Diamond Dust

by Anita Desai

  Where springs not fail—"

  and then? And then? How does it go—

  "And I have asked to be

  Where no storms come

  Where the green swell is in the heaven's dumb,

  And out of the swing of the sea—"

  remember? remember?'

  Who did not? Who did not, Sarla would have liked to know, but suddenly Simba was upon them, bursting out of the house, his great tail thumping, his claws slithering across the veranda tiles in his excitement as he dashed at Maya, then at Ravi, finally at Raja and, to Sarla's horror, Raja was pushed back into his chair by Simba's vigorous attention, but Raja was pushing back at him, laughing, 'Oh, Simba, Simba of the Kenyan highlands! You remember me, do you?' and Sarla, cupping her chin in her hand, leaving her coffee untouched, watched as Raja, suddenly as sprightly as a boy, the boy who had bicycled helter-skelter down the streets of Oxford, dark hair rising up from his great brow and falling into the luminous eyes, now ran down the stairs with Simba into the garden, then bent to pick up a stick and send it flying up at the morning sun for the pleasure of having Simba leap for it. Old Simba, usually so gloomy, so lethargic, was now springing up on his hindlegs to catch the falling toy and run with it into the shade of the flamboyant tree, Raja following him, his pale silk dhoti floating about him, his white hair glistening, making the startled parakeets fly out of the clusters of scarlet flowers with screams.

  Then both Sarla and Maya released small sighs. Ravi watched their expressions from the stool on which he was perched, and finally asked, diffidently, 'May I have a lump of sugar and a little milk, please?'

  In spite of his poetic response to Sarla's suggestion that he accompany them to the mountains, Raja continuously postponed the journey. No, he had come to Delhi, all the way to Delhi in the heat of June, to see them, to relive the remembered joys of their beautiful home. How could he cut short his time here? And there was so much for him to see, to do, to catch up on. He wanted Sarla to drive him to the silver market in Chandni Chowk so he could gaze upon the magnificent craftsmanship on display there, perhaps even purchase a piece to take back with him to California where the natives had never seen such art bestowed upon craft, and then if Maya were to accompany him to the Cottage Industries emporium, and help him select a pashmina shawl, then he could be happy even on those chill, rainy days that he was forced to endure. "What, didn't they know, California had such weather? Had they been deceived by posters of palm trees and golden beaches? Didn't they know the fraudulence inherent in the very notion and practice of tourism, that abominable habit of the Western world? Tourism! Now, when he returned to India, it was not to see the sights, he already knew them—they were imprinted upon his heart—but to imbibe them, savour them, nourish himself upon them. And so when Sarla and Ravi took him to Nizamuddin and beside the saint's tomb they heard a blind beggar play his lute and sing in a voice so soulful that it melted one's very being,

  'When I was born

  I was my mother's prince.

  When I married

  I became my wife's king.

  But you have reduced me

  To being a beggar, Lord,

  Come begging for alms

  With my hands outstretched—'

  it was as if the thirst of Raja's pilgrim soul was being slaked, and never had thirst been slaked by music so sublime as made by this ancient beggar in his rags, a tin can at his knee for alms—and of course he must have whatever was in Raja's purse, every last coin, alas that they were so few. Now if this beggar were performing in the West, the great theatres of every metropolis would throw open their doors to him. He would perform under floodlights, his name would be on posters, in the papers, on everyone's lips. Gold would pile up at his feet—but then, would he be such a singer as he was now, a pilgrim soul content to sit in the shade of the great saint Nizamuddin's little fretted marble tomb, and dedicate his song to him as homage?

  Raja, leaving his slippers at the gateway to the courtyard, approached the tomb with such ecstasy etched upon his noble features that Sarla, and Ravi too, found themselves gazing at him rather than about them—Sarla's bare and Ravi's stockinged feet on the stones, braving the dirt and flies and garbage that had first made them shrink and half turn away. Sarla had held her sari to her nose as they passed a row of butchers' shops on their way to the tomb, buffalo's innards had hung like curtains in the small booths, and the air was rife with raw blood and the thrum of flies, and she asked Raja, in the car, 'How is it that you, a vegetarian, a Brahmin, walked in there and never even twitched your nose?' He cast his eyes upon her briefly—and they were still those narrow, horizontal pools of darkness she remembered—and sighed, 'My dear, true souls do not turn away from humanity or, if they do, it is only to meditate and pray, then come back, fortified, to embrace it—beggars, thieves, lepers, whoever—their sores, their rags. They do not flinch from them, for they know these are only the covering, the concealing robes of the soul, don't you know?' and Sarla, and Ravi, seated on either side of Raja on the comfortably upholstered back seat of the air-conditioned Ambassador, now speeding past the Lodi Gardens to their own green enclave, wondered if Raja was referring to himself or the sufi.

  That afternoon, as they sat on the veranda, sipping tea and nibbling at the biscuits the cook had sent up in a temper (he was supposed to be on leave, he was not going to bake fancy cakes at a time when he was rightfully to have had his summer vacation, and so the sahibs could do with biscuits bought in the bazaar), Raja, a little melancholy, a little subdued—which Sarla and Ravi put down to the impression left on him by their visit to the sufi's tomb—piped up in a beseeching voice, 'Sarla, Ravi, where are those ravishing friends of yours I met when you were at the High Commission in London? The Dutta-Rays, was it not? You must know who I mean—you told me how they'd returned to Delhi and built this absolutely fabulous hacienda in Vasant Vihar. Isn't that quite close by?'

  'It is,' Ravi admitted.

  Like a persistent child, Raja continued, 'Then why don't we have them over? This evening? I remember she sang like a nightingale—those melancholy, funereal songs of Tagore's. Wouldn't they be perfect on an evening like this which simply hangs suspended in time, don't you know, as if the dust and heat were holding it in their cruel grasp? Oh, Sarla, do telephone, do send for her—tell her I pine to hear the sound of her avian voice. Just for that, I'm even willing to put up with her husband who I remember finding—how shall I put it—a trifle wanting?'

  Sarla found herself quite unwilling. Truth be told, the morning's expedition had left her with a splitting headache; she was not in the habit of walking around in the midday sun, leave that to mad dogs and—she'd always said. Even now, her temples throbbed and perspiration trickled discreetly down the back of her knees, invisible under the fresh cotton sari she'd donned for tea. But Raja would not hear of a refusal, or accept any excuse. If she thought the Dutta-Rays had left for Kashmir, why did she not ring and find out? Oh, there was no need to get up and go to the telephone—'In this land of fantasies fulfilled, isn't there always a willing handmaid, so to speak, to bring the mountain to Mohammed?' and Sarla had to send for the telephone to be brought out to the veranda, the servant Balu unwinding the telephone line all the way, and she was forced to speak into it and verify that the Dutta-Rays were indeed still in Delhi, held up by a visit from a former colleague at India House, but were going out that evening to that party—didn't Sarla and Ravi know of it? 'We're supposed to be away,' Sarla said stiffly into the telephone. 'Everyone thinks we are in the hills by now. We usually are.' Well, the Dutta-Rays would drop in on their way—and so they did, she a vision of grace in her finely embroidered Lucknow sari, pale green on white, to Raja's great delight, and only too willing to sing for his delectation, only not tonight since they were already late.

  So Sarla and Ravi found themselves throwing a party—a party that was to be the setting for a recital given by Ila Dutta-Ray, a woman neither of them had any warm feelings for, remembering how unhelpful sh
e had been when they had first arrived in London and so badly needed help in finding a flat, engaging servants, placing their children in school, all so long ago of course. Instead of helping, she had sent them her old cook, declaring he was the best, but really saving herself the air fare back to India because he proved good for nothing but superannuation. They rang up whoever of their circle of friends remained in Delhi to invite them for the occasion. It was quite extraordinary how many friends Raja remembered and managed to trace, and also how many who were on the point of going away, changed their plans on hearing his name and assured Sarla and Ravi they would come.

  Then there occurred a dreadful incident: Sarla was choosing from amongst her saris one cool enough for the evening ahead, which was, of course, one of the summer's worst, that kind of still, yellow, lurid evening that it inflicted when one thought one could bear no more, and meant that the recital would be held not in the garden after all but in the air-conditioned drawing room instead, when a terrible thought struck her: she had forgotten to invite Maya! Maya and her husband Pravin! How could she have? It was true Maya had told her Pravin was very preoccupied with a special issue his paper was bringing out on the rise of Hindu fundamentalism but that was no reason to assume they might not be free. Sarla stood in front of the mirror that was attached to one leaf of the armoire, and clasped her hand over her mouth with a look so stricken that Ravi, coming in to ask what glasses should be taken out for the evening, wondered if she had a sudden toothache. 'Ravi! Oh, Ravi,' she wailed.

  The telephone was brought to her—Balu unwinding the coils of an endless wire—and the number dialled for her. Then Sarla spoke into it in gasps, but unfortunately she had not taken the time to collect her wits and phrase her invitation with more tact. Maya's sharp ears picked up every indication that her sister had been unforgivably remiss, and coldly rejected the insulting last-minute invitation, insisting proudly that Pravin was working late and she could not possibly leave his side, he never wrote a line without consulting her.

  As if that was not agony enough, Sarla had to undergo the further humiliation of Raja piping up in the middle of the party—just as Ila Dutta-Ray was tuning her tanpura and about to open her mouth and utter the first note of her song—'But Sarla, where is Maya, that aficionado of Tagore's music? Surely we should wait for her? Why is she so late?' An awful hush fell—and Sarla again assumed her stricken look. What was she to say, how was she to explain? She found herself stumbling over Maya's insincere excuse, but of course everyone guessed. Frowning in disapproval, Ila Dutta-Ray began her song on a very low, very deep and hoarse note.

  In retaliation, Maya and Pravin threw a party as soon as Pravin's column had been written and the special issue had gone to press, and their party was in honour of the Minister of Human Resources, whose wife was such an admirer of Raja's, had read every word he had written and wanted so much to meet him—'in an intimate setting'. Since she had made this special request, they had felt obliged to cut down their guest list—and were sure Sarla and Ravi would not mind since they had the pleasure of Raja's company every day. But when Ravi stoically offered to drive Raja across to their house, he found the whole road lined with cars, many of them chauffeur-driven and with government number plates, and had the humliation of backing out of it after dropping Raja at the gate, then returning to Sarla who had given way to a fierce migraine and was insisting that they book seats on a train to the hills as soon as possible.

  'But don't we need to wait till Raja is gone?'

  'Raja is incapable of making decisions—we'll have to make his for him,' she snapped, waving at Balu who was slouching in the doorway, waiting to take away the remains of their meagre supper from the dining table.

  She was still agonised enough the following morning—digging violently into half a ripe papaya in the blazing light that spilt over the veranda even at that early hour—actually to ask Raja, 'How can you bear this heat? Do you really not mind it? I feel I'm going to collapse—'

  Raja, who had a look of sleepy contentment on his face—he had already meditated for an hour in the garden, done his yoga exercises, bathed, drunk his tea and had every reason to look forward to another day—did not seem to catch her meaning at all. Reaching out to stroke her hand, he said, 'I know what you need, my dear—a walk in the sublime Lodi Gardens when the sun is setting and Venus appears in the sky so silently — and went on to describe the ruins, their patina of lichen, their tiles of Persian blue, the echoes that rang beneath their domes, in such terms that Sarla sank back in her chair, sighing, agreeing.

  What she did not know was that he had already arranged to walk there with Maya, Ila Dutta-Ray, and the wife of the Minister of Human Resources who, it turned out, had read that book of verses he had written when in Oxford and had published by a small press in London, long expired, so that copies were now collectors' pieces. All three women owned such copies. And Sarla found herself trailing behind them while Raja pranced, actually pranced with delight, with enthusiasm, in their company. At their suggestion he recited these verses:

  'The lamp of heaven is hung upon the citrus bough,

  The nightingale falls silent.

  All is waiting,

  For a royal visit by night's own queen—'

  and then burst into mocking, self-deprecating laughter, waving away their protests to say, 'Oh, those adolescent excesses! What was I thinking of, in Oxford, in the fog and the smog and the cold I suffered from perpetually! Well, you know, I was thinking of— this,' and he waved at the walled rose garden and beyond it the pond and beyond that the tombs of the Lodi emperors surrounded by neem trees, and they all gazed with him. Eventually the Minister's wife sighed, 'You make us all see it with new eyes, as if we had never seen it before.'

  Sarla, who had hung back, and was standing by a rose bush, fingering the fine petals of one flower pensively, realised that this was so exactly true: it was Raja who opened their eyes, who made them see it as they never saw it themselves, as a place of magic, enchantment, of pleasure so immense and rich that it could never be exhausted. She gazed at his back, his noble head, the silvery hair, the gracefully gesturing arm in its white muslin sleeve, there in the shade of the neem tree, totally disregarding the dust, the smouldering heat at the summer day's end, and seeing it all as romantic, paradisaical—and she clasped her hands together, pressing a petal between them, grateful for knowing him.

  That evening she tried again. 'Raja, I know you would love Winhaven,' she told him, interrupting the Vedic hymn he was reciting to prove to Ravi that his Sanskrit was still fluent—hadn't he taught it to the golden youth of Berkeley, of Stanford, of the universities in Los Angeles and San Francisco, for all these years of his exile? 'And I would love to see you in the Himalayas,' she went on, raising her voice, 'because they would make the most perfect setting for you. Perhaps you would begin to write again over there—'

  'But darling Sarla,' Raja beamed at her, showing both the pleasure he took in her suggestion and his determination not to be swept away by it, 'Maya tells me there is to be a lecture at India International Centre next week on the Himalayas as an inspiration for Indian poets through the centuries, and I would hate to miss it. It's to be given by Professor Dandavate, that old bore—d'you remember him? What a dreary young man he was at Oxford! I can quite imagine how much drearier he is now—and I can't resist the opportunity to pick holes in all he says, and in public too—'

  'But next week?' Sarla enquired helplessly. 'It'll—it'll be even hotter.'

  'Sarla, don't you ever think of anything else?' he reproved her gently, although with a little twitch of impatience about his eyes. 'Now I don't ever notice the heat. Drink the delicious fresh lemonades your marvellous cook makes, rest in the afternoons, and there's no reason why you shouldn't enjoy the summer. Oh, think of the fruit alone that summer brings us—'

  But it was the marvellous cook himself who brought an end to Raja's idyll in Sarla and Ravi's gracious home: that very day he took off his apron, laid down his egg whisk an
d his market bag, declared that enough was enough, that he was needed in his village to bring in the harvest before the monsoon arrived. He was already late and had received a postcard from his son to say they could not delay it by another day. He demanded his salary and caught his train.

  Sarla was sufficiently outraged by his treachery to make the afternoon tea herself, braving the inferno of the kitchen where she seldom had need to venture, and was rewarded by Raja's happy and Ravi's proud beam as she brought out the tea tray to the veranda. But dinner proved Something else altogether. Balu showed not the slightest inclination that he meant to help: he kept to the pantry with grim determination, giving the glasses and silver another polishing rather than take a step into the kitchen. Sarla had a whispered consultation with Ravi, suggesting they take Raja out to India International Centre or the Gymkhana Club for dinner, but Ravi reminded her that the car had gone for servicing and they could go nowhere tonight. Sarla, her sari end tucked in at her waist, wiping the perspiration from her face with her elbow, went back into the kitchen and peered into its recesses to see if the cook had not repented and left some cooked food for them after all, but she found little that she could put together even if she knew how. At one point, she even telephoned Maya to see if her sister would not come to her aid—Maya was known for her superb culinary skill—but there was no answer: Maya and Pravin were out. It was to an embarassingly inadequate repast of sliced cucumber, yoghurt and bread that the three finally sat down—Balu looking as if it were far beneath his dignity to serve such an excuse for a meal, Sarla tight-lipped with anger with herself for failing so blatantly, Ravi trying, with embarrassed sincerity, to thank her for her brave effort, and Raja saying nothing at all, but quietly crumbling the bread beside his plate till he confessed a wish to go to bed early.