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By Root 1362 0

and installed herself in a corner chaise longue, where she knew the lamplight was pinkish and flattering. Parvati was on the phone with Rabi's mother in San Francisco, sharing kitchen chitchat twelve hours and half a world apart, including tips on shrimp malai curry (go crazy with the garlic; caramelize the diced onion; slow-sauté the spices so they don't taste and smell raw; canned coconut milk is for amateurs; steep, squeeze, discard coconut flakes and use just enough of the liquid so the jhol has thok-thok consistency). Auro was still showering. Anjali tuned out Parvati's voice, now gone on to serious topics with her sister, in Bangla, the hiss and sizzle of the kitchen sisters deep-frying pakoras, the gardener's son and nephew practicing birdcalls just outside the open window. Soon Mr. GG's car tires would scatter gravel on the unpaved road.

Auro slap-slapped noisily into the room in stiff-soled Kohlapuri sandals. He acknowledged Parvati with a shrug and a mumbled, "What's your sister up to now?" on his way to the bar trolley. "What an enchanting vision!" he exclaimed to Anjali. He made a camera with his fingers. "Click! Click! Pensive Woman Awaits Nightfall. Why isn't Rabi here to capture this?" Anjali responded with a half-wattage version of her halogen smile. Auro lifted the lid of the ice bucket. "What'll you have, Pensive Woman?" In his modish turquoise cotton kurta and loose white pajama, his bristly wet hair sleeked back, he looked a relaxed host. "The usual?"

She winced when she thought back to the squabbles and tears on the rare Sundays that her mother persuaded her father to have "Munitions" Mitter and "Tobacco" Nyogi and their families over for lunch. "A waste of my sweat-of-brow savings," "Railways Bose" ranted. "What favor have they ever done for us?" The only person he tolerated as a regular visitor was Dr. Fit-as-a-Fiddle Dasgupta, who was smart enough to leave after a double peg, which he earned by dispensing medical tips: hartaki-steeped water for constipation, ajwan water for indigestion, folic acid pills for child-bearing daughters. "Yes, please. The Auro Special." The Auro Special was a fizzy sweet-sour nonalcoholic cocktail that had become Anjali's new signature drink, and Swati brought out freshly blended ginger and mint paste, lime juice and chilled syrup when Auro was ready to play bartender.

"Don't do anything rash, Tara," Parvati begged her sister on the phone, "and promise you'll call me back in a couple of hours?" She flipped her cell phone shut. "Tara's cooking as therapy. She says cooking calms her, and the more elaborate the recipe, the better. She's sick of the same old, same old fight with Bish about where to retire. Bish wants us to look into Bangalore properties. Whitefield, Palm Meadows, for a start."

"Don't get sucked into Tara's problems," Auro admonished his wife. "Gin and lime? I'm serious, never lend money to relatives, and never, never give marriage advice."

"It better be a scotch tonight, Auro."

"That bad?"

"Bish wants to settle here, but she wants to bring up little Kallie in San Francisco."

"In other words, your sister would rather live in California than in Bangalore."

"Once Bish has made up his mind, it seems there's no changing it."

Auro laughed. "Pull of homeland, et cetera. We know about that, except you and I were on the same page." He fixed Parvati's drink: a halfpeg of single malt.

"Bish'll keep the San Francisco place for Rabi. That's the only concession he's willing to make. Tara's very upset."

"Upset as in furious? Or upset as in depressed?"

Anjali marveled at how openly they were discussing family fights in front of an outsider. Rabi's mother was lucky to have a sister she was so close to. She remembered her last bitter fight with Sonali-di in Patna. She'd been a novice runaway with a heavy suitcase then. She still had that suitcase, and she was still running. Boldly, she asked "Would you be offended if I changed my mind and asked for a glass of the Sula chardonnay instead?"

"As long as you promise not to get tipsy, my dear," Parvati joked. "Auro,