Darshan (24 page)

“What should I say?” Satnam asked indifferently.

“Satnam is right,” Baba Singh said, clasping his hands over his stomach. “Leave it be.”

Manmohan’s jaw tightened.

Vikram was sprawled out on the floor. Mohan and Karam ran toy trucks over his body. Karam’s eyes narrowed as he drove his vehicle toward his uncle’s stomach. As the front wheels made their approach, Vikram began to laugh, as if it were too much. Rolling onto his side, he curled himself into a ball. “Stop, stop,” he pleaded.

“Does it tickle, Vikram Chacha?” Karam asked, grinning, and he and Mohan threw themselves on top of him, trying to reach his most sensitive spots. In spite of his frustration, Manmohan smiled. He knew Vikram was not very ticklish.

“Not too rough,” Priya said. “Karam bruises easily.”

“He bruises the same as any other boy,” Jai said, still irritated.

Sitting up, his turban askew, Vikram threw his hands in the air, defeated. “Okay, okay, I surrender.”

“Now you have to do what we tell you,” Mohan said.

Karam nodded. “You can be our horse and take us through the house.”

“But first,” Vikram said, “perhaps we should get everyone some ice water.”

Mohan shook his head. “Horse first.”

“Are they always so demanding?” Vikram asked his brothers.

Manmohan grinned. “Only when you are here.”

Vikram laughed. “I suppose it is an uncle’s job to be the entertainment.” He stood and crossed the room to the kitchen.

“Horse first, horse first,” the boys shouted.

Vikram chuckled. “It is too hot just now. When the sun sets. I promise.” He pulled some tumblers down from a cupboard. “Bapu, why don’t you tell them about your idea?”

Manmohan turned curiously to his father.

Baba Singh made a face and shrugged. “A dairy farm is for sale near Veisari. I mentioned to Vikram that we should all buy it.”

“Hmm,” Manmohan said cautiously, pretending to mull it over. “Such a big time commitment, Bapu. Have you heard from Bebe?”

“I have asked her to join us.”

Satnam glanced up in surprise.

“The war is over,” Baba Singh continued. “Your grandfather is gone, and she is alone. After what happened with independence, she will change her mind. This time she will come.”

“It is just that I think she is waiting for us to go back to her,” Manmohan said, taking a tumbler from the tray Vikram was passing around. He took a sip. The cold water felt good in his mouth.

“I am not going back,” Priya said, sitting up, an edge in her voice. “It is better here, especially now. I heard what happened there. Trains full of dead bodies.” She shuddered.

Manmohan set his tumbler on the floor to roll his slacks up to his knees. The air was not very humid today, but the temperature was high, and he was sweating. “What about the farmland?” he asked, retrieving the tumbler and reclining again.

“I have no plans to return just yet,” Baba Singh told his son. “Khushwant has been doing a fine job with the land.”

Satnam shook his head. “I am perfectly satisfied with my job. I am not a dairyman. Patrolling suits me. We do not always have to change things.”

Baba Singh regarded Satnam for a brief moment, and then he said, “Think about it. Let me know what you decide.”

Manmohan looked sharply at his father, then quickly took another sip from his tumbler to hide the incredulous resentment he knew was written clearly in the flat, hard line of his mouth.

Baba Singh turned to address him. “And you?”

Slowly swallowing his water, Manmohan covered his mouth with his fist and cleared his throat. “It is a bit unexpected,” he said, attempting a smile.

His father regarded him with impatience. Or was that eagerness? It was so difficult to tell the difference.

Manmohan held his smile. “But, yes, it is a sound idea,” he said. He could feel the tight pressure of the leather watchband on his wrist. He had gotten it while serving as an army signal. It had not worked properly since just after his son died, which was why he liked to wear it. It was comforting to feel that he was not bound so strictly by time, that he had eternities to sort through all that confused and upset him.

Vikram gestured his agreement, sitting again on the floor with the boys and setting the empty tray beside him. “Is this not why we came to Fiji? Certainly not to be policemen.”

Addressing Satnam, her tone wheedling, Priya said, “Gharwala, let’s not miss out on this opportunity. You can keep your job and work on the farm during your free time.”

Satnam looked away from her, his attention fixed on the water tray beside Vikram.

“Is that a new toy?” Karam asked Mohan, pointing to the plastic hammer.

“Yes,” Mohan said, gripping the tool closely to his chest.

“Can I play with it?”

“No.”

Priya wrested the hammer out of Mohan’s grip.

“Hey…”

“Do not be so greedy,” she said. “You should share your toys.”

Manmohan abruptly stood. “Give it back.”

Priya hesitated, looking up at him. Then she smiled ingratiatingly. “Of course,” she said sweetly, returning the hammer. “It is just that I teach my Karam to share. It is a bad habit to allow children to be greedy. Karam would have shared.”

Manmohan slowly lowered himself back down onto the springy cushions of the couch.

Jai beckoned Mohan over. “Come sit with me for a little while,” she said. She made room for him on her chair and rocked him slightly, wrapping her thin, strong arms around him. He pouted and glared at his aunt.

Manmohan raised his cup to his mouth.

Priya smiled, lightly, as though she had already forgiven the outburst. She tucked her legs under her knees and addressed Baba Singh. “The dairy farm is such a good idea. My friend’s husband started one several years ago, and their family now has such a beautiful house.”

“Priya—” Satnam began.

She waved a dismissive hand at her husband and laughed. “What is not to love about it? Naturally we will contribute.”

Manmohan caught Baba Singh intently watching Satnam. He turned away and focused on the cold tumbler grasped firmly in his hand, hating that look on his father’s face, that expression of apology, of sympathy, and of unmistakable concern.

~   ~   ~

The Toor family dairy farm was located far down from the hills of Tamavua, south of Suva in a jungle clearing off the island’s main road. Though the twenty-five acres of pastureland and eighty cattle—fifty-eight cows, two bulls, and twenty calves—had been advertised as a functioning dairy farm, much of the equipment was rusted beyond repair, broken, or damaged. The shack housing the water tank balanced precariously on its rotten frame. Another, slightly larger shack—for the double-boiler stove, the generator-operated milking machine, the refrigerator, and pasteurizer—was a cramped and untidy space in which to operate the machinery. The only structure on the farm of any quality was the shelter where the animals slept at night, and even that, as Manmohan knocked on the supporting beams, looked as though it would soon need reinforcing.

As he surveyed the property, meandering through the clumsily built structures, Manmohan could not understand the appeal, why this was so much more preferable to the alternative, which was simply to return home to his mother as promised with the small fortunes they had accumulated. He wondered if she was still waiting.

He tried to picture Barapind in its current state. It must now be a no man’s land where Sada Kaur wandered, empty and depleted. So much feeling once lived there, so much love and anger, hope and frenzied fear. Now all that remained were echoes of laughter and shouts in the wind. How did he get here? Why was he waiting for his father to finally decide to go home?

Baba Singh commenced work on the farm with the construction of a fourth building, a small cottage where he would live with Vikram. It was a modest structure with only two rooms and a tarp overhang out back shielding a metal stove for cooking. It was so simple in its layout that it did not take more than four days to complete. When they had hammered in the final nail, Baba Singh considered it. “Perfect,” he muttered darkly.

“There is no room for Satnam to sleep,” Manmohan remarked. “He cannot travel every day from the outer islands.”

“No,” Baba Singh said. “This place is also his, but his strengths lie elsewhere.”

And Manmohan was hurt because still he did not understand.

The farm had gotten a strong start, which required an unrelenting pace, particularly during its first year. Manmohan was forced to retire his police uniform, commit himself entirely to his father’s venture. After they had torn down and rebuilt the sheds and replaced or repaired the broken machinery, the farm opened to almost immediate profit. Baba Singh had already introduced himself to shop owners in Suva and had arranged for milk, butter, and cream delivery to those who preferred his lower prices to the larger, well-established dairy farms in the area. The Toors were also the only Sikh dairymen in Greater Suva, and community loyalty swung Sikh customers in their direction, without abatement. Often out making deliveries in the year since the farm’s opening, Manmohan saw these customers more than he did his own wife and sons.

He daydreamed now, all the time. When driving through town with milk loaded in his World War II truck, or when he was with the cows, the soft skin of the udders in his fists as he monotonously squeezed milk into iron buckets, he thought of his boys. If they were together now, he would take Mohan to the cinema to see
Achhut
. He would find Darshan and walk with him along the back of the house near the garden. The boy had taken his first steps, had a practiced, rolling gait.

How different this boy was from his namesake, this Darshan so quiet and unassuming. The other was eager and ambitious. In the long hours working on the dairy farm, Manmohan sifted through his memories, comparing, making distinctions. The first had been driven to
do
. But this Darshan was an observer. He watched.

~   ~   ~

The evening was still relatively young, Manmohan released from his duties early for the first time since opening the farm. He pushed the front door in, happy to see Jai, who was comfortably snuggled on some floor cushions in the living room, stitching a hole in a pair of his trousers. She glanced up at him from her sewing and smiled. Setting aside the trousers, she went to make a pot of tea for their evening together. As she passed, she lightly squeezed his hand.

Mohan was also there, his back to the door, kneeling in front of the couch where Darshan was seated. When Manmohan called out to him, he did not turn around. He was focused intently on his brother, who appeared slightly agitated.

“Oi, Mohan,” Manmohan said. “I am home early.”

Still his son did not acknowledge him.

Removing his boots at the door, Manmohan tried again. “Mohan?”

Darshan began to whimper with frustration. Mohan finally swung his head around, his chin on his shoulder, his chest leaning into the couch cushions. “He won’t take it.”

“Take what?” Manmohan asked, joining the boys on the couch. Then he saw the plastic toy hammer lain like an offering between Darshan’s plump, outstretched legs.

Mohan gestured at the hammer. “I am trying to give it to him. It is a gift. But he won’t take it.”

“Why did you think he would?”

“I don’t know. He never takes it.”

“You have tried it before?”

Mohan nodded.

Manmohan moistened his lips, wondering how to respond. Finally he said, “
This
Darshan does not like them. You understand?”

Mohan watched uncertainly as Manmohan lifted the hammer. “I think it is time to put it back, don’t you?”

For a moment, he thought Mohan might challenge him. His son, however, said nothing. His expression was bewildered, like he was losing something significant, but was not certain what.

LPs on the Gramophone & a Cabinet Radio

1949–1952

Family Tree

The faint odor of engine grease permeated the air of Pali Bhatia’s mechanic shop. It was one of Manmohan’s favorite particulars about Suva Auto Repair. Walking through the center aisle toward a door at the rear, he waved at the store clerk on duty as he passed, glancing around at the iron shelves laden with parts and all manner of equipage for vehicle repair and maintenance, the merchandise covered in black fingerprint smudges from mechanics’ hands.

“Is he out there?” Manmohan asked the clerk, gesturing toward the door.

The clerk nodded. “Just got in.”

Entering the main garage, Manmohan took a deep breath, savoring the smell of oil and metal much like Jai often inhaled the scent of the freshly cut plumeria and morning glory that grew along the edges of their house. The already large space of the high, wood-ceilinged garage was made larger by the rolled-up sectional tin door that opened to an expansive back alley courtyard where several rusted vehicles had taken root. Parts and tools were strewn around two cars, one bus, and several motorbikes. Mechanics—some Hindus, some Sikhs, and one Madrassi—worked on repairs while listening to Hindustani love songs on the radio, transmitted across the local Fijian airwaves.
So ja Rajkumari
from the movie
Zindagi
echoed from the black box, the male vocalist’s smooth, melodious voice sharpened by the radio’s antenna wires spread in a V.

Manmohan approached one of the motorbikes, delivered several weeks ago by ship from Auckland. It was a dull, black color. He reached out and placed his hand on the torn leather, double-passenger saddle, the bike standing firmly on its kickstand.

“She is old, but a classic,” Pali Bhatia said, clapping Manmohan on the back and kissing his puckered fingers. He was known around the island as Junker Singh, a moniker the mechanic cherished, conferred upon him because of his love of beat-up vehicles he believed still had life.

Manmohan smiled at his friend. “German. Puch 1934. It will need anodizing, a good coat for the paint to prevent rusting. Four-speed gearbox. Double-piston engine, 284 cc.”