Anuradha Roy - An Atlas of Impossible Longing

At last Manjula finished anointing her face with cream and flour and went for a second bath.

The doorbell rang.

Gouranga opened the door and leapt away from it. It was Larissa Barnum, followed by her khansama, in grey uniform, complete with tarnished brass buttons and grey cap.

“Ask them!” she ordered.

The khansama said to Gouranga, “Where is your Mataji? Memsahib has to see her.”

The servant stammered, “Upstairs, but … ”

“What is he saying?” Mrs Barnum demanded.

“ … she does not see anyone.”

The khansama translated.

“What nonsense,” Mrs Barnum exclaimed. “I need to see her. If she is upstairs, I will go to her.”

And that was how 3 Dulganj Road had its first British visitor, a visitor who reached the bedrooms upstairs. Mrs Barnum darted curious glances around the first Indian home she had ever been in as she went up the dark stairwell that opened into Amulya’s stained-glass verandah and led to his bedroom. Her heels clattered on the cool, hard floor. Manjula, hearing the unfamiliar sound in the bathroom through a cascade of water, wondered what it was, then returned to her iron bucket and mug.

Mrs Barnum swept into Kananbala’s room and trilled cheerfully, “Well, here you are, we meet at last!”

Kananbala, startled, leapt up and exclaimed, “Oh Ma, what’s this?”

“Tell her,” Mrs Barnum ordered the khansama, who was hovering at the door.

“My memsahib would like you to come with her for a while, please,” the khansama said in Hindi. “It will not take long.”

Kananbala understood Hindi, though she did not speak anything but Bengali. She looked at the khansama and Mrs Barnum in speechless surprise. She had not left the house for what seemed like forever, let alone with strangers. It was impossible. She said so.

“That is absurd, quite absurd,” Mrs Barnum said, and walked up to Kananbala. Firmly, she took her arm, trying to lead her out of the room. “Don’t worry,” she said in a reassuring voice. “It’s only across the road, there’s nothing to worry about. You’ll be back before anyone knows. D’you realise we’ve known each other for ages and never met?”

Kananbala looked up at Mrs Barnum’s smiling, confident face bobbing considerably above hers. What strangeness! Her clothes, the colour of her skin, the way she walked, shoulders thrown back. She noticed Mrs Barnum’s earlobes were long and pierced with green stones, that her front teeth were stained yellowish, that she smelt of roses and smoke. Kananbala had looked at Mrs Barnum so many nights and evenings separated by road, window grill, and distance that to have her so close seemed a revelation. Impelled by some irrational force, Kananbala felt she could not stay in her room any longer. She felt as if she could do anything at all, anything to get out of the house. She looked down at her sari, not one of her going-out ones, and smoothed it, saying, “I should change … ” But nobody heard her anxious murmur.

Mrs Barnum, dropping Kananbala’s arm, was standing at her window, the same window at which she had seen Kananbala every night looking out, waving to her. She examined the view from that window towards her own house across the road, the bougainvillea at the gate, the window upstairs, curtained against the world, the portecochère . How much had Kananbala seen that night, Larissa Barnum wondered. How different it all looked from this side of the road! Then she heard a muttering of voices behind her and called out to the servant, “Shoes, get her shoes, joota, joota !”

Kananbala divined what was required and went and slipped her feet into the good, wine-coloured velvet pair that Amulya had got her once from Whiteways in Calcutta, a pair she had never worn. She walked through the verandah, down the stairs, out of the gate and onto the road, suffused with an unreality that made her stagger. The light was too bright, the trees too tall, the road too long and smooth. She had not been outside the house before dusk for months. For months, she had seen the world outside from her window, or by evening light when Amulya took her to the garden to make her walk. She stumbled again. Mrs Barnum held her elbow and said, “There, it’ll be alright, it’s just strange at first. What bastards, to lock you up.” The khansama thought it best not to translate everything.

The car was parked outside the gate. The khansama got into the driver’s seat, while the two women sat at the back. Kananbala began to panic and looked wide-eyed with questions at Mrs Barnum. “Where are we going?” she quavered.

Mrs Barnum understood the question despite not knowing the language. Gaily, she laughed, “A surprise, it’s a surprise!” The khansama dutifully translated this as he started the car.

The car rumbled down the road. It began to move faster, too fast for Kananbala who stared bewildered out of its window, her heart thumping with the novelty of it, with the speed. She had barely focused on one tree or building or clump of bushes when, already, it was part of the past. The wind rushed into her hair and made strands escape from her tight bun. Her aanchal slid off her head; there was nothing she could do to keep it on. Bare-headed, hair flying, she put her face to the rushing air that made her eyes water. A feeling of exhilaration swept over her, something overpowering, something she could not remember feeling after she was newly married.

* * *

Amulya returned home at midday, as he usually did. Sitting on the bench by the front door, he took his shoes off, calling out, “Arre o Gouranga, where are you? Bring me some water!”

He rose and in slippered feet walked up the stairs towards his bedroom. In the long verandah-room, the light streaming in through his stained-glass window was a mellow monsoon colour. Amulya paused to admire it, relishing the thought of at least a month of rain, and reached out for the glass of water Gouranga had brought. “Where is everyone?” he enquired. “The house is very quiet, what’s happening?”

“N … nn … nothing, Babu,” Gouranga said, and, almost grabbing Amulya’s empty glass, scampered out of the verandah as if pursued. Amulya watched him disappearing and muttered, “Dolt … fifteen years and still he isn’t trained … just can’t make a horse out of this donkey.”

He turned into his bedroom saying, “Are you there? I’m back.”

He stepped in. “Are you there?” he said again, peering into the curtained-off dressing area.

Amulya stood puzzled, brows knit, wondering where Kananbala could be. Then, thinking she might be — uncharacteristically, he admitted — with Manjula in her quarters, he sat down with the newspaper to wait for Manjula to call him for lunch. He flipped it open to the editorials and began to read. The silence was broken only by the rustle of the paper and the monotonous tinkle of cow-bells.

Much time had passed, his hungry stomach told him. He pushed the paper aside as if everything in it was nonsensical and got up.

Looking into the corridor, he bellowed “Bouma!” towards his absent older daughter-in-law.

Manjula appeared, wiping her hands on her sari, looking drawn with worry. Like the rest of the household, she was terrified of Amulya’s temper.

“Ma has gone out,” she stammered when he asked. “I was having a bath … Mrs Barnum … ”

Amulya stood stock still for a moment, then turned away from her without a word. The thought that his wife had left the house, defying him — even in her disturbed state she knew the rules — that she was making a fool of herself with a stranger, that the stranger in question was an Anglo-Indian murderess! He could not stretch his mind far enough to accommodate all these facts together. He summoned Gouranga and sent him across the road to call her back. Gouranga returned after ten minutes, not daring to speak.