by Adib Khan
At the mosque, I waited until the throng of orphans, beggars, fakirs and charlatans had dispersed. There was a different mullah, a youngish, bearded fellow, scooping the leftover kichri from a massive cauldron into a pot.
‘The old man?’ I inquired loudly, thrusting a tin plate in front of his navel.
The mullah had to look for me. There was no visible reaction to the oddity that confronted him. ‘I am in charge now. What do you want?’ There was no resentment in his voice. He ignored the plate and stared at my cap and satchel.
‘The same as others,’ I replied, raising my plate and waving it at him.
‘You don’t look as if you are desperately hungry.’
‘The old mullah never refused to feed me. Where is he?’
‘Enjoying the delights of Paradise. Allah summoned him last week. May he rest in peace. Aameen!’
‘How do you know he is in Paradise?’ I had a faint inkling of what he meant by Paradise. A place of perfection. Without the itch of unattainable dreams.
He ignored my question. ‘Behaesht! Where all believers will be rewarded with eternal bliss.’ He looked at me sharply. ‘Are you a Muslim?’
‘Only if you feed me.’ He looked offended. ‘Can you tell me more about Behaesht?’ The mullah smiled dismissively. ‘Will you?’
‘There is a clear path to Paradise for those who can fulfil their duties demanded by Allah.’
I wished I could see as clearly as he did. Why was there a perpetual twilight in my life? I, too, possessed knowledge, but it wasn’t the same. Mine was the knowledge of doubt. I had to steer through uncertainties with the aid of instinct. See inside myself. Chase shadows and listen to faint voices. How did God call? How far in space was Behaesht? Father Daniel had not mentioned such a place. Could it be that Jesu had not discovered it?
The mullah dumped a couple of spoonfuls of the mushy mixture of rice and lentil on the plate, but he made no move to hand it to me. ‘Are you Hindu or Christian? Parsee? Buddhist?’
I shrugged my shoulders. His question had no relevance for me. ‘Will you tell me about Behaesht?’
‘Do you really want to know?’
I said, ‘Yes,’ and reached for the food.
‘Come up and we shall find some shade.’
We climbed up the steps of the mosque to the deserted courtyard used for prayers. On one side there was an awning under which a boy sat reading a book in an unfamiliar language. He swayed back and forth, rapidly chanting words in a shrill voice. The mullah snapped his fingers. The boy stopped reading, closed the book, kissed the cover and walked away with it.
‘Why did he touch the book with his lips?’
‘You are certainly not a Muslim,’ he observed. ‘It was a sign of his respect and devotion to the Holy Koran.’
We sat on a faded rug worn out in the middle. The kichri was still warm. I remembered my meeting with Father Daniel. The lingering recollection was the coolness inside the church.
‘Did Mullah Hafiz tell you about our religion?’
‘Mullah Hafiz?’
‘The old man who is no longer with us.’
‘He hardly ever spoke to me.’
He crossed his legs and mumbled a prayer. ‘Words,’ he whispered fervently, ‘are inadequate to describe the magnificence of what awaits the true believer. Who am I, an insignificant mortal, to undertake such a monumental task? It is best left to the farishtas to guide us through the blissful glory when the time comes, as the archangel Jibreel did with our Rasul. May peace be on him! Aameen!’
My plate was empty. I decided to ask him later if I could scrape the bottom of the cauldron for the burnt bits of rice and lentil. ‘You are as close to an angel as any human can be,’ I murmured.
He grinned and blushed with pleasure, stroking his beard contentedly. ‘Imagine, if you can, a place without overbearing heat or freezing cold. Imagine a green, endless garden where one can relax under fruit trees. Silver and silk in endless supply. Everything is clean and gleams with the purity of a holy light. Gurgling water fountains and eternally young boys, like sprinkled pearls. Young maidens, fair as coral and rubies, in attendance.’ There was a glazed look in his eyes as if he were overcome by the splendour of what he had himself described. ‘Rivers of milk and honey. Serenading angels. Djinns at one’s command. Everything is bathed in beauty and grace. The celestial light of Allah’s blessing shines forever. Paradise is everything that appears in your best dreams and more. Much more!’
He must have sensed that I was unaffected by his enthusiasm.
‘In my best dreams I often stand in front of a mirror without flinching at the reflection. I see myself among the normal inhabitants of the city. After a day’s work, there’s a home to come back to. A wife and children. We share a simple meal. We have clothes. There is no fear in our lives. There is no need to look beyond ourselves for contentment.’
He was visibly angered by my simplistic vision of Paradise. ‘Those who do not adopt the true faith…’ He glared at me as if I were firmly placed among the unenlightened. ‘Fetters and chains. A blazing fire! Unbearable pain and the foulest of stench from the Devil’s mouth. There will be only the company of the Evil One and its henchmen! When you are thirsty, there will be drinks of pus and blood mixed with mucus. For food there is the degradation of eating one’s own raw flesh. There is only pain and loneliness.’
What he said did not intimidate me. I returned his stare. ‘It takes more than words to frighten someone who knows about loneliness and pain.’
His shoulders drooped. ‘I have wasted my time with you,’ he said wearily. ‘You haven’t understood anything I have said. It takes a more developed mind to grasp what cannot be seen with our eyes.’
I made a move to leave without saying anything further, but it wasn’t in my nature to suppress the words provoked by denigrating me. ‘I will never understand such a state of perfection that you describe,’ I admitted. ‘You see…’ I knew that what I was about to say would ensure that I would never again be a recipient of free food. It was a dismal prospect, but I couldn’t restrain myself. In some ways I was incapable of lying. I didn’t see that as a virtue, but merely a defining characteristic. ‘You see, I don’t need a Paradise with angels and houris, God and perfection. My vision of Heaven is uncomplicated and of this life. But for me it is unattainable.’
It was nearly twilight when I reached the bustee. The sun had torched the western sky in a final gasp of vengeance. A saffron haze of smoke and dust covered the dwellings. I was impatient for the night sky. I needed darkness to restore my belief in illusions.
The bustee never varied—irritated voices, crying children, people discussing the water shortage. Women sat outside their hovels, cooking on clay chulas. The acrid smells of burning twigs and leaves, bits of cardboard, paper and dried cow dung. Anything combustible. I walked past a row of squatting children shitting on the ground.
‘Story Vamana?’ one of them called.
I was too preoccupied with the afternoon’s conversation with the mullah to bother with a reply.
Other voices. Shrill and outraged. I drifted towards them and stopped to listen. I spotted Lightning Fingers and Nimble Feet in a crowd of men arguing among themselves. Without warning, tractors and bulldozers had arrived earlier in the day. They began to dig trenches and lay pipes beside the dirt track that led to the main road. A foreman sounded an ultimatum over a megaphone. Residents had two days to abandon the hovels on the edge of the bustee. They were advised to move in temporarily with those who had dwellings further inside.
It was a mistake, people had pleaded. Sri Jhunjhun Wallah would sort it out. He must be on his way to clear up the misunderstanding. He had promised. Everyone waited, but the businessman and his associates did not appear. The machines spluttered into life. Steely claws dipped into the earth. A broken brick hit the side of a tractor. A crowd gathered. More bricks and stones sent the workers scuttling for safety. Scuffles. The drivers were dragged out of the tractors and bulldozers to be
punched and kicked. The foreman was assaulted. Anger exploded into a destructive frenzy. A bulldozer was rolled on its side, doused with kerosene and set alight. Pipes were smashed and tyres slashed.
The police arrived, followed by Jhunjhun Wallah and his thugs. They surveyed the considerable damage. Jhunjhun Wallah yelled abuses and gesticulated wildly. No one knew whether the fire brigade had been summoned.
‘There is a water shortage in the city,’ a resident called out. ‘The firemen are on leave.’
‘War!’ Jhunjhun Wallah shouted, walking around in a circle, his hands raised in the air. ‘Total war! The scum of the city must be eliminated! Vermins! Snakes! Bastards! Dirty mongrels! After everything I promised to do for you! Ungrateful wretches!’
His body shaking with rage, the businessman strode abruptly to his car and was driven away.
Lightning Fingers and Nimble Feet disagreed about what happened next. Lightning Fingers swore that it was Barey Bhai who, at this point, signalled the police to attack. Nimble Feet was equally certain that the bald traitor had left earlier in Jhunjhun Wallah’s car. There was a lathi charge. Men, even some children, were beaten and kicked. Screaming women were abused and assaulted. A number of protestors were hauled into a waiting van.
I listened attentively until I heard the name Ram Lal mentioned. My limbs twitched, and irrepressible noises escaped from me. It felt as if I had been drenched in iced liquid. The pores in my skin widened. Sweat poured from them like water. His thin, delicate face, almost innocent. His dull eyes. Heavy boots on my neck. The detached voice that warned me. His indifference as he continued to hit me.
But then I thought of the way I had managed to anger Ram Lal when I followed him. He had a weakness to be exploited. The itch for revenge sparked an idea. I resolved to track him back to his house.
People were gathered in front of the television set that flashed coloured images of big-bosomed girls heaving and panting. They danced and sang in front of a water fountain with trees and flowers in the background. Perhaps it was a scene set in Paradise. I looked up to the roof of the godown. The eye was pointed at the sky. Was it communicating with a force that had sinister intentions?
I cleared my throat and declared that it was a fine night for a story. I was told to shut up. I tried again. Heads turned and several voices echoed the same message. The evil round refused to look at me. Its unwavering gaze at the heavens made me feel as if I were unworthy of its attention. I looked at the screen. I had to admit that the girls were extraordinarily pretty.
Chaman was sitting beside a candle, patching up a torn blouse, when I entered the godown.
‘There are people who want to move in here.’
‘But the ghost…’
‘You overcome fear when you are desperate.’
‘You heard about Barey Bhai?’
She nodded. ‘He prefers to be with those who win. At least we can be comforted by his absence.’
‘Does Baji know?’
‘It won’t matter. He is like a son. She will find an excuse to forgive him. Besides, their drug business is doing well.’
‘We may have to move soon.’
‘They won’t reach us for some time. It doesn’t matter to me. Does that sound selfish?’
I couldn’t tell. ‘Why doesn’t it matter?’
‘I may not be alive,’ she said very casually, as though she were talking about a stranger. She continued sewing, her face veiled in shadow.
‘The medicine,’ I reminded her. ‘Did you take the powder?’
‘Yes,’ she said. A little too quickly, I thought.
‘Do you know where the big Christian cemetery is?’
I said I passed it frequently.
‘It is a peaceful place that is never raided by the police.’
‘They might one day, if they are desperate for bodies to fill their jails.’ I couldn’t see why the cemetery was suddenly the focus of interest.
We laughed. Temporarily I forgot about the problems of the bustee and Ram Lal.
‘Sometimes I go there late at night and sit under the stars.’
‘Among the graves?’
‘Is that strange?’
‘No…but aren’t you afraid?’
‘Silence doesn’t frighten me. We could go there one night and talk.’ It was a plea rather than a suggestion. I had never heard Chaman sound so vulnerable.
I was about to suggest that we could perhaps have a chat in the company of ghosts later that night, when I remembered what I had planned. There was also the other matter on the roof. ‘Tomorrow? Unless you are…’
I suspect she knew what I was about to say. ‘Tomorrow,’ she said firmly, cutting me off with an abruptness she used with some of her more difficult visitors.
There was an air of desperation in the bustee that evening. No quarrels, but people talked in high-pitched voices. There was more than the normal share of laughter and vulgarity. I had a significant victory in convincing the neighbours that the television was a bribe from the enemy intended to seduce us to a quiet acceptance of Jhunjhun Wallah’s plans for a quick demolition of the dwellings. The set was turned off and the door locked.
We assembled in small groups outside the hovels and boasted about our success in thwarting the businessman. It was necessary to delude ourselves about our ability to resist and survive. There were boastful claims and impractical strategies. The men were restless and quite clearly excited about the possibility of a violent struggle.
‘War!’ There were sporadic and imitative cries. ‘Total war!’
I was asked to narrate some of the heroic struggles of ancient times.
‘Tell us about courage and daring deeds! We need to be inspired!’
The requests were made without any sensitivity for my preferences. They did not wish to hear about incest or self-mutilation, cannibalism or torture. Pity! I had a few new stories…
It was always more difficult to create a complete story during daylight when I was reduced to the abjectness of making a living. At night I became an apothecary who prepared potions to nourish illusions. I sought to induce dreams, purge illnesses and implant hope. Listeners paid for their sustenance, but they never asked what it was that compelled me to create such murky worlds and populate them with human oddities—you know, the type of people I might have fathered. I preferred it that way. I gave the impression of being wise, the custodian of the answers to complex riddles. The truth was that I did not understand the origins of the interior landscapes or the details of their features. All I knew was that they had always been there—clear pools and running streams, swamps and treacherous rivers, dark forests teeming with life, creatures that naked eyes could not bear to see. There were voices that belonged to wounded monsters, flashes of blinding light, the shady areas and purple shadows. Darkness…darkness where I belonged.
Often I strummed the chords of misfortune with the purpose of making people accept what they were. The ugliness, suffering and pain, deformity, perversion, shame and despair that I brought to life were far worse than most would have experienced. Beggars, the homeless and the diseased, the suicidal, those who despaired, the mutilated and the mentally scarred listened and then went on their way, buoyed with the possibility that there could be people in situations far worse than their own. Lies, of course, but necessary lies to console and calm. I helped others to find the harp embedded within each of us and plucked the strings. Even the oceans listened and the winds paused. Life recuperated temporarily.
Ah Vamana! If only it were in your power to suffocate suffering permanently! How I wish I could have dispensed happiness like a benevolent king scattering coins to clamouring beggars.
In the dim glow of a few candles and hurricanes, faces gathered around me. The hushed attentiveness spurred me on.
‘If we could only hear your voice without seeing you, Vamana, we would all fall in love,’ the girls in the bustee often teased me.
I chose to tell them about Rama and his years spent as a hermit in the forest
. I emphasised the virtues of endurance and suffering, for in my heart I did not believe that the community would survive the ambition of the fat businessman. I narrated the rescue of the abducted queen and the war between what was righteous and evil. I inserted my own bits about Rama, Sita, Lakshmana and Bharata. They heard whatever they wished to believe. At night everything sounded credible.
Someone thrust a bottle of a locally made brew in my hands, and then another. We drank until we were unable to stand steadily. The pounding of drums and the plaintive sound of a harmonium became the heartbeat of the community. Singing replaced the stories. We sank into the primitive depths of the night in a state of dangerous contentment. Such amazing sights! The dance of horned humans around a gigantic fire. Winged creatures, too ugly to be angels, and young boys in white. Demure houris. A nocturnal migration.
Throw in your souls! a voice demanded. Keep feeding the flames of life!
So! This was where they escaped to from Heaven when God slept. The mullah’s Paradise was a distant vision. Abandoned, green acres. The silence of sterility.
When I awakened, there was only the quietness of stars. I lay on the ground, gripped by a furious headache while around me drunken bodies snored, twisted and calmed by oblivion.
The entire universe was in sight and in my exclusive possession. The Creator had made Vamana and decided not to repeat the mistake. The curse of imperfection was aloneness and an unending supply of unanswerable questions.
Wander the spaces and live through the expanse of eternity. It is yours alone. Your seeds will never create life.
But I have a mind! I am not alone!
A breeze caressed my face. The sky told me that dawn was still at a distance.
In the godown I gathered whatever was needed. Inside the satchel there was a sturdy piece of timber, string, a knife and the folded hessian sack. I rubbed myself with coconut oil and tied a loincloth loosely around my waist. I was ready.
It wasn’t easy to climb up to the roof. I slipped and fell. I rubbed my hands with dirt for a firmer grip on the pole. I cut the wires and twisted the eye so that it didn’t point to the sky. I howled at the moon and claimed victory.
