Ruth Prawer Jhabvala - Heat and Dust

On Sunday Inder Lal and I went to Baba Firdaus' grove for a picnic. It was my idea though when we were sitting, soaked with perspiration, in the bus and rattling through the broiling landscape, I wondered whether it had been such a good one. We got off and toiled up the rocky, completely barren and exposed path that led to the grove: but once there, it was like being received in Paradise. The sun could not reach here through the foliage of the trees; the sound of the little spring trickled cool and fresh. Inder Lal lay down at once under a tree, but I was so delighted with the place that r wandered around it. The contrast could hardly have been more complete with the last time I had been here — on the Husband's Wedding Day — when it was packed with pilgrims and loudspeakers. Now it was quite, quite still except for the water and the birds, and sometimes the leaves rustled. I bathed my hands and face in the spring which was so shallow that I could touch the stone-cold pebbles in its bed. I inspected the shrine and found it to be a very plain structure with an arched entrance and a small striped dome like a sugar-melon set on top. Inside it was rather thickly whitewashed — probably each time a Husband's Wedding Day came round a new coat of paint was hurriedly slapped on; the latticed window was covered with red threads tied by supplicants. There was no tomb — Baba Firdaus' whereabouts at the time of his death were unknown — but a little whitewashed mound of stone stood in the centre. On ~his were draped several strings of flowers, most of them dead but one or two quite fresh. The place was so completely deserted, so full of silence and solitude, that I wondered who could have left them there.

When Inder Lal woke up, I unpacked the sandwiches I had brought for us. He had never had sandwiches before and ate them with interest, always glad to be learning something new. What was also new to him was to have an outing with only one other person present instead of the usual crowd of family and friends. He said he appreciated the conversation that could be had when there were only two people together, each then being in a position to disclose the contents of his heart to the other. I waited for him to do so, but he only asked me some rather banal questions, such as about picnics in England. He listened eagerly to my answers and kept trying to draw out further details. "For my information only," he said. It is a phrase he often uses when asking me questions. He seems to relish collecting irrelevant bits of information and to store them away for further use. His mother does the same with things. I have seen her reverently pick up and smoothe out a wrapper of chocolate paper I have thrown away, corks, empty bottles, shreds of cloth. She hoards them away in her big trunk and when I ask what for she is surprised. To her, as to him, every scrap is useful or could become so in the future.

He said" Look what I have brought. "

He produced two pieces of red string; he said we had to tie them to the lattice in the shrine and then our wishes would be fulfilled. We took off our sandals and entered the shrine. He first tied his piece of string, to show me how to do it; he shut his eyes and wished fervently. I said "I thought it was only for barren women."

"All wishes are heard," he said. "Now you do it." He handed me my string and watched me with interest: "You can say your wish aloud," he encouraged me. "If you are alone or only one friend with you."

Instead of answering, I pointed at the fresh garlands laid on the stone mound: "Who do you think can have put them? It looks as if no one's been here for ages."

He said "Even if a place like this is in the middle of the desert, one thousand miles from anywhere, people will come." What did you wish?"

I smiled and went back to sit in our place under the tree; he followed-me. "Tell me," he coaxed, really consumed with curiosity.

"Well what do you think?" But whatever it was, he felt embarrassed to say. So now I was curious, wondering what he could be thinking.

He parried: "How can I say. I am not a magician or other person with powers to read another's thoughts. But if you tell me," he said cunningly, "I will tell you."

"Let's try and guess."

"You first." He enjoyed this game.

I pretended to concentrate very hard while he looked at me eagerly. "I think," I said finally, "it had something to do with your office."

At once his face fell- in astonishment, in consternation:

"How did you know?"

"Oh I just guessed."

But I wished I hadn't. He became depressed and no longer enjoyed the game. When I said "Now it's your turn," he gloomily shook his head. Sunk in his own troubles, he was no longer interested in my wishes.

But now I wanted him to be. I really had the desire — as he had said — to disclose the contents of my heart to another. However, it is difficult enough to do that to a person conversant with one's life and problems: what then to say to him to whom these are utterly unknown and alien! If I had had a definite wish — such as for a husband, a baby, or the removal of an enemy — I would have been glad to tell him. But in fact, while I had tied my thread with all the others, there had been nothing really definite I knew to wish for. Not that my life is so fulfilled that there is nothing left to ask; but, on the contrary, that it is too lacking in essentials for me to fill up the gaps with anyone request.

However, at that moment I did have a desire, and a strong one: to get close to him. And since this seemed impossible to do with words, I laid my hand on his. Then he looked at me in an entirely different way. There was no lack of interest now! But it was difficult to tell what there was. I could feel his hand tremble under mine: and then I saw that his lips trembled too. Perhaps because he was about to speak; perhaps with desire, or with fear. There was certainly fear in his eyes as they looked at me. He did not know what to do next, nor what I was going to do next. I could see — it was ludicrous! how everything he had heard about Western women rushed about in his head. And yet at the same time he was a healthy young man — his wife was away — we were alone in a romantic spot (getting more romantic every moment as the sun began to set). Although the next few moves were up to me, once I had made them he was not slow to respond. Afterwards he made the same joke the Nawab had made; about what had happened hereon the original Husband's Wedding Day to make the barren wife pregnant.

1923

One day Harry arrived with the car sent for Olivia. She was ready to leave at once but he said to wait awhile, he wanted to rest before going back. He sat on and on. He seemed ready to spend the day. She said, several times, "If we don't leave soon, it'll get too hot."

"Play something, "he said, indicating the piano. "Go on, I haven't heard you in ages."

"And then we'll go," she bargained.

She sat down at the piano and began to play with her customary dash. She played Debussy, and Harry put back his head against the yellow armchair and shut his eyes and one foot tapped with pleasure. But after a while she played too fast and stumbled, and once or twice a key got stuck and she banged at it impatiently. She broke off: "I'm out of practice. Come on now, Harry, we must go."

"Why are you out of practice?"

"It's too hot to play. And have you heard the piano, what a state it's in?" She banged at a defective note again. "This is simply no climate for a piano and that's all there is to it. Get up, Harry, do."

"You could get a tuner. From Bombay.”

"It's not worth it. I hardly play now."

"What a pity."

He said this with such feeling that she became thoughtful.

Why hadn't she been playing? She hadn't asked herself that before, had vaguely thought it was too hot or she just didn't feel like it. But there was something more, and she tried to think what that could be.