After all the practical matters had been taken care of, Dadaji said, “Look here! ”

They looked at him.

“When I was playing chess with the Colonel, he happened to mention his grandson in America — I’d completely forgotten about the boy. I asked if he was married — he has finished his master’s degree — and they said he was not. I asked what he was waiting for. They said he had his own ideas and those ideas did not amount to anything. Meanwhile the Colonel’s wife told me she could smell a royal aroma when she drove past our house. She said, ‘I thought if they didn’t send us any kebabs, then there must be some reason. At least give us the recipe, I’ve been begging for years. ’ ”

“Why should we hand over the secrets of our kitchen for no reason? ” asked Ba. In any case, why would the Colonel’s wife make such a request when everyone knew a person must always render a sly omission when pressured for a recipe — subtract an ingredient, jiggle a quantity to leave the recipient tormented: Something isn’t right!

Dadaji said, “Let’s take the remaining galawati over tomorrow. ”

“But why? ” asked Mina Foi. “We could eat them for lunch. ”

“If Sonia is lonely, the problem is easily solved. Let us make an introduction between Sonia and their grandson. ”

Dadaji, Ba, and Mina Foi each privately recalled an incident from a decade ago that nobody had forgotten, when the Colonel had encouraged Dadaji to invest in a woolen mill started by an army colleague to whom the Colonel believed he owed his life — they had fought in Kashmir together. The business failed, and the considerable investment in military blankets, socks, balaclavas, and sweaters had resulted in a financial loss to Dadaji, who had been as upset, naturally, as the Colonel had been apologetic. While the incident had interjected a new undertow of regret and falsity into their former neighborliness, by the magnanimity of continuing to dispense free legal advice on the subject of the Colonel’s court case seeking compensation for the family land in Lahore that was lost during Partition, by continuing to send across kebabs and other dishes from their kitchen as unstintingly as always, by continuing their games of chess and gallantly losing, Dadaji had been unconsciously biding time until he might call the debt home.

It was essential to remain close to those who had caused you harm so that the ghost of guilt might breathe through their dreams, that their guilt might slowly mature to its fullest potential. Not that Dadaji had thought it through — it never worked to consciously plot, to crudely calculate — and he himself was astonished at the possibility of what was unfolding. Even now it would never do to name this liability. The Colonel would not allow his grandson to bear the burden of his grandfather’s mistake. Dadaji and Ba may simply suggest a desirable match between the grandchildren, two America-educated individuals, two equals, two people who naturally belonged together because of where they came from and where they were going. Without either of them mentioning it, the obligation might be beautifully unraveled.

Ba and Mina Foi were once again witness to the brilliance of Dadaji. He might have lost the afternoon game, but he’d played a consummate match of chess. Said Ba, “And they will not have the face to ask for a dowry! ”

Again the driver soaped and washed the rotundity of the Ambassador and drove the family to the Colonel’s residence. They carried a ceremonial scalloped silver platter of kebabs.

Dadaji said, “We recently heard from our granddaughter. It seems loneliness is a big problem over there in America. ”

Mina Foi noticed on the side table of inlaid ivory that along with the Colonel’s wife’s ikebana arrangement, there was a photograph of their grandson. Haughty with the nose of a nawab but the lips of a cherub, he was reading a newspaper. She found him handsome.

“Lonely? Lonely? ” said the Colonel’s wife.

“Without people one is nothing, ” said Mina Foi. “Especially in wintertime. It snows nonstop over there. ” Betsy and Brett had lent her Little House on the Prairie, which had become Mina Foi’s favorite book. She must have read it a hundred times, although her parents considered novels as much a useless luxury as telephone calls to missionaries.