But she was no longer an innocent little girl with oil-glossed plaits. She was a woman now. A woman in trouble. What on earth had she been thinking when she’d started an affair with that snake Kori? An intelligent, pleasant girl with her entire life ahead of her should have been wiser than that. Instead she’d been foolish and careless. Undeniably stupid.
The suppressed anger started to simmer and bubble once again. The urge to drag his sister out of bed and give her a thorough scolding was creeping up on him. In fact, that irresponsible little brat deserved a flogging. And yet, the desire to protect her was equally fervent. He had always looked out for her safety. He wasn’t about to give up that role now.
Every year, his family observed the Hindu ritual of bhau beej, when his sister reverently waved an oil lamp before him, applied a red dot on his forehead, and wished him a long and happy life. In return he gave her a small gift, promised to protect her from evil and hardship. It was time for him to fulfill that sacred oath he’d taken so many times over the years. Vini needed him now more than ever.
Could some of this be his own fault? Had it been a mistake for him to leave his family and go to Bombay to pursue a career? But he couldn’t refuse that impossible-to-turn-down job offer from a major corporation. His father had encouraged him to take it, too. Working for one of India’s most reputable financial-services giants as a chartered accountant for a year or two would make him more attractive to Palgaum’s elite clientele. His dream of turning his father’s modest business into a major financial planning company would be more reachable if he learned everything he could from his present employer.
On the other hand, his absence had allowed his sister to go astray, directly into the path of destruction. If he’d been here, he would have discovered Vini’s love affair before it could go too far. He would’ve strangled that worthless bastard Kori, and sent him straight to the sewer, where he belonged. Vishal would have talked some sense into Vini before she could ruin herself. If that hadn’t worked, he’d have talked his parents into enrolling her in an out-of-town college, somewhere far from Palgaum.
But it was too late for any of that. Even now his fingers itched to encircle that egomaniac’s neck and squeeze until the man’s funny golden eyes popped out. Nonetheless, it was wishful thinking. What good would it do, anyway? Any confrontation between himself and the powerful Kori family, which had every government official and politician in their deep pockets, would end up only one way.
Besides, the Kannada-Marathi tensions were already high in this town, and any clash of that sort, however minor, could blow up into a major episode. His father could lose his loyal Kannada clients. His family could even get hurt or killed. He couldn’t risk that.
At the moment, he needed to smuggle his sister out of town and keep her out of the public eye for the next few months. His parents were counting on him to accomplish that. It was going to be hard, but in that respect his being in Bombay was a blessing. He didn’t know too many people there, not even his neighbors. Big-city life rarely involved friendly relationships with one’s neighbors. Nobody would know Vini there.
His nice, comfortable bachelor life would be disrupted. But he’d manage somehow. It was only for a few months.
What really scared him was Vini’s health. He knew nothing about caring for an expectant woman. He’d have to ask his mother about that.
As if in response to his silent reflection, the back door opened. His mother’s silhouette appeared against the backdrop of the kitchen light. Her hair was an untidy halo around her head.
“Vishal?” she called softly.
“Yes.”
“I heard the swing…guessed it was you.” She spoke in whispers.
“I couldn’t sleep,” he said, putting both feet firmly on the floor to bring the swing to a stop.
“Me too.” She sat down beside him and sniffed. “You ate a banana?”
He smiled. His mother could smell something a mile away. “Hmm.”
“If you’re hungry, I’ll make something for you.” She started to stand.
He caught her wrist and forced her to sit back down. “You don’t have to feed me constantly.”
She reluctantly settled back on the swing. They sat in uneasy silence for several minutes.
He inhaled deeply the humid, mogra-scented air. “Our Vini is going from teenager to mother,” he said, gingerly introducing the subject that was uppermost in both their minds. Unwed mother, he corrected himself.
His mother sighed. “I haven’t slept since Vini dropped the bomb on us.”
“I know.” Vini’s crisis certainly qualified as a bomb. He was still reeling from the explosion.
“What are we going to do, Vishal?” His mother’s face was turned toward him. With only a faint glimmer of light coming through the partly open kitchen door, he couldn’t see much of her face, but the concern in her voice was as clear as daylight. “How can something so horrible happen to us?”
“Papa and I will take care of it,” he replied, with more certainty than he felt.
“I am so relieved you are here. Your father seems more like his normal self now.”
“This is very upsetting for him.”
“I thought he was going to have a heart attack. Never seen him like that. I expected him to get angry, but he became very quiet after he heard the news.”
“It had to be the shock,” Vishal offered.
“And when he remained like that all night, I was so scared.”
“I know,” he repeated. He angled one foot on the cold slate floor and propelled the swing into gentle motion again. “I’ll take her to Bombay…make sure she stays out of trouble.”
“How?”
“I’ll keep Kori away from her.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about. Kori wants nothing to do with her or the child.” She touched his arm. “This doctor friend of yours. Is he reliable?”
“Very,” he assured her. “His name is Ram Gupte. He and I used to be classmates in the first two years of college, but we lost touch after he went off to medical college.”
“How come I never heard of him…or his family?”
“His father was in the army,” he explained. “So they were in Palgaum for only a short while.”
“So you don’t know this chap all that well.” She sounded dubious. “Will he keep a secret?”
“Oh yes. He’s a reputable doctor affiliated with Bombay Hospital. When I explained everything to him earlier, he understood.”
“But still…”
“He assured me he handles other cases like this—girls from respectable families getting into trouble.”
She paused for a minute. “But Bombay Hospital is such a big, public hospital. Someone we know could easily see Vini there—”
“They won’t,” he interrupted. “Ram has his own office. He apparently treats all such…unusual cases there. He says his staff is very discreet.”
“But I still worry about her future. If she insists on keeping the child, it will ruin her.” She paused. “And us.”
“I’ll talk to her. She’ll be staying with me for the next few months, so we’ll have a chance to discuss it.”
“She will not listen to you.”
“She will,” he said with all the conviction he could muster. “I’ll convince her.”
“I don’t think so, Vishal.”
He gave himself a second to respond. “Don’t you trust me, Mummy?”
“Of course I trust you,” she snapped. “But this is different. She’s not herself.” His mother sighed long and loud once again. “I don’t know what is wrong with her. Why is she being so obstinate?”
“I don’t know,” he said in frustration. “Maybe it’s her condition. What do I know about pregnant women?”
“Well, I do!” Sarla stopped the swing and rose to her feet. “It is probably best if I come to Bombay during the delivery, don’t you think?”
“Absolutely! I know nothing about childbirth. She’s going to need
you there.” I’m going to need you. The idea of having to see his sister through childbirth made him shudder.
“I will fly out there for a few weeks when her time comes,” she said in a flat, resigned tone. “Go to bed, Vishal.”
“I will, in a few minutes. You go ahead.” He watched her open the door and step inside. She looked like she’d aged by a decade within the last few hours. Her petite body looked almost frail. And yet she was quite young, only in her forties. He called out to her. “Mummy.”
“Hmm?” She turned around to face him.
“How are you and Papa going to explain Vini’s sudden disappearance?”
“Papa thinks we should say she got a special scholarship to study at some college in Bombay.”
He rolled his eyes. “Nobody is going to believe it.”
She nodded. “I told him that. They’ll wonder why we didn’t brag about it before.”
“I agree.”
“I think we should say she was recently diagnosed with some kind of tumor or something and is receiving treatment in Mumbai.” She paused for a beat. “At least people will understand why we kept it a secret.”
Vishal stroked his mustache, considering her viewpoint. “I don’t know about that, either.”
“No?”
“But it sounds more believable than a scholarship, I suppose.” Palgaum didn’t offer many medical options, and lots of people who could afford better health care went either north to Bombay or south to Bangalore for specialized treatment. It wasn’t unheard of.
“We’ll have to think of something soon.” She sounded exhausted, dejected.
“And we will,” he said. “We will, Mummy.”
She closed the door and disappeared inside the house.
Vishal sat in the stillness of the night for a long time. He wasn’t sure if his mother believed him. Heck, he wasn’t sure if he believed himself. But he’d made a promise to his parents. He’d have to find a way to keep it. It was going to be a difficult road to negotiate.
A long time later, he got to his feet and returned to bed.
He knew what he had to do.
Chapter 10
Sarla immersed herself in making breakfast—spicy omelets made with chopped onions, hot green chilies, and coriander leaves.
Cooking was like an old friend—warm, comforting, always ready to listen in silence. Whenever she was troubled about something, she liked to stand at her Burshane gas stove and cook. Besides, a good breakfast would fill her children’s bellies and keep them going until their flight reached Bombay and they could get to Vishal’s flat.
She gazed out on the awakening dawn through the open back door while the omelets sizzled and filled the kitchen with the aroma of eggs and onions cooking. The night’s fog still hadn’t lifted completely. Dew sat heavily on the bushes. The swing that she and Vishal had shared the previous night stood still on the veranda.
Vini used to love that swing. Because of its size it had been a big attraction for the neighborhood children. A half dozen of them could huddle together on it at the same time.
Years ago, Vini and her little friends had sat on it for hours, whispering, giggling. They would abandon the swing only when the sun started to go down and the mosquitoes would drive them indoors. Even now, Vini used it often, gliding gently while she studied for her exams or listened to her favorite Vividh Bharati music program on the transistor radio. On chilly winter mornings, she sat with a woolen blanket wrapped around her.
Picturing an innocent, young Vini on that swing, wiggling her tiny toes and singing Hindi movie songs along with the radio in a high-pitched voice, was enough to make Sarla sigh and turn her attention back to the stove. The tears came despite her efforts to stem the tide.
In the course of a single day, everything in Sarla’s near-perfect life had gone upside down. It wasn’t exactly perfect, but then whose life was? Her son was working so far away from home. Her brother and sisters and their families were scattered and she rarely saw them.
Her blood pressure, too, was a little on the high side lately, so she had been asked by the doctor to eat less salt. “How can anyone eat food without salt?” she’d asked him.
“I didn’t say eliminate it. Just eat less,” he’d told her gruffly. “You don’t want to have a stroke or heart attack, do you?”
It was hard to curb the salt, but she was trying to use less of it in her cooking, mainly because she didn’t want to die early like her father, who had died of a paralytic stroke while he was still quite young. He had had high blood pressure, too.
She hadn’t been able to sleep at all the previous night, even after Vishal had assured her he’d take care of everything. Bhalchandra, or Bhal, as everyone called her husband, was finally snoring after a restless night, so to allow him his rest she’d slid out of bed as quietly as she could and headed for the kitchen.
Soon they’d all be up and bustling to get Vishal and Vini to the airport. She wiped her damp eyes with the edge of her sari. From now on she’d be alone in the house during the day. Not that it was any different in these last several years, since Bhal’s business had expanded and he worked late hours in his office, six days a week, and the children were in school or college most of the day.
Since Vishal had left home for Bombay, at least her daughter had been around to talk to. Daughters were usually more attached to the parents, too.
Most evenings, while Vini studied, Sarla did her cooking or worked on her embroidery. While they waited for Bhal to come home to a family dinner, their silent companionship was pleasant.
Now, all of a sudden, Vini was leaving, too. And under such a black cloud of scandal and misfortune. Why, Lord? When things were going so well for her daughter, when she was the brightest student in her class, and had such a promising future, why had the silly girl gone in search of trouble? In some two years she would have had a degree and she could have married a nice young man and had a good marriage—and a career, too.
Even though Vini had somehow ended up committing a youthful indiscretion, why hadn’t she confided in them earlier? Things could have been fixed—to some extent, anyway.
Now her chances for both a career and a marriage were reduced to nothing. Who would marry a girl with a horrible reputation? And an illegitimate child on top of that? The whole world would find out…sooner or later. Their town was notorious for vicious gossip.
If the ladies at the Palgaum Club, especially Vandana and Girija, discovered the truth, the news would travel faster than the rockets the Americans and Russians were shooting into space. And how was Sarla going to face her friends over the next high tea? How was she going to explain such a shameful thing to those smirking women who were jealous because Sarla’s children were so intelligent and earned such high marks in class—so much higher than their sons and daughters?
And then there were the servants. They would start asking questions about Vini. Thank goodness the washerwoman didn’t start work until late morning. Vini and Vishal would be long gone by then. But seeing Vini and most of her personal belongings missing, Sulu was certain to get curious. Later in the evening, the man who helped clean the house and Bhal’s office would show up. He was much more withdrawn than the washerwoman, but he, too, would surely wonder where Vini was.
As soon as Bhal woke up, she’d have to take him and Vishal aside and decide what explanation they were going to offer for Vini’s sudden and long absence. They had better come up with a credible one.
All this plotting and lying was giving her a headache. Oh Lord, what a lifelong burden. How was she going to survive the scandal? She could only pray that Bhal’s business didn’t suffer as a result of this. What if his conservative clients decided to take their business elsewhere? There was no shortage of tax preparers in Palgaum.
The omelet was turning brown on the bottom, so she quickly flipped it over and let it cook on the other side. Bhal disliked burnt food.
As the dawn sky began to lighten and turn a light shade of coral, she sliced the bre
ad, slathered the slices with her freshly churned butter, and toasted them on the cast-iron tava. The tea was brewing in a stainless-steel pot.
Hearing footsteps, she turned around and saw Vini standing on the threshold. “You’re up early,” she said to her daughter, noticing how listless and exhausted she looked. The girl probably hadn’t slept in days.
“Couldn’t sleep,” said Vini, stepping inside.
Now that she knew about her daughter’s condition, Sarla eyed her for a moment, then looked away. A slight bump showed quite clearly through Vini’s long cotton gown. Why hadn’t she noticed that before today? Was she so blind that she hadn’t seen something that was as clear as that sun blooming over the horizon?
She had always assumed she and her daughter were close, that there were no secrets between them. But Vini had obviously been harboring a huge secret for months. Was she afraid to confide in her own mother? She had to be, to have concealed so much. Did Vini’s friends know what was going on? If yes, how much of this had already spread through college gossip?
Even if Vini had hidden the truth, wasn’t a mother supposed to know every little thing about her own child? It wasn’t as if there were no signs. Vini had been eating very little, studying less and slipping in her class rank, getting irritated for the most trivial reasons, rising in the middle of the night to use the bathroom, and spending several evenings a week away from home.
With so many things going on right under her nose, Sarla still hadn’t guessed the obvious. And for that reason she despised herself more than her errant daughter. A mother was supposed to protect her children, prevent them from making mistakes.
She had failed in her maternal duties.
“Why don’t you have some breakfast while it’s still hot?” Sarla suggested. The girl needed some nutrition, now more than ever. Despite being in the family way, she’d lost weight in the last few weeks.
“I’m not hungry,” she mumbled as usual. “I’ll have some tea.”
Sarla turned off the burner. “Now listen, Vini. You have to eat something. All this starving is not good.” She pointed the spatula at her. “Look at you—thin as a bamboo.”
The Unexpected Son Page 9
