He came out to the garden terrace, where they served breakfast. It was still chilly in the morning. A thin fog had descended over the river, blurring the contours of the forest on the opposite bank. Its outline, with its wide canopies and dangling roots, reminded him of a faint watercolor on the jacket of a Kipling novel he had owned ages ago, painted by one of those nineteenth-century British women artists who’d traveled all over the East in search of exotic flora to draw. The river was still, unperturbed, save for a slim boat, a shikara, slowly breaking the surface with its oars.
There she was, alone at the table under the trellis, wrapped up in the new pashmina dyed with natural pigments that had taken the place of her black sweater (“Black? Who wants to wear black anymore, once you see all these vibrant colors?”).
“Hi, darling,” she said, smiling. She was usually in a good mood in the morning. She always said that it was her happiest time.
“Would you like to see the paper?” She slid The Hindu across the table. It was another ruse she had taken up, this pretense of being interested in Indian internal affairs, with all those intricate party names and corrupt politicians. However, in only a couple of weeks she’d become an authority. She knew the candidates for the next elections by name and had even picked the one they should root for.
“No thanks, not now,” he demurred. Every now and again, he resisted her voracious curiosity; it was his way of keeping her in check.
What about his own enthusiasms? Why had they dwindled, why did he no longer take pleasure in discovering new things? He feared there might be only one answer to that, and it was age. He was only forty-seven—just three more years to go before the old writer’s epiphany—yet he felt his scale had already tilted over to one side. Surely the portion of future available to him as a youngish-looking, energetic and still attractive man was much smaller than what he had put behind already. Shouldn’t he make an effort, make the best of it? Why could he not gather the energy to feel passionate again about what lay outside his own head?
He had figured he no longer did because by now all he really cared and worried about were the books he still needed to write before it was too late and he’d have nothing more to say. “Egotism—necessary/?essential trait,” he’d once scrawled in a journal, thinking that one day he might use the idea in an essay. At this point in his life all he actually longed for was to be able to sit still in one place with as little disturbance as possible in front of his computer, waiting for the words that would, line after line, compose the unformed story in his head. He knew he wasn’t alone in that; every other writer had said the same thing when asked about the mystery of their profession in any interview: the act of writing was a sedentary, solitary work, where no other people were needed. He had stashed away enough experiences when he was a younger man; now he just needed to elaborate on that material, organize it. He didn’t need to live it again, did he?
It was either that or depression, this lack of want for life.
Secretly, a year earlier, he had seen a psychiatrist, a friend of a friend whom he’d met at a party. “Only half an hour of your time is all I really need,” he had told the kind-looking doctor. But the minute he sat across from him in his luscious, book-lined studio, he poured out his unpleasant thoughts of death, how his appetite for life seemed to be tapering off. The older man, with his gentle face and sympathetic expression, had said he didn’t sound depressed—depression being a serious clinical condition. But he’d be happy to prescribe something mild if he felt he needed “just a little help.” He said he didn’t need it and came out of the doctor’s studio both relieved and disappointed. The idea of “a little help” was humiliating; he’d somehow wanted his mental condition to be either all or nothing.
He realized in the taxi home after his session that what he forgot to tell the psychiatrist was that his novels didn’t sell nearly as well as they had in the past. There were reasons, of course. New, younger writers for one, to whom people were more drawn because of their looks, their reckless lives, the wordplay they used. There was also the fact that he, along with so many other writers of his generation, had lost his luster (the author’s photos on the jackets had had to change, no more leather and ruffled hair, but tailored suits and receding hairlines). And lastly, possibly, he had to admit to a certain repetitiveness in the plots of his novels. Like most writers, he’d always had a specific theme and followed the same thread (wasn’t that a quality rather than a flaw? Didn’t great writers essentially always write variations of the same book over and over again?). His particular theme had revolved around the existential musings of a character who had been the protagonist of most of his novels. Throughout the years the character had kept the same name, the same job, he had grown, aged, lost his hair, just like him. Somehow though, as of late, his readership too had thinned. Not dramatically—he still sold enough to keep his publisher happy and enough money coming in—but the phone calls from his agent to keep him up to date on the sales were not nearly as effervescent or as frequent as ten years earlier.
The trip had been her idea. He knew he owed it to her. It was only fair for her to demand they spend time alone together, have a few weeks with nothing coming between them. Yet he couldn’t help thinking of it as a duty rather than a gift. She’d proposed that after handing in the last draft of his novel he take her to India. Since they’d been together, he’d promised just this. But something had always come up and the trip had always been postponed.
“I’ll divorce you, otherwise,” she’d said jokingly.
In the fall he rang an expensive travel agent who organized upmarket tours in the vein of Paul Bowles followers. Then he wrapped the itinerary and tickets in a golden envelope and gave it to her for Christmas.
They’d been at the Fort three days now and so far they’d been the only guests. She had instantly fallen in love with the place and had asked him if they might lengthen their stay instead of moving on to their next destination. He was relieved at the idea of canceling what was left of their exhausting itinerary and settling down somewhere. He didn’t mind that some of the hotels had already been paid for, he’d never been fussy about money. What was more important was the relief of no more hours spent driving on those terrible roads risking their lives, always too close to the HORN PLEASE signs on the backs of those overly painted trucks; no more dark temples with sticky floors, poojas, milk poured on shiny lingams, no more beggars, fumes, swarms of motorcycles carrying husband, wife and two children squeezed on one seat with no helmet; no more ghastly bazaars selling dusty junk, no more haggling with rude rickshaw drivers. They could sit still, make this beautiful place their home, so that he might be able to jot down some lines at last while his wife read and went looking for the handloom textiles the region was famous for.
The hotel had been the family home to a dynasty of maharajas for four hundred years. It was an impressive fortress perched on the edge of a cliff overlooking the banks of the Narmada River. It had only a handful of exquisitely furnished rooms open to guests; the rest was still the maharaja’s private home. He was the last heir to the dynasty, a handsome man in his midfifties with a slender, elegant figure, who spoke fluent French, Italian and English with a pleasant American accent, due to the years he’d spent there in college. He joined them every morning for breakfast on the terrace in the rampart, overlooking the river, in a beautiful coat cut in Mughal style, and he reappeared in the evening in a starched kurta and woolen vest and a ruby on his little finger. The maharaja had a Danish wife, who was in Copenhagen at the moment, but they’d seen a picture of her in a silver frame on one of the tables in the drawing room. She was beautiful and wore her sari like she’d been born into it.
Being the only guests had enhanced the feeling of being at home and allowed the fantasy of owning the place. They dined each night in a different courtyard lit by hundreds of candles that flickered in the dark, designing graceful geometric patterns. Every night his wife engaged in conversation with the maharaja—she was of course enraptured by his elegance, his knowledge of the local traditions, but also by his worldly manners and his wit. She was delighted to have the prince all to herself.
He joined her at the beautifully laid breakfast table. There were flowers arranged in small clusters, linen napkins and silverware polished to a glossy shine. An attendant immediately came to pour his tea.
“Where is our prince?” he asked his wife.
“He just left. We had a lengthy discussion about food. He wanted to know about fried zucchini flowers, believe it or not. Apparently he had them in Rome once and has never forgotten them. He wants me to teach him the recipe. Isn’t it hilarious?” She laughed. “You must come and take a picture of me in the kitchen while he and I cook together. Will you?”
He nodded absentmindedly. They both knew that he’d find an excuse not to and that eventually she’d find someone else, either a waiter, the cook or the woman who swept their room—people whose names she’d already memorized—and hand over the camera. It was the kind of photo she most sought to have and to show: immortalized in her shalwar kameez, next to her charming prince, intent on cooking in his kitchen! That would show their friends how far inside real India they’d managed to reach.
“Tomorrow he’s organized a classical dance performance on a tiny island upriver for a group of friends who arrive tonight. We’re invited, of course. Would you like to go?” she said.
He nodded vaguely.
“Let’s see how the day goes.”
“His friends are from Delhi,” she added, as if to stress that the level of familiarity they’d accessed with the prince woudn’t be offset by the arrival of a bunch of foreigners. It was an all-Indian soirée they’d been asked to.
“It’s an Odissi dance performer. Apparently she is the best in the country, he said. The number one.”
She waited for him to show some interest.
“Odissi is the classical dance we’ve seen in the temple sculptures. In Puri, remember? Those beautiful bas-reliefs?”
“As long as it’s not a four-hour-long ordeal. You know how entertainment can drag on forever here.”
“It won’t, I’m sure. I’m sure it’ll be fantastic. He’s so good at creating fabulous sets using just lights and flowers.”
“Do we have to answer now?” he asked. There was a hint of impatience in his voice.
“Not immediately. But I think it would be polite to let him know by tonight, don’t you?”
“Fine. We will. Can you pass me a piece of toast, please?”
He began to butter the slice of brown bread and she went back to The Hindu.
She still looked beautiful, despite her age. She was already forty-two. Good bone structure—that, she had. High cheekbones, a straight aquiline nose, lips still full and thick eyebrows. It was a handsome, strong face. There were lines, of course, there was sagging and creasing in places. But she was still holding on graciously. Men still looked at her and found her attractive.
“You look ravishing today,” he said, feeling guilty. He knew he had been unpleasant.
She immediately touched her face.
“Really? I can’t look at my face, it’s so drawn. And my hair is a horror.”
“Don’t be silly. You are glowing.”
She rested her hand on his.
“Thank you. That makes me feel a lot better.”
He needed a little time alone, he’d said as they finished their breakfast. They would meet again for lunch, after the zucchini flowers experiment. She was used to this kind of announcement, it had been such a big part of their marriage, the off-limits zone he declared at random that had to be immediately cleared. Whenever he said he needed to be alone it meant he had to think and when he had to think it meant he had to walk. Apparently moving at a fast pace produced a parallel flow in his mental processes, facilitating an entryway into the story he was beginning to shape in his head. This rule she had learned to observe with respect, even awe. The first few years they were together she took it as a sign of his artistic temperament and had been proud of his mannerisms.
He left her reading the paper at the table and walked down the steps that led from the Fort to the ghats below. The riverbank was quiet in the early-morning light. There were only a few women washing clothes or bathing in their saris, slowly combing their long, wet hair. The water sloshed quietly against the steps, lapping at the feet of the small marble nandis that lined the bank. Each one of the divine bulls carved in stone had an oil lamp at its feet, and at night people would light them. He had seen their glow from the Fort’s terrace at night. Who took care of that? And since when? Perhaps those oil lamps beneath the feet of the nandis had burned nightly for centuries and there would have been someone attending to this ritual every night. Even at this time of day, so early in the morning, the white marble bulls had already been laden with garlands of fresh jasmine and marigolds. He also wondered where all those flowers came from. Every morning all across India, from the north to the south, whether there was snow or desert, people bought garlands to crown their gods. He assumed thousands of tons of flowers must be strung in garlands every day. Yet he never saw flowers growing anywhere, all he had seen in weeks of traveling was red dust, burned grass, yellowing reeds. How did all the flowers travel, how many trucks drove across the country at night, loaded with marigolds and jasmine? How come these garlands always looked fresh, undeterred by dust and heat? Surely his wife would love to research this conundrum.
He walked some more, all the way to the Shiva shrine at the end of the ghat. He had had no useful thoughts about the story he was trying to crack. India wasn’t a place conducive to creativity, he decided; it occupied too much space with all its unanswerable questions. Despite his efforts not to be distracted, he too had been encumbered by India’s too many layers, its multiple souls, by the myriad messages it sent everywhere one looked.
She went back upstairs to their room and sat on the cushions by the bay window overlooking the river. She was relieved to be alone again. Looking through the latticed shutters she was able to make out the silhouette of her husband walking slowly on the ghat right below her, heading toward the Shiva shrine. In his blue polo shirt and khaki pants, he stuck out like a sore thumb among all the women standing knee-deep in the river. As usual, he walked with his head down, looking only at his feet. He didn’t look happy, or inspired by his walk, that much she could tell. She wished that every now and then he’d make the effort to look up at what was around him rather than gazing constantly inward. They had been three weeks on the road by now and she’d begun to feel how tiresome it was to travel with someone who never seemed to enjoy himself. As usual, she had had to do all the work, like a puppeteer moving all the characters across the stage, or a ventriloquist doing all the voices, in order to keep the audience entertained. Sometimes it became too demanding. Though she knew that if she stopped working at it they would both sink into a silence and that could get scary. Once she had tried it: she had allowed herself to plunge into a wistful silence and he’d begun to question her relentlessly, not because he sincerely worried about what might have upset her, but rather, she felt, because he was alarmed at the idea that his private jester may have gone on strike.
Although she hadn’t formulated this thought in its entirety, she knew exactly why she’d come up to the room and what was going to happen next. She watched herself open her husband’s laptop and go online. Watched her fingers tap her ex-lover’s name. She just wanted to check how difficult it would be to find him. She could look for his name on Skype first. That would be easy and quite innocent. No need to call or send a message. All she wanted was to find a way to get in touch with him, so that someday—and only if she wanted to—she would know how.