The Calcutta Chromosome

by Amitav Gosh

  Murugan quickened his pace and the boy shouted again, at the top of his voice: 'Wait, mister; where you are going?' He was wearing a discoloured T-shirt with a print of a palm-fringed sea and the words pattaya beach. Murugan was dismayed to see him again, so close behind: it had taken him the better part of an hour to shake him off earlier.

  Murugan fought his way to the wall that flanked the pavement, and waited for the boy to catch up. 'Listen, friend,' he said, first in his half-remembered Bengali and then in Hindi. 'Stop walking behind me: you're not going to get anything out of me.'

  The boy bared his teeth in a smile. 'Change dollar?' he said. 'Good rate.'

  Murugan exploded. 'Don't you get it?' he shouted. 'How many ways do you want me to say it: no, na, nahin, nyet, nothing, nix. I don't want to change dollars, and if I did you'd be the last person on the planet I'd go to.'

  Reaching into his pocket he pushed a handful of coins into the boy's hand. 'That's all you're going to get from me,' he said. 'So take it and shove off.'

  He ducked quickly back into the crowd, leaving the boy staring at a palmful of coins. He was at the corner of Harish Mukherjee Road now. Ducking down, Murugan turned the corner and pushed himself flat against the wall. Hidden by the fast-moving crowd, he watched his pursuer running off in the other direction; he saw him looking around, scanning the street. Then the boy broke away and plunged straight into the traffic, racing towards the Victoria Memorial, in the distance.

  'And good night to you too,' Murugan said, stepping back into the crowd.

  The crowd thinned out after the corner. The red-brick buildings of P. G. Hospital were on his left, well behind the shoulder-high perimeter wall and the narrow ditch that ran along it. He slowed his pace, watching the wall for the memorial arch.

  Then suddenly there it was, across the ditch, momentarily spotlighted by the headlights of a passing truck: an arch framing a rusted iron gate. At the apex was a medallion, with Ronald Ross's bearded head in profile. Under it, to the right, was an inscription: In the small laboratory seventy yards to the southeast of this gate Surgeon-Major Ronald Ross I.M.S. in 1898 discovered the manner in which malaria is conveyed by mosquitoes. On the left, carved in marble, were three verses of Ross's poem, 'In Exile'.

  Murugan ran his eyes over the familiar lines:

  This day relenting God

  Hath placed within my hand

  A wondrous thing; and God

  Be praised. At His command,

  Seeking His secret deeds

  With tears and toiling breath,

  I find thy cunning seeds,

  O million-murdering Death.

  I know this little thing

  A myriad men will save.

  O death where is thy sting?

  Thy victory O grave?

  Ronald Ross

  Murugan began to laugh. Turning around he spread his arms out and began to declaim, from the same poem, in a deep, gleefully stentorian voice:

  'Half stunned I look around

  And see a land of death

  Dead bones that walk the ground

  And dead bones underneath;

  A race of wretches caught,

  Between the palms of need

  And rubbed to utter naught,

  The chaff of human seed.'

  He was stopped by the sound of hand-claps from the other side of the wide street. 'Very good, mister,' a voice called out.

  Murugan dropped his arms and peered into the treeshaded darkness on the far side of the road. He caught a glimpse of a printed T-shirt and a grinning, gap-toothed face.

  'Are you following me, chaff of human seed?' he shouted, cupping his hands. 'Why? Why, what's in it for you?'

  The boy replied with a wave and darted into the traffic. Murugan spotted a truck rumbling towards him, from the direction of the Race Course. He waited until the truck drew alongside, blocking him from the boy's view. Then he turned, pulled himself over the wall and dropped down on the far side of the arch.

  His feet landed in something soft and yielding. At first he thought it was mud; he could feel the dampness soaking through the soft leather of his new loafers. A moment later the smell hit him. 'Shit,' he said, under his breath, looking around.

  He was in a narrow, overgrown stretch of wasteland at the back of the hospital's main buildings'. Facing him were a few nondescript outhouses and a small cement structure that housed a water-pump. In the reflected light from the hospital's wards, towering above, Murugan could see a pack of dogs scavenging in an open refuse dump close by. Shading his eyes he peered into the shadows: there was no one in sight except for an old man, squatting against the wall, some distance away, washing his buttocks. Heaps of broken masonry lay in front of him. Scattered among them were neat piles of turds, ashen in the reflected light of the neon street lamps.

  Murugan clamped a hand over his nose and flattened himself against the wall. He heard footsteps approaching at a run, on the other side; they stopped, receded, came back again. He heard the boy muttering to himself then walking off, in a hurry.

  Breathing again Murugan began to move sideways, bracing himself against the wall with his open hands. Pushing along the wall, his left hand chanced upon the rim of an opening in the rough brick surface. Murugan leaned over to take a look and discovered that the opening was actually a little alcove: or rather, a gap where a few bricks had been removed from the back of the memorial arch.

  He thrust his hand gingerly inside. It brushed against something; a small object. His fingers closed on it and he pulled it out. It was a little clay figurine.

  Murugan held the figurine out at arm's length, into the dim glow of the distant street lamp. The figure was made of painted clay, and it was small enough to fit quite easily into the palm of his hand. It reminded him of the little images of gods his mother had carried with her on their travels.

  The central part of the figurine was a simple, semicircular mound, crudely modelled and featureless except for two large stylized eyes, painted in stark blacks and whites, on the baked clay. They gave Murugan a momentary start; they appeared luminous in the dim neon glow, staring directly up at him, out of his open palm. They seemed to fix upon his eyes, holding his gaze; he had to blink before he could look away.

  He turned the object around in his palm. To the right of the mound was a tiny bird, unmistakably a pigeon, clearly and carefully modelled – feathers, eyes and all. Growing out of the other side of the mound was a little protuberance, like the amputated stub of an arm. The arm had a small metal object attached; Murugan could not tell what it was – all he could see of it was a little metallic cylinder. He brought the figurine closer, examining it carefully, trying to work out what the metal object represented.

  Then once again he was interrupted: 'Mister; I find you; what you doing here?' The boy was peering over the wall, his face right above Murugan's head, laughing.

  Murugan lost his temper. 'Get out of my sight, you son of a bitch,' he shouted.

  The boy made a leering face and wagged his head. Then he caught sight of the figurine in Murugan's hand. He shot out an arm and snatched the object from Murugan.

  Murugan lunged at the figurine, but his hand caught the boy's fist and knocked it out. It crashed to the ground, on the other side of the wall. The boy dropped off the wall and fell to his knees beside it.

  Pulling his head up, Murugan looked over the wall. The boy was on all fours, gathering up the pieces of broken clay. He looked at Murugan over his shoulder and spat out a curse.

  'You asked for it,' Murugan said. 'It's not my fault.' Keeping his back to the wall, Murugan began to move to his left, stepping carefully over the excrement and debris. He came to a stop at a dilapidated red-brick outhouse, built so close to the ground that it was almost completely hidden by the boundary wall. The structure seemed like an abandoned shell, with branches of peepul growing out of the cracked plaster and grinning holes marking the old windows and doorways..

  Murugan pushed his head gingerly through a gaping
window. 'Hello,' he called out. 'Anyone there?'

  Suddenly there was a flapping, whooshing sound and he was hit in the face. A flock of pigeons swirled past, brushing his face with their feathers.

  Murugan threw himself back and covered his head with his arms. A sound rang in his ears; it was only after a few seconds had passed that he realized he had screamed. Then he heard a pebble strike the ground, beside him. He looked up and saw the boy, hanging over the boundary wall, his arm flexed to throw another stone.

  Murugan ducked through a passageway, into the main drive and headed for the hospital's gates, at a run. Several taxis were waiting at the entrance, on Gokhale Road. Murugan jumped into one and slammed the door. 'Let's go,' he cried, 'let's go, move it.'

  The Sikh taxi driver turned to look at him, unhurriedly. 'Go where?' he said, in Hindi.

  ' Robinson Street,' Murugan said, gasping breath. 'Between Loudon and Rawdon Street.'

  The driver turned the ignition key. The old Ambassador started up with a roar and pulled slowly away.

  Murugan sat crouched by the window, scanning the road and the pavements. Seeing no sign of the boy, he sank back into the seat. His eyes fell on his shoes; they were covered with brown stains. He caught a whiff of a foul odour and thrust his feet under the front seat, hoping the smell would not reach the driver. But the odour lingered; he couldn't rid himself of it. He wrapped a handkerchief around his hand, took the shoes off and dropped them out of the window.

  He sank into his seat, breathing a sigh of relief. But a moment later there was a thud on the back windshield. He looked around just in time to see his second shoe flying through the air. It struck the window and bounced off, leaving a long brown stain on the glass.

  The driver stuck his head out of the window and began to shout at the boy, who was racing towards them through the traffic. Then the lights changed, the cars behind began to sound their horns and the taxi pulled away.

  As the taxi turned into Lower Circular Road, he glanced over at the brilliantly lit facade of the Rabindra Sadan auditorium. He noticed two women hurrying down the stairs, and thrust his head out of the window. The taxi was moving a little faster now and he only had a brief glimpse of them, heading for the gate.

  He was almost certain they were the two women he'd spoken to earlier in the evening.

  Chapter 9

  THE ARTICLE IN the LifeWatch newsletter was wrong on one point. There was only one meeting between Murugan and a representative of the Personnel Department before Murugan's departure for Calcutta.

  One morning Antar arrived at his cubicle at LifeWatch's headquarters on West 57th Street to find a file waiting on his screen: it contained a complete record of Murugan's requests for reassignment. Antar was sure that the file had been routed to him by mistake: he was only techically a member of Personnel; he dealt almost exclusively with accounts. He lost no time in shooting off a query to the Director of his department. A couple of hours later the Director sent him a message asking him to drop by.

  The Director was a serious and conscientious Swede who never lost an opportunity to remind his staff that their real business was caring. 'Let's get you away from your screen for a bit,' he said to Antar. 'I've got a more human job for you today.' He called up Murugan's file and took Antar through it. 'See if you can't talk some sense into this man Murugan: hard economic sense, I mean. Tell him about pension schemes and medical benefits and all that sort of thing. You'll see from the records that this gentleman already pays out a third of his salary in alimony: effectively he's not going to be earning anything if he goes off to Calcutta on this wild-goose chase.'

  Antar E-mailed Murugan that very afternoon. A couple of days later, shortly before the lunch break, Antar heard a loud, screeching voice echoing through the department's open-plan office. He knew at once who it was even though he could not see him from his cubicle.

  Murugan was carolling greetings to his acquaintances: 'Hey there, how are you doing on this fine day? Enjoying the low pollen count?'

  Antar and his neighbour in the next cubicle exchanged startled glances.

  The voice rose several decibels: 'Which one of you is called Ant… Ant…?'

  'Over here,' Antar shouted, jumping to his feet. He found himself holding his hand aloft, like a schoolboy, so that it peeped out over the plywood top of his cubicle.

  'Stay right where you are Ant,' Murugan called out cheerfully. 'I'll find my way to you.'

  A minute later he appeared at the entrance to Murugan's cubicle; a dapper, pot-bellied man, in a dark three-piece suit and a felt hat. They were about the same age, Antar estimated; both in their early forties.

  'Hey there, Ant,' Murugan said, beaming at him, holding out his hand. 'This is some heap you've built yourself out here.'

  Disconcerted by the man's manner, Antar gave him a thin smile and gestured at a chair. Pulling out a list of figures he plunged straight into the little speech he had prepared, explaining why a move to Calcutta would be a career disaster.

  Murugan sat through the monologue in silence, stroking his goatee, his bright, piercing eyes fixed on Antar. When Antar ran out of breath and paused, he gave him a nod of encouragement.

  'Go on, Ant,' he said, 'I'm listening.'

  Antar had saved his trump card for the last. He played it now. 'And have you thought about your payments?' he began. Halted by a momentary twinge of embarrassment, he stopped to clear his throat. 'Your payments to your ex-wife, I mean?' he said. 'You'll barely have enough to support yourself if you go ahead with this.'

  Suddenly Murugan leaned forward, looking into Antar's eyes. 'You ever been married, Ant?' he said.

  Startled, Antar fell back in his chair. Without meaning to, he nodded.

  'And you're not now?'

  'No,' said Antar.

  'Yeah.' Murugan pursed his lips, as though confirming something to himself. 'I could tell.'

  'How?'

  'Just could,' said Murugan. 'So let's hear it, Ant: you paying alimony too? You seem to know a lot about the subject.'

  'No!' Antar said vehemently. 'My wife died, in her first pregnancy…'

  'That's too bad,' said Murugan. 'Were you together long?'

  'Yes.' The directness of the question took Antar off guard. 'I was orphaned you see, and her family kind of adopted me when I was in my teens, in Egypt. She was everything to me-' He cut himself short, flustered.

  Murugan pulled a sympathetic face: 'Shit happens.' He glanced at his watch and pushed his chair back. 'Come on, let's go grab a bite.'

  Antar's head was reeling from the barrage of questions. 'Grab – a – bite?' he said, momentarily uncomprehending.

  Murugan gave a hoot of laughter: 'Get some lunch, something to eat.'

  Antar had brought his lunch with him, of course. It was right behind him, in his briefcase; a sandwich and an apple. He liked to have lunch in his cubicle, by himself. But he could not bring himself to say so now.

  'All right,' he said. 'Let us go.'

  Out in the corridor, on the way to the elevator, Murugan declared cheerfully: 'Sounds like you got a pretty raw deal, huh?'

  Trying to turn the conversation away from himself, Antar said quickly: 'And what about you?'

  'My divorce was pretty straightforward,' Murugan said offhandedly as they joined the lunchtime queue at the elevator bank. His voice seemed to grow louder as they stepped into the elevator. 'The whole thing was a mistake – arranged by our families. Didn't last but a couple of years. No kids.'

  Murugan gave a screech of laughter that went spiralling tinnily around the elevator. 'How did we get on this subject anyway?' he said. 'Oh yeah, you were telling me I'm going to be a deadbeat divorce if I go to Calcutta.'

  Antar intercepted a stare from an acquaintance and dropped his eyes. He kept them down until they stepped off the elevator.

  They went to a small Thai restaurant, right around the corner from the building where LifeWatch had its offices. The waiter took their orders, and a moment of constrained silence foll
owed. It was Antar who spoke first. 'Why are you so determined to go to Calcutta?' he blurted out suddenly. He regretted it once he'd said it; he was not in the habit of inviting confidences from strangers, especially someone as loud and brash as this. Yet, appalled as he was by the man's voice and manner, he couldn't help feeling an inexplicable sense of kinship with him.

  Murugan smiled. 'Shall I tell you why I have to go, Ant?' he said. 'It's simple: I don't know how many years I have left, and I want to do something with my life.'

  'Do something with your life?' Antar said, on a note of derision. 'What you'll be doing is throwing away all your prospects – at LifeWatch, anyway.'

  'But look at it this way,' said Murugan. 'You could find a thousand people – no, two thousand… maybe ten – who could do what I'm doing now. But you won't find another person alive who knows more than I do about the subject I specialize in.'

  'And that is?' Antar asked politely.

  'Ronald Ross,' said Murugan. 'Nobel-winning bacteriologist. Take it from me, as far as the subject of Ronnie Ross goes, I'm the only show in town.'

  A look of some scepticism must have crossed Antar's face, for Murugan added quickly: 'I know it sounds like I'm bragging, but it's not really that big a claim. Ross wasn't a Pasteur or a Koch: he just didn't have as much variety to his game. His stuff on malaria was about the only cutting-edge work he ever did. And even that was a freak one-off thing. Do you know how long it took him?'

  Antar answered with a polite shake of his head.

  'The actual research, the hands-on stuff, took just three years, door to door; three years spent entirely in India. He kicked off in the summer of 1895, in a little hole-in-the-wall army camp in a place called Secunderabad and ran the last few yards in Calcutta in the summer of 1898. And for only about half that time was he actually in the lab. The rest went into cleaning up epidemics, playing tennis and polo, going on holidays in the hills, that kind of stuff. The way I figure it, he spent about five hundred days altogether working on malaria. And you know what? I've tracked him through every single one of those five hundred days: I know where he was, what he did, which slides he looked at; I know what he was hoping to see and what he actually saw; I know who was with him, who wasn't with him. It's like I was looking over his shoulder. If his wife would have asked, "How was your day, honey?" I could have told her.'