During the weeks Sonu was away, I made an important decision. I asked a property dealer close to our house to find me a bigger house with a garden in an upper-class residential area. My firm was making a lot of money and I was determined now to move out of the house gifted by Achint Ram. To put him in his place, I’d buy a much larger house than what he had given his daughter. Of course, it would not match her father’s mansion, but I could give Sonu the feeling that she had not done too badly with me. This time buying a house would not be a problem: I still had no real black money, but I could now pay a part in rupees and the rest in dollars, for which there were many takers.
I did not tell anyone about my decision, not even my father. I wanted it to be a big surprise to Sonu and a gift for my newborn son. A week later the realtor came by with a map of New Delhi indicating where the kind of house I wanted would be available and on what terms. I spent a morning travelling with the realtor from one large house to another. I settled for one in Maharani Bagh, not far from where I was living. It was a double-storeyed bungalow with a lawn in front, a modest courtyard at the back, two garages, three big rooms and a terrace on the first floor and a large reception room, two bedrooms, a study and a kitchen on the ground floor. There were servant quarters in the rear. I fell in love with it at once. The owners, an elderly couple shifting out to Chandigarh, were willing to hand over possession as soon as the money was paid to them. I had my company lawyer draw up the agreement for sale and handed the couple a lump sum in cash as part payment.
After the deal had been finalized, I told my father. He was somewhat dismayed. ‘Isn’t this house good enough for you?’ He had spent almost his entire adult life in a government flat and every house looked to him too large for comfort. ‘You see it, you will love it,’ I assured him. ‘You have to give it a name.’
The morning after my son was born, I took my father to see the house. He was very pleased with what he saw. He had chosen a name for my son—Ranjit Kumar; the house was to be named after him—Ranjit Villa.
This is the house I live in today in the style expected of a youngish millionaire. I got pricey interior decorators to do it up. I engaged a Mug cook; the young fellow who cooked for us till then became his assistant, bearer and masalchi. The house had its own cleaning woman who lived in the quarters. I took her on so she could stay where she was. I also engaged a part-time gardener and a chauffeur as I found driving in Delhi somewhat tiresome.
I was impatient to bring my wife and child to the new house I had bought for them. ‘As far as I’m concerned, you can take them home now,’ Sonu’s gynaecologist told me. ‘I’m always available at all hours. But if Sonu feels nervous, I suggest you hire a night nurse who can keep an eye on the baby so that the mother can sleep undisturbed and only be woken up when the baby wants to be fed.’
The Rai Bahadur did not bother to consult me. ‘For a few days she will stay with us,’ he told the doctor. ‘We will have a day and night nurse for as long as the baby needs breast-feeding.’
So that was that. While I was in the office, Sonu and the baby were shifted to the Rai Bahadur’s residence along with two nurses. I only found out when I went to the nursing home to see them. An undeclared tug-of-war restarted between us. I did not go to the Rai Bahadur’s house that evening.
The next morning when I met Sonu I complained. ‘You did not bother to let me know you had returned home. I looked such a fool when I went to the nursing home. What must the staff have thought about our relationship?’
‘You could have rung up before going there. They wanted the room for another expectant mother, so I had to leave.’
‘When are you coming home?’
‘Give me a few more days here. I have to feed this brat every four hours. He sets up such a howl if his meal is delayed by a few minutes. Here I have these two nurses and my mother to look after us. Mother says we should choose a nice name for the boy.’
‘We already have one. Father’s chosen it: Ranjit Mohan Kumar. I like it. It was my great-grandfather’s name.’
‘So you let your father decide his name without consulting me? I am the boy’s mother, in case you’ve forgotten.’
Every time we talked to each other, it became an argument. I was determined not to let her have her way over our son’s name. ‘Ranjit Mohan Kumar it is going to be. I’ve named our home after him: Ranjit Villa. You will see it on the door when you decide to come home.’ I said nothing about having bought a new house and let her presume I had given our old house a new name.
I let her spend another fortnight in her parents’ home. Then my patience ran out. ‘You have to come home now,’ I told her over the phone one afternoon. ‘I have cleared one bedroom for your nurses for as long as you need them. Your parents can come to see you every day if they like while I am in the office. You can spend weekends with them if you like.’
She knew I meant business. She told her parents. Very reluctantly they agreed to let her go. Not on the Saturday following because Saturday was inauspicious, being the day of Shani—Saturn. Sunday would be better. I turned up on the morning of the following Sunday. She had accumulated a lot of baby’s things: bed sheets, soft blankets, nappies, talcum powders, gripe-water bottles and a huge teddy bear. There was not enough room for everything in my car, so one nurse got into the Rai Bahadur’s car with the baggage. Sonu took the front seat beside me, the senior nurse, with the baby in her lap, took the rear seat. I told the Rai Bahadur’s driver, ‘You follow me.’
‘Sahib, I have been to your house many times.’
‘Follow me,’ I told him again, ‘it’s not the same one.’
‘Where are we going?’ asked Sonu.
‘To your new home. I kept it as a surprise for you.’
I pulled up at the gate of my new house and pointed to the brass name plate. ‘See! Ranjit Villa.’
I thought she would be happy to see her large new house named after her son. What I saw was sullen resentment written all over her face. ‘Without consulting me, without telling me!’ she snarled. I knew she would have more to say on the subject when the nurse was not within earshot. The nurse’s reaction also quietened her. ‘Mr Mohan, what a beautiful house you have! My! My!’ she gushed as I took them inside and showed them Sonu’s and the baby’s bedroom: silk bed covers; large, soft feather pillows imported from Germany; a baby’s cot; bathrooms done up like in five star hotels.
My father did his best to welcome them. He applied kum kum powder on Sonu’s and the baby’s forehead, waved hundred-rupee notes round their heads and pressed them into their hands. The servants came in. I introduced them in turn. They touched her feet. ‘Mem-sahib, aap ko bahut bahut mubarak ho,’ said the Mug cook, congratulating her in his Bengali-Hindi accent. The bearer she already knew. The jamadarni introduced herself as just the jamadarni, the woman who did the floors and the bathrooms. ‘So the staff has also been appointed without consulting the mistress of the house!’ remarked Sonu very acidly when we were left alone. ‘All I have to do is to eat what is offered to me, sleep with you when I’m expected to and be the wet-nurse for my own child.’
I was exasperated. ‘Is there anything I do which pleases you? I’ve done all this to make you happy. All the thanks I get is a barrage of criticism.’
I stormed out of the room. I hoped this would make her feel she had overdone it. She went round the house inspecting the rooms. She went to the kitchen and asked the cook what he had made for lunch and supper; she came down and went round the reception room. I could hear her open the drinks cabinet and examine the cut glass. Finally she came into my study where I was pretending to work. ‘I’m sorry to prove such a damper,’ she said apologetically. ‘Everything is carefully laid out. You can do very well without me.’
‘Well, I’m glad you like the place.’
‘What about your nurses?’ she asked.
‘Ask them their food preferences and tell the cook,’ I replied.
She asked the nurses to come down and introduce themselves to me. ‘Saar, my name is Mary Joseph. I am Roman Catholic, from Tamil Nadu,’ said the older one. She was a dark, plump woman in her thirties. On her ample bosom she had a gold cross dangling. The younger one introduced herself: ‘I am Ittiara Mathews, sir, from Kottayam in Kerala. I am Syrian Christian.’ She was not as dark, nor as plump as the other nurse. I showed them to their room next to my study. I had two beds put in it. They would occupy the room in turns, depending on their hours of duty. ‘I am the night nurse,’ said the Keralite, ‘so Mary will be here at night; I during the day.’ I told them to tell the cook what kind of food they liked to eat. ‘Saar, anything you eat, we eat,’ replied Mary. ‘Sometimes we like idli-dosa. We can make that ourselves.’
In a couple of days life fell into a pattern. Sonu and the baby slept in one of the bedrooms upstairs. The nurse from Kerala dozed off in an armchair in the same room. The baby’s bawling every four hours was her alarm. I had a bed put in my study for myself. The Tamilian occupied the room next to mine. She was more communicative than the Keralite. She told me she was married and had a child. ‘My husband, he drink, drink, drink all the time. Like a fish. When I say stop he beat me. Not enough money in the house and child to bring up. What to do, saar? So I took course in nursing and after I got my certificate, I told my husband—Mister, you stay here and drink and look after my child. I am taking a job in Delhi and send you whatever I save.’ She looked quite cheerful about it. ‘Saar, one life to live. Not to waste it on a drunkard husband. You agree?’
I agreed.
Sonu would not let me come near her. ‘The doctor said no sex till I have weaned the baby. After six months I will start giving him milk from a bottle and some solids like Farex. Then we’ll see what we can do.’
I had not had proper sex for over six months. Another six months of abstinence would be hard on a lustful man like me.
One evening I had more than my quota of Scotch. Sonu did not touch alcohol as it went into her milk, which was harmful for the baby. My father had taken to eating before sunset and retiring to his room for the night. I waited for the servants to leave and locked the rear entrance which they used. After dinner I took a short stroll in the garden, locked the front gate and came to my study-cum-bedroom. Mary Joseph came to say goodnight to me. I don’t know what came over me. I took her in my arms and kissed her passionately. She did not resist. ‘Saar, somebody may come in. It is not safe.’ I bolted my study from the inside and pushed her on my bed. She was quite willing. She pulled up her white skirt and took off her panties. I tore open her blouse and went hungrily for her large breasts. She stretched her thighs wide apart. As I entered her she exclaimed, ‘Aiy Aiy yo! Saar, you are very big. I like it very much.’ She responded vigorously to my thrusts. We climaxed together.
‘Not safe,’ she said as she got up and re-adjusted her dress. ‘No good if I become pregnant. I am Catholic; no divorce, no illegitimate child. If Jesus forgives me this time, I will get birth control pills for future. Only one life to live, Saar.’
Did I suffer pangs of guilt? I did not. I justified what I did with Mary Joseph the same way Mary Joseph justified her adultery: only one life to live. Sex is important. When denied it becomes more important. The body’s needs come above religious taboos and notions of morality.
Jesus forgave Mary Joseph her transgression. Two days later she had her period. Six days later she was on the pill. Every night it was the same exclamation of surprise and joy—‘Aiy Aiy yo! Saar, you are very big.’ And every night she thrust her hips up at me, matching my desperate rhythm, leaving me in no doubt that she liked it ‘very much’.
Our fun and games did not last long. Apparently I looked more relaxed and cheerful than I had for some time, and Sonu was curious. She had no evidence whatsoever of my infidelity. Of the two nurses, it was the younger Keralite who was more attractive, and she spent the night in Sonu’s room. The Tamilian was fat and shapeless. The gold cross dangling between her breasts was proof that she was a devout Christian and would not have sex with anyone besides her husband. But women have a sixth sense which warns them when their security is threatened. Sonu suspected that there was something wrong going on under her own roof. She did not want to take any chances. A fortnight later she announced that she did not need a day nurse any more and had asked her mother to get her an ayah to keep an eye on the child in the day time. Mary Joseph’s services were dispensed with. Before she left she gave me her visiting card. It had the name and telephone number of her nursing home. ‘Saar, any time you want me, just ring me up and I will come over. Any hotel or friend’s house. Anywhere. I don’t want any money; just you.’
I put her card in my wallet.
Getting rid of the day nurse did not change Sonu’s attitude towards me. I could not understand what had come over her. She found fault with everything I did. Every evening she brought up some topic which ended in an angry exchange of words. I would switch on the TV to avoid her picking a quarrel, and keep it on through the drinks hour and dinner till it was time to go to bed—she to hers and I to mine. In that mood having sex never entered our minds. My thoughts began to stray to Mary Joseph. She was no beauty but she was willing. That made her desirable. I was reluctant to take the initiative. She was not. One afternoon Vimla Sharma buzzed my phone, ‘Sir, your baby’s nurse wants to talk to you. I hope all is well with the child.’
‘Put her on,’ I replied.
It was Mary Joseph. ‘Saar, excuse me for disturbing you in the office. I wanted to enquire about the baby’s health. How is my little baba?’
‘He’s fine. Look, will you be available on this number if I ring up later in the evening?’
‘Yes, saar, for you always available, anytime, anywhere.’
That was what was nice about Mary Joseph. I rang up the Ashoka Hotel to book a room the next day in the name of a business partner in Bombay. The Ashoka had some advantages which other Delhi hotels did not. It was owned by the government and was the largest hotel in the city. It was also very impersonal. Most important of all, it had a third floor with a lift of its own beside the patisserie along the parking lot. Visitors staying on the third floor did not have to go through the large entrance hall with the reception desk, enquiries and the cashier’s counters. There were always people sitting or loitering around in the lobby, people who would recognize you and reach all kinds of conclusions—usually the right ones. For the third floor all you had to do was to pretend you had come to pick up fresh bread, cakes or pastries and go round the shop to the elevator. Room waiters on the third floor knew what businessmen from Bombay, Calcutta and Madras wanted in the way of relaxation when they came to Delhi. They went about their jobs silently, asked no questions, only expected to be tipped handsomely.
I got Mary Joseph on my direct line. ‘Meet me tomorrow evening at five, Mary. Room number three hundred, third floor, Ashoka Hotel. Not in your nurses’ uniform. And don’t ask for me, just knock on the door.’
‘Sure, sure, saar. Okay.’
The next day I left the office at half past four and told the chauffeur he would not be needed till the next morning. From the patisserie I bought some chicken patties and a chocolate cake. I took the small elevator to the third floor. Room No. 300 was open, with the key in the key hole. I put it in my pocket and went in. It was a comfortable single bedroom. A bottle of Scotch and two glasses sat on the table beside the usual basket of fruits and vase of flowers. There were sodas in the fridge. I helped myself to a Scotch-n-soda. The room bearer came in to take orders. ‘I will ring if I want anything,’ I replied. ‘Put the don’t disturb sign on the door and leave it open.’
He had never seen me before, but he knew the drill and departed. A few minutes later there was a gentle knock on the door and in came Mary Joseph. ‘Notice on door says don’t disturb,’ she said with a broad smile. ‘I hope I am not disturbing you, saar.’ She was dressed in in a white cotton sari with gold borders. It suited her more than the nurse’s uniform. Like modern girls she wore a backless, sleeveless blouse. She had a cute belly button.
‘Shut and bolt the door behind you. The notice is not for you but for other people,’ I told her.
‘I know, saar. I am not stupid.’
She put her arms round my neck and gave me a gentle kiss on the lips. ‘Saar, I missed you like anything. I said to myself, Saar will never ring you up. He has his memsahib and big, big business to look after. Who will think of one poor nurse after he has had her, one, two, four, five times?’
We sat down on a sofa. ‘Do you like this room?’ I asked her.
‘Very nice,’ she replied. ‘There it was always at night and I couldn’t see you. And always fear in my mind that someone may suddenly come in. Now it is daylight, we can see what we are doing without bothering about anyone. No?’
I took her in my arms and kissed her hungrily. I slipped my hand under her blouse and fondled her big breasts till her nipples became hard. We got up and moved to the bed. First she took off her gold necklace, kissed the cross and laid it reverently on the table. Then she took off her sari, folded it and put it on a chair. She took off her blouse; her breasts tumbled out. She looked down coyly at them. I untied the knot of her petticoat. It fell to the floor. She put her hands between her thighs to cover herself and giggled. I pushed them aside and saw the mass of healthy curling pubic hair. She had very broad thighs, silken soft. ‘You also, saar. Like me. Nothing,’ she pleaded.
I stripped myself of my clothing and we lay down side by side on the bed. ‘Saar, you have the biggest thing I have ever seen. So big no other man has.’
‘How many have you seen?’ I asked her, putting it into her caressing hands.
‘What seen? My husband not half as big. And so quick to finish. In out, in out. Phut. Once his younger brother had me. Also small and very quick quick. The padre of our village church was much better. But he was sorry for doing it. After he finished he asked me to pardon him and made me pray with him to Jesus to ask his forgiveness. Imagine, no, still naked and sweating and kneeling on the floor and praying to God! He made me feel worse than a prostitute who did it without asking for money. Tell me, saar, is it a sin to do it with somebody you like?’
The only way to stop Mary Joseph from talking was to seal her mouth with mine. This I did again and again while I stroked her thighs and pushed three fingers through the springy pubic hair and into her. She was warm and slick. She began to moan with pleasure, ‘Oh! oh! oh! … How can such a nice thing be sin? Tell me, saar, tell me.’ She pulled my hand away and threw her heavy, smooth legs high and wide. I mounted and entered her and glued my mouth to hers. She was more animated than I expected from a woman of her bulk. And when she came she dug her nails into my neck and bit my lips, then collapsed with her arms and legs stretched wide.
‘For me this was heaven,’ she said when she had regained her breath,’ and for you, saar?’
‘Very nice,’ I replied. ‘Let’s get back into our clothes. Shall I order tea or coffee for us?’
‘Coffee for me, saar.’
We washed ourselves together. As I saw her dark, ungainly figure, I could not understand how I could have made love to her. But I had enjoyed every minute of it. I put my clothes on, then sat and watched her dress. First she put her necklace round her neck and again kissed the cross. Then she put on her blouse, then the petticoat and finally—and with surprising swiftness—her sari. I rang for the room bearer and ordered two coffees and a plate of biscuits.
Mary Joseph was in a chatty mood. She wanted to tell me all there was to know about her village, married life, her husband, his brother, her son, the nursing home, the doctors and other nurses. She sensed I was not listening to her. ‘I talk too much, saar,’ she admitted. ‘Everyone calls me chatterbox. I will keep my mouth shut and you do the talking.’
‘I don’t talk very much,’ I told her. She felt she had been reprimanded. The bearer brought coffee and biscuits. I handed him my credit card. I asked him to give it to the cashier and bring me the receipt. A few minutes later he came back for my signature and with the receipt. It was over a couple of thousand rupees for the two hours with Mary Joesph. I gave the bearer a hundred-rupee note as a tip.
‘Let’s go,’ I said to her. I handed her the two boxes with the cake and patties. ‘I bought them for you.’
‘O thank you very much, saar. You should not have bother. This is very expensive—room and all in five star hotel!’ She put her arms round my neck and looked directly into my eyes. ‘Saar, you will see me again, won’t you? Soon? I will pay my share of the room charge.’
‘Don’t be silly. I can afford it, you can’t. And I got as much fun out of it as I hope you did.’
There was so much pleading in her eyes that I could not help committing myself to further meetings, if not in the Ashoka, in some other hotel. I asked her to go ahead of me by the small lift, gave her the number of my car and told her to wait for me. A few minutes later, I followed her, opened the car door to let her in. ‘How did you come to the hotel?’ I asked her.
‘In a three-wheeler. I can’t afford taxis.’
‘You must let me pay for your transport. I can always drop you back home.’
I drove her to the top of the road where her nursing home was and dropped her at the cross roads. ‘When will you ring me up, saar?’ she asked as she got out of the car. ‘Soon,’ I replied, ‘but don’t ring me in the office. They will begin to talk.’
I was back home a little later than usual. Sonu noticed I had driven in myself, and demanded, ‘Where were you driving around without the chauffeur?’
‘I went to the club to have a drink and told him to go home.’
The smell of the whiskey on my breath spared me further questions. I went to see the baby. He had his tiny feet in his hands and was gurgling away, his large eyes wide open to take in the world. He had begun to recognize me and would show his pleasure by knocking both his legs together and slapping his cot with his hands. I tickled him under the chin; he responded with a toothless smile and a ‘gug-gug-gug’. Next to the TV it was the baby who gave me an excuse to avoid getting into an argument with Sonu.