A Fine Balance (6 page)

Dina noticed in the lobby a young man who, like her, was engaged in observing from the edges the merry mingling of their fellow con-certgoers. Since she usually arrived early, anxious to get away from home, she was there to see him sail up to the entrance on his bicycle, dismount cleanly, and wheel it in through the gates. The gateman allowed him this liberty in exchange for a tip. At the side of the building, he padlocked the bicycle, making sure to remove the briefcase from the rear carrier. He snapped the clips off his trousers and slipped them into the briefcase. Then he retired to his favourite corner of the lobby to study the programme and the public.

Sometimes their eyes met, and there was a recognition of their tacit conspiracy. The funny man in the brown suit left Dina alone but included him in his round of greetings. “Hello, Rustom! How are you?” he bellowed, and thus Dina learned the young man’s name.

“Very well, thank you,” said Rustom, looking over the shoulder of the brown suit at Dina watching amusedly.

“Tell me, what do you think of the pianist today? Is he capable of the depth required in the slow movement? Do you think that the largo – oh, excuse me, excuse me, I’ll be back in a moment, soon as I say hello to Mr. Medhora over there,” and he was off. Rustom smiled at Dina and shook his head in mock despair.

The bell rang and the auditorium doors opened. The two tall sisters hastened to the first row with synchronized hopping steps, unfolded the maroon-upholstered seats, and flopped down triumphantly, beaming at each other for once again winning their secret game of musical chairs. Dina took her usual centre aisle seat, roughly midway down the hall.

As the place began to fill, Rustom came up beside her. “Is this one free?”

She nodded.

He sat down. “That Mr. Toddywalla is a real character, isn’t he?”

“Oh, is that his name? Yes, he is very funny.”

“Even if the recital is so-so, you can always rely on him for entertainment.”

The lights dimmed, and the two performers appeared on stage to scattered applause. “By the way, I’m Rustom Dalai,” he said, leaning closer and holding out his hand while the flute received the piano’s silver A and offered its own golden one in return.

She whispered “Dina Shroff” without taking his hand, for in the dark she did not immediately notice it being held out. When she did, it was too late; he had begun to withdraw it.

During the interval Rustom asked if she would like coffee or a cold drink.

“No, thank you.”

They watched the audience in the aisles, bound for the bathrooms and refreshments. He crossed his legs and said, “You know, I see you regularly at these concerts.”

“Yes, I enjoy them very much.”

“Do you play yourself? The piano, or —?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Oh. You have such lovely fingers, I was sure you played the piano.”

“No, I don’t,” she repeated. Her cheeks felt a little hot, and she looked down at her fingers. “I don’t know anything about music, I just enjoy listening to it.”

“That’s the best way, I think.”

She wasn’t sure what he meant, but nodded. “And what about you? Do you?”

“Like all good Parsi parents, mine made me take violin lessons when I was little,” he laughed.

“You don’t play it anymore?”

“Oh, once in a while. When I feel like torturing myself, I take it out of its case to make it screech and wail.”

She smiled. “At least it must make your parents happy, to hear you play.”

“No, they are dead. I live alone.”

Her smile collapsed as she prepared to say she was sorry, but he quickly added, “Only the neighbours suffer when I play,” and they laughed again.

They always sat together after that, and the following week she accepted a Mangola during the interval. While they were in the lobby, sipping from the chilled bottles, watching moisture beads embellish the glass, Mr. Toddywalla came up to them.

“So, Rustom, what did you think of the first half? In my opinion, a borderline performance. That flautist should do some breathing exercises before he ever thinks of a recital again.” He lingered long enough to be introduced to Dina, which was why he had come in the first place. Then he was off, gambolling towards his next victims.

After the concert Rustom walked her to the bus stop, wheeling his bicycle. The departing audience had their eyes on them. To break the silence she asked, “Are you ever nervous about cycling in this traffic?”

He shook his head. “I’ve been doing it for years. It’s second nature to me.” He waited for her bus to arrive, then rode behind the red double-decker till their ways parted. He could not see her watching him from the upper deck. She followed his diminishing figure, her eyes sometimes losing him, then finding him under a streetlamp, travelling with him till he became a speck that only her imagination could claim was Rustom.

In a few weeks the concert regulars came to regard them as a couple. Their every move was viewed with concern and curiosity. Rustom and Dina were amused by the attention but preferred to dismiss it in the same category as Mr. Toddywalla’s antics.

Once, on arriving, Rustom looked around to find Dina in the crowd. One of the first-row sisters immediately came up to his elbow and whispered coyly, “She is here, do not fear. She has just gone to the ladies’ room.”

It had been raining heavily, and Dina, soaked, was trying to tidy herself up in the ladies’ but her tiny hanky was not equal to the task. The towel on the rod looked uninviting. She did the best she could, then went out, her hair still dripping.

“What happened?” asked Rustom.

“My umbrella was blown inside out. I couldn’t get it straight quickly enough.”

He offered her his large handkerchief. The significance of this proposal was not lost on the observers around them: would she or wouldn’t she?

“No, thanks,” she said, running her fingers through the wet hair. “It will soon be dry.” The concertgoers held their breath.

“My hanky is clean, don’t worry,” he smiled. “Look, go in and dry yourself, I’ll buy two hot coffees for us.” When she still hesitated, he threatened to take off his shirt and towel her head with it in the lobby. Laughing, she accepted the handkerchief and returned to the ladies’ room. The regulars sighed happily.

Inside, Dina rubbed her hair with the handkerchief. It had a nice smell to it, she thought. Not perfume, but a clean human smell. His smell. The same one she perceived sometimes while sitting next to him. She put it against her nose and breathed deeply, then folded it away, embarrassed.

It was still raining lightly when the concert ended. They walked to the bus stop. The drizzle hissed in the trees, as though the leaves were sizzling. Dina shivered.

“Are you cold?”

“Just a little.”

“Hope you’re not getting a fever. All that soaking. Listen, why don’t you put on my raincoat, and I’ll take your umbrella.”

“Don’t be silly, it’s broken. Anyway, how can you ride your cycle with an umbrella?”

“Of course I can. I can ride it standing on my head if necessary.” He insisted, and in the bus shelter they undertook the exchange. He helped her into the Duckback raincoat and his hand grazed her shoulder. His fingers felt warm to her cold skin. The sleeves were a bit long, otherwise it fit quite well. And nicely heated up by his body, she realized, as it slowly got the chill out of her.

They stood close together, watching the fine needles of rain slanting in the light of the streetlamp. Then they held hands for the first time, and it seemed the most natural thing to do. It was hard to let go when the bus came.

From now on, Rustom used his bicycle only to get to and from work. In the evenings he came by bus, so they could travel together and he could see her home.

Dina was happier meeting him without the bicycle. She felt he should give it up altogether, it was too dangerous in the city traffic.

“I’
m going to get married,” announced Dina at the dinner table.

“Ah,” beamed her brother. “Good, good. Which one is it, Solly or Porus?” – these two being the gents he had most recently introduced.

Dina shook her head.

“Then it must be either Dara or Firdosh,” said Ruby, smiling meaningfully. “They are both crazy about you.”

“His name is Rustom Dalai.”

Nusswan was surprised; the name did not belong among the numerous candidates he had brought before Dina over the past three years. Perhaps it was someone she had met at one of the family gatherings he so detested. “And where did we come across him?”

“We didn’t. I did.”

Nusswan did not like the answer. He was offended that all his efforts, all his choices, were being spurned by her for a total stranger. “Just like that you want to marry this fellow? What do you know about him and his family? What does he know about you, your family?”

“Everything,” said Dina in a tone that made him anxious. “I’ve been seeing Rustom for a year and a half now.”

“I see. A well-kept secret,” he said, affecting sarcasm. “And what does he do, this Dalai fellow, your Rustom-in-hiding?”

“He’s a pharmaceutical chemist.”

“Hah! Pharmaceutical chemist! A bloody compounder! Why don’t you use the proper word? That’s what he is, mixing prescription powders all day long behind a counter.”

He reminded himself there was no sense in losing his temper just yet. “So, when are we going to meet this Father Forty-Lakhs of yours?”

“Why? So you can insult him in person?”

“I have no reason to insult him. But it is my duty to meet him, and then advise you properly. In the end it’s up to you.”

On the appointed day, Rustom arrived with a box of sweetmeats for Nusswan and Ruby, which he placed in the hands of little Xerxes, who was almost three now. For Dina, he brought a new umbrella. The significance was not lost on her, and she smiled. He winked at her when the others were not looking.

“It’s gorgeous,” she said, opening it up. “What a lovely pagoda shape.” The fabric was sea green, and the shaft was stainless steel, with a formidable spike at the end.

“That’s a dangerous weapon,” joked Nusswan. “Be careful who you point it at.”

They had tea, with cheese sandwiches and butter biscuits prepared by Ruby and Dina, and the time passed without unpleasantness. But that night, after the visitor left, Nusswan said he could not understand for one moment what was in his sister’s head – brains or sawdust.

“Selecting someone without looks, without money, without prospects. Some fiancés give diamond rings. Others a gold watch, or at least a little brooch. What does your fellow bring? A bloody umbrella! To think I wasted so much time and energy introducing you to solicitors, chartered accountants, police superintendents, civil engineers. All from respectable families. How will I hold my head up when people hear that my sister married an unambitious medicine-mixing fool? Don’t expect me to rejoice or come to the wedding. For me it will be a day of deep, dark mourning.”

It was sad, he lamented, that in order to hurt him she was ruining her own life. “Mark my words, your spite will come back to haunt you. I am powerless to stop you, you are twenty-one, no longer a little girl I can look after. And if you are determined to throw your life away in the gutter, I can only watch helplessly while you do it.”

Dina had expected all this. The words washed over her and gurgled into oblivion, leaving her untouched. The way the rain had rolled off Rustom’s lovely raincoat, she remembered, on that beautiful night. But she wondered again, as she had so many times, where her brother had learned to rave so proficiently. Neither their mother nor father had had much talent for it.

In a few days Nusswan grew calmer. If Dina was getting married and leaving for good, better that it should happen amicably, without too much fuss. Secretly he was also pleased that Rustom Dalai was no great catch. It would have been unbearable if his friends had been rejected in favour of someone superior.

He participated in the wedding plans with more enthusiasm and generosity than Dina expected. He wanted to book a hall for the reception and pay for everything out of the money he had been collecting for her. “We’ll have the wedding after sunset, and then dinner. We’ll show them how it’s done – everyone will envy you. A four-piece band, floral decorations, lights. I can afford about three hundred guests. But no liquor – too expensive and too risky. Prohibition police are everywhere, you bribe one and ten more show up for their share.”

That night in bed, Ruby, who was pregnant with their second child, expressed dismay at Nusswan’s extravagance. “It’s up to Rustom Dalai to spend, if they want to get married. Not your responsibility – especially when she wouldn’t even let you select the husband. She never appreciates anything you do for her.”

Rustom and Dina, however, had simpler preferences. The wedding took place in the morning. At Dina’s request, it was a quiet ceremony in the same fire-temple where her parents’ prayers were performed on each death anniversary. Dustoor Framji, old and stoop-shouldered, watched from the shadows, upset that he had not been asked to conduct the marriage rites. Time was slowing him down, and the flesh of young women was rarely caught now in his once-dexterous embraces. But the name of Dustoor Daab-Chaab clung to his autumnal years even as all else was withering. “It’s disgraceful,” he grumbled to a colleague. “Especially after my long association with the Shroff family. For death, they come to me – for saros-nu-paatru, for afargan, baaj, faroksy. But for a happy occasion, for wedding ashirvaad, I am not wanted. It’s a matter of shamefulness.”

In the evening there was a party at the Shroff residence. Nusswan insisted on at least this much celebration, and arranged for a caterer. There were forty-eight guests, of which six were Rustom’s friends, plus his Shirin Aunty and Darab Uncle. The rest were from Nusswan’s circle, including extended family members who could not be left out without risking criticism from relatives – the insinuating, whispered kind of criticism to which he was so sensitive.

The dining room, drawing room, Nusswan’s study, and the four bedrooms were rearranged to allow mingling and movement, with tables set up for food and drink. Little Xerxes and his friends ran from room to room in a frenzy of adventure and discovery, screaming and laughing. They were thrilled by the sudden freedom they enjoyed in a house where their previous visits had felt like time spent in prison, grimly supervised by the very strict daddy of Xerxes. Nusswan himself groaned inwardly each time one of them collided with him, but smiled and patted the child on its way.