by Ruskin Bond
Recently, confirmation came from an old India hand now living in London. He wrote to me reminiscing of early days in the hill station and had this to say:
Uncle Georgie Forster was working for the Crown Brewery when a coolie fell in. Coolies were employed to remove scum etc. from the vats. They walked along planks suspended over the vats. Poor devil must have slipped and fallen in. Uncle often told us about the incident and there was no doubt that the beer tasted very good.
What with soldiers and coolies falling into the vats with seeming regularity, one wonders whether there may have been more to these accidents than met the eye. I have a nagging suspicion that Whymper and Buckle may have been the Burke and Hare of Mussoorie’s beer industry.
But no beer is made in Mussoorie today, and Devilal probably regrets the passing of the breweries as much as I do. Only the walls of the breweries remain, and these are several feet thick. The roofs and girders must have been removed for use in other buildings. Moss and sorrel grow in the old walls, and wild cats live in dark corners protected from rain and wind.
We have taken the sharpest curves and steepest gradients, and now our taxi moves smoothly along a fairly level road which might pass for a country lane in England were it not for the clumps of bamboo on either side.
A mist has come up the valley to settle over Barlowganj, and out of the mist looms an imposing mansion, Sikander Hall, which is still owned and occupied by the Skinners, descendants of Colonel James Skinner who raised a body of Irregular Horse for the Marathas. This was absorbed by the East India Company’s forces in 1803. The cavalry regiment is still known as Skinner’s Horse, but of course it is a tank regiment now. Skinner’s troops called him ‘Sikander’ (a corruption of both Skinner and Alexander), and that is the name his property bears. The Skinners who live here now, quite sensibly, keep pigs and poultry.
The next house belongs to the Raja of K. but he is unable to maintain it on his diminishing privy purse, and it has been rented out as an ashram for members of a saffron-robed sect who would rather meditate in the hills than in the plains. There was a time when it was only the sahibs and rajas who could afford to spend the entire ‘season’ in Mussoorie. The new rich are the industrialists and maharishis. The coolies and rickshaw pullers are no better off than when I was a boy in Mussoorie. They still carry or pull the same heavy loads, for the same pittance, and seldom attain the age of forty. Only their clientele has changed.
One more gate, and here is Colonel Powell in his khaki bush shirt and trousers, a uniform that never varies with the seasons. He is an old shikari; has written a book called Call of the Tiger. He is too old for hunting now, but likes to yarn with me when we meet on the road. His wife has gone home to England, but he does not want to leave India.
‘It’s the mountains,’ he was telling me the other day. ‘Once the mountains are in your blood, there is no escape. You have to come back again and again. I don’t think I’d like to die anywhere else.’
Today there is no time to stop and chat. The taxi driver, with a vigorous blowing of his horn, takes the car around the last bend, and then through the village and narrow bazaar of Barlowganj, stopping about a hundred yards from the polling station.
There is a festive air about Barlowganj today, I have never seen so many people in the bazaar. Bunting, in the form of rival posters and leaflets, is strung across the street. The tea shops are doing a roaring trade. There is much last-minute canvassing, and I have to run the gamut of various candidates and their agents. For the first time I learn the names of some of the candidates. In all, seven men are competing for this seat.
A schoolboy, smartly dressed and speaking English, is the first to accost me. He says: ‘Don’t vote for Devilal, sir. He’s a big crook. Vote for Jatinder! See, sir, that’s his symbol—the bow and arrow.’
‘I shall certainly think about the bow and arrow,’ I tell him politely.
Another agent, a man, approaches, and says, ‘I hope you are going to vote for the Congress candidate.’
‘I don’t know anything about him,’ I say.
‘That doesn’t matter. It’s the party you are voting for. Don’t forget it’s Mrs Gandhi’s party.’
Meanwhile, one of Devilal’s lieutenants has been keeping a close watch on both Vinod and me, to make sure that we are not seduced by rival propaganda. I give the man a reassuring smile and stride purposefully towards the polling station, which has been set up in the municipal schoolhouse. Policemen stand at the entrance, to make sure that no one approaches the voters once they have entered the precincts.
I join the patient queue of voters. Everyone is in good humour, and there is no breaking of the line; these are not film stars we have come to see. Vinod is in another line, and proudly grins at me across the passageway. This is the one day in his life on which he has been made to feel really important. And he is. In a small constituency like Barlowganj, every vote counts.
Most of my fellow voters are poor people. Local issues mean something to them, affect their daily living. The more affluent can buy their way out of trouble, can pay for small conveniences; few of them bother to come to the polls. But for the ‘common man’—the shopkeeper, clerk, teacher, domestic servant, milkman, mule driver—this is a big day. The man he is voting for has promised him something, and the voter means to take the successful candidate up on his promise. Not for another five years will the same fuss be made over the local cobblers, tailors and laundrymen. Their votes are indeed precious.
And now it is my turn to vote. I confirm my name, address and roll number. I am down on the list as ‘Rusking Bound’, but I let it pass: I might forfeit my right to vote if I raise any objection at this stage! A dab of marking-ink is placed on my forefinger—this is so that I do not come around a second time—and I am given a paper displaying the names and symbols of all the candidates. I am then directed to the privacy of a small booth, where I place the official rubber stamp against Devilal’s name. This done, I fold the paper in four and slip it into the ballot box.
All has gone smoothly. Vinod is waiting for me outside. So is Devilal.
‘Did you vote for me?’ asks Devilal.
It is my eyes that he is looking at, not my lips, when I reply in the affirmative. He is a shrewd man, with many years’ experience in seeing through bluff. He is pleased with my reply, beams at me, and directs me to the waiting taxi.
Vinod and I get in together, and soon we are on the road again, being driven swiftly homewards up the winding hill road.
Vinod is looking pleased with himself; rather smug, in fact. ‘You did vote for Devilal?’ I ask him. ‘The symbol of the cock bird?’
He shakes his head, keeping his eyes on the road. ‘No, the cow,’ he says.
‘You ass!’ I exclaim. ‘Devilal’s symbol was the cock, not the cow!’
‘I know,’ he says, ‘but I like the cow better.’
I subside into silence. It is a good thing no one else in the taxi has been paying any attention to our conversation. It would be a pity to see Vinod turned out of Devilal’s taxi and made to walk the remaining mile to the top of the hill. After all, it will be another five years before he gets another free taxi ride.
A MAGIC OIL
One cosy summer morning in Fosterganj, when not much was happening, but life was going on just the same, I was in the bank, run by Vishaal (manager), Negi (cashier), and Suresh (peon). I was sitting opposite Vishaal, who was at his desk, on which there were two handsome paperweights but no papers. Suresh had brought me a cup of tea from the tea shop across the road. There was just one customer in the bank, Hassan, who was making a deposit.
In walked Foster. He’d made an attempt at shaving, but appeared to have given up at a crucial stage, because now he looked like a wasted cricketer finally on his way out. The effect was enhanced by the fact that he was wearing flannel trousers that had once been white but were now greenish yellow; the previous monsoon was to blame. He had found an old tie, and this was strung around his neck or rather h
is unbuttoned shirt collar. The said shirt had seen many summers and winters in Fosterganj, and was frayed at the cuffs. Even so, Foster looked quite spry, as compared to when I had last seen him.
‘Come in, come in!’ said Vishaal, always polite to his customers, even those who had no savings. ‘How is your gladioli farm?’
‘Coming up nicely,’ said Foster. ‘I’m growing potatoes too.’
‘Very nice. But watch out for the porcupines, they love potatoes.’
‘Shot one last night. Cut my hands getting the quills out. But porcupine meat is great. I’ll send you some the next time I shoot one.’
‘Well, keep some ammunition for the leopard. We’ve got to get it before it kills someone else.’
‘It won’t be around for two or three weeks. They keep moving, do leopards. He’ll circle the mountain, then be back in these parts. But that’s not what I came to see you about, Mr Vishaal. I was hoping for a small loan.’
‘Small loan, big loan, that’s what we are here for. In what way can we help you, sir?’
‘I want to start a chicken farm.’
‘Most original.’
‘There’s a great shortage of eggs in Mussoorie. The hotels want eggs, the schools want eggs, the restaurants want eggs. And they have to get them from Rajpur or Dehradun.’
‘Hassan has a few hens,’ I put in.
‘Only enough for home consumption. I’m thinking in terms of hundreds of eggs—and broiler chickens for the table. I want to make Fosterganj the chicken capital of India. It will be like old times, when my ancestor planted the first potatoes here, brought all the way from Scotland!’
‘I thought they came from Ireland,’ I said. ‘Captain Young, up at Landour.’
‘Oh well, we brought other things. Like Scotch whisky.’
‘Actually, Irish whisky got here first. Captain Kennedy, up in Simla.’ I wasn’t Irish, but I was in a combative frame of mind, which is the same as being Irish.
To mollify Foster, I said, ‘You did bring the bagpipe.’ And when he perked up, I added: ‘But the Gurkha is better at playing it.’
This contretemps over, Vishaal got Foster to sign a couple of forms and told him that the loan would be processed in due course and that we’d all celebrate over a bottle of Scotch whisky. Foster left the room with something of a swagger. The prospect of some money coming in—even if it is someone else’s—will put any man in an optimistic frame of mind. And for Foster the prospect of losing it was as yet far distant.
I wanted to make a phone call to my bank in Delhi, so that I could have some of my savings sent to me, and Vishaal kindly allowed me to use his phone.
There were only four phones in all of Fosterganj, and there didn’t seem to be any necessity for more. The bank had one. So did Dr Bisht. So did Brigadier Bakshi, retired. And there was one in the police station, but it was usually out of order.
The police station, a one-room affair, was manned by a daroga and a constable. If the daroga felt like a nap, the constable took charge. And if the constable took the afternoon off, the daroga would run the place. This worked quite well, as there wasn’t much crime in Fosterganj—if you didn’t count Foster’s illicit still at the bottom of the hill (Scottish hooch, he called the stuff he distilled); or a charming young delinquent called Sunil, who picked pockets for a living (though not in Fosterganj); or the barber who supplemented his income by supplying charas to his agents at some of the boarding schools; or the man who sold the secretions of certain lizards, said to increase sexual potency—except that it was only linseed oil, used for oiling cricket bats.
I found the last mentioned, a man called Rattan Lal, sitting on a stool outside my door when I returned from the bank.
‘Saande-ka-tel,’ he declared abruptly, holding up a small bottle containing a vitreous yellow fluid. ‘Just one application, sahib, and the size and strength of your valuable member will increase dramatically. It will break down doors, should doors be shut on you. No chains will hold it down. You will be as a stallion, rampant in a field full of fillies. Sahib, you will rule the roost! Memsahibs and beautiful women will fall at your feet.’
‘It will get me into trouble, for certain,’ I demurred. ‘It’s great stuff, I’m sure. But wasted here in Fosterganj.’
Rattan Lal would not be deterred. ‘Sahib, every time you try it, you will notice an increase in dimensions, guaranteed!’
‘Like Pinocchio’s nose,’ I said in English. He looked puzzled. He understood the word ‘nose’, but had no idea what I meant.
‘Naak?’ he said. ‘No, sahib, you don’t rub it on your nose. Here, down between the legs,’ and he made as if to give a demonstration. I held a hand up to restrain him.
‘There was a boy named Pinocchio in a far-off country,’ I explained, switching back to Hindi. ‘His nose grew longer every time he told a lie.’
‘I tell no lies, sahib. Look, my nose is normal. Rest is very big. You want to see?’
‘Another day,’ I said.
‘Only ten rupees.’
‘The bottle or the rest of you?’
‘You joke, sahib,’ he said, and thrust a bottle into my unwilling hands and removed a ten-rupee note from my shirt pocket; all done very simply.
‘I will come after a month and check-up,’ he said. ‘Next time I will bring the saanda itself! You are in the prime of your life, it will make you a bull among men.’ And away he went.
The little bottle of oil stood unopened on the bathroom shelf for weeks. I was too scared to use it. It was like the bottle in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland with the label DRINK ME.
Alice drank it, and shot up to the ceiling. I wasn’t sure I wanted to grow that high.
I did wonder what would happen if I applied some of it to my scalp. Would it stimulate hair growth? Would it stimulate my thought processes? Put an end to writer’s block?
Well, I never did find out. One afternoon I heard a clatter in the bathroom and looked in to see a large and sheepish-looking monkey jump out of the window with the bottle.
But to return to Rattan Lal—some hours after I had been sold the aphrodisiac, I was walking up to town to get a newspaper when I met him on his way down.
‘Any luck with the magic oil?’ I asked.
‘All sold out!’ he said, beaming with pleasure. ‘Ten bottles sold at the Savoy, and six at Hakman’s. What a night it’s going to be for them.’ And he rubbed his hands at the prospect.
‘A very busy night,’ I said. ‘Either that, or they’ll be looking for you to get their money back.’
‘I’ll be back next month. If you are still here, I’ll keep another bottle for you. Look there!’ He took me by the arm and pointed to a large rock lizard that was sunning itself on the parapet. ‘You catch me some of those, and I’ll pay you for them. Be my partner. Bring me lizards—not small ones, only big fellows—and I will buy!’
‘How do you extract the tel?’ I asked.
‘Ah, that’s a trade secret. But I will show you when you bring me some saandas. Now I must go. My good wife waits for me with impatience.’
And off he went, down the bridle path to Rajpur.
The rock lizard was still on the wall, enjoying its afternoon siesta.
As I wasn’t making much as a writer, it did occur to me that I might make a living from breeding rock lizards. Perhaps Vishaal would give me a loan.
THE TAIL OF THE LIZARD
There was a break in the rains, the clouds parted, and the moon appeared—a full moon, bathing the mountains in a pollen-yellow light. Little Fosterganj, straddling the slopes of the Ganga-Yamuna watershed, basked in the moonlight, each lighted dwelling a firefly in the night.
Only Fairy Glen Palace was unlit, brooding in the darkness. I was returning from an evening show at the Rialto in Mussoorie. It had been a long walk, but a lovely one. I stopped outside the palace gate, wondering about its lonely inhabitants and all that might have happened within its walls…
I reached Hassan’s bakery around midnight,
and mounted the steps to my room. My door was open. It was never locked, as I had absolutely nothing that anyone would want to take away. The typewriter, which I had hired from a shop in Dehradun, was a heavy machine, designed for office use; no one was going to carry it off.
But someone was in my bed.
Fast asleep. Snoring peacefully. Not Goldilocks. Nor a bear. I switched on the light, shook the recumbent figure. He started up. It was Sunil. After giving him a beating, the police had let him go.
‘Uncle, you frightened me!’ he exclaimed.
He called me ‘Uncle’, although I was only some fifteen or sixteen years older than him. Call a tiger ‘Uncle’ and he won’t harm you; or so the forest dwellers say. Not quite sure how it works out with people approaching middle age. Being addressed as ‘Uncle’ didn’t make me very fond of Sunil.
‘I’m the one who should be frightened,’ I said. ‘A pickpocket in my bed!’
‘I don’t pick pockets any more, Uncle. I’ve turned over a new leaf. Don’t you know that expression?’
Sunil had studied up to Class 8 in a ‘convent school’.
‘Well, you can turn out of my bed,’ I said. ‘And return that watch you took off me before you got into trouble.’
‘You lent me the watch, Uncle. Don’t you remember? Here!’ He held out his arm. ‘Take it back.’ There were two watches on his wrist; my modest HMT and something far more expensive.
I removed the HMT and returned it to my own wrist.