Mahesh Rao - The Smoke is Rising

The doorbell rang at a quarter past eleven, spooling out a joyless version of ‘Edelweiss’.

‘Actually on time,’ thought Susheela as she smoothed down the front of her pallu and walked towards the door.

Sunaina Kamath made her usual entrance: she walked into any room as if expecting to interrupt a vibrant conference. Her apparent disappointment at being confronted by only Susheela and a potted philodendron was quickly swept away as she took off her sandals.

‘How are you, Sush? This heat, I can’t tell you. It gets worse every year.’

Behind Sunaina, Malini Gupta smiled woodenly as she took in her surroundings.

‘I don’t know whether it’s the global warming or getting older or maybe both. But I definitely seem to feel the heat a lot more these days,’ sighed Susheela. ‘Please come, Malini. First time you’re coming here, no?’

Sunaina sank into a brocade sofa.

‘Oof, I think I’ll just stay here for the rest of the day and not move.’

Slightly rested, she let out an abrupt chuckle. Her dimples gave her face a softer, more pliant aspect as she dabbed at her neck with a man’s handkerchief. Sunaina’s hair always looked as if she had walked into it quite by chance, the unyielding bob anxiously perched over her face. She stuffed the handkerchief into one of the many pouches in her handbag and looked ready for business.

Malini Gupta sat straight-backed on a leather and bamboo stool despite Susheela’s attempts to navigate her towards the more comfortable corner armchair. Susheela saved herself some trouble and focused her attentions on Sunaina, it being widely known that Mrs Gupta’s only interests were the cave paintings of Ajanta and the arthritis in her big toe.

The social call slid into its characteristic rhythm. More on the hot weather, children, other family, traffic, general health, specific health, completed building works, anticipated further building works, weight gain, weight loss, cooks, maids, drivers and gardeners.

Sunaina dragooned her way through topics like a seasoned politician, mindful of all reasonable views but keen to move on to other more significant issues. She was convinced that her uncompromising sense of community responsibility and benevolent participation gave her a nose for what mattered. If questioned, she would have been hard-pressed to define the community for which she toiled so industriously. In fact, the question would probably only have served to irritate her: the kind of mindless prattle that got in the way of people setting agendas and achieving objectives. Nevertheless, she recognised the importance of weighty nomenclature. Sunaina had always believed that if one invited gravitas, patronage and influence would automatically follow.

She was therefore an indispensable member of the Association of Concerned and Informed Citizens of Mysore, the chair of the Mysore North Civic Reform and Renewal Committee and the secretary of the Vontikoppal Ladies’ League. No less impressive was her record in the inner circles of the Mahalakshmi Gardens Betterment Association and St Theresa’s Humanities College Alumni Society. She also gave freely of her time to any number of spontaneous causes and supplicants.

In some quarters her tireless public efforts were viewed as a deliberate counterpoise to her husband’s cantankerousness. A canny property developer, he seemed to relish his renowned irascibility, picking fights with even the paan seller outside Mindy’s. The most recent outrage had been an ugly scene involving an overturned basket of chrysanthemums outside the Chamundeshwari temple. During her early married life, Sunaina had appeared to have a firm grip on her husband’s unpredictability. She had regarded her handiwork with the pride of a dog trainer who had made a success of a particularly idiotic mongrel. But over the years the cur had reverted to form and ever more florid notes of apology had been required to appease her relatives and neighbours.

Susheela wondered when exactly Sunaina had begun to call her Sush. She was certainly the only person in the world to do so. Uma appeared briefly to serve the chilled juice and some light mid-morning snacks. Sunaina greeted the malai chum chum and the cashew pakoras with protestations, grudging acceptance and then a cheerful zeal. The air-conditioning system rattled away in the background.

‘Oh Sush, you’re really trying to finish me off,’ Sunaina groaned, biting into another chum chum . ‘Just after scaring us with all these health stories, you serve us these heart attacks.’

Malini Gupta had barely touched her plate. A corner had been nibbled off just one pakora . Susheela made a mental note.

Talk turned to Sunaina’s nephew, whose disinclination to find paid employment troubled her like an ingrown toenail.

‘At least he doesn’t gamble or, you know, conduct himself in loose ways,’ said Susheela.

‘Birdwatching,’ said Sunaina with disgust. ‘That’s the only thing he’s interested in. Always leaping up to tell you that he spotted some crested crow with three legs.’

‘But I suppose it doesn’t do any harm .’

‘It doesn’t do any good either. He may be comfortably off, but as a life, what does it amount to, all this lying around in puddles, gazing at hens?’

Malini Gupta seemed to cheer up a little at the thought of the dismal prospects of Sunaina’s nephew.

The morning’s paper lay folded and pressed flat on the coffee table. The front page revealed that the High Court had granted a fresh stay order on any construction at the site of HeritageLand. The saga of the proposed theme park, one of Asia’s largest, seemed almost immemorial. Every call of support or protest was eagerly absorbed into the civic ether as if the pitch for construction was the real entertainment envisaged by the park’s creators. Almost every aspect of the project was endlessly debated in the local press, the choice of site and acquisition of land being the most controversial. The editor of the Mysore Evening Sentinel was unequivocal in his warning: ‘If we don’t hurry up and build the damn thing, the Chinese will do it, like they do everything else.’

‘As for this so-called HeritageLand, I don’t think we will ever see it in our lifetimes,’ said Susheela.

‘I am just sick and tired of hearing about it,’ said Sunaina, her hands fluttering to her temples.

‘Every day there is another press release, another exclusive. The park will only have five-star hotels, it will have five thousand fountains, it will be seen from space.’

‘Apparently we will be able to experience a day in the life of Tipu Sultan there.’

‘Didn’t he spend his days flinging Britishers off a cliff?’

‘Maybe that’s what they intend, although I hope not. Think of the mess. Just when street cleaning has improved in our localities.’

Sunaina gulped the last of her juice like a stricken heroine.

A bee had somehow made its way into the dining room and its dull drone was interrupted by the thud of its deranged lunges at the closed window. Malini Gupta glanced at the moulded ends of the curtain rail, shifted on her stool and once again examined her uneaten chum chum.

‘So, what made you late this morning?’ asked the mali , as Uma carried a basin of dirty utensils to the outside washing area at the back of the house.

She gathered up the folds of her sari, tucked them between her thighs and squatted to turn the tap on. The mali walked around to one side of the tap and looked down at the top of her head.