Love and Longing in Bombay

by Vikram Chandra

  What I thought of as a gym was actually an akhara, the Akhara Pratap Singh as I now saw, in the sunlight, from the board on the wall that ran around it. It was a small plot of land between two buildings, an open shed with a tin roof on bamboo poles, a pit of fine soil under a broad spreading neem tree. There were the joris to one side, and some other equipment I didn’t know, and a small shrine at the top of the plot. The man who met me at the gate said Guru-ji was eating, which I could see, Guru-ji was sitting crosslegged on the ground and eating from a thali. His student, who was a boy really, went and whispered into his ear as he drank from a tall brass tumbler, and I could see the teacher’s eyes watching me gravely. He waved me over. I started, and then had to stop when the student pointed at my feet. I bent, took my shoes off, and walked across the yard. I could feel the earth under my toes, clean and grainy.

  “Rajesh you’re looking for also?” he said. Guru-ji’s Hindi was difficult for me, accented and turned in a strange Northern way. “Sit.”

  There was nowhere but the ground to sit on, so I bent awkwardly and sat next to him, my knees high.

  “I remember you,” he said. “You came once with him.” He had bright little eyes in a round face, a smooth bald head, and grey in his stubble. His stomach, which he rested a hand on as he spoke, looked round and hard under his kurta. “Yes.” He sat at ease on the ground, as if he had been planted in it.

  “I did,” I said. “Once. It was a long time ago. My name is Iqbal.”

  “Yes, what was your name? Iq-bal? I was surprised to see Rajesh then. Since then I haven’t seen him. I told his brother that.”

  “What do you mean? I thought he came here every other day.”

  He laughed. “Oh, not here. When he was a boy he did. Then he came every day. But now he only goes to that bodybuilding club.” He said the word in English, as “badi-beelding.”

  “What bodybuilding club?”

  “At the corner of Atreya Lane. Many of them go there now, and to other ones. To become big with the machines. Here, I ask too much of them. I ask them to be pure. I am an old man. I’ve heard them say it, Kaniya Pahalwan is an old man and he asks too much. I do. But to have a body of one colour, you must drink a bitter cup.”

  He said, sharir ek rang ka. A body of one colour. “I don’t understand,” I said.

  “Sharir ek rang ka. Not huge slabs of meat hung together on a wire. Like parts on a car. Pieces and pieces. No. All this, this, this, this,” he said, touching his stomach, his heart, his head, “all one. To be all one you must sacrifice. You must be pure. You must eat pure. You must think pure. But they pay money over there to become big. I charge no money I ask them to pay of themselves.”

  “Do you know if Rajesh was, was involved in anything bad? Bad people?”

  “Rajesh was a good boy. But I hear anything can happen at these clubs. All kinds of people go to become big.” He looked down at his thali, which was empty, wiped clean. “Rajesh was a good boy,” he said. “And I am an old man. Do you know, when I first opened this akhara here, forty years ago, this was all an open maidan?” The sweep of his arm took in the akhara, the lane, the buildings, and what lay beyond. “My buffaloes grazed right there. Now everything is built up. Even this land they want.”

  “Who?”

  “They who own that building, and that. They have asked me many times. Perhaps the next time there is trouble in the city, and there will be trouble in the city, I’ll find all this gone, burnt down. If I’m here when it happens, maybe my wrestlers will find me here, two holes in my head.” He pointed at his head with two stiff fingers. “One more poor victim of unfortunate Hindu-Muslim riots. Maybe I should go back to my village. Retire.” He used the English word, “retire,” and he laughed. “It is a village called Rudragaon, near Benares. Have you been to Benares?”

  “No.”

  “Sometimes I cannot remember if I’ve been to Benares.” He laughed again, with his cheeks full and round, and the shadows from the neem moved like a web over his head and shoulders. He didn’t look very frightened.

  “I must go,” I said. “Back to work.”

  “I hope you find Rajesh.”

  “He was a good friend.”

  He nodded his head from side to side. I got up with a click in my knees, and he reached out and rested a palm on my shin. “Come back and do some bethaks with us, Iq-bal. This akhara is open to all. No money.”

  I smiled at him and walked past the wrestling pit, and I left him there under his neem tree. All that afternoon, as I bought soda and Scotch and extra glasses, I thought of Rajesh doing bethaks, squatting and rising in a ceaseless rhythm, his arms swinging forward and back, going to the balls of his feet and then back to his heels as he rose. I counted the first three hundred and then just watched him, the shining dark skin, his eyes radiant and calm, the brown earth rich with sweat, his face as if in prayer. Sharir ek rang ka. When all my buying was done, on the way back, I stopped the taxi on Atreya Lane, and looked in the door of the bodybuilding club, which was one dark room at the back of the ground floor of a commercial building. It was full of long rusty bars, dumbbells, and mirrors, and there was a tower with pulleys on it. There was a two-in-one on a windowsill, and some very loud music, and the room was empty. Then the taxi had to move because a truck was trying to get around the compound, and I ran back, and we went on. I held the carton full of bottles steady with one hand and wondered why Rajesh had taken me to the akhara and not this other place. When we had left the akhara, that night, after he had touched Guru-ji’s feet, he said as we walked down the lane, “That’s a neem tree.” I nodded, silenced by desire. “It’s a good place,” he said. I nodded again, fast. “A really good place,” he said. “I feel at peace here.” I had agreed, too blinded by love, and longing, to know what he really meant. Later that night, with the sea pounding in my ears, I had run my tongue over his stomach hungrily. I felt the small soft prickling of the hair against my lips, my nose. And the tenderness of the skin. He held my head delicately in his arms. I had felt a desperation to know him, to hold something essential. Sharir ek rang ka. I sat in the taxi and wondered what it was that I had kissed. I thought of my own body, and asked, had he found peace in me? And the bottles rattled against each other with tiny bell-like sounds, and I felt an ache in my wrist.

  *

  Late that night I came back to the gym on Atreya Lane. Now there was a man in a khaki uniform sitting on a stool by the door. It was past ten, but I could see through the door that the room was crowded with heavy-shouldered men in banians and T-shirts. The music was heavy and loud.

  “Members only‚” the doorman said.

  “I want to talk to your manager. Owner?”

  “Nobody is here. Members only.”

  “Will your manager be coming later tonight? Anybody? Who is in charge?”

  He shrugged. He was chewing a paan, and now he turned his head and spat into the darkness.

  “I’ll wait here,” I said, pointing to the gate. “When whoever is in charge comes, you tell him that I want to talk to him.” I groped about in my pocket and held out a twenty-rupee note. He chewed, and looked disinterestedly at the first button on my shirt. I walked to the gate, and leaned against the cracked concrete. Above my head a streetlight made buzzing noises. I waited, and now and then men came out of the gym, carrying bags. For all of them I had the same question, “Do you know Rajesh Pawar?” I believed the first one when he shook his head and hurried away, looking at the ground, but when none of the first four knew him I grew angry. I snapped out my question at the next one, and he looked at me carefully. I was afraid then, because he was very big, with a neck so thick that he had to turn his whole body to look at me. But he said, quietly, “No,” and walked away. I asked each one who went in or out, until midnight, and the doorman watched me from his stool. A little after twelve he got up, stretched, and began to shut the door. I hurried up to him.

  “Manager?” I said.

  “Didn’t come,” he said, and spat past my k
nee. He shut the door in my face. I looked at the chipped paint on the wood for a minute, then went home. I walked most of the way, even though twice I could have caught the bus if I had run a little, to the stop. I was punishing myself, I think. I felt that I could have done more, should have. I entered the house very late, fell exhausted into my bed without taking off any clothes, and dreamt of childhood.

  The next morning I made my usual call to Dilip. He began our usual small talk, but I cut him off, and asked, “Who are those people that Rajesh is supposed to have worked with?”

  “Who?”

  “The bhai log. Who are they? Do you know any names?”

  “Iqbal,” he said. I could feel, over the line, his fear. It was there, present, as thick as the exhaust fumes on the street outside. “Why do you want to know such things?”

  “Tell me,” I said.

  “I don’t know anything specific, you understand,” he said. “But I have heard the name of Govardhan bhai.”

  “What else?”

  “Nothing,” he said. “Be careful.” And then he hung up.

  I went back that evening to Atreya Lane. Again the doorman at the gym regarded me with infinite boredom. But when I said, “I want to see Govardhan bhai,” he straightened up.

  “Wait,” he said, and disappeared. A few minutes later he came back and led me inside, past the loud room with the muscles straining against weight, and into an office at the back. There was a man sitting behind a desk, a man with a thin moustache, about forty, in a plain white shirt. And another one, younger, heavyset, standing next to the desk.

  “You’re asking about Govardhan bhai?” the man with the moustache said.

  “Are you Govardhan bhai?” I said.

  “No, no, I’m not him,” he said. “I am merely a friend of Mr. Rajan here, who is the owner of this establishment.” He waved a hand in the air. But Mr. Rajan was leaning over to light his cigarette, and when the match flared I knew where I had seen the man with the thin moustache before: outside the Pushkara Gallery, when I had been waiting for Sandhya, and I had thought he was a driver. Until this moment I had had a brittle kind of courage, a thin belief that nothing had happened to Rajesh, and that nothing would happen to me, but now I was very afraid. He pulled at his cigarette and watched me.

  “Your good name, please?” I said.

  He smiled and shook his head, nodded at Mr. Rajan, who left the room, shutting the door behind him. “Doesn’t matter,” he said. “Yesterday you were asking about Rajesh Pawar. Already the police has been here, with his brother I think it was. You are?”

  “His friend.”

  “His friend. Very good. Name?”

  “Iqbal. Iqbal Akbar.”

  “Iqbal,” he said. “That’s a good name for a friend to have. I had a friend named Iqbal once, long ago.”

  “Do you know where Rajesh is?”

  He raised his hands, palms upward. “No. Why would I?”

  I was breathing fast, and the room seemed dark to me. I said, very fast, “Because I saw you outside the gallery the other night. I think you work for Ratnani. I think Rajesh also worked for Ratnani. Rajesh met you here, in this place. He started working for you and Ratnani.”

  “Interesting story. What does he do for me?”

  “I don’t know.” I shook my head. “He’s strong. Maybe he kills people?”

  He laughed, throwing his head back. “You’re mad,” he said. “Arre, Rajan,” he called, not very loudly, but the door behind me opened instantly and Rajan appeared behind me. “Throw this madman out. And don’t let him in again.”

  I tried to struggle, but Rajan had one of my arms twisted behind my back, and I discovered again what I already knew: I am not very strong.

  *

  Even at that time of night it took me only an hour and a half to find out where Ratnani lived. You can search in this city forever for a poor man, but the mansions of the rich are landmarks. I made phone calls, and told the friends that I got on the line to make more phone calls, and before long I knew that Ratnani lived off Pali Hill Road, near KetNav, in a bungalow at the very end of a dead-end lane. Behind a high wall covered with creepers. As I paid off the autorickshaw driver and walked up the lane I could see a huge metal gate let into the wall, and high over the wall, the exotic turrets and lovely red tiled roofs of the castle that Ratnani had built for himself. I pounded on the gate with my fist and it rang loud, like a huge bell. The man was right: I was a madman. Sweat poured down my face and I lashed with both fists on the iron. A little window opened in the middle of the gate, and eyes peered out at me. “What?”

  “I want to see Ratnani,” I bellowed.

  “Don’t shout, you bastard,” I heard behind me, and then I was on my knees, holding my head. Under my left hand the top of my ear and the side of my head throbbed with pain.

  “Who the hell is he?” I heard.

  When I managed to focus my eyes I saw three uniformed guards with lathis in their hands standing over me. To the left there was a man in plain clothes, with hair cut very short and a very straight back. In his hands he held a Sten gun, the muzzle pointed directly at me. And stepping through the gate there was the man with the clipped moustache from the Atreya Lane gym.

  “You again?” he said, mildly. “Never mind,” he said to the armed man, who was jerking glances over his left shoulder and right, and looked ready to shoot. “It’s all right. I’ll take care of him.”

  He put a hand under my elbow and pulled me to my feet. I was still looking at the gun, which looked heavier than anything I had ever seen in the movies, and my legs gave out from under me. “Steady,” my moustached friend said. “That’s Mr. Ratnani’s police protection. You made him nervous.” He was walking me towards a black Matador van parked at the head of the lane. “You’ll get yourself in real trouble if you keep pulling this kind of crazy stunt.”

  He put me in the back of the van, tapped on the black plastic partition, and the Matador jerked forward.

  “Are you a policeman also?“I said.

  “No, I’m not a policeman,” he said. He had one arm along the back of the seat, and was sitting back, quite relaxed. “You were a good friend to this Rajesh Pawar. Very loyal. I like that. But take my advice. Go home and forget about it. Otherwise you’ll end up in a ditch. Tap-tap. Dead.”

  Outside the van, separated from us by thin lightly tinted glass, a family drove past, three children laughing in the rear seat. And on the other side of the road, there were shops, brightly lit. Inside, I looked at this man, at his angular profile.

  “Tap-tap‚” I said. “He did work for you, didn’t he? Did he kill?”

  “What, Rajesh?” he said, smiling. “He was too big.”

  “You know him then.”

  “You boys, you watch too many movies. Size is what you think it’s all about. Silly. Now you, you would make a good shooter. You look like nobody. So you look like everybody. That’s what a shooter needs. Walk up in a crowd, behind your target, and tap-tap‚ that’s all. Bas. Disappear into the crowd. The big fellows, all they’re good for is scaring people. Destroying houses and huts and slums. Clearing land. If anyone dies, they die—it’s incidental.”

  “Is that what he did for you? For Ratnani?”

  He was quiet then, and he looked straight ahead, and in the occasional flashes of light I could see his thoughtful face.

  “Is Rajesh all right?” I said.

  We were speeding along a stretch of empty road now. On every bump we swayed first in one direction and then the other, as if in time. He didn’t say a word, and then it occurred to me that I was going to die. I had heard that things like this happened, that people like this existed, that shattered bodies were found in the city parks, but it had been always far away, something for Rajesh to fantasize about. Now I was in a van in the middle of the night, alone with this man and the driver I hadn’t seen, and it was really happening. Here was my knee rattling against the side of the van. My hand on the rough cloth of the seat. And currents of
pain along the side of my head. I tried to say something, I’m not sure what, and I whimpered. A small sound, but high and quite distinct and audible. He looked at me, then, and I was paralysed and the air rushed against the window behind him. His eyes were black and cool.

  Finally he nodded and slapped his hand on the partition, once. The van skidded quickly to a halt. He pushed open the door, got out, and crooked a finger at me. I had to make a conscious effort to move myself the breadth of the seat, every inch of it. We were on a seafront, not a beach but just a wall, dropping sheer to rocks below. He bent forward, grabbed my arm, and pulled me out of the van. I took a step, and then sank to the ground. My legs were bent under me. I sat.

  “Are you afraid?” he said.

  I nodded. I was looking out at the dark sea, and I didn’t want to turn my head to look at him.

  “Good,” he said. And then I felt his hand on the top of my head, his palm cupping the crown, his fingers holding gently. “I know who you are, Iqbal Akbar. By tomorrow I will know where you live. Who lives with you. Understand?”

  I tried to nod but he held me.

  “Don’t ask questions about Rajesh. Don’t make noise. You’ll get eaten and nobody will even notice you’re gone.”

  Then I felt his hand leave me. I waited. There was a crunch of gravel, and with a great effort I turned my head. My neck hurt.

  “Your friend named Iqbal,” I said. “What happened to him?”