Pandit Bansi Lal had used his walking stick to admonish him for dropping his prayer thali. Madan never told Avtaar Singh about that beating, and though now he had no fear of the man, he steered clear of the Pandit as much as possible.

The dog continued to howl into the night and Madan forced his eyes shut, dreaming of a snakelike Pandit Bansi Lal coiled around his neck, squeezing slowly, while Madan begged to be finished off with one venomous strike.

In the accountant’s office, Madan shut the last ledger and placed it on Mr. D’Silva’s desk. Every morning Madan attended the timber auction at Lakad Mandi, bidding for quintals of poplar and eucalyptus. While poplar’s price depended on its grading—a good-quality log might cost more up-front but yield more too—the mottled-bark eucalyptus was not as fussy, and he learned to look for logs that Mother Nature favored with near-perfect cylindrical proportions. That would mean less wastage when peeled down to its pale underbark.

For the rest of the day he helped in the office, reconciling orders and helping Mr. D’Silva with the accounts.

“All done?” Mr. D’Silva asked, flipping through the ledger. “You’re getting faster and faster.”

Madan thought about what he could do next. It was too hot to work on the factory floor and unless there was a problem, there was no need for him to go out there. He took out the book he had started that morning.

“What’re you reading?” asked Mr. D’Silva, peering over his glasses.

“
Noble House
,” said Madan, holding the book cover up so he could see. Embossed on the paperback’s stark white cover was a cracked bronze pendant with Chinese inscriptions.

Mr. D’Silva answered the curt ring of the phone. “Put it away, saab wants you,” he said.

Avtaar Singh was on the phone when Madan entered. “He’s here now, I’ll send him over.”

Placing the phone down, he said, “I need you to drive memsaab and the girls. Do you remember Trilok-bhai’s house? On the way to Hathni Kund?”

“I think so.” Madan recalled going there once; the house was out of the town limits of Gorapur, but still fell under its administrative jurisdiction.

“If Ganesh is outside, take directions from him, but it’s easy to find, no other house is as big in that area. And Madan,” he said as Madan stepped out, “take the Contessa.”

The twins were waiting when he drove up. “Come on, Mama, hurry up, he’s here!” they shouted into the house. Minnu memsaab came out a while later, adjusting earrings so big and round that they hid most of her ears.

The twins chattered like monkeys and Madan, his thoughts on his book, tuned them out. Presently they shed the clamor and tumult of the town, and as the Contessa traveled silently through fields of mustard and rice, the occupants of the car fell into a dreamy silence.

All the land west of Gorapur as far as one could see—farmland, forest, villages—belonged to Trilok-bhai. Madan first met the stout landowner in the factory and the man often came into town with his wife for social occasions at Avtaar Singh’s house. Though Trilok-bhai was older than Avtaar Singh by a few years, they shared an easy friendship, for Trilok-bhai’s focus was on the running of his lands, and he did not interfere with Avtaar Singh’s ventures in Gorapur. It was during election time that Trilok-bhai’s interest in Gorapur stirred, and he and Avtaar Singh usually supported the same candidate. They had to ensure that whoever took office would be amiable and open to running things their way and not the way of the distant government in Chandigarh.

If people talked about Trilok-bhai, it was because of his three sons. The girls from the villages and the deer in the forests ran and hid when the boys came thundering through in their jeep. They were well known to hunt them with equal enthusiasm. Madan often ran into the boys when they were in town causing a commotion. As long as you matched them joke for joke, one dirtier than the next, and admired their well-oiled hunting rifles, they had no dispute with you.

“There it is!” said Rimpy as the house came into view, its odd shape reminiscent of one of Swati’s sewn creations. The house had stood in this location for generations, even longer than Avtaar Singh’s family had been in Gorapur.

“Finally, Minnu, you come out to the country to see us!” said Trilok-bhai’s wife, Neeta, who was waiting out front. Her bangles clinked as she hugged the girls and guided them toward the house. Madan looked around for a shady spot to park the car. They would stay for lunch and evening tea, so he had a few hours of reading time.

“Auntie, where’s Neha?” Dimpy asked as they walked in.

It had been about twenty minutes. In his book, Ian Dunross, the new tai-pan, was about to discover who was behind the hostile takeover bid of his company, Noble House, when a movement at the front of the house caught Madan’s attention. The twins and Neeta memsaab had come back out, and stood on the front steps.

He got out and went to them in case the girls needed something. Neeta memsaab looked agitated. “She knew you were coming,” she said. “She loved it when you girls visited her in Delhi. Remember all the shopping we did at South Extension?”

The twins nodded. “I don’t understand this girl.” Neeta memsaab turned in the direction of the fields, looking perturbed.

“It’s okay, Auntie, we’ll go with Madan and find her,” Rimpy said.

“No, no.” Neeta memsaab threw back her shoulders. “You girls don’t go out in this heat. We’ll send your servant boy.” She nodded toward Madan standing at the foot of the stairs.

Rimpy and Dimpy glanced uncomfortably at each other. They did not look at Madan but let their gazes wander to the side. Madan did not flinch; he kept his attention on Neeta memsaab, wishing the twins would stop looking so awkward. He did not eat on the same plates, let alone at the same table. Whatever he did for them, whatever he shared with them, no matter how much he was part of their daily lives, when the doors shut at the end of the day he went to the back of their house, to another world and another family.

“Just follow the path.” Neeta memsaab pointed to the trails slicing into the fields surrounding the house. “You’ll come across her at some point. Check one of the lookout towers.” She turned back toward the house.

“It’s Neeta Auntie’s daughter, Neha,” said Rimpy, realizing that no one had told him who he should be looking for.

“He’ll find her,” Neeta memsaab said from the doorway. “You girls come back in. I’ve made fresh nimbu pani, its icy cold and sweet, just how you like it.”

Rimpy ran back up, and Dimpy, throwing Madan an apologetic look, followed her twin.

Madan tossed his book in the car and locked it, following the path Neeta memsaab pointed out. The hip-high stalks of corn allowed an uninterrupted view of the area, but there was no sign of anyone. He wiped his brow with the sleeve of his T-shirt. He hadn’t even known that Trilok-bhai had a daughter, and now he was out hunting for this girl, who for some odd reason had decided to take an excursion on this burning hot day. She was probably “bored” like the twins always claimed to be, but at least he didn’t have to waste his time searching for them all over the countryside.

He walked on, swatting at gnats that greeted him. Soon the fields petered out and a clump of trees provided shade. The grove ended suddenly and he was back in the fields. It was quiet, even the hawks hunted in silence up above. He couldn’t imagine some girl having walked all the way out here by herself. This may be her father’s land, but it was foolhardy to be out this far alone; anything could happen and there was no one around to hear her screams. He turned back, looking for another path. Spotting a lookout tower not too far away, he decided to check there.

The wooden tower had a few rungs missing from its ladder but the platform above seemed sturdy enough. Madan looked up and around and thought he saw something glinting in the sunlight.

He tested one of the rungs before climbing up to the platform. The moment he swung up and onto it, he saw the girl curled in a shady corner, her head resting on a small backpack, her face hidden under her arm. Her scuffed and grass-stained jeans made him wonder how long she had been out.
Maybe she’s hurt
, he thought, and then decided she was probably asleep.

He stood there, not knowing what to do. Should he call out to her and wake her up? He moved closer, but before he could say anything she said, “Were you sent to get me?”

“Yes,” he said, “your mother wants you back at the house.”

Her arm slid slowly off her face and she got up in one fluid movement, lifting her arms to capture her flyaway hair and twisting it into a knot at the nape of her neck. Her shirt lifted a little as she did this, and Madan turned his gaze to the small lake in the distance.

When he looked back at her she was holding her backpack out to him. He took it and she smiled. “Thanks,” she said, startling him enough that he looked straight at her. No one had actually thanked him before; not the twins or their family, and he never expected them to either.

Flecks of copper lit the muddy darkness of her eyes and for an instant he thought it was a reflection of the yellow flowers sprinkled in the fields. She lowered her lids, and when she looked back up, the twinkling specks beckoned once again.

He turned abruptly to the ladder, in part to clear the sudden light-headed feeling that came upon him. Too much sun; he was getting dehydrated. He climbed down and then looked up to make sure she was following. She was nearly to the ground when she lost her footing on a missing rung and slid the next few rungs down. Madan dropped the backpack and caught her firmly by the waist before she fell too far.

She found a sure footing, yet he didn’t let go, his arms feeling heavy and lethargic like he had been unloading trucks all day. He was reluctant to move them ever again. She turned slowly and put her hands on his shoulder. He lifted her up, placing her gently on the ground.

“Careful,” he said, and then felt silly about the warning, as she had already slipped.

They walked back on the same path he had taken earlier, Madan a few steps behind, the backpack thumping against his side. Her hair came undone again and it swung long and straight as she picked her way forward, her hands gliding over the tops of the stalks.

Her mother was outside; she had probably spotted them walking back. She was angry. As they stepped onto the driveway, she grabbed Neha’s arm and pulled her up the stairs. “Look at you! Filthy.” Still holding her arm, her mother began to dust her jeans and T-shirt. Neha squirmed as she tried to avoid her mother’s quick slaps. Finally, her mother ran her fingers through Neha’s unraveled hair and twisted it tightly away from her face. Neha’s hands went up to her head as a tiny cry of pain escaped.

“Go clean up. I want you in the drawing room looking presentable in five minutes. Don’t embarrass me in front of these people.” Neeta memsaab pushed her into the house, leaving Madan outside still holding the backpack.

A few seconds later the door swung open and Neha rushed out, extending her arm for the bag. He handed it to her; she looked distracted and didn’t say anything. Madan returned to the car, felt under the seat for his bottle of water and took a long, cold drink. He opened his book, letting it claim his attention.

Then, sliding onto the page, obscuring the words and making him reread the same sentence over and over again, came the memory of those eyes speckled with copper and the smile that had lifted him off the ground, if only for a moment.

T
HE GROUNDS OF GORAPUR ACADEMY WERE QUIET IN THE
weak early morning sun, and some students clamored around the notice board in front of the principal’s office. “There it is,” said Madan, pointing to Jaggu’s name. His own name had been easier to spot; it was on the top of the list.