Chapter One
Inspector Ghote - But for how much longer, he was thinking, will I be Inspector? - looked out at the Calcutta night from the airport bus. Calcutta, already he could feel how different it was from his familiar Bombay. Different, and better? Or different and worse?
Well, whatever is happening to me here at least I would not be facing up to criminal and anti-social elements at each and every moment. Perhaps my Protima is right and her native city is truly a better place than Bombay. A city, she was saying in the plane, where the people ‘are too intelligent not to know honesty is best policy, where we would be able to get the deeds and papers for this house I have inherited without paying any of dui-nambari money.' So perhaps now at last I have seen the end of number-two money.
He sighed with careful pleasure.
And certainly the night outside was different from night in Bombay. The bus had suddenly become surrounded by celebrating crowds, celebrating more wildly, more frenziedly, than when Bombay had its festivals and people danced and sang and burst crackers under everybody's feet, when idols of the gods were carried high above. But as, hooting and honking, the bus jutted and jabbed its way onwards and he peered across his wife out of the window, he was inescapably aware that celebrating Calcuttans were noisier, more exuberant, more carried away than any Bombayites.
Yes, he felt, there is something in the air here, hazy now with blueish smoke, that is somehow alien to me. Yes. Yes, it is that. Utter lack of restraint.
And am I definitely to be spending the remainder of my days in this place? And no longer Inspector. From here on just only one Mr Ghote. Ghote Babu, as they say in Bengal. Husband of the Bengali lady I was marrying those many years ago, who has now, so unexpectedly, inherited from her distant, distant cousin-uncle this big, big house she is hardly able even to remember from her childhood.
In Calcutta. In distant, different Bengal. All right, I am in fact still officer of Crime Branch, Bombay Police Headquarters. On Casual Leave only. But, if we come to live in this house that Protima is so much wishing not to be selling but to be staying in, with the tall rooms she is remembering, the sweeping staircase, the courtyards with fountains playing - and not much more than one week ago she was not even knowing it would come to her - then I must send in my resignation and begin a new life as a Calcuttawalla. Not Inspector Ghote, but just only Ghote Babu.
And one well-off man. Or, tell the whole truth, husband of one well-off woman, Bengali by birth. This wife of mine who, suddenly, is thinking nothing at all of spending out and spending out. Look at the way she was obtaining air tickets to come here. All flights full-house, and at once she was whispering to me that I must, against my each and every liking, offer a bribe, that I must say to the tickets walla I am betting you two hundred rupees that two seats together are not available. And, yes, at once it was tap-tap-tap on computer keys and Sorry, sir, you have lost the bet. But how did Protima know this was the way to do it? Tfrith is, she is not the woman I have all along believed.
Still, after all it was not a very big bribe. And it was oiling the wheels, as they are saying. So in a way good.
But, no, it would really be better if this wife of mine was agreeing to sell the house. We could go back to Bombay and end up there having a fine life in retirement with the money we are getting. I could finish my service in a decent way, doing what I am knowing I am able to do. Then afterwards we could have some fine rest and relief in a nice little house somewhere in the hills outside of the city. Outside of Bombay, where we have lived happily for all the years of our marriage.
But, no. No, she is wanting to stay here. In Calcutta. In her big house. Living a fine Bengali life. A life, she is telling, that is the only civilized one in entire India. In a city - ‘Yes, problems are there, but they are getting better, better' - that is much more free from crime and corruption than Bombay, acknowledged by one and all as Crime Capital of India.
Why, oh why, was she seeing in some newspaper, just when there had come that letter from this Calcutta lawyer, A. K. Dutt-Dastar - if that is his high-and-mighty name - that Calcutta is holding almost lowest place in speed-money table? Very well, nice to live somewhere you are not having to pay a bribe to get anything done in right time. But - he glimpsed through the bus window a huge poster in Bengali script, almost unreadable to him - for me there would be still something of complications. And no work to be doing. No keeping of law and order, howsoever difficult to achieve same.
Peering forward, he saw the whole road far ahead was now even more crammed with people. People dancing, singing, rhythmically chanting. Noise came battering at him from every angle, loudspeakers booming and blaring distorted music, fireworks popping and exploding, and from the lanes to either side piercing blasts from gaudily uniformed bands playing their trumpets, trombones, drums at unrelenting maximum volume.
‘Oh, yes, yes,' Protima exclaimed abruptly. ‘Of course, it is Laxmi Poornima tonight. How could I have forgotten? All Calcutta must be celebrating. Yes, look, look. There. A beautiful pandal for Goddess Laxmi. And now, on the other side, there is another.'
Ghote made an obedient effort to see, flipping his head from side to side. But the bus at that moment lumbered a few feet further forward and he got only a single fleeting glance at one of the decorated platforms. A glimpse of the brightly painted statue of the goddess of wealth, golden crowned, gorgeous in vermilion sari, seated on a wide-petalled lotus, her white owl beside her, clasping her golden vessel. Then chaos again.
Huddled in his seat with their heavy flight bag cutting cruelly into his thighs, he made himself think that, after all, Bengal was just another part of India. In his faraway village childhood, he remembered, in the puja alcove where his mother had weaved the smoking incense to and fro and rung and rung her little bell there had been, too, an idol of Laxmi. Smaller than the image of elephant-headed Lord Ganesh presiding there, but still present to beg blessings from.
But this Laxmi celebration here was an altogether different matter. Such extravagance, such richness, such wild abandon, all making so many more demands than the simple daily puja he recalled.
The glimpse he had had of that Calcutta Laxmi showed her as somehow more elegant, more swirlingly dazzling than his mother's little statue, complete though that also had been with the goddess's lotus seat, white owl and golden vessel. No, this was altogether too much.
He shut his eyes - after the flight across India from Bombay he was tired enough - and tried to blot out even the sound of the bawling loudspeakers, the brazen band music, the shouts and the shrieks, the firework cracks and bangs.
‘This is our Calcutta season of festivals, you know,' he eventually heard Protima saying in his ear. 'The ten days of Durga Puja just past. Now Laxmi Puja. And in two weeks exactly, on the next moonless night, it will be Kali Puja. Yes, now look. Look up out of the window. You can see the Poomima full moon.'
Dutifully he opened his eyes and peered But, seated on the inside, he was not in fact able to see the moon any better than earlier when he had caught no more than a quick sight of the pandals enshrining Goddess Laxmi. But, true enough, in such patches of the road where there was less glare from the strings of coloured lights cool moonlight was flooding down. However ineffectually.
Where will I be, he wondered, when this full moon above me now has turned to its dark phase? On the moonless night of - What was it Protima said? Yes, of Kali Puja?
'Oh, how I remember Laxmi Poornima in our house in Rash Behari Avenue when I was a little girl,' she burst out again now. 'Ma always set up a big, big basket filled with rice, garlanded and covered with a beautiful cloth. And all the way from the door to our own idol of Laxmi there would be the tiny footsteps Ma had made with rice paste, for Laxm
i to tread along as she came in to bring us prosperity. We would set a line of lighted lamps outside to welcome her, and then we would sit up all night to— Look, look. In that doorway you can see a basket and the people of the house sitting there just as we did. You know, they won't be gifting any baksheesh tonight. You must not waste or lose any money tonight, or Laxmi will be angry.'
Ghote looked out as directed. But once again, from his inside seat and encumbered by the heavy flight bag on his knees, he was unable to see what he had been told to take in.
'And my father,' Protima went on excitedly, 'he would always tell me how on this one night of all the year you were allowed to steal if you wanted. Whatsoever you were thieving became yours by grace of the goddess. He would tease me by saying some dacoits would come to take my best doll. But, when he saw I was scared, then he would smile and say, It's all right, baba, because there is so much moonlight, we may easily see any thief who is coming and tell them you are needing your doll too much.'
But Ghote, exhausted as he was by the long flight from Bombay and the sudden reversal in his life that the news of Protima's inheritance had brought, could not bring himself to share her delight. Instead, illogically reacting to the word dacoit, he simply clutched all the harder at the handle of the bag on his knees, suddenly feeling himself menaced here by unknown assailants. A stranger in a strange land.
Chapter Two
The bus jerked to a full halt. Above the still tumultuous din Ghote heard a voice shouting 'Fairlawn Hotel, Fair-lawn Hotel.' Protima thrust a sharp elbow into his side.
'We must get down. We must get down. This is it. Fairlawn Hotel, where Dutt-Dastar Babu has booked the room for us. Fairlawn Hotel.'
Fairlawn Hotel. Large letters, green, yellow-edged, shiny and smart stretched across the gateway. Beyond, the building itself loomed and faded in the ever-changing light from the fireworks above and the on-off, on-off coloured lamps of yet another Laxmi pandal. Loading himself up with their luggage, he felt a new dart of unease as he confronted the building. Plainly, despite its enveloping coat of pale green paint, it dated from Calcutta's long-ago rich past. Not at all the sort of place he and Protima chose when they went on holiday. And even further away from the decent, workaday sort of hotel he stayed in if he was away on duty.
Too posh.
Altogether too posh. Why has this lawyer, A. K. Dutt-Dastar, put us in a place like this? The fellow knows, after all, that I am no more than inspector of police. Yet this is looking like somewhere for tourists with money-fat wallets or expense-account foreign executives, even in days gone by for the sahibs of the British Raj.
‘Come,' said Protima sharply, heading for the entrance.
He followed, seething with suspicions.
Inside, more green paint. On walls, on pillars, underneath the elegantly rising stairs. And pictures and paintings. The British royal family in heavily framed photographs. Time and time again. In ones and twos, in groups. With little dogs, without little dogs.
Is this really the place for us to be?
There was a bell to ring on the green-painted marbled reception counter Setting down his load of luggage - the back of his legs ached abominably - he gave its brass knob a gentle pat. The loud ring that resulted brought, from somewhere behind, a lady he guessed was an Anglo-Indian or possibly an Armenian, wearing a severe black skirt and a black and white blouse with an ornate pattern that seemed to echo the hotel's heavy British-days architecture.
‘Yes?' she said in a ringingly assured voice. ‘I am the proprietress. What are you wanting?'
Ghote swallowed, and told her that he believed Mr A. K. Dutt-Dastar had booked a room for them 'under the names of Mr and Mrs Ghote'.
He wished he could have said Inspector Ghote and wife. But, even if he had, he doubted whether the statue-stern lady on the other side of the counter would have been much impressed.
But at least she reached for a large blue-covered book and slapped it down in front of them.
'Ah, yes,' she said. 'Mr Dutt-Dastar, a good friend of ours. D. D., we call him. Yes, D. D. Though, of course, we have many other good friends here, film stars, famous authors. British film stars and American enjoy their stay when they come to the city to shoot. You know our hotel was shown in that great film about Calcutta, City of Joy? Patrick Swayze is a very good friend.'
'Yes, yes,' Protima broke in. 'I was seeing that film. Many, many shots of Calcutta. Very good, first class.'
Her eagerness evidently pleased the proprietress.
‘I will call a bearer to show you your room as soon as you have signed in,' she said. 'But first let me tell you the rules of the hotel. Your room price' - she glanced at the big blue book - 'which is 750 rupees, non-airconditioned, includes all meals. They are served exactly to time. No Indian slackness here. If you are late, you are late. Dinner at eight. Breakfast, seven-thirty. English luncheon, one o'clock. Afternoon tea, quarter past four.'
Ghote, astonished at how much A. K. Dutt-Dastar had agreed they would pay - Must be very, very good friend of the management, he thought - hardly took in all the times and conditions that had been shot out at him. And, following the bearer carrying their cases, up the elegant stairs, out on to a balcony, in again, and on upwards, he felt nothing but a tiny glim of pleasure at the thought that in a few minutes he would be able to lie down on abed.
But when at last they reached their room Protima refused to think of sleep. Eyes dancing with excited joy, she insisted that they should watch the continuing celebrations even though the window instead of looking out on to crowded and noisy Sudder Street at the front gave them only a view of a dark back-lane. But something could still be seen. So grimly he stood there beside her, fighting off draining fatigue, even a little chilled in the mild October night. Over and over again he reminded himself it had been Protima's first thought when she had read that lawyer's letter that now he himself would be able to start a comfortable retirement after his hard days struggling against Bombay's criminal elements.
But, despite the muffled noise of celebration and the occasional sight of the pink and gold trail of a rocket ascending the moon-drenched sky, he was able to make out little more than that in the lane below there was a huge shapeless mound of something or other. To judge by the smell, distinct even at their height above, it had to be garbage deposited there layer by rotting layer over many months past.
Is that heap then, he asked himself, the reality of Calcutta? He managed to resist the temptation to point it out to his sky-gazing wife. But only just.
Then, at last and at last, he felt the time had come when he could reward himself for his forbearance. Silently, leaving Protima where she was, entranced, he slipped off to the waiting bed.
They missed breakfast. Ghote knew, as he jerked into wakefulness, that he had fallen at once into a deep sleep the night before. He had had no idea how late it had been when Protima had joined him. But now she was fast asleep still, lying flat on her back and, if not snoring, at least breathing deeply, regularly and rather noisily. He looked at his watch. Half past eight. From outside there was coming the distant irritable honking and hooting of a day's busy traffic.
He woke Protima. As soon as he had told her how late it was she declared that what they would have to do was to get themselves ready as quickly as possible. ‘Then we must set off to see the house.'
'But Mr Dutt-Dastar was saying he would reach us there by car, no? Leaving hotel at eleven?'
'No, no,' Protima had answered. 'You don't understand A, B or C. I cannot wait and wait for some dry stick of a lawyer. We will leave a message for him. I must see my house just only with you. It is my present from above.'
'But you are not a child who must open whatsoever they are given at Diwali before they have even thanked the parents who have gifted it.'
'Nonsense, nonsense. Best way to show you are pleased is tear off wrappings ek dum.'
A little offended at that quick Nonsense, nonsense, he had said not a word more.
So, quickly
as they could, they washed and dressed and hurried out, finding without trouble a taxi in crowded, half-lazing, half-bustling Sudder Street. The Sikh driver when Protima showed him the address of the house was grinningly confident that he could get them there 'in one hour time, less, less. No problem.'
But problems there were. The first of them still within sight of the hotel. An elderly Sikh stepped out blithely into the roadway right in front of them. As his co-religionist at the wheel brought their vehicle to a brake-screeching stop, the Sikh gave him a playfully joyous smile and went into an elaborate happy pantomime of hurry-scurrying out of the way. The performance took him to the far side a great deal less quickly than if he had crossed at full leisure.
City of joy, Ghote thought sourly. City of ridiculous play-acting.
However, if there were going to be as many stoppages as this - a barefoot, bare-chested rickshawalla taking a smartly uniformed ten-year-old girl to school had cut in right across their path - it looked as if Pro-tima's determination to get to the house early was going to prove a good thing. If for the wrong reason.
He ventured to say as much.
Protima gave a long, tinkling laugh.
Why is she wearing that sari, he asked himself in a sudden fit of irritation. It is one of her best, I am only just now noticing. And she has draped it down her back Bengali fashion, instead of having the pallu hanging down beside her, Bombay style. The way she has always put on a sari ever since our college days.
'Surely,' she said, 'you cannot be thinking Dutt-Dastar Babu will come on time. We would be there well before, whatsoever delays there may be. You are in Calcutta now. He will be certainly more than one hour late. Not your Bombay ten-twenty minutes.'
He felt his simmering anger rise even higher. The fellow to be so appallingly late. And that name of his. Dutt-Dastar. Typical Calcutta idea, that both your family lines are so important, so— What was the Bengali word Protima sometimes used? Yes, so bhadrolok that both must be preserved for ever. And why must she call him Dutt-Dastar Babu? What was wrong with Shri Dutt-Dastar. Or English, Mr Dutt-Dastar?
Bribery, Corruption Also Page 1
