The Smoke is Rising

by Mahesh Rao

  According to some local gossipmongers, Uma had arrived in Mysore from one of Bangalore’s satellite towns where her lover had savaged her husband with a machete, most probably at her instigation. The lover was now said to be awaiting trial at Parappana Agrahara jail while Uma tried to create a new identity for herself elsewhere. Another account that had percolated through the narrow alleys was that Uma had been compelled to leave her husband’s house in disgrace after seducing her father-in-law. Her apparent attempts at wringing cash and property out of the old man had failed and led to her exile in this bleak corner, below the network of sidings at Mysore Junction. There were other stories too: narrations that elicited spiky comment and drawn-out deductions.

  Uma kept her counsel. She woke early and left for Mahalakshmi Gardens six days a week, returning only after seven in the evening. On the days when she had no packet of leftovers, she would stop at the provision store on the main road and buy a quarter-litre packet of yoghurt and, on occasion, some greens from one of the carts. She spoke to no one on the short walk past the Muslim cemetery and the coin-operated telephone clamped to a pole on the corner. As she walked down her row, she kept her eyes lowered and only lifted them once she had closed and bolted the door of her room.

  It was almost a miracle that she and Janaki had ever spoken. At the time, Janaki had just moved in to Shankar’s small house on the periphery of the squalid sprawl. Their paths had crossed a few times while Uma was looking for work and Janaki had taken a liking to Uma’s sedate poise. Janaki had never probed into Uma’s past but she felt duty-bound to support a lone woman who was refusing to choke in the neighbourhood’s hostile smog. Janaki herself had been the target of malevolent gossip from a young age and had seen the dirty edges of everything that it touched. She knew that it was up to her to make the effort; if not, Uma would probably allow herself to fade away, bleaching back into the dirt-streaked walls around her.

  ‘Uma, not eaten yet? Please go ahead, the next batch is just starting,’ said Shankar as he brushed past her, weighed down with a pail each of ghee rice and sambar.

  ‘I think I’ll wait for Janaki.’

  ‘No no, you better eat. She says she wants to eat inside later, away from the crowd. Actually what she said was a lot ruder than that,’ Shankar lowered his voice, before heading towards the tables.

  Janaki emerged from the house, led by Shankar’s mother and aunt. A chair was quickly found for her and placed in the middle of the front courtyard. As she lowered herself into the chair, Janaki caught Uma’s eye and beckoned her over.

  Uma made her way past the canopy, through the thronged courtyard and leant down towards Janaki.

  ‘What are you doing standing over there by yourself like a police constable? How was the food?’ asked Janaki.

  ‘It was very good.’

  ‘You should tell Shankar; he has hardly been able to sleep. He was sure the caterers would ruin everything today.’

  ‘So what time are you leaving for your mother’s house?’

  Janaki’s voice became a throaty whisper: ‘No idea. They have to make sure the sun, moon and every single planet are in the right position before I am allowed to fart, let alone leave here for six months.’

  ‘They only want to make sure nothing goes wrong.’

  ‘So you have my mother’s address; make sure you come and see me next week or the week after. I will have nothing to do there but eat and sleep so plenty of time to talk. You’ll come, no?’

  ‘I’ll definitely come.’

  ‘Also, I’ve told Shankar to come and see you now and then. If you need any help for anything, you just ask him.’

  ‘What help will I need? Really, there’s no need to trouble him.’ Janaki’s face took on a picture of theatrical outrage: ‘After all the trouble he has given me? Look at me sitting here in this heat like a buffalo.’

  Under the shade of the canopy, a teenager was pointing his camera at the servers, having assigned himself the role of official photographer of the event. Patches of sweat had made his white shirt translucent and an agonising concentration invaded his face. Among the seated guests, hair was hurriedly tamed, pallus were straightened and noses wiped: preparations the photographer chose to ignore as he made his way along the tables.

  A mother said to her child: ‘Ai gube, channag smile maado. Face like a kumbalakai.’

  In the washing area set up for the caterers, Shankar had just finished giving instructions to some young boys. He turned round and, seeing Janaki sitting in the courtyard, made an exaggerated bow in her direction, a saucy grin animating his features.

  The car made its way out of the Prithvi House basement and sped along Sayyaji Rao Road where a couple of police barriers had been dragged to the side of the road and then abandoned. Angry discs of smoke wheeled up into the sky from a point behind the bazaar that lined one side of the street. A few cars were still on the road, all moving out of the city centre in the direction of Tejasandra Lake. A man lay on the ground in the shade of a mimosa tree at the Nelson Mandela Road junction. The position of his limbs gave no clue as to whether this was just respite from the heat or something more sinister.

  Susheela had managed to ascertain that Sunaina’s friend was called Jaydev and that he lived only fifteen minutes away from her in Yadavagiri. After that she had retreated into the air-conditioned chill of the car’s interior, her temples throbbing and her throat sore. Jaydev’s gaze moved from the mirror to the deserted road ahead and back. It was only when they were finally moving along the southern edge of the lake that he spoke.

  ‘There is some water on the back seat if you want.’

  ‘No, thank you.’

  It occurred to Susheela that her response might have come across as brusque, so she added: ‘I am just so relieved to be nearly home.’

  She thought her voice sounded strangely loud and high-pitched.

  Jaydev shook his head: ‘Even Mysore can be a scary place these days.’

  Susheela noticed that Jaydev’s leather watchstrap was loose and that the watch had slid a third of the way down his arm. His hands, settled firmly on the steering wheel, had a prominent network of veins that crowded their way into his knuckles. The cold air circulating in the car had made the silver hairs on his arms rise. All of a sudden Susheela became aware of the fact that this was the first time since Sridhar’s death that she had sat in the passenger seat of a car, being driven somewhere by a man. The car’s low croon weighed heavily on her as the forced intimacy of the moment began to make her feel restless. The car’s interior smelt of clean seats and a hint of jasmine. A CD of Carnatic violin music lay on the dashboard.

  ‘I must thank you once again. God knows how long I would have been stuck there or what would have happened,’ she said, needing to fill the space with words.

  ‘No, no, please. It’s just lucky I was passing. I actually got delayed waiting at my accountant’s office while he was stuck somewhere and couldn’t get into the city. Must be the same story everywhere. Anyway, at least we managed to escape from the mob. Just like in a movie.’

  Jaydev turned to smile at Susheela.

  She kept talking: ‘The trouble is these days there is no community spirit. If you are a farmer or whatever and you want to agitate for something, there is no concern for how your actions will affect everyone else. Your aim needs to be achieved at any cost and the rest can all go to hell.’

  Jaydev looked like he was listening to her intently but did not respond.

  ‘I mean, especially for senior citizens, it is like we don’t exist. We can’t cross these crazy roads, we can’t barge into queues like youngsters, we can’t endlessly ask people to do things without going mad,’ said Susheela.

  The car was approaching Mahalakshmi Gardens, silent at this time of the afternoon.

  Susheela laughed. ‘I’m sorry. You have been kind enough to give me a lift and here I am, turning into one of those crazy raving people. It’s right at the end of this road.’

  ‘Not at all. I thi
nk speaking one’s mind is one of the privileges of getting old. Let’s face it, there aren’t too many others,’ said Jaydev.

  Susheela smiled. The mali had come running to open the gate and the car pulled in to the driveway. Susheela got out of the car and noticed that the driver was still not back. She began to wonder whether something serious had happened.

  She leant into the car and said, ‘I really don’t know how to thank you. Please come inside for some coffee?’

  ‘No, thank you. Maybe some other time. I also need to get home.’

  Susheela stood in the doorway, waving as Jaydev reversed out of the gates. As she turned to go inside the house, her throat felt inflamed and her head still ached. All she wanted to do was wash the grime off her body and lie down until the night air brought some relief.

  Girish could hear the rasp of drawers being pulled open in the bedroom. There was a clang as the door of the metal cupboard swung open and hit the corner of a chair. The room fell silent for a few moments before he heard the muffled sigh of something being lifted on to the bed. The cupboard door clicked back into place and the drawers were eased back with a jiggle. Mala emerged from the bedroom, a few loose strands of hair hanging limply by the sides of her face. Her forehead and nose glistened and a flush was forming on the skin between her collarbones, like a wet stain under a piece of muslin.

  ‘Some electricity man had come here to cut the supply. He said we hadn’t paid the bill,’ she said, leaning against the door.

  ‘I thought you said you had paid it.’

  ‘I did pay it. I told him that but I couldn’t find the receipt. That’s what I was looking for just now. He said he’s coming back later.’

  ‘That would be a great thing, no? The regional deputy chief of customer relations for electricity has not paid his own bill and so his current is cut.’

  ‘I told you, I have paid it. I just need to find the receipt. If they didn’t have such useless records, they would know that I have paid it.’

  ‘You better find it before he comes back.’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘I am not going to bother calling someone up to sort all this out at the office, if that’s what you’re expecting.’

  ‘I was looking for it just now. I’ll find it.’

  Mala sat down next to Girish and added as an afterthought: ‘If you are so worried about it all, maybe next time you should pay it yourself and not leave everything to me.’

  Her hand lay on the waxy surface of the sofa, fingers curled upwards. Girish began to press down on them with his hand. He continued to look straight ahead; only a slight spasm in his jaw hinting at any effort. The heel of his hand crushed her fingers, a commanding force bearing down through the heft of his neck and shoulder.

  Mala flinched.

  ‘No, stop it, please. That’s really hurting.’

  Girish grabbed her hand and began to force it upwards. Mala’s fingers were trapped in a ridge of pain and her wrist began to tremble under the strain.

  ‘What are you doing? Stop it.’ Mala wrenched her hand away, pushing herself off the sofa.

  Girish stood up.

  The blow, when it came, was definitive. The impact of the slap loosened a tooth, rattled the glass cabinet doors, cracked the paving stones by the gate, split the trunk of an ancient tamarind tree in the lane outside, sent an alley dog skittering away in terror, collapsed the humpback bridge that led to the main road and caused a lone cold wave to begin rising over the surface of distant Tejasandra Lake.

  PART TWO

  Monsoon

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE senior executives of the Mysore Tourism Authority (MTA) were worried. Their critics in the local and trade press were becoming increasingly vocal.

  ‘We need dynamic individuals who will take resolute action to rescue our ailing tourism industry,’ thundered a front page article in the Mysore Evening Sentinel.

  A leading hotel owner, interviewed at a travel fair, had been more blunt: ‘This band of baboons simply moves around from one luxury hotel to another, enjoying free hospitality and talking nonsense at their good-for-nothing events. I can tell you one thing, they are most certainly not welcome at my hotel.’

  The information from associations of tour operators, travel agents and hotel owners was not encouraging. A survey across Tier I and Tier II cities by a market analysis firm showed a disquieting ignorance of Mysore’s main attractions, coupled with a worrying lack of interest. There was no doubt that serious efforts would have to be made to enhance the city’s lustre. The momentum had to build since the beginning of construction at HeritageLand kept slipping every few months.

  The MTA quickly rejected any kind of international onslaught. The focus quite clearly needed to be the Indian market, as large numbers of domestic tourists were travelling further and more frequently, with apparently ever-increasing holiday budgets. In any case, as far as overseas tourists were concerned, overtures could be made at a later stage for Mysore’s prominent inclusion in the Ministry of Tourism’s Incredible India campaign.

  The MTA, not known for its radical promotional strategies, had at first decided to play it safe. It seemed that the most logical step would be to recruit a popular Hindi film personality to become Mysore’s brand ambassador. An immediate issue had been the inability to identify a high- or medium-profile star with any connection to Mysore or its environs. A number of board members also began to question whether a close association with a major star would really capture the appeal of Brand Mysore. After all, if remunerated adequately, these luminaries were willing to lend their faces to everything from prickly heat powder to motorcycle engine oil.

  The next suggestion was to approach reformed rowdy-sheeter and rising Kannada cine star, Nuclear Thimma, to represent Mysore. His hit songs were causing a sensation among the key youth demographic in South India and he had lived for many years opposite a mutton stall just yards from Mysore Junction. But he simply did not have the required national allure and his unfortunate past was an insurmountable obstacle. The idea was scrapped.

  The board of executives decided that specialist assistance was required and set up a number of meetings with advertising agencies and brand consultants. A full briefing was sent out to the relevant representatives, pitches were prepared and the business of illuminating Mysore began in earnest. The ideas put forward by the various creative departments ranged from the inane to the fantastical, a fact that did little to achieve consensus among the members of the MTA’s board of executives. The elephant in the room was of course the many delays in the development of HeritageLand, a subject that was taboo in this sensitive congregation, many of whom felt faint at the mere thought of offending Venky Gowda.

  After another round of meetings at various heritage properties, it was agreed that the proposal that offended the least number of people was the ‘Geneva of the East’ campaign. A team of consultants had drawn on Tejasandra Lake for inspiration and found that it had the potential to transform Mysore into a simulacrum of the Swiss city. The campaign would centre on the great range of attractions around the lake, from the Anuraag Kalakshetra and the museums at one end of the lake’s shore to the Galleria’s upmarket shops and restaurants at the other. Given the enduring affection for Switzerland among the Indian middle classes, brought up on a surfeit of films featuring chiffon-clad heroines on Alpine slopes, the campaign was certain to evoke the perfect melange of old-world sophistication and a suitably aspirational aesthetic. City officials on the board assured their colleagues that there would be a rapid improvement in basic services around the lake, including drainage and waste collection, in order to give credence to the key aims of the campaign.

  Support for the ‘Geneva of the East’ campaign at the MTA was far from universal. A number of board members expressed their reservations in bald terms. One of the more pessimistic views was that it would simply invite ridicule and contempt, succeeding only in singling Mysore out as a city of deluded imbeciles. Another detractor felt that the c
ampaign reeked of colonial sycophancy. He was later compelled to add that he was perfectly aware that Switzerland had not been in possession of any colonies and that he was gravely disappointed that some of his colleagues could not grasp simple critical concepts.

  A further series of meetings were called in an attempt to make a final decision. As discussions continued, one fact became clear: the pulsing need for HeritageLand was being felt more keenly than ever.

  The jets of water from the sprinklers at the Mysore Regency Hotel shot up like silver streamers on the expansive front lawn. The sprinklers were fed by an enormous reserve tank, which in turn drew upon one of two bore wells on the property. A third had run dry a few years ago. Mysore’s public water supply was somewhat unreliable even at the height of the rainy season, so this year, after five dry months, expectations were not great. In any case, Mysore’s custodians of luxe were accustomed to navigating their way around the shortcomings of the municipal authorities. The hotel often purchased water from private suppliers and the results were more than satisfactory. A healthy thicket of palms by the main gate provided the security guards with some shade. On the borders below the wide verandas the camellias were flourishing, and despite the prolonged summer their leaves had retained their imperial gloss.

  The driveway curved around the front lawn and stopped at the grand Indo-Saracenic foyer. A turbaned doorman opened car doors to allow visitors to walk up the mosaic steps towards the front desk, burnished with furniture wax and the best hospitality training. The mahogany writing desk in a corner of the room was said to be a replica of the one owned by Sethu Lakshmi Bayi, Maharani of Travancore. The windows next to the reception hardly let in any light as they were almost covered by a lunatic cascade of allamanda vines that dropped to the ground outside. The reception area was lit by the amber cups of a Hyderabadi chandelier, their glow reflected in the shards of mirror that studded the occasional tables. On the other side of the front desk, a set of brass doors led to the veranda bar, the Burra Peg.