The train back toward Lahore was less crowded than the one that had brought him, but the compartment had its usual ornaments: a snoring trader sprawled on a bench, a dozing clerk clutching a briefcase, and a woman in a purdah corner with a child whose curiosity leaked out from behind the cloth.
Jinnah sat in a corner seat, facing forward. Outside, the canal landscape flickered by: fields in squared patterns, occasional clumps of trees, the flash of station boards in black letters on white.
For a while he said nothing, watching the scenery with his habitual lawyer's stare — as if cross-examining the countryside for defects.
Then, without moving his lips, he spoke inward.
We have land in principle, he said. We have a temporary house, we have candidates for staff. Now we must secure a base in Lahore. Chambers and residence. Without those, this remains a hobby, not a profession.
Lahore, Bilal replied silently, is step two of the mod. The District is your Backend Server; Lahore is the Front-End Interface. If you don't have a respectable address there, nobody will treat you as more than a retired crank who wandered into the canals.
You use words like "backend" and "front-end" as if they mean something, Jinnah said. But I understand your point. Appearances are not trivial. Legitimacy is currency.
He glanced down at his cuff — still sharp, even after canal dust — and at the leather valise containing neatly organised documents.
You will have to endure, Bilal added, a certain amount of… commentary. Some people here think the independence movement is only authentic if you are either in homespun or in prison.
They already think that, Jinnah replied. Bombay has not been shy with its opinions. Lahore will not be gentler, I expect.
He turned his gaze back to the window, watching the green fields give way to the scrub of the outskirts.
In any case, he murmured under his breath — soft enough that it blended with the train's rattle — we have chosen the field. Now we must dig the trenches.
The trader across the compartment snored on, oblivious to the construction project beginning in the mind of the man opposite him.
A House in Civil Lines
Lahore received him in its usual fashion: dust, noise, and a strange, almost scholarly energy. The Mall with its colonial facades, the High Court in red brick, the bustle around Anarkali — all under an early spring sky that promised heat with perfect honesty.
By the second day, a temporary pattern had emerged.
Mornings: visits to potential residences in Civil Lines and near the Mall — houses with verandahs and tulsi pots, some too cramped, some too ostentatious.
Afternoons: meetings with senior advocates at the Lahore High Court, discreet enquiries about available chambers, clerks who could be trusted, and registrars who would not lose his briefs mysteriously.
By late afternoon on the second day, he stood in the front garden of a double-storey house in Civil Lines: whitewashed walls, four decent rooms upstairs, two down, a small lawn, and just enough space in the back for servants' quarters.
The local agent hovered anxiously.
"Good location, Sir," the man said. "Close to Mall, close to High Court. Other barristers also live around. Very respectable area."
Jinnah surveyed the house: the line of the roof, the shade of the lone neem tree, the width of the front steps.
Acceptable, Bilal said. Not Malabar Hill, but good enough for "standard of living" promises.
"The rent," Jinnah asked, "is as stated in your letter?"
"Yes, Sir," the agent said quickly. "Owner is in Simla, very happy to have such a tenant. Bungalow will be whitewashed before you move in. Some furniture can be arranged."
"Have it done," Jinnah said. "I will require one room as study, one as bedroom, one as guest room. The downstairs room on the right can be for my sister when she visits."
And Dina, Bilal added.
And Dina, Jinnah agreed silently.
He turned away from the house.
"Prepare the papers," he told the agent. "I will sign tomorrow, after I have confirmed chambers."
Chambers and Comment
The High Court complex had its own ecosystem: judges, clerks, lawyers, touts, petitioners, tea-sellers. Word had already spread that "Bombay Jinnah" was in town.
In a small, wood-panelled room off a corridor near the bar library, three senior advocates sat with him around a table:
Mr. Chaudhry: Heavy-set, moustached, eyes shrewd. Mr. Narang: Lean, impeccably dressed, with a Hindu merchant's polish. Mr. Shah: A quiet man with a greying beard and an expression that suggested he'd seen too many hopeless cases and too few reforms.
"Lahore welcomes you, Mr. Jinnah," Chaudhry said, with the tone of a man welcoming both a colleague and a potential rival. "It is not often we steal stars from Bombay's sky."
"Bombay retains enough," Jinnah replied. "I am merely adjusting my orbit."
"Yes, yes," Narang said lightly. "We've all heard the rumours. Health, climate, dislike of Bombay politics, fondness for Punjab wheat." He smiled with a hint of teeth. "Some say you are retiring. Others say you are changing fronts."
"I am changing tempo," Jinnah said. "Not abandoning the field. I intend to practice here, selectively. Appeals, constitutional points, matters where my particular habits of argument may be of use."
"Good," Shah said quietly. "We have more than enough men willing to shout in the streets. Fewer who can actually read the statute book."
Narang smirked.
"Ah, but shouting wins hearts these days, does it not?" he said. "The independence movement is very theatrical. Spinning wheels, marches, jail-going. A gentleman like you, Mr. Jinnah, may find it… not entirely your line. Not everyone can have Gandhi's charisma."
There was no open insult in the words, but there was a certain sleek edge: You are surplus to the main drama.
Here it comes, Bilal said. Punjab version of 'you're not real resistance.'
Jinnah placed his hands lightly on the table, fingers interlaced.
"Mr. Gandhi," he said, "is a very intelligent man. I do not dispute it. Nor do I deny that he has a talent for touching the emotions of the people. But my difficulty is simple."
He paused; the three men waited.
"I cannot," he continued, "in good conscience, ask people to break laws that I have spent my life using to protect them. Those laws were drafted and passed by the very authority whose policies I oppose — that is true. But until we have built something better, they are the only bulwark against total arbitrariness. If I train the public to treat law as disposable when it is inconvenient, I will not be able to complain when the next demagogue treats my laws the same way after independence."
Chaudhry grunted, half-approval, half-caution.
"So you do not believe in civil disobedience?" he asked.
"I believe," Jinnah said, "in civil argument. Civil litigation. Civil organisation. I will not stand in the way of those who choose Gandhi's path, so long as they accept the consequences honestly. But I will not lead them there. My temperament and my training both forbid it."
Narang leaned back, shrugging.
"As you wish," he said. "History will decide which method worked."
It already has, Bilal said in his mind. Spoiler: it's messy. And half the people making these remarks disappear from the record entirely.
What do you mean? Jinnah asked silently, while keeping his face still.
In my time, Bilal said, no one remembers the local bar politicians who sneered at you. Or the district leaders who thought you were finished. Their names vanish. Completely. While you, Gandhi, Nehru, Patel — you're carved into stone, printed in textbooks, argued about on television. Reverence, statues, streets named after you.
Reverence, Jinnah replied inwardly, does not ventilate lungs, Mr. Game Developer. It does not lift a man out of ignorance, or put grain into a child's bowl.
I agree, Bilal said. I'm not saying it as consolation. Just telling you: all these little digs about 'not being a proper independence leader' belong to ghosts. History keeps their lines in a wastepaper basket.
That may satisfy your sense of narrative, Jinnah said, but it does nothing for my purpose. I do not wish to be remembered. I wish to see, if possible, better minds grow from this soil. If reverence cannot uplift minds, it is only a more polite form of idolatry. Another statue, another monocle on a mantelpiece.
He blinked slowly, then brought his attention back fully to the room.
"You asked about chambers," he said to Chaudhry. "Is there any space adjoining the bar library? I would prefer to be close to the reports. It saves time when the Registrar forgets that I am fragile and lists a matter at 10 a.m. sharp."
Chaudhry smiled, tension eased.
"There is one set of rooms," he said. "Small, but dignified. The previous tenant took a judgeship; we have been considering applicants. If you take them, Mr. Jinnah, no one will complain."
"No one would dare complain," Narang said, half-joking, half-true.
"We can look at them now," Shah said, rising. "Before the clerks discover someone important is interested and triple the imaginary prestige."
They walked through a narrow corridor and up a short flight of stairs. At the landing, a pair of wooden doors opened into a modest suite: one larger room with a high window and space for a table and chairs; a smaller inner room that could serve as a private office; a tiny ante-room where a clerk might sit, drowning in papers.
The walls were scuffed, but the bones were sound.
"This will do," Jinnah said.
"You don't want to think?" Narang asked. "We can show you others."
"If I think too long," Jinnah replied, "someone else will arrive with quicker feet and slower brains and take it to hang a nameplate and hold court in the corridor."
Chaudhry laughed.
"Very well," he said. "We'll recommend your name. The bar committee will ratify it. Officially, of course, we'll pretend it was a long, hard debate."
"I would expect nothing less," Jinnah said.
As they walked back to the library, a younger lawyer — sharp suit, sharper tongue — murmured just loud enough to be heard:
"So, Mr. Jinnah, I hear you've decided to join us provincials. Aren't you afraid it will damage your London reputation? Independence movement is a street theatre these days. Not quite the arena for gentlemen, hmm?"
Jinnah stopped just long enough to answer.
"On the contrary," he said. "I find that when the streets are full of theatre, someone must remain backstage to ensure the building doesn't burn down before the last act finishes."
A few nearby advocates chuckled. The young man flushed.
"Gandhi may fill the streets," Jinnah added calmly, "and he does it very well. I will content myself with the unglamorous work of ensuring that when the noise stops, there is still a courtroom, a canal, and a gram of law left standing. We each have our talents."
He moved on, leaving the remark behind like a placed file.
He will repeat that as an insult or a compliment, Bilal noted, amused. Either way, the line will travel.
Let it, Jinnah replied inwardly. Words are my cheapest tool.
The Triangle
That evening, back in the nearly-empty Civil Lines house he had just agreed to rent, Jinnah stood by the upstairs window, looking out at the line of trees and the distant lights of the Mall.
Papers lay on the table behind him: draft lease for the house, draft application for the chambers, notes from Harrington about the Montgomery file.
We now have, Bilal said, counting silently, Bombay as the old capital, Lahore as the new professional hub, Montgomery–Sandilbar as the lab. Triangle established.
Triangles are stable, Jinnah replied. So are tripods. Let us hope ours does not collapse under the first gust of history.
There will be gusts, Bilal said. Storms. Partition is still coming.
Yes, Jinnah thought. But now, when it arrives, there will at least be one corner of Punjab where the wind meets something designed to bend without snapping.
He turned away from the window, picked up a pen, and began composing a letter to Fatima:
Dearest Fati,
Lahore is less unbearable than I expected…
Behind the careful sentences meant for a sister, the scaffolding of an invisible system settled another inch into place — in land records, rent books, bar rolls, and the quiet determination of a man who would not break a law he had not first had the chance to improve.