Searching for a Chauffer

Searching for a chauffer

“Why do you need a full time chauffer?” asked my sister in law. “You drive, so does your husband and both your children.”

She neglected to mention that husband travels 20 days out of 30 and the two children “fled the nest” many years ago. I have elderly parents living with me , and they need to be taken for medical evaluations, to church and occasionally shopping. I work six days a week. The last thing I want to do once I am safely home is to set out  again in the traffic.

“Get  a contract driver whenever you want one. They are good, you have your car and they are less expensive than a permanent employee.” Words of sage advice.

I contacted an agent and the next time my parents wanted to go to Chennai I asked him to arrange a chauffer  to take them. An hour after they left Vellore I got a phone call from my mother. “Your father is driving. He can’t see or hear.”

“ I know that,” I replied, “that is why I arranged the driver.”

“The driver drove into a truck. Luckily nothing was wrong with the car. The bonnet is dented. So he asked the driver to get out and he is driving.”
I arranged for another driver to pick them up and bring them back. A week later they had to go again.

I got another call. “Your father has sent the driver back----“

“Why?” I asked.

“He refused to wear the seat belt even though your father asked him to”.

Things went smoothly for the next two trips.

My mother succumbed to cancer and my father made weekly trips on his own. The substitute drivers worked well for a while. There was no one available for one trip and we hired a taxi.

“I have been on the road for 4 hours!” My father was irate.

“Why? Have you not reached Chennai?”

“We were rear-ended and so we are waiting on the road.”

“But ---, Okay “ I said “give the phone to the driver.”

Once the driver had the phone I said, “please go to Chennai.”

“I can’t” he explained , “I have to wait for my boss.”

Once that problem was sorted, the owner came and money changed hands,  he turned to my father, “I have not eaten any lunch. I am hungry. Would you like to eat too?”

“No “ said my father decisively, looking askance  at the fly infested roadside eatery with lip smacking oily delicacies.

By the time the driver eating finished it was 7 pm.

My father said, “There is no point in going forward, let us go back to Vellore.”

Once he was safely home, father refused to pay the taxi. The owner came to my clinic the next day and after a lot of heated argument (The taxi owner claimed he was rear ended. I claimed I was not responsible and my father’s trip to Chennai had been sabotaged) I paid half the bill.

We were really happy to get Divakar (names changed). He was tall and thin, very polite and soft spoken. He folded his hands deferentially when he addressed my father. He handed over toll tickets and other bills neatly stapled together arranged by date. He was an “independent operator” and willing to come whenever we asked. My problems were solved!

I called him on Tuesday. “Can you come on Thursday?”

“Mmm,” he said.

The answer sounded vague so I called again on Wednesday. The  phone rang a long time. Finally a strange man answered. “I am Divakar’s brother. He committed suicide last night.

I never understood why-- though I found out how—he had hung himself.

We, as a family are back to square one. I have placed an advertisement in the local paper. Chauffer’s are a strange  breed!

Dr. Gita Mathai

The writer is a paediatrician with a family practice at Vellore.

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