A Fine Family: A Novel by Gurcharan Das

patiently explained that the guru meant a great deal to the boy, even more than his own family.
    ‘If it was
my
daughter, I would have personally gone to see the family.’
    ‘I don’t understand where your Bauji finds these boys. As for us, my dear, we have always gone in for landowning families when it comes to finding matches for our daughters,’ said another with a superior air.
    ‘What can you expect, sister: who will marry a girl who has been working? We warned you two years ago when your daughter started going out.’
    ‘Your family may be professionals, Bhabo, but you shouldn’t throw away our good traditions.’
    Bhabo returned home thoroughly humiliated. The family discovered her distress when she did not come down from her room at noon. For years Bhabo had faithfully adhered to a routine: between noon and one she would serve buttermilk and thick wheat rotis to anyone who came by the house. Consequently, a stream of poor people regularly came to receive her charity.
    Some were holy men, others performed some service in the house, a few were just beggars, and there were others who did not want to pass up the free food. Since Bhabo had never missed this ritual, and had always made it a point to return home by noon, everyone was concerned when the poor started arriving and there was no Bhabo. To the servant who knocked on her door, she gruffly replied that she did not want to be disturbed and asked him to take over her noontime duties.
    When she did not come down for lunch either, the situation became alarming. An air of crisis permeated the house. Bauji, in a rare gesture, went up to talk to her. Soon both of them came down, Bhabo walking behind him, drying the tears from her reddened eyes. She had relented because Bauji had promised to send the family barber to the boy’s parents’ home to formally request the hand of their son for her daughter. She smiled as she ate a mango cut by Bauji’s hands.
    Bhabo was in good humour by the time the two Khanna sisters dropped in for their daily visit. The two sisters were married to the Khanna brothers, both accomplished lawyers from Lahore. The ladies always looked fresh and smart, dressed in white saris of Manchester Muslin No. 26. They came punctually at three everyday, had tea with Bhabo, gossiped and left promptly at four before the menfolk returned from the Courts.
    The Khanna ladies enthusiastically supported Bauji’s efforts to find a professional husband for Tara, and Bhabo felt relieved. Since they had grown up in Lahore, the Khanna ladies brought modern and enlightened ideas to the provincial mind of Lyallpur. Among Bhabo’s friends, they were the first to install a sink for washing hands. This was a novel and clever idea which was the talk of the house for days. They also heated their water in an electric heater, which impressed Bauji because it was clean. Bhabo’s children admired them because they were modern and systematic: they budgeted their expenses, observed regular hours, ate at a dining table, and lived in separate houses and not in a joint family as Bauji’s family did.
    ‘Sister,’ said the elder one to Bhabo, ‘What is Bauji’s secret in finding such a good match for his daughter? Imagine, an irrigation engineer for Tara! Tell us, sister, for we too have daughters to marry off.’
    Bhabo smiled and replied honestly that she did not know. She then naively recounted her humiliating experience with her friends in the morning.
    After the Khanna ladies left, Bhabo invited Tara to visit her ‘treasure room’. It was an unexpected honour since no one was allowed to enter this tiny room on the first floor, which was situated next to the ‘cotton carpet room’. In the narrow, dark, cool room Tara saw neatly stacked rows of silk saris, embroidered linen, silver utensils and velvet covered boxes filled with gold jewellery.
    ‘This is part of your dowry, my child. I have been collecting it for years,’ Bhabo whispered conspiratorially.
    Tara