Inspector Ghote Breaks an Egg

by H. R. F. Keating

  ‘I promised that when I had removed the organs – They have to be sent to the Chemical Examiner. In Bombay. We have not the facilities here. The town is small and often I have complained …’

  ‘Yes, yes. I know the organs have to be sent to Bombay. But what did you do with them?’

  ‘Nothing. No. Yes. No, I will tell. I was ordered –’

  And at that moment a rain of knocks on the cell door battering obscurely at Ghote’s ear for some time, finally penetrated. They seemed at that climax to have penetrated the foggy mind of Hemu Adhikari as well because he stopped dead in his narrative and looked at the door with an expression of pure consternation.

  Ghote leapt up and flung the door open.

  The sergeant was there.

  ‘Inspector, I thought you had been attacked. I knocked and knocked.’

  ‘Go away. Go now.’

  Ghote swung round to the pathologist.

  ‘Inspector,’ the sergeant went on behind him, ‘Inspector, I took the message but afterwards he insisted. He told me he would get me sacked from the force. He would get me gaoled. Inspector, I believe him. The call is in Inspector Popatkar’s office. You must come.’

  Ghote looked at the pathologist, who had been severely disconcerted by the interruption and was absolutely unlikely to pick up again from where he had got to. He turned back to the sergeant.

  ‘All right, I understand,’ he said. ‘I will go.’

  He ran all the way along to Inspector Popatkar’s office.

  There on the desk beside the waiting telephone receiver was a long and detailed message in the sergeant’s clear but laborious handwriting. Ghote subjected this to one frizzling look to make sure it dealt with all his inquiries and then seized the receiver from the desk surface.

  ‘Ghote here,’ he barked, careless of all security.

  ‘Ah, at last,’ came the familiar, querulous, detestable voice of the Eminent Figure: ‘Inspector, I cannot really be expected to give messages to underlings. This is a highly confidential matter, I would remind you.’

  Able here in Inspector Popatkar’s office to hear a great deal more clearly the shouting and the crashing of hurled stones from the rioters outside, Ghote had a short answer to this.

  ‘Sir the matter is by no means confidential here, I would assure you.’

  ‘That is as may be, Inspector. But I am not accustomed to deal with the lower echelons.’

  ‘Sir, I am in middle of a crucial phase of an interrogation. Did the sergeant tell that?’

  ‘Ah, yes, Inspector, what interrogation is this? The man said it was an alcoholic you were interrogating. What possible significance can such a person have to your inquiry?’

  ‘Sir, any minute of delay now may mean hours more work. And, sir, the Swami here is dying. Already there is rioting in the streets. If he dies, sir, and I have found out nothing I do not think I will succeed ever.’

  ‘That is all very well, but what progress exactly are you making? I must be kept informed.’

  ‘I am making progress, sir, but –’

  ‘Inspector, you will tell me now exactly what you are doing. I wish to hear a concrete example.’

  Blackening rage erupted in Ghote’s head.

  ‘Oh, if you wish that,’ he shouted, ‘I can tell that I have found out that the Chairman is the true son of an outcaste woman from Nagpur side. But that is not getting the inquiry anywhere.’

  ‘What is this? What is this?’

  The distant voice had lost every trace of the querulous.

  ‘I am saying, sir, that subject in question has as matter of fact been misrepresenting his origins of birth. An investigation of this sort does not go on without making discoveries.’

  ‘You have proof of this, Inspector?’ the voice excitedly asked.

  ‘I can produce the mother, sir, but –’

  ‘Then you may return to Bombay as soon as you like.’

  18

  Ghote stood there beside Inspector Popatkar’s desk with the telephone receiver still clamped to his ear. He said nothing. He hardly thought. The impact of that single sentence ‘Then you may return to Bombay as soon as you like’ seemed to have deprived him of the power of rational reply. On the silent line the sound of another telephone ringing and ringing, though faint, could be distinctly heard.

  At some hived-off level of his brain Ghote thought with furious impatience ‘Why do they not answer?’

  At the far end the Eminent Figure appeared not to wish to add to his remarks.

  At last Ghote found words.

  ‘Sir,’ he said, ‘my inquiries in the case of Sarojini Savarkar deceased are not yet completed.’

  ‘A fig for Sarojini Savarkar deceased. Do you understand nothing, man? We have got him. We have well and truly got him now. In a town like that such a thing will break him into a thousand pieces. Thanks to you, Inspector, he can be swept away at a breath.’

  ‘Sir, it is you who do not understand. I have made certain inquiries. From them it looks as if very soon there will be a case of murder ready to bring. I cannot let the investigation drop.’

  ‘Listen to me, Inspector. You were sent out there to do a job. To break that man. You were sent by me as the most suitable instrument to hand. You have done that job: you will return to duty.’

  ‘Sir,’ said Inspector Ghote, ‘it is my duty to complete my case.’

  And he replaced the receiver on its rest.

  For some moments afterwards he stood there thinking what it was he had done. He had antagonized a person who was hand-in-hand with every member of the State government, a person who had only to make the most casual request of a colleague such as the Minister for Police Affairs to have him flung violently out of the police force in two minutes. Yet he could not have done otherwise. He knew it. He knew that he would not have been able to live with the thought of abandoning a case of murder at the whim of a politician when the whole case was within hours of being satisfactorily completed. His whole reason for existence would have been crumbled up to fragments inside him.

  And then a gleam of light broke. There was one thing that could prevent all this. And happily it was just the thing he had sworn that he would do. If he successfully brought his murder charge against the Chairman he could hardly be dismissed from the police afterwards. That alone would save him.

  But he had to make his charge stick.

  He strode over to the door of the office, flung it open and marched back to the cell where Hemu Adhikari awaited him.

  But Hemu Adhikari was not awaiting him. Hemu Adhikari had met someone else first.

  ‘The monkey, the monkey,’ he was screaming as Ghote unlocked the cell door. ‘Take him away. He would shake my hand. He would touch me. The monkey. The yellow monkey.’

  *

  Ghote left him attempting to fend off the hallucinatory beast and went to fetch help. Things had obviously got to a pitch he could not deal with on his own.

  He cursed as he went. He had known that a break in the interrogation at that point was likely to be disastrous, but he had not expected it to be as disastrous as this. The man might even go on struggling in this lost world of his for days.

  He was contemplating raiding the station first-aid supply for a massive dose of rum when he saw the Medical Superintendent from the hospital, Dr Patil. He was standing just beyond the entrance hall, looking for all his bland dignity a little lost.

  The sight of him made up Ghote’s mind.

  ‘Doctor,’ he called sharply. ‘I wonder if you could give me some assistance, if you please.’

  Dr Patil turned slowly.

  ‘Ah, it is Inspector Ghote. I came to say that there is no change in the Swami’s condition. Indeed, I had the greatest difficulty getting here at all. If one of Chavan’s excellent sergeants had not spotted me and sent a few of his men out with lathis I would have had to abandon the attempt.’

  ‘It is pretty bad out there, then?’ Ghote asked.

  ‘They are calling out all the time, an
d stones are being thrown quite freely,’ Dr Patil answered. ‘But what can I do for you, Inspector?’

  Ghote told him, and found to his delight that the doctor was by no means above turning to and seeing what could be done to bring Hemu Adhikari to a reasonable state. A sortie to Dr Rao’s dispensary next door was made under the personal direction of Superintendent Chavan, who for all his connection with the Chairman seemed more than willing to do anything to help that could be construed as being strictly police business. And when certain drugs had been safely brought back treatment was begun.

  ‘I must warn you however,’ Dr Patil said, rubbing his long-fingered hands together professionally, ‘that this is likely to take quite some time.’

  ‘How long?’ Ghote asked dismally.

  ‘That I cannot tell, my dear fellow. But several hours at the least.’

  Superintendent Chavan, his uniform still wonderfully uncreased despite his having been out among the stone-throwing, took off the steel helmet he had worn and held it solemnly in front of his ample belly.

  ‘Inspector,’ he said to Ghote, ‘in view of Dr Patil’s observation it becomes necessary for me to tell you that I cannot guarantee to keep those people out of here if the Swami should die.’

  Ghote looked at him in consternation.

  ‘But, surely, Superintendent … It seems your men are in such good command of situation.’

  ‘Up to now, yes. A first-class show, though I say it. But I do not think you have the necessary conception of what will happen when they are hearing the fatal news.’

  ‘As bad as that?’ Ghote said, finding his worst expectations were being doubled.

  ‘As bad as can be,’ the superintendent answered. ‘They would fire the place, Inspector, I am convinced of it.’

  ‘In that case,’ Ghote said, hearing the words as if someone else was speaking them. ‘In that case I shall go out immediately and try to persuade the Swami once more to desist from his fasting.’

  Both the superintendent and Dr Patil looked at him in frank alarm. It was the superintendent who spoke first.

  ‘Inspector, if they realize out there who you are, I think they would tear you limb from limb.’

  ‘But will they realize?’ Ghote asked, making a fierce effort not to grab at this offered lifeline.

  The superintendent considered the matter.

  ‘I think you may be right,’ he concluded. ‘With communications cut from Nagpur there have not been any newspapers that might have printed your photograph. And then you could take with you that box of sample eggs. You have it still?’

  ‘Yes, I have it.’

  But now Dr Patil proceeded to pile on yet more reasons for caution.

  ‘You are a brave man, Inspector,’ he said, ‘but all the same is there any good reason for going to the Swami? He is a most obstinate individual. What can you say to him now you have not said before?’

  And again Ghote was constrained to reject the plea, though a part of him cried out ‘Relent, relent.’

  ‘I think I have something new to put to him, Doctor. Certain circumstances have come into my knowledge that might influence him.’

  Yet would the Swami abruptly switch round on learning that his protégé was not a Brahmin? By no means necessarily, Ghote felt. But he knew that he had to go and try any expedient while it existed.

  ‘No,’ he said, ‘he must be forced to give way. That is all there is to it.’

  *

  But it was only after considerable discussion of ways and means that he was able to put his plan into action at all. Though it was possible for a respected figure in the town like Dr Patil to get into the police-station provided he was willing to take a few risks with flying stones, and though a quick foray to Dr Rao’s shop had been practical, it was by no means easy to get somebody out unobserved.

  Eventually however a plan was agreed. Ghote was to leave by the back way. His departure was to be covered by a squad of constables making a sortie as if to relieve pressure on the rear wall of the compound. He was to take an electric torch with him and to signal when he wanted to return, the letter G for Ghote in Morse, dash, dash, dot.

  It was typical, Ghote thought, of Superintendent Chavan’s all-round efficiency that he should have this last piece of information at his finger-tips.

  So his departure, when at last it took place, was conducted in an altogether efficient manner.

  Under the superintendent’s direction a ramp was constructed out of old oil drums and planks at a chosen point in the compound wall, so that a concerted attack could be made on the besiegers. And, on a given signal, a detachment of the toughest constables, steel-helmeted, lathi-armed and with wire-mesh riot shields strapped to the left forearm, mounted the ramp at a double, dropped down on the far side, reformed in close ranks and carried out a classic lathi-charge against the rioters in the lane, the long rods swinging and falling in almost unbroken rhythm.

  They cleared the mud-thick little lane in no time. Ghote, dipping down behind their shoulder-to-shoulder ranks and darting at the right moment away up a narrow side-lane, holding his egg-box as if it were a treasure-chest he was bent on taking into hiding, could not repress a feeling of warmly pure delight at seeing a rule-book police procedure so well carried out.

  But he had to store such thoughts away at the back of his mind. For the time being all his energies had to be concentrated on getting away from the police-station area without being identified as coming from it. He ran steadily, the egg-box tucked under his left arm now, the long torch the superintendent had lent him clasped in his right fist, and he kept a good look-out for the least sign of any knot of rioters. But only the most timorous had chosen to escape the lathi charge in this direction and none of them had stayed to see what was happening. Indeed, no one was out at all. Even the dogs had slunk to safety and Ghote ran between the low houses in the area to the rear of the police-station without seeing a soul for as much as ten minutes.

  He had been given good and clear directions too before leaving, and so when at the end of his long dash he allowed himself to halt and look about him, before walking out in the guise of a visiting salesman for Grofat chicken feed, he found he was already within striking distance of the river and the road to the ruined temple.

  He set off at a good pace.

  On the way he met only a handful of people coming towards him. There was one middle-aged woman wearing a garish sari and a determined expression, a carrier of tidings if ever there was one, though plainly with not much tidings to carry at present. And there were two youths sharing a very battered bicycle and laughing and joking to each other, who stopped their antics decidely abruptly when they saw him coming. But again the two of them showed clearly that the Swami was alive still, though he guessed that they were spies sent by the Chairman to see whether he had his trump card yet. Luckily they were both too occupied with keeping secret what they had been speaking about so loudly to pay him much real attention and he hurried on.

  At the temple itself there were no more people than there had been on his last visit. There were the crippled beggars and there were a few elderly women disciples who apparently preferred staying on the spot to going to the town to make more public demonstrations of their devotion to the Swami. But no one else.

  Ghote made his approach carefully nonetheless.

  Inside he let his eyes get accustomed to the gloom and then made for the inner room where he had seen the Swami on his last visit. He went towards it on tiptoe. None of the bent old women, crackedly chanting prayers, offered to stop him.

  He put his head round the doorway. In the dimmer greenish light he saw that the Swami was no longer sitting. Instead he had lain down, or more likely he had been laid down. His body, naked from above the waist, could be seen gaunt and ribby as a famine-stricken corpse. And indeed it was plain from the terribly laboured, painfully slow in-and-out of the breathing that the man was only a hair’s-breadth away from being precisely this, a famine-struck corpse.

  Beside
him the Sikh doctor Ghote had met on his former visit was sitting on a camp stool, stethoscope still dangling on his blue shirt, white turban as clinically neat in its every fold as it had been before.

  His white teeth flashed in his dark beard as he greeted Ghote with a silent smile of recognition.

  Ghote went up to him even more elaborately on tiptoe than he had earlier.

  ‘How is he?’ he whispered.

  The Sikh replied in a voice little lower than normal.

  ‘It could be minutes,’ he answered. ‘Or hours. Not more. He’s very weak. Hardly taking anything in even.’

  ‘I could talk with him?’ Ghote asked, dreading the answer.

  The Sikh wagged his stiffly turbaned head.

  ‘He would understand,’ he answered. ‘If you spoke loud, and kept things pretty clear. But I cannot vouch for what it would do to him.’

  Ghote looked over the doctor’s burly shoulder at the near-corpse on its pallet at the far side of the little room. He watched the ribs under their almost constricting covering of thin rubbery skin climb fraction by fraction upwards as a breath was taken in. He watched them cease from every movement at the apogee, and wondered whether they had at that very moment ceased from movement for ever. Then at last he saw them sink fraction by fraction downwards as the breath was expelled.

  ‘He is so weak,’ he said to the doctor, ‘can you not feed him a little? Is there nothing he can have?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ the Sikh answered, ‘there are a variety of things that can be used for forcible feeding at such a time, and if one were administered with care it’d be pretty likely to do the trick. Orange juice, buttermilk, coconut juice, there are lots of suitable treatments.’

  ‘Then why … ?’

  ‘Not one of them in here, old boy. They won’t trust me with them. Irreligious Sikh, you know.’

  ‘They?’

  ‘The old women out there. They’ve got something ready though, and if I come out and tell them he’s willing to take it they’ll be in in a jiffy and let me give it to him. But only after he’s made it quite clear he wants it.’