Darjeeling

by Bharti Kirchner

  In this cosmopolitan town where one heard English, Hindi, and at least ten other tongues, this sweet ingenue spoke only in Bengali. How Nina adored the melodious language: soft, rounded vowels coalescing with powerful consonants to form words, which then made loving liaisons to form lyrical sentences. The sounds, never harsh or vulgar, floated in the air like offerings to the gods. How appropriately here beneath the Himalayas, where those gods made their abode.

  “I can manage.” Nina gestured toward the envelope in her hand. “Look, I got a note from Aloka today.”

  “Aloka-di is coming?”

  Nina nodded. Reenu, who had never met the grandchildren, was already referring to Aloka as her older sister by attaching the honorific of di. Though Nina employed three other servants in this household—a cook, a driver, and a gardener—she had a special fondness for this artless maid. Reenu’s father had been a trusted worker at the tea estate for several decades until his death two years earlier. Her mother had been occasionally employed as a cook’s helper in this house until arthritis prevented her from working. Reenu’s mother was famous for her cabbage ghanto. She knew just how much five spice, or phoron, to sprinkle on that dish and had enough brains to add tomatoes for a hint of tartness. Thus far, Reenu had proved to be as loyal and dedicated as her father and as fine a cook as her mother. She never missed a day of work, performed all her duties with unusual care and attention, and offered many extras, such as providing Nina with company. As was the custom, Reenu didn’t share meals with the family members or join in any family functions, but she’d adopted forms of address reserved for relatives without appearing presumptuous. She accepted occasional gifts of saris and toiletries from Nina with gratitude.

  Reenu was asking, “Where will Aloka-di be staying?”

  “Her old room upstairs, the best bedroom. She is the older of the two daughters of my late son Bir and in our family the oldest child always receives special treatment. Aloka had such a good disposition. Everyone loved her when she was a baby. What a smile. Then, when she started to walk, she brightened up the house with her gentle footsteps. I still remember her grabbing the handrails—her pink fingertips against the chestnut-brown wood—as she came down the stairs. She always kept her back straight, like a princess. We tried to make sense of the few precious words she mumbled. When she had her ‘first rice,’ we invited two hundred people. That day, with everyone applauding and blessing, we named the house after her—Aloka Kutir.”

  Nina watched Reenu glance about with surprise. And she should be surprised that this yellow-washed, ten-room dwelling, with its extensive lawn and flower and vegetable gardens, could be called a kutir, or cottage.

  “Sujata always resented the fuss we made over her sister, so we named that tree after her.” Nina gestured to the magnolia tree. A mere sapling over a quarter century ago, it had reached its splendid height and was still producing new branches. A brass plaque nailed on its trunk at eye level proclaimed, “Sujata gaach,” or Sujata’s tree.

  “So Sujata-di is coming, too?”

  “Just as I hoped for. We’ll have plenty to talk about. She’s in the tea business.”

  Nina’s mind had already formed a scheme: She would seek Sujata’s help with the nearly bankrupt family-owned tea estate. After her son’s death, Nina had hired a manager and ordered him to give the workers a wage increase, paid medical care, and running water, all at a substantial cost to the family’s income. The quiet and unassuming manager hadn’t always performed well in his duties. Under his care the production had become sluggish. Last month, the tea pluckers had received their pay several days late. And all he had had to say was, “Just a slipup.”

  Nina would never forget how, eight years ago, tea pluckers had rebelled against just such cavalier treatment by management. That had strained Gupta family ties and contributed to Bir’s untimely death. Nina shuddered to think that the experience could be repeated. Sujata, now an astute career woman, could handle those grievances before they reached the point of revolt.

  Nina’s mouth moistened at the relish of another thought. “It’s time Sujata got married.”

  “A wedding!” Reenu chirped her excitement. “That’s exactly what this big house needs to come alive.”

  “But first I’ll have to introduce her to the man. What else is an old woman like me good for? Mreenal Bose is the son of a prominent Calcutta doctor. He’s coming here on holiday. His great-aunt, Tami, who’s a friend of mine, dropped by this morning. She lives only four kilometers away. Mreenal went to a boarding school here for a year. He even met Sujata briefly. She was about twelve then, he, a few years older.”

  “Would Mreenal-babu and Sujata-di still remember each other?”

  “I doubt that—even though they were about that age when children start noticing the opposite sex. Mreenal was brilliant. He graduated from Calcutta University, first in his class, then went to the States to study at Stanford. He now lives in Seattle, which I’m told is a couple of hours by boat from Victoria. He works for a software enterprise, an electronic plantation, you might say. From all I’ve heard, he’s a decent boy with no bad habits. Oh, he goes out for a hamburger every now and then—but who can blame him for eating fast food over there? We don’t teach our boys how to cook.”

  “If he lives so close to Sujata-di, why can’t they meet over there?” Nina pondered. Most employers assigned little importance to a servant’s words, but not Nina. Reenu possessed common sense.

  “Perhaps I could get them together sooner,” Nina answered. “That might make my job easier, and it won’t seem like an arranged marriage. You never know about young people these days. They can be foolishly romantic one moment, cynical the next. They think of arranged marriage either as a savior or as a curse. Still I have high hopes for Sujata. She’ll know what’s right for her. Better get the downstairs bedroom ready for her. That had always been her room.”

  “Isn’t it a little small?”

  “So? It’s closer to mine and the view is great.” Nina loved the granddaughters equally, or so she told herself. “I have asked Sujata to come earlier. She’ll have a couple of weeks to relax with me and have a chance to spend time with Mreenal before Aloka and Pranab get here.”

  “I can set up tea for Sujata-di and Mreenal-babu on this lawn.” Reenu seemed caught up in the scheme. “I’ll help you in anyway I can, Thakurma.”

  Now it occurred to Nina that Reenu would be useful for spying on the young singles. And goddess Durga would forgive Nina for that. She had much to accomplish in a short time.

  “I’ll take you up on it.” With that cordial end to the conversation, Nina hobbled unsteadily up to the house with Reenu in tow. Once settled in her room, she asked, “Before you go home today, would you get the big trunk out? You know, the one with the family photos?”

  Her niece, Toru, who lived nearby, was a superb photographer. At family functions Toru quietly snapped everyone’s pictures. The only problem was Nina seldom bothered to arrange the prints in albums. Hundreds of pictures from over the years were lying loose in the trunk.

  “I will, Thakurma.”

  “Maybe I’ll find a snapshot of Sujata and Mreenal together. Wouldn’t that be something?”

  eighteen

  “Aloka?” Pranab sounded as though he didn’t recognize her voice.

  So soon? It had been only a week since their divorce. But the more important question in Aloka’s mind was, why was he calling at seven-thirty in the morning, just as she was leaving for the office? She held the receiver in one hand, strapped her pumps on with the other. “Aloka speaking,” she offered again. If her voice quavered, it had to do with the dream she’d had of him last night in which they traversed a narrow trail in Darjeeling, so narrow that they could only pass it single file.

  Now she listened for clues.

  “Meant to ring you last night, Aloka, but I was up to my ass in work.”

  She suppressed a smile. This was the first time the high-minded Sanskrit scholar had uttered the A-w
ord, at least in her presence. In the past, differences between them had often resulted from his inability to adapt to rough, brusque metropolitan life. Alone now, perhaps he was finally being forced to adjust. She checked a loose brass button of her double-breasted suit to make sure it would stay in place the rest of the day.

  “Did you take your Sunday walk?” he asked casually. “It was such a lovely day. My apartment in Brooklyn isn’t far from a park. I’ve been spending a lot of time there in the evenings and on Sundays.”

  She slipped on her trench coat, taking note of the eagerness in his delivery. He was avoiding the real issue, which was not unusual for him.

  “Of course, there’s litter on the paths. Why can’t the city municipality put a waste bin next to each park bench?” Finally, in a guarded tone, “I left my warmest sweater—you know, the cable knit one—in your place, and a few incidentals.”

  She swallowed as she recalled seeing the sweater hanging in her bedroom closet. His last connection with his former life and with her was about to be taken away. Not a cozy way to begin the day.

  She picked up her purse, checked her keys. “Look, Pranab, I really have to scoot now, otherwise I’ll be late for work. I’ll have a messenger deliver your belongings to you. Okay?”

  “No, no, Aloka. A messenger is too much of a bother, not to mention expense. I’ll come get it.”

  “I can put the stuff in a plastic bag and leave it just outside my door. My neighbors will ring you in.”

  “I don’t want to inconvenience them. Besides, it might get stolen. I’ll come over.

  She clutched the receiver tighter. It wasn’t exactly that she didn’t trust him enough to let him in. During the last six months of their separation, he would frequently escape the tiny room he’d rented from a friend and come over here to catch up on reading or to write letters. Her muscles twitched another warning. “Where did you leave the sweater?”

  “In a dresser drawer. If it doesn’t bother you too much, Aloka, I’ll stop by this evening, say around eight? It won’t take but a few minutes. I’ll try not to get in the way of your Thursday music practice. I’ll just grab the stuff and be gone.”

  He had the habit of hiding objects in the oddest places, then forgetting all about them. This, he’d once explained, came from his childhood when his large family lived in a two-room house and he had to conceal his personal items away from the prying eyes of his siblings. Once he hid a cluster of fresh, plump grapes in a shoe box, intending to consume them at a later time when no one was about. Days later, he opened the shoe box and discovered some withered, bad-smelling “raisins.”

  She said, “I don’t see why not.”

  She hung up with a hit of regret. In happier times, she had believed in his words and never doubted that he trusted her. Now, a week after their divorce, he didn’t want her to even look for an old sweater.

  An instinct told her he might be searching for something else. What could it be?

  She glanced at her wristwatch, threw her coat, purse, and keys on a chair, and raced to the bedroom. The small room, outfitted with a dresser, double bed, and end table, was no longer cluttered. Pranab had always been the messy one. But the room, alas, also felt less intimate. She pulled the dresser drawers open one by one and combed through layers of saris, blouses, petticoats, scarves, and stoles. She went to the closet where her suits, dresses, and jeans hung neatly, well spaced out to fill the area where Pranab’s clothes had hung. Sure enough, his sweater hung there, its long sleeves splayed like a suitor about to hug. She fingered the wavy knit and held it against her breast and cheeks, then let it droop there as before. Turning, she kept looking around the entire room and its shadowy corners for more of “Pranab’s belongings.

  She walked over to the bed. Devoid of male presence these many months, it seemed shrunken in size. She smoothed the down cover. On a hunch, she knelt and peered beneath the bed. Steeped as she still was in the family folklore, she did so with a strange anticipation. Back home, the bed was more than a platform for sleeping, especially a high Indian khaat thrust up above the ground by posts. According to tales told by Grandma, the empty space underneath was where clandestine lovers hid, children tinkered with their broken toys, and a newly married Grandpa had once shoved a week’s worth of laundry while his homesick bride was visiting her mother. Though this Western-style bed was too low to conceal a clandestine lover, there was definitely enough room to hide a small package.

  And so it was.

  Directly under the center of the bed, barely visible in the gloom, lay a buff-colored envelope. She snaked her hand forward, retrieved the envelope, and sat down cross-legged on the floor. She placed her find on her lap, brushed the dust from its top surface. The envelope, embossed with a faint outline of a swan, was addressed in Pranab’s careful hand in indigo ink. She had never known Pranab to indulge in such choice stationery or such fine ink. Then the mailing address caught her eye. Oh, goddess Durga. The letter was waiting to be mailed to Sujata in Victoria. Aloka sprang up and unfolded the dainty paper with shaky fingers: Dated a year ago and obviously never mailed, the letter had probably slipped out of a manila folder that normally housed all of Pranab’s letters.

  Sujata, manorama,

  Sujata, mind’s delight. Dizzied by the endearing form of address, Aloka tore her eyes from the sheet. Should she read it? The Guptas believed that a letter was a messenger of the gods and must not be intercepted by a third party. Forget about the Gupta code of privacy, she told herself. She would pursue her heart’s dictate on this matter. After all, she’d already discarded family tradition in so many ways. She’d gotten a divorce and shed the sari; she lived alone.

  She steadied herself against the dresser and finished reading the damning letter. The contents didn’t register word for word. Only the yearning expressed in it floated before her eyes like a bad dream. She became convinced that Pranab had been meaning to get in touch with Sujata for a long time. What Aloka had believed to be long-forgotten lurid history was actually a current affair. Although Pranab had never given her the true reason why he’d left her, she’d always harbored a suspicion that it had something to do with Sujata. The contents of the letter transformed that suspicion into a rage. With a shaky hand she refolded the sheet and put it back inside the envelope.

  She wiped the beads of perspiration on her forehead with a hand. Though she couldn’t see her own image, she could feel that her mascara was running, her lipstick smudging, and the curls of her hair going limp. With rigid fingers, she slid the envelope back into its hiding place beneath the bed.

  nineteen

  Nina gazed up at the sky from the large window by her writing, desk. At this elevation the light was uncommonly pure, direct, and generous. The sun god with his seven horses had descended in his kindness to give the mortals their day, as Hindu scriptures would suggest. Despite her failing eyesight, Nina could see well in this benevolent light and she thanked the sun god for it. She was leafing through snapshots scattered on the desktop before her—miniature life portraits frozen in eternal moments—when she discovered one she’d been searching for. In discordant contrast to the bittersweet quaver of shehnai droning on the stereo, she blurted out an exclamation of joy and surprise and turned toward Reenu, who was on her knees wiping the floor with a wet rag.

  “Look, this is Mreenal when he was about twelve.”

  Nina brought the photo closer to the light and studied it, nodding approvingly at Mreenal’s even features, his direct gaze, his smoothly brushed hair, and his respectful demeanor. “Doesn’t he look like a fine, well-mannered boy?”

  Her shell bracelets jingling as she bounced up, Reenu peered intently over her mistress’s shoulder. Curious and animated, she smelled of the talcum powder that Nina had given her during the recent Durga Puja celebration. “Very nice.” Reenu nodded also.

  “Sujata will soon get a surprise phone call from this very nice young man,” Nina murmured.

  “You haven’t told Sujata-di yet?”


  “Should I ask my grandchildren to approve what I do?”

  As if to press her point, Nina settled herself firmly in the chair and drew her gaze back to the snapshots. This was not her usual way of spending time. Photographs and reminiscences often absorbed her elderly acquaintances, but Nina had always been more engaged with what lay ahead, especially now that she was nearing her eighty-first birthday. In her youth, the future had been a road extending to infinity; now it loomed ahead as a high wall. She still had much to accomplish before she hit it.

  A black-and-white shot caught Nina’s eyes. “Here’s Pranab, ten years ago.” Staring back was an earnest young man, wedged between waist-high tea bushes, a white work apron hugging his slim midsection. His eyes still had dream, a vision of the future.

  Then came the sight of a photo of Aloka, who was then about thirty years old. Perched regally in a peacock chair, she was grinning into the lens, her skin dewy, her eyes glowing. She must have been holding a whimsical thought about Pranab, whom she’d just met.

  “Doesn’t Aloka look gorgeous in that mauve brocade?” Nina said to Reenu. “I’d bought that sari for her because the color went so well with her skin tone. What you’d call dudhe aalta. Ivory pink.

  “And here are Kabita’s wedding pictures. You haven’t met Kabita yet. She’s Aloka’s cousin-sister and they were close friends.” With misty eyes and gnarled fingers, Nina traced the photo of the glowing bride peering shyly at the camera. Now, years later, that same woman, mother of three children, had the body of a guitar and skin of a blemished guava. Nina blew out a sigh.

  Reenu pointed her finger at the next group photo. “And who’s that?” “Sujata, at a house party.” Something in that image had caught the maidservant’s attention, causing Nina to examine it more closely. Her youngest granddaughter and Pranab were standing against a wall, away from the pack of guests, unmindful of the camera’s presence. Their eyes were plainly reserved for each other; their shoulders were touching, a kiss hanging in the air between them. Now, even Reenu had caught it.