Bhupati and Paes

Their first acrimonious break-up did deeper damage than was feared.

Thousands of miles away, the tenor of both voices on the telephone is the same, so are the tone and the words they can bring themselves to speak, uniformly low and sad. To Indian tennis, it's almost like a death in the family. Like death, it appears now that the professional parting between Mahesh Bhupathi and Leander Paes turned out, unfortunately, to be inevitable. The two were living in the same hotel in Indian Wells, California, separated by one floor and hours and days of unspoken resentment, answering the same questions about the reasons why they will play with different partners on the professional tour-in all probability, for the rest of their working lives. As they discuss their futures, Paes says he is looking for commitment and communication, so does Bhupathi. But it is clear that they are not looking to each other any more.

They will play with others because they can no longer play together. On the endless weeks of the professional tennis tour, Team Bhupathi-Paes has failed to make it beyond the second round in their last three events. In the last six Grand Slam events, stretching back to the US Open of 2000, they have won one, but lost in the first round four times and once in the second. Their troubles are more than six Grand Slams old. Their first acrimonious break-up-blamed on the interference from support teams who instigated a personal rivalry for a share of the limelight-did deeper damage than was feared. Everything that has happened since has stemmed and festered from there. In the past two years they have hardly had much to say to each other off court and in their last match together in Delray Beach, Florida, they barely exchanged a word on court either. Outgoing coach Bob Carmichael was their medium, but following his departure in search of a younger replacement, everything has come unglued, including, most critically, the way their peers look at them. A friend says, "They had an aura on court. Now, it's like someone has taken a pin and burst it-pop."

At their fiercest, they could be trailing 2-5 in a final set and the opponents would worry because man, those Indian guys could rise from the grave and send you there. Today, up 5-2, anything could give. "It has hurt us both," Paes says. "Those guys we lost to in the US Open," Bhupathi says, "we didn't know who they were." While they would not be mobbed walking down the street when compared to the 12th man of the cricket team (Paes was once asked if he played table tennis), to the average Indian Bhupathi-Paes were Indian tennis. To the global game, they were Indian tennis too. Beyond the immediacy of daily headlines and the seeming relevance of who started it and who finished it, former Davis Cup captain Naresh Kumar recognises the moment for what it is-the end of an era. "They are without doubt India's greatest doubles team of all time. I don't think we will get an Indian world No. 1 team again."

Bhupathi and Paes know that too, which is why turning their backs on the second wind will be doubly painful. Their partnership was founded on a mix that was more heart than head: two boys who knew each other from age 14, played complementary styles and liked corny Hindi songs (so much that they picked Alisha Chinai's tinny Made In India as the ditty to introduce them by during their first appearance at the World Doubles Championships in 1997). Emotion melted their first freeze-out as the clamour for the boys to get back together "for the country's sake" was overpowering. Paes saw the Sydney Olympics like a beacon that beckoned and Bhupathi, who had all but signed up to play with Australian Todd Woodbridge for two years at the time, also responded to the powerful pull of that light. Once the moment was gone, so was the emotion, but not the differences. This then is another way to handle the fact that the last few years of both men's careers are too precious to be awash with bitterness and bad memories. They will not defend their French Open title, but will turn out for India in the Davis Cup, where they have won 10 out of 12 matches played together, last losing in 1996. It may seem all seething emotion today, but this parting is Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi's age of reason.