by M G Vassanji
It’s all right, Njoroge told her on the phone, I would escape anywhere in the world with you—if it worked; but it wouldn’t…do you see that, darling? You also don’t want to run away from everything you love?
She agreed. You’re right, Njo…let’s wait then as we planned.
I love you, Deep, he said as they hung up.
But a worry tugged at her: Why was he so reasonable, not burning up like her?
It was nine o’clock and my parents had grown frantic with worry. Finally, in an act of desperation, Papa and a neighbour took off in the latter’s car to comb the plausible streets of Nairobi to look for Deepa. The sparsely lit suburbs of Nairobi take on an eerie look at night, but much to their relief the two men saw her near Forest Road, racing back home in the family car, and they turned around and followed. Papa and Deepa walked in together, he severely scolding her; she would not explain where she had been, instead went to her room and locked herself in. What made her come out finally was my telephone call that night; she broke down over the phone, saying, Vic, they are tormenting me, Mama and Papa, they are destroying my life!
A doctor was called, who sedated her.
Njo, did you have a fight with her? I asked.
It took me a few hours and a lot of expense to get hold of him that night. It was not easy to make a late phone call from the Dar University campus; my call home earlier had been from the post office downtown. I sought help from a Danish lecturer, from whose apartment, under the watchful gaze of his suspicious wife, I tried to locate Njoroge over the telephone. A search was set in motion after my first call to Kampala; thereafter I called the number, a public phone used by students, every twenty minutes to check for progress. Njoroge had been observed at the library, then traced to a friend’s room, and later to a pub in the company of this friend and others, and was finally located arguing politics outside Lumumba Hall and brought to the phone.
No, we didn’t have a fight, he replied to my question. Why do you ask? What did she say? My God, did I give that impression to her? Tell her, Vic—
I told him that she had hardly spoken to me, that she simply had been in a state.
Tell her, Vic—tell her that I shall see her on Tuesday at the gate of her school. And that I care very much for her…nothing has changed.
Don’t do anything risky, Njo. I can explain to her what you tell me; I’ll tell her everything’s all right.
Just tell her, Vic, that I’ll see her Tuesday in Nairobi outside her school. Please.
On Tuesday at lunch hour he was waiting for her at the gate of her school. She saw him, tall and lean and black, wearing a white shirt, and gave a shrill cry and flew toward him like a gazelle, barely catching herself from giving him a public embrace. Still, a fair-sized crowd of curious boys and girls were there to observe them as they strolled off. The news would get around.
Where could they be together that was respectable enough for her and also private? She had planned to attend school in the mornings and spend afternoons with him.
I don’t want to meet you like a harlot, she said, when he suggested a hotel or a friend’s house. I’m surprised you even mention something like that?
I was only testing you, Deep, he teased.
They were immensely happy, need I say more?
They had to control themselves in public, keep their trembling arms from brushing, their hands from seeking out and clasping, their heads from coming together in unguarded moments brimming with love; but they couldn’t, and their violations were furtive, quick, full of guilt and fear. He couldn’t keep his hands off her hair when it blew on her face; impulsively he would reach out then drop his hand. These were their first hours together since they had declared their love in a café that Saturday morning and parted, brave and confident. They sat out two afternoons on a bench in City Park. On Thursday at noon they took the bus from Ngara to Temple Road and she took him to the Sanatan Dharma temple, which she and Mother liked to frequent.
It was a wonderful temple, where all the gods’ statues were displayed behind glass and worshipped equally, and to which even I have had recourse sometimes. They could have been a young couple come to worship together. But they were black and brown, a Kikuyu man and a Punjabi Hindu woman of the Banya-Kshatriya caste. He strolled inside with wonder-filled eyes, everything was so dizzyingly colourful, almost gaudy, even the ceiling. She walked beside him, her head covered with a dupatta which she had brought, keeping a small formal distance between them, occasionally coming close on the pretext of explaining something. A young man from the temple came to guide them after a while, taking them from right to left, from Vishnu reposing under the cobra, to Krishna killing the snake, to Shiva and Parvati, and Ganesh their son and Ganga from Shiva’s hair, to Radha-Krishna and Rama-Sita-Lakshman, to Amba Devi the goddess and Kali her other form, and before each of them they joined their hands in pranam, and Deepa closed her eyes in a momentary prayer. Then the guide took them to pay respects to all the ten avatars of Vishnu that were displayed at the back, including Gautama, and finally to the great souls Shankaracharya and Vyasa and Mira Bai and Guru Nanak.
The young man’s name was Yogesh, and he told them he was a graduate in astrology and palmistry and could tell their futures.
Njoroge quickly agreed, and just as quickly Deepa said, No—not today. Yogesh left them at the doorway, and just as they prepared to leave, the temple priest called them from where he was seated on the floor, against a side wall. When they went over to him, curious, he offered them prasad. They went down on their knees before him, bowed together, and accepted the sweet; then he put sandalwood paste on their foreheads. Finally, joining their hands to the gods, they left. Deepa uncovered her head.
What did this mean to them?
I considered myself married to him, Vic, she stammered out once, years later, her face flushed.
And he? What did he make of it?
He too, I’m sure…We both made vows as we stood before the gods. We vowed that we belonged to each other, nothing would come between us.
She asked him if he would prefer her to go to a Catholic church with him some time, or—a twinkle of mischief in her eyes—climb Mount Kenya the abode of the Kikuyu God, Ngai.
We’ll do both, he promised, pleased at the idea.
Joyful and confident, foolishly on Saturday they went to eat an Indian thali at the Supreme and were seen by none other than Mrs. Sharma, our Meena Auntie. Deepa’s future mother-in-law, if our parents had their way, waved from her table, then barrelled over with a friend and sat down with the couple, crowding them and thus spoiling a tender, emotional farewell, with further endearments yet to be uttered, strategies yet to be completed. I knew, Mrs. Sharma told Deepa when a fuming Njoroge left the restaurant by himself, I knew that that African must have forced himself on you. Don’t you know, they’ve had eyes on us all along, on us and our businesses.
The goodbye with Njoroge, who was waiting outside the restaurant, was short and strained, under the watchful and grim eyes of the two Indian matrons, who drove away with an almost tearful Deepa.
Mother, when she found out about the rendezvous, was beyond control. When did he come to Nairobi, this man? How many times did you shamelessly see him? Without telling us! How dare he come and meet in secret with you! Sala badmaash! What kind of a faithless man he has turned out to be, after all we’ve done for him—
Watch what you are saying, Sheila, Papa spoke sternly. It is Njoroge you are talking about!
Papa, when he wanted to, could be a very sensitive man. He didn’t want her to say anything she would regret later. But he was also the cause of much of Mother’s unhappiness, by his late stays at his club; she would look at him with distaste the next morning at breakfast, when he would be the worse for wear, obviously still hungover. Recently he had hired an assistant, an English widow who appraised properties and antiques for him. Her name was Mrs. Burton and he rather flaunted her; word had reached Mother that he had been seen having coffee with her at the New Stan
ley patio restaurant on more than one occasion.
I don’t know what’s come over Mama, Deepa wrote to me. She who was so gentle and loving, such a harbour for our little sorrows, the voice of reason in our home, how could she have metamorphosed into such a fury and fiend? Please, please invite me to come and visit you, dear Bhaiya, let me get away from Nairobi for even a week.
And so, expecting a respite in my schedule, I invited her to visit me; in fact, hoping that away from home she and Mother could arrive at some intimate understanding, I invited them both to come and see balmy, relaxed Dar es Salaam, the fantastic Land of Not-yet.
EIGHTEEN.
You fool, Vikram, she told me when I picked her up at the airport, it was from her that I wanted to escape, and you had to go and invite both of us together!
I looked at her, surprised, amused, a little sad.
So how did you manage to leave her behind? You told her not to come?
I censored your letter—didn’t read out the part where you invited her to come too. I hope you don’t mind.
But I also invited her on the phone.
She became quiet. Mother had actually told me by way of excuse that it was better that my sister and I had a chance to be alone to talk things over. She listed a litany of Deepa’s sins, the most grievous of which was her treachery and sheer recklessness in meeting with Njoroge, when Meena Auntie of all people had seen her.
In a restaurant, in public! Her whole future!—she wants to throw it away like that! With a click of the fingers. And then she looks pleased with herself and pert as a new bride—tauba! I’m not going to live through this, mark my words, Vikram!
But I guessed that Mother had declined to come also because she didn’t want to leave Papa by himself, with the Englishwoman Mrs. Burton lurking close by.
Later, as I got Deepa’s things out of the taxi and paid the driver, she informed me matter-of-factly: You know, Njo is also coming to Dar this week.
You didn’t tell me. And he didn’t either.
He assumed I would, and I didn’t get a chance, Vic. It doesn’t matter, does it?…And Mahesh Uncle left today, I guess you know that.
I nodded. That I knew.
Our uncle had been named to a delegation, led by the minister Okello Okello, which was leaving that day on an official visit to the Soviet Union. It was a momentous occasion for him, a prize for someone who had always kept communist sympathies, for which he had been taunted and called names. Uncle had come to see Mother in great excitement a few days before his departure and announced his decision to stop over in Delhi on the return leg of his journey. He was hoping he could convince his boss Okello—who had studied engineering in India—to do the same, though the latter, being a government minister, desired an official invitation.
I wish I could come too, meet you in Delhi and see Bauji, Mother said. Wouldn’t it just be wonderful, Bhaiya, the three of us together again!
But of course she couldn’t go, with the home front being what it was, and especially not when both Papa and Deepa had insisted too keenly that it was a good idea. She had not been back in ten years, though, and Uncle not since he arrived in Africa. He had spoken to her about his visit to me, the evening we had spent together in Dar, and that pleased her immensely. Family is all you have, she would remind me and Deepa whenever we quarrelled as children.
I will only go to India after you are married, she had said to Deepa this morning. Both your Papa and I will go, then. And perhaps you and Vikram can come along too and meet your nanaji.
That will take a long time, Mama, and Nana can’t wait that long. You should go and see him before he—
Your nana will wait for me, Mother declared confidently. He would always wait for me—if I was late from school, he wouldn’t eat his lunch until I was home—do you know that? The love of a parent…we don’t realize what it means when we are young. My Vikram knows it, but; but you, Deepa—do you know what a mother’s love is?
Deepa left the torment of the breakfast table in tears. A few hours later my parents dropped her off at the airport, and there was an emotional farewell. And now here she was, in another act of betrayal and love.
So where’s this girlfriend, this Yasmin of yours?
Not girlfriend—just friend, remember.
What kind of friend? Do you hold hands, do you bite her ears—haven’t you promised to marry each other?
No. Just friends, like I told you. Special friends, but no commitment.
Dar es Salaam was a small city and gave a couple no privacy to speak of, save for the university on its isolated hill, where Yasmin and I could go off on walks in the evening. Sometimes we held hands, yes; and sometimes after much cajoling she would relent and sing a filmi song or two—she had a beautiful voice.
Ours was a relationship straining for definition. We spoke about many things together, even about how the other Indian students looked askance at us. Yet we assiduously avoided the subject of exactly what we meant to each other. I was aware, though, that she had left the onus on me. As a boy, I was supposed to take the initiative, declare my intent.
Beside me, Deepa trudged thoughtfully on, leaving me to my musings. We were on our way to the refectory for lunch, having dropped her luggage in my room, where she would stay with me, and it was dazzling hot. Once she muttered, breathlessly fighting the sandy trek beneath our feet, How can you stand this heat? The sand itself is boiling!
I believe they roast peanuts in the sand here, I said wisely, without too much exaggeration.
More silence later, Deepa turned to me and asked with concern, Are you afraid of commitment, Bhaiya?
I’m not sure, Sis.
The truth, which I did not tell her then, was simply my failure of heart. I could not find that passion within me, even a small and reasonable portion of the tempestuous, uncontrollable, unbearable spring of love such as she had found in herself, to take me over my hill with Yasmin. There was a frozen core buried deep inside me that I could not dislodge or melt, that held me back. Thus even the question of what Mother would think of my relationship seemed somewhat beside the point.
But I will meet her? my sister asked.
Of course you will.
Do her people know about you?
Yes.
And? They like you?
I don’t think so. Nobody in Dar likes to see me walking around with a Shamsi girl. So you see, Sis, it’s not just our mother and father, it’s what we Asians are, even with each other. And if you think about it, others in this whole wide world are not much better.
I know, even in America, with those riots and marches.
Yasmin’s neighbourhood had actually turned more hostile toward me in recent days. I couldn’t help the feeling when I was there that I was constantly being watched. Once while we were walking together on Upanga Road, beside the low brick wall outside her mosque, I had the distinct impression that a car had passed us a few times. She saw me staring after it but didn’t say a word. And then only the previous Friday evening, having dropped her off at her home, as I came strolling down the same road headed for the bus stop, a partly eaten mango came flying at me from the shadows, grazing and soiling the front of my shirt, accompanied by the pejorative epithet, Banyani-dengu!
I have often recalled that scene on suburban Upanga Road: a gentle evening breeze blowing, wafting in the salty smell of the ocean, which was a mere five minutes’ walk away down a side road; a faint whiff of incense; a few cars on the road; and a distant chorus of singing voices floating out the upper windows of that imposing prayer house a hundred yards away. A few stragglers, well dressed, hurrying toward it, through the gates and into the garden. And then from behind the hedge close to me, that filthy missile, that vile invective.
That afternoon President Julius Nyerere was addressing the students; it had taken a lot of inveigling with university authorities to be excused from attending the public meeting so I could meet my sister. Yasmin of course had to go. And Njoroge, who had arrived earlier in the day un
beknownst to me, was also there, and by coincidence briefly met my “special” friend Yasmin.
Njoroge and Deepa were together three days; they spent time on the campus mostly, but they took the bus to town one day and strolled on the main avenue, walked into restaurants, and later visited a nightclub. They held hands, they danced together. They were stared at, of course. But nobody knew her in Dar; she was doubly a foreigner. As a Punjabi she did not have a community here; and in her clothes, her speech, the accented Swahili she spoke, she was so very obviously a Nairobi girl—westernized, fashionable, and presumably free in her ways. And so, except for a few poisoned arrows from the loafers who hung around the Odeon, an area best avoided in dubious situations, she was not harassed.
What bliss to be loved, and to love in kind. I never experienced that, but then I have saved myself from that aching shadow that always dogs such ecstatic reaches. There was no doubt in my mind that Deepa and Njoroge’s declaration of their hand in the open, in Dar, would eventually make news in Nairobi—the two cities did talk, after all. And so a council of war was called for.
Deepa liked that term:
Yes, Bhaiya, a council of war, that’s what we need—how to proceed now, how to convince the mai-baap to relent. We don’t live in the Stone Age anymore.
I looked from Deepa to Njoroge. He was sitting sideways at my desk; my sister and I sat facing him in our chairs, across my sloping coffee table—fashioned by the carpenter who worked next to the tea kiosk down the road when he was undoubtedly drunk. Beside me, as I also recall, was the three-legged low stool with a zebra-skin saddle-top—such items were not banned then—with a newspaper upon it, looking much as it does stooped in my presence now, thousands of miles away and decades later, bringing them both close to me in my memory, closer than she actually is across the lake in Rochester fretting about his son…
Suppose our mother doesn’t come around, I said. Then what?
