Vikram Seth - A Suitable Boy

A line from Haresh’s tour of the tannery had stuck in Lata’s mind. ‘All the other processes — glazing, boarding, ironing and so on — are optional, of course.’ She remembered it again now, and saw in front of her the soaking pits, where thin men with orange rubber gloves were pulling swollen hides out of a dark liquid with grappling hooks. She looked down at the delicious skin of her roast chicken. I can’t possibly marry him, she thought.

Mrs Rupa Mehra, on the other hand, had moved several miles forward in the opposite direction, aided by a delicious mushroom vol-au-vent. She had decided not only that Haresh would make an ideal husband for Lata but that Prahapore, with its playground and sweetpeas and protective walls, was the ideal place to bring up her grandsons.

‘Lata has been saying how much she has been looking forward to seeing you in your smart new place,’ Mrs Rupa Mehra fibbed. ‘And now that we have seen it you must come for dinner on New Year’s Day to our place in Sunny Park,’ she added spontaneously. Arun’s eyes opened wide, but he said nothing. ‘And you must tell me if there is anything you particularly like to eat. I am so glad it is not Ekadashi today, otherwise I would not be allowed to have the pastry. You must come in the afternoon, that will give you a chance to speak to Lata. Do you like cricket?’

‘Yes,’ said Haresh, attempting to follow the ball of the conversation. ‘But I’m not a good player.’ He passed a puzzled hand across his forehead.

‘Oh, I’m not talking about playing,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra. ‘Arun will take you in the morning to see the Test match. He has got several tickets. Pran also is so fond of cricket,’ she continued. ‘And then you can come over to the house in the afternoon.’ She glanced at Lata, who, for some unknown reason, was looking quite upset.

What can be the matter with the girl? thought Mrs Rupa Mehra, irritated. Moody, that’s what she is. She doesn’t deserve her good fortune.

Perhaps she did not. At the moment her fortune, Lata couldn’t help musing, was somewhat mixed. In immediate terms it consisted of meat curry and rice; Czech sentences floating across from another table followed by a heavy laugh; a Christmas pudding with brandy sauce that Arun took two helpings of and that Mrs Rupa Mehra took three helpings of, her diabetes notwithstanding (‘But it’s a special day’); coffee; Varun silent and swaying; Meenakshi flirting with Arun and bewildering Haresh with a discussion of the pedigree of Mrs Khandelwal’s dogs; suddenly mentioning that her maiden name was Chatterji, to Haresh’s consternation — from which he recovered by plunging into talk of Praha; too much, far too much talk of Praha and Messrs Havel, Bratinka, Kurilla, Novak; the sense of a pair of co-respondent shoes lurking invisibly under a thick white tablecloth; the sudden view of a pleasant smile — Haresh’s eyes disappearing almost entirely. Amit had said something about a smile — her smile — just the other day — yesterday, was it? Lata’s mind wandered off to the Hooghly beyond the wall, the Botanical Gardens on its banks — a banyan tree — boats on the Ganga — another wall near another Praha factory — a field fringed with bamboos and the quiet sound of bat against ball. . She suddenly found herself feeling very sleepy.

‘Are you all right?’ It was Haresh, smiling affectionately.

‘Yes, thanks, Haresh,’ said Lata unhappily.

‘We haven’t had the chance to talk.’

‘It doesn’t matter. We’re meeting on New Year’s Day.’ Lata made an attempt at a smile. She was glad that her latest letters to Haresh had been quite non-committal. She was grateful, in fact, that he had hardly spoken to her at all. What could they talk about? Poetry? Music? Plays? Common friends or acquaintances or members of the family? She was relieved that Prahapore was fifteen miles away from Calcutta.

‘That’s a lovely salmon-pink sari you’re wearing,’ Haresh ventured.

Lata began to laugh. Her sari was a pale green. She laughed with pleasure and for the sheer relief of it.

Everyone else was amazed. What on earth had got into Haresh — and what on earth had got into Lata?

‘Salmon-pink!’ said Lata, happily. ‘I suppose just “pink” isn’t specific enough.’

‘Oh,’ said Haresh, suddenly looking uncomfortable. ‘It isn’t green, is it?’

Varun gave a scornful snort, and Lata kicked him under the table.

‘Are you colour-blind?’ she asked Haresh with a smile.

‘I’m afraid so,’ said Haresh. ‘But I can see nine out of ten colours accurately.’

‘I’ll wear pink the next time we meet,’ said Lata. ‘Then you can praise it without any uncertainty at all.’

Haresh saw the two cars off after lunch. He knew that he would be the topic of conversation for the next fifteen miles. He hoped that each car contained at least one of his supporters. He sensed once again that neither Arun nor Meenakshi wanted to have anything to do with him, but could not see what more he could have done to try to reconcile them to him.

About Lata he felt completely optimistic. He did not know of any rivals. Perhaps the lunch had been too filling, he thought; she had looked a bit sleepy. But it had gone off as well as expected. As for his colour-blindness, she would have had to find out about it sooner or later. He was glad that he had not asked them to come back to his flat for paan — Kalpana Gaur had warned him in a letter that the Mehras did not approve of paan. He had grown to like Lata so much that he wished he had had more time to speak with her. But he knew that it was not she but her family — and especially Ma — who was the target of today’s exercise. ‘Make 1951 the deciding year of your life,’ he had written earlier in the year in one of his Action Points to himself. There were only three days to the new year. He decided to extend his deadline by a week or two, to the time when Lata would return to her studies in Brahmpur.

Savita had got into the front seat of the Austin; Arun was driving, and she wanted a word with him. Meenakshi sat at the back. The others went back to Calcutta in the Humber.

‘Arun Bhai,’ said the gentle Savita, ‘what did you mean by behaving like that?’

‘I don’t see what you mean. Don’t be a damned fool.’

Savita was the one person in the family who was not daunted by Arun’s bullying tactics. There was to be no summary closure of debate.

‘Why did you go out of your way to be unpleasant to Haresh?’

‘Perhaps you should ask him that question.’

‘I don’t think he was particularly nasty to you.’

‘Well, he certainly said that Praha was a household word in India and that the same couldn’t be said for Bentsen Pryce.’

‘It’s a fact.’

‘He had no call to say it even if it is.’

Savita laughed. ‘He only said it, Arun Bhai, because you had gone on and on about the Czechs and their crude ways. It was self-defence.’

‘I see you are determined to take his side.’

‘That’s not how I see it. Why couldn’t you at least be civil? Don’t you have any regard for Ma’s feelings — or Lata’s?’

‘I most certainly do,’ said Arun pompously. ‘That is precisely why I think this thing should be nipped in the bud. He is simply the wrong sort of man. A shoemaker in the family!’

Arun smiled. When, on the recommendation of a former colleague of his father’s, he had been asked to appear for an interview at Bentsen Pryce, they had had the wisdom instantly to perceive that he was the right sort of man. You either were or you weren’t, reflected Arun.

‘I don’t see what’s wrong with making shoes,’ said Savita mildly. ‘We’re certainly happy to use them.’