The Peacemakers
  By Sandra Hunter

Sunila stares out of the window at the bare branches of the sycamore tree. A thrush is huddled up on one of the upper branches. It is one of those grey and white days where your breath puffs ahead of you. A few days of this and then the temperature will drop another ten degrees. November in Middlesex.

On the phone, Pavitra is trying to say something, but Sunila can’t make out the words.

“He—he—he” The words are broken into sobs. It would be funny except Pavitra is weeping. It is funny and Sunila has to bite the inside of her cheek. If only Pavitra could hear herself she would laugh, too.

Pavitra tries again, “Suni, he—he—” She gives up and weeps while Sunila shakes as she tries to contain herself. Finally Sunila gasps aloud.

Distracted, Pavitra manages a full sentence. “Suni, are you all right?”

Sunila shrieks with laughter. “If only you could hear yourself, Pavi. He—he—he—”

There is silence, then a nervous giggle, and her sister-inlaw says, “I sound like a monkey!”

“Or one of those comedians on television.”

They laugh together, neither able to get a meaningful phrase out for some moments. The laughter dwindles, they sigh, and Pavitra says, “I like Morecambe and Wise.”

“Oh yes. I like them, too. Remember that sketch? The one where he puts his foot out and keeps putting and putting—”

“And the leg is ten feet long!”

They scream again and Sunila sinks onto the stairs so she can laugh more comfortably.

She wipes her eyes. “So funny.”

“And clean, Suni.”

“Oh yes. I only like clean comedy.”

This isn’t true. Some of Sunila’s happiest memories are from parties with her cousins in Toronto where the men told naughty stories while the women egged them on. Secretly, she likes Benny Hill but wouldn’t dare tell Arjun. Benny Hill would definitely belong to the category that Arjun calls lowbrow comedy.

Sunila has spent much of her life trying to distance herself from her low-brow upbringing. But it clings, like the kind of dirt in her children’s white school uniform shirts, which she scrubs, but never gets
quite white enough.

Arjun dislikes what he terms ‘smut.’ Smut can be a joke about knickers.
Murad came home with a very funny joke: What lies on top of the
ocean shouting, Knickers knickers knickers? Crude oil! She had leaned against the kitchen counter, shaking with laughter. You mustn’t tell me jokes like that.

Eventually, Arjun found out about it. Your mother is not to hear this kind of smut. Sunila had solemnly agreed. Such things were not appropriate, especially since Arjun was such a high-up in the church. Deacon and all.

She briefly considers telling an off-color joke to Pavitra, but what if Pavitra doesn’t laugh? What if it gets back to Arjun? It would be at some family party and someone would take Arjun aside, Arjun, bhai, Sunila is telling dirty stories. Not nice, hahn? Then she would have to face Arjun’s bitter face, the one that told her she has failed again, that she is inadequate again, that he only married her because he needed the promotion and the woman he really loved had moved to Agra.

Sometimes, when it is too much and she goes to stand at the bottom of the garden pretending to tidy up the compost heap, she allows the thought to come. She lays her cheek along the thin, smooth skin of divorce.

She can only whisper the word. It is a bad word. Bad people do it. But
in the Women’s Own magazine in the doctor’s office two weeks ago, she read that Elizabeth Taylor had done it. She’d done it so many times that it was just part of her normal routine. Get up, put on face cream, divorce Richard. How daring it sounded; so chic.

Sunila practices. Get up, put on Johnson’s Baby Lotion, divorce Arjun.
She thinks again, I’ll just divorce him and he can take his disapproving
face and jump in the lake. She laughs.

Pavitra says, “What is it, Suni? Why are you laughing?”

“Oh, just thinking about that Morcambe and Wise.”

“Oh yes. Funny fellas.” Pavitra sighs. “Thank you for listening, Suni. I
always feel better after talking to you.”

Sunila feels guilty. She hasn’t been a good sister-in-law. She has given
no advice, has offered no help. “Pavi, how about having lunch? We can
go to that Chinese place in Hounslow.”

“Oh. King Chow’s. What a good idea!”

“Let’s go the day after tomorrow. It’s Sunday and we have nothing planned. How would that be?”

“Are you sure? How about Arjun?”

“He’s not doing anything. He can take the children out. They’ll love it.”

“The boys are going on a church outing, so I won’t have them. Thank you, Suni. How sweet you are.”

“No, no. Don’t thank me. It will be nice to get out of this place.” Sunila hears the words jumps out of her mouth. “I mean, just for a change.”

There’s a second’s hesitation before Pavitra says, “Yes, a change is always nice.”

Sunila tries to rebalance the conversation. “And then you can tell me all about it.”

“Oh, yes.”

Suni hears the hesitation. “It’ll do you good to get it off your chest. If you’d like. I don’t want to press you.”

“You’re right, Suni. It’s better to talk about these things.”

Sunila knows she’ll wriggle the truth out of her sister-in-law one way or another. She loves her sister-in-law, but understands that information is power. If she knows one bad thing about Pavitra, then it is all right that she has hinted that she wants to get out of this place.

Does everyone know? Do they know the truth about the endless arguments and shouting and the times he’s hit her? But doesn’t everyone have their troubles from time to time? She’s seen the bruises on Pavitra’s arms. At least her own bruises are easily camouflaged, as though Arjun instinctively knows what can be covered by long sleeves.

She is thankful she doesn’t have to wear a roll-neck shirt, like Pavitra sometimes does. Sunila’s neck is short and she looked just like a turtle when she wore a pink roll-neck shirt two months ago. The children laughed at her, and she saw Arjun’s mouth twitching. And she hated him even more. He did this. He squeezed her throat and left the purple marks. And now he laughed at her because she looked foolish in the stupid shirt.

But that was only once. Even he realized he had gone too far. She had lost her voice and pretended to the children she had a cold. Sometimes she thinks the children will see right through her lies.

What if she were to just say it all out loud? I can’t sit down because my back aches from your father’s fist. She imagines their horrified faces, the whispering, the complete outrage of the family. Her mother-in-law would take her aside. We don’t speak of these things. My children have been through terrible times. You must understand this. Arjun was separated from his family for years. There was no one to care for him. He was in a boarding school. His father hated him. Hated him. Do you understand what that means?

Her mother-in-law would tell her these things not because she loved her, but because she was reminding her of what might happen if Sunila refused to behave, refused to bear everything in silence; if Sunila didn’t behave the whole family would reject her.

She wouldn’t be asked to make her special lemon and butterscotch pies for the weekend gatherings, no one would call during the week, she would be excluded from the powerful gossip that centered around her mother-in-law. She would live in a kind of familial purgatory.

Even worse than that was how Arjun would be humiliated; a man who couldn’t control his wife. They wouldn’t exclude the children; after all, it wasn’t the children’s fault. But Murad would no longer be his grandmother’s favorite. And because of that, her mother-in-law would lavish on Sunila the bitter, enduring hatred of the bereaved.

Sunila longed to reply, You hated him, too. He’s told me how you stripped him naked in front of the other kids and called him a chimpanzee, how you beat him until he fainted.

If she could choose, she would go back to Canada where her Sri Lankan cousins don’t care about being brown, who love eating fresh green chilies, who shout with laughter and scream at each other when they are angry, making up in a struggle of limbs so that their love-making is half-war, half-surrender.

Canada is so much like England. Everything is arranged so carefully, wrapped in hygienic plastic, not like the Indian shops where everything is laid out to be touched. Not like India, where the disgusting cows leave dung everywhere, the filthy gutters streaming with dirty slops, rubbish, and, in some places, sewage. In England, in Canada, the sewage is kept properly underground. And people speak so nicely to you. “Good morning, Mrs. Dasgupta.” None of this head-waggling business.

And so she goes between despising her family and yearning for them, and longing to be English and being shocked at how ignorant the English are, and feeling superior to these know-it-all Indians and wishing she knew what it is they are all laughing at.

But they won’t be laughing if they find out she’s been telling Pavitra dirty jokes. So hypocritical. They would laugh at the Indian and the elephant joke if they would just come down off their high horses. She knows Murad tells his cousins the jokes he hears at school. She hears them talking and laughing. If only she could sit with them and laugh. But she is a grown-up and grown-ups don’t sit with the children.

 

Surprisingly, Arjun makes no opposition to her plan to meet Pavitra. It is a big favor, even though she spoke so airily about it on the phone. It means that he will have to deal with the children and Arjun doesn’t like to be bothered with these things.

Sunday is his day of rest. He must lie on the sofa in the living room and no one must come in or out to disturb him. No one must open and shut the door. No one must come in to find a pencil or a book. The piano lid is shut and Murad must do his piano practice before ten or wait until the evening when he will be scolded for not doing it earlier.

However, Arjun has decided to forego his precious rest and take the children to Beconscot, the miniature village an hour away from London. This is partly a mild retaliation for Sunila’s outing with Pavitra. Beconscot is one of the few places she loves to go, so she will miss this treat. But she is happy because she knows the children will enjoy themselves and Arjun will receive a vicarious pleasure from watching Roxi entranced by the miniature buildings and tiny landscapes while Murad will forget his usual air of anxious superiority to bend over the tiny trains rushing under bridges and through tunnels. Arjun may even buy them a cream cake.

Sunila gets off the bus and finds Pavitra already waiting outside King
Chow’s. They hug each other and Sunila feels her sister-in-law shivering.

“Cold, Pavi?”

“Just a little.”

“You need a new coat.”

“I’m fine. I should have put on a warm woolly. Let’s go inside.”

It is only just noon and the restaurant is already filling up for lunchtime. The two women are led to one of the last window tables. The manager moves between tables, greeting old customers. He stops at their table to speak to Pavitra.

“Mrs. Owen, so nice to see you again.”

“Mr. Chow, this is my sister-in-law, Mrs. Dasgupta.”

Mr. Chow bows a little and Sunila nods back at him.

“So, Mrs. Owen, you bring a new customer to me. I give you special surprise.” He smiles and wags one finger at her.

“Oh, no, please don’t go to any trouble.” Pavitra laughs nervously.

“No trouble, Mrs. Owen. My pleasure. You choose any dessert you like. On the house.” He beams at both of them and moves on to greet the next customers.

“Such a nice man.” Pavitra tucks her coat over the back of her chair.

“I must say he’s a very friendly person.” Sunila carefully shakes out her coat before folding it and putting it on the chair next to her.

“He’s like that with all his customers.”

“No wonder it’s so popular. And free dessert, too. What a treat!” Sunila looks out of the window. A real window table. She and Arjun have gone to dinner a few times but only to Indian restaurants and never at a window table. She looks forward to the pleasure of looking over the whole dessert menu and not having to worry about the price.

Suni leans forward to whisper across the table. “Pavi, what should we order?”

“I’ll find something nice for us. We’ll get a couple of things and we can share.”

The waiter takes their order for Chow Mein and Kung Pao Chicken. Sunila is not used to eating noodles. What if they fall off her spoon? Will she look a complete idiot in front of everyone?

As she glances around, she sees a man, sitting by himself, having a particularly hard time. As he tries to get his spoonful up to his mouth for the second time, the noodles slip off onto his plate and he looks up to see Sunila watching him. He laughs. “I know there must be some way of eating them!” His accent is posh, and he seems respectable, but she is not going to be drawn into a conversation with a strange man.

Sunila half-smiles and ducks her head. Pavitra turns to see who is talking. The man repeats. “I was just saying to your sister that I’m not much good at this.” He is not wearing a tie. If he didn’t have such a nice accent, Sunila would write him off as a bounder.

“Oh, I’m not much good, either.” Pavitra says. “I think it takes a lot of practice.”

Sunila whispers, “He thinks I’m your sister.” She giggles.

Pavitra leans forward, “Don’t worry, Suni. The Chow Mein is very easy to eat. Not like this other kind. You’ll see.”

They wait for their tea and Pavitra smiles. “So nice to get away, isn’t it?”

Sunila rotates her shoulders, as if shrugging away this other married, maternal life and glances at the noodle man. He is looking at them. He gives a quick smile and then looks away.

Sunila leans forward. “Pavi. That man is looking at us.”

“Well. There’s no law against it.”

“I’m not going to encourage him.” She pulls her cardigan around her. It’s not her fault that she has a large bosom. Men are like that, though. They’re always looking where they shouldn’t.

Pavitra looks around and the noodle man smiles at her, too.

“Pavi.” Sunila takes control of the situation. “Pay no attention. He is just being silly.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“That man.”

“Suni, I was looking for the waiter.” Pavitra looks confused and Sunila feels a niggle of embarrassment. Pavitra is so innocent. She doesn’t recognize a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Anyway, the man is clearly more impressed with her than Pavi. It’s her skin. She looks so fair people must mistake her for being English. That’s what comes of being from such good stock.

Her sisters were much darker. They looked like typical Indians. But she, Sunila, the one with the light skin, the sickly child cosseted by her mother, was always a little better, one step higher than the others. She knew she was destined for something better than marriage to some black heathen.

Of course, this wasn’t something she pointed out. She didn’t have to. Sunila is so fair; she could be from North India. Those fools. Who were they to say she was from North India? North India, South India, it was all the same to her.

Her magical kingdom lay much further away, in the books and maps from the mission school. England; with Janet and John chasing their blue ball, their blonde mother and brown-haired pipe-sucking father cheerfully smiling at their antics. They had a small brown dog, called Spot. Sunila didn’t like dogs, but to be part of Janet and John’s world, where everyone wore white socks, where there were always crumpets for tea, and everything was so clean—that would be heaven. She would endure the small dog for that paradise.

So when Arjun told her they were moving to England she knew God had heard her prayers. Arjun was dark, but his grandfather had studied in England which meant he was closer to being English than even she with her fair skin.

They would make a fine life in England. They would have a bone china tea-set and she would entertain her neighbors, all English, all impressed with her electric oven, her Bex Bissell vacuum cleaner, her washer and dryer. She might even have a little dog called Spot.

But in the real England the women were tired-looking. They wore long, beige raveling cardigans and one or two even wore slippers to go to the shops. The children wore hand-me-downs and had runny noses and shouted dirty words at her. Some of the men looked straight past her or if they did look, it was sly.

She had come to heaven but been dumped in the wrong part; the lower class. She deserved much better than this. Where was the bone china tea service? She nagged Arjun for a Royal Crown Derby set. He bought Denby. She was furious. The Denby set wasn’t delicate. It was solid, with thick handles on the brown mugs and ridges on the cream saucers. She had thanked him through gritted teeth and barely listened as he insisted that it would last for years.

A delicate cup and saucer arrives in front of her. The waiter pours the golden tea into each cup and places the tiny silver jug of milk and china bowl of sugar between them.

“Come, Suni. Let me serve you some milk.” Pavi lifts the jug and adds a little milk into Sunila’s cup.

Sunila serves herself two lumps of sugar and stirs it in, listening to the soft tinkle of the tiny spoon against the side of the cup. She gazes out of the window with pleasure.

The London plane trees, marching along the high street at twenty feet intervals, hold their stiff bare arms up. No refuge for small birds which flutter closer to the ground, picking at a squashed Cornish pasty. Not many pedestrians on a Sunday. Some are coming from church; such lovely clothes they wear; a few men in flat caps and tweedy jackets on their way to or from a football match, or pub, or some such masculine occupation. And there’s a small dog with a black patch over one eye. She smiles at it. Sweet little thing.

Suddenly she feels guilty about being so comfortable and happy. And she is angry that she feels guilty. Why shouldn’t she feel comfortable once in a while? Look at how she has endured the low-class neighborhood, the coarse neighbors, the church people who all think they are better. It’s not her fault she ended up in the wrong place, the wrong class, the wrong marriage.

She leans forward. “So, Pavi. How are things?”

“Oh, not so bad, Suni.”

“How are your arms?”

“Suni!” Pavitra is shocked.

“I’m sorry, Pavi. But you have to talk about these things. If you don’t, you just bottle it up inside and then it explodes.”

“I’m not going to explode. But we can’t talk about that.”

“You long for things, we all long for things. And then we don’t get them. Nothing turns out the way we want. Nothing. We just have to face it.”

Pavitra asks, “Suni? Are you all right?”

Sunila looks up, realizes she has been stirring her tea too vigorously. Some has slopped out into the saucer. “Oh, how clumsy of me.” She uses a paper napkin to mop up the mess. “I should have been more careful. Such dainty cups. Not like the big hulking mugs we have at home.” She laughs.

The waiter brings their chicken and noodles. As Pavitra demonstrates, the noodles are easy to cut with the edge of the spoon. Soon they are talking about the children, about their jobs, and the danger recedes for now.

As they are finishing, the Noodle Man gets up to leave. Suni sees him coming and nudges Pavitra under the table. “He’s coming.”

Pavitra looks up. “Who?”

The Noodle Man arrives at their table. He bows. “I’m sorry to intrude.”

“Oh, not at all,” Pavitra says

Sunila kicks her under the table. It’s meant to be a small reminder that they shouldn’t talk to this man, but her foot connects sharply with Pavitra’s ankle.

“Ow,” Pavitra says.

“Are you all right?” The Noodle Man is solicitous.

“It’s okay. I just bumped myself.”

“Please allow me to say that I think you are quite lovely. I come here every day and I’ve never seen such a lovely woman.”

Pavitra, rubbing one ankle, is confused. Sunila is even more confused. Surely, as rude as this fellow is, he ought to be talking to her. She is the fair one, not Pavitra.

But now that she looks at Pavitra, she can see that she is lovely—the large eyes, the shoulder-length wavy hair, the long delicate hands.

“Oh,” Pavitra says. She hesitates. “Thank you. I am having lunch with my sister-in-law.”

The Noodle Man inclines his head towards Sunila and says, “Good afternoon.”

“Good afternoon.” She inclines her head also.

“Well, I’ll leave you two ladies to enjoy your lunch.” He bows again to Pavitra. “You should be in a painting. I mean it.”

As he leaves the restaurant, Pavitra giggles. “What nonsense.”

Sunila doesn’t smile. She is angry about something, but she is not quite sure what. Is it that her sister-in-law is more beautiful than she who, in a certain light, could be mistaken for English? Is she so desperate for male attention? This can’t be it. She has never actively looked for attention. She is all modesty and downward glances.

There were a few times when she deliberately looked out for the young delivery boy at work. But that was only because he reminded her of her cousin in Canada, Alex, who once said he loved her and wanted to marry her. He’d had several beers, but she knew he meant it. He could never have found the courage to say it sober. But she had promised herself never to think of him. It was wrong. Cousins didn’t marry. And he was low-class anyway. But she had loved him.

No, she had never loved him. What nonsense, this business of loving. All the yearning glances, Alex’s hands on her.

She folds her napkin into a tiny square.

“Who does he think he is coming up to us and talking in that way? I’m going to call the manager.”

“Oh, no, Suni. Please don’t. He didn’t mean any harm.”

“We’re respectable women. We don’t need this kind of annoyance.” Sunila waves the waiter over. “Please send the manager over.”

“Is everything all right, madam?”

“The food is fine. Please send the manager here.”

The waiter leaves and Pavitra says, “Suni, I don’t think we need to bother Mr. Chow.”

“I’m going to tell Mr. Chow exactly what I think of his restaurant.”

“Suni, please don’t. What if he gets angry? We’ll never be able to come again.”

“Quite frankly I have no intention of coming again.”

Mr. Chow, beaming, arrives at their table. “Mrs. Owen, can I help you?”

“Mrs. Owen didn’t call you over. I did. A man came up to us.” Sunila hesitates. What is she to say about him?

“Ah, yes. You want to know this gentleman who come to your table.” Mr. Chow bends towards them. “He the new owner of this restaurant.”

Before Sunila can speak, Pavitra asks, “That man in the woolly scarf owns this restaurant? I thought you owned it, Mr. Chow.”

“No. He just buy it. His name,” he whispers, “Viscount Brentford.” He nods and smiles at them. “A lord. But he don’t want people to know he a lord. So we don’t tell. But he come to your table. He like you.”

Sunila stares at Mr. Chow. Is he joking with them? Mr. Chow leans on their table. “Very nice man. Viscount Brentford. So.” Mr. Chow straightens up. “I bring you dessert?” Mr. Chow waves over the waiter.

Sunila sits with the menu in front of her. She cannot read anything. Surely there is some mistake. That man can’t be a lord. She can see Pavitra is also staring blankly at her menu.

Pavitra looks up and they both begin laughing. It is ridiculous. Pavitra says, “We came for a Chinese meal in Hounslow and we meet Viscount Brentford. Perhaps he was lost!”

“What a name, Pavi. Viscount Brentford, my foot. How about Lord Putney Green?”

Pavitra waggles her head and holds up the tiny saucer of chutney. “Would you like some chutney, Lord Putney?”

“Stop, Pavi. You’ll make me choke.” Sunil pretends to wipe her mouth with the napkin so no one will see her laughing.

“Anyway, he didn’t do any harm,” Pavitra says.

“Huh,” Sunila says, and rubs the flat of her hand against her nose. “He was just trying it on.” She picks up the menu. “Shall we have the lychees?”

“Let’s have ice-cream, too.”

After the meal, they wander along the high street. There’s a sale on at Debenham’s and Sunila persuades Pavitra to try on a new coat. It’s a beautiful dark-blue wool blend and it will keep her warm.

The coat is fifteen pounds and it’s obvious that Pavitra likes it, but she takes it off.

“Perhaps another time.”

Sunila suddenly says, “Let me buy it for you. Just pay me back when you can.” She doesn’t know where this impulse came from; perhaps if she makes the offer, Pavitra will decide to buy it.

“No, Suni. Mike would be so angry if he knew I borrowed money from you.”

“But we’re family. We always help each other out. Look, you don’t have the money now. I do. It’s all right. Mike won’t mind.”

Pavitra hesitates. “But, Suni, I don’t get paid for another two weeks.”

“That’s all right. I don’t need the money right now.” She looks at Pavi.“Doesn’t Mike give you money for clothes?”

“He pays all the rent, Suni. He pays for everything. It’s not fair to ask him for extra.”

“What about your money?”

“Oh, I pay for the bills and groceries and things for the kids.” Pavitra stops short.

“So you’re paying for everything except the rent?”

“Oh, Suni, don’t tell. Please don’t tell.” Pavitra sits on a chair. “After we were married, he said if I wanted something I must buy it myself. I thought he meant just clothes, like this.” She strokes the soft wool of the coat. “But he meant everything. Food, bills, everything.”

“But how are you managing?”

“My job can pay for most things. But I have to really save if we want to go on holiday. Mike likes to take the kids to Spain. He’ll pay for the airfare and half the hotel. I pay for the other half and everything else. Food, trips, and all.”

“Pavi, it’s not fair.”

“Well, that’s the way it is. Like you were saying. Nothing turns out the way you want.” She gives a half-smile.

Sunila hugs her. “We’ll buy the coat. You can say someone gave it to me, but it doesn’t fit. We’ll cut out the labels and put it in an old plastic bag. He won’t know. Men don’t notice these things.”

“If he finds out, Suni, he’ll be so angry.”

Sunila looks into her worried sister-in-law’s face. “He’s not going to find out.”

She takes out a ten-pound note and a five-pound note. She will tell Arjun that there were no lamb chops at the butcher’s. She can curry the chicken she already has in the freezer. She will pretend that Marks and Spencer had sold out of the black cardigan and skirt she was going to buy.

She can save up and buy them another time. They were only for work, and her Crimplene skirt and grey wool cardigan are still perfectly fine. The merino wool jacket would have looked so elegant.

She watches her sister-in-law put on her new coat, the sweet, delicate face beaming and the long, slender fingers smoothing the fine wool.

“Pavi, you look like the Duchess of Hounslow.”

Pavitra twirls around and laughs.