In Custody

168 Pages·2016·0.63 MB·English

by  Desai Anita

Anita Desai
In Custody

First published in 1984

To Alicia Yerburgh
With affection and gratitude

They should take, who have the power
And they should keep who can.

Rob Roy’s Grave, William Wordsworth
Chapter 1

His first feeling on turning around at the tap on his shoulder while he was buying
cigarettes at the college canteen and seeing his old friend Murad was one of joy
so that he gasped ‘Murad? You?’ and the cigarettes fell from his hand in
amazement, but this rapidly turned to anxiety when Murad gave a laugh,
showing the betel-stained teeth beneath the small bristling moustache he still
wore on his upper lip. ‘But I have a class just now, Murad,’ he stammered as
Murad squeezed his shoulders tighdy as if he did not intend to let go.
‘Stop worrying about your class,’ Murad said, drawing him close to him and
laughing into his ear. I ve come all the way from Delhi to see you - can’t you
give me half an hour of your time?
‘But it’s Monday - not on Monday, Murad.’
‘Oh, so friendship is only for Sunday, is it? Is that friendship?’ Murad
boomed.
They walked away from the canteen, across the dusty field that separated the
corrugated iron shack of the canteen from the brick building of the college where
Deven taught. Deven was aware that many of his students had observed this
encounter with his old friend and were staring openly, some even smirking at the
sight. He tried to wriggle out ofMurad’s grasp unobtrusively so as not to offend
him.
‘Just one more class, Murad,’ he pleaded, ‘then I’m free to go home.’
‘Home? Who wants to go home?’ shouted Murad.
‘Were going out to lunch. We’re going to lunch in the best restaurant in your
great city. If I come all the way from Delhi to see you, then you can at least give
me a good lunch,’ he added in a petulant voice.
‘Of course, of course,’ Deven assured Kim, feeling guilty at his lapse in
hospitality. Here, have a cigarette, I bought two. He fumbled in his shirt pocket
for them and handed one to his friend.
‘Still a two-cigarette man, are you?’ Murad laughed, holding one between his
fingers and waiting for Deven to strike a match. As there was a March wind
tearing across the open field and whirling dust and dry leaves around violently,
this was a lengthy, fumbled business. When it was done at last and they strolled
on, Murad said insolently, ‘A full-fledged lecturer in a college, an important
citizen of Mirpore, and still can’t afford a whole packet of cigarettes? You seem
to be where you were in your college days. What’s the matter?’
‘No, no,’ Deven hastened to explain. ‘My wife has told me not to buy a packet
at a time. She says if I have to go out to buy just one at a time, I will smoke less.’
He tried to laugh, as at a pleasant joke. Women are always trying to make you
smoke less, drink less. You know.’
‘Oh, so you do still drink, do you? I’m glad to hear that,’ Murad gave a yelp
and another clap on Deven’s shoulder. ‘Will I get a drink with my lunch?’
Deven was shocked. He looked furtively to the left and the right. They were
walking Up the stairs to the main hall. Anyone could have heard, even someone
on the staff, or the Principal himself. His eyebrows crept together in a furry
scowl. ‘Please, Murad, leave me now,” he muttered anxiously, hunching his
shoulders and clutching his books to his chest. ‘I must go to my class.’
Even a visit from an old friend you have not seen for years will not make you
give up your damned class?’
Murad shouted, pretending to be outraged. ‘Perhaps I should not have come.
Why did I bother to catch a bus and travel all the way in this heat to see an old
friend who doesn’t even care?
Deven felt uneasy, certain that Murad had reasons for this that he had not yet
divulged. Determined not to go another step with Murad at his side, he stood at
the top of the stairs and begged, ‘Please, Murad, wait in the canteen for me.
Have a cup of tea there. I’ll join you after my class.’ Then he swung away with
such desperation that he dashed right into a group of girl students also coming up
the stairs and caused much offence, affront, tittering and giggling which Murad
stood and watched with a grin.
Recoiling from them, Deven made his way down the passage to his classroom
and arrived at the desk beside the blackboard as if at a refuge, panting with
exertion and relief. Here he could turn his back to the class and pretend to write
something on the blackboard while he composed himself and tried to construct
an authoritative teacher-self out of his jolted nerves and distracted ways. Why
should a visit from Murad upset him so much? There was no obvious reason of
course—they had known each other since they were at school together: Murad
had been the spoilt rich boy with money in his pocket for cinema shows and
cigarettes and Deven the poor widow’s son who could be bribed and bought to
do anything for him, and although this had been the basis of their friendship, it
had grown and altered and stood the test of time. But Deven did not like him
appearing without warning during college hours and disturbing him just when he
needed to concentrate; it was very upsetting. Now, instead of going home to
lunch, he would have to displease his wife by keeping her waiting, and not
turning up, and instead spend far too much money on a restaurant meal for
Murad. He pressed his hand to his shirt pocket where he kept his money ever
since a pickpocket on the bus had stolen his wallet. There was not much to feel
in the pocket except for one crumbling cigarette: it was the end of the month
after all and he had had to give Sarla more household money just that morning.
How would he manage? He could not bear to think of Murad flashing those
brighdy coloured teeth in another derisive grin and saying, ‘Oh, still a two-
cigarette man?’
Why should Murad not pay for the lunch after all? Not only was he the son of
a wealthy Kashmiri carpet dealer in Delhi - although he claimed to have been
disowned by him he still lived in his house—but he was also the editor of the
magazine he had persuaded his father to buy for him, and of which he liked to
say he had made a great success. It was true that he had never paid Deven for the
book reviews he had printed in an issue six months ago or for the poem he had
accepted and was to publish in the next one. Perhaps he had forgotten. Perhaps
he had come to Mirpore to pay him.
Suddenly and savagely Deven wiped out whatever he had written on the
blackboard along with this foolishly sanguine idea, and turned to face the class
that had been gathering behind his back with much scraping of chairs and
shouting across desks. It was not wise to allow himself such indulgence in
fantasies of sudden wealth, unexpected cheques, acceptance in the literary circles
of the metropolis, so enticingly close. Childish, he snapped at himself with a
small jarring sound of his teeth that some of the students closer to him seemed to
hear for they looked up at him inquiringly. He was too old now, he went on
scolding himself obsessively, and had had too bitter an experience of life to set
any value upon such puerile fantasies.
‘Withered as the last leaf upon the tree, Shaken by the chill blast of winter,’ he
murmured to himself for he was much given to reciting poetry aloud, a habit he
had been told his schoolteacher father had also had and which he therefore felt
entitled to inherit.^, The students in the first row or two were staring openly at
him now. He became aware of their curious waiting faces at last and squared his
shoulders to meet their looks. The expression he saw—of boredom, amusement,
insolence and defiance—made him look away quickly and focus his eyes upon
the door at the far end of the room, the door that opened on to the passage,
freedom, and release. He had for years been practising this trick of ignoring his
class arid speaking to himself, or someone outside, invisible. That was what
made him a boring teacher who could not command the attention, let alone win
the regard, of his unruly class.
‘Last time I asked you to read as much as you could find of Sumitra Nandan
Pant’s poetry,’ he began, pitching his voice too high in order to make it carry to
that invisible student outside the door, the ideal one. Now it cracked. I hope you
have done it, he squeaked, and the class /mwr>lw”3*ljn laughter. (dissolved^
‘Don’t laugh,’ he said, putting down the tumbler of cold buttermilk. ‘This is not
the capital, after all, it is only a village.*
So this is village fare we are getting, is it? grimaced Murad. I must take care
not to visit your village again.’
‘Oh, it is not so bad,’ Deven protested. ‘Try this radish,’ he coaxed. ‘We have
good fresh vegetables here at least.’
‘Raw radish—the food of cows, and pigs,’ groaned Murad, but took it all the
same and appeared to eat it with relish, making loud crunching sounds.
Fortunately the small restaurant in the bazaar was packed with lunch-hour
crowds and what with all the talk, the roars of laughter, the loud sounds of eating
and the clatter of tin dishes and ladles and spoons, Deven was not afraid of his
friend’s derogatory remarks about the cuisine being overheard. It was true that
this was not a very good place to eat; being next to the bus depot it catered
chiefly to bus drivers and passengers in a hurry which made the service hurried
and slapdash. It must seem very mean in comparison with the restaurants of
Delhi but he could not possibly afford a meal in Kwality or Gaylord, the two
best restaurants, both air-conditioned and exorbitant, on the main road where the
bigger shops and offices were, and perhaps it was not a bad idea to show Murad
that he was not at all well off and could afford only this simple meal of potato
curry and fried puris in a jgimy_bazaar eating-house. He gazed into the mirror
that hung behind Murad’s head and watched the customers move in and out of
the roses and vines engraved along its edges while Murad finished the plate of
raw radishes.
To his surprise, Murad seemed to be aware of the message he was trying to
convey to him silently. Helping himself to the potato curry and bread, he
grumbled, It is too bad how badly our lecturers are paid. How can the
intellectuals of this country do anysj^orthwhile work if no one shows them any
respect or compensates them for all the suffering they have to undergo for the
sake of art?’
Deven nodded and nodded with great vehemence, quite overcome by his
friend’s unexpected sensitivity to his situation and by his compassion. It was
rarely that one heard such sentiments from any but similarly hard-up colleagues.
Helping himself to the last spoonful of curry in the bowl—the helpings were
very small, he noted regretfully - he sighed and said, ‘Yes my friend, now you
have seen how hard it is to survive in this position. If I knew a way to change my
situation, I would do it but -what is there to do?’ Then an idea struck him as
sharply as a slap on the head. The boldness ofit quite embarrassed him but it was
the end of the month after all, and the bill for this meal would clear out his
pocket and leave him with nothing for tea or cigarettes for the rest of the week.
The desperation of his circumstances made him say something he never would
have otherwise. All through his childhood and youth he had known only one
way to deal with life and that was to lie low and remain invisible. Now he leaned
forward on his elbows and said emotionally, ‘If only we got payment for the
articles and reviews that we write for magazines and journals, that would be of
some help.’
But now Murad was no longer being sensitive or compassionate. He was
feeling inside his mouth with a finger for something that had made his face
darken and frown with anger.’
‘Extracting it, he placed it on the edge of his plate and glared. Had he heard
Deven at all? Raising his head, he glowered at Deven as if it was he who had
placed the stone in the bread for him to bite. ‘Nearly lost a gold cap,’ he said
furiously. ‘Everybody thinks it an easy thing to bring out a magazine,’ he went
on. ‘Nobody knows of the cost involved. Every month there is a crisis - the
printing press refusing to print unless past bills are cleared, the distributor
refusing to pay for last month’s supplies of copies, the telephone bill, the
postage… Such expenses. What can you know about it? he challenged Deven
aggressively. Worries, worries, worries. And where are the readers? Where are
the subscriptions? Who reads Urdu any more?
‘Murad, your magazine must be kept alive for the sake of those who do still
read it,’ Deven said fervently.
‘That is what I am doing,’ Murad glared at him. ‘Now I am planning a special
issue on Urdu poetry. Someone has to keep alive the glorious tradition of Urdu
literature. If we do not do it, at whatever cost, how will it survive in this era of -
that vegetarian monster, Hindi?’ He pronounced the last word with such disgust
that it made Deven shrink back and shrivel in his chair, for Hindi was what he
taught at the college and for which he was therefore responsible to some degree.
‘That language of peasants, Murad sneered, picking his teeth with a matchstick.
‘The language that is raised on radishes and potatoes, he laughed rudely, pushing
aside the empty plates on the table. ‘Yet, like these vegetables, it flourishes,
while Urdu - language of the court in days of royalty -now languishes in the
back lanes and gutters of the city. No palace for it to live in the style to which it
is accustomed, no emperors and nawabs to act as its patrons. Only poor I, in my
dingy office, trying to bring out a magazine where it may be kept alive. That is
what I am doing, see? He threw another proud and angry look at Deven and spat
out a small piece of chewed matchstick in his direction.
‘I know, I know, Murad,’ Deven sighed. ‘How happy I would be to join you
on the staff, work for you, for the journal. But I can’t give up my job here. I had
to take it when it was offered. I was married, Sarla was expecting, you know…
‘How could I know,’ Murad said. ‘Am I supposed to be responsible for that?’
He laughed crudely.
Deven pretended not to hear. He went on trying to win Murad’s sympathy. ‘I
could not have supported even myself by writing in Urdu, let alone Sarla and a
child. I can write Urdu now only as my hobby.*
‘Only your hobby,’ mocked Murad. ‘Can you serve a language by taking it up
“only as your hobby”? Doesn’t it deserve more? Doesn’t it deserve a lifetime’s
dedication - like mine?’ he ^demanded.
Deven lifted both hands in the air with a helpless gesture of accepting all
Murad had to say, accepting and admitting defeat.
Then Murad unexpectedly barked at him, ‘So, what about sending me
something for my special number on Urdu poetry, hunh?’
Deven’s hands fluttered on to his knees as he melted at the suggestion and felt
a glow creep through him at the thought of writing something in the language
which had been his first language when he was a child in the half-forgotten,
unsubstantial city of childhood, and which was still his first love. The glow was
also caused by pride, of course, at being asked to contribute a piece by the editor
of what he took to be a leading Urdu journal. That was what Murad had assured
him it was and he was happy to believe it. ‘Will you print my poems if I send
them to you—the remaining ones in the sequence?’
No. Who wants to read your poems? Murad said at once, abruptly. ‘I have
enough poems for the issue already. As soon as I sent out the circular
announcing it, contributions started pouring in. Poems, poems, poems.
Everybody writes them, I tell you, he complained, plucking at his hair in mock
distress. ‘I had to stop them. I had to pick and choose. Only the best, I said.
Firaq, Faiz, Ran, Nur…’
‘Nur? He has sent you some poems?’
Murad looked evasive and shrugged. Poor man, he is very old and ill. I have
said I will only publish new work, not excerpts from old collections, and he has
written nothing new. He is finished.’
‘But no special issue on Urdu poetry would be com-pete if it did not have
some verse by Nur, exclaimed Deven, scandalized. ‘Old, new, it doesn’t matter
—you must have Nur.
*Of course I must have Nur, responded Murad, looking suddenly smug. Nur
will be the star of the issue. The light that blazes in the centre and sends its rays
to all corners of the world where his verse is known - in Iran, Iraq, Malaysia,
Russia, Sweden - do you know, we have sent his name to the Nobel Prize
Committee for its award for literature once again?
Deven nodded. They did this every year, he knew. He himself was convinced
that one day the response would come from Stockholm, and shake the literary
world of India to its foundations. He felt it beginning to shake already, under his
feet. The two o’clock bus from Morad-abad roared by. When it had passed and
he could make himself heard, he asked, So you will print some of the old poems
after all? The great Rose poems, or the Winter ones? You know—and he made
ready to declaim his favourite lines, the ones that contained all the enchantment
and romance he had ever experienced in his life.
But Murad cut him short by leaning forward on his elbows and speaking
almost into his ear. No, I won’t, Deven. I don’t print stale old stuff in my journal.
Even if I have to wait two, three, four months before I get all the material I want,
I get it - then I print. I want a full feature on Nur—Nur in his old age, the dying
Nur before he is gone, like a comet into the dark. I want you to do that feature.’
‘I? breathed Deven, so overcome that he quite forgot for the time the noisy
surroundings, the empty plates, even the foul breath from Murad’s mouth so
close to his face. It was the comet he was seeing, swift and pale in the dark like a
bird of the night.
You go and see Nur, Murad continued. You know his work well—oh, as well
as anyone, I suppose. You wrote a book about him once, didn’t you?’
A monograph, yes. Will you publish it? Deven asked breathlessly, thinking
that when a comet appeared all kinds of strange happenings might occur. For a
moment he became confused and thought it was not Nur who was the comet but
Murad who had come from Delhi to visit him, to show him a light: he was
willing to believe anything.
But Murad snapped crossly, No, I won’t. Of course not. I don’t want to
become bankrupt. I want to bring out my journal. That is what I’m talking about,
idiot. Try and listen. Be serious. I want you to track him down in his house in
Chandni Chowk—’
‘Oh, they say he does not like visitors,’ Deven said quickly. The comet was
something to be feared, he just remembered, it was a bad omen, not lucky. He
could not have said why but he was frightened.
‘Look, will you do this feature for me or not?’
‘Ofcourse I will, Murad.’ He became meek. He hung his head, looking at his
fingers clutching the edge of the table. On each fingernail a pale cuticle loomed
bleakly.
‘Then do as I say. Find him. Go to him and interview him. Discuss the Urdu
scene with him. Ask him for his new work. He must have some, dammit, and I
want it. I need it for the special issue, see?