Vikram Seth - A Suitable Boy

Kakoli sneezed. Cuddles barked. Dipankar blinked and continued.

‘Well, Kuku, if I were you—’

‘You didn’t bless me,’ protested Kakoli.

‘Oh, sorry, Kuku, bless you.’

‘Oh, Cuddles, Cuddles, Cuddles,’ said Kuku, ‘no one loves us, no one at all, not even Dipankar. No one cares if we get pneumonia and die.’

Bahadur entered. ‘A phone call for Baby Memsahib,’ he said.

‘Oh,’ said Kuku, ‘I must flee.’

‘But you were discussing the direction of your life,’ protested Dipankar mildly. ‘You don’t even know who’s called — it couldn’t possibly be that important.’

‘But it’s the phone,’ said Kuku and, having delivered herself of this complete and ineluctable explanation, did indeed flee.

Next came Dipankar’s mother, not to take, but to give advice.

‘Ki korchho tumi, Dipankar?. .’ she began, and continued to upbraid him quietly, while Dipankar continued to smile pacifically. ‘Your father is so worried. . and I also would like you to settle down. . family business. . after all, we are not going to live forever. . responsibility. . father’s getting old. . look at your brother, only wants to write poetry, and now these novels, thinks he is another Saratchandra. . you are our only hope. . then your father and I can rest in peace.’

‘But, Mago, we still have some time left to settle the matter,’ said Dipankar, who always deferred whatever he could and left the rest undecided.

Mrs Chatterji looked uncertain. When Dipankar was small, whenever Bahadur asked him what he wanted to eat for breakfast, he would just look up and shake his head in one way or another, and Bahadur, understanding intuitively what was required, would turn up with a fried egg or an omelette or whatever, which Dipankar would eat quite happily. The family had been filled with wonderment. Perhaps, Mrs Chatterji now thought, no mental message had ever passed between them at all, and Bahadur merely represented Fate making its offerings to a Dipankar who decided nothing but accepted everything.

‘And even among girls, you don’t decide,’ continued Mrs Chatterji. ‘There’s Hemangini, and Chitra, and. . it’s as bad as Kuku,’ she ended sadly.

Dipankar had rather chiselled features, not like the milder, more rounded, features of the large-eyed Amit, who fitted Mrs Chatterji’s Bengali idea of good looks. She always thought of Dipankar as a sort of ugly duckling, was fiercely ready to protect him against accusations of angularity and boniness, and was amazed when women of the younger generation, all these Chitras and Hemanginis, babbled on about how attractive he was.

‘None of them is the Ideal, Mago,’ said Dipankar. ‘I must continue to search for the Ideal. And for Unity.’

‘And now you are going to this Pul Mela in Brahmpur. It is so inappropriate for a Brahmo, praying to the Ganga and taking dips.’

‘No, Ma, not at all—’ said Dipankar seriously. ‘Even Keshub Chunder Sen anointed himself with oil and dipped himself three times in the tank in Dalhousie Square.’

‘He did not!’ said Mrs Chatterji, shocked by Dipankar’s apostasy.

The Brahmos, who believed in an abstract and elevated monotheism, or were supposed to, simply did not go about doing that sort of thing.

‘He did, Mago. Well, I’m not sure it was Dalhousie Square,’ Dipankar conceded. ‘But, on the other hand, I think it was four dips, not three. And the Ganga is so much holier than a stagnant tank. Why, even Rabindranath Tagore said about the Ganga. . ’

‘Oh, Robi Babu!’ exclaimed Mrs Chatterji, her face transfigured with muted ecstasy.

The fourth to visit Dipankar’s clinic was Tapan.

Cuddles at once jumped out of Dipankar’s lap and on to Tapan’s. Whenever Tapan’s trunk was packed for him to go to school, Cuddles would become almost desperate, would sit on the trunk to prevent its removal, and would be inconsolably ferocious for a week afterwards.

Tapan stroked Cuddles’ head and looked at the shiny black triangle formed by his eyes and nose.

‘We’ll never shoot you, Cuddles,’ he promised. ‘Your eyes have no whites at all.’

Cuddles wagged his bristly tail in wholehearted approval.

Tapan looked a bit troubled and seemed to want to talk about something, but wasn’t very articulate about what he wanted to say. Dipankar let him ramble on for a bit. After a while Tapan noticed a book about famous battles on Dipankar’s topmost shelf and asked to borrow it. Dipankar looked at the dusty book in astonishment — it was a remnant of his unenlightened days — and got it down.

‘Keep it,’ he told Tapan.

‘Are you sure, Dada?’ asked Tapan gratefully.

‘Sure?’ asked Dipankar, beginning to wonder whether such a book would really be good for Tapan to keep. ‘Well, I’m not really sure. When you’ve read it, bring it back, and we’ll decide what to do with it then. . or later.’

Finally, just as he was about to begin meditating, Amit wandered by. He had been writing all day and looked tired.

‘Are you certain I’m not disturbing you?’ he asked.

‘No, Dada, not at all.’

‘You’re quite certain?’

‘Yes.’

‘Because I wanted to discuss something with you — something that’s quite impossible to discuss with Meenakshi or Kuku.’

‘I know, Dada. Yes, she’s quite nice.’

‘Dipankar!’

‘Yes; unaffected,’ said Dipankar, looking like an umpire indicating a batsman out; ‘intelligent,’ he continued, like Churchill signalling victory; ‘attractive—’, he went on, now representing the trident of Shiva; ‘Chatterji-compatible,’ he murmured, like the Grande Dame emphasizing the four aims of life; ‘and Beastly to Bish,’ he added finally, in the stance of a benevolent Buddha.

‘Beastly to Bish?’ asked Amit.

‘So Meenakshi told me a little while ago, Dada. Apparently, Arun was quite put out and refuses to introduce her to anyone else. Arun’s mother is distraught, Lata is secretly elated, and — oh yes — Meenakshi — who thinks there’s nothing wrong with Bish except that he’s insufferable — is taking Lata’s side. And incidentally, Dada, Biswas Babu, who has heard of her, thinks she is just my type! Did you tell him about her?’ asked Dipankar unblinkingly.

‘No,’ said Amit, frowning. ‘I didn’t. Perhaps Kuku did — the chatterbox. What a gossip you are, Dipankar, don’t you do any work at all? I wish you’d do what Baba says, and get a proper job and handle all these wretched family finances. It would kill both me and my novel if I had to. Anyway, she’s not your type in the least, and you know it. Go and find your own Ideal.’

‘Anything for you, Dada,’ said Dipankar sweetly, and lowered his right hand in gentle blessing.

Mangoes arrived for Mrs Rupa Mehra from Brahmpur one afternoon, and her eyes gleamed. She had had enough of the langra mango in Calcutta, which (though it was acceptable) did not remind her of her childhood. What she longed for was the delicate, delectable dussehri, and the season for dussehris was, she had thought, over. Savita had sent her a dozen by parcel post a few days earlier, but when the parcel had arrived, apart from three squashed mangoes at the top, there were only stones underneath. Clearly someone in the Post Office had intercepted them. Mrs Rupa Mehra had been as distressed by the wickedness of man as by her own sense of deprivation. She had given up hope of dussehris for this season. And who knows if I’ll be alive next year? she thought to herself dramatically — and somewhat unreasonably, since she was still several years short of fifty. But now here was another parcel with two dozen dussehris, ripe but not overripe, and even cool to the touch.