"Your husband's eyes light up when we mention your name, Subbu" said the lady, "you have to tell me what you do to make him love you so much."
"Do they, Kiran madam?" Subbu was immensely pleased to hear that.
"They do without any doubt. How do you manage that?"
The questioner was in her early forties. Though plainly dressed, she had the bearing of a person with considerable means. Appearances in this case did not belie; her husband was the owner of two of the largest cotton mills in Mumbai. The scene was the drawing room of the lady's bungalow. Subbu's husband was assistant manager in the mill. It is not usual for mill owner's wives to be interested in the brightness level of the eyes of their assistant managers, nor is it a common practice for their wives to sit in the drawing room of the owner's house on terms of equality. But assistant manager Raman's duties were mostly to attend to the various needs of the owner's household. He was so popular with members of the family that he held the brevet rank of a close relation. He was in a way closer than close relatives, for he being a Tamilian he did not know Gujarathi, and they could speak freely in his presence with no chance of family secrets leaking out.
Subbu arrived in Mumbai four years ago as a nineteen-year-old fresh bride. She was a surprise. Her husband had the deportment and bearing to move in elite circles with ease, but his wife was straight from the village. She, with training, learnt the use of the spoon; the fork however still remained a mystery. She was so unselfconscious and genial that the owner's wife took a liking to her. Her English, spoken with Tamil syntax, was fun to hear, but her attempt to speak Gujarathi made even the stoniest of faces to break into a smile. On occasional afternoons when she was free the mill owner's wife invited Subbu to her home to prepare South Indian savories, which Subbu did expertly. It was in one of these sessions that the tendency for the assistant manager's eyes to light up when someone mentioned his wife's name became the topic of discussion.
This was not an easy question to answer. Subbu stared knowing not what to say.
"Subbu, I have to explain; I have been too abrupt. My husband and I are drifting apart. This is sad but it is so. He is a lonely man. He has lately taken to drinking more than is good for him. A man with a wife and child has no business to be lonely. Subbu, I want you to change that. You have to tell me what I should do."
"I would be most happy to help you madam, but I am so inexperienced that it is funny that you should ask me."
"I feel you have the secret formula to keep husbands happy. You tell me what you do and I will do the same. I have been thinking about it for some time now. I have framed some questions to ask you. You have to answer that. It is as simple as that."
"Yes madam. But I must tell you that you are putting me a very embarrassing position."
"No, Subbu. For the moment you are not the assistant manager's wife. You are my teacher and I am your pupil. Now tell me what is the most important duty of a wife to her husband?"
Pat came the reply.
"Satisfy his sexual needs." Subbu said it with such a serious face that the lady laughed.
"You have to explain."
"We can allow cooks to prepare food for husbands, and friends to provide companionship, but sex is our monopoly. It is similar to the mother's duty of feeding her baby. It is her exclusive duty. And attending to the sexual needs of the husband has to be done with the same devotion and love that mothers show to their babies."
"Mothering a baby and cuddling a husband, are they the same?"
"Cuddling the husband is more onerous madam. Babies can have milk from the bottle, but husbands who want to be respectable citizens can have sex only from their wives. That puts a great responsibility on the wife.
"You mean putting him off by pretending headaches is no good."
"No Kiran madam. Would a mother say she has backache and allow her hungry baby to cry? We are in it for joy as much as he. We have to get into it in that spirit. You have to be at it at all times he is at home.
"Having sex at all times of the day could be difficult Subbu."
"Not having sex all the time," said Subbu and laughed. "Getting him and yourself into a mood for eventual sex is a full time job. Anything that spoils the mood one should avoid. The job has to start in the morning. When I bring him bed coffee I kiss him."
"No problem that, I have done that at one time. I can restart, though that would puzzle him. What next?"
"Not just a kiss madam. You have to say tender things, and he will do things to you, and you have to do things to him."
"What is this doing things?"
"Feeling the body madam."
"Oh! You allow him?"
"No madam, I invite him. I offer him."
"Hmmm, and he offers you."
"If not I take it. It is mine by right."
"One thing may lead to another, won't it."
"It can, and is there a more wonderful way of starting the day madam?"
"Indeed. Subbu, you are taking me to places where the air is very rarified. Next."
"Before he goes to office he must see me without clothes on at least once." The lady collapsed laughing, but Subbu was serious. She appeared to disapprove of the other's levity on a topic that demanded reverence, and that made it even funnier; Kiran continued to laugh.
"Before you go any further tell me who taught you all this."
"My mother."
"Your mother?"
"It is the mother's duty to tell the daughter about sex.
"Then I'll have to tell Sushma? I'd die rather than speak to her about these things. Did not your mother feel extremely embarrassed?"
"Probably not madam. In villages we are a lot more free about sex then in the city."
"The idea I suppose of showing your bare body is to fix your image in his mind to the exclusion of others."
"Mother did not explain the reasons, but that is possibly what is intended."
"How do you manage to show him your bare body every morning?"
"Easy madam. One day I will ask him to bring the towel to the bathroom; another day I will come out of the bathroom to wipe and dress, and so on. But in my house there are not half a dozen maids to disturb me, of course."
"Maids can be a nuisance, but we can always ask them to keep away. What next."
"You must know what type your husband belongs to."
