Jimmy felt the eyes of his guests follow his every move. Some of those eyes were wide with admiration, some narrow with envy, others wet with affection. Usually, the envy that he sensed in his friends and neighbors at Wadia Baug made him adopt a humble, quiet posture in their company. Not a trace of the roaring, competitive corporate lawyer who paced the corridors of the high court like a lion. Jimmy knew that many of his less fortunate neighbors masked the sourness of their own puny lives by ridiculing the successful and the powerful. It was their way of coping with the disappointments of their lives, and Jimmy respected that. He had learned the lesson of humility the hard way. But tonight was different. His only son had gotten married, and Jimmy relished the multiple roles he had to play—the proud, adoring father; the gracious, attentive host; the affectionate, doting husband; the sharp, charming business associate; the teasing, cussing good old Wadia Baug boy.
Surrounded by his immediate family, Jimmy felt blessed. Looking at them now, he felt the same appreciation and joy that he felt when he looked at a work of art at the Prince of Wales Museum. He reveled in the sight of them—his wife Zarin’s trim, well-maintained figure; Mehernosh’s handsome profile, which was fit to adorn the side of a coin; his new daughter-in-law Sharon’s young, radiant face with its stubborn, pointed chin. Jimmy Kanga himself felt extraordinarily fit and youthful. Each morning before going to the office, he walked for an hour at a park in Breach Candy. The result was a body that did not squeak and creak with middle age the way so many of his contemporaries’ did. He knew he looked good tonight. He had forgone the traditional Parsi dagli in favor of an elegantly cut dark brown suit that Zarin had picked up for him during her last trip to the States. “Saala boodha,” Soli Contractor had said, complimenting him earlier in the evening. “You are looking more like Mehernosh’s older brother, rather than his father. What, is the law business not doing well these days? You looking for a second career in Hindi films? I heard Dev Anand is finally retiring.” Dev Anand was the perennially youthful movie star, who, thanks to the twin blessings of genetics and face-lifts, had defied time and gravity.
Jimmy laughed. “Saala, Soli,” he said in a mock whisper. “Don’t let my son hear you say that. Especially in front of his young bride.”
He had spent Rs. 3 lakhs on the wedding. At one point, Zarin had tried to curb his extravagance, but the pleading look on his face had stopped her. And now, Jimmy was glad he had not listened to his wife. Mehernosh is worthy of this party, he thought. After all, his Harvard-educated son had turned down several job offers in America to join his father’s law firm. Not too many Parsi children disregarded the siren call of America these days. Just as he, Jimmy, had returned from Oxford to set up his law practice in Bombay, so had Mehernosh returned, all these years later. Both father and son had bucked the trend.
Though truth to tell, he could have happily stayed on in England, if it had not been for its awful racism. He had loved Oxford, its tree-lined streets, its quaint buildings, its ridiculously stuffy traditions. In the few years he had been there, he’d felt a loyalty—no, a patriotism toward the university that he had never felt toward any country. Some days, as he walked down the cobbled streets, breathing in the crystal-clear air, he felt as though he could go to war for Oxford, lay down his life for it. Oxford, after all, had given him a full scholarship, and the deans and professors had never made him feel anything less than welcome, had treated him no differently from the sons of lords and barons.
The problem was on the streets. There, he could not escape the color of his skin. In Bombay, Jimmy’s light skin had been a sign of privilege, a status symbol. But in England in the late 1960s, his skin was not good enough. Not light enough. Although most people did not guess he was Indian, being mistaken for a Middle Easterner was not much of an improvement. Nothing overt ever happened—he was never verbally insulted or physically attacked. Just a slight chill in the air whenever he was around and that hard, appraising glance that lasted a second longer than it should have. Still, it was enough to make Jimmy bristle. He was simply not used to being looked down upon. That was the reason he called it off with Karen, the ruddy-cheeked, boisterous woman whom he had spotted in the library during his second term at Oxford. They had liked each other immediately, and Karen was miraculously free of the subconscious superiority he detected among almost every white person he encountered. But even Karen’s devotion was not enough. He was painfully aware of how he and Karen were watched every time they entered a pub or walked down a street together. Although Karen never said a word, he knew that she was aware of it, too, and the thought made him feel small and weak. And Jimmy never wanted to feel small and weak again. He had spent too many years getting away from that feeling. All the time he was in England, he lived with the fear that if anybody ever said anything snide to him, the street punk that he had once been would come to the forefront and let his fists do the talking.
Also, there were whispered horror stories about the work experiences of other Indian students, once they left the cocoon of the ivory tower for the bullring of the corporate world. About inequities in pay, skipped promotions, discrimination, and harassment.
Jimmy decided early on that he would rather be a big fish in a small pond than a small fish in a big pond. He returned to Bombay soon after he graduated. His old college friends were incredulous at his return. “Arre, yaar, every day we are hearing stories about how the British government needs workers, how they’re welcoming educated people with open arms,” said Nasir Hussein. “People here are selling their houses, furniture, cats, dogs, parents—everything—and migrating. And you came back? Didn’t they teach you basic geography, your East from West, at Oxford? Why are you going in the opposite direction?”
But Jimmy knew something they didn’t. In England, he would be a dime a dozen, one of hundreds of brilliant Oxford graduates. In Bombay, his uncle’s contacts, his Parsi heritage, his light skin, his fluent English, his Oxford education—all these would make him a star. Unique. A big fish.
Then there was the other reason, one that he was even more reluctant to talk about. Quite simply, Jimmy missed Wadia Baug the longer he was away from it. Walking past the gorgeous ivy-covered buildings, eating in Oxford’s ornate dining halls, stepping into an icy night after a theater performance, he would suddenly be hopelessly homesick. At such times, Oxford seemed too dignified, too stuffy, too bloodless a place. He missed the Wadia Baug gang, their brashness, their nonchalance, their practical jokes and general irrelevance. It dawned on Jimmy that he would always be looking for a way to get back home. That was the side effect of being an orphan. More than most of his friends, Jimmy needed to have a place to call home. He had never forgotten those three months spent going from one relative to another, after his parents had died in a train accident when he was nine years old. His need for security, for permanence, for stability was infinite. He also felt he owed his uncle Hormazd his return. After all, it was his bachelor uncle who had stepped forward and proclaimed that he would care for his dead bother’s son. It was Hormazd who had taken the train to Hyderabad and brought back to Wadia Baug an angry, bitter, confused boy of nine.
Looking at the hundreds of people gathered for his son’s wedding, Jimmy Kanga repeated to himself the old, familiar words: Not bad for an orphan. The words were his rosary, the beads on which he measured his successes. He had said those words as he stood looking at the festive, cheerful crowd at his graduation from Oxford. After he had argued his first case before the Indian Supreme Court. After Peter Silk, his old roommate, phoned him from London asking for advice on a particularly difficult case. Not bad for an orphan, he thought, sitting in his big air-conditioned office at Breach Candy.
And after he married Zarin. Jimmy told all his friends that his luck changed after he married Zarin, that his wife was his reward for returning from England.
To Jimmy’s chagrin, his law practice did not take off like a rocket after his return. He discovered that a degree from Oxford had not prepared him for the slug
gish, bureaucratic Indian legal system. His clients were intimidated by his crisp, brisk manner; the judges were offended by what they considered to be his arrogant phoren ways. To his astonishment, Jimmy found himself losing a fair number of his cases. Despite Hormazd’s best efforts, Jimmy’s practice shriveled up as word spread about the young barrister’s short temper and impatience with ill-prepared clients. Jimmy had been a young man in a hurry, but now he had nowhere to go.
The only bright spot in Jimmy’s life during his first year back was Zarin, the daughter of Hormazd’s family doctor. Jimmy had been interested in Zarin even before he had left for England, but had never had the nerve to ask her out. Although they were part of the same gang of Parsi boys and girls, Zarin Chadiwala was unapproachable, a member of a family of doctors who were legendary in the Parsi community. Although she lived only two streets down from Jimmy, she might as well have lived on the moon.
It was Rusi Bilimoria who had encouraged Jimmy to ask Zarin out. For weeks, Rusi had noticed the surreptitious glances that Jimmy threw Zarin’s way, noticed the bead of sweat that trickled down Jimmy’s face when Zarin stood close to him. He finally cornered Jimmy at Soli’s birthday party. “Saala, here you are, a foreign-returned lawyer and you’re frightened as a baby around a woman?” Rusi chided him. “If you don’t talk to Zarin today, I’ll march up to her and tell her how she makes your heart melt like ice cream.”
“Don’t you dare. I’ll talk to her in my own sweet time. Approaching a woman is like approaching a judge—you have to lay the foundation down properly.”
“Two hours,” Rusi said, grinning as he walked away. “If you haven’t laid the foundation in two hours, Mr. Big Shot, I’ll speak to Zarin myself.”
When Jimmy finally screwed up his nerve and approached Zarin, her reaction stunned him. “Gosh, Jimmy,” Zarin replied. “Sure took you long enough. I’ve only waited for three, four years for you to ask.”
By their fifth date, Jimmy knew that Zarin was the woman for him. On that date, he shared with her the perplexing dilemma of why his law practice was not soaring, why he seemed to be chasing his clients away. By this time, Jimmy had already told Zarin about the circumstances that had brought him to Wadia Baug, about the unhappy, terrified kid he had been. Zarin listened to his complaints wordlessly. When he was done, she spoke. “Remember what you told me about how hurt and lost and bewildered you were when you first came to Bombay?” she said. “Well, the next time you have a new client, try and remember how you felt as a boy. Your client probably feels the same way about the court system, I’m guessing. Like he’s drowning in unknown waters. Your job is to be the guide, the strong anchor that Hormazd Uncle was for you.”
He stared at her, knowing instinctively that it was perfect advice. After that day, he never lost a client because of his temperament.
Now, Zarin was walking up to him. “Hello, darling,” she said, a smile drawn over her dimpled face. “This is quite a party, no?”
He put his arm around her and held her to his chest for a quick moment. “Yes. Looks like everybody’s having a good time. Even Tehmi seems to be enjoying herself.”
“Speaking of guests, why are you standing all by yourself, looking like the lord of the manor, master of all you survey? Come mingle with your friends, janu.”
“Oh sure, sure. I was lost in my thoughts, is all.”
Arm in arm, they strolled toward where their son was sitting, surrounded by his father’s old friends. Rusi Bilimoria looked up at Jimmy. “Hey, Jimmy.” Rusi grinned. “We were just telling your son stories about your wild youth.”
Jimmy made a face. “Okay, Mehernosh. As your legal adviser, I ask you to leave this group of crackpots this very minute.”
“Oh, Mehernosh,” Sheroo Mistry broke in. “You should’ve seen how lattoo-fattoo your daddy was over your mummy before their marriage.”
That comment triggered a common memory. “Ae, remember when Jimmy first proposed to you, Zarin?” asked Soli Contractor. Except for Mehernosh, the rest of them laughed at the memory.
The whole gang had piled into Rusi’s car and gone to Khandala for the weekend. Zarin and the other girls had lied to their parents and told them they were going on an all-girls picnic. On their first day there, inspired by the beautiful red hills of Khandala, Jimmy proposed to Zarin. Confident that she would accept, he waited until all of them had finished lunching on the hotel’s veranda and then dramatically went down on one knee.
“Ae, Jimmy, what happened? You broke your knee, or what? Get up from that dirty floor,” someone had said.
A look of disdain came over Jimmy’s face. “Stupid donkey,” he told the offender. “Gadhera. Can’t you see what I’m doing? I’m proposing marriage.”
At the word marriage conversation at the table came to a halt. Somebody let out a nervous giggle, but the offender was immediately shushed into silence by the rest. Zarin looked mortified.
Jimmy turned to Zarin. “Zarin darling. Love of my life, apple of my eye. I humbly beg you to make me the happiest man on earth by marrying me. If you say, ‘I do,’ I promise to love and cherish you till … till … the cows come home,” Jimmy finished lamely. It was a surprisingly inarticulate speech for a lawyer.
There was a snicker at the table. Jimmy did not dare meet anybody’s eye. Zarin felt, rather than saw, the smirks and shuffling of the people around her. She could not imagine what had possessed Jimmy to propose to her in such a public way. For a moment, she thought he was pulling her leg. But Jimmy’s raised, glistening face, his flared nostrils, and his trembling body told her this was no joke.
With a start, Zarin realized they were all waiting for her to say something. More than anything, she wanted to cut the tension that was building. “Okay, Jimmy, I’ll marry you. On one condition,” she added quickly. “You see that little pig running around in the court-yard? You catch that little dookar and bring him to me. If you succeed, I’ll marry you.”
Slowly, Jimmy got to his feet. He stared at Zarin, aghast, while the others exploded in hoots of laughter. Zarin obviously has a well-concealed streak of meanness in her, Jimmy thought. Here she was, treating a man with aspirations to sit on the Supreme Court someday as if he were a common coolie.
Bomi Mistry leaned over the table to congratulate Zarin. “Well said, Zarin, well said,” he cried.
“Why are you still standing here, Jimmy?” asked another boy, laughing. “Your fat little piggy is waiting for you.”
“Ae, if Zarin won’t marry you, maybe the pig will,” Sheroo hooted.
Jimmy caught Rusi’s sympathetic gaze, but Rusi turned away in embarrassment. A red-faced Jimmy turned to Zarin. “Consider your wish to be my command,” he said in a stiff, pinched voice. He stepped off the veranda and into the courtyard. He looked evaluatingly at the resting pig for a second and decided that a swift offense would be his best strategy. When the pig saw the tall, intent-looking youth rushing straight toward him, he gave a squeal of surprise and moved hastily away, shaking his behind as he ran. Jimmy gnashed his teeth. The damn thing moved fast for something that looked like a coffee table on wheels. He tried again. And failed. Tried again. Lunged toward it. But he stumbled and the pig moved away again. But this time, it gave a grunt of annoyance rather than a squeal of surprise. Angry at being disturbed from his afternoon siesta, the pig rushed toward Jimmy, charging like a miniature bull.
Perspiration rolled down Jimmy’s face. He’d have to marry Zarin from a hospital bed if that monster got hold of him. Abandoning all pride, he lifted his baggy pants from the waist and ran for the safety of the veranda. The pig followed at his heels, then stopped a few feet before the veranda, frightened by the noise coming from it.
“C’mon, Jimmy, run,” his friends cried. “Watch out. That little soovar looks really mean.”
At the veranda, Jimmy had a few minutes to consider whether he really wanted to marryZarin after all. Any woman with such a cruel sense of humor was dangerous. But then he saw the bemused way in which she was looking
at him, and his pride stirred. If, for centuries, men had hunted wild animals to feed their families, surely he could capture a stupid pig for Zarin.
“Where you going, Jimmy?” the people on the veranda asked in wonder.
“You all go in. I won’t stop until I catch that madaarchot pig.”
All that afternoon, Jimmy chased that pig. When he got tired and took a break, the pig chased him. At one point, he actually got his hands around the pig’s rump. But the animal felt so fat and greasy that Jimmy loosened his grip in a gesture of involuntary recoil.
For an hour or so, the others sat watching the show, until one by one they left to take a nap. Each time someone left, they’d say, “Chal ne, Jimmy. Enough now. Just come in, yaar.” But it was no use. He was determined not to quit. Besides, Zarin never once asked him to quit, Jimmy observed. Rather, she gave him an intense, glistening look that made Jimmy go weak in the knees. It was a look of pure sexual desire. He wondered if the others noticed. But soon, there was no one left on the veranda to watch Jimmy’s strange courtship of Zarin.
Later, Rusi offered to take the others for a drive. They urged Jimmy to accompany them, but he only looked at Zarin, a wild, primitive expression on his face. Zarin looked back at him coolly. Rusi got the distinct impression that if Zarin had at that moment asked him to quit, he would have. But Zarin said nothing, and Jimmy returned to his task.
When they finally got back at 7:30 P.M., a strange sight greeted them. Jimmy was stretched out on the long wooden bench on the veranda, his face streaked with dirt and gray with fatigue. His crumpled white shirt was as brown as the earth and hung over his torn pants. Jimmy was fast asleep and breathing so hard that even their start of surprise did not awaken him.
The reason for their cry of surprise was the pig. He lay on the first step of the veranda, a few feet away from his would-be captor. Like Jimmy’s, the pig’s face was streaked with dirt. Like Jimmy, he, too, was fast asleep.
Bombay Time Page 7
