Shining Hero (36 page)

There came a cry from the crowd of onlookers. ‘Come on, Karna, do it for Poopay Patalya.’ Everyone had seen the famous karate scene by now.

Karna’s concentration wavered momentarily. He whispered, ‘Poopay’ as he fell.

Around Shivarani the crowd had been shouting, ‘Come on, Karna’ but Shivarani, her own voice inaudible in the din, had been shouting, ‘Stop that, Arjuna, stop that, Karna. You’ll hurt yourselves.’ If she had been at home, she would have ordered the pair of them to behave themselves and it was frustrating now to look on helplessly.

Quite soon Karna rose, apparently uninjured, out of the dust. He was crownless and dishevelled, but none the less alive. She could not understand, though, why he should look so furious, as though once again Arjuna had beaten him in a hard-fought contest.

Later the producer congratulated Arjuna saying, ‘Well done, young man.’ The story had been revamped. The advert would not show the king eating Amul butter but, instead, the Sikh commander.

Thanks to the Amul advert, Arjuna, limping and stiff, arrived back in Bombay a hero. His class rose and cheered him as he came into the room and his tutors all smiled, looking pleased and gratified. He received an invitation to a party from the director, Dilip Baswani.

Shivarani’s rich friends, with whom Arjuna stayed in term time, lived on Malabar Hill. They became worried when Arjuna told them he was trying to buy a car to drive to the Baswani party. ‘Those film people are such snobs,’ his host said. ‘You should allow our driver to take you there.’ Arjuna’s hosts were like grandparents to him.

Nothing would persuade Arjuna, though. He wanted to arrive in his own car, as Karna had done.

Although Karna had been extra cold to Arjuna since this episode, all the same Arjuna decided to approach him and see if Karna, who knew everyone and could get anything, could get him a loan, or even a car on credit, till DR Uncle could be found. Arjuna approached his
half-brother with trepidation. But when Karna heard what Arjuna wanted he laughed. ‘A car? Of course. I can easily get you one.’

Arjuna was surprised and delighted. Karna, in spite of his sulky ways, was at heart a good sort after all. He did not seem at all resentful, anymore, about the unfortunate battle.

‘In fact,’ said Karna, ‘I am thinking of selling my car and buying something else. Would you like to try it?’

‘Don’t worry about paying me. Let me have the money whenever you can,’ said Karna cheerily later. ‘There’s no hurry at all.’ Arjuna began to think he had misread his half-brother from the start.

The car petered out five kilometres before the Baswani estate. First it became quieter, then slower, then stopped altogether and nothing would start it. Arjuna turned the key, pressed the accelerator and even tried shouting to the car, as he had shouted to Draupadi. Nothing would produce the smallest sign of life from it.

Arjuna knew nothing about the workings of cars and after half an hour managed to flag down a lorry. The lorry driver opened up the bonnet, peered into Arjuna’s engine and muttered something incomprehensible, but which Arjuna eventually understood meant that some vital part of the vehicle was missing and that there was nothing the lorry driver could do.

Arjuna arrived in the turnip lorry an hour later. His starched white front was grimed with dust, his shiny black shoes hopelessly blurred. The durwans at the gate were at first reluctant to let him in even when he flourished his written invitation, and in the end Mr Baswani was sought out.

‘My dear boy,’ he cried, laughing at the sight of the dishevelled Arjuna. ‘Can this really be the same shining hero that unseated the king in the butter advert? Come and meet my daughter, Poopay Patalya.’ He gestured to where a small slim girl wearing a black
sweatshirt and tights, her mass of blue-black hair held in a band, was laughing with a group of friends.

Arjuna recognised her instantly and gasped with delight. Around Poopay were women gleaming in gold silken saris, mouths were bright with lipstick, eyes were ringed with mascara and throats glittered with jewels. Poopay had not dressed up at all, wore no make-up and was, Arjuna decided, more beautiful than any woman there.

Poopay turned from her friends and called, ‘What are you saying about me, Papa? I can hear you.’

‘Poopay always calls me “Papa”,’ explained Dilip Baswani to Arjuna.

‘Does she? Oh really?’ cried Arjuna, enthusiastic. ‘In that case may I have your permission to marry her?’

Dilip smiled. ‘If I thought you were serious and if she really was my daughter, I might say “yes”.’

‘Is she or isn’t she?’ demanded Arjuna.

‘Do you really want to know?’ teased Dilip. ‘Everyone tries to make out that I am their father. Even your brother, Karna.’

‘Karna?’ The statement temporarily winded Arjuna. He said, ‘Karna’ again, in an almost despairing tone. He sighed. He felt a little gulp of nausea rise in his throat. He said miserably, ‘Then you must be the man who destroyed my mother’s life.’

Dilip smiled and patted Arjuna’s elbow. ‘Karna and I have already had that out and we have come to the conclusion that, because of my predilection for girls of the lower castes, it could not have been me.’

‘Oh,’ said Arjuna, feeling relieved.

‘Poopay, come and meet Arjuna,’ called Dilip. ‘He wants to marry you.’

Poopay came over, laughing and showing a lot of small bright teeth.

‘I’ve seen all your films. I think you’re absolutely marvellous,’ Arjuna breathed.

‘Thank you,’ said Poopay and she gazed on Arjuna’s face as though as thrilled with him as he was with her.

They were standing like this, staring at each other, when Karna appeared.

‘Oh, you two have met, have you?’ he said gruffly. And to Arjuna, ‘You are bloody late. Where have you been?’

‘Your car broke down,’ said Arjuna crossly, dragging his gaze from Poopay with difficulty.

‘I can’t understand that,’ said Karna. ‘It was always very reliable. I never had the least trouble with it. You must have done something wrong.’

Karna was shaken by the sight of Arjuna who, he thought, would have been certain to arrive too late. But it had not all been bad. He looked very smart and tidy and Arjuna was a mess, though when he came upon Poopay and Arjuna looking at each other, there had been something in Poopay’s expression that worried him.

Peerless Karna, lead us onward
To a brighter happier fate,
For thy arm is nerved to action
By an unforgotten hate
.

Karna wrote, inviting Shivarani to stay with him in Bombay.

Shivarani read the letter twice over, and felt moved. It was badly written, wrongly spelt, but graciously worded. She wondered if, for the first time in nine years, some kind of intimacy would develop between them when she visited him. For her sister’s sake she had always tried to do her best for Karna but somehow it had never really worked. She often had a sense that she had failed him, but now he had written this letter. ‘Dear Shivarani Aunty, I have a flat of my own in Bombay. It is rather small but all the same it would be very nice …’ She tried to imagine herself in a rather small flat with Karna, and could not. After she read on she understood better why he had written, even why he had asked her to come. ‘I have been offered the leading role in a new Mahabharata. I am to act the part of Arjuna,’ he said. She could almost feel the shiver of joy that had gone through him when he wrote the words. ‘The training you gave me, all those dancing lessons and martial arts have paid off.’ He was trying to thank her.

‘Dear Karna,’ she wrote back. ‘I would love to. I will come by train.’ Because he was almost her child, she had a piece of news that she felt he ought to know. But as soon as the letter had been posted, she began to have second thoughts.

On the journey there, she went over in her mind, once again, the conversation with DR Uncle.

‘I am lonely,’ he had said, ‘and I think you are too. Will you marry me?’

She had caught her breath. A shock of pain had pierced her.

‘I am sorry, I should not have said anything.’ DR Uncle touched her hand. ‘Forgive me. The matter will not be mentioned again.’

‘May I think about it?’ said Shivarani quickly.

‘Will you? That will be good,’ smiled DR Uncle.

She would marry DR Uncle, she decided now. It would solve a lot of problems. Ever since Bhima had told her he was marrying Malti, Shivarani had tried to find a way of banishing him from her heart. Perhaps this would be the way.

Karna was waiting for her at the station. He came towards her smiling then touched her feet. ‘My car is waiting,’ he said a little grandly.

He drove her through Bombay, pointing out the sights, telling her of places where a film had been made, pointing towards the sea. ‘That’s my father’s house.’

‘And that’s where Poopay Patalya lives,’ he said, and became suddenly so silent that she thought she could see into his heart.

‘Tell me about this film part you have been offered.’

He said shyly, ‘It is the most wonderful thing that has ever happened to me.’

She leant back, feeling soothed because, after all, though she had made many mistakes, things were turning out all right. Bombay flowed by glitteringly. Karna’s driving seemed to have improved a little, his gear changes now often worked first time. She was relieved to see that he could manage an emergency stop. The sleeping buffalo should be grateful too, she thought.

Karna was chattering childishly, making Shivarani feel that he was experiencing proper childhood for the first time in his life. Perhaps, despicable though these trashy films were, they would all the same give Karna the things he had so far lacked. At least, she thought, he should be able to gain enough self esteem and money from it
so as not to have to resort to crime again.

He said, ‘After this I won’t ever mind anything again.’ He glanced at her swiftly and added, ‘Dilip Baswani, my father you know, arranged for me to play the part. He was impressed at how I handled the adverts.’

Shivarani was brought up short. It was at her suggestion that Karna had sought Dilip out, but all the same he was the man who had seduced her sister Koonty and ruined her life. It was because of Dilip Baswani that Koonty was dead. Shivarani did not want to have to be grateful to him. But she only said, ‘That’s wonderful, Karna. Really wonderful.’

‘And also, in spite of never having been to film school, I got the lead, not Arjuna.’

‘Good for you,’ said Shivarani, feeling glum because even now, in his moment of triumph, Karna could still not stop the rivalry.

Karna brought his car to a tyre-shattering halt in front of a large grim-looking apartment block and told her proudly, ‘My home.’ It was pitch dark inside the hallway. Karna said, ‘Electricity seems to be off again. We’ll have to feel our way up.’ He paused and even though she could not see his face, she sensed that he was trying to pluck up his courage to say something that embarrassed him. At last he muttered, ‘Shall I hold your hand or something? The stairs are a bit broken.’

‘No, no, thank you. It’s all right,’ smiled Shivarani.

They had to climb nine flights to reach his flat, Karna giving frequent warnings, ‘Be careful here, there’s no banister.’ And ‘This bit’s rather tricky because two stairs are missing.’

They got there at last and Karna grandly unlocked and threw open his door. Shivarani flinched at the sight of the clutter and the tiny room. Karna, unaware, led her round. ‘There are my cups and plates and things,’ he said, waving a hand. ‘And in there is my bedroom.’ He flung open a door. ‘I thought you should sleep there.’

‘What about you?’ Already Shivarani was wishing she was home again.

‘I’ll be on the sofa,’ said Karna. ‘And this is my portrait. Did you ever see it after Rishi finished it?’

‘Goodness,’ said Shivarani.

‘The eyes follow you all round the room, wherever you go,’ Karna said.

‘They certainly do,’ said Shivarani. She looked around.

‘Do you ever see Arjuna?’ She did not hold out much hope here, presuming that the relationship was as bitter as ever. But Karna said, joyfully, ‘Oh yes. I see him quite often as a matter of fact. I’ve been helping him quite a lot and he’s grateful to me, I think.’

‘Good,’ said Shivarani and could hardly believe what she was hearing.

‘We have to get on nowadays, you see, because I managed to persuade Dilip to give him a minor part in the Mahabharata too. We’ll both be acting in the same film.’

‘How nice of you to be so helpful, Karna.’

‘At the moment, Arjuna and I are engaged in a mammoth squash contest. It has been going on for two weeks. We are going to play our final game tomorrow. Why don’t you come and watch?’

‘I’d love to,’ said Shivarani.

The squash tournament had been vicious. Squash balls had burst like eggs under the gigantic blows. Racket handles had shattered. The brothers had already worn through a couple of pairs of gym shoes each and chunks had been knocked out of the plaster walls, where they had crashed against them. This was the final and deciding game.

But when Karna and Shivarani arrived next day, Arjuna was not there.

Karna, who felt sure he was going to win because everything was going his way these days, began to feel jittery. Then a bearer came and said there had been a phone message from the film studio and that Mr Pandava had been detained.

‘Don’t take it so hard,’ Shivarani tried to console. ‘It must have been something unavoidable. I bet he’ll be there tomorrow. I will definitely come and see it then. I’m looking forward to it.’

Gradually, as they returned to his flat, Karna’s dark mood began to lift, and by the time they arrived he had become quite cheerful. He told her, ‘Today we are getting our scripts. I’ve got to go round to the studio to collect mine.’

‘I will do some shopping while you’re away,’ said Shivarani. It seemed the right thing to say, and shopping the sort of thing people do when they come to stay in Bombay, but all the same she laughed at herself for she was not at all a shopping sort of person.

Karna arrived to find the studio oddly empty.

‘Where is everyone?’ he asked. Usually at this time the place was humming with activity, engineers up ladders fixing bulbs, painters getting the back boards up, make-up people dashing round with palates of grease paint …

‘There’s been a change of plan,’ the stage manager said. He looked shifty and uncomfortable.

‘Where is Arjuna?’

‘He has gone away with Mr Baswani.’ The stage manager’s nervousness seemed to increase.

‘I’ve come for my script,’ said Karna.

‘Oh, yes.’ The stage manager pulled out a wedge of papers and handed it to Karna.

Karna looked at it then handed it back. ‘Hey, this isn’t mine. This says “Karna”, I’m doing Arjuna.’

‘This is what Mr Baswani told me to give you,’ said the man looking miserable.

‘But this is ridiculous. Where is Mr Baswani? I need to talk to him. There’s been some ludicrous mistake.’

The manager sighed heavily. ‘They have gone to the airport.’

‘To the airport?’ Karna kept his tone steady. ‘Who has? Why?’

‘They are flying to some mountain village. Mr Baswani heard that
there was some good snow at the moment and he did not want to miss it.’

‘Why do they want snow? Who wants snow? Who has gone to the airport?’

‘All of them. Mr Baswani, Miss Poopay and Arjuna Pandava. Mr Baswani wants to do a quick snow scene before starting on the big one.’

Karna stared at the man in silence.

The manager had been warned to expect a scene. Mr Baswani was a great one for last-minute choppings and changes. ‘Mr Arjuna left a letter for you.’

As Karna ripped it open he had to keep an icy control on his hands to stop them trembling. ‘I’m sorry about the squash,’ wrote Arjuna. ‘We’ll play the match when I get back but Dilip has asked me to play Arjuna and we are off to do some of the filming in the Himalayas.’

Karna stared at the letter in silence for what, to the manager, seemed like ages. Then at last he said in a voice so quiet it was almost a whisper, ‘What time did they go? Which road did they take? What time does the plane fly?’

Shivarani waited in Karna’s flat for hours and when by afternoon he had not come, she went herself to the studio.

‘He has driven off to the mountains, I think,’ one of the lighting people told her. ‘Something to do with the filming of the Mahabharata.’

‘When will he be back?’

The man shrugged. ‘You can never tell with filming.’

Irritated at Karna’s lack of concern in not sending her any message, hurt because she had been hoping that something good might come in her relationship with Karna on this visit, she packed up her things and returned to Hatipur.

Arjuna sat in the back of the gleaming purring Audi with Poopay Patalya at his side. He kept looking at her. Each time he turned away he would think, she can’t really be as beautiful as that, and then have to have another look. He and Poopay were to spend three days dancing, singing and flirting with each other in a remote snowbound Himalayan village.

They were hurrying through the night to catch a plane that would take them to a place where snow lay. Arjuna did not remember any snow in the story of the Mahabharata and had no idea what this bit of film was about but if it meant staying near to Poopay then he was not going to ask questions.

Sometimes during the hours that followed, Karna thought he must be catching up on them. The script of Karna’s part was at his feet and its open pages flopped about his shoes as he thrust the accelerator on to yet greater speeds.

Dilip Baswani was relieved to have put a distance between himself and Karna for the moment and hoped that by the time they got back to Bombay, Karna would have got over his anger. Although Baswani had been perfectly within his rights to change his mind, he had flinched from telling Karna face to face. If Karna still made a fuss when they got back he would explain to the young man that he had purposely given Karna the more difficult and subtle part because he was a more experienced actor than Arjuna. And that was true. Surely when it was explained to him Karna would see the sense of it. One thing Dilip could not stand was emotional scenes.

Arjuna, Poopay and Dilip Baswani arrived at the hill station at midnight. The air was cold and thin, and they breathed heavily as they climbed into the waiting car, then coughed because the cold rasped their throats.

At the hotel where they were staying people came running to meet the car. A young man held out a fleecy blue coat to Poopay.
‘This is your new spot boy,’ said Dilip as the boy snuggled Poopay into the sleeves. ‘He will look after you while you are here.’

Another young man began wrapping Arjuna in a woollen coat as well, as Dilip went waddling off to his room.

‘Why does he only wear a thin shawl and fix us up in these huge great jackets?’ laughed Arjuna.

‘It’s a shahtoosh shawl,’ said Poopay. ‘Just as warm as the stuff he’s got us into, though ten, a hundred times the price. He’s a show-off and wants us to admire his ability to endure the cold. But really he’s just as allergic to the cold as we are.’

That night Arjuna could not sleep. Through his mind whirled thoughts of being with Poopay, up here in this snowy place.

He woke next morning and saw a sparkling white landscape and the snow clad peaks of Shiva’s mountains made rosy red with the light of the rising sun. A man went cantering by on a small white pony. His heart was singing. At the first chance he would climb alone and explore these beautiful mountains where, he felt sure, God lived.