some instinct made her turn back and
say, “Frying pans are this way. I can show
you if you want.”
D
uring one of their walks in the
market, which became routine over
the next several months, Srikanth told
Geeta that a colleague had invited him
to the Bakers’ party, and that he had
hated it. “Not one person said anything
interesting,” he said. “Except for you.
My little au pair.”
He spoke English, Tamil, and atro-
cious Hindi. She spoke Hindi, Odia,
and passable English. So they made
English their language, though she
learned a few Tamil words, flattening
her tongue in her mouth to speak them.
Veetu, house. Mazhai, rain. Ponnu, girl.
When she told the Bakers that she
was leaving to get married, they did not
try to dissuade her.
“I don’t remember him,” Mrs. Baker
said. “Do you, Charlie?”
“Not well. Someone brought him
along, I think. How old are you, Geeta?”
“Twenty-nine,” she said.
He nodded. “Older than I thought.
But he’s quite a bit older than that?”
“He is fifty-three years old,” she said.
“Not a child,” Mrs. Baker said, and
there was a warning there, but whether
it was addressed to Geeta or to Mr. Baker
was unclear, as was whether it was meant
to refer to Srikanth or to Geeta herself.
“Emma and Sally are going to hate this,
you know,” she added.
Mr. Baker said, “Are we at least in-
vited to the wedding, then?”
Geeta smiled. He sighed a little
sadly, as if he’d never expected that they
would be.
S
he called to tell Sister Stella, who
took some time to remember her.
Geeta could see the wide rosewood desk
in the dark-panelled office. Three ball-
point pens: red, green, black. The old
Bible bound in brown leather, as big as
a briefcase. The wooden cross on its
stand. The ruler that stretched the
breadth of the desk. Sister Stella said,
“And he is a Christian?”
“No,” Geeta said. “But he is willing
to convert.”
“Oh? In that case,” Sister Stella said,
“this is a joyful day indeed.”
They got married in March. Sri-
kanth left for the office around nine
o’clock, and Geeta spent most morn-
ings wandering around the large house.
She loved to sit in the vast garden at
noon, when trees throttled the sunlight
and she could hear the hectic buzzing
of heat above the canopy. The house
had belonged to Srikanth’s father, who
had, of all things, won the lottery and
bought this fan-shaped slice of land in
the heart of Bangalore. Now it was
worth a fortune.
“He was a miser,” Srikanth told her.
“If he could have taken this house with
him when he died, he would have. Noth-
ing made him suffer more than giving
it to me. But the only other option was
Swati, and he would have burned it
down before giving it to a girl.”
She had met Srikanth’s sister, Swati,
a tall, officious woman, who arrived on
the express from Chennai for the wed-
ding. It was a registry wedding and was
over before Geeta knew it. She heard
Srikanth say, “Geeta, you have to sign,”
and she blushed, knowing that Swati
was watching.
There had been a brother, too, but
he had died in childhood.
The morning after the wedding, be-
fore taking the express back to Chen-
nai, Swati invited them to visit her. She
made the offer with cool professional-
ism, and her eyes betrayed no emotion.
“She is not married?” Geeta asked,
after Swati left in a taxi, refusing to
allow them to drive her to Canton-
ment Station.
“Why would you think that?” Sri-
kanth asked. “She’s got two children, a
boy and a girl.” He touched her lower
back. “Not everyone stays alone for as
long as you.”
S
he knew that he had been married
before, that his first wife was still
alive. She knew that he had a daughter,
who was grown. She did not ask for pic-
tures or details, because early on in their
meetings he had joked that he was an
“The phrase ‘how interesting’ was not meant to encourage you.” old man, and that by the time he’d told
