Khushwant Singh Best Indian Short Stories Volume 2

by Khushwant Singh

  Her face now wore an expression of intense agony and tears trickled down her cheeks. I felt deeply touched and rather guilty at having overplayed my hand.

  ‘I’m very sorry…but I love you.’

  ‘Do you – really?’ She looked at me through her moist eyelashes. Then why don’t you come along with me to France? We could always live together with or without work. My father is in oil and I’m his only child.’

  ‘I should love to – but…’ I fumbled for words.

  ‘That’s all right then,’ she said somewhat stoically.

  Next morning at the airport, she clung to me like a child, helpless and forsaken. ‘I can now say that I too had my little adventure in life.’

  ‘Please don’t rub it in,’ I said. ‘You know how very wretched I am feeling at this moment. I’m to blame – entirely.’

  ‘No, no – please, don’t say that ever.’

  Soon she was called to pass through the customs and immigration checkposts and I walked over to the visitors’ gallery.

  A few minutes later, she emerged at the other end and I saw her trudging towards the gangway, her bag strapped across her shoulders. And then suddenly she pulled up to look at me.

  ‘Eugene! Je vous aime!’ She almost screamed and waved lustily at me.

  The engines of the Jumbo dragon had already started whirring.

  ‘Colette!’ I shouted and waved back at her.

  The monster now lurched forward to taxi around, then nosed up into the air, folding up its enormous talons, and vanished into the sky.

  SIX

  The Fat Frog

  P. LAL

  There were two friends, a he-frog and a she-rat.

  ‘Let’s have dinner,’ suggested the rat.

  ‘All right,’ said the frog.

  ‘Well, you go get the firewood, and I’ll go get the milk and bread and vegetables,’ said the rat.

  She cooked and she cooked till the ground was covered with all kinds of fragrant food.

  ‘Now you wait here and guard the food,’ she said, ‘and see no one eats it all up, while I go and have my ritual bath before dinner.’

  And off she went.

  The frog looked at the dishes. Yummy!

  He heard the rat singing and splashing water over herself at the village pond:

  Take a small mouthful,

  And chew it slowly –

  Nothing like a bath

  To make you feel holy…

  Tra-la-ra-la-ra-la-ra-la…

  The frog couldn’t keep his eyes off the dishes. Yummy!

  He heard her singing, and he looked right and left, and before you could say ‘Hari Om!’ he had popped the whole dinner in his mouth, one by one, all the delicious dishes, and he sat there like the elephant-god Ganesha or a pot-bellied brahmin, with a fine, fat, froggy look on his face.

  The frog looked at her innocently.

  ‘Easy now, easy now!’ he replied. ‘What could I do? Here I was, guarding the food as you had asked me to do, when along comes a HUGE, BIG boar of a dog and growls at me! Like this – GRRRRRRR! And what could I do, I?’m just a small frog and he was a bull of a dog, and… and…and…well, I ran away because I was afraid, and he must have eaten up the dinner, I guess.’

  ‘Oh,’ said the rat. ‘Well, we’ll cook again. You get the firewood and I’ll get the milk and bread and vegetables.’

  So she cooked the dinner again, and went out a second time to have her ritual bath in lotus-scented water.

  The frog looked at the food. Yummy!

  He heard her splashing water and singing:

  Put a dozen lotus leaves

  In the scented water…Tra-la!

  Yummy! thought the frog, and gobbled up the food a second time and sat down with a thump like a bowl-bellied brahmin, with a finer, fatter, froggier look on his face. Then he said to himself, ‘No, this won’t do’, and waddled off and hid inside a clump of marigold bushes.

  The rat returned, smelling all lotusy, and found the food gone, and the frog gone.

  ‘I smell a rat,’ she muttered.

  The frog shouted, ‘Yoo-hoo, here I am!’ and heaved himself out of the marigolds.

  ‘What happened this time?’ the rat asked angrily.

  ‘This time too the HUGE, BIG dog ate up the dinner, and wanted to eat me up too, so I ran away and scuttled in here where he couldn’t find me.’

  ‘Oho,’ thought the rat, ‘so you could run with that fat belly of yours, could you? I see through your game now!’ But aloud she said, ‘Well, in that case, for the last time, let’s cook dinner. I’m hungry!’

  They got the firewood and the milk and bread and vegetables and the rat cooked dinner for the third time that evening.

  And for the third time, when she returned from her bath, fragrant with lotus flowers, the frog said, ‘It was the BIG BAD dog again!’

  ‘No, I don’t believe it,’ said the rat. ‘It was you.’

  ‘It was the BAD dog.’

  ‘You’re lying!’

  ‘Say that again!’

  ‘You’re a liar!’

  ‘Say that again!’ shouted the frog.

  ‘You’re a liar!’ the rat repeated.

  ‘Say that again, and I’ll EAT YOU!’

  ‘You’re a liar!’

  The words were hardly out of her mouth when the frog opened his jaws wide and in one giant gulp ate her up.

  Having done which, he sat down heavily on the ground with the fattest, froggiest grin on his face.

  Along came a baker with a basketful of loaves.

  ‘Hey, baker, give me a loaf,’ shouted the frog.

  ‘One paisa for one loaf,’ said the baker.

  ‘I don’t have any money.’

  ‘No money, no loaf,’ said the baker.

  ‘No loaf, no baker,’ the frog said quickly, and opening his mouth wide he swallowed the baker, loaves and all, in one giant gulp.

  Having done which, he produced another fat and froggy grin.

  Along came a fruit man carrying berries and bananas.

  ‘Hey, fruit man, give me a banana,’ shouted the frog.

  ‘Two paise for a banana, a paisa for ten berries,’ replied the fruit man.

  ‘I haven’t any money.’

  ‘No money, no banana,’ said the fruit man.

  ‘No banana, no fruit man,’ the frog said quickly, and opened his mouth wide and swallowed the fruit man in one giant gulp, bananas and berries and all.

  Along came a horseman.

  ‘Hey, horseman, give me a ride.’

  ‘All right,’ said the horseman. ‘Jump up!’

  ‘No,’ said the horse, ‘no ride for a frog, especially a fat, foolish, low-caste frog like that one.’

  ‘No ride, no horse,’ the frog said quickly, and opened his mouth wide and swallowed the horse in one gargantuan gulp, rider and all.

  Along came a barber.

  ‘Hey, barber, shave me.’

  ‘A paisa a shave.’

  ‘I have no money.’

  ‘No money, no shave.’

  ‘No shave, no barber,’ the frog said quickly, and opened his mouth wide and swallowed the barber, razor and all.

  But this barber was a shrewd one and, inside the belly, he stropped his razor on the lining of the frog’s stomach and – zip! – slit open the fat frog in a circle around his navel.

  Out jumped the rat – and the three dinners!

  Out jumped the baker – and all his loaves!

  Out jumped the fruit man – and his berries and

  bananas!

  Out jumped the horse – and his puzzled rider!

  Out jumped the barber – with the razor in his hand.

  And out jumped the life of the frog – and he died.

  SEVEN

  An Accident

  R.K. LAXMAN

  Kailas checked the mileage and was satisfied with the distance he had put between Gunny Daga and himself, driving almost ceaselessly from the moment he had left him sprawled on the sofa t
hree nights ago.

  The road wound through a thickly wooded part of the country and, as he raced along, the tall trees gradually gave way to shrubs and fields. Now lone farmsteads stood haplessly in the parched vastness of unyielding land. Tiny, faceless villages came and went like poor relatives.

  Kailas marvelled at the country and felt grateful to it for offering him such a protective expanse and variety in which he could get lost.

  He saw a greasy petrol pump and stopped. There were lorries laden with goods standing around, spewing diesel smoke and making belligerent noises. While his car was being attended to, Kailas went across the street to a little shop and bought a newspaper. Though it was a day old, he scanned its columns anxiously.

  Then, returning to his car, he sat down and repeated the performance – this time more carefully, dropping each page he finished into the back seat. He was relieved that there was no news about his escape.

  When he got set to start again on his journey, he was happy to see before him the road stretch invitingly to infinity without a bend. Deciding to take advantage of the bright day to get as far away as he could before the sun went down, he took off like a jet on a runway.

  The wheels spun, whistling on the hot melting tar surface; the wind hit the glass shield with the force of a gale and wailed like a thousand unseen ghosts. The horizon quivered and danced in the heat and mirages of puddles receded, disappeared and reappeared as Kailas madly sped towards them, spurred on by the feel of brute power under his grip. The ground on either side became more and more blurred as it hurtled past him with the gathering speed of the car.

  Suddenly he heard sounds of a thunderous flapping all round him. Before he could react, the view of the road in front disappeared and his reflexes went into action instantly to slam down the brakes. The car swung crazily and skidded, its steel frame shuddering as though its bolts would fly off.

  When it ground to a halt, Kailas was sitting stunned, gripping the wheel so hard he could have cracked his bones. All his nerves had gathered up into a concentrated tight knot binding his action. He had no idea what devilish force had dealt the blow and where.

  He slowly realized that he was looking at a sheet of the newspaper he had bought. He wondered how it came there, spread out neatly on the steering wheel, as if he had propped it up there to read in a relaxed manner.

  There was another sheet limply lying on the space above the dashboard, partly covering the windshield. And he saw one more next to him on the seat. He turned and noticed in the rear seat a chaos of newspaper pages.

  The angry hooting of a passing truck jerked Kailas back to reality. His car was standing at an odd angle, blocking the way.

  After moving it out of the way, he sat and began to reflect in horrified fascination on his fate if he had dashed against the fat tamarind tree nearby! He visualized his car in a shambles and himself in it reduced to a bloody pulp. The gory image sent a cold shiver down his back. No one would have believed that his death was caused by half a dozen newspaper sheets flying about madly, churned up by wind inside the speeding car, and that one of them wrapping itself round his face and blinding him had sent him crashing against the tree at more than a hundred kilometres an hour!

  Before he resumed the journey, Kailas made sure that every scrap of paper was thrown out of the car. But he never felt at ease again as he drove on: more imaginary noises of papers rustling and odd sounds harassed him all the time and hindered his progress.

  The sun had gone down – setting the western sky aflame – a long time ago and Kailas had still not passed a town where he could rest for the night. Late at night, at last he came by a place so tiny that its sole excuse for existence seemed to be a noisy cinema house with its brightly coloured bulbs and garish posters. The town was still awake, for the show had not ended.

  He parked the car in front of Nehru Lodge, went in and asked for a room.

  ‘Of course, sir. I will give the one on the other side. You will not be disturbed by the racket created by the cinema house.’

  Kailas was pleased with the friendly proprietor and the cheerful atmosphere of the place.

  The room was small. An iron cot and chair filled it entirely. There was a window overlooking the pitch darkness outside. The walls were unevenly plastered. A snuff manufacturer’s calendar hung on the wall as if to add elegance to the room, with a picture of a pink nude female standing knee deep in a brook. But her provocative assets had been discreetly airbrushed to a superb vagueness, producing in the eager viewer a feeling of being let down. But some previous occupant had tried his hand at restoring the picture with a ballpen.

  Kailas went down the passage to the common bathroom and poured buckets of cold water over his head, and soaped and scrubbed himself. Returning to his room, he changed, took out a bottle of whisky and sat down to relax.

  For the first time after many months, Kailas felt a sense of security and peace. With the money he had, he could enjoy his tranquillity for a long time. Chances of Daga tracing him to Nehru Lodge seemed remote. His eyes fell on the pink nude in the calendar and curiously his thoughts turned to Dorine, the typist, who worked for Daga.

  She had disappeared without a trace just a few days before he himself deserted Daga.

  ‘That bitch has no loyalty. It is not safe to have her around,’ Daga had complained often.

  The same suspicion he had about Kannan who slaved for him in all sorts of ways. He was found dead on a railway track one day. Daga had not even pretended to be shocked when the news was brought to him.

  Kailas, sitting in a poky room in an obscure hotel, thanked his stars that he had got away before Daga began to feel that he was a security risk too.

  The next morning a clattering noise outside the window woke him. His watch showed 6 a.m. He felt oppressed at the thought of the day that seemed to stretch like a desert without an object in view.

  The noise outside went on rhythmically. Kailas edged up to the window and saw a timberyard: trucks were unloading logs.

  Under a small corrugated sheet of covering, a man was sitting at a ‘table’ which was actually the stump of a log. A smaller version of it served as his chair.

  It struck Kailas that the set would look smart at the poolside of the fancy mansions that Daga built as a contractor. The kind of customers he had literally wallowed in money and it meant veritable poverty to them if it was white. Kailas himself was greatly influenced by such a sentiment and managed to keep his accountability to the tax collector to the barest minimum. The philosophy had resulted in the accumulation of unmanageable quantities of cash in his flat.

  Daga used to come into the room and toss bundles of notes on his table, calling it his ‘share’ of the ‘deal’. It was tremendously exciting for a while. But it began to be a source of constant anxiety getting rid of the inundating cash. Kailas saw no intelligent way of disposing of it, except again and again on drinks, girls and gambling.

  This kind of life in its turn sucked him deeper into the business of the underworld.

  He realized that, unknown to him, he had moved on quietly from being a building contractor’s partner to a culpable crook. Kailas was appalled to think that he had indeed become a mean accomplice to several shady activities including even murder.

  Daga’s consuming hunger for money and the mindless manner in which he blew it up with all the vulgarity of a Roman orgy began to sicken Kailas. He wanted to get away from it all but fear of attracting Daga’s fatal suspicion kept him performing like a circus dog in his troupe. There was nothing like a friendly parting from Daga. He had a knack of getting rid of inconvenient people and he considered it a treacherous act if anyone even thought of leaving him.

  Tension and suspense mounted unbearably each day and Kailas had worked himself to such a state that if Daga happened to turn and look at him full in the face, even casually, he panicked and went cold all over.

  One day, in a spirit of drunken bravado, lolling in bed with Dorine, he had declared his plans to quit and had inv
ited her to flee with him. A few days later, she disappeared without a trace. Kailas realized that the time had come for him to depart too.

  After one of the Roman banquets one night, when Daga lay sprawled on a sofa in a drunken stupor, Kailas saw his chance, packed his bag and left.

  That was four days ago and Daga had no way of knowing that Kailas was in Nehru Lodge with nearly the entire subcontinent between them.

  The trucks unloaded and left one by one. Kailas washed, changed and went down for breakfast.

  At the table opposite him, a man sat writing in a bulky weather-beaten leather diary. He looked up and gave a friendly smile – small-town traits, reflected Kailas.

  ‘You are occupying the upstairs room overlooking the timberyard, aren’t you? My name is Naidu,’ the man said.

  Kailas was taken aback. ‘How did you guess I was in that room, Mr Naidu?’ he asked, really surprised.

  ‘Not Mr Naidu. Just Naidu. I saw you at the window, watching the unloading,’ Naidu grinned.

  He was big and dark with curly silvery hair and a moustache.

  ‘People from big towns don’t observe much,’ he remarked, sounding pleasantly critical.

  ‘I am not from any big town,’ Kailas bluffed hurriedly.

  ‘Never mind. Any town other than this is big. You won’t find one smaller than this in the whole country. Your name, sir?’

  Kailas was prepared for the question. ‘Hem Kumar. Call me Kumar, please.’

  They sat and chatted for a long time. Kailas learnt that the government had leased out to him a nearby forest from where he got the logs.

  Three weeks went by. One day Naidu said to him at the breakfast table: ‘I want someone to mind the work at the other end at the Forest Lodge. Someone reliable and trustworthy, Kumar.’

  Then the conversation proceeded on semi-business lines and, at the end of it, Kailas accepted the offer.

  The Forest Lodge was tucked away inside a jungle, some fifty kilometres away, off the trunk road. An hour’s drive on an undulating dirt track inside the jungle brought Kailas and Naidu to the lodge.

  ‘During the British days, this used to be a hunting lodge, they say,’ Naidu said.