Their Language of Love Page 6

  The women in the garden could sense the aircraft’s distress. It was making tighter circles and the engine’s roar appeared to have developed a strident whining undertone.

  ‘For God’s sake let it land,’ breathed Ruth, echoing the prayer in each quickening heart. Billo’s small features had drawn closer together, making her pugnacious face appear even more belligerent. Ruth was surprised to see the line of tears glistening down her slightly pockmarked cheeks.

  The noise was deafening. The huge aircraft appeared to almost touch the TV antenna tied to a bamboo pole on their roof; then it banked and perilously sank from view. The women cringed, anticipating the explosion and the plume of flame and smoke that would arise from the crash. A few seconds later they knew from the heightened roar and screeching that the plane had landed. Grace and Billo both made the sign of the cross. Grace and her husband Sadiq attended mass most Sundays at the Catholic church, a ten-minute walk from the house. Billo was Muslim. Her gesture didn’t surprise Ruth who suspected she was a Christian convert to Islam. Such conversions were commonplace—a means to avoid the stigma of untouchability attached to most converts to Christianity. In any event, Billo had the bubbly, confident personality that could embrace all the religions in the world.

  ‘You want lunch outside, Memsahib?’ asked Billo, wiping the telltale trails of moisture from her face and reverting to what Ruth fondly termed her managerial mode.

  Ruth nodded: ‘Whenever the cook is back.’

  The men would soon return to their duties. The cart driver had yet to be paid. Billo disappeared through the sliding French doors that led into the sitting-room and Grace began unhurriedly to disperse the puddles of water on the drive with her long reed jharoo.

  Shernaz gave Ruth a ride to the polo grounds later that afternoon. In his zeal to further Islamize the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, General Zia had banished the racecourse to the outskirts of the city. The verdant acreage of the abandoned racecourse was converted into a garden with winding brick-paved paths and dramatically lit waterfalls and fountains. But the grassy spaces used by the polo players remained intact, except for the addition of a newly built cement stand for spectators.

  Ruth and Shahnaz knew almost everyone. They greeted their friends and acquaintances as they climbed the steps and sidled past them to take their seats. There was no sign of Raj. Ruth was soon caught up in the excitement of the match as the horses’ hooves thundered and the polo-sticks, wielded by sturdy men in jodhpurs and turbans, flailed about raising dust. It was hard to keep track of the ball.

  The sun, a cooling, crimson, pollution-enhanced orb, was low in the sky by the time they left. In the fifteen minutes it took to drive to Ruth’s house in the Cantonment it was already dark. Winter or summer, it surprised Ruth how abruptly the sun set in Lahore. At times she felt she could almost see it sink as the horizon consumed it.

  Ruth sometimes compared these rapid sunsets to the lingering twilights of her summers in New England. They had seemed like a gift of time—a period of grace in which she could indulge the activities she most enjoyed—hanging out with friends, flirting with eastern religions, protesting Apartheid and the Vietnam War at various campuses, dancing to rock, and avoiding her mother’s calls insisting she return to the church. And after the children came it afforded a precious slice of time—after they were put to bed—in which she could read, listen to music with Rick, or watch TV in an exhausted stupor as she and Rick sipped wine out of the crystal glasses they had received as wedding gifts.

  Billo knocked discreetly and without waiting for a summons entered the bedroom. Ruth frowned; Billo knew better than to disturb her when she retreated to her room after lunch. She held the paperback she was reading face down and raised her head from the pillows. Billo walked over to her with an oddly mincing gait and reserved countenance. The formal way her white woollen going-out shawl was draped around her head and torso gave her an alarming dignity. Billo seldom covered her head in the house; not even when they had visitors. Ruth pushed back the pillows and propped herself up against them.

  ‘Memsaab, he say he must talk to you.’ Her mouth a stern pucker, Billo was cryptic. ‘He not go. You come.’

  Billo usually made short work of the beggars, snake-charmers and hawkers who sometimes got through when the gate was not properly bolted. Sometimes she threatened to set the dog on them. If they persisted, she did. If it was a ragged mullah from one of the mosques dotting the Cantonment, asking for donations and handing out tracts and talismans—and these fellows were as persistent as the Jesuits in Boston—Billo would stand at the door and brusquely say, ‘The Sahib and Memsahib are Christian. They give to their own Girja-church. It is not seemly to disturb the sanctity of the house when the Sahib is away and speak to the women like this.’

  Alarmed by her choice of words and the accusation of impropriety they implied, threatened by Chikoo’s frenzied barking from behind the woman’s shalwar, the poor bearded cleric would confusedly lower his head and saunter away.

  On one occasion, appalled by Billo’s rudeness, Ruth had deliberately invited the man to step into the hall. Billo, clearly infuriated, brusquely signalled her away and slammed the door in the cleric’s face. Then she turned to stare sternly at her naive mistress.

  ‘You could have said the same thing more politely,’ Ruth had defended herself. ‘There is no need to be rude.’

  Billo had stared at her mistress for three mute seconds, her head wobbling slightly with frustration and anger. ‘Memsahib, you so little understand our ways!’ she had said with scathing finality and, turning her broad back on her mistress, trudged ahead with a curiously stiff-legged dignity.

  Confronted by so much authority, Ruth didn’t dare argue. She had felt like a rebuked cub that had put itself in harm’s way.

  Ruth could hear Chikoo barking fiercely at the entrance door. A whiff of fear emanated from Billo: it was uncharacteristic. ‘Who is it?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘He say he is police Inspector.’

  ‘You left a police officer standing in the porch?’ Ruth said, mildly exasperated.

  ‘Show him into the sitting room.’

  ‘No. Better you talk outside.’

  Billo held out Ruth’s calf-length robe. Ruth—who had initially been infuriated by what she considered Billo’s condescending attitude in frequently correcting her—had learnt enough not to question her judgement on matters of apparel. Her pants and sweater suitably concealed by the robe, Ruth followed the staid, stumpy figure chugging ahead.

  Billo opened the entrance door just wide enough to allow her mistress out and keep the dog in. Then she stood guard, bulging ominously through the partially opened door.

  The man was not in uniform. He wore a long cream linen shirt over his matching shalwar and stood modestly behind Ruth’s black Buick. He was a strapping, broad-shouldered fellow, well-fed and well-tended, the sheen on his face and exposed skin hinting at a recent almond oil massage: one noticed such things in Pakistan, she thought.

  After a brief glance at Ruth, the man politely averted his eyes and maintained a diffident distance. Clearly he was not accustomed to mixing with women socially and certainly not with Western women. To put him at his ease Ruth stepped up to him instead. She did not hold out her hand as she would have when she had first arrived in Pakistan. Ruth was glad she wore her robe: up close he emanated an almost feral air that was mildly disturbing. ‘Yes?’ she said, pleasantly.

  ‘Madam, you are Ruth Walker?’

  ‘Yes?’

  The man removed a laminated plastic card from his shirt pocket and politely gave it to Ruth. ‘I am sub-inspector Junaid Akhtar from ISI, Cantt. Sector.’

  Ruth scanned the information briefly and handed the card back. What was a secret service man doing on her porch?

  ‘I need to ask you a few questions.’ He spoke better English than she expected. ‘It won’t take long.’

  She could tell from his voice and mien that the man was making an effort not to offend or intimidat
e her. She wasn’t afraid.

  ‘You had an Indian woman staying in your house as guest?’

  The question caught Ruth off guard. The distrust between Pakistan and neighbouring India bordered on paranoia. Ruth disguised her unease by adopting a defiant air. ‘Yes—is that a crime?’

  ‘Yes, it is.’ The sub-inspector’s voice took on a subtly menacing edge. ‘Don’t you know foreigners, Indians, are not allowed to stay in the Cantonment? This is a sensitive military area, a restricted area.’

  Even as the answer confirmed her misgiving, it shocked her.

  ‘Oh,’ Ruth said, ‘I didn’t know.’ She felt a little breathless. It occurred to her to say: ‘But aren’t my husband and I foreigners …?’

  He had anticipated her remark and cut in before she completed her sentence. ‘Your landlord took special permission from the Cantt Board when he let his bungalow to Americans. You are okay. Don’t worry.’

  It figured. Their landlord was a retired General. The army was in charge of the country and General Zia was Head of State.

  Ruth had met the Indian woman, Uma Bhat, at a party and found her lively and fun to be around. The family with whom Uma was staying were suddenly expecting a hoard of relatives from their village and were looking for someone with whom Uma could stay. Uma was to return to Delhi in a couple of days and Ruth had gladly volunteered her hospitality.

  ‘Didn’t you notice our red Suzuki?’ the man asked. ‘It was parked here all the time.’ He indicated with his chin the space between the Buick and the lawn where the Suzuki had been parked. There was the hint of a swagger in his voice.

  For a moment Ruth was bewildered; and then things fell into place. There was a lot of traffic in and out of her house during Uma’s stay. Friends came to pick her up or drop her off at all times of day and night. Ruth had noticed the Suzuki snugly parked by the lawn. Its pristine red coat polished to a gloss, it was clearly visible from the sitting-room. She had assumed it belonged to one of Uma’s friends. Except for that one time when she knew Uma was out and had been vaguely discomfited at its continuing presence on their drive. Ruth was not by nature suspicious and her experiences in Pakistan had given her little cause for mistrust. She had shrugged it off: they must have piled into another car and parked it for the duration.

  But she should have been suspicious; she had ignored the repeated red flags its presence had signalled.

  Ruth felt a surge of anger and a mortifying sense of violation. Where most tiny, locally assembled Suzuki cars in Lahore are typically white, this one was flagrantly red; and the small car had breached their space and spied on their house. Its showy red colour upset her the most—somehow it represented the brazen audacity of the intrusion.

  She wished Rick wasn’t travelling. ‘My husband is the South Asia manager for Dow Chemicals Fertilizer Company,’ she said, grappling for any importance she could muster in efforts to combat the sub-inspector’s own air of confidence.

  ‘I know that.’

  Of course! She felt foolish.

  ‘Madam, you are in a ladies’ club?’

  Ruth was taken aback by the change in tack and somewhat relieved. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘The International Women’s Club.’ Surely there was no harm in that: the elite of Lahore belonged to it.

  ‘Do you hold office in it?’

  ‘I am on the Executive Committee.’

  ‘Aren’t you president?’

  ‘I was, last year.’ She didn’t like the tricky way he had inserted that. At the same time she felt afraid; he probably knew a lot else about her. She didn’t want to antagonize him.

  ‘What activities you all do at the Club?’ The sub-inspector didn’t bother to conceal his contempt of the activities of an elitist Women’s Club. Ruth had come across this brand of chauvinism all over the globe.

  ‘It is a social club but we do volunteer work in orphanages. We work on women’s rights issues and help destitute women and their children,’ she said, speaking with prim defiance. ‘We hold fund-raising events.’

  What was she trying to prove? And to whom?

  ‘Who all are on the committee?’

  She found herself naming the current president and an impressive list of committee members. They were her friends: she played bridge with them, swam in their pools, watched polo and socialized with them almost every evening at the Punjab or Gymkhana Clubs or at dinner parties at their homes. Was she implicating Shahnaz and Sorriya and Gogo and Tita and Nergis and Nasira? They were savvy, educated women: lawyers and journalists—married to politicians, business tycoons, doctors, feudal lords, CEOs of multinational companies.

  ‘And the other members? Their names?’

  ‘There are over 500 members!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘Try,’ he said. ‘Tell your servant to get pencil-paper and write them down.’

  She had all but forgotten Billo’s watchful and forbidding presence in the door.

  ‘You’ve got to be kidding.’

  ‘I am not kidding. Write down whatever names you remember.’

  She was in a foreign country. Her husband was in Bombay or Sri Lanka or God knows where. She had brandished the committee members’ names and they hadn’t impressed. Every instinct told her to be cautious.

  ‘Get me a pen and writing paper,’ she told Billo.

  Billo, whose agitation had escalated to a point where her austerely covered head wobbled, looked incredulous.

  Ruth held her eye.

  Her face a mask of suppressed fury and disapproval, Billo let the dog out and slammed the door shut.

  Chikoo growled and sniffed at the man’s sandalled feet and sub-inspector Junaid Akhtar took mincing steps backward, fearing the dog’s touch might pollute his clothes before he could offer his Friday Jumah prayers. He knew enough not to kick Chikoo in front of Ruth. He looked down from his great height at the rodent-sized canine as if Chikoo was a Rottweiler. Ruth picked up her agitated pet and tried to calm him, and calm herself.

  Billo handed her mistress the pen and notepad and took the dog from her. Without deigning to look at the man, she again positioned her bulk in the door like a protective sentinel.

  Placing the lined pad on the Buick’s bonnet Ruth wrote down name after name. Salma, Nishat, Shyma, Tita, Talli, Lubna—they came to her easily because they were no longer difficult foreign names but bore the shapes of friends. The opening lines from Sara Suleri’s memoir, Meatless Days, came to her. It was among the books suggested to them at the orientation when they were posted to Pakistan. ‘Leaving Pakistan was, of course, tantamount to giving up the company of women.’ The words had appeared disingenuous and mildly offensive to Ruth. Now, as she named her friends, they rang true. She had discovered the company of women! Not that she lacked intimate friends in Houston or Boston or wherever Rick had been posted, but here she had understood a different connection within her own gender. Perhaps it was the segregated nature of Muslim society that dulled the competitive edge and enabled trust—permitted women to derive so much comfort and pleasure from each other’s company.

  The sub-inspector was reading over her shoulder from an appropriate distance; he must have lynx eyes. Suddenly he said: ‘What about Shireen?’

  Ruth looked up at him puzzled. ‘Shireen?’ Which Shireen was he referring to—she could think of at least three or four.

  ‘Isn’t Shireen Walid a member of your club?’

  Even though Ruth realized that the sardonic edge of contempt verging on hate in his voice was directed not at her but at Shireen Walid, a sprightly woman dedicated to human rights and women’s issues, Ruth was offended. ‘I don’t have the membership list memorized.’ Her tone was, for the first time, short. ‘She could well be for all I know.’

  Shireen, who Ruth guessed to be in her sixties, and her late husband Mazhar were dedicated communists. With her liquid amber eyes and clean-cut Grecian features she still was a strikingly beautiful woman. Ruth had heard that her husband had been jailed often for his fiery editorials in the Pakistan Times. Ruth ha
d met their handsome firebrand son, on a brief and almost clandestine visit. He lived in semi-exile in London. Did all this still matter in the late eighties—now that communism was becoming increasingly discredited and irrelevant?

  ‘But you know her?’

  ‘Yes I do.’

  ‘She came to your house to meet the Indian woman?’ It was more an assertion than a question.

  Ruth didn’t know if she had. ‘I don’t keep track of who visits my house-guests,’ she said.

  Billo’s gruff voice suddenly cut in: ‘Memsahib, no need to talk when Sahib not home. Come inside. Tell him, go!’

  ‘My husband is not home,’ Ruth said primly, Billo’s intervention reminding her of Pakistani proprieties. ‘I shouldn’t talk to you when there is no man in the house. If you need information, ask my husband.’ She looked at her watch. She’d had enough. She turned her back on the man and stepped in through the door Billo held open. Moments like this increased her appreciation of Billo’s overbearing and meddling ways. They could hear Chikoo’s excited barks and growls as he escorted sub-inspector Junaid Akhtar out of the gate.

  Later that afternoon, on the way to the polo grounds, she told Shahnaz about the visit from the Secret Service man, laughing at the rough way Billo had treated him. ‘She had him pegged all right—I wouldn’t be surprised if Billo was a jail-warden at some point!’

  ‘She probably was. She certainly looks like one.’ Shahnaz’s pert face darkened. ‘He damn well knew you were alone, and he had no business visiting you when Rick was away. These fellows are cowards. You shouldn’t countenance them.’ She smiled at Ruth to lighten the mood. ‘They tried the same thing on us … Arif has instructed the guards to shoo them away.’

  ‘Shoo them away?’ Ruth exclaimed laughing.

  ‘Ya, that’s the only way to treat the assholes. Otherwise they’ll sit on your head.’

  A week later Rick returned from his tour. She had a lot to tell him. She told him about the hijacking of the Air India plane and the airplane’s flying in ever tightening circles above their house, about her terror that it wouldn’t be permitted to land.