Hot Water Man (11 page)

Shamime crossed the headlights, making her way round the hut. He had no torch to help her. The wind had risen and the moon clouded over.

A sharp cry.

‘Shamime?'

He stumbled forward and bumped into her. She was climbing to her feet. He put his arms around her and helped her up.

‘Just a can,' she said, her voice shaking. ‘Probably one of ours.'

He was still holding her. She was thinner than she seemed. ‘Pardon me.' Quickly he let her go and took the can, inspecting its label as if his life depended on it. She stood near, looking at it too.

‘Root Beer. I thought we'd cleared them up. Sure you're okay?'

‘Fine, I think. I should've worn my shoes.' She lifted one bare foot, holding his shoulder for balance. The wind blew her hair, whipping his cheek.

Along the beach, a loose shutter banged. She searched her pocketbook and found the key.

‘Let me do it.' He felt his way to the hut door and unpad-locked it. He stepped in. The party seemed to have happened a week ago. ‘You wait here,' he said. ‘You have some matches?'

She did not wait outside; she came into the hut. She was walking around, holding out her flickering lighter. The flame lit her tilted face and that bumpy nose. ‘I'm sure they're here somewhere.' Indoors her voice was smaller. ‘Somewhere around.' She sounded unsure. ‘There must be some candles. They leave the candles by the sink . . . I thought they did.'

‘I'll feel around.'

Like a blind man he ran his hands along the wall. Outside the waves were roaring. Shamime's face was flickering the other side of the hut.

‘Can't find the candles,' she said. ‘Perhaps they took them back.' She was lost without her servants.

This end of the hut it was pitch dark. He continued his search. The walls were rough and warm. He felt the floor. It was gritty with sand. His fingers felt the debris swept into the corner – a weightless cigarette carton, more sand. Waving to the right, his hand brushed the webbed back of an armchair. He felt'down its wooden leg.

‘I don't think they're here at all,' said Shamime's voice.

He looked up. The light caught her face as it turned. She should be safely back home. His hand met another leg, the next chair. He was old and clumsy. He should be back home too. His fingers felt the wall again; in places it was cracked.

‘You've searched your side?' her voice asked.

He was near her now. He straightened up.

‘What shall we do?' she said. ‘I don't know where they leave things.' She held up the lighter. Her hair was messed by the wind. His heart lurched. The small flame illuminated her face; her eyes were filled with tears.

‘What will my parents think?'

He had never seen her like this. The dog barked again, nearer. The wind slammed the door shut. The flame blew out. He felt her jump like a deer.

A shaky laugh. ‘This is silly,' she said. ‘You see, I'm terrified of the dark. Duke, are you there?'

‘I'm here.'

‘When I was little . . .'

Her hand touched his chest. ‘Duke, don't leave me alone.'

As she entered
the door, Christine was already writing the letter to Roz. Part of the reason she had come here, in fact, was to produce something amusing for Roz to flatten out on her desk at Rags. She imagined Roz laughing in that cubbyhole full of other women's lace. (Her own sister Joyce would not see the joke; Christine's letters to her were fond enough, but travelogue in tone.)

The British Wives' Association is over the other side of our modern suburb. Cars parked down the street outside. I had walked. I only came to see if somebody wanted a gardener so I could find mine another job. Chintzy curtains; loud women in loud prints. Tins of Nescafé and plates of biscuits, a Coffee Mornings atmosphere. Oh, remember our coffee nights? I miss the way we talked.

Everything nice and safe. Furnishings preserved, Weybridge circa 1956. A room from my own childhood. Wars might rage, Pakistan be gripped by Russians invading through Afghanistan, the crooked Prime Minister overthrown; outside there might be famines and floods, but here inside there will be honey still for tea.

Large woman called Anthea introduced me. Everyone started praising Ann Smythe, my predecessor, what a brick she was, didn't know how they'd manage without her. Doubtful looks at my potential as replacement. Children everywhere. A.S. had two.

Besides children, main topics of conversation: parties and servants. High jinks, like young blood from Consulate throwing someone's wife into swimming pool. A Fancy Dress do – ‘Look Who's Wearing The Trousers' – where men dressed as women and vice versa. Men simpering, with rouged cheeks, and asking for Little Girls' Room. Daring stuff. Remember my last letter about transvestites down in the bazaar? Felt tempted to contribute this item.

‘It's not like England,' said one woman. ‘We have to make our own entertainments here.' Another one asked, ‘You're not one of those Women's Libbers are you?' Tried to explain about our group. ‘Sounds just like us,' she said, ‘but fewer laughs.'

Servants discussed at length, mainly complaints. Servants are like second-hand cars – cheap to buy but performance to be distrusted. Not considered human being at all, let alone friend. Marjorie Somebody said: ‘Ibrahim made Nicky a birthday cake, with five candles and H-A-P-Y B-U-R-thday on it. Still, Nicky can't spell either.'

Behind the armchairs, shelves of lending-library books – Agatha Christie, Catherine Cookson etc. Not a single book about this country except Indian Horticultural Association
Tips for the Tropics,
printed 1935. Charming tinted illustrations of dahlias etc., with background of bending servants. Curious how much more palatable old pictures are of this subject.

Had to sign up for B.W.A. in order to borrow book. Also to leave notice. Beside french window noticeboard is fixed with lists of members' names, ages of their children etc. Plus announcement of films at Consulate and amateur production of
Salad Days
at British Council. Plus Mrs Wilmot's recipe for marmalade, posted up by public demand. Plus small ads for cook-bearers and fridges. Thought of replacing, at nightfall, with small ads from our café, how I miss that place – cards for Tai Ch'I and inner growth.

‘Here's a pin.'

Anthea was standing beside her. With a smile she passed Christine a drawing pin. She was a middle-aged woman with a wide, pink, placid face, as if any questions it had once felt had long been settled. Her hair, dried coarse and yellow by the climate, was fixed into permanent waves.
Like a thatched aunt
, Christine would write.

‘I'm seeing if somebody would like my mali.'

‘Thanks for your subscription. Welcome to the B.W.A. Wouldn't you like one of these?'

‘Er no thanks, I like smoking these.'

‘The subscription money all goes to charity, you know.'

‘I see. Who?'

‘There are still some old folk living here – mostly widows, whose husbands served here.' She scratched the straw. ‘They've no place in Britain now, so they've just stayed. And there's a couple of schoolmistresses from the old British Grammar school.' She pointed to the list.

Christine re-lit her cigarette. These Pakistani ones kept going out. She looked at the names. ‘Mrs Iona Gracie, how wonderful. Sounds like the heroine of one of those books.' She pointed across at the cloth-bound romances.

‘By all accounts she looked like one, long ago. She's a bit eccentric now. Quite a character. You must meet her.'

Christine thought: I don't want to meet English people. ‘Do you have any Pakistanis?'

‘Goodness no.' Anthea laughed. ‘Pakistanis keep their old folk in the family. They take care of them better than we do.'

How many Pakistanis do you know? thought Christine.

‘We also do practical work,' said Anthea. ‘Visiting hospitals, fund-raising, that sort of thing.'

Christine thought: I don't want to go around like Lady Bountiful with my basket. I don't want to give them, as a gift, my idea of what they should want. She sucked her cigarette back to life.

The room felt enclosed and hot, with its portrait of the Queen above the bookshelves. In the garden, safe inside the high white walls, children played on the grass. With the temperature in the nineties, they were fully clothed. No doubt Anthea had children, driven from house to house, never stepping foot on the dusty road between.
I thought of your children, Roz, running bare under a lukewarm English sun.

‘We're visiting Jinnah Orphanage next week,' said Anthea. ‘Would you like to come? We collect our spare toys. It's a bit upsetting. Some of the babies are very young.'

Christine paused. ‘I'll think about it.'

‘Heavens, I've forgotten to sign up myself.' Anthea took out a biro. ‘After all my cajoling.' She wrote her name on the list of volunteers.
Anthea Siddiqi.

For a moment Christine did not understand. The word looked vaguely foreign.

‘What an unusual surname,' she said. ‘Is it Italian?'

Anthea roared with laughter. ‘Good God no. Looked in the phone book? It's as common as Khan.'

‘Ah.'

Christine felt her face heating up. To hide it, she turned and put out her cigarette in somebody else's saucer. The stub hissed in the brown puddle.

Her mental letter to Roz ceased. Anthea had moved away to talk to someone else. Christine felt irked and unsettled, in her flimsy ethnic blouse. Everyone else was talking, probably about their children. There were about fifteen women here, four of them visibly pregnant.

‘Another card,' said Anthea.

‘No, it's not for pinning up. I just wondered if you knew where this place was.' She spoke to Anthea with more respect now. As if in confirmation of her own stupidity, a brown-skinned girl was now sidling' against Anthea's slacks, rubbing her cheek against the linen.

‘Sultan Rahim Estates.' She read the address and thought for a moment. ‘Nazimabad's miles. Right the other side of Karachi.' She explained the location.

Outside it was noon, and very hot. Somebody – Margaret or Marjorie – offered her a lift but Christine refused. None of these women would live in Nazimabad. It was the sort of place that one only read about in newspaper reports of riots.

She waited some time for a rickshaw, her feet scuffling the dust like a refugee.

‘Nazimabad?' The man repeated the word without interest.

‘East Nazimabad, Street 13b.' Bending down, she repeated the words again, louder. She could not tell if he understood. If he did, he did not care to indicate so. Was he waiting for her to get in? She felt the usual irritation rising. It was like fighting cotton wool. They stared when you were trying to be alone; they gazed way beyond, uninterested, when you actually wanted an answer.

A car stopped beside her.

‘Can I help?' It was Anthea.

She took the card and explained, in fluent Urdu. The man still looked bored but he understood, wrapping his turban more tightly around his head.

Time Is Golden, Do Not Fritter Away.
The placards bounced past. The rickshaw bumped along the highway, showing off with its European lady passenger. The driver had tilted his mirror to get a better view of her face. She expected this now. She wished she had worn her dupatta, as much for the dust as for modesty. They passed miles of suburban slums. The highway was lined with hoardings-big painted women's faces taken from the magazines. They held up talcum powder and soap. One showed Julie Christie, repainted in bolder style, with
Dr Zhivago
printed beneath. Only a month before, these faces had loomed out of the dark. She had sat in the Cameron car, the air ripe with her crushed garland, and wondered at it all. She had laughed at her first sight of a rickshaw. Now she sat, sticky on the plastic seat, her feet dusty in their rubber chappals, swaying with its movements.

It took a long time to get there. Karachi had grown so huge. Donald had told her the exact figures: it doubled in size every three years, or was it five? He was the one for facts. Now they were arriving at what must be the commercial centre of Nazimabad, though there were no signs. Europeans did not come to a place like this. The rickshaw stopped. Beside the road stood a block of offices; white, stained concrete like the Adamjee Plaza where Donald worked. Signs, bleached by the sun, were fixed on various floors of the building to indicate the different businesses within.
Sultan Rahim Estates.
She felt a rush of excitement. Donald presumed her to be clinking tea-cups with British mums.

The interior of the building was as sweltering as the street. She walked up the stairs. The walls were spattered red from betel spit. A peon in a dirty uniform was coming downstairs with a tray of tea-cups. Clerks were walking down, talking together; it was lunch time. They fell silent and stopped to let her pass. But they worked in an office; they did not jostle her like the men in Juna Bazaar. Perhaps Mr Rahim had gone out for a meal too.

She had pictured a suite of rooms and people typing. In fact it was a small cell with one desk and a man rising from his chair.

‘Please to enter. Come in, come in.'

‘But you're on the phone.'

‘No importance.' He gabbled some Urdu and put back the receiver. ‘This is my pleasure.'

He shook her hand, drew out a chair, hurried to the door and yelled down the corridor.

‘That is the tea,' he said. ‘You have understanding of our language? No? You are recent arrival?'

‘Very recent.' She sat down. ‘I should've phoned really. I came on impulse.'

‘You are a lady of impulses. Already I can tell. I too work from the heart.' He sat down at his desk and put his hand to his chest. ‘All good business is done not from the head,' he shook his head, ‘but from the feelings.'