Free Their Language of Love by Bapsi Sidhwa Page A

asked. ‘It was parked here all the time.’ He indicated with his chin the space between the Buick and the lawn where the Suzuki had been parked. There was the hint of a swagger in his voice.
    For a moment Ruth was bewildered; and then things fell into place. There was a lot of traffic in and out of her house during Uma’s stay. Friends came to pick her up or drop her off at all times of day and night. Ruth had noticed the Suzuki snugly parked by the lawn. Its pristine red coat polished to a gloss, it was clearly visible from the sitting-room. She hadassumed it belonged to one of Uma’s friends. Except for that one time when she knew Uma was out and had been vaguely discomfited at its continuing presence on their drive. Ruth was not by nature suspicious and her experiences in Pakistan had given her little cause for mistrust. She had shrugged it off: they must have piled into another car and parked it for the duration.
    But she should have been suspicious; she had ignored the repeated red flags its presence had signalled.
    Ruth felt a surge of anger and a mortifying sense of violation. Where most tiny, locally assembled Suzuki cars in Lahore are typically white, this one was flagrantly red; and the small car had breached their space and spied on their house. Its showy red colour upset her the most—somehow it represented the brazen audacity of the intrusion.
    She wished Rick wasn’t travelling. ‘My husband is the South Asia manager for Dow Chemicals Fertilizer Company,’ she said, grappling for any importance she could muster in efforts to combat the sub-inspector’s own air of confidence.
    ‘I know that.’
    Of course! She felt foolish.
    ‘Madam, you are in a ladies’ club?’
    Ruth was taken aback by the change in tack and somewhat relieved. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘The International Women’s Club.’ Surely there was no harm in that: the elite of Lahore belonged to it.
    ‘Do you hold office in it?’
    ‘I am on the Executive Committee.’
    ‘Aren’t you president?’
    ‘I was, last year.’ She didn’t like the tricky way he had inserted that. At the same time she felt afraid; he probably knew a lot else about her. She didn’t want to antagonize him.
    ‘What activities you all do at the Club?’ The sub-inspector didn’t bother to conceal his contempt of the activities of an elitist Women’s Club. Ruth had come across this brand of chauvinism all over the globe.
    ‘It is a social club but we do volunteer work in orphanages. We work on women’s rights issues and help destitute women and their children,’ she said, speaking with prim defiance. ‘We hold fund-raising events.’
    What was she trying to prove? And to whom?
    ‘Who all are on the committee?’
    She found herself naming the current president and an impressive list of committee members. They were her friends: she played bridge with them, swam in their pools, watched polo and socialized with them almost every evening at the Punjab or Gymkhana Clubs or at dinner parties at their homes. Was she implicating Shahnaz and Sorriya and Gogo and Tita and Nergis and Nasira? They were savvy, educated women: lawyers and journalists—married to politicians, business tycoons, doctors, feudal lords, CEOs of multinational companies.
    ‘And the other members? Their names?’
    ‘There are over 500 members!’ she exclaimed.
    ‘Try,’ he said. ‘Tell your servant to get pencil-paper and write them down.’
    She had all but forgotten Billo’s watchful and forbidding presence in the door.
    ‘You’ve got to be kidding.’
    ‘I am not
kidding
. Write down whatever names you remember.’
    She was in a foreign country. Her husband was in Bombay or Sri Lanka or God knows where. She had brandished the committee members’ names and they hadn’t impressed. Every instinct told her to be cautious.
    ‘Get me a pen and writing paper,’ she told Billo.
    Billo, whose agitation had escalated to a point where her austerely covered head wobbled, looked