Helen Forrester - The Moneylenders of Shahpur

‘Oh, yes,’ agreed Dr Mehta hastily. But his mind revolted at the idea than an alien tongue united his beloved Gujerat with the cocksure southerners and the stupid northerners. His thoughts began to wander.

Although he was a professor of English, knew the plays of Shakespeare nearly by heart and had bookshelves crammed with the latest works in English, his heart lay in his little glass-fronted bookcase amongst his sacred Jain writings, laboriously collected over the years, some of them manuscripts written in Gujerati or Prakrit or Magadhi. Before this bookcase he would sometimes put a little offering of rice; and he would carefully take the writings out and dust them at the appropriate festival.

Vice-Chancellor Prasad glanced up at the Dean’s thin, lined face, clean-shaven except for a moustache, with its drooping eyelids and calm, firm mouth. The Dean saw the glance and came back to earth immediately. He pulled his watch out of his trouser pocket; it was a fine gold one which had belonged to his father, and he flicked the lid open carefully.

‘Dr Bennett is coming to see me for a few minutes at about twelve o’clock. He wants to go over the Marwari Gate temple; so if you will excuse me I’ll go now.’

‘Certainly. I should like to see Dr Tilak as soon as he arrives – I’m particularly anxious that our new Department should start off properly.’

‘I, too,’ replied the Dean with more fervour than he felt. He had advised against a Department of Zoology and he had an uneasy feeling that Dr Tilak could find himself on a collision course with Jain members of the staff.

That same morning, a very bored Anasuyabehn Mehta had been to the library to change her books. Domesticated and obedient as she was, she trusted implicitly her father’s promise to arrange another marriage for her. But in the meantime, she seemed to be living in an empty limbo, too old to associate with other single girls, yet without the advantages of matrimony.

Her aunt frowned at her as she entered and put the library books down in a corner. ‘Go and wash yourself, child, before entering the kitchen,’ she instructed. Then she turned to chide the boy servant for putting too much charcoal on the fire. ‘Savitri is waiting on the roof,’ she shouted, as Anasuyabehn trailed off to the bathroom.

Her friend, Savitri, knew her well enough to wait a little longer, thought Anasuyabehn, as she filled the bath bucket. Before commencing to wash herself, however, she went to the bottom of the stairs and called to Savitri that she would be up in a few minutes.

Savitri, comfortable in the shade of a tree taller than the bungalow, shouted that she had not to be back at work for an hour.

Anasuyabehn quickly bathed, washed her hair and changed her petticoat, blouse and sari. Then, taking a towel and rubbing her hair as she went, she climbed the stairs to the roof, promising herself that she would go down to help Aunt in the kitchen after a few minutes’ gossip with her friend.

Savitri lived such a full and interesting life, she thought enviously. She actually earned her living as a chemist. She herself had never been able to persuade her father to allow her to work.

‘Have you had lunch?’ she asked Savitri. Her voice was solicitous and deferential. It rejuvenated the other girl’s self-esteem, which always sank when she saw Anasuyabehn.

She turned her thin, heavily bespectacled face towards her friend and said she had eaten. She thought mournfully that she had a university degree and competed successfully in the world’s hardest labour market; but when she and Anasuyabehn walked together in the evening it was at Anasuyabehn that young men cast longing glances. Savitri’s needle-sharp wit might enliven a party, but it was to Anasuyabehn’s shy acquiescing answers that men really listened – negative, obedient Anasuyabehn – so obedient, thought Savitri grimly, that it was just as well that she had few opportunities to meet young men alone. Savitri herself had haughtily repelled her father’s offers to find her a husband and yet she craved for a man of her own.

She sighed, and watched without interest as a tonga loaded with luggage rumbled down the lane beneath her.

A thin, sharp shriek of ‘Niece!’ up the stairs broke into their conversation and reminded them suddenly that a caustic-tongued old lady awaited Anasuyabehn’s ministrations.

The girls grimaced at each other.

‘I wish I were married,’ they said in chorus and then dissolved into laughter. They were still laughing and joking when two gentlemen walked down the lane.

John Bennett had found the peace he sought in a high-ceilinged, stone-floored room in the house of a retired teacher, a few doors away from Dr Mehta’s home. The room was light and airy and austerely furnished with a wooden couch for sitting and sleeping, a big desk and a chair, and a table from which to eat; there was also a large cupboard for his books and other possessions. On a veranda behind the room, Ranjit camped contentedly among the cooking pots; and on another veranda, to the front of the room, were comfortable basket chairs.

Since his arrival, John had immersed himself in his new history and was almost happy. Though he could not trace any of his former English friends, he had met some Indian ones again and found that none of them held any rancour against him for being English. He had visited his old friend, Dr Ferozeshah, at his surgery, where he was introduced to his head nurse, an English lady of quiet, professional demeanour, Miss Armstrong; Ferozeshah told him that she had previously served in a medical mission north of Shahpur.

As time went by, he was able to discard one of his walking sticks, though his legs still caused him pain occasionally.

While Savitri and Anasuyabehn chatted on the roof of Dean Mehta’s bungalow, John took the record of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony off his record player and dusted it carefully.

He opened the cupboard and laid the record on the top shelf, put the record player on a lower shelf, and closed and locked the door.

‘Ranjit,’ he called, as he began to unbutton his shirt, preparatory to changing.

‘Ji?’ responded his servant. He put down the tray of wheat he had been cleaning and creaked slowly to his feet. Though elderly, he was a powerful-looking peasant. He had come to Shahpur from United Provinces forty years before, when only a boy. Except when the Bennett family was on leave in England, he had never left them. He had made a close study of Shahpur and was well known for his profound knowledge of exactly where to place a bribe to hurry officialdom or obtain a favour.

‘Put those papers into my briefcase, while I change my shirt. I’ve an appointment with Dean Mehta.’

Ranjit wiped his seamed face with the dish towel draped over his shoulder and, with surprisingly deft movements, he packed the briefcase. He turned a toothless smile upon John. ‘Will you be in for lunch?’ he asked.

John buckled his belt, and, balancing himself by holding on to various pieces of furniture, he went to the bathroom in search of a comb.

‘Yes,’ he decided, as he combed vigorously at his hair, which never would lie down properly. ‘I won’t go to look at the temple until tomorrow.’

When he was ready to leave, Ranjit preceded him through the shady compound, in order to open the gate for him.

‘Sahib, there’s a tonga here.’

John presumed that the occupants of the carriage had come to visit his landlord. He viewed with interest, however, the tall, slim man who sprang down into the dusty lane. An elderly woman and a thin young girl still in the carriage peeped at him from behind their veiling saris.

‘Excuse me,’ said the man in good English. ‘Can you tell me where to find Dr Mehta, the Dean?’