Princess Louise

Rajat Chaudhuri

"Edouard Manet- “A Bar at the Folies- Bergere."

The day looked bright. More so because Nicole was with him. That was the bright side of things. But who was this man wearing a flat cap following them right from the time they had taken the train to London? Tanmoy wondered. He hadn’t alerted Nicole, didn’t want to scare her. That would mess up his plan. Well the plan was simple. He had been working on it right from the time he had begun to visit their local. The Red Lion in the little town of Novingdon, on the southern coast. And the theatre of Novingdon for him had been a little tame all this while. No high comedy, no nerve-wracking excitement, nowhere a spot of heartbreak. Tragedy was dead, the circus had moved to another town and here he was stuck with good old Eugene and the researchers, the molecular biologists and plant physiologists, chained to their thermal cyclers and magnetic stirrers, trying to save the world. No, he was not bored with the project nor had he given up, but he needed diversion, some excitement, and the emptiness of the little town had left him thirsty for company.  Wilster was a diversion no doubt but his company was calm seas all the way, not a smidgen of excitement on the farthest horizon. The violinist, though he was a friend, gave him depression sometimes, with his save the earth lectures. 

Nicole was the only possibility of escape from the dreary doldrums that his life had become. But she was always behind the bar at The Red Lion and conversations were limited to things like the unpredictable flow of customers or the fireworks on Guy Fawkes night. She would banter with him a little, as she did with all other customers, while slow pouring the Guinness. If the bar was crowded, The Guinness provided an extra minute of conversation over bitters and so he always ordered it. If attendance was thin, he would listen to her talking about this new place she had gone with her friends or tell her about this crazy barman he had known in India.  Her green eyes remained with him for the rest of the week, he memorised her curves, plotting them in his mind from complex algebraic equations. But that wasn’t taking him anywhere. 

So he had been bold. He had asked her out. She had refused politely. Then a year had gone by and another. He had changed pubs and then he set up a bar at home and didn’t visit a pub so often. In fact many years had passed and he had forgotten her almost till one day he had bumped into her at Tesco. And the old attraction came flooding back with fury. What was he to do? She was hovering in front of the wine racks. He suggested an Argentina Malbec which he had enjoyed. She looked older, more experienced. Her green eyes were fiery in their brightness. She looked unconvinced, `We haven’t seen you for ages?” she had said in a matter-of-fact voice while examining the label. Tanmoy had mumbled something about work. Indeed the work had been getting difficult the last few years as they approached the final splicing experiments to see what characters were expressed in the new transgenic rice varieties. The splicing work was going on in full swing, using the new methods, and the glasshouse was full with the experimental crops of transgenic rice. Almost decade of relentless hard work by his team and the network spread out in universities all over the world was moving towards fruition. In between new plant physiologists had joined his team, a brilliant molecular biologist had left but soon replaced by another, advancements made by others had enriched their work. But still it was his baby. Tanmoy knew his contribution to the Super Rice project would never be forgotten. He had become more and more confident as major hurdles in gene transfer and making the rice produce vitamins was crossed. He had been indeed busy.

She pretended not to hear his excuse about work and asked if he would be visiting their pub. “I sure will” he had said. 

And in fact he had returned to The Lion, falling back into his old habit of a weekend pint. She still looked lovely and a huskiness had come to her voice as she had matured into a very attractive woman. Does she have children? He had asked her and she had laughed out loudly at his question. `I am not married, if that is what you want to know!’ she had said patting his shoulder playfully. A few more weeks. He had bit his tongue and asked her when she had a day off. This was that weekend. She had some work in London, a few errands to run and Tanmoy suggested they have dinner together and it was convenient for her too. They could take the short train ride back to Novingdon together. Though she never went out like this even if she knew the customer well, she made an exception this time. The scientist looked like a nice guy.

They hopped off the train at Victoria. Everything was running with clockwork precision except for this bloke in a flat cap turning up at the station and keeping an eye on them throughout the journey. He had a small chiselled face with a one-day stubble and very dark eyes. Didn’t look like a nice guy.

It was midday already and the Piccadilly service from Green Park was bad. Some trains had been cancelled and the platforms were overflowing. They managed to fight their way into an eastbound train that packed them in like sardines. Chewed and mashed up, they were spit out at Covent Garden where there were long queues at the exit lift. Someone in that crowd was farting. The man in the flat cap was there too. He had followed them while they changed tubes and had come right up to Covent Garden where Tanmoy had nothing to do but watch the crowds. The lift disgorged them like processed meat from a slaughterhouse conveyor belt. Nicole said she would return exactly in two hours.  

Tanmoy had put on his red linen shirt over off white trousers, a little loose at the waist. He didn’t care much about fit nor about the fact that the zipper of his fleece jacket had got stuck midway and he could neither pull it up or down. He took a stroll up Long Acre right up to Leicester Square which was buzzing with tourists and weekend crowds, some coming from Chinatown, others waiting for buses or taking selfies with the Hippodrome as backdrop. 

A young Englishwoman and a nervous looking Indian man came hurrying from the direction of Piccadilly Circus, stopped in front of the casino, discussed if it might rain and then the man saw her off at the tube station with a wave of his hand. Somehow the sight of these two people walking up together -- the man nervous, the woman friendly but with ten other things going on in her mind then the woman leaving and the man lighting a cigarette, standing outside the casino, distracted him for a while. He was almost melancholic, which he hated. He thought he would call Nicole immediately but then realised he was not carrying his diary with her number and he didn’t use a mobile phone. 

He ambled on. At the next intersection a particularly crestfallen gentleman was emerging from a steak house that was widely acknowledged to be a rip off. Meanwhile the man in the flat cap on the other side of the street had lit a cigarette. He hadn’t realised that Tanmoy could see his reflection on the glass storefront. How could he get rid of this piranha?

Nicola was waiting when he returned to Covent Garden -- her face flushed. She looked restless. “Something bothering you?” he asked.

“No, I thought I had muddled up the time we were supposed to meet with something “I am late,” he apologised.

“Actually not. I told you it would take about two hours but it didn’t. What do you want to do?” 

“Let’s take a stroll along river and then hang around in a pub till it’s time for dinner,” he left it there hoping that one thing will lead to another. 

The grey river with the gulls swooping down for bread crumbs was a big bore but the bridges looked exciting. The mammoth steel arches leaping from pier to pier, the hulking joists, the granite deck hugging the banks, were all from an age when heavy industry was the fount power, when people like Watts and Boulton were laying the groundwork for the age of steam. His attraction for the Scottish mechanical engineer had begun early after his arrival in England and this day he showed Nicole the Inscription on Watts’ statue at Westminster

Not to perpetuate a name

Which must endure while the peaceful arts flourish

 But to shew 

That mankind have learnt to honour those

Who best deserve their gratitude ...

And so it went. He sat for a while at the foot of the Watts monument while she smoked a cigarette. A forest of cranes were working on the other bank, a spindly chrome and glass structure was jabbing a finger at the sky, another was being pulled down. Lovers sat on the grass near the memorial for the abolition of slavery. He walked in step with Nicola along the old river. The man in the flat cap didn’t give up.   

When they arrived at the pub, he had disappeared. Tanmoy had suggested this gin palace, “perhaps the last one standing” he had read somewhere. London creaking at its joints but still sharp eyed – like an aging cricket star. The Princess Louise defied the most fertile of imaginations. It was a maze of passages and secret chambers with gorgeous mahogany partitions, gilded mirrors gleaming on its walls, decorative tiles in the corridors, stained glass windows and plush leather seating. At its heart was a horseshoe bar serving seven different partitioned sections originally meant for people from different social backgrounds. That was how they preferred to drink in those times. There were frosted glass snob screens in the wooden partitions and each section was lit up with crystal chandeliers and table lamps that shone on the ornate tiles, reflecting golden light back on the faces of the patrons, turning paupers into princes. 

In the shadowy snugs of the centuries old gin palace, grey haired men with rubicund faces, who had lived two hundred years and more, read the Evening Standard sitting at mahogany tables from the time of Victoria. Mirrors were everywhere, etched and gilded, their glass surely from Belgium while the mosaic floors had a distinct byzantine flavour.

They went into the front right room pushing through a door set with etched glass panels and straight up to the bar where a young man with shaved head and nose ring was taking orders. He asked for a bitter while Nicole settled for a deep red Abruzzo that came in a bottle, polished black like the stranger’s eyes. She sipped the wine sitting cross-legged on one of the upholstered benches against the wall. Tanmoy sunk into a plush armchair. “How has your work at the laboratory been?” she looked straight at him over the rim of her wine glass, her fingers curled lightly around its thick stem. She had painted her nails a rich red, and was wearing a crimson lipstick that complemented the smoky green of her eyes.

“Better than last year. We are onto something and will soon know if we are on the right track.” She looked fun in a maroon top over a little black skirt and diamond stripe black tights but Tanmoy was careful not to discuss the project, even if everything about the evening got him drunk. 

He took a sip from his glass and set the paper bag he was carrying, on the table, “I brought something for you,” he said softly.   

She looked surprised, “but it’s not my birthday!” 

“Have a look,” and he handed her the bag. 

She looked strangely at him before opening it. Inside was a glass jar wrapped in muslin cloth. 

“Unwrap slowly.”

She unwrapped the jar and gasped. The glass jar had begun to glow in her hands. A pair of glow butterflies went fluttering about inside the jar and a green incandescence spread around the table, flickering like candles in the wind. 

“They are the colour of your eyes,” he said quietly.

“Are they real?” Still looking very surprised, intently watching the butterflies.

“Absolutely. Genetically modified butterflies from my lab. We gave them glow worm “I can’t take this,” she said wavering between surprise and bewilderment. 

“You have to -- specially created for you,” he lied, “you need not keep them locked up in the jar. They can fly about in your bedroom if you wish.” 

“I am really touched,” she said giving a furtive glance in the direction of the bar, then looking down at the table, “let’s leave this place.” 

“Why. There’s still a lot of time and I have hardly touched my drink.” 

But she was restless and he couldn’t make out what had changed the weather. That’s when Tanmoy noticed the dark eyed stranger sitting in another section of the bar, watching them in a mirror on the wall. The bastard had seen him give her the butterflies and hadn’t been able to wipe off the astonishment on his face. He had taken out his phone and was speaking to someone. Had she noticed him too? 

The horseshoe bar counter served seven radiating sections, three on each side and one facing the street.  Six of these partitioned rooms opened into either of the twin corridors that ran parallel to each other along the left and right walls of the ground floor while the street facing room had double doors opening into both the corridors. These twin passages were sumptuously decorated with alternating mirrors and tiles, a patterned ceiling in gold and a frieze with bas reliefs of swags and urns. 

At the front of the building, the corridors had separate access to the street while one could also step in directly into the street facing drinking space without entering the corridors at all. This street facing section had double doors with etched glass panels, one to the left the other to the right. So the Louise had four doors opening onto the street, two for the twin passages and two double doors leading into the street side section.  

 If you sat facing the bar counter in the street facing section, there were three sections radiating from the right wing of the horseshoe bar and three more from the left. It was pure and exquisite symmetry. Three rooms on each side, one corridor each, one door to each corridor, a double door on each side of the street facing section. Three and three and one is seven, and one and one is two and two and two makes four. 

From the corner of his eye Tanmoy could see the man in the flat cap nursing a pint, occasionally looking up to make sure they were still there. He had kept his phone before him perhaps waiting for a call. He was sitting in the middle left hand side snug facing the bar and watching them in the mirror which was to Tanmoy’s left. He and Nicole were sitting face to face, their table parallel to the bar in the front right hand snug and just by turning their heads 

a little, both of them could see him easily.

“Aren’t we going somewhere else?” Nicole asked, a sense of urgency creeping into her voice. She had kept the jar with the butterflies on the chair beside her.  

“Are you all right?” 

“I am feeling suffocated with all these mirrors and lights,” she said and looked around and he noticed for a fraction of a second she took in the stranger.

“Ok let’s go to the front bar. It looks bigger.”

She reluctantly accompanied him and they came out into the right corridor with their drinks and again entered through the double door on the right into the street side bar.

They sat at one of the low tables at the centre of the room, facing each other. There was no one in there. He whispered something mischievous and as she cocked her head to listen, the light from the window bounced off her honey blonde hair. The dazzling light blinded him for an instant and he saw colours dancing in front of his eyes. The table being small, her legs touched his, firing up his neurons, the current travelling right through up his spine and into his recently shampooed hair where it crackled and sparked.  

The light from the street washed over the bar counter and looking up he had suddenly realised that the man in the flat cap was not sitting where he had thought he was. In fact it was his image reflected twice in the mirrored walls of the compartments that had fooled him. 

He was actually right there in the compartment they had just left. They had, all this time, been watching his reflection. The mirrors on the walls of each bar played tricks. So he was right there and must have been eavesdropping! Had Nicole also realised this or had she not spotted the stranger following them through the day? Perhaps he was just imagining things. 

The thousand reflections of the stranger in the etched Belgian glass mirrors made his head reel. Each image reflected itself back and once again and a few more times, on and on, endlessly, ad infinitum. Three and three and one is seven, and one and one is two and two and two makes four and anything divided by zero becomes infinite. An endless game of repetition, through centuries, over eons -- the code of life getting replicated again and again. 

The double helix DNA strands slithering through space-time, bridging infinite distances, snaking through curtains of arithmetic dust. He felt pressure on his bladder and excusing himself, hopped out through the street side door. “Take care of the butterflies,” he called out to her and went into the street before entering the Princess Louise through the left passage. About three and half feet wide, the passage had a timbered dado set with diamond shaped tiles. Above this were gilded mirrors alternating with brightly coloured decorative square tiles -- three tiles and three mirrors then a painting then three more mirrors with tiles in between, the pattern repeated over and over again. The other wall was made up of mahogany screens and etched glass panels separating the different bars and snugs. Halfway down the passage hung a bowl chandelier, brightening up the gold patterned ceiling and lighting up the Byzantine floor tiles. The mahogany screens to the right were interrupted by three doors with frosted glass panels and etched borders, leading to the left side drinking Tanmoy pushed open each door hoping it would lead to the washroom only to find customers.  The first room was occupied by four Russian gangsters sitting in a fug of cigarette smoke, playing whist and cursing loudly while downing shots of vodka, in another a French commandant was practicing his harp while a glass of wine lay unattended at his table and in the last room, two hooded figures in cowls stared coldly at the door, an empty glass standing at the centre of the table between them.  

He went back to the street and entered through the right hand corridor entrance and checked each door on the left hand side to find empty snugs with yellow lights burning, well-groomed Englishmen in grey suits arguing loudly about the economy and a cowboy having a spritzer all by himself. The stranger was nowhere to be seen nor had the washroom revealed its position. His bladder was going to burst. He hurried out to the street and walked back into the left passage. Walking slowly this time, he stopped at the door to each of the snugs, making sure it was not the entrance to the loo. Once more checking the third door, leading to the snug with the hooded figures, he spotted a shelf on the wall to the left. On it was a cherub lamp, porcelain pill boxes and an oak cased mantle clock which said it was midnight. Just where the shelf ended was a crack in the wall which he hadn’t noticed before. It was a door! He pushed and it creaked open. 

Why do the Brits hide their loos?

Beyond the door was the landing of a carpeted iron staircase that went down into the basement. The passage from the right hand entrance joined the landing here through another door. The wash room was down those stairs. He hastened down the steps.   A carved mahogany door set with a glass painted panel led to the men’s room which

had three marble urinals and two WCs. The tiles on the floor and the walls of the wash room were even more gorgeous then those out in the passage. The marble urinals were embossed in gold with heritage emblems. The stench of urine was overpowering and he involuntarily covered his nose. The door to one of the WCs was closed and because it was fitted high he could see the shoes of a man inside. 

It was hard to breath in the nauseating fumes. `Centuries of imperial piss,’ Tanmoy told himself as he rushed to the first urinal and unzipped his fly. A door creaked open. Someone tapped him lightly on his shoulder. “What are you doing with my woman?” an icy voice spoke into his ear.

With his fly still open he swung around and saw the flat cap first. He was a hand taller than him. He must have been inside the WC for he could just catch a glimpse of the open door to the cubicle when the stranger raised his hand. He was holding the butterfly jar. Thinking he was going to smash the jar on his head, Tanmoy panicked and trying to dodge sideways, lost his balance on the slippery tiles. He fell headlong and his glasses smashed to pieces. He had knocked his head hard and was squirming in pain. The stranger in the flat cap hovered over him for a few moments undecided, then he padded away. As his brain was turning into jelly he could see the butterflies, fluttering about in the heritage loo, circling over him, flitting from one urinal to the next, their firefly genes pumping green fire into the 

smothering darkness pushing in from all sides.  

A pleasant fragrance -- wafted into the restroom. Flowers? It was powerful enough to drive the ammonia smell of piss away. The flowery scent was inside his head or wherever his consciousness was hovering about, for he couldn’t tell if his body was still with him or left behind on the toilet floor. He thought he heard the click of pencil heels and then water being splashed on his face. 

His sense had returned. Opening his eyes slowly, he could see the WC doors and at the edges of his vision, the washroom ceiling. He was lying on his side. He tried to focus.

A young woman with a soft round face and dark shiny eyes was bending down, splashing him with water. His shirt was getting wet but he did not have the strength to stop her. The scent of flowers -- more distinct. “Who are you?” he muttered through the throbbing “I thought I have lost you. Wake up, I am a friend,” she said in a foreign accent .

She extended her hand, “can you get up or should I call for help?”

“No, no, I think I can manage on my own,” he said, worried what other trouble a group of people might bring.

“Is he still here?” he asked.

“Who? There is no one here, get up slowly. Here I will help you,” she gently held his forearm. 

His head swam and twice he tried to sit up but failed. Then he retched violently and lay still for some more minutes. A muscle cramp was beginning to form down near his toes and he resisted it with whatever willpower he could muster. 

Finally, with some help from her he could manage to pull himself up. Holding the wall for support, he advanced a few steps. “Thank you,” he said leaning against the washbasin. There was a nasty swelling on his head where he had taken the knock and part of his face was turning blue. He wet a bunch of tissue and patted the swelling with water. Then he washed his face and asked her to wait outside the door while he used the loo. 

 “I don’t know your name,” he said with some difficulty.

In the low light of the corridor, he noticed she was carrying a thick peacock blue coat on her arm and was holding something that looked like a measuring tape but could also be a length of garrotting wire.

 “There. Lean against the wall if you are feeling dizzy,” she said. 

He was still dizzy, his head was throbbing with pain but he managed to drag himself up the stairs to the corridor. They made slow progress, Tanmoy stopping every other moment to steady himself. Right at the end of the corridor, he leaned against the door of the street facing bar pushing it open, just a crack. He peered inside. It was packed with unknown faces – a loud group of Chinese tourists. Nicole had vanished. She was no more there. There were other people sitting at their table. He stepped back into the passage in black despair. She was holding the front door for him.  

“You didn’t tell me your name and why you are helping me?” he said as they stepped out of the gin joint into the light of evening.

“You can call me Lotus.”

Disclaimer:

Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental

About the Writer:

Rajat Chaudhuri studied Economics, got drawn towards climate change activism and now writes fiction. He is the author of two English novels -- Hotel Calcutta and Amber Dusk – and Calculus, a book of stories in Bengali. He is a Charles Wallace Creative Writing Fellow (2014) at the University of Chichester, a Hawthornden Castle Fellow (2015), a Korean Arts Council-InKo Fellow (2013) at Toji Cultural Centre, South Korea and was a resident writer at the Sangam House International Writers Residency.