No longer quite so agitated or alarmed, nevertheless Mrs Pearce was entirely captivated by the blurry figure outside, as he implored heaven for an Excalibur to smash through the heavy glass window. Her fascination increased when another figure came into the scene, someone in uniform, perhaps a security man or even a policeman. While she couldn’t hear what they were saying, she could see that their conversation was clearly heated and getting hotter by the second.
‘Oh, dear, I hope he’s not going to be arrested.’
Anjali turned sharply just in time to see a querulous Uncle Ram being led away by a security guard. Stifling a bubble of laughter, she left the hydrotherapy pool and went over to an internal telephone, leaving behind a somewhat flustered and befuddled Mrs Pearce.
The security office in the hospital was a tiny, cramped room, sparsely furnished apart from a utility table. In a grim frame of mind Uncle Ram glowered at the security guard across the table, although the guard was completely unaware of being scrutinized, his nose buried deep in the Sun.
Abruptly Uncle Ram was startled when the only door in the room opened, and his daughter – rather, his niece – entered. At least she was dressed in normal clothing, though much too modern, covering much too little.
The security guard winked at Anjali and left her alone in the room with Uncle Ram, who waited until the door was closed before reproaching her for the terrible way he had been treated. Finally she had gone too far. Much too far.
‘Now look here, Anjali. You are a wicked woman!’ He shook his head sadly. ‘May Shiva hear me. I shall never forgive you this day.’
But Anjali was not buying his damnation today, any more than she would any other day. ‘What rubbish you talk, Uncle Ram. I am at work with patients, and you believe I can drop everything?’ He seemed confused rather than enlightened by her argument. ‘And what kind of foolishness is it that you creep around the hospital?’
Ram took this as an affront; responding directly to the insult would be beneath him. Yet he felt wounded, anguished by her insolence.
‘You have no feelings any more for your family.’
Anjali sensed he was being serious, not simply foolish. ‘That isn’t true, and you know it.’
Faintly, just perceptibly, there was a small kernel of a notion he thought he detected in her attitude, the layers of her bitterness peeled away for a brief moment, revealing a trace of old roots she had so long and fervently tried to bury. Even in this ‘modern’, rebellious woman perhaps there was yet a glimmer of hope for the ultimate flowering of family honour and tradition.
‘Ah, so you agree that the family is important?’ he ventured, careful not to invest too much hope at this point.
‘Of course.’
However, she didn’t seem to care much, not really. He decided to accept her contrition for what it was worth and try to guide her further along the right path, if only for the sake of his sister and the sacred responsibility she had entrusted to him upon the death of her husband.
‘I’m glad to hear it.’ Yet he couldn’t resist making a slight comment under his breath. ‘The way you mix out of your culture, it wouldn’t surprise me.’
As usual these days, she was much too impatient with him. ‘What are all these questions?’
‘Things which are important to me,’ he solemnly replied. ‘And now your father is dead, it is my duty to see you do not let outside things interfere with your religion and culture.’
Her eyes were still sceptical, unaccepting. ‘Then I’m surprised you need to ask. They are just as important to me.’
Again he might have interpreted her response as positive, though expressed from a contrary stance. ‘Well, at least it is good that you have not forsaken your background … that the family is important to you.’
For some reason, that remark seemed to make her suspicious. ‘Uncle Ram? You didn’t come here to discuss race relations. Get to the point.’
She might have an occupation and a government uniform, but she would never be a diplomat. ‘Very well. We are having a very important meeting tonight. And by we, I mean the whole family.’ He looked directly into her eyes. ‘Which includes you, Anjali.’
‘Uncle Ram, I can’t. I am on duty tonight.’
‘No, no, no, no, no!’ How could she so misunderstand the meaning of the word ‘duty’. ‘It has been arranged,’ he insisted. ‘And did you not just tell me the family is important?’
Anjali could understand the significance of a family gathering to Uncle Ram, yet she also realized how futile it was to try to relate her feelings of responsibility for her brother and sister Specials, and for the human family, as pompous as it might sound to him.
‘Uncle Ram, you’re asking me to let a lot of people down. People who rely on me.’
‘Your family also rely on you. This is a matter of great importance,’ he repeated, trying to persuade her to accept his words on sheer faith for once.
‘All right,’ she conceded at last. ‘I will cancel the Specials.’
‘Praise be. That is the first sign of wisdom you have shown.’
He wished that now she would meet his wonderful surprise with innocence and not cynicism, with eagerness and not antagonism. However, she was barely showing any curiosity at all.
‘But what is so important?’
He allowed himself a gentle sigh. ‘Tonight, it is you who are going to meet someone special.’
‘Who?’
He hesitated one more time, wanting to remember forever the look in her eyes when he told her.
‘Your future husband.’
‘My what?’ she shouted, her face aghast.
Uncle Ram was distressed at her outburst and the unpredictable eruptions of her temper. What was he to do with such a spitfire?
Noreen was deep in the invoices and account ledgers when her husband came into the office, hands black with grease, headed for the small annexe where he could wash them.
‘One of your fancy ladies called.’ She raised her voice sufficiently so he could hear. ‘One Anjali Shah. Special, she said she was.’ Momentarily she lowered her voice. ‘Aren’t we all, I told her.’ Then she shouted to Loach once again. ‘Anyway, she can’t make tonight.’
He reappeared, drying his hands, his face as long as the Queen’s speech. Noreen began again in a normal tone.
‘She’s got family problems. I think I got that right. But I didn’t like to pry,’ she added. ‘One woman’s misfortune is another man’s one-night stand, as they say.’
Loach slumped down at his desk, looking glum indeed. ‘Oh very funny, Noreen, Bloody headaches is all I get. With this kind of pressure, you’d think I was the SDO and not just the SO.’
Noreen concurred with bitter sympathy. ‘Not to mention S.O.D … R.A.T … and S.H. –’
‘I get the picture,’ Loach surrendered. It wasn’t worth fighting about.
Before she could gloat in her little triumph of the moment, the outer door of the office opened, and young Kevin stumbled in, running at the mouth.
‘I tried to tell her, Mr Loach, but she wouldn’t …’
Before he could complete his explanation, Kevin was bundled