The Grammarian Read online

  When he stood there, Adivi said congenially, “May this be the first of many meals in which my humble family is graced by your presence, Dr. Lautens.” And with a sweep of his arm, Adivi motioned them all to sit. Immediately upon sitting, Lalita hissed short words at one of the dining stewards, who quickly returned with a gleaming tray of silverware and made a quick turn around the table, hastily setting a fork, knife and spoon alongside the dinner plates. Lalita smiled at Lautens apologetically, “You must excuse us, Dr. Lautens. No matter how many times you instruct these servants, they can’t seem to remember simple directions.”

  Alexandre colored, “Please! Don’t apologize.”

  Adivi took up his knife and fork and with that everyone else took their cue also to begin eating. The food was served formally; Adivi and Alexandre were served larger portions of rice and meat. There was a stew of lamb, eggplants stuffed with dry spices, pickled mango in hot oil, puffed breads, lentils and spinach, a clear, red soup of oil and onions eaten with rice.

  For the briefest second, Adivi’s eyes widened, aghast, as his mother ignored the silver utensils in front of her and began eating with her right hand.

  “Amma!” he said, in a barely audible hushed whisper.

  Adivi’s mother looked at him with a look so sharp that Lautens looked down into his plate in a feeble attempt to exclude himself from the tension.

  He noted that the food was markedly milder than the food of the train, and wondered if this had been done in polite concession to his foreign taste buds. The water was poured from stainless steel jugs and its cold, metallic taste reminded Alexandre of sucking on icicles when he was a boy.

  The servant came around with the ghee, warm, clarified butter, ladling small spoonfuls into each diner’s plate, over the rice and curries. Not wanting to appear rude but warned by his friends in Cambridge against the rich excesses of Indian cuisine, Alexandre smiled and waved the servant away as he hovered over Alexandre’s shoulder with a full spoon.

  “What is that?” Kanakadurga asked with bemused confusion.

  Alexandre colored, “I’m terribly sorry. It’s just that I’ve been told to eat lightly while I’m here; you see, my system isn’t yet much accustomed to Indian food.”

  “What nonsense!” Kanakadurga smiled and turned to the servant, waving her left hand animatedly as she directed in Telugu: “Go, go on. Give him some ghee.”

  Alexandre laughed nervously, resigned. The servant put a small amount of butter on his food.

  “My goodness what is this! Put it properly. Must I get up and do it?” She leaned back as if to rise from her chair.

  “Amma!” Adivi admonished his mother under his breath.

  She addressed the servant again. “Put it properly,” and then, as the servant ladled out two round spoonfuls of the fragrant butter over his food, “yes, that is it; yes like that.”

  “Dr. Lautens, how was your trip? You must be rather exhausted,” Lalita said, her voice gentle and maternal.

  “It was rather long, yes, but I do want to thank your family for your generosity and kindness, I feel rather refreshed, having rested in my room a bit.”

  “Oh, good.”

  “Dr. Lautens,” Kanakadurga began, “my son tells me you have terribly good taste.” She smiled, and Alexandre cocked his head. “You are studying our beautiful language? Telugu? How did this come to pass?” Alexandre smiled, glad the tension was broken. Kanakadurga resumed eating, sighing happily as she ate.

  All the attention was on Alexandre, and he was courteously questioned on the nature of his academic pursuits and his family.

  “Well, in university I decided to start studying philology, and I did my early studies with a focus on Greek and Latin.” Alexandre mixed some creamed, spiced spinach with the rice and took a careful bite, chewing for a moment before he continued, “and then I started reading about the similarities scholars were analyzing among Greek and Latin and Sanskrit . . . and from there, my natural curiosity led me to the other languages of India. But I think that the moment it happened, the real moment I decided to study Telugu, was when I came across some French translations of the poet Vemana.” He quickly eyed Kanakadurga; though the idea of eating with one’s hands had initially startled his sensibilities, since being in India it had surprised him how neat a practice it could be. She ate using only the tips of her right hand; occasionally she would poke a hole in the pile of rice on her plate and motion for the servant to pour ghee in it. Alexandre cleared his throat, “ . . . yes, I still remember the first poem of his I read, you must pardon my pronunciation,” he smiled, “Inumu virigeneni irumaaru mummaaru/ kaachi yatakavachu kramamu gaanu/ manasu virigeneni mari chercharaadaya . . . ” Iron, if broken, can be joined together, twice or thrice, but a heart once broken can never be put together again.

  Adivi broke into a wide grin and clapped, “Bravo, Dr. Lautens! Bravo.”

  The Adivis were intelligent and curious, and verbosity in women seemed to be tolerated—even celebrated—but only when they attained a certain age. Neither of the girls spoke much, but Mohini looked at Alexandre when he spoke with wide eyes and a mischievous smile, asking him if he’d seen the Eiffel Tower, or what his favorite painting was in the Louvre; Anjali, however, seemed less taken with him, and mostly looked down. The attention of women was something he had long grown used to—he was charming and eloquent, but also beautiful, a characteristic that he relied on and was embarrassed by equally.

  Alexandre smiled, his eyes wide and blue, “Yes, so I am here to write a grammar—a sort of description of Telugu for language students. It is utterly foreign to European students, and I hope my book will serve as a sort of primer on Telugu. I wrote an outline on the train, and I’m hoping to get started right away . . . first by describing the pronoun system and then your incredibly rich and subtle verbal system.” Out of the corner of his eye, Alexandre could see Mohini smiling, and he continued, “If I might impose now and again upon your family,” he turned now to Mohini, coloring, “there is no better source than a native speaker.” For so long, he hadn’t had access to any real speakers—in fact he learned the language the best he could with the works of C.P. Brown, and a Bible written in rudimentary Telugu by French missionaries fifty years before. He knew a good amount of Sanksrit, and so he recognized many of the lexical elements of Telugu, but all the rest of the language presented constant challenges for him.

  “But of course, Dr. Lautens,” Kanakadurga answered, quickly. “We would all be happy to assist you in whatever ways we can.”

  “It will be my first major work of scholarship since I completed my doctorate,” Alexandre said the last words to Anjali and caught himself; he was a scholar and did not need to prove himself to this girl.

  Kanakadurga smiled, “Last night, my husband came to me in my dreams. Whenever he returns to me, it is an omen of blessings to come. You must be a good luck charm for our family, Dr. Lautens. I wonder what good things you will bring to us while you are here?” She had finished her meal and was now eating a banana.

  Both Kanakadurga, with the well-honed wit of the elderly, and Lalita, articulate and intelligent, contributed as much as he and Adivi to the general conversation. Alexandre noticed Adivi’s soft and affectionate glances at his wife. Between them was some sort of sparkling energy, like a shared secret, a happy one—though they listened to him with generosity and politeness, their attention was on each other. When the dishes were cleared, and a milky white dessert of mild cheese and syrup was served with rich coffee, Adivi said, “Dr. Lautens, it is with great honor that I announce, in your presence, that my daughter Mohini,” he smiled toward his younger daughter, “is to be wed next month. We are very happy that you are here to share with us this most joyous and auspicious occasion.”

  Alexandre broke into a wide smile but then saw Lalita and Anjali. Lalita caught her older child’s glance and looked down; Anjali’s mouth tightened into a line; Alexandre noted the awkward exchange but offered congratulations to Adivi. The room fell silent,
Adivi’s face the picture of a sort of forced, tense exuberance. Alexandre saw out of the sides of his eyes that the announcement seemed to have moved Anjali to a sort of stunned silence, and the girl stared at her empty coffee cup and dessert dish. Her grandmother too said nothing but smiled, looking downward.

  Adivi smiled widely, his eyes crinkling with joy. He slapped the table happily and said, “Champagne! We must have a toast.” He turned to the servants and rattled off some instructions.

  Two servants Alexandre estimated to be his own age returned with a Languedoc champagne bottle and crystal glasses. The glasses were passed out and filled in the peculiar silence that had descended.

  Adivi raised his glass, and the others followed him, “To my daughter Mohini, and her future husband, Varun. May your marriage bring us all great happiness, and may it give myself and your mother many grandchildren.”

  After they finished the toast, Adivi turned to Anjali. “Anjali, perhaps you can recite some ghazals for our guest.”

  The girl looked down and sighed as if resigned. She stood, leaning against the table.

  “Whose words tonight, darling?” Kanakadurga asked.

  She looked hard at the table and began, in a soft voice, her gaze downward: “Mirza Ghalib,” and then she started, “Allah Allah aik woh log hain jo teen teen dafah iss qaid say chhoot chu-kain hain aur aik hum hain keh aik ag-lay pachas baras say jo phansi ka phanda galay mein parha hai to nah phanda hi tut-ta hai nah dum hi nikalta hai.” When she finished she was looking not at but through her father, as if she could see the cold wall behind him.

  Kanakadurga sighed softly and said the girl’s name under her breath in a tone of gentle reprimand.

  Lalita closed her eyes, as if she could block out the moment. It was not that she was simply angry. But she alone knew that family happiness was an altogether unlikely and fragile thing, and she protected it fiercely. She saw her husband’s jaw clench and reflexively touched Anjali’s elbow.

  The quiet admonition about the table seemed to strengthen Anjali’s resolve, and she followed in English, still looking, it seemed, at the wall behind her father, though her eyes now were soft: “God, God, there are some among us who have been freed from the prison three times and I have for the past fifty years this rope around my neck . . . neither this rope breaks nor it takes my life.” She had memorized much of Ghalib, her father’s favorite poet; she did it at first to please her father but did it now to spite him. To take from him something he thought was beautiful and to know it better and more deeply than he could.

  And her father glared at her, as he often did, his face an expression of hate that masked the horror of his enraged and broken heart.

  LALITA WAS EXHAUSTED. She smoothed out the pleats of her sari over her shoulder, pulling the long swath of silk around her waist and tucking it into her petticoat. Today was the culmination of a long preparation for Dr. Lautens; in the last few months, through postal messages and many-times passed-down messages across the Eurasian landmass, the Adivis had received notice as to his plans and needs. She hoped they had done enough to accommodate him. There were things to be done when one had a guest like Dr. Lautens. Lalita thought that with this type of guest, one must make one’s life out to be not merely what it is in fact but what is should be: clean, moral, an exercise in good form, a well-set and generous table, intelligent conversation and social graces.

  In the brief hours since he had been in the Adivi home, Lalita found him gentle and sophisticated; she did not look upon the Europeans as kindly as her husband did, and often found them boorish and superior. Due to obligations of status and class, the Adivis were regularly in European company, and too often she found herself desperate for the time when they could at long last part ways and return to the comfortable confines of their home. She had spent the last week overseeing the preparation of the home for their guest, and by night her feet ached and she would fall asleep quickly and deeply. She had all the bedclothes in all the rooms changed, the curtains and windows washed, the floors scrubbed and the hallways swept. Lalita sent the butler out to purchase extra soaps, toothpastes and powders. Two cooks were sent out to the import stores for liquors, wine, chocolate and candy and to the marketplace to stock the kitchen fully with all the basics: onions, garlic and ginger, Orissa salt, lentils, tea and coffee, nuts, oil, tomatoes and curry vegetables—the meat and fish would have to be bought on a daily basis when they were fresh, troublesome as that was.

  Lalita knew Europeans ate meat every day and felt it would be impolite not to provide this for Dr. Lautens, distasteful though she found it. The food would have to be cooked in a more mild fashion for Dr. Lautens, but her mother-in-law would insist on fully spiced curries and Lalita worried that for the next several months she’d have to supervise two full sets of meals; the cook, she knew, would put up a fuss and Lalita hated arguing with the servants. Just thinking about it made her anxious; houseguests, as often as the Adivis had them, always posed extra work for her, but since this guest was European, the work was redoubled—otherwise she wouldn’t need to concern herself with silverware and washcloths, table settings and flower arrangements. That sense of self-consciousness that caused her to clean the house from floor to ceiling was stronger around foreigners, and knowing that this would be an extensive stay made her sigh periodically in anxious anticipation as the servants ran about the house carrying buckets of soapy water, bundles of freshly laundered linens or baskets full of potatoes.

  She sent to Bombay too for a French-English dictionary, in case one of his needs were lost in translation; her husband told her that Dr. Lautens spoke fluent English, and good Hindi, but Lalita believed that one can master other languages but the only one he’ll ever really know is his mother tongue.

  Despite how tired she was, there was that singularly pleasing feeling of overseeing the folding of linens or the assembly of the silverware drawer, that wave of satisfaction from completing a wifely and self-sacrificing task, that exhaustion that came from cooking and cleaning that so reaffirmed her. She was the woman of this house. It was a series of small tasks: leaving a room spotless, anticipating her husband’s need for more rice and mango pickle before he asked for it, keeping the pantry stocked with her mother-in-law’s favorite brand of biscuits, making the whole ordeal of wifely duty—to perform all these tasks and a thousand others all while wearing a clean sari scented with talcum powder, her hair in a neat bun, always ready to graciously receive last-minute guests, to make all of this look effortless was what filled Lalita with her quiet, womanly pride. It was a part of her very femininity that, through repeated and constant show, she had attempted to pass down to her daughters—successfully to Mohini but to which Anjali seemed immune. Her elder daughter’s cold superiority had alienated Lalita more and more as Anjali grew out of girlhood.

  AT THE TIME of Lalita’s marriage, the 1891 harvest of mangoes began with such a boon of perfect sunshine and rich soil that her father had to hire extra farmhands to collect all of the fruit in the great wicker baskets that when full shone like pots of gold. However, at the height of the season in late June, while she and her mother were being visited daily by silk vendors with wedding saris in their trunks, a plague of fungus started on the mango trees, and as quickly as her father had hired the farmhands, they were let go. She could still remember, as she looked out from the sitting room onto the verandah, her noble father, offering up poor explanations to emaciated, sinuous young men promised a summer of work. They—brown boys with bare feet and dirt embedded in their hands—left with less than they had hoped for but slightly more than they had actually yet earned.

  The mango grove, for the rest of summer, smelled of rot; flies swarmed it, and birds pecked at the blackening fruit. Nevertheless, by August the home was festooned in red and saffron curtains, and the maids dusted auspicious kolam patterns in white chalk on the home’s doorsteps. She had met Shiva once before the wedding. In a kurta of cream silk with silver thread embroidery, he had arrived with his parents, a butler an
d the driver of their coach.

  She was taken first by his handsome face. But later in the meeting too by his swift and arrogant manner, tinged by tenderness and humor. So decisive a young man—Shiva was three years older than she—and in whom the corporal so perfectly manifested his personality: robust, broad, with light touches of the feminine in long eyelashes and lips curved into the shape of a warrior’s bow. To that first meeting, she wore a sari of pink, thinking it innocent, feminine and virtuous. Her mother had dressed her hair, braided in a single rope with jasmines. Lalita lined her eyes with soot-colored kajal. Foreign aid of this sort was rarely resorted to—Lalita’s beauty was well-known among those of their community and wanted for little. But this occasion was pivotal to her whole life, and she without shame would admit that when she stole a glance at herself that day in the mirror she was surprised, proud and elated at her loveliness. Though there was some relative difference in the family’s wealth, and though Shiva was known to be a bachelor of infinite eligibility—handsome, rich and from a good family—her beauty gave her family the upper hand. He would want for no one else. Shiva’s father was like his son: tall and proud; his mother was deeply maternal, her body already heavy, her brow sympathetic and intelligent.

  Both of their families had retained ownership of the land through the permanent settlement licenses reached between the East India Company and authorities of the Princely States a hundred years before. Part of the contract ensured that their families, and others in a group of then nascent landed gentry, would continue to grow not only food crops but also indigo and tea. The ever-increasing tax on a presumed crop had forced many families to sell their land, but the Adivis through their close connections with the English had made a success of the treaty.