Indian Magic

by Balraj Khanna

  ‘Eat,’ she said, just the way Kaku’s mother had said before giving the poor boy a slap.

  We were still eating the kheer when the storm returned. It had gone full circle, done all the boroughs of London and taken all that time to reach its heart, the Queen’s residence and us nearby. And it was majestic. Spectacular fireworks opened up above rooftops and the ladies covered their heads with the pallas of their saris and held their earlobes and muttered: ‘Hare Ram, Hare Krishna,’ in awe of God and the savagery of the storm, its sound and fury. ‘Toba, toba, toba,’ they said in disbelief, and gathered their little ones like hens gathering their chicks under their wings. Coming from the country of monsoons where such manifestations of the divine were far more frequent, their utterances only amplified their sense of wonder.

  ‘Good forgive, what weather! Cat and dog,’ said Chanchal.

  ‘Mummy-Daddy weather,’ said her son, seven-year-old Gogi. Everybody laughed.

  The ladies then stood up and went away to the kitchen to wash up and the interest in the room shifted from food and God to, embarrassingly, me. I put it down to my being my uncle’s nephew, the man of the moment, the conceiver of the idea of Magic Number Two, the visionary and the innovator, the teacher of English to the English, quite simply, a cut above them. They became impervious to the crack of lightning and thunder and asked me all sorts of questions. It bothered me because some were of a rather personal nature. What did my father do? How much did he earn? Did he own the house we lived in? How much land did we have? How many unmarried sisters did I have? I nearly told them to get stuffed with ‘Bhudia wife handmade’ dandals laced with whatever they were laced with. But I turned to my boss instead.

  ‘Mr Swami, why am I being asked these questions?’ He brushed me off as if I was being silly. But I persisted and Mr Gokul Swami finally said, ‘They just want to know. That’s all.’

  Many of the ladies came back after having made themselves useful. They looked at their men. The men looked at their watches. It was past ten and in that rain and storm, Southall seemed a long way away. A big question mark suddenly seemed to hang down from the middle of the ceiling like an unlit chandelier. Mr Gokul Swami solved it with just two words.

  ‘Issleep here.’ Indians love sleeping ten to a room. There was universal delight. I stood up to go - I did not love sleeping ten to a room. Besides, I loved storms.

  ‘You are not going anywhere in this weather,’ Mr Gokul Swami said.

  It was not that I just didn’t like sleeping ten to a room, it was simply that I did not want to spend the night in the Swami house. I wanted to go home and sleep in my own bed, in my own sheets in which Jane and I had made love earlier in the day. But did I have a choice?

  ‘Sit down. Sit, sit, sit.’ I obeyed and found myself seated obliquely opposite Lakshmi. It was then I became conscious of the fact that quite by chance, she had sat opposite or near me for most of the evening. I apologised to my love in Greenwich and she said not to worry. It can happen.

  ‘Who is going to sleep with who and where?’ Mr Gokul Swami asked, knowing well the answer: men would double up in the available beds, ladies and kids would sleep on the floor. He handed out spaces like a grand zamindar allotting plots of land to impoverished peasants, and he did the matching up. He had a simple solution for me: ‘Ravi, you issleep with Bhudia sahib in spare double bed in the loft. Plenty room there.’

  Not on your nellie, sir. I’m not going to share a bed with this twenty-stone ape of a wrestler, Dara Singh. I’d rather get into the cage with Guy the Gorilla of London Zoo, I said in my throat.

  ‘Sir.’ I pointed to Bhudia’s height and width. ‘Do you want me to wake up tomorrow flattened like a papadom?’ This made him laugh. This made everybody laugh.

  ‘All right, all right. Issleep on the floor then. Take blanket and share with one two kiddies.’

  No, thank you. I am sleeping alone in my own bed in my own flat.

  As if he had heard me talk to myself, Mr Gokul Swami repeated his order. ‘Take blanket and two children and lie down by the door.’

  As movement began from one room to the next and up and down the stairs, I saw my chance to slip away unnoticed. But first, I needed to pay a call. The main loo downstairs was stuffed with kids. I went to the one upstairs. I had never entered the Swami house without being embarrassed, nor ever left it without suffering the same plight. When I had arrived earlier this evening, it had been Lord Rameshwar. Now that I was about to make my exit, lo and behold:

  I pushed open the door of the toilet on the first floor and there squatting on his huge haunches, upon the porcelain bowl, Indian-style, was Mr Bhudia reading the India Weekly published here and smoking, revealing his family jewels. The fool had forgotten to lock himself in!

  ‘Sorry, yaar, sorry,’ he muttered, smiling and coughing.

  ‘Don’t get up. All that delicious food. Enjoy your smoke.’ I shut the door on him and went back down the stairs, mournfully. This little interlude cost me dearly, for Mr Gokul Swami stood in the hall, directing the traffic: I was trapped. Soon Mr Bhudia turned up, smiling. He put an arm around me and explained in a whisper: ‘Fact of the matter is, I can’t do it English-style, sitting, like on a throne.’

  A scramble began. It was like stall wallahs in a market back home, pitching for prime space. I was handed a thick grey wartime blanket which smelled of the Battle of Britain, given Bubbles and Dimples and allotted the window. With feuding Bubbles on the right of me and Dimples on my left, I laid down my weary bones and wondered what Jane would have made of it all, had she come with me. Would she have hated it? I felt embarrassed to think about it, so I stopped thinking and fell asleep. Ten minutes later, I was jolted out of sleep by a violent kick in the ribs - Bubbles turning around. I had barely returned to sleep when a donkey kicked me in my hindquarters - Dimples this time. With me as their punch-bag, the two carried on their feud even in their sleep till I decided enough was enough and stood up. I covered the kids with the blanket, pulled the plastic tablecloth off the dining table, wrapped myself in it then lay down next to them. It had stopped raining, but a rainlike drone still filled the room - Mr Bagria and someone else snoring in concert from the east and west wings of the room. It was time I did something about all this.

  I took matters in my own hand, stood up and went to the loo, opened the little window and climbed out into the night.

  THE SHAH OF THE TANDOOR

  My teaching career ended when construction began on Indian Magic Number Two. I spent my days with the builders as one of them and supervising them. Lord Rameshwar was also there, supervising me. Sweetness daily brought us lunch – parathas, cauliflower bhajee and suchlike. It was the lunch my mother gave me when I was a boy to take to school. St Edward’s was below Simla’s lifeline, Cart Road, that connected the mountain city with the rest of the world. The school was a mile from our house, by Clarke’s Hotel on India’s most fashionable avenue, its Mall. Downhill all the way, it made walking to school a joy. But the tragic part of it was that I often ate my lunch bit by bit even before I set foot in the classroom. So I had to spend my lunch recess hungrily eyeing other more sensible boys munching their parathas. My daily pocket-money of four annas didn’t fetch me much at the tuckshop.

  Sweetness knew where lay the way to a man’s heart – through his stomach. Her phirni rice-powder custard was a dessert fit for Indian Presidents and Prime Ministers.

  ‘Mrs Swami, you are a supermarket of sweetness,’ I once said.

  ‘Ah, flattery? Flattery will get you everywhere and beyond,’ Lord Rameshwar said, licking his fingers noisily.

  ‘Raavi talking flattery because he knows it brings aloo Parathas,’ said Sweetness looking delighted by the praise.

  ‘Mrs Swami, you know I am telling you the truth.’

  ‘All I know is you are spending too, too much on construction. It is stealing Mr Swami’s sleep.’

  ‘Issleep flying out of my window like a bird trapped,’ Mr Swami moaned – he too came daily af
ter work at Number One to inspect.

  ‘If you are ordering me, sir, then we’ll do what all Indians do - have a patch-up job and save money,’ I replied one day.

  ‘Indian patch-up means hotchpotch and shambles. That what you want, Gokul?’ Lord Rameshwar said.

  ‘I don’t know what I want any more.’

  But I knew exactly what I wanted. I wanted Number Two to be a smaller Veerabhai’s, London’s choicest new restaurant where people could eat the choicest new Indian food. It would be a warm and welcoming place. There was one little hitch, though – money.

  ‘What you doing to me, boy?’ My boss said with liquid tragedy in his eyes. He was a walking-talking portrait of a man who had bitten off more than what he could chew. One day he dragged me along to see his bank manager back in Pimlico.

  Mr Smith, a handsome man in his early fifties, bore a striking resemblance to my father. I liked him instantly and marvelled at the coincidence.

  ‘Mr Issmith, I have the sad pleasure of presenting my new manager to you. Please tell him what he is doing to me.’

  Mr Smith studied me with a faint smile and I got the feeling that he liked me too. Then he nodded his head like a bank manager – it meant neither this nor that.

  ‘Young man, you are spending rather a lot on the construction work, you know. And Mr Swami is justly worried.’

  ‘Because I am borrowing from Mr Issmith’s very kind heart.’ My boss looked heartbroken saying that. It was his way of appealing to people he needed.

  ‘Come, come, Mr Swami. We lend money to those we know are reliable, enterprising and what’s more, hardworking.’

  ‘See, Raavi, how kind Mr Issmith isspeak. And what you doing?’

  In my best English, I explained at length to Mr Smith what We were doing to Number Two, adding, ‘It would be simply different and exquisite. Inside and out.’ My boss interrupted me. ‘What inside?’ He had never paid a thought to the inside, which for him was only chairs, tables and tablecloths. ‘And what out?’

  ‘An elegant environment tastefully furnished and – ‘

  ‘And what?’ Mr Gokul Swami’s eyes widened.

  ‘And a spot-lit waterfall cascading down a wall.’

  ‘A waterfall? Mr Issmith, I’m taking my manager to Harley to a mental doctor.’

  The bank manager could not suppress a laugh. Nor could I.

  ‘Who is this wonder chef and where is he coming from?’

  ‘Sir, Balli Shah is a renowned chef in Simla, my home town.’

  ‘Simla in the hills?’

  ‘Do you know Simla, Mr Smith?’

  ‘I was there towards the end of the war for a while before being sent out to fight the Japanese.’

  ‘In Burma, sir?’

  ‘On the border with India at Kohima and Imphal.’

  ‘Where did you stay in Simla, sir?’

  ‘In a camp for the newcomers at that mini racecourse.’

  ‘Anandale, sir? I have played many cricket matches there.’

  ‘Charming place, Simla. Any Englishman who ever went to India spent some time there. It was home from home in the Himalayas.’

  We talked of the ‘charming place Simla’. It became like my interview with dear Mrs Alderfield of the County Hall, and I knew that the loan was in my boss’s pocket. Then I talked of the equally charming charming Number Two, where people would want to come again and again.

  ‘Mr Smith, we would like you and Mrs Smith to be our honoured guests at our gala opening.’ We hadn’t thought of an opening, gala or non-gala. But the idea suddenly came to me. It seemed a good one. My boss gave me a smouldering look which should have burned me to cinders. But I extinguished it with a grin.

  ‘Thank you. I hope we will be able to come. Who are you going to ask to open your new restaurant?’

  ‘We have someone in mind, sir.’

  ‘Of course.’ Mr Smith nodded his head. He knew who I was talking about. He was an intelligent man.

  ‘I hope you like Indian food, Mr Smith.’

  ‘Well, yes. India converts you. Actually, my wife is rather fond of it.’

  ‘Now she will grow even fonder. We are going to introduce a new menu and new things.’

  ‘What sort of things?’

  ‘Dishes that have never been tried here before.’

  ‘How interesting. What are they?’

  ‘Our Mughal cuisine, sir, tandoori cuisine – revolutionary. Princely stuff, sir. We are going to catch London by its belly.’

  ‘I wish you both luck.’ As long as were within the walls of the bank I knew I was safe. Once outside, however…

  ‘What was that bak-bak nonsense about gala-shala? Why tell bad lie to good Englishman?’

  ‘I wasn’t lying, sir.’

  ‘Then why that banana-skin talk and crazy-bend mouthing?’

  ‘A gala opening means publicity, the soul of any good business.’

  ‘You want to issink me?’ my boss wailed. ‘Then issink me proper. Take me to West Minister Bridge and push me in.’

  The gala idea received a mixed reception. Lord Rameshwar was opposed to it – ‘too much useless expense.’

  Jagan and Prohit agreed, even though their opinion was not sought. But Bossni liked it. And Ranji.

  ‘A successful restaurant is like a healthy animal. It needs four legs to stand on. One of them is good publicity,’ Ranji said.

  ‘What are the other three, eh?’ Lord Rameshwar asked.

  ‘Best food. Best décor. And best manager.’

  ‘Chamcha arselicker,’ Jagan and Prohit hissed in my ear.

  ‘I agree with Ranji,’ Sweetness said. ‘Also with Raavi. Have A gala, ji. Throw a big bang party. I want. Veena also.’

  ‘Issweetness! Whose side are you on?’

  ‘Show London that the Swamis of Pimlico have a heart.’

  There were only two people in this world my boss could not say no to. One of them had spoken.

  ‘All right then.’

  I began to regret it as soon as he had said that. I would have to get my uncle to do the opening and make a speech – Gokul Swami wanted a speech. I had dug my own grave.

  ‘All right then.’ The boss looked at me. ‘I hear he is a top, top speaker your very good Uncle-ji.’

  But I was saved. Divine intervention. Deus ex machina.

  ‘Just look at this,’ Lord Rameshwar said, producing the newest edition of India Weekly. In a picture on the front page my ‘uncle’ was making a speech at an Indian function. Underneath, it said his term had come to an end and that he was returning to Delhi in a fortnight. My boss’s jaw fell in pain.

  ‘Why you not tell us. Now who is going to make the isspeech? Rameshwar? Fool Prohit or the Philip Prince?’ he barked at me. I could have kissed Lord Rameshwar like I did that PC Watson. ‘I didn’t because we had not agreed on anything. Anyway, we will get our local MP. MPs love doing this sort of thing. Very good for their own publicity.’

  ‘Even better, a proper white MP,’ Lord Rameshwar said.

  ‘All right. Get an MP who sits the House,’ Boss agreed.

  ‘I don’t like that, Lord Rameshwar, you preferring a white man to my uncle. I am deeply hurt.’

  ‘No offence meant. Get the man when the time comes.’

  What bloody man? I didn’t even know his name. In the end, one phone call and the secretary of the Right Honourable Bob Batting, MP for North Westminster, said he would be delighted to open ‘a restaurant with a difference’.

  ‘He’s done it, the poet-philosopher. Got married behind our back. We are U-bent with laughter.’ Tariq coughed in the phone.

  ‘But when? Where? And who to?’

  I had to go to the Sub because Mrs Ferreiro had phoned to say there were some letters for me. I had some time on my hands, so I went to Golders Green station, only the second stop from mine, and stopped at Melaram’s stall to say hello. My friend was not there. An Indian lady with a beautiful moon-face and a certain girth manned it. Had I not seen her before?

&nbs
p; ‘Gone shopping,’ she informed me in a very sweet voice.

  ‘Forgive me, but be you?’

  ‘Yes. And why not? What’s the matter with you boys? Never heard of a man getting married?’

  ‘But why didn’t he tell us?’

  ‘That you have to ask him,’ she said, pointing behind me. A train had just arrived and Melaram had come out of it with two carrier bags. We fell into each other’s arms.

  ‘You approve?’ he asked in a whisper.

  ‘But?’ I had ten questions to ask.

  ‘We met. We saw. We conquered. Each other.’

  ‘What a conquest!’ Conquest was twice my friend’s girth and half his height. I approved wholeheartedly.

  ‘You are a very lucky man, Mela-ji.’

  ‘And I, a very lucky girl. Like your Jane-ji, Raavi.’ It was just after four. Time to move on. As I emerged from the Sub with my mail, who should I bump into outside the house? She whose name had been mentioned so poetically and so recently.

  ‘Baby!’ I cried. Jane was driving up in her mum’s car. She parked right in front of me, just as surprised. ‘Baby,’ she cried. ‘I was just thinking of you.’ Having her in front of me made my body ache. ‘Come inside the car.’ Sitting next to each other, the thirsty explorers did what they had to do in their unexpectedly found oasis. It was not good enough. They simply had to be somewhere with more leg room – inside a house or a jungle. ‘Let’s go inside for a minute.’

  ‘Baby, you are mad.’ What was she saying?

  ‘Nobody’s at home. They won’t be back for quite a while.’

  ‘You are loco. And so am I.’

  ‘We won’t do anything.’ Inside their sitting room, first she put on a Beatles LP. Then her lips were on mine. Soon we forgot where we were and the fact that her father was racing home with a shotgun to blow my arse off. But her kisses were worth dying for. Suddenly, it all became unbearable. In a frenzy, I pulled off her skirt, kicked off my shoes, trousers and underwear. As usual, we took our time. She didn’t hear the key turn in the front door. I did.