The Edges of Time

by Farahad Zama

  Aruna was still trembling when she reached her house. The reaction to the truth serum must have been wearing off because she could not believe she had said all those words when she had been explicitly told to keep calm and cajole the old man into agreeing to the sale. She had completely blown it, and so comprehensively that nobody else could repair it either.

  At dinner later that day, there was drama. 'You shouldn't have sent her, naanna,' Mani said. Ramanujam hadn't wanted to say anything but either due to the last lingering effects of the serum or her innate honesty, Aruna had confessed everything, leaving out only the truth serum part. Ramanujam and Aruna had agreed earlier that they should keep that secret from everyone. Aruna's sister-in-law Mani was very upset. Tears flowed down her face. 'This was supposed to be my inheritance,' Mani cried. She pointed to Aruna and said, 'Obviously she won't be interested. She actively sabotaged it.'

  Aruna was distressed. However much Mani seemed reconciled to her, when the chips came down the accusations started flying. She had schemed to trap Mani's beloved – and naïve – brother in marriage; she shoveled her in-law's money to her parents; she went out to work and neglected her husband and his parents...

  Mani's father intervened. 'That's not fair, Mani. And don't point your finger at your sister-in-law. That's rude.'

  Ramanujam said, 'Prasad Uncle was never going to sell to us anyway. It didn't matter what Aruna or I said. He thinks that by selling to us, he becomes less than us somehow and it's a matter of prestige for him.'

  Mani went quiet but the way she scowled at Aruna and refused to speak to her showed that she hadn't forgiven her sister-in-law entirely. Aruna was more concerned with her father-in-law's feelings. She apologized to him when she gave him his night-time tablets. 'I am sorry sir,' she said. 'We failed you.'

  'Only the effort is in your hands, Arjuna, not the fruit thereof,' said her father-in-law quoting the advice given by Lord Krishna to the warrior Arjuna on the eve of the Great Battle in the Mahabharata. 'Don't take Mani's words to heart. I know that you and Ramanujam would have negotiated with my cousin in exactly the same manner whether you were eventually going to get the land or Mani. I have no doubts about that.'

  'Thank you,' said Aruna, feeling grateful for his understanding. But she felt guilty too. She should have kept a tighter control of her tongue.

  The following afternoon there was an urgent phone call from Ramanujam's cousin. 'Father is unwell, please come immediately.' Prasad Uncle had been admitted to Seven Hills hospital.

  At the hospital, Prasad's two sons and daughters-in-law were in the waiting room. 'How is he?'

  'He is better now, thanks to the Lord of the Seven Hills,' said Prasad's oldest son, the one who had called them. 'He's been under a lot of stress ever since the Income Tax department raided us. It's been a complete nightmare.'

  A doctor came in just then, having seen Ramanujam enter. They were old friends and greeted each other. After a few minutes of conversations, Ramanujam asked about Prasad. 'Is that your uncle? We didn't know that. He had an ischemic attack. Anyway, we've stabilized him with an intravenous drip. He'll need to be careful in future not to stress himself too much and to avoid salt, but he'll be fine. You can advise your uncle, I am sure.' The doctor's phone rang. He looked at the number and said, 'I've got to run. Great to see you.'

  Only one visitor was allowed, so Ramanujam's father went to see the patient. Half an hour later, they were on their way home. Aruna's father-in-law was silent as they drove up the steep slope from the hospital to Siripuram Junction. They turned left towards Asilmetta and he said, 'Let's stop at the Sampath Vinayak temple.'

  There was a queue at the temple, as always, and it was almost an hour later that they got back to the car. 'I had two reasons for praying now,' Aruna's father-in-law said.

  'Two?' said everybody.

  'Yes. Firstly, my cousin had a heart attack and survived. Secondly, I am now able to fulfill my promise to my mother.'

  'What?' they all cried.

  Aruna's father-in-law's face broke into a smile. 'Yes,' he said. 'Prasad says the heart attack has made him think again. Aruna’s words have made a big impression on him. He was praising you – said that you were a wise woman. Whose daughter-in-law is she, I said. Anyway, he wants to sell my mother's land to me. He apologized that he could not give me a discount because he needed all the money he could get at this stage. Which is a good thing really.'

  'Why is that a good thing?'

  'Because he's always been such a miser that if he had offered me a discount, I would have got a heart attack on the spot.'

  They all laughed and got into the car for their journey home.

  At the same time, the conversation was a lot less light-hearted in the Outpatient department of the district hospital. 'What do you mean you found the truth serum?' asked Ravi.

  'Yes, sir,' said the nurse, holding out a bottle. Sodium Pentothol, IP, it said on the label.

  'But... but... if this is here, what about Aruna? Oh God, I have to call Ramanujam again and tell him. He’s going to kill me for sure.'

  'We don't have to tell anybody sir. You've already informed the doctor that his wife needs an iron injection, so she'll get the treatment anyway. Why tell him anything?'

  'We both deserve to lose our licenses,' Ravi said, shaking his head. 'What did we inject Aruna with anyway?'

  'Pure distilled water, sir.'

  ~ ~ ~

  Author’s Note

  A Glass of Water – the story is set in the world of The Marriage Bureau for Rich People. Vizag is a real town on the eastern coast of India and the Ali’s house is modelled faithfully on my parents’ home. Sadly, the guava tree now lives only in my fiction. The real tree was cut down to make space for a car to be parked.

  The Edge of Time – the location of Auschwitz as the site of a concentration camp was actually suggested by Arpad Wigand in 1940. Wigand was born in the German city of Mannheim, which was incidentally where both the bicycle and the motorcar were invented. The hyperinflation of 1923 in Weimar Germany is probably the most (in)famous episode of monetary collapse in history. A thief really stole a bag and dumped the money it contained during this time and Hitler was a rising politician making speeches in beer halls in Munich. The strict vigilance that the European Central Bank maintains against inflation is a direct consequence of the lasting impression that hyperinflationary episode has stamped on the collective German memory, which in turn has led to the prolonging of the Euro crisis in countries like Greece and Spain ninety years later.

  Kindness – the character of Vithal Rao is fictional, but the locations, dates and ages of the historical people in the story are as accurate as I could make them. There is no evidence that Gandhi and Nathuram Godse ever met in real life before the assassination. The assassin was really raised as a girl for the first few years of his life because of his parents’ fear that young Ram would die like his older brothers who had all passed away in infancy.

  The Debt – this is based on a true incident narrated by Javed Akhtar as part of his Classic Legends programme on television. I have forgotten the name of the Urdu poet Akhtar Saab was talking about and I have been unable to find it again.

  The Beginning – a block of ochre and a shell bead necklace from seventy thousand years ago in Blombos Cave, South Africa, are the first indisputably human works of art. The story tries to represent current research as accurately as possible. The one liberty I have taken is in giving the characters sophisticated language skills. We don’t know when humans developed full-fledged speech but it is unlikely to be as early as depicted in the story.

  Success – the city of Hyderabad is real. It’s a historic city on the Deccan plateau that’s a melange of Muslim and Hindu influences on the Deccan plateau and its ruler was once the richest man in the world. It did go from provincial capital to high-tech city during the administration of Chandra Babu Naidu. The village of Himagiri is fictional but based on a hilltop temple beyond a village that’s off the National High
way on the way to my grandmother’s village.

  The Truth Serum – I wrote this after a reader requested that I include at least one story featuring Aruna and Ramanujam from The Marriage Bureau series. Indian authorities have used intravenous barbiturates for interrogation in fraud and terrorism cases. Readers of my novels will recognize that this story takes place before the events in Mrs Ali’s Road to Happiness, in which Aruna is pregnant.

  You can follow me by ‘liking’ my author’s page on Facebook at www.facebook.com/farahadzama.

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