‘Tonight, from behind that curtain, I will show you the real thing.’ Chef cleared his throat. ‘The real memsahib,’ he said.

‘Tonight?’

‘Yes, observe her attitude. She speaks polished Inglish. And observe her nakhra. The way she holds a fork.’

8

Everything is ready, almost ready, in the kitchen. Fumes are rising from simmering pots. Soup is cream of corn. Starter is sheekh kebab. Main course is seven items, including pork in mango-coriander sauce. Memsahib is vegetarian, Chef tells me. Navrattan paneer and dal makhni have been prepared especially for her. Lady Fingers are also for her. Biryani, kakori and fish are for the colonel. Trout is ready – from Dachigam in the morning.

Evening approaches. Tonight the real memsahib is coming. The sun reddens the kitchen walls before it sets in the enemy’s land.

Everything is ready.

General Sahib stands on the verandah, hands clasped behind him. He is an inch or two above six feet and he always stands in this manner. The black American suit gives him a stately air, the red scarf on his neck depicts a leaping leopard. There is a fresh shaving mark just below his left cheek. His skin has an oily sheen, no wrinkles yet. Everything about him is what I had imagined to see in a General, even his eyes, which are at once intimidating and filled with compassion. He bends his neck, listening to the sound of footsteps on the gravel path. The guests are approaching.

The colonel, a short man wearing a black beret, walks a little ahead of his wife. She has Bombay actress good looks, but he is a bit on the heavier side. He looks restrained but angry as if already tonight someone has offended him deeply.

The two men shake hands firmly.

Sahib kisses the memsahib on her cheek, which is red because of make-up. She giggles. Says something in English.

‘ India and Pakistan all right?’ asks General Sahib.

‘Both of us are very well, sir!’ says the colonel.

‘I don’t believe a word!’ says Sahib.

‘No. Please don’t believe him,’ says Memsahib and giggles.

‘Is there anything I can do to help?’ Sahib guides them to the living room.

‘More fire power,’ says the colonel, now looking more relaxed.

‘Darling, stop it,’ she says with a sparkle in her eyes.

She is wearing silk. The sari clings to the curves of her body, tight, as if purely out of desire.

Inside, Chef explains the meaning. ‘Gen Sahib calls all married couples as India and Pakistan.’

‘But who is Pakistan?’

‘Women are.’

There are three sofas in the drawing room, and a grand fireplace with glowing red coal. The painting of the dead woman looks down at the guests from the wall. Not far from the painting there is a glass cabinet. The artillery mementoes inside the cabinet demand one’s attention. Next to the mementoes are bottles of finest quality rum and scotch, and Kingfisher beer.

She sinks in the sofa, the real memsahib.

Chef and I are standing just behind the gap in the curtain. He is holding a sharp knife; he keeps wiping the blade with his apron. Now and then he points a finger. At first I find it hard to observe the colonel’s wife properly. All I can see clearly is the back of her blouse.

‘Where is the little one?’ she asks.

‘Rubiya, your Aunty and Uncle have arrived,’ says Sahib a bit loudly.

Rubiya is in her room with the ayah.

‘Papa, I am trying to commit suicide,’ she shouts from her room.

General Sahib laughs.

‘She learns these words. Don’t know from where. She doesn’t even know the meaning of “suicide”. Two days ago she told the ayah that her mother actually committed a suicide.’

India and Pakistan laugh.

The colonel rubs his hands.

‘Whiskey?’

‘With soda, sir.’

The colonel clears his throat.

‘Your wife was very beautiful, sir.’ He admires the painting; so does the memsahib.

‘She was a coastal woman.’

‘The beauty of Kashmiri women, sir, is overrated. Real beauty belongs to Indian women, especially from the coastal regions, as you very rightly said. Coastal women are real. They have real features. They may be darker, but with impressive features. That is why they get crowned Miss World, and Miss Universe also. Our Aishwarya Rai, sir!’

‘Kashmiri women here have a delicate beauty,’ says General Sahib. ‘The kind of beauty hard for Indian women to match. They are fair, they are lovely. What else can I say? I disagree with you, colonel.’

The two men look at the colonel’s wife.

‘What does Pakistan say?’ asks the General.

She wants to say something, but decides against it. She smiles tactfully, changes her seat. Her heels click when she moves next to Gen Sahib on the sofa. Sahib sips his drink.

‘But to us, Patsy, you are the one most beautiful,’ he says. The General touches her naked arm. Then he laughs and she, too, giggles and squeezes his hand.

The colonel chews his lips. ‘A thing of beauty is a joy forever,’ he says after a long pause.

The curtain flaps on my face.

‘What do you think about Memsahib?’ asks Chef, wiping the knife with his apron.

‘She is all right,’ I say.

She is wearing a low-cut blouse. Observe the shape, whispers Chef. She drinks two or three glasses of port and, I observe, the drinking is making her sad. The two sahibs raise their voices reminiscing about younger days when they were in the Military Academy, where they had been trained alongside batch-mates who were now running the enemy army in Pakistan. Memsahib’s nails are long and red and her hair is red too because of henna.

Chef wipes his hands on my apron and takes a mirchi and chops it like a surgeon and garnishes the Wagah biryani. Smell it, kid. Jee, sir… He applies a sizzling tarka to dopiaza and yells at server: Is the table ready? Chef hurries back to his position behind the curtain and with his finger makes me taste his new invention, the Mhow chutney. Then he puts his arm around my shoulder.

Memsahib flips through a foreign magazine, which has many photographs. She is comparing herself to the photos.

It is our time to come to existence, Chef tells me. We come to existence only to carry out orders. He parts the curtains briefly and enters the drawing room. There is a rhythm in his legs. He clicks his heels.

‘Dinner is ready to be served, sir.’

‘Dinner, Memsahib.’

Gen Sahib and India-Pakistan move to the table. Back in the kitchen, ghee sizzles and the air tastes pungent and Chef orders the assistant to start slapping more naans in the tandoor and phulkas on the griddle. Perfect puffed-up circles. No maps of India, he warns.

Yessir.

The guests keep an eye on the General’s plate. When he eats fast, they eat fast. When he slows down, they slow down. Sahib keeps an eye fixed on Memsahib’s face, even while chewing the lamb. He is liking the Rogan Josh. Sometimes his fork makes circles in the air, sometimes his knife hits the plate like artillery. But, he is liking the lamb. She eats with her mouth shut. She stops chewing now and then and flashes a smile.

Memsahib will stop eating only when he stops, says Chef. The General is aware of this. So he will keep eating until he is sure that Memsahib is almost finished.

They talk about classical music, beekeeping, carpets, silkworms, diameter of the most ancient plane tree, absence of railways in Kashmir, loathsome Kashmiris, and picnics in the Mughal gardens. Also about Nehru when he was the PM: an army helicopter would fly to his residence in Delhi with Kashmiri spring water. They pause just before their conversation drifts towards hometowns, educational institutions, well-settled brothers and sisters. Then one of them mentions death: the soldier who killed his own sergeant, the Major who hanged himself at the border, and the young Captain killed recently during the Pakistani shelling on the glacier.