The Calcutta Chromosome

by Amitav Gosh

  'What's the matter?' said Urmila, jumping to her feet. 'You look like you've had a shock.'

  Sonali fell into a chair. 'Apparently Romen's on his way to Robinson Street,' she said, chewing on her knuckles.

  'I see,' said Urmila. 'Did he have an appointment?'

  'Not that I know of,' Sonali said. 'And he's going to stop at Park Circus on the way.'

  'Why there?'

  'I don't have any idea,' said Sonali. 'The only person I know who lives there is Phulboni. But Romen didn't say anything about visiting him: he said he'd come here around nine tonight.'

  Urmila gave her arm a pat. 'I'm sure he'll be here soon,' she said in a soothing voice.

  Sonali made a distracted gesture. 'I don't know,' she said. 'Everyone seems to be disappearing today. If he doesn't come soon I'll have to go and look for him.'

  She laughed, a little nervously. 'Now what was it that you wanted to ask me about?' she said.

  Urmila sat up eagerly, 'Iwas curious,' she said, 'about whether you ever heard Phulboni talk about someone called Laakhan?'

  'Someone called Laakhan?' Sonali lowered herself into a sofa. 'That's interesting. Why do you ask?'

  Chapter 15

  THE CROWD IN the restaurant was thinning now; the tables were emptying fast as people hurried back to work. Antar glanced from his watch to Murugan, sitting across the table. He was pouring from the restaurant's bamboo-handled teapot, evidently unconscious of the time. Antar decided to stay a few minutes longer.

  'What's the joke?' Murugan said sharply, his voice cutting through the buzz.

  Antar sat up, startled: 'I'm sorry?'

  'Why are you smiling?'

  'Was I smiling?'

  'You bet you were,' said Murugan.

  'Well, then,' Antar said. 'I suppose I was smiling.'

  'You think this scenario is funny or something?' Murugan asked.

  'Frankly, I don't know what to think,' Antar said. 'I've heard you out, and as far as I can see you don't have a shred of real evidence, or proof or anything… '

  'And what if I said that's what my proof is?'

  'The lack thereof, you mean?' said Antar, trying not to smile.

  'I mean secrecy is what this is about: it figures there wouldn't be any evidence or proof.'

  Antar shrugged. 'But even if I were to grant that,' he said, 'your version still wouldn't make sense. If I followed you correctly, you were suggesting that this other team – to use your phrase – was already ahead of Ross on some of this research. But then why wouldn't they just go ahead with this research themselves? Why wouldn't they publish their findings and put themselves in the running for the Nobel?'

  Murugan ran his hand over his chin. 'All right,' he said, after a long pause. 'I'll sketch a scenario for you. I'm not saying that's how it happened: I'm just asking you to hear me out.'

  'Go ahead,' Antar said politely.

  'Let me put it like this,' Murugan said. 'You know all about matter and antimatter, right? And rooms and anterooms and Christ and Antichrist and so on? Now, let's say there was something like science and counter-science. Thinking of it in the abstract, wouldn't you say that the first principle of a functioning counter-science would have to be secrecy? The way I see it, it wouldn't just have to be secretive about what it did (it couldn't hope to beat the scientists at that game anyway); it would also have to be secretive in what it did. It would have to use secrecy as a technique or procedure. It would in principle have to refuse all direct communication, straight off the bat, because to communicate, to put ideas into language, would be to establish a claim to know - which is the first thing that a counter-science would dispute.'

  'I don't follow,' said Antar. 'What you're saying doesn't make sense.'

  'You took the words out of my mouth,' Murugan said. 'Not making sense is what it's about – conventional sense, that is. Maybe this other team started with the idea that knowledge is self-contradictory; maybe they believed that to know something is to change it, therefore in knowing something, you've already changed what you think you know so you don't really know it at all: you only know its history. Maybe they thought that knowledge couldn't begin without acknowledging the impossibility of knowledge. See what I'm saying?'

  'I'm listening,' said Antar. 'For what it's worth.'

  'Maybe none of this makes sense,' said Murugan. 'But let's just try and take it on its own terms for a minute. Let's look at the kinds of working hypotheses it yields. Here's one: if it's true that to know something is to change it, then it follows that one way of changing something – of effecting a mutation, let's say – is to attempt to know it, or aspects of it. Right?'

  Antar nodded.

  'OK,' said Murugan. 'So let's run with this for a bit. Let's say that just about the time that Ronnie's beginning to work on malaria there's this other person – this team that's also been working with Plasmodium jalciparum but in a different way; a way so different it wouldn't make any sense to anyone who's properly trained. But let's say that by accident or design they've made a certain amount of progress; they've taken their work to a certain point and then they've run smack into a dead end: they're stuck, they can't go any further – because of the glitches in their own methods, because they just haven't got the right equipment. Whatever. They decide that the next big leap in their project will come from a mutation in the parasite. The question now is: how do they speed up the process? The answer is: they've got to find a conventional scientist who'll give it a push.

  'Enter Ronnie. But what do they do next? They can't tell him what they know because it's against their religion. Besides, they can't exactly walk up to him and say, "Hey there, Ron, what's cooking?" To begin with they wouldn't get past the guards of the 19th Madras Infantry. Even if they did, Ronnie wouldn't believe them. They've got to make it look like he's found out for himself. So they go into a huddle and try to think through their next move. Remember that these guys haven't got a whole lot going for them: they're fringe people, marginal types; they're so far from the mainstream you can't see them from the shore. On the credit side, there's a lot of them and they know all about Ronnie, but neither Ronnie nor anyone else knows anything about them. They've also got the best collection of parasites in town. They've just got to play their cards right and they can do it.'

  'That's all very well,' said Antar. 'But it still leaves the basic question unanswered.'

  'And what's that?' said Murugan.

  'Why? Why would anyone go to so much trouble? It's clear enough what's in it for Ross: fame, prospects, promotions, a Nobel. But what could these other people accepting your premiss for a moment – hope to gain from all this?'

  'I thought you'd ask,' Murugan said. 'And once again, I don't have the answer. But if I am right – and the way this game's set up, there's no way you're ever going to know whether I'm right or not – but if I am right, let's just say even fractionally right, then what these guys were developing was the most revolutionary medical technology of all time. Forget about the Nobel, forget about diseases and cures and epidemiology and shit like that. What these guys were after was much bigger; they were after the biggest prize of all, the biggest fucking ball game any human being has ever thought of: the ultimate transcendence of nature.'

  'And what might that be?' Antar asked politely.

  'Immortality,' said Murugan.

  Antar slapped the table. 'Oh, I see,' he said, with a laugh. 'You mean like Osiris and Horus and Amun-Ra? Were they hoping to grow nice little jackal heads? Or were they planning to sprout ibis beaks?'

  'Maybe I overstated the case a bit,' Murugan said. 'What I'm really talking about is a technology for interpersonal transference.'

  'Interpersonal what?' said Antar.

  Before Murugan could answer, the waiter appeared, and placed the bill between them. He was middle-aged, with a diffident, nervous manner. He looked on, smiling exaggeratedly and rubbing his hands as they counted out their money.

  All of a sudden Murugan sat bolt upright in his chair. 'I'll gi
ve you an example,' he said. Jumping to his feet, he thrust his face into the waiter's. Then, at the top of his voice he shouted, 'Yo!'

  The waiter stumbled back, his mouth open, his eyes dilating. The plate dropped out of his hands, shattering on the floor. He fell to his knees and began to whimper, in shock, covering his face with his hands.

  Antar stared soundlessly, frozen, half in and half out of his chair. There was an absolute hush within the restaurant; several pairs of chopsticks hung in the air as every head turned towards Murugan.

  Murugan was watching the waiter with a look of suppressed excitement, his eyes bright with expectation.

  'What is the meaning of this?' demanded Antar. Suddenly Murugan spun around and leapt at him.

  Thrusting his nose within an inch of Antar's he shouted, 'Boo!'

  Antar recoiled, brushing the back of his hand across his face. 'Have you gone out of your mind?' he said angrily.

  Murugan stood back, with a smile on his face. 'See,' he said, 'it worked.'

  He waved a nonchalant hand at the few remaining diners. 'Relax,' he said, cheerfully. 'Nothing to worry about. Just checking variations in individual motor reactions to stress situations. '

  He patted Antar on the shoulder. 'See,' he said. 'Same stimulus, different response: he says tamatar and you say tamatim. Now think, what if the "im" and the "ar" could be switched between you and him? What would you have then? You'd have him speaking in your voice, or the other way around. You wouldn't know whose voice it was. And isn't that the scariest thing there is, Ant? To hear something said, and not to know who's saying it? Not to know who's speaking? For if you don't know who's saying something, you don't know why they're saying it either.'

  The hush broke and an indignant, protesting murmur swept through the restaurant. The waiter picked himself slowly off the floor while the manager began to advance purposefully towards their table. Three other waiters followed close behind.

  Murugan threw them a hurried glance and pulled out his wallet. 'Now what would you say, Ant,' he asked, 'if all of that information could be transmitted chromosomally, from body to body?' He shook his wallet under Antar's nose. 'How much do you think you'd pay for that kind of technology, Ant? Just think, a fresh start: when your body fails you, you leave it, you migrate – you or at least a matching symptomology of your self. You begin all over again, another body, another beginning. Just think: no mistakes, a fresh start. What would you give for that, Ant: a technology that lets you improve on yourself in your next incarnation? Do you think something like that might be worth a little part of your pension fund?'

  The waiters converged and Murugan broke off to confront them. 'It's all right,' he said, taking a wad of notes out of his wallet. 'I'll pay for everything.'

  Ignoring this, they took hold of his arms and began to push him away from the table.

  'Hey, guys,' Murugan protested. 'Didn't I say it was an experiment? Where's your spirit of enquiry?'

  Lifting him bodily off the floor, the waiters carried him quickly towards the door.

  'See why I have to go to Calcutta, Ant?' Murugan shouted, as they bore him inexorably towards the entrance. 'If there is a Calcutta chromosome I've got to find it. I guess I need it more than you do.'

  Chapter 16

  'I'VE BEEN DOING a little research,' Urmila said to Sonali, 'and I've discovered that when Phulboni was a young man he wrote a set of stories called The Laakhan Stories. They were published in an obscure little magazine and have never been reprinted. I managed to find the right issue in the National Library.'

  'I've never even heard of them,' said Sonali. 'I was probably too young when they came out.'

  'Well, the stories are very short and they all feature a character called Laakhan,' Urmila said. 'In one he's a postman; in another he's a village schoolmaster, something else in another.'

  'How odd,' said Sonali.

  'Isn't it?' Urmila said. 'When they were first published the critics thought it was some kind of elaborate allegory with each character being different but also the same and all of them being mixed up and so on. And then of course everyone forgot about them. But I looked them up, and I had the distinct feeling that there was something more to it. '

  'More?' said Sonali. 'What do you mean?'

  'I couldn't put my finger on it exactly,' said Urmila. 'But I was talking to Mrs Aratounian one day-'

  'Had she read them?' Sonali interrupted, eyebrows raised.

  'Oh no,' Urmila laughed. 'She doesn't have much time for writers. Besides, you know how she is: doesn't know a word of Bengali even though she's been here all her life. But she's very sharp you know and I often find that it helps to talk things over with her. She's given me a lot of good advice over the years: in fact it was she who suggested that I go to the National Library.'

  'I see,' said Sonali. 'Go on.'

  'So I told her about the stories and she agreed with me at once. "Dust in our eyes, my dear," she said. "Take my word for it. "'

  'What did she mean?'

  'She thought the stories were a message to someone; to remind them of something – some kind of shared secret. You know, like those strange little ads you sometimes see in the Personal columns?'

  Sonali's eyes widened. 'That's interesting,' she said. 'It's possible. '

  'So you do know something about the stories?' Urmila said eagerly.

  Sonali took a sip of her tea. 'I don't know if it has anything to do with the stories you're talking about,' she said. 'But I do know that something very strange happened to Phulboni when he was in his twenties. And it did have something to do with a "Laakhan".'

  'Really?' Urmila sat up eagerly. 'What happened?'

  'It began with my mother asking him why he'd given up shooting.'

  'Shooting?' said Urmila in astonishment. 'You mean Phulboni used to shoot?'

  'Yes,' said Sonali smiling. 'He was a very good shot. I'll tell you how I found out.' She curled her legs under her and settled into the cushions that lined the sofa's armrest, her face lit by a fondly reminiscent smile.

  'Phulboni was always in and out of our house when I was a child,' she said. 'He was like an uncle to me: I used to call him Murad-mesho. We were living in a tiny flat off Park Circus, just my mother and me. The flat was really very small, but we always had lots of guests – especially writers and artists: every evening there'd be at least half a dozen people there and Phulboni was one of the regulars. He always came wearing the same old pair of frayed trousers, the same worn leather belt, and starched white shirt. You know how starch always smells a little when you sweat? That's how he smelt: of cigarettes and sweaty starch.

  'He was a splendid-looking man: over six feet tall, straight and lean as a lamp-post. He was very poor then and lived all by himself: his wife had left him and gone back to her family. The moment he arrived my mother would whisper to the servants to run down and get some biriani. He'd had a good job once, with a British firm, Palmer Brothers, but he gave it up when he started writing. He wanted to make his living as a writer but his work was just too difficult for the public: all those dialect words from languages no one had ever heard of. His father worked for one of those mountain maharajas in Orissa and he grew up in the jungle, speaking the language of the local people, running wild. That's why he later took the pen-name Phulboni, after the region.

  'Living in the forest, he must have learned to shoot very early, but he never told anyone about it. It was quite by accident that I discovered that he was an excellent shot. 'Once, my mother was acting in a jatra somewhere on the outskirts of Calcutta. It was one of those places where the performance is under a huge circus tent. There's a round stage inside and at the same time there is a fair going on outside – you know, with phuchka-stalls and roundabouts and all that.

  'I had squeezed into a little space under the wooden stage, and I was watching the crowd, making faces at the children, that kind of thing. The play was Marie Antoinette: Queen of France. My mother was playing Marie Antoinette, of course: she was getting on
then, and if there was a wicked queen or a harridan of a mother-in-law she would invariably get the part. Ma was just launching into her big speech, you know, the famous one: "They don't have any rice? Then let them eat ledigenis."

  'Suddenly I looked up and saw Phulboni coming in. I screamed and ran up to him, pushing through the crowd. Both of us had heard the speech a hundred times. I was bored so I didn't let him watch the play. Instead I made him walk around the fair, buying me jhalmuri and mihidana and that kind of thing. Then we came to one of those stalls with an airgun and lots of balloons lined up in rows. I began to tease him, saying why don't you try and shoot some of those balloons: you writers aren't good for anything. He kept saying no, no, no, but in the end he gave in. To my astonishment he didn't miss once in his first ten shots. I said: "That was just luck, let's see if you can do it again." He said, "All right," and took five steps back, and again he didn't miss a shot. He moved back still further: a whole crowd gathered to watch him. Not a single miss. In the end the stall-owner begged him to stop: "Sahib, please forgive me, but if I let you go on like this, what are my children going to eat?"

  'I told my mother about the incident and she was just as surprised as I. Phulboni had never said a word to her about shooting or hunting. She asked him about it and he just laughed it off. But my mother wasn't one to give up. She got to work on him one day after he'd drunk a lot of rum and he told her a story. But he was very upset the next day: he said he didn't want the story to get around and made her promise never to tell anyone.'

  'Oh, I see.' Urmila could not keep the disappointment out of her voice.

  'In fact after that he began to avoid us,' said Sonali. 'In the last years of her life my mother became very worried about Phulboni. His behaviour became stranger and stranger as his fame grew. He'd get drunk and wander the streets all night as if he was looking for something: I've heard he still does. She wanted him to come and live with us but he wouldn't: he stopped seeing his old friends and wouldn't have much to do with anyone. He didn't even come to see her when she was dying. She was convinced that it was because he'd never forgiven her for getting that story out of him and she could never understand why. And I must say I couldn't either.'