The Sari Shop (24 page)

‘I don’t know the details, but from what I have heard, Chander and his wife really went through a very bad time for months, till Chander found this job here. Chander made a mistake though. One day, when he was drunk, he told his wife their names, the Guptas and the Kapoors, and where they lived. Bas, that is all she needed I suppose. He has forgotten all about it, because you have to get on with life, and these things happen all the time. That’s the way of the world. But his wife, she is a complete witch. Mad woman that she is, she still holds a grudge against her husband’s employers after all these years. Abuses them in anyone’s hearing. And after all you know, both of them are counted amongst the biggest men in Amritsar. And who is she? Nobody. It is so unwise of her. At least she should have thought of her husband, no? While living in the same water, a small fish cannot afford to make enemies with the crocodile. But who will explain that to her? She is completely mad, I think. And she drinks. It is disgraceful, and so hard on Chander, isn’t it? God alone knows what happens to her mind when she is drunk.’

Ramchand listened in silence. He thought of her, the woman
in the purple sari, of her collarbones sticking out, of the emptiness in her eyes.

And for the first time, he felt completely sick with himself, for being deferential towards Mrs Gupta when she came shopping, for enjoying Rina Kapoor’s wedding, for being flattered by Rina’s interest in him, for being the person he was.

*

Over the next few days, Ramchand became more withdrawn than he had ever been. Into his heart, crept a permanent feeling that everything was very wrong – a constant disquiet, a perpetual sinking feeling in the stomach. Sometimes he felt guilty. Maybe he should have spoken out. But why hadn’t Chander’s wife spoken up for herself? Maybe she wanted to keep it quiet. In that case, maybe he was right to keep quiet too.

His appetite vanished, sometimes he couldn’t even bear the smell of food. He felt unwashed and dirty even after he took thorough, soapy baths and wore freshly laundered clothes. There was a constant bad taste in his mouth. His intake of tea went up, and he rarely spoke to anyone, just listening quietly when anyone addressed him.

He even lost the comfort of fantasizing about Sudha, or anyone else, for that matter. For when he lay down, shut his eyes, and started rubbing his crotch over his trousers, ready to be aroused and pleasured by daydreams, ready to find some physical relief from his misery, the only images he could conjure up were the vomit stains on Kamla’s blouse and the bloodstains on her sari.

Then he would feel the pricking of tears in his eyes, and all physical desire would disappear.

*

And then, one morning, to his horror, Ramchand saw the door of the shop open, and Mrs Gupta came in, as usual accompanied by Mrs Sandhu. Apart from Ramchand and Gokul, everyone was busy attending to other customers.

Ramchand didn’t want to wait on Mrs Gupta. He quietly got to his feet and shuffled into a corner, hoping not to be noticed.

So it was in front of Gokul that the two women plopped themselves down.

Gokul gave them his best smile.

‘Aai hai, it is so hot,’ Mrs Gupta said, taking out a scented, lace-edged, pink handkerchief from her handbag. She mopped her face carefully with it, skirting cleverly around the lipstick and dabbing her eyes gently so as not to smudge the eyeliner.

Mrs Sandhu’s fair skin had gone red. She fanned herself with one end of her blue chunni.

‘Shall I get some water?’ Gokul asked solicitously.

‘No, no,’ Mrs Gupta said, groping in her bag and drawing out a ten rupee note. She held it out to Gokul. ‘Just send for a bottle of chilled mineral water. Chilled. And only Bisleri, mind you.’

Gokul motioned to Hari, who had just finished selling a peach sari to a thin, harried looking woman and was looking pleased with himself.

Hari came over, swaggering. He rarely sold a sari all on his own.

Gokul gave him the note and the instructions. And in a lower voice, he hissed in Hari’s ear, ‘And be back in a minute. Don’t go off to loaf or to buy pakoras.’

Hari looked injured. ‘Have I ever done such a thing, Gokul Bhaiya?’ he asked in a pathetic voice. ‘Maybe I have,’ he added, ‘but not for a very long time now. These days, if you haven’t noticed, I have become hard working. You’ll hardly ever see me wasting time. And you know…’

‘Shut up, Hari. No drama now. Go immediately,’ Gokul told him and then turned to the two women again, smiling.

‘Show us some thin saris, for summerwear. But nothing that creases easily, okay?’ said Mrs Gupta.

‘We want cotton, but the most superior quality cotton you have,’ added Mrs Sandhu.

Gokul nodded and gestured to Chander across the room. Chander was looking weary. He could be heard throughout the shop arguing with a customer over the price of a zardosi-bordered sari. Chander nodded at Gokul and, continuing to argue, reached out to the shelf behind him and took out a few packed saris. One by one, he threw them accurately at Gokul. They flew over the heads of all the customers and Gokul caught them deftly.

He opened the packs one by one, extolling the virtues of each sari. Hari returned with a bottle of chilled mineral water. Ramchand remained huddled in the corner, watching silently, thinking of Chander’s wife.

Did Chander know? Should he tell Chander, ask him if he knew or not? But how could he speak to Chander about something this intimate concerning his wife? He looked at the animated, chattering face of Mrs Gupta. Should he tell
her
? What would be the right thing to do?

He groaned quietly, drew up his knees and bent his head down, resting it gently on them. He felt like crying, weeping out loud, collecting all the people in the shop and telling them everything. Surely, someone would do
something.

Would they?

Ramchand continued to squat on the mattress, his ten toes sinking inside it, gripping the softness firmly.

‘Ramchand?’ A voice startled him. He looked up.

Mahajan stood towering over him.

‘What is this, hunh? The shop is full, everyone is so busy that nobody has the time to scratch his head even, and you
are sitting here relaxing. You think you are sitting on a bench in Company Bagh?’

‘Bauji…’ Ramchand began.

‘Okay, okay. Now don’t give me any of your excuses. At least help Gokul if you have nothing else to do,’ Mahajan said, turned abruptly and walked away.

Ramchand looked at Mahajan’s unyielding, spiteful, flabby retreating back with fresh dislike.

He was about to shuffle closer to Gokul when he saw Mrs Bhandari come in with Mrs Sachdeva. It felt so unreal. He remembered a similar afternoon, or was it a morning, in the winter, when they had all come to the shop on the same day. He had attended to all of them.

But at least now he wouldn’t have to show Mrs Gupta any saris. He came forward and smiled weakly at the two women who had just come in. They did not look at him. They ran their eyes around at the shelves before they sat down in front of Ramchand, murmuring to each other in low voices, unlike Mrs Gupta and Mrs Sandhu, whose shrill conversation could be heard all over the shop.

‘Show us some new batik prints,’ said Mrs Sachdeva. Ramchand nodded and got up to fetch them. He didn’t feel like shouting to Hari, who was closer to the batik prints shelf, and have Hari grin and shout and throw him the packs.

He rummaged for a while in the shelf while the two women waited. Shyam caught his eye and frowned at him. It was considered criminal in Sevak Sari House to keep customers waiting. It was much better to drown them in a deluge of saris, till they
had
to choose one, even if just in order to escape. Ramchand hurriedly took out a few packs and went back to his place.

The women began the familiar routine. They felt the fabric of each sari with their fingers, they made comments to each other in low voices, they examined the borders critically.
Ramchand didn’t say much. He did not try to push any sari forward or draw their attention to anything remarkable in a particular sari. He just sat there silently, handing them the saris one by one.

Shyam caught his eye again and raised his eyebrows questioningly, looking slightly annoyed. In Mahajan’s absence, Shyam and Rajesh considered themselves to be in charge of the shop, as long as it didn’t interfere with their tea-drinking and bidi-smoking sessions.

Ramchand deliberately looked away.

He tried his best to appear calm when Mrs Sachdeva picked up a brown sari and complained to Mrs Bhandari, ‘See, this would have been perfect if the border hadn’t been so wide, wouldn’t it?’

Ramchand remembered the time when he had sat in the drawing room of the Kapoor House, listening to Rina Kapoor talk to Mrs Sachdeva. The Kapoors, who had been partners with the Guptas in the cloth-processing unit, who hadn’t paid Chander, who had made Chander’s wife so angry.

‘Are you listening?’ Mrs Sachdeva asked him sharply. ‘I said, do you have the same sari, same colour and design, but with a thinner border?’

Ramchand shook his head.

She looked annoyed.

Ramchand looked at the creases in her forehead. What would she say if she knew?

She was supposed to be a learned woman. Then another thought struck him. Did Rina Kapoor know that her father did not pay wages on time? At least sometimes.

Should he go to her and talk to her? But he felt doubtful. Who would believe him? To Mrs Sachdeva, Ravinder Kapoor was probably just the doting father of her star pupil.

Ramchand squeezed and pinched the area between his
eyes. Everything seemed so dark and hasty suddenly. What could he do?

Now, Rajesh was frowning at Ramchand too. Ramchand felt a wave of resentment against him. Silly man, always talking, talking, talking, never even pausing to think what to say next!

Ramchand tried to collect himself together and pay more attention to the two exacting woman facing him. He took out some more saris.

‘Oh, hello, Mrs Bhandari,’ said Mrs Gupta suddenly.

Mrs Bhandari looked up, appearing to be surprised. ‘Oh, hello. I didn’t see you. Shopping?’

How silly, thought Ramchand, of course all the women were shopping.

‘You know Mrs Sandhu?’ asked Mrs Gupta, waving a hand towards her companion. ‘Her husband is Chief Engineer in the Electricity Board.’

‘Oh, that is nice,’ Mrs Bhandari said vaguely. ‘And I am sure you know Mrs Sachdeva. Head of English Department…’

Mrs Gupta interrupted her with a bright smile. ‘Oh, yes, of course I remember her. Don’t you think all of us met at the Kapoor wedding, you know Ravinder Kapoor’s daughter’s wedding?’

‘Yes, that is right,’ said Mrs Sachdeva. ‘But, you know, that girl is so bright that even if you say Rina Kapoor, one would know who you are talking about. She has forged an identity of her own, you know, she is not just Ravinder Kapoor’s daughter.’

There was an awkward pause in the conversation. Then Mrs Bhandari asked, ‘So, Mrs Gupta, what is your news? What is happening? How is your daughter-in-law? Shipra, her name is, right?

‘Shilpa,’ said Mrs Gupta, beaming. ‘Really, God is very kind.
Very, very kind. Touch wood. She is expecting, third month.’

Everyone smiled at this.

‘Well, congratulations. We’ll wait for the baby and then you’ll have to give us a party,’ said Mrs Bhandari.

‘Oh, yes, sure. And she is such a nice girl, you know. So submissive and well mannered. And by God’s grace, my son Tarun’s factory is also doing very well. And my younger son calls up from the USA every week.’

Mrs Sachdeva looked at her, then turned her eyes back to the sari she had in her hands, saying in a very low voice, ‘That is very nice.’

Mrs Gupta beamed.

Mrs Bhandari then turned to Mrs Sandhu.

‘And how are your children?’ she asked in a friendly voice.

Mrs Sandhu replied in a slow, placid voice. ‘Oh, they are doing well. My elder son, Manu, Mandeep, his name is, but we call him Manu, he has cleared his entrance exams. He’ll be able to get into the Amritsar Medical College. Finally, I can use the mixer-grinder and the washing machine without worrying about making a noise and disturbing him. All Waheguru’s blessings.’

‘Well, yes, academics are very important these days,’ said Mrs Bhandari. ‘My Rosie has gone to Delhi to do her MSc. I told her, do it here, but she wouldn’t listen. There are such good matches coming for her, but she says she is not in the frame of mind to marry now. She says marriage and money aren’t everything in life.’

Mrs Gupta sniffed. Mrs Sandhu said with a fond smile, ‘But believe me, Mrs Bhandari, today’s youngsters want everything. No matter what they say, they do want money. My younger son is just in Class Ten. And a new demand every other day. Now he is saying he wouldn’t go to school till we buy him a motorcycle. What can one do?’

‘Well, we are as bad, aren’t we?’ said Mrs Gupta, with a
conspiratorial smile. ‘Just the other day we bought a new microwave oven and now I feel like buying an outdoors barbeque set.’

‘What to do? You can’t help it,’ said Mrs Sandhu. ‘You do need money, bhai, no matter what anyone says.’

Mrs Sachdeva suddenly said in a smooth voice. ‘True, money is very important. To maintain a standard of living. But there must be other things in life apart from money. Now look at Rina Kapoor. Doesn’t lack anything in life. She has money, beauty, a solid family backing. But she has carved out a niche for herself by writing a book, by earning her own reputation. Have you read the book?’ she asked Mrs Gupta and Mrs Sandhu.

Both of them shook their heads, and Mrs Gupta said, ‘Who has the time? For you it is your job, but we have to look after so much at home, you know.’

There was tension in the air.

Then Mrs Sachdeva suddenly smiled a friendly smile. ‘By the way, Mrs Gupta,’ she asked in a friendly voice, ‘your daughter-in-law is pretty young, isn’t she?’

‘Yes, she is twenty-one.’

‘And what has she done?’ Mrs Sachdeva asked casually.

‘You mean?’ Mrs Gupta faltered.

‘I mean, her qualifications?’

‘Well, she did take admission in BA. But she couldn’t finish it, you see, the marriage got fixed up in the middle of it.’