Ghost Train to the Eastern Star

"That was only the beginning!" Vincent said. "It could get pretty rough. I'd rather not repeat it."

Vidiadhar said, "For the U.S. customers we said, 'We're in California'—well, the headquarters of the company was in California, so it wasn't really a lie. If we'd told them we're in India, they would have said, 'How can an Indian understand the problems I'm having with my product?'"

They too said that they'd bought telephone numbers and customer profiles, which was reminiscent of the Glengarry leads.

"We had hot leads and cold leads. We paid a lot of money for some of them, but we knew so much about the people—their age, their address, if they'd refinanced their mortgage, what sort of credit rating and financial history."

But the stress had got to them after a few years, and the women objected to the heavy breathers. So Vidiadhar and Vincent entered that other growth area in Bangalore, making deals in the American clothing market.

"Any labels I'd recognize?"

"Are you familiar with Kenneth Cole, Banana Republic, and Tommy Hilfiger?" Vincent said.

The usual routine was that one of these companies would give them a specific pattern. The cloth, cotton or silk, was generally from India; the buttons and waistbands were from the United States. They would run up a sample, get it approved, and sign a contract for a certain number of units.

I said, "Banana Republic sells a type of pajama bottom that I usually wear on the train. Drawstring type with pockets. They cost about forty dollars."

"We make them for seven."

Vidiadhar said, "Any U.S. clothing company could sell their clothes for fifty percent off and still make a good profit."

The men and women who cut and stitched these clothes, the low-level tailors, earned $1,000 a year.

"That polo shirt you're wearing," Vincent said. "It looks familiar. I'm pretty sure it was made here."

***

I FOUND SOME GLASS PAINTINGS in Bangalore and got acquainted with the man who sold them to me, Mr. V. K. Reddy, who said he dabbled in antiques. He was blimpish and backward-looking, opinionated and very funny in his conceits, with a big mustache, as outlandish as an actor's comic prop, that he continually twirled with his big blunt finger. He was stout, with a dyspeptic scowl, and his manner, his booming voice especially, was that of a former Indian army officer, which he might have been.

"What a lot of bosh!" he said when I told him that Bangalore was regarded as an example of the Indian miracle.

"What do you think it is?"

"This town was nothing, I tell you! Just little retired ladies and gents living out their days as pensioners. And now this! For the past three years!"

"Nightmarish traffic," I suggested.

"You are naïve, my friend! Worse than nightmarish."

"Noisy," I said.

"Noisy is not the word, sir!" Mr. V. K. Reddy said and worked on his mustache, tweaking its sticky tips. "It is hellish din."

"But you have your antique shop."

"No more than a hobby." He leaned forward and said, "It so happens that I have in my possession Mother Teresa's personal rosary, with a letter in her own inimitable handwriting, testifying to its authenticity. I can offer this for your perusal, and should you purchase it, you would not regret it."

"Must be unique," I said.

"Of unparalleled interest," he said, still plucking at his mustache. "And don't forget spiritual value."

If I should return to Bangalore, Mr. Reddy said he would take me to lunch at the Bangalore Club. "There you will see the old Bangalore. The old India."

He meant the Raj, and the genteel and dusty Anglo-Indian aftermath of tiger shoots and high tea and polo matches and dented tureens of mulligatawny. But a day or so later, near where I sat, at breakfast in my hotel, a cup of coffee in one hand, the Times of India in the other, I read that four members of a family at a local court had just been given life sentences "for abetting self-immolation." Two were the sons of the victim; that is, to help in the ancient (and outlawed) practice of suttee, they had thrown their sixty-year-old mother on the funeral pyre of her husband, joining his burning corpse in death. Everyone talked about the new India, but the old India was never very far away.

THE SHATABDI EXPRESS TO CHENNAI