The Hope Factory Page 23

  “How large, Amma?” asked Narayan. “How large a sum?”

  “Why?” cried his exasperated mother. “What difference does that make to us, the size? It is so large that it doesn’t bear speaking of. When one cannot put two-pie together, what use is it to speak of whether lakhs or crores are required?”

  “They would want so much?” Narayan asked, startled.

  “No,” she said grudgingly. “But they may as well. It would be a sum as much out of our reach.” Then, in response to the persistent question in his eyes, she said: “I don’t know, perhaps as much as fifty thousand rupees?”

  This sounded to her like a substantial offer of money. Would it be sufficient? Would the landlady expect much more? Fifty thousand rupees was forty thousand more than she had saved in the little cover at the bottom of her trunk. That ten thousand had been accumulated over ten years, painfully, squeezed out like blood from a bone when all the flesh has withered away and the bloom of life long vanished.

  “Oh, Narayan,” she said. “We will be forced to roll up our beds and sleep on the streets. Where will we go?”

  She glanced at him helplessly. She had been so proud of him; so proud of the ease with which he had settled into the new school, so smart in his new uniform and proud of his book bag. His English tuition master had reported that he was learning the language quickly; good news, so pleasing to his mother—and now this. Why did the gods envy the little she had? And immediately temper the good with bad?

  They ate their night meal in silence; Kamala could not cook in her distraction, and the meal of dry chapattis and pickles would not settle in her mouth. She tore at half a roti before giving it up. Narayan too ate absentmindedly, his young brow furrowed in thought. “Can we not raise the money, Amma? Somehow?”

  “Forty thousand? How is it possible, Narayan?”

  “My uncle,” he said. “He said we have wealth waiting for us in the village. From my father’s family.” His mother’s silence was eloquent. “Amma, do we really have cows and fields waiting for us in the village?”

  “You and I do not. That is certain,” said Kamala. “But do not be spreading that around the courtyard. It would be disrespectful to your uncle.”

  “Can you ask him for the money?”

  “I have not asked your uncle for a paisa since you were a baby. I should be ashamed to start now.”

  “Can we start a chit fund like Thangam? She has made a lot of money with it.”

  “Us? A chit fund? Are you crazy? Who will run it? You? It is not so easy. And besides, I think it is one of those things that gives trouble more than it helps.”

  Narayan did not look convinced by his mother’s lack of enterprise. “In that case, do you suppose Thangam might be able give us a loan?”

  “Aiyo! Ask! Ask for money!” She slapped her hand on the ground next to her, feeling the pain radiate powerfully through her palm. “I, who have never asked anyone else for a paisa, not for a glass of water that I have not earned, now you want me to lower myself, abase myself, abase the entire work of my blood and body, and go, like a beggar, and ask for money? Did you not hear what I said? That chit fund of hers is in trouble. More than you know. People are defaulting. So eager to join, greedy for the big payout, but now they find they cannot keep up with the monthly payments. She has to be ready to pay on their behalf, but she also cannot afford to, this chit fund is so big. In fact, she is so frightened, she has been asking me for money.”

  “Anand-saar,” he said, after some further moments of silence.

  But Kamala was already shaking her head. “Anand-saar is already giving us so much. I will not go ask for more.”

  “Yes, my education, I know,” said Narayan. “But, the truth is, it is easy for them. This is not so big from their side. They can easily afford it.”

  “That does not change the generosity of this gift, Narayan,” said his mother. “Or lessen its rarity.”

  “They spent twenty thousand rupees just for the fireworks at the Diwali party. I heard her say so.”

  “Yes, and the corner shop man spent thirty thousand on a new scooter,” said Kamala. “How does any of that affect us?”

  Dissatisfaction was easy to feel and could twist the mind into unprofitable thoughts. Narayan would have to learn that lesson for himself. If he ever did. Or he would spend his entire life unhappily chasing after the shadows left by the lives of other people as though they were real.

  She said: “Your education. I did not ask. He offered…. To ask for money … I have seen that, with others. It is not good. There is no self-respect in it.”

  Narayan said nothing more, but the question that shone from his eyes echoed loudly around the little room: was there any self-respect in being thrown out of their home?

  twenty-one

  THIS WAS ONE OF THOSE MORNINGS when he rose well before the alarm. On the balcony in the cold dawn, he watched the lightening of the sky and listened to the neighborhood muezzins. They had acquired competing loudspeakers, the mosques; one maulvi’s voice had a magical, haunting quality, the other squawked self-importantly. Behind them, like so many echoes, the sounds of prayer ebbed and flowed over the awakening city, the suprabathams from the temples and, when the sun strengthened, distant bells from the Catholic church.

  There was nothing left for him to do. He had fussed over the paperwork for a week. The demand drafts were ready and waiting in the safe.

  He went downstairs to fetch another cup of coffee and joined his father on the verandah, where the older man was working his way through a sudoku puzzle. “I am a little surprised,” said his father, on Anand’s appearance, for this had evidently been bothering him, “that he has still not come to visit me. Or invited me to their home. It is disrespectful, is it not?”

  Anand kept silent. He could not explain to his father why Harry Chinappa was maintaining an unusual distance from his daughter’s house. And why he, Anand, could not care less. Instead, he listened to his father on the subject of Ruby Chinappa, who had visited the previous day, seeking, by her nervous presence, to diffuse her daughter’s anger and atone for her husband’s distance.

  “Your father is looking so well,” she had said to Anand. “So good to see him in such health. Harry is very busy right now, so many things, you know, but we really must have your father over for a meal, we really must, I will speak to Vidya about it…. Anand, are you keeping well? Is everything okay?”

  “I’m fine,” Anand said, but that did not appear to reassure her. The worry in her face was tangible as she went slowly up the stairs to see her daughter, and deepened when she eventually scuttled back to her car.

  Anand drank the last of his coffee. On an impulse, he told his father, “Today, I am going to register the purchase of some land … twelve acres of farmland …”

  “Is it? Good, good,” said his father. “You are planning to become a farmer now?”

  “Not exactly,” said Anand, wryly recognizing the real anxiety that lay behind his father’s jest. “I am buying this for the company—to expand our facilities.”

  “Oh, is that so?” said his father. “In that case, be sure to avoid signing the agreements during the rahu-kaal times.”

  “Rahu-kaal?” said Anand. He had never worried about scriptural notions of auspicious and inauspicious times; he could not see the sense of such superstitious behavior, though he was aware that no one else, including Ananthamurthy, seemed to share his view. “What would happen if I did sign in rahu-kaal?”

  His father shook his head. “Do not joke about this. It is important. Suppose something went wrong just because you signed in an inauspicious time?”

  “Nonsense, Appa,” said Anand, but minutes later, as though on cue, he received a phone call from Ananthamurthy. “Sir, I hope,” said the operations manager, “that you are avoiding the rahu-kaal.”

  Anand called the Landbroker. “Are we avoiding the rahu-kaal for signing today?”

  The Landbroker said: “Yes, sir, not to worry. Today’s rahu-kaal i
s finished six-thirty to seven-thirty in the morning.”

  “Right. It doesn’t matter anyway,” said Anand. “How much time will the registration take? The full day, is it?”

  MUCH HAD HAPPENED IN the two weeks since he had last seen Harry Chinappa.

  Anand and Mrs. Padmavati had signed the agreements to purchase the land, below the company seal and next to the fingerprints and the signatures of the farmers who were selling. They had handed over large sums in both check and cash to the Landbroker. They had paid more than Anand would have liked to at this preliminary stage, but the Landbroker had echoed what Vinayak had told him at the very start: such large payments were needed just to convince the farmers to sell. The concluding payments would be correspondingly less, of course, but the risk was unquestionably higher. If something went wrong with the registration, they would find it difficult to recover the money. Their financing in the factory was so tight, it was not a loss they could bear easily.

  “Sir, do you think he is trustworthy?” Mrs. Padmavati asked.

  Anand smiled wryly. “I hope so, Mrs. Padmavati.” He devoutly prayed he was not making a mistake. As much as he tried to ignore them, Harry Chinappa’s words of warning preyed on his mind, louder and louder as the registration date appeared. Mrs. Padmavati and Mr. Ananthamurthy had started vociferous discussions with the earnest architect, newly hired for the project, not too expensive but competent. Anand kept himself aloof from the process; he would not feel truly confident until the sale was complete. The agreements may have been signed, but until the final sale deeds were executed, until the land ownership papers were handed over, until the land was safely registered in the name of Cauvery Auto—the deal was not done. The Landbroker had laughed at Anand’s caution. “Not to worry, saar,” he said. “The land is yours. We will register immediately. You please start your planning. We can start building a compound wall right away. And leveling the land for your future construction. Shall I have all the trees removed?”

  “After we register,” said Anand.

  The Sankleshwar fiasco continued to sit in his mind. Mr. Sankleshwar was a powerful businessman—with a formidable network of political contacts and a history of ruthlessness. Anand would have liked to maintain a good relationship with him—and certainly not have his own reputation spoiled with such a man. He deeply regretted, again and again, the loss of temper that had made him walk out of that second meeting with Sankleshwar. If it had involved anyone else, he would have immediately written to clarify the matter. But to write and accuse his own father-in-law of lying would be to create an extraordinary scandal—and probably do nothing to restore Anand’s reputation.

  He debated the matter in his mind for a half a day before leaving it unhappily alone. There was nothing he could do about it. Harry Chinappa might be willing to sacrifice Anand’s reputation to save his own. Anand could not bring himself to reciprocate. He wished he could talk this through with someone; he searched his mind for possibilities and failed; the very notion felt awkward, the situation too personal, too much of a family matter to make public.

  THE SUBREGISTRAR’S OFFICE LAY an hour’s drive away; to reach it he had to pass the farmland. He didn’t slow down, just glanced quickly at the land lying lush in the sunlight, as a groom, full of future avarice, might sneak a peek at his bride’s breasts and bottom. The iPod was plugged into the car’s speakers, and he sang along softly to “Sugar Magnolia” by the Grateful Dead. In the bright morning light, it did something to ease the tension within him.

  The rural land registrar’s office was far removed from urban congestion, housed in a sprawling, yellowing colonial-era government office building that abutted a village school. The building was a warren of rooms organized around a central courtyard, the dust-encrusted architecture in slumberous contrast to the busy buzz and press of humans who entered its portals. Anand knew better than to go wandering through the warren. He parked his car and called the Landbroker.

  “Yes, saar, I am already here,” said the Landbroker. “I will find you; you please wait in the car. Namaskara, saar,” he said, magically appearing at the car window before he’d finished speaking.

  The Landbroker, a curious mixture of eagerness and pride, sitting next to Anand and telling of his achievements: Sakkath difficult, sir, to get everyone to agree. This was his moment of success: the bringing together of different farming families, entire disputing clans whose members had frequently left the land years before for the urban welter; to convince them to sell their land and divide the money, to negotiate across grievous family divides and old accusations of greed and sorcery on the unborn child and the division of dead goats, to cajole them into signing the documents of agreement a few weeks earlier, and again, today, to sign over the title deeds to their property and accept in return the money that Anand carried in his briefcase as a series of bank drafts.

  In the distance, through the cacophony and crowd, the other parties to the deal clustered under the spread of a tamarind tree. They had about them an air of festivity, as though this were a picnic of no uncommon interest. Entire families: aging uncles and grandfathers, dressed in shirts donned specially for the occasion over their usual singlet vests and dhotis, towels placed around their shoulders like shawls; young mothers, neatly groomed with well-oiled and flower-bedecked hair; gossiping grannies with thinning gray hair twisted and knotted at the nape and red-stained teeth revealed in ancient laughter; squealing babies handed around to love and kissed foreheads and pinched cheeks. The middle-aged males of the family, clad in shirts and pants, stood together, talking, parrying, thrusting, taking one another’s measure and, according to the Landbroker, trying to evaluate the relative terms of the deal each was getting, hoping to learn more than each revealed, for the Landbroker had done his work well, sowing money and secrecy through the group, leaving each person convinced that he was possessed of a better deal than the others.

  “Everyone has arrived?” asked Anand.

  The Landbroker looked at the group under the trees. “Almost, sir. Almost. Eighty percent. Not to worry,” he added, “everyone will come.” He left the car, first providing Anand with strict instructions. Anand was to stay in his car, keeping a low profile; it might take a while to put through the initial paperwork, and the Landbroker did not want any seller chatting with Anand and impulsively deciding to increase the asking price. That could jeopardize the entire deal…. Did Anand understand this? He would wait in the car and not take it amiss?

  “No problem,” said Anand, tapping his laptop bag. “I have brought work.”

  “And the money?” said the Landbroker.

  “Here,” said Anand, this time tapping the briefcase. The money payable was divided into three categories: the demand drafts, the unaccounted cash in neat packets, and a third bundle destined for the registrar to ensure the smooth registration of the property.

  The Landbroker took the bribe money and vanished. They had argued about this earlier: that essential services had to be double-paid for, once with taxes, again with the bribe. The Landbroker had looked at Anand as an elder might at a particularly foolish child. “Saar, how can you complain that this is unfair? These people who work here have in turn paid bribes to acquire such high-bribe government positions, isn’t it? How can they repay everyone they have borrowed from and support their own families if they don’t take bribes? Have they not worked very hard to get to this position?” This baffling argument left Anand bereft of speech and argument. Greedy fuckers, he now said to himself, resigned to the headache that inevitably set in when dealing with any government service. Whoring bastards.

  THE SOUND OF TROUBLE did not at first attract his attention; he was immersed in his work, his music, and the air-conditioned cool of his car.

  When he finally looked up, suddenly alert, he couldn’t make sense of what was happening. The crowds had increased and seemed uneasy, but there didn’t appear to be evidence of any altercation. And was that a procession in the center? And who was that with the film cameras? He
quickly put away his files, got out of the car, and locked it.

  “What is going on?” he inquired of someone standing by. He received a muttered laugh in response. “It is the Lok Ayukta.” The anti-corruption cell had received information on bribes being paid and was raiding the land registrar’s office. To ensure their vigilance received due credit, they were being trailed by some media people.

  The procession entered the building, and Anand returned to his car, frantically wondering what to do. He had spent his adult life grumbling about government corruption—but today was not the day he wanted the Lok Ayukta involved. Where was the Landbroker? Should he call him? What had happened to the bribe money? Was he to be implicated in any manner? All the documents had Cauvery Auto’s name on them. What the fuck should he do?

  As though in answer to his panicked questions, the passenger door opened and the Landbroker jumped in. “Here,” he said, handing the bribe money back to Anand. “You hide this.” He was exuding the thick sweat of fear and, without permission, reached for Anand’s bottle of water and drank it down.

  “You got caught?” asked Anand foolishly, for the answer was evident. If the Landbroker had been caught handing over a bribe, he would currently be parading in front of the television cameras, his career as a deal broker effectively over. “What happened?”

  Somebody, it seemed, had phoned in a tip to the Lok Ayukta. But thankfully, said the Landbroker, the ill luck had befallen the briber just ahead of him in the queue. He, and the official he had paid the bribe to, were both under arrest. The Landbroker pulled out the image of Goddess Lakshmi, who swung on a pendant at the end of the thick gold chain around his neck, and pressed it to his forehead, offering prayers and thanks for his safe deliverance. A few moments later, and it would have been him in the dock: the Landbroker, the official—and Anand as well.