Susanna's Seven Husbands Read online

  He resented the admiring looks that Susanna received from men younger than him, and if one of his colleagues invited them over for a dinner or a get-together, he would refuse, even before Susanna could get a word in. He was even jealous of the servants, especially those like the Goonga, who were in the confidence of their mistress. He would constantly find fault with the jockey, and urge Susanna to get rid of him. But he was a good jockey, often winning races in Meerut or Delhi, and Susanna needed his help in running the stables. Moreover, he was devoted to her, and while Susanna did not find him physically attractive, she valued his loyalty.

  The little jockey hated the Major. All the servants resented him. Susanna, too, was soon regretting her alliance with this boring and egotistic man. There is no more tiresome a creature than a jealous husband, suspicious of everyone who tries to be friendly. He was even jealous of me—wouldn’t stop, if Susanna wanted to talk to me; ignored me, even if I greeted them on the road.

  One day, as I was cycling back from school, I passed their gate just as the Major and Susanna emerged—not in their buggy, but in her old Army jeep. In the back seat were the jockey and the gardener, Shah Rukh. Both carried guns—a rifle, and a .12-bore shotgun. Susanna was driving.

  She stopped when she saw me, smiled and said, ‘We’re off on a shikar trip. Like to come?’

  ‘Some day,’ I said. ‘I’d have to ask my parents.’

  ‘Children shouldn’t be on a shikar trip,’ said the Major. ‘Too dangerous. Especially when there’s a man-eater around.’

  The party drove off, and I did not see them for two or three days. In fact, I did not see the Major again. His remains were not suitable for ‘children’ to view.

  I heard the sad story from Shah Rukh, who had been quite friendly ever since I’d been given the freedom of the guava orchard. He spoke to me over the garden wall.

  ‘Here you heard about what happened to the Major-sahib?’ he asked.

  ‘No. Did he shoot the tiger?’

  ‘The tiger got the Major. Miss Susanna is very upset.’

  ‘What happened?’

  And this is what happened, according to Shah Rukh, who was present when the tragedy took place.

  They had set up a machaan on a big shisham tree, and had made themselves comfortable with their guns and some provisions. The Major had brought along his favourite brand of whisky. A goat had been tied to the foot of the tree as bait. If the man-eater came along, it would not have been particularly interested in a mutton dinner; but if it was really hungry it might be tempted to kill and eat the goat in lieu of something better.

  Shah Rukh was something of a shikari himself and had often accompanied Susanna on her hunting trips. He had joined them on the machaan, but it was the Major who had been given the privilege of shooting the tiger. Shah Rukh sensed the inexperience of the Major and was ready to use the second gun if necessary. This gun was kept between him and Susanna; so both of them had their hands free.

  As the evening wore on, the Major felt increasingly thirsty. He was in the habit of drinking two or three whiskies every evening, and it was now well past cocktail time. The sun had set; a quarter-moon was in the sky. The Major took out his small whisky glass and poured himself a stiff drink.

  The tiger was in the vicinity, and it was aware of the tethered goat. It also knew that there were humans around; it could smell them on the night wind. The tiger was prepared to wait. If the humans were on foot, it would rather have one of them instead of a skinny old goat.

  The Major poured himself a second drink.

  ‘Won’t you have one too, darling?’ he whispered to Susanna.

  She shook her head. ‘We must be very still. Very quiet. Or the tiger will not come.’

  At midnight the Major poured himself a third drink. And at midnight the tiger approached the clearing. Its eyes glowed in the dark. Susanna could see them, but she said nothing.

  ‘Be ready, sahib,’ whispered Shah Rukh. ‘The tiger is approaching.’

  Suddenly the bushes parted and the tiger made its charge.

  But it did not go for the goat. A mighty leap, and it was almost in the machaan. It missed the platform by inches and fell backwards. Major Mehta lurched forward, the whisky glass dropping from his hand. He reached for his gun, but he was already off-balance. The tree was still shaking from the impact of the animal’s charge. The Major toppled over, fell out of the tree, and landed near the bleating goat.

  Immediately the tiger was upon him.

  Snarls, shouts, screams rent the air as the big cat dragged its screaming victim into the bushes. There were more screams, gradually dying away. Then there was silence, broken only by the bleating of the terrified goat.

  Shah Rukh and the Goonga and several forest guards spent two days looking for the Major, while Susanna waited patiently but not too sorrowfully in the Forest Rest House.

  Eventually, they found what was left of the Major: a few bones, his boots, his shredded clothes—not enough for a good funeral pyre.

  Had he fallen of his own volition, or had he been given a little assistance from behind? Had he drunk too much, or had something been added to his whisky? These questions did not arise at the time, but they were to bother me later on.

  Episode Two

  Enter the Beetle

  ‘Won’t you come into my parlour,’ said the spider to the fly, and many a fly has found its way into the jaws of the Black Widow spider on my veranda wall.

  But today there’s a bonus, an extra savoury on the menu.

  A pretty green beetle, sparkling like an emerald, has blundered straight into that intricate web in the corner of my veranda. Our friendly neighbourhood spider loves beetles. A beetle to a spider is like strawberries and cream to a human. Except that spiders can dispense with the cream.

  Our Black Widow loses no time in collecting her breakfast. She tears that little beetle apart and sucks it dry of its strawberry juices. Only the outer covering remains, hanging forlornly from that finely-spun web.

  Mohan Prakash, stage name Jimmy Rogers, wanted to be a Beetle. That is, the singing kind. For he was a great fan of the group that called itself the Beatles, and he felt that he could sing as well as any of them; which was probably true, since real musical ability was not among their accomplishments.

  Jimmy also possessed a guitar, and wherever Jimmy went, the guitar was sure to go.

  He had performed once at our school, but the students had started singing instead, and had drowned him out. He had also sung and played his guitar in a church, but had not been invited to come again. He was sitting on the lawn of the Wheeler Club, playing sad songs for himself, when Susanna heard him and, feeling sorry for him, clapped and complimented him on his singing. Almost immediately, he was on his feet, begging to sing another song for her.

  This was about a year after the loss of her husband, the Major, to the man-eating tiger. I hadn’t seen much of her in that time, as my holidays were spent playing cricket. She now used a car instead of the buggy, as she had become rather conscious of the inquisitive glances of passers-by.

  But I had become quite friendly with Shah Rukh, the gardener, and one afternoon, while Susanna was out shopping, he took me on a round of the grounds, which were very extensive.

  Well behind the house were the stables, where the horses were kept. There were three racehorses here, all in prime condition. They were looked after by a couple of syces, but only the dumb jockey was permitted to take them out for rides. Susanna had her favourite horse, a beautiful black stallion, and she had ridden him herself in a couple of races, much to the resentment and outrage of the male members of the racing fraternity.

  ‘Now let me show you something interesting, Arun bhai,’ said Shah Rukh, taking me by the hand and leading me through some thick shrubbery to a part of the estate that was not visible from the main road. We came upon a large tank, the water covered with floating lotus leaves and flowers. On all sides there were steps leading down to the water, but I did not dare go down any o
f them, because on almost every step there were several snakes, basking in the sun or gliding in and out of the water.

  ‘Why do you keep so many snakes?’ I asked. ‘Why don’t you get rid of them?’

  ‘Miss Susanna is fond of them. And they are used to her. She can go down those steps without being harmed.’

  ‘Are they not poisonous, then?’

  ‘They are all poisonous to some extent. They are vipers, and they have increased in numbers over the years. But they do not go far from this spot. They like it here. Plenty of frogs to feed on! But come, I will show you one that is really poisonous.’

  And taking me by the hand he led me to the far corner of the boundary wall, where a small temple was set into a narrow gap between the wall and the trunk of a pipal tree.

  ‘It’s a Naag Temple,’ said Shah Rukh. ‘Every morning, the miss-sahib or her maid-servant leaves a saucer of milk outside, and the cobra, who lives here, comes out for a drink. See, the saucer is empty. That means he has come and gone.’

  But apparently the resident cobra did not go too far from his abode. Even as we turned away, the tall grass began to sway, and a huge cobra rose from the undergrowth, its hooded head swaying from side to side.

  ‘Do not be afraid,’ he said. ‘It is just looking to see if you have brought it something.’

  ‘Another day,’ I said, as I backed away. ‘But I thought Susanna was a Christian.’

  ‘So she is, when she visits the church. But her mother was a devout Hindu lady, who made this little Naag Temple. And the miss-sahib keeps up the tradition of feeding the cobra.’

  ‘And her father—what was he?’

  ‘Oh, he did not believe in anything. He did not care much for religion. Never went to a place of worship. But he was tolerant of all religions. We are of many faiths here. I believe in the one true God, as you know.’

  ‘And the Goonga?’

  ‘Oh, he is of a strange forest tribe. He believes in magic and spirits and animal sacrifices. Don’t make an enemy of him—he will put a curse on you.’

  He led me away from the temple and around to the front of the house.

  ‘It is getting late,’ he said, ‘and Miss Susanna will soon be here. I cannot take you inside the house—that is forbidden. But she likes you, and one day she may invite you in. There are secret places in parts of the house. Even I have not seen them. But look who’s here—a new hero to entertain us.’

  Sitting on the low wall around the garden well was Jimmy the Beetle, strumming his guitar. ‘Won’t you sing for us?’ asked Shah Rukh.

  ‘I don’t sing for servants,’ said the troubadour. ‘And I play the guitar for myself.’ He stopped playing.

  ‘My friend here is not a servant,’ said Shah Rukh.

  ‘He plays very badly,’ I said. ‘See, even the crows have flown away.’

  Shah Rukh accompanied me to the front gate, and as I turned into the road, Susanna arrived in her small car. She slowed down at the gate and greeted me in the friendliest manner. She was looking prettier than ever.

  ‘You’re growing fast,’ she said. ‘One of these days I’ll take you to the races. You’ll get rich betting on my horse.’

  She drove up to the front of the house, and the Beetle rose from his perch and greeted her with a bow.

  I went home and took a nap. An hour or two later, when I looked over the wall, the Beetle was still there, sitting on the veranda steps and singing to Susanna, who was reclining on one of the veranda’s rocking chairs. I could hear the words of his song quite distinctly.

  ‘Oh Susanna, please don’t cry for me,

  I’ll wait for you in heaven,

  with my banjo on my knee.’

  It was an adaptation of an old Western folk song. Jimmy did not sing it very well, but the sentiment must have pleased Susanna, because she clapped enthusiastically at the end. As for Jimmy, he did not know how prophetic his words would prove to be.

  A few weeks later they were married in the little church that the Begum Samru had built a hundred and fifty years earlier. Not far from it were the graves of two of the several husbands that the amorous begum had sent to their Maker. Not that Susanna intended following in the begum’s footsteps. She seemed genuinely fond of her romantic rock singer, and did her best to promote his singing career.

  She arranged for him to perform at the Imperial in Delhi, and the Savoy in Mussoorie. He sang his heart out, gyrated like Presley, and in his frenzy smashed two guitars. (Since he now had a collection of guitars, all provided by Susanna, this hardly mattered.) The response was lukewarm.

  ‘Perhaps you were not meant to be a Beetle,’ said Susanna sympathetically. ‘All that long hair doesn’t suit you. And the hippies will soon be out of fashion. Why don’t you become a cowboy singer? You’ll look great in a cowboy outfit.’

  So Jimmy had a haircut, took to wearing boots, jeans, a leather jacket, and a wide-brimmed cowboy hat. His repertoire underwent a change too. Now he sang Folk instead of Rock—sang the Blues, sang ballads of the old West: ‘Oh Bury Me on the Lone Prairie’, ‘Don’t Fence Me In’, and ‘Keep Cool, Fool’—but that didn’t work either. People were staying away from his performances, or walking out in the middle of them, and the hotel managements were not pleased.

  ‘He sings all right,’ said one manager. ‘But he doesn’t have sex appeal. Maybe he should go to Bombay and get a little experience there.’

  So Susanna sent him to Bombay, hoping he might get into films. He was sent to various producers, and they were all happy to give him a screen test. After all, he had a rich wife and she might just agree to bank-roll a film if her husband was in it!

  But not only did Jimmy lack sex appeal, he also lacked any sort of acting ability. Nobody wanted him.

  Keeping Jimmy in a flat in Bombay was proving costly, and after six unproductive months Susanna came to Bombay to collect her singing spouse. She was immediately offered roles in several films! Her good looks and striking personality bowled everyone over. Poor Jimmy was weighed down by an inferiority complex.

  Susanna was not interested in a career in films or in being the toast of Bombay society. Her home and her horses called her. She bundled Jimmy into a plane and flew with him back to Delhi. Her car was waiting for them at the airport and two hours later they were in Meerut.

  Jimmy sulked. Another month in Bombay, he said, and he would have broken into films. He had been about to abandon his Western outfit and adopt a more traditional Indian costume for his act.

  ‘It would have made no difference,’ said Susanna. ‘Perhaps you should do something else. Would you like a job at the racecourse? They need a new secretary.’

  ‘I hate horses,’ said Jimmy.

  ‘I can get you a car agency.’

  ‘I hate cars.’

  Susanna had to admit to herself that Jimmy did lack sex appeal. He was half-hearted, almost apologetic in his lovemaking, and sometimes she felt that he would rather be in bed with a guitar.

  ‘What on earth did I see in him in the first place?’ she asked herself. ‘And what do I do with him now?’

  Jimmy did not know what to do with himself. He mooned about the grounds and strummed listlessly on his guitar, but his heart was not in his music. He could not even sing, now that not even Susanna wanted to listen to him. Depressed, he went to a local chemist and asked for something to lift him out of his depression. He went home, swallowed a Dexedrine, and cheered up a little.

  He was on this chemical for two or three weeks, but whenever the effect wore off he was more depressed than before.

  Early one summer morning I was up at the break of dawn, woken by the shouts of two of my school friends who had come to fetch me for a cricket match in a neighbouring town. I dressed, and shouted to my mother to give me some breakfast. Then, out of pure habit, I looked over the wall—and there, hanging from a branch and swaying slightly in the dawn breeze, was a man—or rather his corpse. I recognized Jimmy from his clothes, and from the fact that his guitar lay on the g
rass, a few feet away from his dangling body.

  Episode Three

  Portrait of Susanna

  Jimmy Prakash had the honour of being buried beside Begum Samru’s lovers. ‘Beloved husband of Susanna’ went the inscription on the tombstone. And his favourite guitar was buried with him. That was a nice touch, suggested by Susanna.

  But the matter did not end there. A hanging, even if it’s suicide, has to be investigated by the police, and even before Jimmy had been cut down, Deputy Superintendent Keemat Lal was at the scene, examining the body and looking for clues. Jimmy had hanged himself with a cord, apparently a nylon curtain cord, and there was a deep indentation on his neck where the cord had dug into his flesh. But there were other marks, according to the doctor who conducted the autopsy. There were bruises on the throat, probably caused by the pressure of a hand or hands. Had he been strangled first, and then hoisted into the tree to make it appear as though he had hanged himself? It would have taken strong hands to choke the life out of the young man.

  DSP Keemat Lal investigated the ground around the tree. I watched from the sidelines. I had been the first on the scene, had given the alarm. It had rained that night, and the footprints of my running shoes could be seen quite clearly. But there were other footprints too. The prints of Susanna’s riding boots, of Shah Rukh’s chappals—and also the print of a large bare foot.

  Keemat Lal spent a lot of time studying this particular imprint.

  ‘Come over here, young man,’ he called to me. ‘You seem to be an intelligent boy. Do you notice anything unusual about this footprint?’

  I stared at it for some time. ‘It’s a broad foot,’ I said. ‘Not long but splayed, like a labourer’s.’

  ‘Well done, Dr Watson,’ he said. Obviously he was a student of the methods of Sherlock Holmes. ‘But is there anything else? Something unusual?’

  I stared at the footprint a little longer, then exclaimed, ‘There are six toes! This foot has an extra toe.’