If Ishaq was injured by this painful reference or these

413unjust suspicions, he did not show it. Saeeda Bai told him to fetch Motu Chand, and the three of them soon began to make music for Maan's pleasure. Ishaq bit his lower lip from time to time as his bow moved across the strings, but he said nothing.

Saeeda Bai sat on a Persian rug with her harmonium in front of her. Her head was covered with her sari, and she stroked the double string of pearls hanging around her neck with a finger of her left hand.

Then, humming to herself, and moving her left hand onto the bellows of the harmonium, she began to play a few notes of Raag Pilu. After a little while, and as if undecided about her mood and the kind of song she wished to sing, she modulated to a few other raags.

'What would you like to hear ?' she asked Maan gently.

She had used a more intimate 'you' than she had ever used so far - 'turn' instead of 'aap'. Maan looked at her, smiling.

'Well ?' said Saeeda Bai, after a minute had gone by.

'Well, Saeeda Begum ?' said Maan.

'What do you want to hear?' Again she used turn instead of aap and sent Maan's world into a happy spin. A couplet he'd heard somewhere came to his mind :

Among the lovers the Saki thus drew distinction's line, Handing the wine-cups one by one: 'For you, Sir';

'Yours' ; and 'Thine'.

'Oh, anything,' said Maan, 'Anything at all. Whatever you feel is in your heart.'

Maan had still not plucked up the courage to use 'turn' or plain 'Saeeda' with Saeeda Bai, except when he was making love, when he hardly knew what he said. Perhaps, he thought, she just used it absent- mindedly with me and will be offended if I reciprocate.

But Saeeda Bai was inclined to take offence at something else.

'I'm giving you the choice of music and you are returning the problem to me,' she said. 'There are twenty different

414things in my heart. Can't you hear me changing from raag to raag ?' Then, turning away from Maan, she said :

'So, Motu, what is to be sung ?'

'Whatever you wish, Saeeda Begum,' said Motu Chand happily.

'You blockhead, I'm giving you an opportunity that most of my audiences would kill themselves to receive and all you do is smile back at me like a weak-brained baby, and say, "Whatever you wish, Saeeda Begum." What ^ghazal ? Quickly. Or do you want to hear a thumri instead of a ghazal ?'

'A ghazal will be best, Saeeda Bai,' said Motu Chand, and suggested 'It's just a heart, not brick and stone,' by Ghalib.

At the end of the ghazal Saeeda Bai turned to Maan and said : 'You must write a dedication in your book.'

'What, in English ?' asked Maan.

'It amazes me,' said Saeeda Bai, 'to see the great poet Dagh illiterate in his own language. We must do something about it.'

Til learn Urdu!' said Maan enthusiastically.

Motu Chand and Ishaq Khan exchanged glances. Clearly they thought that Maan was quite far gone in his fascination with Saeeda Bai.

Saeeda Bai laughed. She asked Maan teasingly, 'Will you really ?' Then she asked Ishaq to call the maidservant.

For some reason Saeeda Bai was annoyed with Bibbo today. Bibbo seemed to know this, but to be unaffected by it. She came in grinning, and this re-ignited Saeeda Bai's annoyance.

'You're smiling just to annoy me,' she said impatiently. 'And you forgot to tell the cook that the parakeet's daal was not soft enough yesterday - do you think he has the jaws of a tiger? Stop grinning, you silly girl, and tell me what time is Abdur Rasheed coming to give Tasneem her Arabic lesson ?'

Saeeda Bai felt safe enough with Maan to mention Tasneem's name in his presence.

415Bibbo assumed a satisfactorily apologetic expression and said:

'But he's here already, as you know, Saeeda Bai.'

'As I know ? As I know ?' said Saeeda Bai with renewed impatience. 'I don't know anything. And nordo you,' she added. 'Tell him to come up at once.'

A few minutes later Bibbo was back, but alone.

'Well ?' said Saeeda Bai.

'He won't come,' said Bibbo.

'He won't come? Does he know who pays him to give tuition to Tasneem? Does he think his honour will be unsafe if he comes upstairs to this room ? Or is it just that he is giving himself airs because he is a university student ?'

'I don't know, Begum Sahiba,' said Bibbo.

'Then go, girl, and ask him why. It's his income I want to increase, not my own.'

Five minutes later Bibbo returned with a very broad grin on her face and said, 'He was very angry when I interrupted him again. He was teaching Tasneem a complicated passage in the Quran Sharif and told me that the divine word would have to take precedence over his earthly income. But he will come when the lesson is over.'

'Actually, I'm not sure I want to learn Urdu,' said Maan, who was beginning to regret his sudden enthusiasm. He didn't really want to be saddled with a lot of hard work. And he hadn't expected the conversation to take such a practical turn so suddenly. He was always making resolutions such as, 'I must learn polo' (to Firoz, who enjoyed introducing his friends to the tastes and joys of his own Nawabi lifestyle), or 'I must settle down' (to Veena, who was the only one in the family who was capable of ticking him off to some effect), or even 'I will not give swimming lessons to whales' (which Pran considered illjudged levity). But he made these resolutions safe in the knowledge that their implementation was very far away.

By now, however, the young Arabic teacher was standing outside the door, quite hesitantly and a little disapprovingly. He did adaab to the whole company, and waited to hear what was required of him.

416'Rasheed, can you teach my young friend here Urdu ?' asked Saeeda Bai, coming straight to the point.

The young man nodded a little reluctantly.

'The understanding will be the same as with Tasneem,' said Saeeda Bai, who believed in getting practical matters sorted out quickly.

'That will be fine,' said Rasheed. He spoke in a somewhat clipped manner, as if he were still slightly piqued by the earlier interruptions to his Arabic lesson. 'And the name of the gentleman ?'

'Oh yes, I'm sorry,' said Saeeda Bai. 'This is Dagh Sahib, whom the world so far knows only by the name of Maan Kapoor. He is the son of Mahesh Kapoor, the Minister. And his elder brother Pran teaches at the university, where you study.'

The young man was frowning with a sort of inward concentration. Then, fixing his sharp eyes on Maanhe said, 'It will be an honour to teach the son of Mahesh Kapoor. I am afraid I am a little late already for my next tuition. I hope that when I come tomorrow we can fix up a suitable time for our lesson.

When do you tend to be free ?'

'Oh, he tends to be free all the time,' said Saeeda Bai with a tender smile. 'Time is not a problem with Dagh Sahib.'

6.5

ONE night, exhausted from marking examination papers, Pran was sleeping soundly when he was awakened with a jolt. He had been kicked. His wife had her arms around him, but she was sleeping soundly still.