A Son of the Circus

“They come there to die, Farrokh. We try to help them control it. We can’t help them like we’re used to helping most of our patients,” Macfarlane explained.

“So you just go there, you show up,” Farrokh began. “You check in … tell someone you’ve arrived. Then what?”

“Usually a nurse tells me what to do,” Mac said.

“A nurse tells the doctor what to do!” cried Dr. Daruwalla.

“Now you’re getting it,” Dr. Macfarlane told him.

There was his home on Russell Hill Road. It was a long way from Bombay; it was a long way from Little India, too.

“Honestly, if you want to know what I think,” said Martin Mills, who’d interrupted Farrokh’s story only a half-dozen times, “I think you must drive your poor friend Macfarlane crazy. Obviously, you like him, but on whose terms? On your terms—on your heterosexual doctor terms.”

“But that’s what I am!” Dr. Daruwalla shouted. “I’m a heterosexual doctor!” Several people in the Rajkot airport looked mildly surprised.

“Three thousand, eight hundred and ninety-four,” the voice on the loudspeaker said.

“The point is, could you empathize with a raving gay man?” the missionary asked. “Not a doctor, and someone not even in the least sympathetic to your problems—someone who couldn’t care less about racism, or what happens to immigrants of color, as you say? You think you’re not homophobic, but how much could you care about someone like that?”

“Why should I care about someone like that?” Farrokh screamed.

“That’s my point about you. Do you see what I mean?” the missionary asked. “You’re a typical homophobe.”

“Three thousand, nine hundred and forty-nine,” the voice on the loudspeaker droned.

“You can’t even listen to a story,” Dr. Daruwalla told the Jesuit.

“Mercy!” said Martin Mills.

They were delayed in boarding the plane because the authorities again confiscated the scholastic’s dangerous Swiss Army knife.

“Couldn’t you have remembered to pack the damn knife in your bag?” Dr. Daruwalla asked the scholastic.

“Given the mood you’re in, I’d be foolish to answer questions of that kind,” Martin replied. When they were finally on board the aircraft, Martin said, “Look. We’re both worried about the children—I know that. But we’ve done the best we can for them.”

“Short of adopting them,” Dr. Daruwalla remarked.

“Well, we weren’t in a position to do that, were we?” the Jesuit asked. “My point is, we’ve put them in a position where at least they can help themselves.”

“Don’t make me throw up,” Farrokh said.

“They’re safer in the circus tha

n where they were,” the zealot insisted. “In how many weeks or months would the boy have been blind? How long would it have taken the girl to contract some horrible disease—even the worst? Not to mention what she would have endured before that. Of course you’re worried. So am I. But there’s nothing more we can do.”

“Is this fatalism I hear?” Farrokh asked.

“Mercy, no!” the missionary replied. “Those children are in God’s hands—that’s what I mean.”

“I guess that’s why I’m worried,” Dr. Daruwalla replied.

“You weren’t bitten by a monkey!” Martin Mills shouted.

“I told you I wasn’t,” Farrokh said.

“You must have been bitten by a snake—a poisonous snake,” the missionary said. “Or else the Devil himself bit you.”

After almost two hours of silence—their plane had landed and Vinod’s taxi was navigating the Sunday traffic from Santa Cruz to Bombay—Martin Mills thought of something to add. “Furthermore,” the Jesuit said, “I get the feeling you’re keeping something from me. It’s as if you’re always stopping yourself—you’re always biting your tongue.”