The Cat and Shakespeare (8 page)

So, to use his phrase, the cat came out of the bag. It was a big cat and the bag was a gunnysack. It smelled peculiarly of rice. There’s a saying of Kabir they often quoted in the ration shop: On each grain of rice is writ the name of he who’ll eat it. The ration card is the proof. Medicine for spleen is proof of the ration card. The child is proof of his father, said Velayudhan Nair, showing his child to Govindan Nair. ‘My son has no spleen. He has malaria or filaria, I don’t know what it is,’ said Govindan Nair. ‘You must take him to a decent doctor,’ said Velayudhan Nair. ‘Who is your doctor? ‘ asked Govindan Nair. ‘Why, Doctor Velu Pillai, MBBS, MRCP from Edinburgh. Specialist in children’s diseases.’ ‘My son is seven years old. He is neither a child nor a man. So where shall we take him?’ laughed Govindan Nair. ‘Why,’ replied Velayudhan Nair, ‘I have just the fellow for that. You come here tomorrow at five. And we’ll settle it.’

‘Ah, sir, the cat is out of the bag,’ he said, coming to see me that evening. Hitler was winning his wars. The prices went up. The British army poured into India. India sent rice to Persia. Russia attacked the German left flank. Von Boch was hurtling towards Moscow. Von Rundstedt’s armies rushed towards Kiev. The Dnieper Dam was blasted. Paris decreed against Jews. Roosevelt was wiping his spectacles—that was one of the pictures stuck against the wall in our office. We liked Roosevelt because we hated Churchill. We love what we cannot have. When we have it, we have it not, because what it is not, is what we want, and thus on to the wall. The mother cat alone knows. It takes you by the skin of your neck, and takes you to the loft. It alone loves. Sir, do you know love? O Lord, I want to love. I want to love all mankind. Why should there be spleen when in fact there is no malaria? Why don’t children sit in scales and play the game of ration cards? Who plays, Lord, who plays? ‘Give unto me love that I love,’ such was the prayer that went up from across my garden wall to the nowhere.

‘How is Shantha?’ asked Govindan Nair abruptly, as if suddenly he had seen the mother cat with the kitten, and I said: ‘She was asking your wife about a good maternity doctor. Dr Krishna Veni Amma is no good. She is too young. Do you know of one?’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I am seeing a child’s doctor tomorrow. I think he will do.’

What is a doctor? One who knows diseases is the simplest definition. One who knows a wound and heals a pain is a doctor.

Five o’clock on any watch (including the clock on the Secretariat) is the same moment all over the world. But not the same hour, for the world is regulated by the watch. Pray, what is a watch? A thing that turns on itself and shows the moon. What is the moon? The thing that turns on itself and (elliptically) goes around the sun. And what is the sun? The sun is a luminary that made the earth—the grasses rise green on the sward; the clouds form; the dawn comes; the cattle go home; man puts manhood into woman and the child is born; the tree shoots into the air, and birds sit on it; houses rise, houses, and our children, when they are born, are well looked after . . . Eagles circle. That is all due to the sun. And the moon. And the clock on the Secretariat. (If the government did not run, then who would pay whose debt?) So, at five-fifteen, Velayudhan Nair went over to the table of Govindan Nair (and what an ocean of ration cards was there, with cigarette butts, shirt buttons, broom grass for cleaning the ears, sandal paste—on little banana leaves—dry flowers, books—Eletchan and one or two books on Vedanta—and in the drawers would be pencils, razor blades, stitching needles, and pice. To buy a cigarette the pice is easier to give than an anna. Copper makes the waste simpler, and the boss does not mind it as long as it is cheap and he knows you are not making money on ration cards. Two rupees a ration card is the official black-market price, if you want to know. If you have children you can have ten cards. To have ten children is permitted by law. And the doctors have no objection. ‘So we have ten children. Look how well fed I look. My wife has a ruby earring. Look, look at her,’ etc., etc.).

Velayudhan Nair says: ‘Man, we go to the doctor.’ Velayudhan Nair always began every sentence with Man, for he had been to Bombay. In Colaba every De Souza says: Man. This they learned from the P & O ships. And P & O ships touch Plymouth. Do they say ‘Man’ there, one wonders.

‘So, man, we go to the doctor,’ he repeated.

‘Mr Man, I come,’ said Govindan Nair. He sometimes used Mister to show he too could be elegant. He called his son Mr Shridhar. (‘Mr Shridhar, go and get me a chew,’ ‘Mr Shridhar, the thing that father puffs is wanted,’ etc., etc. Mr Shridhar therefore brought the chew tobacco or that which father puffs, according to orders.)

Velayudhan Nair: ‘Man, it is hot.’

Govindan Nair: ‘Mister, it cannot be cold in April.’

Velayudhan Nair (wiping his face): ‘Yes, but we will have to wait at the doctor’s.’

Govindan Nair: ‘Why, is he such a busy man?’

Velayudhan Nair: ‘Busy? He is as busy as he wants to be.’

So we go, said Velayudhan Nair, and Govindan Nair pulled the shirt over his body and there they were going to the doctor. The doctor lived off the main road, before you come to the temple. You know, as you go down after the railway bridge, there are a number of cloth shops. Then if you turn to the right—the first lane after where the policeman stands—you come to a small square.

A pleasant rain began to fall. It was refreshing, this cool shower of the heavens. They went up an ordinary tier of house steps, knocked at a much-knobbed door (more like houses in Madras than here), and they entered. It was a living house, obviously, for there was a bronze swing at the far end of the corridor, in the huge hall, where there were many lights. Perhaps the clouds had made the house dark. Suddenly the sun shone and the lights went off. There were many ladies inside the house. There were also some men.

‘The doctor is a busy man. Let me go and see,’ said Velayudhan Nair, and went towards the swing.

Govindan Nair sat on a sofa and started reading the
Cheeranjivi.

Nothing is pleasanter than a doctor’s waiting room. You have the pleasantest thoughts because you know the doctor will say: ‘You have no disease. This is not pneumonia. This is a bad cold. This is not venereal, this is only the British bubo,’ etc.

Before you had time to say Rama Krishna, there he was, Velayudhan Nair. They both entered a huge room, opening on the back yard where a lonely neem tree stood. There were many soldiers there, their hands tattooed; there were government officials in slick clothes; there were merchants and even some Communist leaders (who had just been let out of jail). There were bottles on the table. You could hear women’s voices from the other side of the corridor. How they shrieked or hissed, or you heard them sing. One or two of them came out in high-heeled shoes. Some were smoking and even speaking English. A girl came in—an Anglo-Indian no doubt—and spoke in Tommies’ tongue. The men who came out were adjusting their clothes and pulling their ties, and laughing. Some of them had their hands on their hair, quite thoughtful. Life looked gay and remote and not altogether comfortable. Life is like that. Life is a ration shop. The scale weighs everything according to the ration card. Where is your ration card, Sir? Green, red, or blue?

Girls were obviously gathered at the back of the big room opposite. ‘This is Shiv Shanker Pillai,’ muttered Velayudhan Nair, introducing a sleek middle-aged man with an ochre shirt, a clean white elegant dhoti, gold-rimmed glasses—and to speak truly, a gentle, sweet-looking man. ‘He is in charge of the clinic,’ said Velayudhan Nair, and started smiling as if to himself.

‘If the patient could come in and choose his doctor, it would be nice. Like they say in America they have different doctors for different diseases, we have different cures for different horoscopes as it were, and diagnosed by experts. But let us go in.’

Shiv Shanker Pillai opened a big door and Govindan Nair walked in. A large bed lay between the corner and the window to the right. There was also an office table and a chair. A gentle light fell on everything. Even pencil and paper were laid out on the table as if on purpose. ‘We write love letters here,’ Shiv Shanker Pillai joked. A girl came in from behind them, round, with nose ring and necklace, with black hair and a rich bosom. She was shy. ‘The patient may undress while the doctor is getting ready,’ said Shiv Shanker Pillai, and went out. He seemed serious in saying this.

The rich bosom heaved. The
choli
came open. The girl started cooing and singing. She danced a mellow dance. Govindan Nair sat on the chair and looked at this with fascination. ‘What a beautiful woman you are,’ he said. ‘Beauty is the core of music.’ And she continued to dance. Govindan Nair did not get up. He drew the chair nearer as if to see more clearly. He said again and again, ‘You are beautiful, I can see.’ Then she stripped herself and lay on the bed. The gold necklace fell so curvedly about her breast. Her shape was comely, a little fat above the down of the belly. She had much pubic hair, he observed. So she did not shave those parts.

‘How many children do you have?’ asked Govindan Nair.

‘Two,’ said the girl, and added after a long pause: ‘My name is Lakshmi. Oh, my name is Lakshmi,’ she repeated, as if this would explain unsayable things.

‘Two—it means sixty-four ounces,’ he said, to prove he had understood.

‘What’s that?’ she asked, playful, hoping he would come and caress her.

‘It’s just the worth of man plus man—at the ration shop.’

‘Why do you work there?’ she asked, sitting up. Her breasts drooped a little but were very rapt and succouring, beautiful. Govindan Nair had once wanted to paint.

‘Why don’t you work in one? We all live on rations,’ he said, smiling. ‘What is your salary?’ he asked.

‘Six rupees a day plus tips. Good men are good. Sometimes they even give me a necklace. Look at this one. A Seth from the north gave it to me. (He was a grain merchant.) I did not understand his language. He did not speak mine. But he came back after he had gone, and gave it to me and said: Be happy.’

‘Are you happy?’ asked Govindan Nair.

The girl threw a bit of her sari over her body.

‘Are you?’ she asked.

‘Can’t you see I am happy?’

‘Where does it come from?’

‘Where does water come from?’

‘From the tap?’

‘And the water in the tap?’

‘From the lake?’

‘And the water in the lake?’

‘From the sky.’

‘And the water in the sky?’

‘From the ocean?’

‘And the water in the ocean?’

‘From the rivers.’

‘And the river waters?’

‘They make the lakes.’

‘And the tap water?’

‘Is river water.’

‘And so?’

‘Water comes from water,’ she said.

‘I am a kitten,’ he said.

She seemed frightened. She covered her pubic parts with her sari.

‘What?’ she asked.

‘I let the mother cat carry me.’

‘And so?’

‘And the river flows.’

‘And then?’

‘The lakes give water to taps.’

‘Then?’

‘Man is happy—because he knows he lives in a house three storeys high. When his woman is going to have a child, he will build a house two storeys high. He will marry her and build his child a house. The child, the child, he cries as if in tragic tenderness, the child will have a house to grow in. Oh, children need houses. And women need husbands.’

‘I had a husband,’ she said. ‘Yes,’ she insisted.

‘What happened to him?’

‘He died in the wars.’

‘Who killed him?’

‘The British.’ ‘Why?’

‘Because he would not shoot at the Germans.’

‘And how did you come here?’ he asked.

‘And how did you come here?’ she replied.

‘I came because I work in a ration office. I distribute physical happiness to him that wants.’

‘And not to her that wants?’

‘I have a she—and she wants it, and I pour it into her. To speak the truth, nobody can give. Only the mother cat can give.’

‘Give me!’ she cried.

‘Come tomorrow to Ration Office No. 66. I will give you a card, a family card. Between ten and five we are always there.’

She sank back on the bed. Govindan Nair observed that she had flowers in her hair. She was gazing at the ceiling. Just a tear or two was dropping, marking her face with collyrium. She looked lovely with her well-knit limbs, her sorrow which heaved her breasts—there was such ovular pain where the centre of her body lay. He put his hand there and said, ‘Forgive.’

His touch seemed magical. She flung up and put her arms around him, her breasts against his face. He bowed low, made a namaskar, and stood up. How can man make a woman suffer? How can anyone touch a body so smooth, a face so gentle, so helpless, the Seth’s necklace speaking a strange tongue against her imbibing navel? Her hair was so perfect.

‘The British did it?’ he said.

‘Yes. Man did it,’ she said.

‘May I go? he asked.

‘Yes,’ she said, like a wife to a husband. Tenderly she rose, covered herself, and stood up like a daughter before a father. He turned as if to hide his emotions. Of course pen and paper were there. Everything was typed and ready. He signed the paper. Ration Shop Licence No. 9181 in the District of Ummathur. In the village of Udasekarapuram. Name of the holder: Prabhakar Pillai. Address: Main Street, Murtarakara. Valid up to August 11, 1944. Signed: B. Govindan Nair. The signature was clear and round as the eyes of a child. Lakshmi was dressed by now. She looked so clean, so like a Brahmin lady near the temple streets.

‘Your husband will come back,’ he said.

‘They shot him,’ she said.

‘No, they did not. I have the ration cards of all the soldiers. I have his name, I am sure, in the office. Our working hours are between ten and five.’

‘Bless me, as if I were your daughter,’ she said.

‘My sister,’ he said.

And when she lifted up her face, her whole being was lucent. She was going to find her husband. Life is like that. You get what you want. But do you know what you want? ‘Do you really know? Mister, that is the problem,’ said Govindan Nair that evening to me. ‘You do not want to build this house. I really want to. Shantha will have a child. She is your wife. A wife must have a house. You have a son. I prophesy,’ he said, and jumped across the wall as if carried away like a kitten.