Bharati Mukherjee - Miss New India

Peter looked at her over the top of his paper and wished her a subdued good morning, but he didn't put the paper down. It was a brief glance, but Anjali didn't miss its reflection of private despair. How could her failure to follow through pain him so deeply? If she had had Tookie's genius for flippant small talk, she could have eased the tension. She did her modest best. "Your friend, Usha Desai, is so different from the way I'd pictured her." There, she'd brought up the subject of CCI, her reason for running to Bangalore; get Peter's harangue over with. He would keep it short; he had a plane to catch. "I thought she would sound more American."

He folded the newspaper and pushed it toward her. "I don't think she's ever been out of India. Do you read Voice of the South ?"

"Only when I find a discarded copy," she said. She didn't add that she had done so only once, and that was at the bus depot.

"Except for Dynamo's column, it's a rag. But you should get it just to read Dynamo. Very up to the minute."

"I try not to waste money on buying anything I don't absolutely need." She lied.

"Well, splurge on Voice. Dynamo has his finger on the pulse." He asked Asoke to remove his plate of uneaten toast. When Asoke was out of the room, he said, "Last night he couldn't take his eyes off you. I had no idea he was a friend of Minnie. She doesn't leave the house, but she stays wired."

He? Who couldn't take his eyes off me? Asoke? And then it all fell in place, click-click-click: he was Dynamo, and Dynamo was Mr. GG, and Mr. GG was madly in love with her. Before she could say a word, Peter continued. "I always said you have a kind of magic, Angie. Somehow or other, you manage to be in the middle of things. Who can explain it?" But she didn't let on to Peter that it was she, not Minnie, who'd invited Mr. GG. Dynamo couldn't take his eyes off of you. She squirreled that away to savor later.

"Well, shame on Dynamo! I thought well-mannered people didn't stare. Good thing I didn't notice; I'd have told him to stick his eyes back in his head." She glowed with pleasure at having ravished smooth Mr. GG into callow worshipfulness.

"He had his driver leave off today's Voice so I wouldn't miss his column." Peter drained his cup of tea and poured himself another. "He's gung-ho on this outsourcing revolution. Maybe I'm just getting old and cranky." And then a shadow passed over his face, as though the sun itself had been eclipsed. Here it comes, she thought. Prepare yourself.

"Angie, have you been in touch with anyone in Gauripur?"

She wondered which way to go. Maybe with the truth. "No," she admitted. "I've been so busy here." She was about to ask if Mr. GG had been in the back seat of the car when the driver dropped off the paper. He must have been hoping for a glimpse of her. She bet he was the kind who planned "accidental" sightings. Maybe he had gotten a thrill just from being driven down her street. She felt sexy thinking of him.

"Angie, I can't put this off any longer…" Peter's voice sounded anxious and gravelly, but he stopped short because Asoke was back from the kitchen, this time balancing a platter of browning banana slices and golden papaya wedges on one palm and a tray of clean cups and water glasses on the other. Anjali eyed the papaya. Minnie had never served fresh fruit since Anjali had moved in. She had Peter to thank for better breakfast fare as well as romance and free career training.

Asoke removed the folded Voice from the table to make room for the fruit platter; then he took out small fruit plates and fruit knives from a credenza. There was pride in his movements. "Finger bowl coming," he assured them.

Peter thanked Asoke and plucked a wedge of papaya off the platter. "Don't tell Asoke I am used to licking my fingers clean," he stage-whispered to Anjali. "And make sure he doesn't throw out the paper before you've read it." He separated the papaya flesh from its green skin with his fork instead of dirtying the fruit knife, with its mother-of-pearl handle. "Whether you like it or not, you'll find out if Dynamo's faith in the Bangalore experiment is justified. You're the guinea pig."

"Guinea pig? Is your American friend calling us guinea pigs?" Husseina entered suddenly. She was wearing her black silk dressing gown over black silk pajamas as she usually did for breakfast, but this morning she had hidden her long, lustrous hair with a black scarf. Some pre-shampoo hot-oil treatment, Anjali assumed. Muslim women from rich families inherited effective beauty secrets. Husseina slid into the chair next to Peter. He acknowledged Husseina's presence with a nod instead of a good morning.

Anjali sensed tension and tried immediately to defuse it. Guinea pigs were not pigs, but maybe Peter had offended the Muslim Husseina by likening call-center agents to them. "Oh, Peter was just chitchatting. How do you Americans say it, Peter? Shooting the breeze, no?"

"No." Peter objected sharply. "I wasn't joking. Bangalore is a lab where a clutch of scientists run bold experiments. You're the specimen. You are not the scientist."

Anjali intervened. "Husseina, pour you a cup?"

"Nor are you the owner of the laboratory." Peter finished his statement.

"Is it ignorance? Or with you guys, is it genetic arrogance?" Husseina stabbed two curls of butter in the butter dish with Peter's unused fruit knife. It was a vicious gesture, and Anjali saw Asoke, who was still hovering solicitously behind Peter's chair, cringe. Some days Asoke served butter shaped as hearts, diamonds, cloves, and aces. Curls, pats, and balls of butter meant either Asoke had been in a hurry or that he was ill. "What makes you think I am not the scientist? What makes you so sure that I am the sacrificial specimen instead?" She smeared butter on a triangle of cold toast, added a dab of marmalade, and handed it to Anjali. Asoke's homemade marmalade was too bitter, but Anjali didn't dare refuse Husseina's demand for solidarity. A sisterhood of guinea pigs. She wished that this morning Husseina had asked Asoke to leave her breakfast outside her room, as she often did, instead of coming down and ending Anjali's attempts to extract from Peter additional flattering information about the lovesick Mr. GG.

Fortunately Peter backed off. "I am happy to be corrected." He glanced at his watch, which prompted Asoke to ask, "Taxi, sahib?" On the rare occasion that a Bagehot House boarder required a taxi, Asoke had a squatter flag one down from an intersection three blocks away. It meant a tip for the squatter, and probably a cut of that tip for Asoke.

"Auto-rickshaw. I'll tell you when." Peter rose from the table. "Asoke, two teas in my room. Do you mind, Angie?"

Asoke was aghast. "This papaya not tasty, sahib?"

"Sahib?" Elegant Husseina let out a scornful snort. "Did this pathetic old man really use that word?"

"Lost my appetite, that's all." Peter helped Anjali out of her chair.

Eager to hear more about Mr. GG, Anjali scrambled out of the dining room ahead of Peter.

"Do you WRITE regularly to your sister?"

It was the first thing Peter said after Asoke had served them tea and left them alone in the cavernous, underfurnished guest bedroom, pulling the heavy door closed behind him. Just banal chatter to put himself at ease, Anjali decided. They sat, Anjali in the only armchair and Peter on the bed, with a low, wide table between them. Peter had stripped the mattress of sheets as though cleaning up was his job and not Asoke's. No need to bristle at him for asking after Sonali-di and accidentally reviving the raw pain of her final night in Patna. She would guide Peter back to the subject of Mr. GG. She needed to make efficient use of the fifteen or twenty minutes Peter had reserved to say goodbye to her in private. "I used to," she said. "I visited her the day I left," she said, turning on her practiced smile. "We are back-ing and forth-ing quite a bit by letter."