Very frustrating! Also somewhat of a relief. I do not have to waste my bindu on a battered, malodorous woman. I can preserve it for Bhagmati who despite the bashing she gets from men goes for sex with the zest of a newly-wed nymphet. And her mouth smells like a bush of cardamom in springtime.

Hoity-Toity becomes the Lady once more—cold and aloof. She sits at the other end of the seat. When we pull up outside my apartment, she says very dryly: ‘Thanks for everything. Do look me up when you are in London.’

‘It was a pleasure.’ I do not invite her to come in. There is the omnipresent Budh Singh armed with his stave. As soon as I step out of the Rolls-Royce he springs to attention and yells: ‘Parade, present arms! Thak, thak, thak.’ As Hoity-Toity leans out to wave to me, he intones a Punjabi version of ‘God Save our Gracious Queen.’

I wave to Hoity-Toity. I acknowledge Budh Singh’s salute and ask: ‘How’s everything?’

‘Parade, slope arms! Thak, Thak. Everything okay. Your hijda is waiting for you. I let it in because you were so gussa with me yesterday. Excuse my saying so, take a woman, take a boy, but a hijda.. :

I complete his sentence for him. ‘That’s not nice.’ And hurry indoors.

Bhagmati

She sits cross-legged in my armchair turning over the pages of a book. Her left hand is clenched into a fist with a cigarette sticking out of her fingers. She sucks noisily at the cigarette and flicks the ash on my carpet. Her hair is heavily oiled and arranged in serried waves fixed by celluloid clips shaped like butterflies. She wears a pink sari of glossy, artificial silk with a dark blue blouse of the same material. A pair of white slippers with ribbon bow-ties on their toes lie in front of the chair. Bhagmati is the worst-dressed whore in Delhi.

The light of the table-lamp reveals a layer of powder and rouge on her face. It does not lighten the colour of her black skin or hide the spots left by small-pox. The kohl in her eyes has run down and smudged her cheek-bones. Her lips are painted crimson. Her teeth are stained with betel-leaf. Bhagmati is the plainest-looking whore in Delhi.

‘Ajee! You are back from vilayat!’ she exclaims as I enter. And without giving me the chance to say yes, continues, ‘What kind of books do you keep? They have no pictures.’ She waggles her head with every sentence and gesticulates with her hands in the manner of hijdas. ‘No pictures, only black letters like dead flies.’ She changes the subject. ‘Did you ever think of your poor Bhagmati when you were riding those white mares in London?’ Bhagmati is the coarsest whore in Delhi.

Bhagmati is not a woman like other women. She’s told me something of her past life; I’ve discovered the rest myself.