Duty Free (13 page)

Mulloo’s cousin lives in a powder-palace. It has two storeys and is plastered everywhere in white plaster—white pillars, white dome, white triangle, paper-hat-type thing on front porch. All powder-pashas—drugs smugglers,
na
—have houses like this. I think so they must be having a textbook of house designs for drug smugglers from which they all copy. Also house is in Defence Phase V, on the very edge of Lahore, where all the upstarters live. The army only started making it into plots and selling to people five years ago. Before that it was boarder with India.

“What did Mulloo say her cousin’s husband did?” asked Mummy, as the driver honked at the gate.

“All Mulloo’s told me is that girl is called Tasbeeh, she is in her early twenties and that the family is well off,” Aunty Pussy told her. “And she’s got a broken
nikah.
”

“Didn’t someone say he did import–export?” I asked.

“This looks more like the house,” said Mummy, “of someone who only
exports
, Pussy, if you get my meaning.”

“It’s not nice to judge people like that,” said Aunty Pussy with a holy look, “before you’ve even done hello–hi with them.”

I wondered inside my heart whether Aunty Pussy would be as holy if the house had been small and poor-looking.

A tiny window in the big iron gate opened and someone from inside checked us out. Then seeing it was us, rich-type ladies from good baggrounds in nice salon car, the armed guards—nine of them, I counted—opened the gate and we drove in. The house was big and it had taken over most of the plot, leaving only stripes of lawn on the sides, like thin sideburns on a very fat face. There were no trees in the garden but lots of lamp-posts and a plaster statue of a girl in a bonnet and skirt. I think so she was Little Bore Peep or maybe Little Miss Muff It. Also parked in the drive were three big Land Cruiser jeeps with black windows. Mummy looked at the cars and gave me a look.

Mulloo was supposed to meet us here but at last minute she called and cancelled. She said her tummy was feeling upset. But that her cousin was expecting us.

The front door was opened by a barefoot servant man who needed a shave. He took us into the sitting room. It was a big room with big golden sofas spread with white crochay mats where you’re supposed to rest your head and hands. There were no paintings on the walls, only a big print of a verse from the Holy Koran in a golden frame. There were no flowers and no decoration pieces on the tables, accept for a family of smiling Sarvoski hedgehogs. Mother with four babies.

Mulloo’s cousin was shortish and plumpish and dressed in a long-sleeved, high-necked
shalwar kameez
. Around her neck from a gold chain, not a chain, more a rope, hung a big Allah pendant with big diamonds entrusted in it. Her head was covered in a polyester
hijab
that sat low on her forehead.

“Assalam aleikum,”
she said, raising her hand to her forehead. “I’m Farva, Mulloo’s cousin-sister, and I am sorry I was not standing at the door to greet you but I was saying my prayers.” She gave a happy little laugh. “My prayers are a little longer than other people’s because I have so much to thank Almighty Allah for. Even if I lie with my forehead to the ground all day, all night before Him, it would not be enough. So much He has blessed me. Will you take something cold?”

Before we could tell her she called loudly for the servant.

“Siraj! Siraj!
Siraj!
” When he didn’t come she stamped off into the kitchen and from there we heard her shouting. “Where do you all disappear to? What do I pay you for? Why haven’t you given drinks?” Then she came back into the room followed by the unshaven Siraj and also another manservant with greasy hair and asked with another happy laugh, “Coke? Sprite? Fanta?”

We said no but she said no, no we must have something and told Siraj to get three Cokes.

“You must be Mulloo’s friend,” she said turning to me. Her eyes wandered disprovingly over my naked arms. “So much she has told me about you. And you must be boy’s Mummy?” she asked Aunty Pussy.

“Yes, I am Parisa. My son—”

“Oh yes, yes, Mulloo told me. Jehangir his name is, no? Has degree from foreign college. Has English pet name. Conkers? Bonkers?”

“Jonkers,” said Aunty Pussy coldly.

“Oh yes, sorry, sorry,” Farva slapped her forehead. “What to do? My memory is going away.”

“I don’t know if Mulloo has told you,” began Aunty Pussy. She stopped because Siraj had come back with the Coke. He gave us a glass each with a soggy tissue half stuck to the underneath. Aunty Pussy quickly dropped the tissue into an ashtray. She put the glass down and began again, “I don’t know if Mulloo has told you, but my son was married before. It is best to be frank from the start so there is no misunderstanding later. Marriage didn’t last long and, Allah was merciful, there were no children.”

Farva nodded. “Why did marriage break?”

“She was not, er, suitable.”

“How?”

Aunty Pussy looked at me.

“She wasn’t from our bagground,” I said. “Didn’t fit us.”

“And because she didn’t fit,” added Mummy, “we thought, why waste time? So we quickly did die-vorce. Best is not to drag these things along.”

“You
can
do die-vorce,” said Farva, nodding hard. “It is in Islam. You are allowed. Please don’t worry. I am very understanding that way. Tasbeeh, my elder daughter, also had a
nikah
you know. But we had to break it. Even though he was Tasbeeh’s cousin-brother—her father’s own brother’s son. Because we discovered that he was not nice, even though he had grown up in front of our own eyes. He drank. Yes, I know you will not believe it, but he drank. Kept bad company, men who kept drink in their houses. As soon as I found out, I told Tasbeeh’s father, ‘I know he is your brother’s son but I cannot have a son-in-law who drinks. My daughters have had a strict, religious
bringing up. I am not going to give them to men who drink.’ So next day, we broke it. It wasn’t easy you know. Because we had to go to courts and all, but we did it. Without telling Tasbeeh even, we just went and broke it. And Tasbeeh accepted because she knows what we do is always best. She is a good girl, my Tasbeeh.”

“What does Tasbeeh’s father do, if you don’t mind telling?” asked Mummy

“By the grace of Almighty Allah, he has import–export business.”

“And what does he import and what does he export?”

“You will not believe but I have never even asked. So little interest I take in worldly matters. What Allah gives, He gives. Why to question? You are not drinking your Coke. Why they are taking so long with tea? Servants! So lazy, no?”

And again she shouted for Siraj. When he came, she barked at him to bring tea.

“With everything, okay?”

“Er, can we, um,” I asked quietly, because you never know with these
hijabi
types, “meet Tasbeeh? Is she inside?”

“Surely, surely. I am very modern that way. I will go and fetch her.” She went off, her bottom bouncing like a basketball behind her.

Mummy, me, and Aunty Pussy, we all looked at each other.

“You know, Pussy, don’t you, that the Coke was flat?” Mummy said in a low voice. “And those tissues!”

“Don’t be such a snob, Malika.”

“And we still don’t know what the father does,” I whispered.

“Why must you be so suspicious?” Aunty Pussy snapped at me softly. “After all, Jonkers also does export. Are you meaning that Jonkers is also doing hanky-panky?”

“He exports
towels
, Aunty. There’s a difference between towels and—”

“And what?”

“You
know
what!” said Mummy.

“
And
she wears
hijab and
the furniture is so tacky
and—
”

“Here she is.” Farva came back. Behind her was an even shorter but thanks God not plumper person than herself. “Tasbeeh, daughter, do
salaam
to aunties.”

“Assalam aleikum,”
mumbled Tasbeeh staring at the floor. She was also wearing high-necked
shalwar kameez
. It was brown with big, big orange flowers. She was not in
hijab
, thanks God, but her head was covered in a brown
dupatta
. She wore her long hair in a plait like that traitor, Jameela, used to. Her only make-up was some black under the eyes and very wrong orange lipstick.

“Do special salaams to
that
aunty.” Farva pushed her at Aunty Pussy.

With bowed head, Tasbeeh went to Aunty Pussy’s armchair and said
salaam
again.

Aunty Pussy got up and patted Tasbeeh on the head. Even though Aunty Pussy is not, you know, specially tall, Tasbeeh hardly went up to her shoulder. Aunty Pussy gave her three more pats, but she still stood there, eyes downcasted. So Aunty Pussy also stood there stiffly like a rooster, until I patted the sofa besides me.

“Come sit with me, Tasbeeh.”

Tasbeeh looked at her mother and only when she nodded, she came over and sat besides me. She moved her bottom backwards on the sofa until her brown rubber-souled sandals were hanging three inches off the floor. Aunty Pussy sank thankfully back into her chair.

A strong smell of fried meat came into the room.

“Oh, good. Tea is coming,” beamed Farva. “I hope you like kebabs. Tasbeeh’s father always says my kebabs are best.”

“Are you at college?” I asked Tasbeeh.

“No, I—” she began.

“She’s finished,” said Farva from across the room. “Did it in Islamiyat and Geography. BA. Good marks she got. By grace of Almighty Allah.”

“When did you graduate?” I asked.

“Full one year and four months it will be at end of this month,” replied Farva. “No, Tasbeeh, daughter?”

Tasbeeh nodded.

“So you’ve been at home since then?” I lowered my voice so that Farva couldn’t hear and answer again.

“Mostly,” whispered Tasbeeh, looking at her lap.

But Farva had the ears of a labradog. I swear she could probably make them stand up if she wanted.

“No you’ve been to Makkah
shareef
with us to do Umra and after that we took both you sisters to Dubai to buy your dowries,” said Farva. “All those diamond sets we bought you, you’ve forgotten, hmm?”

Tasbeeh’s reply was drowned out by a loud rattling and
creaking as if an old gate was being forced open and Siraj and the other servant arrived pushing a wooden tea trolley with big golden wheels. The tea cosy was in the shape of a smiling blonde girl wearing a big bouncy skirt and a wide hat. The downstairs bit of the tea trolley was loaded with fried food—
pakoras, samosas
, kebabs,
jalebis
, and a huge bottle of tomato ketchup. There was also a cake. Farva put a hand up the blonde’s skirt and pulled out a teapot and without asking if we took milk or not poured out three cups with lots of milk and told Tasbeeh to give to us. Then Siraj pushed the fried food under our noses. When I saw those long oily roles of meat, my
tau
stomach almost came rushing up my throat so I said that no thank you, but I’m a vegetarian. So then Farva insisted I have the potato
samosas
but I told her that I can’t take either
samosas
, or
pakoras
, or
jalebis
because of my cholestroils.

Farva frowned and then she looked at Mummy and Aunty Pussy who had also said no. “I know what you are doing. You are being formal. Please take, otherwise I will mind. Tasbeeh, daughter, give to Aunties.” Then she said if we didn’t have cake, she wouldn’t talk to us.

So I had a tiny slither. It was dry inside.

We sat for another half-hour drinking her milky tea and hearing all about how many sheeps they slaughtered at the last Eid—and that also on their driveaway, imagine!—and how her husband liked doing it himself with his own hands because it was duty of every good Muslim man to do it himself with his own hands and how much meat they had given to
their neighbours and how much they had frozen themselves and that these kebabs she was giving us now were made out of those very same frozen minced sheeps.

In all of this she never for one second asked anything about Jonkers or us because I think so she must have taken all details about bagground—bank account, real state, age, job, degrees, looks, previous marriage, everything—from Mulloo before only. And nor did she let Tasbeeh say one word.

In the middle, the electricity went away and Farva shouted at Siraj to switch on the generator. Throughout she kept talking and laughing happily and Tasbeeh sat still and silent as if she’d slipped into a comma. I’d given up by now trying to get Tasbeeh to talk and so I also just stirred my tea and stared at the big circles of grease going round and round on top. Aunty Pussy looked fakely interested in Farva’s conversation but Mummy’s face was like a shop whose metal shutters had been pulled down and locked up and the shopkeeper had gone home for the night.

At last when Farva put her tongue inside her mouth for five minutes, Mummy and I jumped up and said thank you and that we must go home now. Please.

“So quickly?” said Farva.

“No, it hasn’t been quick at all,” said Mummy heavily, frowning at Aunty Pussy who was still sitting in her chair.

When she was seeing us all to the door Farva held my hand and said, “You know I’ve already started thinking of you like a big sister. So much I’m looking forward to seeing you again and again.”

What cheeks! Big sister, my shoe! She must be at least ten years older than me. I smiled stiffly and took my hand back. No way was she becoming my relative. Money or no money.

Night had fallen down by the time we left. All the lamps had come on in Farva’s empty garden. Outlined against the dark sky, her glittering white house looked like it was made of salt.

On the way home we were quiet for a bit and then in a fakely cheerful voice, Aunty Pussy said, “That wasn’t too bad, was it? Of course they aren’t classy like the Kuraishis and not so educated also, but girl seems a sweet, respectful type. The mother’s a bit—”

“For God’s sake, Pussy!” Mummy burst out. “They are not right and you know it.”

“Why? What’s wrong with them?” Aunty Pussy lifted her thin, pencilled eyebrows at us.