The Hope Factory

by Lavanya Sankaran

  THE POSSIBILITY OF NARAYAN BEING influenced by Raghavan so troubled Kamala, it pushed her into making a plan. She would speak to Vidya-ma as soon as she could. No, not for money, for that was futile. Instead, she would ask for leave. For a day or two. That should be sufficient. Since she had not taken even a half day’s leave so far, not for sickness or festival, hopefully Vidya-ma would not think badly of the request.

  Her sister-in-law’s letter went through her mind. It was cheerful; scribed by her sister-in-law’s neighbor and read aloud by Narayan, but the important part had stayed clear in Kamala’s memory: that the small store in which her brother had acquired a share seemed to be prospering.

  Over the years, she had received numerous offers of help from her sister-in-law, and had been steadfast in refusing it all. Now was the time to relax her pride on this. Narayan, in a smart pant and shirt uniform, a bag of books hoisted like a proud banner upon his shoulder, was enjoying school for the first time.

  After all, what had she asked of her brother since she had left his house twelve years ago? Nothing. And he had repaid that favor with his foolish, proud words to the landlord’s mother. Perhaps he did indeed, after all these years, feel a brother’s duty to her. She would ask him for help.

  THAT THIS WAS NOT a fortuitous day for requests was evident the minute she entered the kitchen; Vidya-ma was in full spate, not discouraged by Thangam’s sulky silence or Shanta’s grimness. “You do nothing but ask me for things! And in return you are so careless with your work! It’s ridiculous! I ask for a cup of tea, it comes cold. My clothes are not ironed. And when they are, they are burned!” She brandished Anand-saar’s shirt in one hand. “Who did this! Tell me that! No, utter silence from you lot. And then, on top of that, you come running to me for loans. No, no more! I will not give another loan to anyone. You seem to think … Kamala, you are late!” Kamala glanced at the clock; she had stopped to buy the grandfather’s pooja flowers, but the sight of them in her hand seemed to aggravate Vidya-ma all the more. “You’re wasting your time on all kinds of useless jobs, and when I need you, you are not available!” She marched out of the kitchen; they heard the front door slam.

  They were working these days in a house strangely divided: the grandfather stayed downstairs on the drawing room verandah in the day hours, returning to his bedroom in the late evening, his retreat almost acting as a signal for Vidya-ma’s own descent for her dinner. Otherwise, when she was home, she stayed upstairs, watching television or on the computer.

  Vidya-ma had lost her happiness.

  Thangam was unsympathetic when Kamala tried discussing this with her. “Aiyo, who has time to worry about her. She is constantly crying over problems that do not exist.”

  When the doorbell rang hours later, Kamala ran to open the door; she still had her request to make and hoped to catch Vidya-ma in a better temper. Kamala collected the various shopping bags from the car and followed her mistress to the bedroom.

  “I know,” Vidya-ma said into the phone, “I swear I wake up exhausted. I don’t know what to do anymore. I’ve tried talking to him, but seriously, it’s just not worth the fucking effort.” She dropped the shopping bags carelessly on the bed, the contents sliding out. Blouses, pants, a handbag whose price tag rippled seductively over the bedspread: Rs 10,000/—“Kamala, a glass of water please,” she said, and by the time Kamala returned, her conversation had shifted. “… I was thinking of wearing an embroidered chiffon saree, but I’m planning a traditional maanga necklace with it.” She pulled a jewelry case out of her handbag and removed a necklace from it, her fingers playing over the ripe gold and pomegranate beauty of the ruby paisley pendants strung along its roped length. “It’s my mother’s. Belonged to my great-grandmother, actually. A gift from the Mysore maharaja.”

  ALL DAY LONG, KAMALA waited to ask for permission—and by late afternoon, she knew she would not get it. Vidya-ma remained closeted in her room. Having made up her mind to ask her brother for help, Kamala wanted to do it before her resolve faltered. She would have to absent herself without leave and claim that she had been sick, meekly swallowing the scolding that would follow.

  In preparation, she said to the other servants while they were seated at lunch, “Oh, I am not feeling very well.”

  No one seemed particularly inclined to comment or sympathize. Thangam was brooding, and Shanta just stared at her sharply.

  “My head,” said Kamala, “it hurts. My legs also.”

  That she was not very successful at dissimulation was clear; Shanta snorted and said, “You look well enough.”

  Kamala’s temper unfortunately chose this moment to flare. “Are you saying that I lie?”

  “I’m saying,” said Shanta, with an annoying acuity, “that you are pretending to be sick just to take some leave.”

  “Have I ever done that?” said Kamala, outraged by the accusation (which her past behavior had certainly not merited) and by the truth of it in the present instance.

  “How am I to know what you have done or not done? Why should I care about such a topic? Of what slightest interest is it to me?”

  “Oh, for the sake of the gods!” said Thangam, entering the fray. “Is it not possible to eat a meal here in silence and peace? And, if I were you,” she told Kamala, “I would worry less about my health and more about my son’s companions.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Kamala.

  “I saw him yesterday. Hanging around with that lout Raghavan and his friends. I went to collect a payment, and he was loitering with them. I am surprised to see him in such company. They are not good men, Kamala,” said Thangam. “You should tell him that. I am surprised you have not already done so. You take such pride in him.”

  Kamala put away her plate in silence, upset to hear her own thoughts echoed by Thangam. Was this what everyone thought? That because Narayan hung about with Raghavan and his crowd, he was like them in character?

  When her son arrived at the kitchen door that evening, Kamala was happy to see that Thangam’s attitude to him remained cordial. She welcomed him, and when Vyasa discovered him and wanted to take him upstairs to his bedroom to show him something, she was the first to encourage him.

  “Let him go up,” she said, when Kamala hesitated. Narayan had never been allowed upstairs in the house. “Pingu cannot bring that huge train set down.”

  Kamala followed her son and Pingu up the stairs with a pile of ironed clothes but could not help feeling uncomfortable at the expression in Vidya-ma’s eyes when they encountered Narayan on the landing. Her mistress did not look at all pleased at the intrusion.

  twenty-five

  THE MEETING WITH GOWDARU-SAAR and the realization of what Harry Chinappa’s careless, self-serving lies had thrown his way unleashed an unprecedented anger that propelled Anand through his home in a great, all-consuming silence. The fat house, overbuilt, overspent; the mechanisms by which it had been created, the human infrastructure of his entire life; all existed, it seemed, to oppress him. He lived mute within it, his silence punctuated by the angry mutterings of his wife and watched in gathering bewilderment by his daughter.

  Valmika saw something in his face that she had never seen before, and worked up the courage one morning to ask, “Appa, what’s wrong?”

  They were headed into Cubbon Park. “Nothing,” he said. “Nothing, kutty. Come on.” They stretched perfunctorily before starting to run. His legs stretched farther today, moving lightly over the ground, feeling an old, forgotten power for the first time in years. At the corner, he glanced back, but Valmika had been keeping pace with him.

  There she was. Kavika. In the distance, holding the leash of her mother’s aging dog. He felt like running right up to her, shouting at her for her obliviousness, grabbing her arm, pulling her to the car, and driving away with her. Somewhere.

  He accelerated, leaving Valmika behind, and came to a despairing halt in front of her. Kavika’s cheerful hello seemed unaffected both by his fevered fantasies and by whatever stories his wife
was feeding her. “This guy,” she said, bending and fondling the dog’s long ears, “would lose a race with a turtle.”

  Her eyes roamed his face; her voice was friendly, kind. “Anand,” she said. “Amir told me something in confidence. About your company. It really worried me …”

  He couldn’t speak. Valmika had reached them and was sucking in shuddering gasps of breath. She fell to her knees, and Anand suddenly felt ashamed. He tried to speak to her cheerfully: “You ran really well, kutty. Great job!”

  Kavika waited until Valmika had recovered her breath. She said: “Sweetie, do you think you could just ramble about with this fellow for a few minutes while I talk to your father? Thank you! And don’t go too far, stay within our sight all the time.” She turned back to Anand. “Amir told me that you were being pursued by some political goon for money…. Is that true? Are you okay?”

  Anand sat on the grass and started talking, telling her, freely, easily, of everything that had happened. He was no raconteur; the narrative was bald and shorn of decorative detail, but she listened with an attentive sympathy that pulled the words out of him. He started with the land investment; he was soon speaking about Harry Chinappa with an honesty that he had never before managed with anyone. He knew that he could trust her, that she would not go running with these tales to either his wife or their friends.

  She offered no conventional platitudes. Instead, she asked directly: “So do you think he is behind this political party coming after you? Harry Chinappa? Would he actually go that far?”

  Anand sighed. He had been debating the same point himself. “No. I don’t think so. Actually, I doubt if he is even aware of it. Family is too important to him—believe it or not—even though he lied about me….” This was something Anand knew, he would never forget and never forgive. But even so, Harry Chinappa wasn’t behind the political parties. “I think Sankleshwar is the man behind it.”

  “Fuck,” she said, digesting this, slowly, implications feeding through.

  “That’s bad, right?” she said. “So … what is he after? Is it money? Is this Gowda person collecting the money for Sankleshwar?”

  Anand did not need to think it through. “Sankleshwar doesn’t need my money. Fuck—it’s peanuts for him. He’s a vicious son-of-a-bitch who is pissed off at me. Thanks to Harry Chinappa. He’s pissed off at me—and wants to teach me a lesson.”

  “So he put those political guys onto you?”

  Anand looked up at the sky, fighting the tears of anger and fright welling up within him. He hadn’t cried since he was a teenager. “Yeah.”

  “He has that kind of political muscle?”

  “Yeah. He’s really connected. Apparently, in his early days, there were some very shady deals where he got his political buddies to convert large tracts of greenbelt land into far more valuable industrial through some rezoning—and in return the fucker helped them launder black money into land. And, according to Vinayak, some business of violence in his early years. He got rid of some guy who didn’t want to sell to him….”

  “Boy, Vinayak and his stories. Sometimes you just don’t know what to believe … I discount half the things he says.”

  “Well,” said Anand, picking up a stone and flinging it against a tree, “that’s what I did too, right? What a fucking mistake. I should never have gotten involved with either Harry Chinappa or Sankleshwar.”

  “Anand.” She placed the warmth of her hand on his shoulder. “Don’t be too hard on yourself. You couldn’t have known. But this is a really crappy situation to be in. You know, it’s one thing to hear of the routine daily corruption we all deal with—but I had no idea that this sort of thing happened with companies. How do you function with this sort of political arm-twisting?”

  “Jesus, Kavika, this isn’t normal,” Anand said. “I mean, you do hear of politicians and their goons sniffing around certain industries … real estate, for instance. Or liquor. Or mining.”

  “Ah. Places that tend to need a helping, corrupt hand …”

  “Exactly. Or getting kickbacks from companies who are chasing government orders. But normally they leave us manufacturing or software companies alone. At least if we keep our heads down…. Of course, we still have to deal with what you said: the routine, daily corruption—which is fucking bad enough. But this … thanks to Sankleshwar, they have their claws into us, and they’re not going to back off. It’s scary.”

  He could see his emotions reflected on her face. She was appalled. And angry.

  “Oh, Anand. That is such bullshit. Bastards! … You know, I remember reading about the company that refused to support one party and, as revenge, the party members planted porn on the company premises and then got the police to raid them and arrest the CEO …”

  Anand looked grim. “Yeah, I remember that too. Poor bugger.”

  “Sorry, that wasn’t the most comforting thing to say…. So if Sankleshwar can set these guys on you, then presumably he can get them to back off. He’s the guy you must talk to.”

  “He’s not returning my phone calls,” said Anand.

  The jacaranda and rain trees made a high canopy of green over their heads, filtering the early morning sun. In the distance, they could see the cocker spaniel snuffling along, smelling the long grass, Valmika having released him from his leash.

  “Someday,” Kavika said, “I will tell you my own story. Difficult choices there too—and I am not always sure I have made the right ones. It’s not always easy to see, is it?”

  Someone had spread birdseed, and a large flock of birds had settled in the spaniel’s path. As he approached, nose and ears to the ground, they rose, the pigeons, in a single gray cloud of fright. The startled dog backed hastily away, almost tumbling over his rear legs, and peered in astonishment at the flying bird-carpet from behind the safety of a bush.

  Kavika’s laughter bubbled up; she was sprawled on the grass, her giggles shaking her stomach. Anand found himself laughing too, for the first time in days—and he was still laughing when his daughter rejoined them, the dog back on the leash.

  “Did you see that?” Valmika asked. “It was the funniest sight.”

  Kavika stood up and gave Valmika a hug. “Thank you! I hope this fool did not trouble you too much? I’m glad!”

  As they headed back to their car, Valmika said: “Appa. You’re smiling.”

  “Yes,” said Anand. “I think I feel better after my run.” He remembered his earlier mood. “I’m glad you came running with me, kutty. And I’m sorry if I made you run too hard.”

  Valmika snorted. “Hard? Appa, next time, I’ll beat you!”

  He put his arm around her and hugged her hard.

  *

  HE WAITED UNTIL 10:00 A.M. and called Sankleshwar’s office again. The great man was traveling, they told him. In meetings. Busy elsewhere.

  Ananthamurthy and Mrs. Padmavati worried over the financial end of the matter with him. Gowdaru-saar had sent word through the Landbroker: the sale price of the remaining land had gone up by 20 percent. This additional amount would have to be paid in cash. If they didn’t pay, the land purchase would not happen.

  “We will have to pay,” said Mrs. Padmavati. “We have no choice. We must pay and hope that they do not once again ask us for more.”

  “Mrs. Padmavati—how do we pay the full amount? We cannot pay more than ten percent; they want twenty. Even ten percent will stretch our budget to the maximum. The banks will not lend us more.”

  “Sir, can you tell them this?” said Mrs. Padmavati. “Tell them we can only afford so much and no more.”

  “It is worth a try,” said Anand. “But it will probably not work. I’ll speak to the Landbroker about this.”

  He met with the Landbroker at the Swamy Miltry Hotel, just off the highway. Dark, low-ceilinged, tiny, walls stained with cooking grease and clumps of decaying cobwebs; the rancid odor of burnt sambar; what the place lacked in comfort, it made up for in anonymity. The Landbroker fetched two coffees from the serving counter,
the tumbler inverted into a steel cup. They stood at one of the tall, Formica-topped tables that dotted the premises.

  “Listen, not to worry.” Anand knew he first had to soothe the Landbroker, to return to him a sense of confidence that the meeting with Gowdaru-saar had undermined.

  “What, saar,” said the Landbroker. “This is the first time this is happening to me. The first time I am having to face such political pressure and the first time”—the Landbroker was upset, barely meeting Anand’s eye—“where I am not sure if a client is buying from me or from someone else.”

  “No, no. I am buying only from you. Not to worry. That Sankleshwar is a friend of my father-in-law’s; that is why there was some conversation. But that is all. Not to worry. Nothing has been signed; no money has been exchanged with him. I am only working with you. Where this Gowdaru-saar has got this information from I don’t know. And I do not know why he has approached me like this. But no matter,” said Anand, gliding lightly over his father-in-law’s dealings. “We have to now deal with this, and we will. You please tell him that we will pay, but you must make it clear—we can only afford ten percent more.”

  The Landbroker looked doubtful and worried. “They will not like to bargain this way, saar.”

  “Tell him this is all we can afford. You please tell him this. We are not as big as he thinks.”

  “I will try, saar,” said the Landbroker, unconvinced.

  AN EMAIL PINGED ACROSS his phone. It was a cheerful, encouraging letter from the Japanese company, looking forward to their next meeting. In Copenhagen, this time. Anand had planned to take Mr. Ananthamurthy and Mrs. Padmavati with him. For both of them, it would have been their first trip abroad. “We are very much looking forward to doing business in India,” the email said, “to participating in the growth of your great nation and, if all goes well, of your company.”

  The first time Anand had traveled abroad, years before, to meet a potential client in Germany, he had not been able to stop staring: at the roads, the bridges, the tunnels, the cars, the trains, at the organized reliability of it all, so startled by such careless munificence he almost wept. When asked later to describe his trip, he was typically laconic: “Everything works,” he said. He had not been successful with the client; they had doubted Indian manufacturing capability.