Passengers, Mumbai’s taxi drivers tell me, come in blocks of time. The ones in the morning are perpetually late for work and impatiently command drivers to break signals and bombard the streets with relentless honking. A fair number of morning passengers finish embellishing themselves within the confines of the taxi: men comb their hair, women dab their chins. They talk on the phone.
Afternoon passengers are more sluggish, drunk with heat and tired of the world. They stare out the window and don’t mind if drivers softly play old Hindi numbers on the radio. The sadder the song, the better matched the music to the mood of these passengers.
“But the most
colourful ones come at night,” this one driver tells me.
I sense a story coming
and lean slightly forward. I am the
atypical morning customer - punctual and all set for a slow conversation.
“One evening this
person asked to be driven to Bandra,” the driver begins. “I was thrilled
because Bandra meant over two hundred rupees.
But the customer had something else on his mind. He pulled out a ghoda
from his pocket and set it beside him, all the while looking at me in the
rearview mirror.”
I was still new enough
to Bombay and cried out - “Ghoda? Horse?
From his pocket?”
“Loha,” said
the driver. “He pulled out a loha.”
“An iron horse?”
He sighed. “A gun,
Madam. He put a gun on the seat.”
I blinked, feeling
slightly stupid. I also quite suddenly
remembered all the Bollywood movies where the horse is pulled out, the
iron handled, people’s brains blown out and served as snacks on a plate
etc. The man laughed, enjoying my discomfort.
“Well,” he went on, “I
saw the ghoda and knew my night was
wasted. These things happen to us every
now and then. If not a gun then a man
too drunk and angry to take punga with will waste a night or two for us
every month. But what could I do?
I drove him to Bandra, took no money from him, and made my way back to town,
picking whom I could on the way.”
“That’s terrible!” I
cried, feeling thoroughly indignant.
“Ah,” said the
driver. He was a man with a philosophic
voice. He said “Ah” the way people with
secrets say “Ah”. “Life has its way of coming around.” Then he smiled a secret
smile and went on. “The next day I saw
him again outside the Asiatic Library. I
had picked him up from the Asiatic the day before too. The moment I saw him, I tried to run off, but
he cocked his head at me that said I had better stop. He was studying my number plate too and this
made me nervous. So I stopped and
grinned at the bastard. He got in
smoothly and when I sighed, feeling terribly dejected at the thought of loosing
another two hundred, he said - ‘don’t worry.
I will pay you today. Yesterday
was another day and today is another day.’"
“So no iron horses?”
“Nope. Just a nice drive over the sea-link. He asked me to put on music. I went to Radio Mirchi and we listened to
some new guy crooning to his girl. At
the end of the trip he asked me to wait for him for ten minutes. ‘I might need
a ride back,’ he said. He noted my phone
number and said he would call if I was not required. When we reached our destination he gave me
two hundred and fifty bucks — twenty rupees more than what the meter read! I waited on the road for five minutes before
he called to say I was no longer required.”
“Fat favour he did
you,” I said, still angry with the man.
“Well, he became my
regular after that. Everyday at five
thirty I came to the Asiatic Library and dropped him off at Bandra. Everyday he called within ten minutes to let
me know I could leave. Everyday he gave
me a little more than the meter.
Sometimes twenty, sometimes five, but always a little more. Where I dropped him was a group of glassy
complexes that glittered despite the grime in the air. I was very happy with the arrangement.
“He never spoke much
but I could sense he was powerful and kind and dangerous, that there was
something secretive about these trips to Bandra and that the gun snored quietly
in his pocket. I kept the songs on the
radio happy and sweet, always about love, never about death.
“And then it was
Valentine’s Day. The city went mad. Lovers everywhere, blooming. It was embarrassing to be near Marine Drive. These youngsters today have no shame. They kiss everywhere! But the man was before
the Asiatic Library at five-thirty sharp.
He had his office bag in one hand, on the other he carried a plastic bag
that held something squarish in it. He
smiled when he saw me. ‘How are you,
Suresh-ji,’ he asked before slipping in.
He was very careful with his plastic bag and placed it gingerly on his
side. Throughout the trip he kept a palm
over the parcel. When I pulled up before
the glassy complex he smiled and said - ‘today I will definitely not need you,
but wait anyway. I might want to go
somewhere.’ He slipped out of the taxi
light as a bee - his office bag and his plastic bag carefully balanced. Five minutes later he called to say I was to
drop him at Colaba. I was ecstatic. Fat
money for me!
“But when he emerged
from the complex he was dark as death.
He must have killed the bastard he wanted to kill, I thought to myself,
suddenly afraid. He got into the taxi
and when I turned on Radio Mirchi he grunted, so I turned it off. He was clearly disturbed and his mental state
made me nervous. I kept my eyes on the
traffic and tried to forget I was driving a man with a gun. Then he began to talk. ‘You have a family, Suresh-ji?’ he
asked. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Two sons, two daughters, one wife. All here, at Ganesh Murti Nagar.’ ‘Oh, Suresh-ji,’ he said, sighing out his
words, ‘she was not home. She has gone
out with her husband for Valentine’s Day.
How could I have forgotten the husband?
He is never there. It’s only her
in the house. He comes if he comes when
he comes. Then it’s Valentine’s Day and
he has made plans! She left a message
with the receptionist who gave me a piece of paper with her writing on it, like
I am some thief. It’s a depressing
world, Suresh-ji.’
“I was disgusted. Here I thought I was driving the king of
Mafia himself, and he turned out to be nothing but another crooning Majnu, and
crooning someone else’s wife too! Really, the ways of the rich are disgusting. But what concern was it of mine? I was to drive him to Colaba and so would
I. While I drove, he talked.
“ ‘I got a cake for
us, Suresh ji. I got her clothes. And
foreign chocolates. What will I do with
them now? I cannot take them home. I have never taken any such things for my
wife before. She will sense something in
a second. The buffalo has a nose of a
dog! Besides, I cannot bear to think she will use what was meant for her!’
“He was
despondent. I tell you, the rich have
such problems! When we got to Colaba I
got a glimpse of his apartment – a ramshackle, Madam! He was just some nothing, but I felt sorry
for the poor bastard nevertheless, and he kept his head down like the world had
collapsed around him. He must have dreamt such dreams, and now he was back home
to damp walls and a buffalo. Finally he
sighed and got ready to get off. ‘You
take these for your family, Suresh-ji,’ he said. ‘I cannot bear to look at
them.’ And he gave me the square plastic bag. ‘No, no, Sahib,’ I said, but he
was stepping out the taxi already, leaving behind the bag.
“I did not take any
more passengers that night. I drove
straight home, though my shift was to end only at midnight. A terrible curiosity, one that was almost
like fear, gripped me. I wanted to pull
over at some secluded corner and rip open the bag, but like I said, the
curiosity was like fear and I had no courage.
Besides, the gun kept coming back to me.
There is something frightening about a bag left behind by a nobody who
carries guns in his pocket.
“After I had parked my
taxi at Ganesh Murti, I pulled the bag out and tried to look nonchalant as I
navigated the alleys to my home. I
hadn’t been home this early for a long time and everything looked a little
different - the shanties, the children.
“The door to my house
was open and I just stepped in, bag in hand, feeling a little like a
criminal. My daughters were home and my
wife was on the bed, stitching buttons to a shirt. She saw the bag and raised her brows. ‘Go, call the boys,’ I told my younger daughter
and she ran off.
“ ‘What is this?’ my
wife asked and I shook my head to indicate I did not know. Then slowly, after my sons were home, we
removed first the smallest box from the bag, then the bigger one, then the
biggest one. The smallest one had a
flimsy nightdress in it, so flimsy my cheeks grew hot. I could not even touch it! My wife stared
like she had seen a ghost. It was blue
like the night sky. I stuffed it under
the pillow so we would not be forced to look at it.
“There were chocolates
in the second box, individual chocolates wrapped in golden wrappers and tied
with thin ribbons. It was a terrible
sight, Madam, and immediately I thought of the gun in the man’s pocket. These must be worth a fortune, I thought,
staring at the gold. So much gold and
silk over chocolates! I gave one to my
youngest boy. He is not like me, Madam,
he is not afraid of anything in the world.
He took the chocolate immediately and ripped off the wrapper. He grinned like a monkey, showing all his
teeth. His mother takes good care of him
and those teeth are clean and white.
Then he popped the entire thing into his mouth. I watched his white teeth turn brown, his
eyes grow moist, throat move up and down, up and down. He made a soft, squishy sound as he ate. We were all mesmerised and picked out a
chocolate each as though in a dream. We
unwrapped slowly, unlike my son who is a hooligan and cannot be slow about
anything. We watched each other with
damp eyes and prayed the food on our tongue would never come to an end.
“When we had each
eaten one chocolate I said, ‘It is Valentine’s Day today.’ My children, who
learn all kinds of things in their schools, giggled. My wife frowned. ‘A day for love,’ I said to my wife, feeling
suddenly like the boys singing on radio.
My wife giggled too. She is a
beautiful woman, Madam. The city has not done any number on her.
“We put away the
remaining chocolates for another time and opened the largest box. It had a cake in it, the type we sometime get
for our children on their birthdays.
Except this was whiter, softer, bigger.
It was so white it glowed. My
wife brought out bowls and cut small pieces of the cake that vanished in our
mouths. I have never tasted anything
like it in my life and I have lived on this earth for forty-five years. I watched my family eating, and I thought of
the poor man who was so unhappy, but I could not feel much for him right
then. You see, Madam, sometimes one person’s
sorrow is another person’s joy, and I was too happy to be sorry about anything.
“That night, after the
children were asleep, I pulled out the nighty from under the pillow and felt it
between my fingers. My wife had never
worn anything so soft upon her. I wanted
to wake her up but she works hard and I hadn’t the heart. She hasn’t worn the nighty yet, Madam. You see, the children sleep like pebbles
between us, so she hasn’t worn it. But I
imagine her in the nighty often. She is a beautiful woman. Not like the women of this city.”
Suresh was quiet after
this. I realised I was smiling, though I
felt I would begin to cry any moment, though who could tell why. The school where I taught was only five
minutes away now and I wished ask after Suresh’s children and what they did
after school and what their names were, and about his wife and what her life
was like now and what it had been when she was a young girl, but there was no
time for any of it today.
“Do you still drive
the man to Bandra?” I asked him.
“No, Madam. I went back to the Asiatic Library the next
day but he was not there. Maybe he was
embarrassed. Maybe he had revealed too
much. I was relieved though. I did not want him in my taxi anymore. For a while I avoided the Asiatic area,
afraid I would bump into him. You see, I
don’t want that Valentine’s Day to become a conversation between us. I don’t want him to ask me questions. I don’t want it to be his gift to me. I want it to be mine, my gift to my children
and my wife. I cannot recreate that
Valentine’s Day ever again, and I don't want my best day to be someone else’s
sadness.”
I said I
understood.
When we reached my
school I smiled and said, “I am sorry I don’t have such an exciting life.”
He smiled back. “I am glad you don’t,” he said, then added, “Don’t
let the city do its number on you, Madam.
It’s a slightly bastardly place.”
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