'Ejop Bkggks Hz,' he insists and takes my arm. He begins pulling me in the direction of the market. I think of breaking free, but his face is so friendly that I allow myself to be led. He walks in a peculiar fashion, almost on tiptoe. He takes me through narrow labyrinthine by-lanes and twisted alleys, and after fifteen minutes we emerge in front of a large mansion. 'Swapna Palace'
says the brass nameplate next to a huge iron door. He opens the door and we step inside. The mansion has a curved driveway, a massive lawn with a painted Gujarati swing and a fountain in it. I see two gardeners toiling on the grass. An old Contessa car stands in the driveway, being polished by a uniformed chauffeur. My friend is obviously known to the occupants of the mansion, because no one tries to stop him as he takes me up the driveway to the ornate wooden entrance of the house and presses the doorbell. A dark, young, good-looking maid opens the door. She looks at my friend and says, 'Oh, it is you, Shankar. Why do you come here again and again? You know Madam does not like it when you come this side.'
Shankar points at me. 'Dz Izzao X Nkkh.'
The maid looks me up and down. 'Oh, so Shankar has brought you here as a new tenant? I don't think there are any rooms left in the outhouse, but I will call Madam.' She disappears into the house.
Presently a middle-aged woman appears at the entrance. She is wearing an expensive silk sari and tons of gold jewellery. Her face is covered in make-up. She might have been beautiful in her youth, but, unlike Neelima Kumari, her face has lost its glow. Plus she has pinched lips which make her look rather severe. I take an instinctive dislike to her.
Shankar gets extremely excited on seeing the woman. 'Q Gkrz Ukj Hjhhu,' he says with a wide grin, but the woman doesn't even register his presence. 'Who are you?' she asks me, looking closely at my clothes. 'And why have you come with Shankar?'
I begin to wilt under her scrutiny.
'My name is Raju Sharma,' I say. There is no way I am going to use any of my real names in this city. Not after killing an unknown man in a train.
'Oh, so you are a Brahmin?' she asks, her eyes turning even more suspicious. I should have realized that a dark-skinned Brahmin would be something of a novelty.
'Yes. I am new to Agra. I have come to ask if there is anywhere I can stay.'
'We have an outhouse where we keep tenants.' I notice she uses the royal 'we'. 'Right now no room is available, but if you can wait a week, we can arrange for a room. It will cost you four hundred rupees per month, with the rent to be paid in advance in full at the beginning of the month. If this is acceptable, Lajwanti can show you the outhouse. But you will have to manage somewhere else for a week.'
'Thank you, Madam,' I reply in English. 'I will take the room and I will pay you four hundred rupees next week.'
The lady looks at me sharply as soon as I speak in English. Her severe features soften somewhat.
'Perhaps you can stay with Shankar for a week. Lajwanti, show him the outhouse.'
That is the end of the interview, conducted at the door.
Lajwanti escorts me to the outhouse, which is immediately behind the mansion and which I discover to be the North Indian equivalent of the chawl. It has a huge cobbled courtyard, with interconnected rooms constructed all round the periphery. There must have been at least thirty rooms in the tenement. Shankar's room is almost in the middle of the eastern corridor. He unlocks the door and we step inside. There is just one bed and a built-in almirah in the room, and, attached to it, a tiny kitchen, just like in our Ghatkopar chawl. The toilets are communal and located at the end of the western corridor. Bathing can only be done in the centre of the courtyard, under a municipal tap, in full view of the residents of the tenement. Lajwanti points out her own room. It is eight rooms before Shankar's. And the room I will get in a week's time is four rooms after Shankar's.
Before Lajwanti returns to the mansion, I ask her a quick question. 'Excuse me, but who is this boy Shankar? I've just met him in front of the Taj Mahal.'
She sighs. 'He is an orphan boy who lives here. We are all very fond of him. The poor fellow has some problem in his brain and cannot talk sense, just utters nonsense words. He roams around the city aimlessly all day. It is Madam's kindness that she has allotted him a room free of charge and also gives him some money to buy food. Otherwise the mental-asylum people would have picked him up a long time ago.'
I am shocked. Shankar appeared to me to be an intelligent boy, with only a speech defect.
Perhaps my assessment of Madam is also off the mark. Given her benefaction to Shankar, she cannot be as stern as she looks. 'And Madam. Tell me more about her,' I ask Lajwanti.
