A Scandalous Secret (28 page)

Sharat spent over a week in Bangalore, going on long walks, exploring parts of the city he had never seen and, despite not being much of a reader, buying half the books in the hotel bookshop. Sitting in the courtyard garden attached to his room, or by the poolside, he read – at first with a kind of dogged persistence and then with increasing enjoyment – discovering a whole variety of writers whom he had never heard of before. Some books were hardback, some paperback in shiny lurid colours, and Sharat lost himself in each one of them, surprising himself by enjoying their offerings far more than he had ever anticipated. Where previously he had always considered fiction rather a waste of time, the valuable role it played came to him as he finished his eleventh book that week and closed it with a satisfied thump: it was these glimpses into other people's hearts and lives that allowed readers to know they were not alone. Made-up, fictional dilemmas and problems that provided readers with some kind of strange courage to face whatever
real
life threw at them. Why, a few of the books Sharat had read this past week had ended up changing some of his views completely. In his current state of mind, that felt to Sharat like a vital job indeed. Never again would he tease Neha
of wasting time when he saw her engrossed in one of her novels …

He had not called her all week and, unsurprisingly, she had not called him either. That was not entirely unexpected; it was typical of Neha to wait to see what he would decide to do. And decide he must. Pleasant as the air in Bangalore was, and accustomed as he was growing to his room at the Windsor Manor, Sharat knew he could not stay forever. Besides, his parents were starting to ask awkward questions about the time he was spending away from Delhi. Having spent more hours introspecting than he had done in a long time, Sharat went one evening for his regular pre-dinner walk in Cubbon Park in order to firm up his decision. He stood watching a pair of children at play with a football, listening to their happy screams, his thoughts far off as he considered the consequences of what he was going to do. Having looked at it every way that he could, he finally knew what he wanted. He went back to the hotel, asked them to book him an air ticket, and then packed his sparse belongings in order to return home.

 

It was evening when Sharat reached the house and, as his car pulled into the drive, he saw Neha walking barefoot in the garden, as she sometimes did on the advice of her yoga teacher. He saw how she stopped and froze at the sight of him sitting in the back seat of his car and felt a renewed sadness that such a close relationship as theirs had become one of mutual fear and suspicion. Something had to be done to rescue it and Sharat knew that, at this point in time, matters were entirely in his hands. He got out of the car as it pulled up under the porch and walked purposefully in Neha's direction. He saw her face crumple
at the expression on his and, without further hesitation, did what he had never done in front of the gardeners before. He took Neha in his arms and held her as though he would never let go.

It was a full two minutes later that he released her, suggesting that they walk up and down the lawn together. Neha nodded, with tears in her eyes, thankful that they would be able to talk without looking into each other's faces. Until she knew for certain that Sharat had fully forgiven her, it was going to be difficult to look him straight in the eye. But she reached out and took his hand in hers with the words, ‘Thank you, Sharat, for coming back to me.'

‘Of course I came back,' Sharat said. ‘Where else would I go, Neha? You know how much you mean to me.' At Neha's silence, he continued. ‘But, given how close we are, I don't think I will ever understand why you couldn't tell me about Sonya when we first met. I was hardly likely to hold against you a mistake you made when you were no more than a child, was I?'

‘It was more than a mere “mistake”, Sharat,' Neha replied gently. ‘I gave a baby away. I had not even told my parents, so how could I bring myself to tell you? And, by the time I had learnt what a kind-hearted man you were, it was too late because I had never said anything at first. And later … later, my deed looked so much worse when we were denied children. Almost as though it it was a punishment I deserved and had brought onto you.'

‘Come on!' Sharat exclaimed. ‘Don't tell me you made some kind of karmic connection between those two things – that's nonsense!'

‘Well, not if you're harbouring the kind of guilt I was,' Neha said wryly.

‘Imagine carrying that pain around on your own all these years,' Sharat said, his voice deeply exasperated. He continued, ‘Do you understand
that's
the hurtful bit, Neha? The fact that you thought I wouldn't understand.'

She lifted his hand to her face and kissed it. ‘Of course, I'm sorry now that I made that assumption, Sharat. If I'd only had the courage to tell you earlier, I could have saved myself so much heartache. But the longer I left it, the more difficult it became to say. Now that it's all come out, of course, I wonder how I couldn't see that you would never blame me, or fail to understand …'

‘Oh, I don't know about understand, because there I was thinking you might be having an affair,' Sharat laughed suddenly.

‘An affair?'

‘Well, it was your reaction to that call on your phone that day. Do you remember, coming back from Jasmeet's – you cut off a call without even saying hello. Which seemed like such a weird thing to do. And, because of your uncharacteristic behaviour, I did a silly thing too. I called back on that number and heard a man's voice. An American man's voice. So, by the time you told me about Sonya, let's just say I was as confused as hell!'

Neha looked up at Sharat and nodded. ‘I thought that might be what happened. That caller was Arif, the gentleman I met in Ananda. Remember, I told you I'd invited him to come and have a meal with us when he passed through Delhi.'

‘I'm sure you never said he was American! And, if you'd mentioned the name “Arif”, I'd never have assumed he was American from that either.' Sharat's accusatory tone was joking and he grinned now as he added, ‘Now, if he'd
been called “Todd” or “Hank”, I think I'd have very easily made the connection, but not “Arif” for God's sake!'

They started to laugh and, having reached the canna patch at the bottom of the garden, started to walk back up the way they had come. The sounds of their laughter reached the gardener who was packing up his tools at the other end of the lawn, the sun having long set and the grass now getting quite damp with dew. The old gardener smiled because he often liked to go home and tell his wife – the mother of his four children – that the sahib and memsahib he worked for were among the happiest couples he knew, even though they had no children of their own.

Sonya quickened her footsteps as she and Estella pushed their trolleys out of the baggage terminal at Heathrow Airport. The flight back from India had got delayed at Dubai and she was concerned that her father would have been waiting an extra hour. When she spotted Richard, standing near the metal barriers just beyond Customs, wearing an anxious expression on his face, Sonya left the trolley right in the middle of the passageway and ran towards him in delight.

‘Daddy, darling Dad!' she cried, yelling with renewed glee as she saw her mother standing behind him. It was only when the first excited hugs had been exchanged that she was suddenly mindful of poor Estella trying to make her way towards them, now pushing two wayward trolleys. ‘Oh, Stel, so sorry, I didn't mean to leave you standing there like that. Just got a bit distracted by the handsomest man in the world,' she said, giving Richard another hug.

‘Typical!' Estella said, rolling her eyes upwards before parking the trolleys to one side in order to greet Sonya's parents properly.

‘She hasn't treated you like that throughout the trip, I hope,' Richard Shaw grinned as he hugged Estella.

‘Worse! Baggage handler, dogsbody, cook, chai wallah,
I've done it all on this holiday, I have. What one does in the name of friendship, eh?' Estella replied, bending over to kiss Laura Shaw's beaming face.

‘C'mon then, let's get you both outta here. Car's that-away,' Richard said, making for the lifts that led to the multistorey car park.

In the car, Sonya and Estella chattered away, giving the Shaws all their news from India in a torrent of information but Sonya was aware that some of the more important subjects were being skirted around. There was time enough to tell her parents all about her meeting with Neha Chaturvedi when they got home and everyone had had the chance to catch their breath. She sat back while Estella narrated the story of their visit to an ancient synagogue in Cochin a day ago. Only half hearing her description of the sweet old Jewess they had met, Sonya looked out at the English countryside that was already turning to beautiful shades of rust and copper in an early autumn. It was lovely to be back, she thought, settling back with a small sigh. Mum and Dad, their cosy little house that always had a delicious smell of something baking wafting around it, her crazy gothic bedroom stuffed with bric-a-brac … much as she felt a sense of achievement to have taken on India and dealt so bravely with her past, this was home and this truly was where she belonged.

After dropping Estella off at her house and chatting briefly with the Wentworths, the Shaw family drove the two-mile distance to their home in companionable silence, listening to the one o'clock news on the car radio. It was only an hour later, after Sonya had showered and descended to the kitchen in her most comfortable pair of track-pants, that she finally took the chance to tell her parents all about Neha. She and Estella had discussed the Keshav business
on the flight and decided that, while it would be necessary to tell their parents just enough to put them in the picture, the details were not required as they would only serve to distress them unduly.

Richard was pulling bottles of mustard and mayonnaise out of the cupboard while Laura sliced a giant sourdough cob on the bread board. Sonya took her usual place at the kitchen table and opened the subject in her customary direct fashion. ‘Mum, Dad, I'm sorry I haven't touched upon my all-important news from Delhi yet. Not that Estella doesn't know everything but I thought you'd rather hear about my meeting with Neha Chaturvedi when it was just us.'

Richard nodded approvingly, as he carried an assortment of bottles to the table, ‘Good thinking, darling,' he said. ‘Much as I adore your Stel, some conversations do need privacy, don't they?'

‘Dad said the second encounter was better,' Laura remarked. Her back was still turned so Sonya could not read her mother's facial expression but she felt reassured by how tranquil her voice sounded.

‘Oh, very much better. I think she was in a state of shock the first time we met but she'd calmed down by the time I saw her next.'

Richard brought the pile of sliced bread to the table before sitting down next to Sonya. ‘She hadn't told her husband about you at that point, you said?'

‘Yes, definitely part of the reason she didn't want me popping up so unceremoniously,' Sonya replied, picking up a knife to start buttering the bread.

Laura was also seated at the table now. Her hands had been busy tearing up lettuce leaves and slicing up pickled gherkins but she stopped that to rest her gentle
grey eyes on her daughter's face. Sonya could, thankfully, not discern on her mother's face any of the distress that had been so much in evidence before she had left for India.

‘And your visit prompted her to tell him, I suppose,' Richard said. It was a question, rather than a statement, and so Sonya nodded.

‘Yes, she was kinda forced to fess up everything to him but I gathered later that she was, in fact, quite relieved to have been given a chance to do so. She said later, when I called to say goodbye, that he was upset at first – understandably, I guess – but then accepted it in the end.'

‘I can't imagine what it must be like carrying around a secret like that in a marriage,' Laura said, shaking her head. Sonya could not tell if the remark was a reproving one so did not respond.

Richard pulled the plate of buttered slices towards him and started filling them with mustard and cold cuts. ‘Well, he must love her very much to forgive her so swiftly,' he remarked. Then, more gently, he asked, ‘Did she explain why she gave you up?'

Sonya nodded and took a deep breath. ‘She was an undergrad at Oxford, apparently having worked really hard to get there from India. Then she fell in love with her professor and – although she didn't quite blame him – I got the impression that he kinda took advantage of her. Having got pregnant, she hoped for a while that he would reciprocate her feelings and, by the time it became clear that there was no chance of that, it was too late for an abortion.'

‘Nevertheless, once that decision was made, she could have kept you,' Laura said. ‘Social workers don't take children away from their parents these days if they can help it. Instead they put in all kinds of support to encourage
mums to keep their kids, which is why there's hardly any that come up for adoption. Not like it used to be when I was young.'

Laura was clearly still feeling a little judgemental but Sonya did not rush to Neha's defence. Instead, she said, ‘I did ask her that but she explained that she was alone in England, with no family and no real friends. Her parents back in India would have been too conservative to accept an illegitimate child and so, when it was suggested to her that she could give her baby up to a childless couple, she did. The sad thing is that she later learnt that she couldn't have any children of her own.'

‘She was very young, wasn't she? Eighteen? Nineteen?' Richard asked.

‘Yeah, the same age I am now, imagine that,' Sonya said.

‘Well, yes, that is very young. Most people that age don't know what's good for them, I suppose. She must have been so confused,' Laura conceded, ‘and it's very sad to hear that she was never able to have any more children.' It was said a little grudgingly but Sonya was strangely touched to finally discern a touch of sympathy in Laura's voice.

The cuckoo clock in the kitchen broke the sudden silence and Sonya sat up to say in a no-nonsense way, ‘Well, I had the explanation I needed so, in the end, we parted quite amicably.'

‘Would she want to stay in touch, do you think?' Richard asked.

‘We didn't discuss that, actually. And, when all is said and done, we occupy two totally separate worlds. But, if she does make contact again, I wouldn't particularly mind. Would you?' Sonya asked.

Richard looked at Laura and Sonya guessed that they
had already discussed that possibility between them when her mother replied, ‘You know, darling, Dad and I would be perfectly contented for you to stay in touch with her if you want. After all, she's missed out on all these wonderful years we've had with you and, now that you're all grown up and leaving home, you should be free to make your friends in the world. Dad and I aren't ever going to stand in your way. We love you and trust you far too much for that.'

Sonya felt a lump form in her throat. How she loved these two marvellous people who had given her so much, and with so few expectations. And poor darling Mum had sure made a long, tortuous journey to get herself to this point from the emotional mess she had been in before Sonya's departure for India.

It was Richard who broke the silence this time, fearing a sudden deluge of female tears, Sonya knew. ‘Oh, speaking of love,' he said, ‘I've been meaning to say, princess – old Tim was on the phone all of yesterday, calling to ask whether you'd arrived. I wasn't sure how you'd left things before you went to India so I said something a little noncommittal, I'm afraid.'

Sonya reached into her pocket for her phone. ‘Thanks, Dad, typically thoughtful! Yes, Tim and I did go over a bump back there but he's such an old mate, I couldn't possibly leave for uni without saying goodbye properly, could I? Perhaps I'll give him a quick call to say I'm back. Stel and I could take him to the Shalimar tonight to regale him with all our stories from India over a curry. I know all their names now!'

‘I thought you'd be up to there with Indian food, having only just come back!' Laura gestured at her neck and laughed. ‘Those are your genes speaking, I suppose!'

‘Genes or no genes, right now I'd kill for another one of your special mustard-mayo ham sarnies, Dad,' Sonya replied, holding her plate out.

‘Ah, the one that employs my secret Shaw formula. Coming right up,' Richard replied.