by Amitav Ghosh
Dubey was Jyoti’s first surprise: looking for the lean gangling figure he remembered, he saw instead a plump, sleek man spilling over with an unexpectedly warm welcome. Dubey disposed of his luggage by snapping his fingers at a constable, and led him out of the little station to a jeep.
Jyoti found himself squeezed between Dubey and the driver, trying to think of something to say. Surreptitiously he glanced at Dubey’s uniform. It was perfectly creased and ironed, the material much finer than any a mere uniforms allowance can buy. That’s the life, he thought. Be a small-town cop and prosper. Aloud he said: You’re looking healthy. How’s your asthma?
Oh, all right, Dubey answered. How’re your paintings?
Taken aback, Jyoti Das said: Not bad, not bad. And how’s Mrs Dubey?
Fine, fine. Went back to Delhi last year. Doesn’t like it here. And you? Still a happy bachelor?
Yes, Das said quickly. Now tell me what all this hurry was about. Have you got him?
No. Not yet. But we know he’s in this area, and we’ll definitely be able to trace some of his associates, so we’ll probably get him soon. That’s why I thought it would be best if you came personally. After all, it’s your case and I don’t want to take any undue credit for it (No, thought Das, I’m sure you don’t). It’s a good thing you’ve come actually, because just this morning some of my chaps in one of the villages around here brought in someone promising. If we get anything out of him, we should be able to pick up your bugger in a day or two, maybe even today. You’ve come just in time.
That’s very quick work, said Das. How’d you do it?
Well, we got the report you people sent – that the Suspect was believed to be somewhere in this area. There are a number of extremist groups around here, so I thought at once that he’d probably try to contact them. Then we got the sketch from your artists and I called in my station-house officers from the villages and showed it to them and told them about the case. After that, information began trickling in. It was easy. But this man we’ve picked up today is the real key.
Have you talked to him yet?
No, he’s still in a station outside the town, Dubey said. We’ll go and talk to him a little later.
The car stopped outside a yellow, tiled bungalow overlooking the sea. This is where you’ll stay, said Dubey, leading Das to a veranda. He gestured at a cane chair and ordered tea. Now, he said, what can you tell me about this business? In answer Das took a thick file from his briefcase and handed it to him. Dubey grimaced: Hell yar, can’t you just tell me? Why all this reading-sheading?
There’s not much to tell, Das said abruptly. You’ve seen the report we sent out already. I suppose you know there was an encounter with an extremist group in a village about five months ago? There was an accident, sort of, and most of them died. But one got away – there was a corpse missing. We managed to trace him to Calcutta. He was hiding with one of his uncle’s associates. I put some chaps on the job, and that was a mistake, for the bird had flown by the time they got there. Anyway the old man told them that the Suspect had ganged up with some Keralites in a textile factory in Calcutta. We got hold of one of the gang but we couldn’t get much out of him. Only that the Suspect was heading south, probably towards Kerala. I talked to the old man myself later. He had nothing much to say, that is, nothing important to say – he had a lot to say otherwise. After that we just followed the routine and sent you people a circular and a sketch. Frankly, we didn’t expect anything to come of it. Actually, to tell you the truth, I’d be quite happy to put an end to this business – I can’t see that it’s important in any way. But the DIG …
Das stopped to look at Dubey. The DIG, he continued, thinks it’s very important. He shrugged: Anyway, that’s more or less all that’s in the files.
Jyoti Das was right – that was all the files said. What else could they say? They knew nothing of the days Alu spent after Bolai-da smuggled him into a truck and sent him to Gopal’s flat in Calcutta. They knew nothing of the time he spent wandering blindly through the city, without stopping to eat, without even wondering how it came to be that he had lost the sensation of hunger. Or of the bench in the Maidan where his straying feet led him every night, to sit and wonder whether a match would still burn his skin, whether that at least was still left to him.
And when he returned to the flat on Hazra Road, Gopal, waiting for him, every night, would ask gently: Where did you go today? Every night the same question and every night Gopal would watch the same bewilderment play across the potato face, for really he did not know. For nights without end Gopal would sit in his easy chair and weep for Balaram, friend of his youth, his tears splashing heavily into the open book on his lap; and, weeping, he would watch Alu and wait for the first hint of an answering tear – for a sign at least – of grief, anything but that dumb, blank bewilderment. But there was nothing.
Only once did Alu have anything to tell him, and then for hours: he talked of a machine, a sewing machine in a display window. He talked of its sinuous curves, its bulging, powerful chest and tapering underbelly, of its shining blackness and dull gold lettering, of its poised needle and the inexhaustible miracle which can join together two separate pieces of cloth. He talked on until dawn, while Gopal wept unheeded, not only for Balaram this time, but for Alu, too, and his ebbing reason. Gopal did not know that that day Alu had won a battle for his spirit.
But soon Gopal stopped worrying for him, for one night Alu showed him two boils, the size of duck’s eggs, one on his leg and the other under his armpit – not ordinary boils, but suppurating craters of pus, as though his flesh had gathered itself together and tried to burst from his body. Gopal embraced Alu that night and laughed. Let them be, he said. They have nothing to do with you; it’s only Balaram trying to come back to the world.
But Alu covered his leg and glowered at him. Not just Balaram, he growled.
Gopal nodded wisely and turned away.
There were more and more, all over Alu’s body, and the pain drove him to walk farther and farther afield – to the crowds fighting their way out of Sealdah Station, to Howrah Bridge, across, and still farther, until sirens were shrieking all around him and he was swept away by crowds pouring out of factory gates. It was then that by some inexplicable turn of fortune Alu did something he had not done before – he stopped at a tea-stall and asked for a cup of tea.
It was there that he met Rajan.
That day, dark, brooding Rajan told him about the great factories all around them. He talked of Jacquard looms and streams of punched paper which could draw patterns with warp strings faster than the eye could see; of looms blessed with the sense of touch, automatic looms, which could send out feelers to sense whether their shuttles were empty or not; of looms without any real shuttles at all, in which hurtling projectiles flew through the empty space of the shed, between the two parted streams of the warp yarn, to bite into a waiting bobbin and carry it back; of looms in which curled iron rapiers served for shuttles, snapping through the shed to carry the weft in a pierced eye; of shuttles of which he had only read, which fly on jets, like aeroplanes … That night Gopal was awake again till dawn, listening to Alu talk of the factory and Rajan and, of course, machines.
After that Alu went back to the tea-shop every day, before Rajan’s shift. Sometimes he talked of his own loom and the cloth he had woven, and to his astonishment he found that his language was no mystery to Rajan. For Rajan was of Kerala’s great caste of Chalias who for centuries have woven and traded in simple white cloth. There was no loom anywhere that was a mystery to Rajan.
One day he smuggled Alu into the mill he worked in: a huge bustling vault, the machines new, awesome in their potency and their size; the men minuscule, compressed, struggling under the weight of the giants. It was a miracle which had no end – webs of yarn shooting into the maws of the automatic looms from whirling bobbins, cloth pouring out in waterfalls, folding itself into ordered bales …
But where are the peanuts? Eyes riveted to the stage,
craning over the hundreds of shoulders in front of him, Alu sends his hands wandering through his pockets, looking for that just-bought jet of twisted paper, filled with nuts, whole coarse-veined nuts waiting to be broken, waiting for the red kernels inside to be worried out and rubbed in minty green salt, for the shells to drop to the floor to be stamped into the earth by those thousands of feet, all shifting nervously now, as the whole great tent watches, awestruck, while the demons dance, encircling the heroes in rings of fire, beating them to the ground with their uncountable arms, dancing on their chests with their clawed feet, reaching for the victory that is almost theirs. And just then, suddenly, all too accidentally, a spanner drops into the shooting rapids of cloth, into the heart of the grinding machine, and, screaming, the demons freeze. A sigh of relief rises from the men on the floor, and they lean back for a few stolen minutes to finish conversations and light cigarettes. But Alu is on his feet, cheering and throwing peanuts, until he has to be led outside, still noisily celebrating the tiny victories of the men who live with demons.
Outside they found Gopal, standing at the tea-shop, his face crumpled with anxiety, holding a cloth bundle. When he saw Alu he ran across the road and hugged him, stammering with relief.
Such news! An elderly brother-in-law in the High Court (mainly revenue and taxation, but also a few criminal sometimes to make a bit of money) was visiting a prospective client in Lalbazar Police Station when he heard search orders being given out for an address in Hazra Road – Gopal’s address. Gopal’s house was to be searched; there could be no doubt for whom.
The bundle was thrust into Alu’s hands. Alu opened it and found the few clothes Gopal had bought him, Gopal’s own copy of the Life of Pasteur and 8000 rupees. Gopal smiled in embarrassment. Your uncle had left it with me, to invest. It’s yours now. Alu looked at him and Gopal looked away. But Alu didn’t argue. He bent down and touched Gopal’s feet. Gopal hugged him once, blindly, and then he was gone, back to the flat in Hazra Road, to send his wife away and wait for the police alone.
Rajan knew, as soon as he saw Alu standing in the road with a bundle in his hands. Alu tried to mumble an explanation, but Rajan stopped him. What was the use of talking and explanations? Everyone saw these things every day. It was not the time for talk. Within minutes Alu had a list of addresses and a letter. With those, and boils erupting all over him, he passed down a chain of Rajan’s Chalia kinsmen, scattered over every factory along the South-Eastern Railway, paying out parts of his 8000 rupees where Rajan had told him to, down, down, steadily southwards, stopping to catch his breath in the great mills of Madurai and Coimbatore, till whispers came that the police had orders and a sketch, Rajan had been taken in … Then it was time to leave the railways behind, time to slip into the forests of the Nilgiris, led by Rajan’s great-grandfather’s cousin’s great-grandson, along elephant trails and deer tracks through clouds in blue mountains, then over the watershed, into Kerala, a step into a magical prawn malai curry, redolent of cardamom and cinnamon, sharp with cloves, sweet with the milk of coconuts enough to float the world. He spent the nights secreted away in the Chalia quarters of scattered villages, lulled to sleep by the cheerful knocking of hundreds of fly-shuttles in familiar looms; but then again, suddenly, rumours of informers, of reports to the police, so faster still, westwards, down through the mountains, faster and faster …
Where were the files then?
A little before sunset Das and Dubey set out for the village in which the prisoner was being held. The car took them into the little town and towards the river, through narrow roads lined with brightly lit shops. Their windows were crammed with bottles and their signs read: IMFL – Indian-Made Foreign Liquor.
Dubey pointed out of the window. Do you booze? This is the place for it. Dirt cheap and good stuff, too.
Das’s eyes slid down to Dubey’s wrist, to a heavy gold watch. He stared at it enviously. Of course, he could have got it from his father-in-law. Could have. A town which lives on the liquor trade – gold watches were probably thrown at everyone from the revenue clerk upwards. What else could one ask for? No DIG sitting on you, forget about promotions and life insurance and provident funds and house-rent allowances. Money no problem – a peaceful, simple life.
Dubey was pointing at a large pink and green house with round portholes for windows. It bristled with air-conditioners. Some of the houses around it were larger, some newer, some even more strikingly opulent.
That man went to al-Ghazira for five years, Dubey said. He was just a mechanic and look at him now. Look at all the rest of them. He’s almost illiterate, you know, but I’m still ashamed to ask him to my house.
Don’t worry, Das murmured. You’ll catch up; it’s just a matter of time.
Of course, Dubey went on, ignoring him, a lot of them are smugglers. You won’t believe how much smuggling goes on here. Mainly it’s gold coming in, from all over the world – Kenya, Tanzania, Iran, the Gulf. But there are other things, too – electronic things, watches …
Look! he jogged Das’s elbow. A paper-thin slice of metal lay in his palm, barely filling it. He poised a finger over a button. There was a soft electronic chime and the display panel lit up. He ran his fingers over it and numbers flashed on to the panel and disappeared, accompanied by a tattoo of chimes. Nice thing, no? Dubey said. Lots of these things lying around here.
He jabbed Das in the ribs, grinning: Maybe your DIG likes these little things? I’m sure he has a son or two who have exams? No?
Das shook his head and looked out of the window. They were passing a lagoon. The water flamed with the crimson of the setting sun. Palms leant languidly across the water and they could see boatmen in conical hats rowing their catamarans out to sea.
It’s very beautiful here, Das said.
Yeah, yeah, Dubey said. It’s beautiful for five days, a week. After that …
Das spotted a Malabar kingfisher on a telegraph pole and turned in his seat as they drove past it. What’s the matter? Dubey said curiously. It’s a … , Das began and stopped himself just in time. He remembered an occasion at the Academy when, interrupting one of Dubey’s monologues on their colleagues, he had pointed out a pheasant-tailed jaçana.
Which year did he join? Dubey had said worriedly, searching his mind. Is he in the police? I don’t think I’ve heard the name …
It had made a good story, but on the whole it had told against him rather than against Dubey. People had thought he was showing off. Dubey had been furious. Still, Malabar kingfishers were probably all right, but if Dubey ever heard him talking about some less familiar species, like Siberian cranes or something like that, he was more than likely to send off a telegram to their superiors reporting him for consorting with undesirable foreigners. He was said to be very competitive, Dubey, for all his thick-headedness. Wouldn’t stop at anything.
What? said Dubey again, waiting for an answer.
I was wondering, Das said quickly. You explained what they smuggle in, but what do they smuggle out? Coconuts?
Coconuts! Dubey laughed. Those people don’t want coconuts over there. No, what they smuggle out is people.
He stopped and stroked his moustache. Sometimes I wish, he said, that someone would smuggle me out – to another posting, I mean. I’m sick of this place. It would help if I got a promotion or an especially good annual report. If we get your chap today or within the next couple of days, maybe your DIG … They say he knows a lot of people.
He looked anxiously across. Das nodded. The car turned off the main road and turned into a narrow lane flanked by banks of earth and laterite walls. A little later it stopped outside a flat-roofed yellow building, unmistakably a police station. The squat, ugly building contrasted sharply with the houses around it, which were white with ornately carved wooden posts, and tiled roofs that stopped just a few feet short of the ground.
A constable in starched khaki shorts came running out of the station. He stood at attention and saluted, his stiff shorts swinging like bells. Dubey acknow
ledged the salute with a brief gesture. Das saw a crowd of children gathering across the street. As he walked past, one of them called out shyly: Hul-lo hul-lo, jol-ly fel-low.
Embarrassed, Das looked quickly ahead, fervently hoping the constable would not make a scene. The constable had not noticed. As he stepped into a large neon-lit room, he heard the boy chant again, somewhere behind hin: Hul-lo hul-lo, jol-ly fel-low.
A table at the far end of the room was covered with plates of food and bottles of soft drinks. Dubey rounded on the constable. How many times have I told you not to waste money like this? he shouted in Hindi.
The constable looked down at his sandalled feet, smiling shyly and wriggling. Automatically, drawn by the force of years of habit, his hand reached under his shorts to pull his shirt straight. Stop that! Dubey snapped. Stand at attention when I’m talking to you.
The constable jumped to attention. Dubey shrugged and turned to Das: Come on, we may as well eat, now that it’s here. They sat behind the table on straight-backed chairs and filled their plates with banana chips and crisp muruka.
Have you talked to the man? Dubey asked the constable.
Yes, saar-ey, the constable answered.
What did he say?
The constable scratched his head. This man is a Chalia, saar-ey, he said, and he has a relative in Calcutta. A man came to him with a letter from his relative, so he led him to Mahé. After that he won’t say anything.
What do you mean, he won’t say anything? Dubey said and stopped abruptly. There was a low but distinct rumbling sound outside the police station. He listened for a moment, his head cocked. He decided to ignore it: Why won’t he say anything?
We tried, saar-ey, the constable said, but he won’t talk. Perhaps you could talk to him.
Does he speak Hindi or English?
Yes, a little bit of Hindi.
All right, Dubey said, bring him in.
The constable gestured to another, who disappeared into a corridor. Again they heard the rumbling sound outside. Dubey picked up a cane and pointed out of the window: What’s that noise?
