Mourning Raga gfaf-9

by Ellis Peters

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Anjli, strongly recovering, and dug her heels in faithfully at his side.

  Someone was coming, hurried, quiet, obsequious feet sliding over polished floors. A turbaned house-man in white cotton, austere but imposing.

  ‘Shri Vasudev Kumar?’ said Dominic, evading lingual difficulties.

  The man stepped back, and wordlessly waved them inside, into a large hall half-darkened by curtains and palms, and panelled in aromatic dark wood. Far to the rear a staircase spiralled upwards, intricately carved and fretted. The servant bowed himself backwards out of sight through a door to their right, and left them there among the exotics and the impersonal evidences of money and loneliness. Beyond the staircase the room receded to a large window, and beyond that again they caught a glimpse of a half-circle of paved courtyard, and two large cars standing, and occasionally the passage of scurrying figures. Beneath the civilised quietness there was a deep tremor of agitation.

  They waited for some minutes, and then a door opened, somewhere out of sight, and let through the murmur of subdued but troubled voices. Then a man came hurrying in by the door through which the servant had disappeared, and confronted the three visitors with patent astonishment. He was not above medium height, but his hard, stringy Punjabi build made him look taller, and his immaculate western suit of dark grey worsted, and the springy black hair crowning his narrow head, accentuated the impression of length. His complexion was smoothly bronze, his features aquiline, and his age somewhere in the middle thirties. He looked every inch the city magnate, director of companies and arbiter of destinies, but with all his machinery temporarily thrown out of gear. His hands were wiping themselves agitatedly on a silk handkerchief, his thin features jerked with tension, and his eyes, confronted by three such unexpected and unaccountable people, looked dazed and a little demented.

  ‘You wished to see me? I am Vasudev Kumar. But this is a very inconvenient time…’ His voice was rather high-pitched, and would have been shrill if he had not been so intent on keeping it almost to an undertone.

  ‘Yes, I see it is, and I’m sorry, Mr Kumar.’ Dominic went straight ahead because withdrawal without explanations was now, in any case, out of the question. ‘I’ll try to be brief, and perhaps we can talk at more leisure another day. We have just come from your cousin’s house in Rabindar Nagar, Kishan Singh thought it advisable for us to come straight to you. We realise Mrs Kumar is ill, and certainly don’t want to increase your anxieties. My name is Felse, and this is Miss Barber. At her mother’s request we’ve brought your cousin’s daughter over to India to join her father, but now we find that he is not in Delhi, and has not received the letter which was sent to him. This is Anjli Kumar.’

  That was quite a bombshell, he realised, to drop on anyone, especially at a time when he was already beset by family troubles of another kind; but on the whole Vasudev, by the time he had heard this out to the end, looked considerably less distracted, as though one more shock had served only to concentrate his faculties. He did not, however, look any more friendly. His black, feverish gaze flickered from face to face, and lingered longest on Anjli. He bowed perfunctorily, with no implication of acceptance.

  ‘My cousin’s daughter? But we have received no communication about her, we did not expect…’

  ‘No, I realise that. Her mother’s letter to Mr Satyavan Kumar is still at his own house, you will find it unopened. I think that will make a better explanation than I can give you. We were expecting simply to bring Anjli over to join her father… permanently,’ he added, seeing no sense in softening anything. ‘Naturally none of us had any idea at all that your cousin had vanished a year or more ago. We heard that only this morning, from Kishan Singh. You’ll appreciate that in the circumstances the obvious thing to do was to bring Anjli to her grandmother, as her nearest relative here. In any case, Miss Lester had asked us to do that in case of any difficulty arising. But I’m very sorry that we should happen to turn up at such a distressing time for you.’

  Anjli, who had stood woodenly to be inspected, not much resenting the suspicion and hostility of a man she didn’t know and had no desire to know, asked now in a wary but determined voice: ‘Is my grandmother very ill?’

  ‘She has had two strokes since my cousin went away without a word.’ Vasudev’s high voice clipped the sentence off resentfully; and indeed he had a grievance, having been forced to step in and shoulder the whole abandoned burden of the family businesses, while never quite acquiring the status of managing director in the eyes of any of the Kumar employees and hangers-on. And then, into the bargain, the old lady’s illness, with its endless demands upon his patience and his nervous resources. ‘Yesterday, I am sorry to say, she had a third one. It is very bad. The doctors have been with her all morning. I do not know what I can do for you… it is very unfortunate…’ A momentary gleam of active suspicion flared in his eyes. ‘You can give me proof of the young lady’s identity, of course?’

  ‘Of course! She has her own passport, and you can check with the American authorities. There is also her mother’s letter waiting to be read.’

  ‘Yes… yes… naturally! Please excuse me, but this is so sudden, I can hardly grasp it. And in the circumstances…’

  ‘In the circumstances,’ said Dominic, ‘having told you the facts, I think we had better leave, and get in touch with you later, when I hope Mrs Kumar will be better. If you have the doctors in the house with her now, we mustn’t add to your worries. We are at Keen’s Hotel, if you should want to reach us. Otherwise, we’ll call you later to enquire about Mrs Kumar.’

  Vasudev wrung his hands and twisted the silk handkerchief in a despairing gesture. He did not want them, Dominic thought, upon any terms, but neither was it politic to let them go away like this. There was something more that had to be said, in his own defence, and out it came in a thin, irritated cry: ‘It is useless! You have not understood. Mrs Kumar is barely conscious… paralysed… she cannot speak… The doctors say that she is dying!’

  There was an instant of silence and shock. Then Anjli said, firmly and finally: “Then I must see her. Whether I stay here or go back to America, I must see her. While there’s time. Surely you can see that. I am her granddaughter, and I have a right to see her, and she has a right to see me.’

  There was no doubt that Vasudev was distinctly reluctant to allow any such thing, and they were always in some wonder as to why he gave way. For one thing, he had to cover himself. It would have looked bad if he had let an accredited relative go away without knowing that this might be the last chance of seeing Purnima alive, and it would look equally bad if he denied access to the dying woman now that it was requested. But he could have tried persuasion, and in the event he did no such thing. Perhaps there had been something in Anjli’s tone that he recognised and respected, an echo of Purnima, the uncompromising firmness of an Indian matriarch laying down the law, very well aware not only of the limitations of her rights (which are obvious) but also of their full scope (which is not, by any means). At any rate, he gave her a narrow, considering look, and then bowed slightly, and turned towards the inner door.

  ‘Very well! Come this way!’

  Tossa, following anxiously, murmured: ‘Anjli, do you really think…’ But Dominic put his hand on her arm, and whispered: ‘Leave her alone.’

  Anjli walked rapidly after Vasudev, along a panelled corridor hung with brocades the beauty of which would have stopped her in her tracks at any other time. No wonder they needed legions of servants to run about these endless halls. Door after door, glimpse after glimpse, where the doors were open, of silken luxury; and at the end, a final door, that opened on a dimmed room with a small lamp burning in a corner, and a little garish altar on a shelf behind it, an almanack Krishna, blue and sweetly-smiling, a dressing-table covered not with the brocades of Benares but the tinsel embroidery of the bazaars, a picture of Ramakrishna and another of Vivekananda on the walls, the gentle saintly seed and the hurricane wind that scattered it across the w
orld. And in the middle of the room two white-clad servants standing on one side of a low bed, and on the other side an elderly gentleman of almost completely European appearance, sitting with his fingertips on the patient’s pulse.

  The bed was just a low wooden frame, without headboard or footboard, with laced springs supporting a thin mattress. A dark blue cloth covered with crude, lovely Naga embroideries of butterflies, elephants, cows and chickens, scarcely swelled over the shrunken body beneath it. On the pillow lay a grey head, the still luxuriant hair gathered into a white ribbon; the up-turned face was grey as the hair, one side of the mouth a little twisted, the eyes half-open and fixed. Her hands lay out on the blue coverlet, motionless.

  It could have been any Indian woman’s room, any but the poorest of the poor. All that wealth and luxury and grace came down at the end into this small, aged figure stretched on a common truckle bed.

  Only the eyes were alive. They moved as the strangers came in, the gleam beneath the lids was not quite quenched. They settled upon Anjli.

  Anjli went forward slowly, past Vasudev, past the two women, and stood beside the bed. She joined her hands reverently, and bowed her head over them as she had to Arjun Baba; and this time there was a curious suppleness and rhythm about the movement of head and hands which had not been present before.

  ‘Namaste, Grandmother Purnima!’

  The fading brightness watched her; there was no other part of Purnima that could express anything now. Anjli slid to her knees beside the bed, to be nearer, and that movement, too, had a fluid certainty about it.

  ‘Grandmother, I am Anjli, your son’s daughter. I have come home.’

  For one instant it seemed to Dominic and Tossa, watching, that the ancient, burned-out eyes flared feebly, that they acknowledged the stooping girl and approved her. Anjli pressed her joined hands into the Naga coverlet, and laid her face upon them. A tiny, brief convulsion, so infinitesimal that it might almost have been an illusion, heaved at the powerless fingers of Purnima’s right hand, moved them a fraction of an inch towards the glossy black head, then let them fall limp. The blue coverlet hung unmoving, subsided, lay still again, and this time finally. The doctor leaned to touch the old woman’s eyelid, to reach for her pulse again. One of the women in white began to wail softly and rock herself. Tossa pushed past Dominic, and took Anjli gently by the arm, raising her and drawing her back from the bed. ‘Come away now, leave her to them! Come! We’d better go.’

  There was no need to tell her that Purnima was dead. Of all the people in the room, Anjli had been the first to know it.

  IV

  « ^ »

  Vasudev overtook them in the loggia, almost running after them with fluttering hands and a dew of sweat on his forehead. The thin line of his black moustache was quivering with agitation.

  ‘Please, one moment! This is terrible… I do not know how… I am so sorry… such a distressing home-coming for my cousin. Let me at least fulfil my responsibilities thus belatedly. You understand, I could hardly believe, so suddenly, with no warning… Of course Anjli must come to us, this is her home. Allow me, Anjli, to offer you the freedom of this house, until my aunt’s estate is settled and proper provision made for you. My aunt’s women will take good care of her, Mr Felse, I do assure you. We have an adequate domestic staff. Really, I insist!’

  ‘I couldn’t think,’ said Dominic very rapidly and very firmly, ‘of intruding on the household at this moment, you must allow us to keep Anjli with us at the hotel for a few days. Until after the funeral. You will have your hands quite full until then, and I think it is better that she should not be involved.’

  ‘I am so upset… so inhospitable and unwelcoming, you must forgive me. Perhaps, however, if you really prefer…’

  ‘For a few days, until after the funeral, I’m sure it would be better…’

  He was not really sorry to let them go, though insistent on making the offer with all punctilio. Perhaps he was at as great a loss as they were about what to do next. As for Anjli, she walked down the long drive between her temporary guardians, silent and thoughtful, but completely composed. What she had done had been done naturally and candidly, and now there was no more she could do for her grandmother, unless…

  ‘I suppose funerals happen pretty quickly here, don’t they?’ she asked practically.

  ‘Not necessarily at this time of year,’ Dominic said, accepting this down-to-earth vein as the best bet in the circumstances. ‘Maybe I ought to have asked him. I expect there’ll be a notice in the papers by this evening, at least about her death.’

  ‘Do you think we should go to the funeral? I know I didn’t know her at all, but still she was my grandmother. And she understood what I said to her, I’m sure she did. What do you think, ought we to go?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t know exactly what happens. We might only be in the way, not knowing the drill.’

  ‘I guess we might,’ she agreed after due consideration, and sensibly refrained from insisting. And the more he thought about her general behaviour, the more he realised that for years she had been standing squarely on her own feet, for want of mother and father as well as grandmother, and for all her compensatory posturing she had never lost her balance yet.

  They walked back to the hotel, for Purnima’s house was down in the rich and shady residential roads in the south of town, not far from the golf links, no more than ten minutes’ pleasant walking from Keen’s. Not one of them said: ‘What are we going to do now?’ though they were all thinking it.

  They waited for the evening papers to arrive, and there it was, the announcement of the death of Shrimati Purnima Kumar, the arrangements for her funeral; imposingly large in the type, as was fitting for so prominent a citizen, and such a rich one. And in every paper alike, at least the English-language ones.

  So now they had all the facts flat before them; and while Anjli was taking her bath they could look each other squarely in the face and consider what was to be done.

  ‘We can’t possibly leave her here with Cousin Vasudev,’ Tossa said.

  ‘No, we can’t. Of course he may be all right, a thousand to one he is, but with no father here, and no grandmother, and seemingly no wife for Vasudev – I could be wrong, of course, did you get that impression, too?’

  ‘What difference would it make?’ said Tossa simply. ‘Wife or no wife, we couldn’t possibly hand her over to somebody who seems to be next in the running for the family fortune, somebody whose interests, if you look at the thing that way, she definitely threatens. I mean, if Satyavan inherits everything, then even supposing he never turns up, some day they’ll have to presume his death, or whatever they do here, and Anjli is next in line. But if there’s no Anjli…’ She let that trail away doubtfully, and kept her voice low. ‘But that’s being pretty melodramatic about it, wouldn’t you say? He doesn’t look the wicked-uncle type.’

  ‘No, he doesn’t. And I don’t suppose they’re any more common here than in England, anyhow. And yet, with all these millions of people around, it would be awfully easy for one little one, a stranger, to get sunk without trace. The thing is, unless we find her father, then the next move is Dorette’s responsibility, not ours, and we’ve no right to appropriate it to ourselves.’

  ‘Dorette,’ said Tossa with awful certainty, ‘would dump her on Vasudev and never think twice.’

  ‘Maybe she would, but she isn’t going to do it by proxy. Not these proxies, anyhow.’

  ‘Hear, hear! So what do we do?’

  ‘I tell you what, I think we’d better ring up Felder and ask his advice. After all, he did offer to help.’

  When he got through to the villa near Hauz Khas, it was Ashok Kabir who answered the telephone.

  ‘They’re not in yet, they’ll probably be late. And they’re off to Benares early in the morning. Is it urgent? Why not tell me, and I’ll pass the problem on to him and ask him to call you back when he does get in?’

  Dominic told him the whole story of Satyavan’s
defection and Purnima’s death, down to the last detail that seemed relevant, and then sat down, a little cheered by Ashtok’s evident concern and sympathy, to wait for Felder to call him back. Presently Anjli sauntered in from the bathroom of the suite she shared with Tossa. In a flowing cotton dressing-gown, and with her black hair swirling softly round her shoulders, for the first time she looked Indian.

  ‘Watch your step when you go for your bath, Tossa, we’ve been invaded. Two huge cockroaches – I suppose they come up the plumbing. Put the light on five minutes before you go to run your bath, and I bet they’ll take the hint and run for the exit.’ She was being, perhaps, deliberately cooler than she felt about these hazards, just as she probably was about her experiences of the morning; but the slight over-statement was merely that, not a falsification. Presented with a burden, she practised the best way of carrying it. Confronted by a problem, she would walk all round it and consider how best to grapple with it. They were beginning to understand their Anjli.

  ‘That’s nothing,’ said Tossa, ‘a gecko fell on me this morning in bed.’

  ‘I know, I heard you squeal. There’s another one going to fall on you any minute now.’ He was clinging with his tiny, splayed feet to the high ceiling just above Tossa’s head, close to the light fixture, lying in wait for flies, a whitish green lizard no more than four inches long, of which more than half was tail. He was so young and small that he was still almost translucent, and only the faint, rapid palpitation of his throat indicated that he was alive, and not a worked fragment of alabaster. ‘I’d rather have geckos than cockroaches, any day. Anything with up to four legs,’ said Anjli, quite seriously, ‘is my brother. Over four, and they’re out.’