Cyrus Mistry - Chronicle of a Corpse Bearer

We laughed. Just a week or so later, Seppy found out, and told me that she was pregnant. How beautiful she was with child, how sated with happiness. . There were worries, too, because we had been reminded over and over again of the dangers of marrying a close family relation. But thank heavens, Farida was born absolutely normal.

The flowering of meaning and intellect in my life happened only after I met Seppy and fell in love. We shared something very special which even now isn’t easy for me to define. I could oversimplify and call it a sense of humour. But it was something much tougher, yet more frail. A shared matrix of perception? — I suppose one could call it that — whose common nodes so intricately intersected that there was complete parity in our understanding of all things: the world, people and every eventuality we encountered in life.

This was no small thing, I should say, for it meant that no matter how rough a day either of us had had, a mere look in the eyes, the subtle sparkle of a smile, a fleeting caress in passing, any form of communication however insignificant could transform one’s mood in an instant, engendering a whole new perspective for the other partner as well. It worked that way with both of us.

Our daughter, Farida, was already a year old when, one afternoon, Temoo’s radio was turned on. This had become possible only because Buchia was away on leave for three days, making a personal pilgrimage to Udvada.

The news was all thunder and fury about maverick Germany’s invasion of Poland, and Prime Minister Chamberlain’s reluctant but angry declaration of war. There were disturbing though still unconfirmed reports coming out of Germany — Austria and Czechoslovakia as well — about the deportation of Jews to concentration camps.

I remember some of the excitement, comments and expostulations that were flying around Temoo’s crowded living room, before we made our exit.

‘What have we to do with their war, tell me? Let them perish if they want to!’

‘Just like that, without asking anyone, without checking with us first they declare that India is at war, too. .? And what prizes can we expect for fighting in their war?’

‘No prizes, brother. Just the glory of crushing the bogey of Fascism!’

‘Fascism-bashism is all very well but why put our lives on the line? Don’t we remember where all our sacrifices of the last war got us? The Jallianwalla massacre, the Rowlatt Act. Why is Gandhi being such a hypocrite?’

‘No prizes for guessing why Congress leaders are such arse-kissers. . So they can step into British shoes, once vacated. No matter if they be stinking with the sweat of those red monkeys, or soaked in Indian blood. Finally, power is the key. .they’ll do anything to take over, once our lords and masters decide it’s time to go home.’

‘Actually, that Hitler seems to me quite a decent, no-nonsense politician, really. We could use someone strong like that in our own country, don’t you think, instead of these crafty khaddar topeewalas!’

‘Oi, oi,’ interrupted Temoo, derisively, ‘we already have one Buchia here, don’t forget! Behnchoad, Hitler no baap!’

Farida will wake up any minute, Sepideh said to me, softly. It was time for us to leave. This time we weren’t planning a stroll, just getting back next door to our end of the tenement where our infant babe was sleeping, like an angel. It’s time for her feed, I can tell, she said; the ache in her milk-engorged breasts was growing more intense.

What I had said by way of reassurance to Seppy was quite true. To this day I am amazed how strong I was, how easily I took to the work. I am short, and built a little stockily, but I had endless reserves of energy.

I still remember my embarrassment on being teased by the other candidates at the naavar retreat which I flunked. It was the old priest, Muncherjee, in fact, who indulged in a sly witticism, while the other boys roared with laughter:

‘Perhaps koustee , not kustee, would have suited you better, Phiroze!’ he had punned, while reaching out to pinch my biceps.

Maybe freestyle wrestling, rather than ritual and prayer. God knows, he could have been right! Some of my strength and bulk has survived, though the muscles have frayed. When I look in the mirror I see that outwardly, give or take a little, I still look much the same as in my younger days. Except that rather rapidly I’ve lost almost my entire curly mop of hair. Now only a wispy aureole still attaches itself to my shiny pate, giving me an appropriately monkish appearance. If Seppy were still here, she would have had to think up another pet name for me: Egghead? Ostrich?

I miss my Sepideh very much. Sometimes I fear I won’t be able to carry on without her calming presence. Why did she have to die so suddenly, so improbably? Just when our happiness was reaching its zenith, and hers, too: just as she was beginning to realize the meaning of motherhood, the joy and anticipation of watching her only child grow up. .

But no matter how bereft I may feel, I have to carry on, if only for Farida’s sake. I had promised Seppy as she lay dying I would look after her daughter, make sure she went to a good school. . No, for my own sake, too. . There’s no choice in this, is there? At all times life demands from one courage, and perseverance. Humour, too, perhaps wit and discretion as well. . Without a grain of each of these, I’d certainly feel crushed by the monstrous encumbrance of an incoherent and meaningless existence.

Dreams, reality, nightmares — are these, in fact, distinct planes of consciousness? Or merely different modalities for perceiving the one grand canvas of an indivisible reality?

There have been moments in my life when I have felt genuinely confused by this question — whether a distinct line of division exists between subconscious and wakeful reality; or whether that bewilderment we experience in such moments of obfuscation is itself an illusion. .

The very last night I slept in my family quarters in the Soonamai Ichchaporia Agiari — for that is what my father’s small fire temple is called, in memory of its founding benefactress, an entrepreneur of the last century who, incidentally, provided employment to dozens of indigent women at a barn-like sweatshop on Sleater Road which produced bhakra, pickles, popatji, and other savouries — I was terribly exhausted; both physically and emotionally. The next morning, I was to leave for the Towers of Silence: that is, to make a more or less permanent separation from my family and the home I had grown up in — perhaps all too quickly. I still had two-and-a-half months to go before I turned nineteen.

Physically, of course, I was tired because I had spent much of my day finding, deciding about and putting together the things I would be taking along: my few clothes, my sudrahs, my topee, a couple of pairs of underwear and socks, various knick-knacks and lucky charms that held an emotional significance for me from childhood. A volume of Gujarati stories about a folk hero called Hameed Mia who had the power to become invisible at will, and his adventures with Parween Banu, his wife. I had heard these stories read out to me several times by Mother when I was a child, yet felt reassured by the idea of keeping the book with me. They were funny stories, and Mother used to read them to me when I wouldn’t sleep. My entire luggage fitted into my old school bag, and Vispy’s, both of which I had been told I could use to transport my things. We had no suitcases or trunks in the quarters which could be spared.

I spent the whole afternoon searching for a scrapbook I hadn’t come across in a long while. In it, I had pasted a rare newspaper clipping of the first All-India Cricket Team to tour England, which boasted of seven stalwart Parsi players, including Homi Kaka and Meherji Bulsara. The scrapbook had never got further than three or four pages of cricketing snippets — for want of a supply of printed matter — after which I had diversified to include swimmers, cyclists, bodybuilders and other stars from the sporting world. The eighty-page notebook was less than a third filled, but it was something I had done, something I didn’t want to just leave behind — even though Vispy had located and contributed about half a dozen of its portraits. No, it was my scrapbook.