The Moneylenders of Shahpur (3 page)

The Marwari Gate temple had been built by an emperor as a sacrifice for the sins of his teeth. John had visited it on a number of occasions, but this time he wanted to arrange to see some of its sacred manuscripts.

The next morning, with clean handkerchiefs held politely over their noses, he and Dr Mehta followed their amiable guide, a monk, through the courtyard and into the halls and sanctuary. He marvelled again at the lacelike carving of canopies, roofs and figures of Tirthankaras, all in white marble.

It was explained to him that some of the manuscripts he wished to see were kept in the Treasure House and no stranger could be admitted to that. He was allowed, however, to examine the outside of the Treasure House. It was covered with finely engraved silver. The engravings told the story of the fourteen dreams of Trisala, the mother of Mahavira who was the founder of Jainism. John asked if he might make sketches of these.

The monk was reluctant to agree to this, and called several others to consult them. John remembered again that a limp is considered punishment for past sins, and, from the conversation, he thought he would be turned down because of this.

They finally agreed, however, and John arranged to visit them again in a few days’ time.

Dean Mehta wished to remain at the temple with his religious teacher, so John wandered off by himself.

A few minutes’ walk brought him to the flower bazaar
and to the big, frowsy cinemas; the latter were tawdry with electric lights and hand-painted posters showing languid, suffering film heroines.

Near one of the cinemas, he stopped to buy some hot sweetmeats from a man clad only in a loincloth, who had a tiny stall tucked into the angle of a wall.

While he slowly ate his sticky sweets out of the palm leaf in which they had been wrapped, he watched an artist in the cinema entrance painting a poster to advertise the next film. Crowds of people pushed impatiently around him. A beggar woman, clutching a naked, swollen-bellied child, squatted at his feet and whined hopefully. He put a coin into the child’s hand and the woman blessed him, while the starving child stared unseeingly over its mother’s shoulder, giving no sign of life, except to clutch the coin firmly in its mouselike hand.

Although such sights were familiar to him from childhood, a sudden wave of pity swept over him as the woman crept away. With an irritable gesture, he threw away the dripping palm leaf, and made to move out into the crowd.

‘Bennett Sahib!’ exclaimed a cheerful, feminine and very English voice. ‘How could you?’

Startled, he looked round.

Diana Armstrong, Dr Ferozeshah’s head nurse, was standing half behind him. Down her rumpled khaki skirt was a spreading splash of sugar syrup, where the palm leaf had struck her. Her freckled face, brick-red with heat, was crinkled up with laughter. Her red hair was plastered down against her head by perspiration and her khaki shirt was equally soaked and clung to her slim figure.

John’s first thought was that he had never seen a more bedraggled-looking Englishwoman. Then he hastily collected his wits. She was, after all, his doctor’s head nurse.

‘Miss Armstrong!’ he exclaimed. ‘I am so sorry.’

He looked around him helplessly.

‘Can I get you a tonga in which to return home? Or perhaps the restaurant across the road would find us something to wipe it with.’

‘The restaurant, I think,’ replied Miss Armstrong. Her voice had suddenly lost its laughter and was rather quavery. ‘I think I’d be grateful for a cup of tea as well.’

John looked at her sharply. The flush was ebbing from her face and he saw the blue smudges of fatigue under the clear green eyes. Poor woman, he thought. Why on earth does she work as she does, for an Indian doctor who probably pays her in annas?

He put his free hand under one of her elbows and, marshalling his stick, he guided her firmly across the street to the restaurant and into the gloom of a family cubicle at the back of it. He took her little black nurse’s bag from her and sat down. He knew her quite well as Dr Ferozeshah’s efficient shadow, but had never wished to know anything more of her, except to wonder idly how she came to work for Ferozeshah; and he was now quite surprised at his own temerity. She was, however, English like himself and obviously not feeling too well. He would not admit to himself that he wanted to speak English to somebody English.

‘Tea,’ he told the white-shirted, barefoot waiter, who was goggling at the rare sight of an English couple in his humble café. ‘English tea with sugar and milk separate – boiling water for the tea. And a clean cloth to wipe the Memsahib’s dress.’ He pointed to the sugar stain.

‘Would you like something to eat?’ he asked. ‘They make nice kabobs here.’

She smiled, showing uneven, very white teeth. ‘No, thank you,’ she said. ‘Just tea.’ She leaned back and closed her eyes for a moment, looking, in her exhaustion, soft and vulnerable.

The waiter departed, not too sure how to make English tea, but hoping the cook would know. He brought a cloth to sponge the skirt, and Miss Armstrong removed the worst of the stickiness.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘I’m a wreck anyway.’

John was inclined to agree with her but had sufficient diplomacy to stop himself saying so. He just twiddled his cold pipe which he had taken out of his pocket, and wondered what to talk about.

Miss Armstrong leaned her head against the wall of the cubicle and hoped she would not faint. She had certainly walked too far and too fast that morning. This John Bennett, though he was something of an oddity, was very kind and she was overwhelmed with gratitude at his bringing her into the restaurant and his concern at her spoiled skirt. She wished suddenly that she was beautiful, charming and amusing so that she could really entertain him with witty conversation. The ceiling gave a sudden swoop and was obliterated by a cloud of darkness for a second.

‘I think you had better sip some water.’ His voice came from far away, though he was bending over her and holding a glass, clinking with ice, to her lips.

She sipped gratefully and the faintness receded. John’s lined, red face, topped by its unruly brush of dark hair, came into focus.

‘Thank you,’ she said with a wobbly smile, ‘I am all right now.’

‘Perhaps you’re working too hard,’ ventured John. ‘Surely Ferozeshah doesn’t expect you to work all the hours God sends?’

‘Oh, no. He’s very reasonable – though he works like a machine himself.’

She leaned forward and put her elbows on the stained,
battered table, and ran her fingers across her eyes. Her shirt was open at the neck. John found himself a little flustered by a glimpse of lace barely masking full, incredibly white breasts. It had been a long time, he thought depressedly.

Unconscious of the stir she had caused in her companion, Miss Armstrong relaxed in the welcome gloom of the restaurant. The dark, varnished wood partitions and the smoke-blackened ceiling gave it an air of shabby, homely comfort.

‘There’s so much to do here – for a nurse,’ she said, a note of compassion in her voice.

John sought uneasily for a further source of conversation. Finally, to bridge the growing gap of silence, he asked abruptly, ‘Were you visiting someone sick, just now?’

‘No – this is my spare time. I don’t have to be in the operating room until eleven, today. However, some of the big Jains here are trying to do a real survey of the city. They want to find out how many people live in each district, what water supplies they have, what parks or playgrounds for children. It’s an awfully difficult job. I’ve been counting refugees from Pakistan camped out on the pavements round here.’

John’s bushy eyebrows shot up in surprise.

‘That’s a departure – for Jains. They’ve always believed that suffering is brought upon oneself. I didn’t realize they cared how the other half lived. What’s the idea?’

‘To raise funds to provide some amenities in the worst slums.’

Miss Armstrong rubbed absent-mindedly at a water ring on the table. She looked up at John’s strong, calm face.

‘Humph,’ grunted John. ‘Times they are a-changing!’ His wide, thin mouth broke into a grin. ‘Jains are usually
more interested in protecting animals than humans – charity is simply giving to monks and beggars.’

‘I know,’ replied his companion. ‘That’s why I want to help them.’

She removed her elbows from the table, so that the waiter could put down the tea tray. When he had gone, she seized the teapot in a small, strong hand and poured out the tea.

John took the proffered cup and himself added sugar and milk, while Miss Armstrong sipped eagerly at the black brew in her own cup. She sighed. ‘That’s better. Mind if I smoke?’

‘Not at all. Do you mind if I smoke a pipe?’

Miss Armstrong dug a packet of Capstan out of her shirt pocket. After he had given her a light, she began to look a little less flushed and her skin took on its more normal appearance.

‘Cream velvet powdered with freckles,’ reflected John in some surprise. ‘She can’t be much over thirty.’

He told himself hastily to stop thinking like a naive youth, and he dragged his mind back to the prosaic subject of the proposed map. ‘I know Shahpur quite well,’ he told her. ‘I was actually born here, and I think I could draw a map of most of it. I’m sure that a proper one doesn’t exist, particularly since the influx of refugees – they’ve built all kinds of shanties – I’ve watched them go up.’ He laughed a little grimly. ‘I bet the postmen are the only ones who really know Shahpur.’

‘You’re right.’

‘It would save a lot of time, if you had a map – and, believe me, I could fill in a great deal of detail – mosques, temples, ruins, fountains – what few gardens there are …’

‘Would you
really
draw one?’ Miss Armstrong asked eagerly. Her face was alight, the mouth a trifle open to
show the tip of a tongue as narrow as a cat’s. ‘Could I tell Lallubhai – he’s the Chairman – about your offer?’

‘Certainly,’ replied John, and wondered what possessed him to undertake such a monumental piece of work. ‘Do you want a wall-sized map – or sections?’

She looked doubtful and then quickly glanced at her watch. ‘I’m not sure. Look, I’ve got to be in the operating room by eleven.’ She picked up her bag. ‘Could we meet somewhere to talk about it?’

John was immediately appalled at this complication. There was not a single European restaurant in the city. He could not very well ask her to his room. A vision of Ranjit’s horrified face floated before him – an English Memsahib in his room would probably ruin her reputation. He had no idea where she lived or with whom. What a fool he was to get involved.

He fumbled with his pipe, matches and stick, at the same time trying to open the swing door of the cubicle for her. She waited patiently while he sorted himself out and thought of an answer to her question.

‘Perhaps you should first talk to your Chairman, Mr Lallubhai,’ he temporized, as he finally managed to push the door open with his elbow. ‘If a student or artist would volunteer, I’d be glad of a little help. Any map I draw is not going to be technically perfect, but it’ll save your Committee a lot of work.’ He paused outside the cubicle, and then asked, ‘I wonder if Mr Lallubhai has thought of asking the City Engineer for a look at his maps. He’ll have some showing drains, waterpipes …’

Miss Armstrong’s little white teeth flashed in a quick smile. ‘I’m sure none of the Committee has thought of it. I’ll suggest it. I’ll write to you – your address is in Dr Ferozeshah’s file.’

As they moved through the crowded restaurant, customers paused in their conversation to watch them pass. At the
bottom of the narrow entrance steps, they were besieged by beggars. Miss Armstrong ignored them. She looked up at John, and said, ‘You’re a brick to offer to help – it’s a big job – are you sure you want to do it?’

She looked anxiously at him, and he could not say to her that he wished he had not volunteered, and said instead, ‘I shall enjoy it – it will be a change for me. Now, can I get you a tonga?’

She was dismissed and, in spite of his affirmative reply, felt unaccountably a little hurt.

‘No, thank you,’ she muttered, ‘I’ll walk. Goodbye – and thank you.’

She turned stiffly on her heavy, flat-heeled shoes, and in a moment was lost in the jostling crowd.

John waved at a passing tonga, and the driver drew into the pavement.

‘University Road,’ said John, ‘How much?’

‘Eight annas, Sahib,’ said the driver outrageously.

‘Four annas and not a pice more.’

‘Sahib,’ the voice was full of reproach.

‘Four annas.’

‘Six annas,’ said the driver, ‘and not a pice less,’ and he lifted his whip to start his horse, to indicate that he would rather go without a fare than reduce his price further.

‘All right,’ said John, and clambered in through the door at the back of the carriage. A little boy, who had been sitting by the driver, scrambled down, ran round the tonga and locked the door after John.

John smiled at the boy and gave him an anna. But behind the smile he felt cross. In two days two new people had entered his life, if one counted that Miss Armstrong had previously been only a pair of hands passing papers to Dr Ferozeshah. They both seemed to be people who would disrupt the peace of his life; Dr Tilak appeared likely to seek his advice quite often and Diana had momentarily disturbed his usual composure.