A Son Of The Circus (92 page)

Madhu was very young and totally unproven, and she had no dowry. Yet here was a gentleman of means, well dressed, clearly a city person – he owned property and managed an entertainment business in Bombay – and was offering Madhu a marriage proposal that Mr and Mrs Das found extremely generous; he would take the poor girl
without a
dowry. Doubtless, in these premarital negotiations, there would have been some substantive discussion of the remuneration that the ringmaster and his wife deserved, for (who knows?) Madhu might have become a star of the Great Blue Nile. From Mr and Mrs Das’s point of view, they were offered a sizable payment for a sullen girl
who
might never prove herself to be any kind of acrobat at all. It wasn’t as if they were being asked to part with a young woman they’d grown fond of; they’d barely had time to talk with Madhu.

It may have crossed the Bengalis’ minds to consult the doctor or the missionary; Mr and Mrs Das at least should have discussed the would-be marriage with Deepa, but the dwarf’s wife was still sick. So what if Deepa was the one who’d spotted Madhu as a future boneless girl? The dwarf’s wife was still confined to her tent. Moreover, the ringmaster held a grudge against Vinod. Mr Das was envious of the dwarf’s car-driving business; since Vinod had left the Great Blue Nile, the dwarf hadn’t hesitated to exaggerate his success. And the ringmaster’s wife felt herself to be vastly superior to the dwarf’s wife; to consult with Deepa was beneath Mrs Das – even if Deepa were healthy. Besides, Mrs Das quickly persuaded her husband that Madhu’s marriage proposal was a good deal. (It was certainly a good deal for them.)

If Madhu wasn’t interested, they’d keep the silly child in the circus; but if the unworthy girl had the wisdom to recognize her good fortune, the ringmaster and his wife would let her go, with their blessings. As for the crippled brother, the gentleman from Bombay appeared to know nothing about him. Mr and Mrs Das felt some responsibility for the fact that the elephant-footed boy would be left on his own; they had considered it prudent to promise Dr Daruwalla and Martin Mills that Ganesh would be given every chance to succeed. The ringmaster and his wife saw no reason to discuss Ganesh with Deepa; the cripple hadn’t been a discovery of hers – she’d only claimed to discover the boneless girl. And what if the dwarf’s wife had something contagious?

A phone call to the doctor or the missionary would have been an appreciated courtesy – if nothing more. But there were no telephones at the circus; a trip to either the post office or the telegraph office would have been required, and Madhu surprised the ringmaster and his wife by her immediate and unrestrained acceptance of the marriage proposal. She didn’t feel that the gentleman was too old for her, as Mr Das had feared; nor was Madhu repelled by the gentleman’s physical appearance, which had been the primary concern of Mrs Das. The ringmaster’s wife was repulsed by the gentleman’s disfiguring scar — some sort of burn, she supposed – but Madhu made no mention of it, nor did she otherwise seem to mind such a hideous flaw.

Probably sensing, in advance, Dr Daruwalla’s disapproval, the ringmaster would wisely send a telegram to Martin Mills; the missionary had struck Mr and Mrs Das as the more relaxed of the two – by which they meant the more accepting. Furthermore, the Jesuit had seemed slightly less concerned for Madhu’s prospects — or else the doctor’s concern had been more apparent. And because it was Jubilee Day at St Ignatius, the school offices were closed; it would be Tuesday before anyone handed the telegram to Martin. Mr Garg would already have brought his young wife back to the Wetness Cabaret.

Naturally, it was in the Bengali’s best interests to make his telegram sound upbeat.

THAT
GIRL
MADHU
/ IT IS
BEING
HER
LUCKY
DAY
/
VERY
ACCEPTABLE
MATRIMONIAL
MADE
BY
MIDDLE-AGED
BUT
MOST
SUCCESSFUL
BUSINESSMAN
/ IT IS
WHAT
SHE
IS
WANTING
EVEN
IF
SHE
ISN’T
LOVING
HIM
EXACTLY
AND
IN
SPITE
OF
HIS
SCAR
/
MEANWHILE
THE
CRIPPLE
IS
BEING
AFFORDED
EVERY
OPPORTUNITY
OF
WORKING
HARD
HERE
/
REST
BEING
ASSURED
/
DAS

By the time Dr Daruwalla would hear the news, the doctor would be kicking himself; he should have known all along – for why else would Mr Garg have asked Ranjit for the address of the Great Blue Nile? Surely Mr Garg, like Dr Daruwalla, knew that Madhu couldn’t read; Acid Man had never intended to send the girl a letter. And when Ranjit gave Farrokh the message (that Garg had requested the circus’s address), the faithful secretary failed to inform the doctor that Garg had also inquired
when
the doctor was returning from Junagadh. That same Sunday, when Dr Daruwalla left the circus, Mr Garg went there.

Farrokh wouldn’t be persuaded by Vinod’s notion — that Garg was so smitten by Madhu, he couldn’t let her go. Maybe Mr Garg had been unprepared for how much he would miss Madhu, the dwarf said. Deepa insisted on the importance of the fact that Acid Man had actually
married
Madhu; surely Garg had no intentions of sending the girl back to a brothel – not after he’d married her. The dwarf’s wife would add that perhaps it
was
Madhu’s ‘lucky day.’

But this particular news wouldn’t find its way to Dr Daruwalla on Jubilee Day. This news would wait. Waiting with it was worse news. Ranjit would hear it first, and the medical secretary would elect to spare the doctor such bad tidings; they were unsuitable tidings for New Year’s Day. But the busy office of Tata Two was in full operation on this holiday Monday — there were no holidays for Tata Two. It was Dr Tata’s ancient secretary, Mr Subhash, who informed Ranjit of the problem. The two old secretaries conversed in the manner of hostile but toothless male dogs.

‘I am having information for the doctor only,’ Mr Subhash began, without bothering to identify himself.

‘Then you’ll have to wait until tomorrow,’ Ranjit informed the fool.

‘This is Mr Subhash, in Dr Tata’s office,’ the imperious secretary said.

‘You’ll still have to wait until tomorrow,’ Ranjit told him. ‘Dr Daruwalla isn’t here today.’

This is being important information – the doctor is definitely wanting to know it as soon as possible,’ Mr Subhash said.

‘Then tell me,’ Ranjit replied.

‘Well … she is having it,’ Mr Subhash announced dramatically.

‘You’ve got to be clearer than that,’ Ranjit told him.

That girl, Madhu – she is testing positive for
HIV
,’ Mr Subhash said. Ranjit knew this contradicted the information he’d seen in Madhu’s file; Tata Two had already told Dr Daruwalla that Madhu’s test was negative. If the girl was carrying the
AIDS
virus, Ranjit assumed that Dr Daruwalla wouldn’t have allowed her to go to the circus.

The
ELISA
is being positive, and this is being confirmed by Western Blot,’ Mr Subhash was saying.

‘But Dr Tata himself told Dr Daruwalla that Madhu’s test was
negative
,’ Ranjit said.

That was definitely the wrong Madhu,’ old Mr Subhash said dismissively. ‘Your Madhu is being HIV-positive.’

This is a serious mistake,’ Ranjit remarked.

There is being no
mistake
,’ Mr Subhash said indignantly. This is merely a matter of there being two Madhus.’ But there was nothing ‘merely’ about the matter.

Ranjit transcribed his phone conversation with Mr Subhash into a neatly typed report, which he placed on Dr Daruwalla’s desk; from the existing evidence, the medical secretary concluded that Madhu and Mr Garg might be sharing something a little more serious than chlamydia. What Ranjit couldn’t have known was that Mr Garg had gone to Junagadh and retrieved Madhu from the circus; probably Garg had made his plans to bring the girl back to Bombay only after he’d been told that Madhu was
not
HIV-positive – but maybe not. In the world of the Wetness Cabaret, and throughout the brothels in Kamathipura, a certain fatalism was the norm.

The news about the wrong Madhu would wait for Dr Daruwalla, too. What was the point of hurrying evil tidings? After all, Ranjit believed that Madhu was still with the circus in Junagadh. As for Mr Garg, Dr Daruwalla’s secretary wrongly assumed that Acid Man had never left Bombay. And when Martin Mills called Dr Daruwalla’s office, Ranjit saw no reason to inform the missionary that Madhu was carrying the
AIDS
virus. The zealot wanted his bandages changed; he’d been advised by the Father Rector that clean bandages would be more suitable for the Jubilee Day celebration. Ranjit told Martin that he’d have to call the doctor at home. Because Farrokh was hard at work – rehearsing for Rahul, with John D. and old Mr Sethna – Julia took the message. She was surprised to hear that Dhar’s twin had been bitten by a presumed-to-be-rabid chimpanzee. Martin was surprised, and his feelings were hurt, to hear that Dr Daruwalla hadn’t informed his wife of the painful episode.

Julia graciously accepted the Jesuit’s invitation to the high tea in honor of Jubilee Day; she promised that she’d bring Farrokh to St Ignatius before the start of the festivities so that the doctor would have plenty of time to change Martin’s bandages. The scholastic thanked Julia, but when he hung up the phone, he felt overcome by the sheer foreignness of his situation. He’d been in India less than a week; suddenly, everything that was unfamiliar was exacting a toll.

To begin with, the zealot had been taken aback by Father Julian’s response to his confession. The Father Rector had been impatient and argumentative; his absolution had been grudging and abrupt – and it had been hastily followed by Father Julian’s insistence that Martin do something about his soiled and bloody bandages. But the priest and the scholastic had encountered a fundamental misunderstanding. At that point in his confession when Martin Mills had admitted to loving the crippled boy more than he could ever love the child prostitute, Father Julian had interrupted him and told him to be less concerned with his own capacity for love, by which the Father Rector meant that Martin should be more concerned with God’s love and God’s will – and that he should be more humble about his own, merely human role. Martin was a member of the Society of Jesus, and he should behave accordingly; he wasn’t just another egocentric social worker – a do-gooder who was constantly evaluating, criticizing and congratulating himself.

‘The fate of these children isn’t in your hands,’ Father Julian told the scholastic, ‘nor will one of them suffer, more or less, because of your love for them — or your
lack
of love for them. Try to stop thinking so much about yourself. You’re an instrument of God’s will – you’re not your own creation.’

This not only struck the zealot as blunt; Martin Mills was confused. That the Father Rector saw the children as already consigned to their fate seemed remarkably Calvinistic for a Jesuit; Martin feared that Father Julian might also be suffering from the influence of Hinduism, for this notion of the children’s ‘fate’ had a karmic ring. And what was wrong with being a social worker? Hadn’t St Ignatius Loyola himself been a social worker of unflagging zeal? Or did the Father Rector mean only that Martin shouldn’t take the fate of the circus children too
personally
! That the scholastic had intervened on the children’s behalf did
not
mean he was responsible for every little thing that might happen to them.

It was in such a spiritual fog that Martin Mills took a walk in Mazagaon; he hadn’t wandered far from the mission before he encountered that slum which Dr Daruwalla had first shown to him – the former movie-set slum where his evil mother had fainted when she was stepped on and licked by a cow. Martin remembered that he’d vomited from the moving car.

At midmorning, on this busy Monday, the slum was teeming, but the missionary found that it was better to focus on such abjectness in a microcosmic fashion; rather than look up the length of Sophia Zuber Road for as far as he could see, Martin kept his eyes cast down – at his slowly moving feet. He never allowed his gaze to wander above ground level. Most of the slum dwellers were thus cut off at their ankles; he saw only the children’s faces – naturally, the children were begging. He saw the paws and the inquiring noses of scavenging dogs. He saw a moped that had fallen or crashed in the gutter; a garland of marigolds was entwined on its handlebars, as if the moped were being prepared for cremation. He came upon a cow – a whole cow, not just the hooves, because the cow was lying down. It was hard to navigate around the cow. But when Martin Mills stopped walking, even though he’d been walking slowly, he found himself quickly surrounded; it should be stated clearly
in
every guidebook for tourists – never stand still in a slum.

The cow’s long sad dignified face gazed up at him; its eyes were rimmed with flies. On the cow’s tawny flank, a patch of the smooth hide was abraded – the raw spot was no bigger than a human fist, but it was encrusted with flies. This apparent abrasion was actually the entrance to a deep hole that had been made in the cow
by a
vehicle transporting a ship’s mast; but Martin hadn’t witnessed the collision, nor did the milling crowd permit him a comprehensive view of the cow’s mortal wound.

Suddenly, the crowd parted; a procession was passing – all Martin saw was a lunatic mob of flower throwers. When the worshipers had filed by, the cow lay sprinkled with rose petals; some of the flowers were stuck to the wound, alongside the flies. One of the cow’s long legs was extended, for the animal was lying on its side; the hoof almost reached the curb. There in the gutter, within inches of the hoof but entirely untouched, was (unmistakably) a human turd. Beyond the serenely undisturbed turd was a vendor’s stall.