Vikram Seth - A Suitable Boy

India was 257 for 6 at close of play. Disgrace at least had been miraculously averted.

Haresh was therefore in a good mood when he arrived at Sunny Park in time for tea. He was introduced to Aparna, whom he tried to humour and who treated him distantly as a result, and to Uma, who gave him an undiscriminating smile which delighted him.

‘Are you being polite, Haresh?’ asked Savita warmly. ‘You’re not eating anything at all. Politeness doesn’t pay in this family. Pass the pastries, Arun.’

‘I must apologize,’ said Arun to Haresh. ‘I should have mentioned it this morning but it slipped my mind entirely. Meenakshi and I will be out for dinner tonight.’

‘Oh,’ said Haresh, puzzled. He glanced at Mrs Rupa Mehra. She was looking flushed and upset.

‘Yes. Well, we were invited three weeks ago, and couldn’t cancel it at the last moment. But Ma and the rest will be here, of course. And Varun will do the honours. Both Meenakshi and I were looking forward to it, needless to say, but when we got home from Prahapore that day, we looked at our diary and — well, there it is.’

‘We feel awful,’ said Meenakshi gaily. ‘Do have a cheese straw.’

‘Thank you,’ said Haresh, a little dampened. But after a few minutes he bounced back. Lata at least looked pleased to see him. She was indeed wearing a pink sari. Either that or she was very cruel! Today he’d certainly get a chance to talk to her. And Savita, he felt, was kind and warm and encouraging. Perhaps it was no bad thing that Arun wouldn’t be there for dinner, though it would be odd to sit down at his table — and that too for the first time — in his host’s absence. Haresh could feel muted pulses of antagonism emanating from his direction, and to some extent from the darkly radiant Meenakshi too, and he would not have felt entirely relaxed in their company. But it was certainly an odd response to the hospitality he had offered them.

Varun was looking unusually cheerful. He had won eight rupees at the races.

‘Well, we didn’t do so badly after all,’ said Haresh to him.

‘I’m sorry?’

‘After this morning, I mean.’

‘Oh, yes, cricket. What was the closing score?’ asked Varun, who had got up.

‘257 for 6,’ said Pran, astonished that Varun hadn’t been following it.

‘Hmm,’ said Varun, and went over to the gramophone.

‘Don’t!’ thundered Arun.

‘Don’t what, Arun Bhai?’

‘Don’t put on that damn machine. Unless you want me to box your two intoxicated ears.’

Varun recoiled with murderous timidity. Haresh looked startled at the exchange between the brothers. Varun had hardly said a thing that day in Prahapore.

‘Aparna likes it,’ he said in a resentful tone, not daring to look at Arun. ‘And so does Uma.’ Unlikely though this was, it was true. Savita, whenever she found that legal Latin did not put Uma to sleep, would sing this song to her while rocking her to and fro.

‘I do not care who likes what,’ said Arun, his face reddening. ‘You will turn it off. And at once.’

‘I haven’t turned it on in the first place,’ said Varun in creeping triumph.

Lata hurriedly asked Haresh the first question that came into her head: ‘Have you seen Deedar ?’

‘Oh, yes,’ said Haresh. ‘Thrice. Once by myself, once with friends in Delhi, and once with Simran’s sister in Lucknow.’

There was silence for a few seconds.

‘You must have enjoyed the film,’ said Lata.

‘Yes,’ said Haresh. ‘I like films. When I was in Middlehampton I sometimes saw two films a day. I didn’t see any plays though,’ he added rather gratuitously.

‘No — I wouldn’t have thought so,’ said Arun. ‘I mean — there’s so little opportunity, as you once said. Well, if you’ll excuse us, we’ll get ready.’

‘Yes, yes,’ said Mrs Rupa Mehra. ‘You get ready. And we have a few things to do. Savita has to put the baby to bed and I have a few New Year’s letters to write, and Pran — Pran—’

‘—has a book to read?’ suggested Pran.

‘Yes,’ agreed Mrs Rupa Mehra. ‘And Haresh and Lata can go into the garden.’ She told Hanif to put on the garden light.

It was not yet quite dark. The two walked around the small garden a couple of times, not knowing quite what to say. Most of the flowers had closed, but white stocks still perfumed one corner near the bench.

‘Shall we sit down?’ asked Haresh.

‘Yes. Why not?’

‘Well, it’s been such a long time since we met,’ said Haresh.

‘Don’t you count the Prahapore Club?’ said Lata.

‘Oh, that was for your family. You and I were hardly present.’

‘We were all very impressed,’ said Lata with a smile. Certainly, Haresh had been very much present, even if she hadn’t.

‘I hoped you would be,’ said Haresh. ‘But I’m not sure what your elder brother thinks of all this. Is he avoiding me? This morning he spent half the time looking around for a friend of his, and now he’s going out.’

‘Oh, he’s just being Arun. I’m sorry about the scene just now; that too is typical of him. But he’s quite affectionate sometimes. It’s just that one never knows when. You’ll get used to it.’

The last sentence had slipped out of its own accord. Lata was both puzzled at and displeased with herself. She did like Haresh, but she didn’t want to give him any false hopes. Quickly she added: ‘Like all his — his colleagues.’ But this made things worse; it sounded cruelly distancing and a bit illogical.

‘I hope I’m not going to become his colleague!’ said Haresh, smiling. He wanted to hold Lata’s hand, but sensed that — despite the scent of stocks and Mrs Rupa Mehra’s tacit approval of their tête-à-tête — this was not the moment. Haresh was a little bewildered. Had he been with Simran, he would have known what to talk about; in any case they would have been talking in a mixture of Hindi, Punjabi and English. But talking to Lata was different. He did not know what to say. It was much easier to write letters. After a while he said:

‘I’ve been reading one or two Hardys again.’ It was better than talking about his Goodyear Welted line or how much the Czechs drank on New Year’s Eve.

Lata said: ‘Don’t you find him a bit pessimistic?’ She too was attempting to make conversation. Perhaps they should have kept on writing to each other.

‘Well, I am an optimistic person — some people say too optimistic — so it’s a good thing for me to read something that is not so optimistic.’

‘That’s an interesting thought,’ said Lata.

Haresh was puzzled. Here they were, sitting on a garden bench in the cool of the evening with the blessing of her mother and his foster-father, and they could hardly piece together a conversation. The Mehras were a complicated family and nothing was what it seemed.

‘Well, do I have grounds to be optimistic?’ he asked with a smile. He had promised himself to get a clear answer quickly. Lata had said that writing was a good way to get to know each other, and he felt that their correspondence had revealed a great deal. He had perhaps detected a slight cooling off in her last two letters from Brahmpur, but she had promised to spend as much time as she could with him over the vacation. He could understand, however, that she might be nervous about an actual meeting, especially under the critical eye of her elder brother.

Lata said nothing for a while. Then, thinking in a flash over all the time she had spent with Haresh — which seemed to be no more than a succession of meals and train and factories — she said: ‘Haresh, I think we should meet and talk a little more before I make up my mind finally. It’s the most important decision of my life. I need to be completely sure.’