DAS When you stood … with the pitcher of water, you were an Alma-Tadema.

FLORA Well, I don’t want to be painted like that either.

DAS I don’t understand why you are angry with me.

FLORA You were painting me as a gift, to please me.

DAS Yes. Yes, it was a gift for you.

FLORA If you don’t start learning to take you’ll never be shot of us. Who whom. Nothing else counts. Mr Chamberlain is bosh. Mr Coomaraswami is bosh. It’s your country, and we’ve got it. Everything else is bosh. When I was Modi’s model I might as well have been a table. When he was done, he got rid of me. There was no question who whom. You’d never change his colour on a map. But please light your Gold Flake.

Pause. Das lights his cigarette with a match.

DAS I like the Pre-Raphaelites because they tell stories. That is my tradition, too. I am Rajasthani. Our art is narrative art, stories from the legends and romances. The English painters had the Bible and Shakespeare, King Arthur … We had the Bhagavata Purana, and the Rasikpriya which was written exactly when Shakespeare had his first play. And long before Chaucer we had the Chaurapanchasika, from Kashmir, which is poems of love written by the poet of the court on his way to his execution for falling in love with the king’s daughter, and the king liked the poems so very much he pardoned the poet and allowed the lovers to marry.

FLORA Oh …

DAS But the favourite book of the Rajput painters was the Gita Govinda which tells the story of Krishna and Radha the most beautiful of the herdswomen.

The ceiling fan starts working.

FLORA The electricity is on.

DAS You will be a little cooler now.

FLORA Yes. I might have a sleep.

DAS That would be good.

FLORA Mr Durance has invited me to dinner at the Club.

DAS Will you be well enough?

FLORA I am well now.

DAS That is good. Goodbye, then.

FLORA Were Krishna and Radha punished in the story?

DAS What for?

FLORA I should have come here years ago. The punkah boy can stop now. Will you give him a rupee? I’ll return it tomorrow.

DAS I will give him an anna. A rupee would upset the market.

Das leaves. Flora remains in the bed.

ACT TWO

The Jummapur Club after sundown. Gramophone music. Three couples are dancing: Flora and Durance, the RESIDENT and the ENGLISHWOMAN, and a third couple, an ENGLISHMAN and ENGLISH LADY.

Somewhat removed from the dance floor is a verandah, which is spacious enough not only for the necessary furniture but also for two gymnasium horses, fitted out with stirrups and reins. These ‘horses’ are used for practising polo swings and there are indeed a couple of polo sticks, a couple of topees and odd bits of gear lying in the corner.

Pike is sitting alone on the verandah. He is tieless, wearing a Lacoste-type short-sleeved sports shirt.