Vikram Seth - A Suitable Boy

‘It is not for society or children or courts, but for Him to say,’ cried one old man, shaking his finger in Rasheed’s face.

‘Well, that’s a matter for opinion and argument,’ retorted Rasheed.

‘Iblis knew how to argue before his fall!’

‘So did the good angels,’ said Rasheed furiously. ‘So do others.’

‘Are you calling yourself an angel, Maulana Sahib?’ sneered the man.

‘Are you calling me Iblis?’ cried Rasheed.

He suddenly realized that matters had gone far enough, had in fact gone too far. These were his elders, however insulting, reactionary, hypocritical, jealous. He also thought of Maan and how bad a scene like this would look to him — how unfavourable an impression it would convey of his religion.

Once again a pulsing pressure had begun building inside his head. He moved forward — his path had in effect been blocked — and a couple of men moved aside.

‘It has become late,’ said Rasheed. ‘Excuse me. We must go. So, we’ll meet again — and then we’ll see.’ He moved through the broken arc, and Maan followed.

‘Perhaps you should say “khuda haafiz”,’ said a final sarcastic voice.

‘Yes, khuda haafiz, God protect you too,’ said Rasheed angrily, walking on without turning back.

Though Debaria and Sagal were separate villages about a mile apart geographically, they could have been a single village for the purposes of rumour. For whatever was said in one was repeated in the other. Whether it was someone from Sagal coming to Debaria to bring some grain to be parched, or someone from Debaria dropping by at the post office at Sagal or the schoolchildren going to study in the common madrasa, or someone visiting someone in the other village or happening to meet him in an adjoining field, the two villages were so indissolubly interlinked through networks of friendship and enmity, ancient ancestry and recent marriage, information and disinformation as to form one single intersecting web of gossip.

Sagal had almost no upper-caste Hindus. Debaria had a few brahmin families, and they too formed a part of this web, for their relations with the better Muslim families like Rasheed’s were good, and they would drop by sometimes at each other’s houses. They took pride in the fact that feuds within each of the two communities dominated any friction between the communities. This was not the case in some of the surrounding villages, especially where there were memories of violence against Muslims at the time of Partition.

The Football, as one of the brahmin landowners was popularly called, was in fact just on his way to pay a morning visit to Rasheed’s father.

Maan was sitting on a charpoy outside the house, playing with Meher. Moazzam was hanging around; he was delighted with Meher, and from time to time passed his hand wonderingly over her head. Mr Biscuit hovered around hungrily.

Rasheed and his father were sitting on another charpoy, talking. A report of Rasheed’s altercation with the elders of Sagal had reached his father.

‘So you don’t think namaaz is important?’ he observed.

‘It is, it is,’ replied Rasheed. ‘What can I say? I haven’t observed it strictly these last few days — I’ve had unavoidable responsibilities and duties. And you can’t roll out a prayer mat on a bus. Part of it is my own laziness. But if someone had wanted to correct me and explain things to me with sympathy, he would have taken me aside — or spoken to you, Abba — not damaged my honour in a full and open gathering.’ He paused, then added with fervour: ‘And I believe one’s life is more important than any namaaz.’

‘What do you mean by that?’ said his father sharply. He noticed Kachheru passing by. ‘Ei, Kachheru, go to the bania’s shop and get me some supari — I’ve run out of it for my paan. Yes, yes — I want the usual amount. . Ah, the Football is waddling along to pay us a visit; he’s probably come because of your Hindu friend. Yes, people’s lives are important, but that is no excuse — anyway, no excuse for speaking in that way to the big people of a village. Have you considered my honour when you behave like that? Or your own position in the village?’

Rasheed’s eye followed Kachheru for a while. ‘All right,’ he said, ‘please forgive me — the mistake is all mine.’

But ignoring his insincere apology, his father was now greeting his guest with a broad smile, his red mouth wide open: ‘Welcome, welcome, Tiwariji.’

‘Hello, hello,’ said the Football. ‘What were father and son discussing so heatedly?’

‘Nothing,’ said both father and son simultaneously.

‘Oh, well. Two or three of us have been thinking of visiting you for some time now, but what with the harvest and so on we couldn’t find the time. And then we heard that your guest had gone away for a few days, so we decided to wait till his return.’

‘So you’ve really come to see Kapoor Sahib, not us,’ said his host.

The Football shook his head vehemently: ‘What are you saying, what are you saying, Khan Sahib? Our friendship goes back for decades. And one gets so little chance to talk to Rasheed either, now that he is improving his mind in Brahmpur most of the year.’

‘Anyway,’ continued Rasheed’s father rather mischievously, ‘why don’t you have a cup of tea now that you’ve made such an effort to come. I’ll summon Rasheed’s friend, and we will talk. Who else is coming, by the way? Rasheed, ask for tea for all of us.’

The Football became agitated. ‘No, no—’ he said, gesticulating as if he were brushing away a swarm of wasps, ‘no tea, no tea.’

‘But we will all be having it together, Tiwariji, it is not poisoned. Even Kapoor Sahib will join us.’

‘He drinks tea with all of you?’ said Tiwari.

‘Indeed. He eats with us too.’

The Football was silent while he, so to speak, digested this. After a while he said:

‘But I have just had tea, you know, with my breakfast — I’ve just had tea and also far too much to eat before I left my house. Look at me. I must be careful. Your hospitality knows no bounds. But—’

‘You aren’t saying, by any chance, Tiwariji, are you, that what we are offering falls below your expectations? Why don’t you like to eat with us? Do you think we will pollute you?’

‘Oh, no, no, no, it is just that an insect of the gutter like myself does not feel happy when offered the luxuries of a palace. Heh heh heh!’ The Football wobbled a little at his witticism, and even Rasheed’s father smiled. He decided not to press the point. All of the other brahmins were straightforward about their caste rules, which forbade eating with non-brahmins, but the Football was always evasive.

Mr Biscuit approached their charpoy, attracted by tea and biscuits.

‘Clear off, or I’ll fry you in ghee,’ Moazzam said, his hedgehog-hair bristling. ‘He’s a glutton,’ he explained to Maan.

Mr Biscuit stared at them with a blank gaze.

Meher offered him one of her two biscuits, and he came forward like a zombie to ingest it.

Rasheed was pleased at Meher’s generosity, but not at all pleased with Mr Biscuit.

‘He does nothing but eat and shit, eat and shit the whole day,’ he told Maan. ‘That’s his entire business in life. He’s seven years old, and can hardly read a word. What can one do? — it’s the atmosphere of the village. People think he’s funny and encourage him.’

As if to prove his other skills, Mr Biscuit, having absorbed the offering, now put his hands to his ears and called out, in a mockery of the muezzin’s call to prayer:

‘Aaaaaaye Lalla e lalla alala! Halla o halla!’

Moazzam shouted: ‘You low creature!’ and made as if to slap him, but Maan restrained him.