My Kind of Girl

by Buddhadeva Bose

  She had no lack of relatives in Calcutta, but she chose to stop at our house. I never asked myself why. My brother’s wife loved her very much and she loved everyone in our family – even if there were a larger reason, a different, more real reason, I did not have the courage to acknowledge it.

  No, I had not the courage. Pakhi arrived in the evening, I merely caught a glimpse of her, “How are you?” are the only words we exchanged. Thereafter she became the property of everyone else, especially the women, for there is no creature more interesting to other women than one who has just gotten married, be she seven or seventy-seven. Late in the evening, everyone settled down on the veranda under the moonlight to chat, while I slipped away to meet my friends at their hostel. We used to meet often like this, but I remember how special that evening was, each of them like soul mates. They agreed unanimously that they had never seen me in such good spirits either. Spirits? I don’t know what name to give that feeling. Joy? Yes, it was a heartbeat-accelerating, fear-inducing, extraordinary kind of joy. Just as the miser cannot put his jewels out of his mind, deriving joy from the certainty that he has them, hidden away, so too was I joyous at being possessed by this joy – except that the miser fears losing it, while I feared seeing it, getting it, owning it. This was why my heart beat faster all the way back home, in pleasure, in hope, in apprehension, in happiness.

  That moonlit summer night was truly wondrous.

  I went to my room after dinner. The women congregated on the veranda again, outside. I sat and listened to their voices, their laughter, Pakhi laughing in her soft voice. As the night advanced, conversation flagged. I sat before my table lamp, a thick book open before me. I was really reading it, or trying to, even turning the pages occasionally, but what I read, or even what book it was, was something I remembered absolutely nothing of the next morning.

  Meanwhile, near the kitchen, the servants fell silent and the session on the veranda finally broke up. I sat on, listening to them shuffling around, to the small sounds of doors being locked. The noise on the road had died down too; the night was silent. I sat there, still, with my book open.

  Suddenly I saw Pakhi standing by my desk. The moment I saw her, I realized this was what I had been waiting for. Yes, no point trying to hide it. I felt I had made her appear with the force of my longing – she had no choice, she could not have done otherwise. So I was not surprised, I said nothing, I only looked at her in silence.

  What was she like, the Pakhi I saw that night? That slim girl of fourteen, and this glowing young married woman – could the two even be compared? Tonight she was dressed in a blue silk sari, bedecked with jewelry of all kinds. I never could stand the sight of jewelry, but that night, that night they didn’t look bad at all; they did suit some people sometimes.

  Pakhi was the first to speak. I remember her words clearly.

  “I’m a lady. You should stand up when you see me.”

  I stood up obediently.

  “Reading so late in the night?”

  I glanced at the fat, open book in response.

  “Are you up only to read?”

  My head lowered itself in guilt. There was a silent pause. I could hear the ticking of the clock in the next room. There was one more sound, probably a sound in my heart, a strange one.

  Pakhi spoke again, “You’re going abroad soon?”

  “Planning to.”

  “How long will you be there?”

  “At least two years, maybe longer.”

  “When will you leave?”

  “In September.”

  We exchanged only these words as we stood there, and then silence descended again. Several times I felt the urge to look at her, directly, face to face, properly, but I don’t know what shyness prevented me. I kept my face averted though I knew in my heart, with all my heart, that she was there, near me, so near. But soon she wouldn’t be.

  Suddenly Pakhi came around and stood in front of me. “Listen,” she said.

  I raised my face to look at her. Her expression was severe, almost stern. I could see the rise and fall of her breath in the hollow of her throat; it was so silent all around, and she was so close, that I could practically hear the sound of that breath.

  “You must do great things in life.” All of a sudden, I heard Pakhi’s voice. “Don’t stay up any longer – you might fall ill. Go to bed, I’d better leave.”

  I think I tried to say something, but not a sound emerged from my throat.

  “I’ll switch the light off before I go.”

  I saw her hand touch my table lamp, and in a moment I was transported to another world. A dark, bluish moonlight came to life, my room was a room no more. Her blue sari looked almost black, and as soon as she moved her eyes glistened, her lips painted by the brush of the lunar glow. I saw her for a moment like this, and then her long, strong, soft yet firm arms wrapped themselves around me; she held me hard and kissed me on my lips again and again. My eyes closed, my breath stopped, I felt the foretaste of death.

  Then she moved away and said, “I cannot give you anything more.”

  She spoke and left. That night, too, I could not sleep.

  Gagan Baran paused again. He tried to pour coffee into his cup, only to be disappointed: there wasn’t any left, whatever there was had been drunk long ago. He lit a cigarette – he had probably been thirsting for one – inhaled deeply, filling his lungs, and then blew the smoke out slowly.

  The writer shifted and said, “And then?”

  Gagan Baran seemed startled to hear the sounds of another person, perhaps a shade embarrassed. What misguided notion had led him to start this tale? Never mind – what did it matter, after all? He was not going to meet any of them again. He tried to return to his present reality; he tried to think of Delhi, his job, his wife, his children, but none of them seemed very important at the moment, his head was filled with the echoes of the events he had been recounting all this while.

  Transferring his cigarette to his left hand, he resumed.

  Then I went abroad, came back: employment, marriage, children, promotions at work, getting older in spite of oneself. In other words, just like millions of others, my life too was proceeding along its pre-arranged, banal orbit. Yes, no matter how much you take care of yourself, live healthy, eat healthy, run to the doctor and the dentist, when it’s time you have to get older, no one is exempted. My hair had grayed too, though you can’t see it at first glance, but how long can you hide it? And I admit with shame that I see nothing to be proud of in having gray hair – I consider those who can leave this earth before they have gone gray fortunate.

  There would have been no harm in not meeting Pakhi again, it would have suited this story better had I not. But that romantic chapter was far from my mind when I ran into her, which I kept doing, several times, at intervals of a few years. Each of those encounters was trite, abridged. She kept getting plumper; she loved her paan a little too much; she was perpetually cheerful, very happy, completely immersed in her children and household. I saw her daughter too once: she was growing up, suddenly she seemed to be her mother, the way her mother used to be as a child, all those years ago.

  It was at this daughter’s wedding that I saw her last – about three years ago. The wedding was in Calcutta, on Madhu Roy Lane. She had sent me a printed invitation card, to my Delhi address, along with a couple of handwritten lines to my wife: “My dear, how happy I’d be if you could somehow make it.” She had met my wife a couple of times. My wife is a convent-educated woman, she found Pakhi rather rustic, but Pakhi had found an opportunity to tell me, “Oh, you’re a fortunate husband.”

  It was just at that time that I had to visit Calcutta on official work. Debating whether to attend the wedding or not, I finally decided to go. Calcutta had long become a foreign land to me; I would visit for a day or two, stay at a hotel, spend evenings at the movies, never meet anyone but government officials. This time there was something else to do, somewhere else to go besides the Writers’ Building. The thought was
not unpleasant. I had remembered the date, and thought I would go early and finish the thing off before the rest of the invitees turned up. I didn’t have a dhoti to wear, it was no longer a part of my wardrobe, so I went in my less-suitable western garb.

  It took quite some time to locate Madhu Roy Lane in Bhawanipur. Calcutta had changed a lot, and I seemed to have lost my bearings. Carrying a Benarasi sari as a present, I arrived at the wedding venue after evening had set in. Lights, decorations, shehnais, overdressed young women and men, the faint smell of food being fried – I was confronted by this utterly Indian environment after ages without it. Just as I was feeling hesitant, as though I didn’t belong there, a young man I didn’t know welcomed me in, saying, “Please come in.”

  I said, “My name is so-and-so, I’m here from Delhi, if someone could just . . .”

  In a few minutes, a boy of fifteen or so escorted me upstairs. Pakhi’s son, I hazarded a guess.

  Pakhi was genuinely surprised to see me, and seemed almost improperly pleased. After a few pleasantries I said, “I can’t stay long.”

  “All right, all right, I’ll make sure you aren’t late.”

  Pakhi deposited me by myself in one corner of a room and disappeared. But I wasn’t alone for long; elders from another generation gathered around me, one by one. Old men, old women; some without hair, some with blurred vision. An entire lifetime seemed to have passed since I had met them last. One by one, they began to speak – they appeared a little inhibited, but I could clearly make out that they were happy to see me after all these days. I was happy too. They had known me when I was young, when I was a child – how much longer would such people live? It would soon be that only those who thought of me as an old man, or an older person, or, at the most, a contemporary, would remember me. I forgot the weight of my years for some time, in this family gathering. I was surprised to see it wasn’t difficult to converse with them. “Where’s he? How is she? What news of so-and-so?” These led to more memories, old memories, some amusing. I had never realized I remembered so much.

  Pakhi appeared again after a while. She was carrying an enormous plate, small bowls arranged on it in a semi-circle. Oh dear. “I won’t take no for an answer, you must eat,” she told me at once. The old men and women joined in and I ate almost like a bride, head lowered, taking small mouthfuls, ending up eating most of it.

  I stayed much longer than I had meant to. I met the bride, heard praises sung to my gift, and met countless children who had arrived from all directions to pay their respects. Eventually I felt that the wealth of kinship I had experienced in those two hours would comfortably last me a lifetime.

  Then, when it was time for the groom to arrive, the entire household animated, the shehnais playing afresh, I took my leave. Pakhi walked with me to the door, a few people behind her. We probably exchanged some words like these standing at the door:

  “Well, at least we met again.”

  “Yes. Couldn’t stay for the wedding, please accept my apologies.”

  “You go back tomorrow?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  “Take this,” said Pakhi finally, handing me a biscuit tin.

  “What is it? It seems quite heavy.”

  “Some sweets for your wife and children. Remember to take them with you.”

  “Of course I will. Calcutta’s sweets are famous all over. Unmatched around the world. They’ll be thrilled.”

  “Why don’t all of you come over to Calcutta for a holiday?”

  “Yes, let’s see . . . this job . . . all right, goodbye . . .”

  As soon as I turned to leave, I heard a comment – probably from a grandmother type. “Oh, you’ve got gray hair!”

  I was about to come up with a light-hearted riposte when Pakhi softly touched my shoulder and said, “Yes, our Gagan Baran, he too has gray hair now.”

  Casual words, a casual incident, but will I ever forget the way she said those words! Never! In those words, in that little touch of her hand, I realized clearly that evening that Pakhi still loved me – it was probably the only time that I realized, fleetingly, what love is.

  Out on the street, the strains of the shehnai made me melancholy. “Nice story. Ve . . . ery nice,” the contractor said, sighing loudly.

  The writer said, “But the moral is clear. You get the one you lose and so on. Love is somewhere else, in the distance, even if maybe it’s only a wish for love, only imagination – not real at all. Many people have propagated this point of view over the ages, I don’t subscribe to it.”

  “Look, I don’t know of any points of view,” said the Delhi man. “I don’t think about such things either. Eat, drink, and be merry. I have no other viewpoint.”

  “We’re unanimous about that,” the contractor smiled.

  “But both of you told us sad stories,” the doctor smilingly quipped. “How about a happy one now?”

  “Of course, of course.”

  “The story of my marriage. Barring those who die before their time, everyone – fine, maybe not everyone, but most people – eventually ends up marrying someone or the other; there’s nothing unusual about that. Still, there was something interesting about my marriage, it’s not a bad story.”

  “Never mind the modesty. Let’s hear the story.”

  The doctor began . . .

  Chapter Four

  . . .

  DR. ABANI’S MARRIAGE

  I had been practicing barely a year when I got married. I hadn’t thought of getting married quite so young. Having gotten myself a chamber in Dharmatala and a telephone connection, I even had a small car, but no clients to speak of. According to my calculations, the estate my late father had left for his only son would last five years or so – if I couldn’t build a practice by then, shame on me.

  I had decided to not even think of marriage until I was earning at least a thousand a year. All those people who got into their wedding finery the moment they got their sixty rupees a month jobs gave me palpitations. It’s all very well to get married, but what about things like children, illnesses, the wife’s whims, your own demands? And even if you managed to provide for all of these, there were the tiffs, the heartache, the conflicts. All that was not for me. Or so I had thought. But things turned out differently.

  The year I graduated from college my mother passed away, which meant I had no real family anymore. Unmarried young doctors normally tend to live slightly undisciplined lives; being the person I had become, with no roots and no need to answer to anyone, it would have been easy to become debauched. But I succeeded in restraining myself – not through some extraordinary strength of character, but simply through my searing ambition to become a great doctor. After dinner, I’d study till midnight or one in the morning, and then, tired of medical textbooks, go to bed with a novel and resume reading the same novel in bed for a while upon waking in the morning. This was my habit at that time, but it didn’t last.

  I laugh when I think about it now, but my heart beat with nervousness on the morning of my wedding day. I’d seen Bina in so many different situations for so long, spoken to her in public, and later in private, so many times, but every time I realized she was about to become my wife, that she would live in my house, sleep in my own bed, that her authority over my life would be greater than mine – and that all this would continue not for a month or two, not even for a year or two, but all my life; every time this realization hit home, I had no choice but to run and get myself a drink of water, or pace up and down my room.

  Yes, I was very nervous that day. But I shouldn’t be putting the cart before the horse. It’s best to begin at the beginning.

  I remember the first time I saw Bina. There I was, sitting in my patientless chamber, dressed for the day, when my friend Ramen telephoned. “Can you come over right away?”

  “What’s the matter?”

  “There’s this girl who’s cut her foot – it’s all swollen up – she’s in a lot of pain . . .”

  I laughed and replied, “What do you wan
t a personal visit from the doctor for? Put a boric compress on it, it’ll heal.”

  “No, it’s just that – she needs to recover very soon, or else we can’t get on with our rehearsals.”

  “Rehearsals? For what?”

  “You didn’t know? We’re putting on a play, The New Nest.”

  I’d read a novel called The New Nest recently by Shailesh Dutta, who was quite a famous novelist back then. Was it being made into a play? The answer was yes. Dutta had written the play himself, and he was directing it himself too; the girl who had injured herself was his sister-in-law. She was playing the main role, but the poor girl could barely stand because of the pain, so I had to go over and cure her promptly. I was to go to Dutta’s home. Ramen gave me an address on Lake Road; the lake was a new addition to Calcutta and Lake Road had been built very recently.

  “What are you doing there?” I asked Ramen.

  “I’m with them too.”

  “Since when have you started hobnobbing with writers?”

  “One has to keep in touch with everyone. Don’t forget,” said Ramen and disconnected.

  Ramen was a great friend of mine those days. He was a strange character; the first two years in medical college had convinced him he wasn’t going to get through examinations, so he dropped out and opened an oculist’s store on Free School Street. The shop soon moved to Chowringhee and an ophthalmologist with a foreign degree was installed, as was an Anglo-Indian girl at the counter. None of us had expected his business to thrive so much. We were a little surprised, to be honest; he didn’t have much by way of concrete capital. But he did have one divine form of capital – his appearance. You seldom found such a handsome Bengali; six feet tall, as fit as the center forward of a football team, with a fair, ruddy complexion and a head full of curly black hair. It was his appearance, I felt, that was the key to his success.

  These same good looks meant that the Anglo-Indian he’d hired as an assistant became so brazen that she didn’t relent till she had married him. Friends like us tried our utmost to prevent it, but Ramen whistled his way to the registrar’s office. Within a year the marriage was over, but Ramen couldn’t have cared less. He ran his shop with the same enthusiasm as he had earlier and promptly hired another Anglo-Indian girl to run the counter.