‘Yes, sir.’
Shah spat on the beach.
‘We have been reasonable in every way with this old teacher. We asked him what he wanted from us, and promised to give it to him.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Now let him find out what it means to want nothing in Mumbai.’
Shanmugham held out his fist to his employer and opened it. ‘Yes, sir.’
On the way back, the builder stopped to stroke the horse. Ignoring him, the boy whispered into the large pink ear.
‘Fellow,’ Shah said. ‘Take this.’
‘What’s this for?’ The boy did not touch the banknote the stranger offered.
‘Because I feel like it.’
The boy shook his head.
‘Then take it for keeping your horse in good shape. I like looking at beautiful things.’
Now the boy took the hundred-rupee note.
‘Where are you from, son?’
‘Madhya Pradesh.’
‘How long in Mumbai?’
‘Two months. Three months.’
‘You shouldn’t spend all your time talking to the horse. You should look around you, at people. Rich people. Successful people. You should always be thinking, what does he have that I don’t have? That way you go up in life. You understand me?’
Stroking the side of the horse, Shah left.
The horse-keeper was still examining his windfall when Shanmugham swooped down on him.
‘Give that to me,’ he said. The boy shook his head and pressed his face into his horse’s neck.
‘The Sahib meant to give you a ten-rupee note. He gives money and then he changes his mind; he’ll send someone down to take you to the police.’
The boy considered this, found it believable, and surrendered the gift. Shanmugham exchanged it for a ten-rupee note; then he leapt up the rocks with the spring of a man who has just become ninety rupees richer.
What do you want?
In the continuous market that runs right through southern Mumbai, under banyan trees, on pavements, beneath the arcades of the Gothic buildings, in which food, pirated books, perfumes, wristwatches, meditation beads and software are sold, one question is repeated, to tourists and locals, in Hindi or in English: What do you want? As you walk down the blue-tarpaulin-covered souk of the Colaba Causeway, pass the pirateers at the feet of the magical beasts which form the pillars of the Zoroastrian temple in Fort, someone will demand, at every turn: What do you want? Anything can be obtained; whether it is Indian or foreign; object or human; if you have no money, perhaps you will have something else with which to trade.
Only a man must want something; for everyone who lives here knows that the islands will shake, and the mortar of the city will dissolve, and Bombay will turn again into seven small stones glistening in the Arabian Sea, if it ever forgets to ask the question: What do you want?
Lunch at the Pintos’ was served, as usual, at fifteen minutes past one o’clock. Nina went around the dining table, ladling out steaming prawn curry over plates of white rice. As Masterji settled into his chair, Mr Pinto asked: ‘Is anything wrong with your phone?’
Masterji, about to stab a prawn with his fork, looked up.
‘Why do you ask?’
‘No reason,’ Mr Pinto said, as he mixed curry into his rice.
Sometime before two o’clock, Masterji said goodbye to the Pintos. The moment he opened the door of his flat, the phone rang.
‘Yes?’
A few minutes later, it rang again.
‘Who is it?’
As soon as he put his phone down, he heard the phone ringing in the Pintos’ living room. Then his rang again, and the moment he picked it up it went dead and the Pintos’ was ringing again.
The door of the Pintos’ flat was open. They were sitting side by side on the sofa, and Nina, their maid, stood next to them, protectively.
‘It’s just the children,’ Masterji said, standing by the door with his arms folded. ‘It must be Tinku or Mohammad. At school there was a boy who stuck notes on the backs of teachers. Tall boy. Rashid. Kick Me. I Love Girls. I caught him, and he got two weeks’ suspension. The maximum penalty, short of expulsion.’
‘I wonder why God made old age at all,’ Mrs Pinto said. ‘Your eyes are cloudy, your body is weak. The world becomes a ball of fear.’
‘We’re the Vakola triumvirate, Mrs Pinto. Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus. No one can make us budge.’ Masterji refused a glass of cold water that Nina offered. ‘I’ll go down and speak to Kothari.’
‘Someone rings and hangs up the phone,’ he explained to the Secretary, who sat in his office, reading the real-estate pages of the Times of India. ‘I think it’s someone inside the building.’
The Secretary turned the page.
‘Why?’
‘Because the moment I enter my room, they start calling. And when I leave, they stop calling. So they know where I am.’
The Secretary folded his newspaper. He patted his comb-over into place and leaned back in his chair, exhaling a breath of curried potatoes and onions.
‘Masterji’ – he burped – ‘do you know, another person died in a building collapse on Tuesday?’
Kothari grinned; the lynx-whiskers spread around his slitted eyes.
‘I forget the name of the place now. Someone in that slum near the ocean… that wall near their slum collapsed when the rains… it was in the papers…’
‘Are you the one making the phone calls, Kothari?’ Masterji asked. ‘Are you the one threatening us?’
‘See?’ Kothari said, gesturing helplessly to a phantom audience in his office. ‘See? For 2,000 years we’ve played this game, this man and I, and now he asks if this is a threat. And then he hears phone calls. And soon he’ll see men with knives and hockey sticks coming after him.’
Back in the Pintos’ flat, they talked it over.
‘Maybe it is just in our minds,’ Mr Pinto said. ‘Maybe Kothari is right.’
‘When in doubt, make an experiment,’ Masterji said. ‘Let’s put the phone back on the hook.’
When no one had called for an hour, Masterji walked up to his room. As he turned the key in his door, the phone rang. The moment he picked it up, it went dead.
*
At midnight, he went down the stairs and knocked on the Pintos’ door. Mr Pinto opened it, went to the sofa, and held his wife’s hands.
‘I heard it,’ Masterji said.
The Pintos’ children in America did sometimes miscalculate the time difference and call late at night; but the phone had rung four times without being picked up. Now it began to ring again.
‘Don’t touch it,’ Mr Pinto warned. ‘They are speaking to us now.’
Masterji picked up the receiver.
‘Old man, is that you?’ It was a high-pitched, taunting voice.
‘Who is this calling?’
‘I have a lesson for you, old man: if you don’t leave the flat, there will be trouble for you.’
‘Who is this? Who told you to call? Are you Mr Shah’s man?’
‘There will be trouble for you and for your friends. So leave. Take the money and sign the paper.’
‘I won’t leave, so don’t call.’
‘If you don’t leave – we’ll play with your wife.’
‘What?’
‘We’ll take her down to the bushes behind the building and play with her.’
Masterji let out a laugh.
‘You’ll play with a handful of ashes?’
Silence.
‘It’s the other one who has a—’ A voice in the background.
The phone went dead. Within a minute it rang again.
‘Don’t pick it up, please,’ Shelley said.
He picked it up.
‘Old man: old man.’
This time it was another voice: lower, gruffer. Masterji was sure he had heard this voice somewhere.
‘Act your age, old man. Grow up. Take the money and leave before something bad happens.’
>
‘Who is this? I know your voice. You tell your Mr Shah…’
‘If anything bad happens, you alone are responsible. You alone.’
Masterji slammed down the phone. He walked up the stairs to Mrs Puri’s door and knocked; when there was no response, he banged. She opened the door, with bleary eyes, as if she had been sleeping.
‘What is this about, Masterji?’
‘The phone calls. They just called us again. They’re threatening us now.’
Mrs Puri swallowed a yawn.
‘Masterji, you have been talking and talking about these phone calls but no one else can hear them.’
‘Either someone in the building is calling, or someone in here is giving a signal to the callers. Their timing is too good. I’m sure I recognized one of the voices.’
She laughed.
‘Mine? Is that what you’re saying?’
‘No… I don’t think so.’
‘I am not making the phone calls. Shall I ask Ramu if he is making the calls?’
She began to close the door: but Masterji pushed it back towards her.
‘What about your sense of shame, Sangeeta? I am your neighbour. Your neighbour of thirty years.’
‘Our sense of shame? Masterji, you say our…? After the way you behaved at Mr Shah’s house? After the way you lied to your own son about accepting the offer?’
When she closed the door on him, Masterji struck it with his fist.
‘You borrowed money from my wife, and never repaid it. Do you think I didn’t know?’
He walked down into the compound. In the darkness, distances were obscured; masses dissolved; lit window called out to lit window; he saw rhymes in light. One lamp went out in a nearby Society; another came on in Tower B.
Were they doing it?
An autorickshaw drove past the gate, heading towards the slums.
Woken up in his room at the back of the Society, Ram Khare, when the situation was explained to him, pouted his lower lip.
‘Speak to the Secretary. Phones are not the guard’s responsibility.’
He turned on his bedside lamp. His khaki shirt hung on a nail from the wall; old black-and-white photographs in which a bare-chested yoga teacher demonstrated the four stages of the Dhanush-asana were taped above his bed.
‘What does that mean, Ram Khare? We’re being threatened. It’s night-time: you’re the guard.’
A half-bottle of Old Monk rum stood on the only other piece of furniture in the room, a wicker table. Exhaling boozy breath, Ram Khare crossed his arms and scratched his back with long fingernails.
‘I warned you, sir. I warned you.’
He turned in bed, and, showing his visitor his back, bumpy with mosquito-bites, went back to sleep.
‘Why don’t you call Gaurav,’ Mr Pinto asked, when Masterji was back in their flat, the door safely locked behind him.
‘Ask him to come over and spend the night with us. In the morning we’ll go to the police.’
Masterji thought about it, and said: ‘We don’t need anyone’s help. We’re the triumvirate.’
He yanked the Pintos’ telephone cord out of the wall and threw it on the floor.
‘All three of us will sleep right here. First thing in the morning we’ll go to the police.’
Mr Pinto made up the sofa for him; Shelley came from the bedroom with a spare pillow in her blind arms.
Masterji went up to his living room and returned with a smile and a large blue book.
‘What’s that for?’ Mr Pinto asked.
‘It’s my Illustrated History of Science.’ Masterji made a motion of hitting someone on the head with the book. ‘Just in case.’
The produce stalls were now covered with gunny sacks, and the vendors were sleeping beside them. Mani, the assistant, sat outside the glass door of the Renaissance Real-Estate Agency, yawning.
The office was dark, and the broker’s laminated desk was deserted. Yet Mani knew that business was still going on; his boss might need him.
All the children at Vishram Society knew that below the Daisy Duck clock on the wall of Uncle Ajwani’s real-estate office was the door that led into an inner room. None of them had been in there, and it was variously speculated that the broker used the room to sell black-market pharmaceuticals, pornographic magazines, or national secrets.
Shanmugham had just been led through the dark office into the inner room; the broker shut the door behind him.
The inner room had a cot with no cover, and two wicker baskets, one full of coconuts, and the other full of coconut shells. Sawdust, masking tape, nails, a hammer lay on the floor. Avoiding the nails, Shanmugham sat down on the bare cot.
‘What do you use this room for?’
Ajwani pointed to the treasure hoard in the wicker basket. The coconuts were large and green; a curved black knife lay on top of them. ‘I buy them wholesale. Six rupees each. Much better than your Coke or Pepsi. Fresh and tasty.’
‘A room just for coconuts?’ Shanmugham frowned.
The broker slapped the cot. ‘Not just coconuts.’ He winked. ‘Do you want one now, by the way? Full of vitamins. Best thing for the health.’
‘The news, Ajwani. What did you call me here for? Have the old men agreed?’
Ajwani stirred the coconuts with his foot.
‘No, things have become worse. Tinku Kothari, the Secretary’s son – hungry eyes – saw them at the school today. He spoke to the old librarian and got the facts. They were looking up the numbers of Masterji’s old students and calling them from the library phone.’
‘Is this a problem?’
‘No. People respect a man like Masterji. No one loves him. No one will help him.’
‘So why did you call me here, Ajwani?’
‘Because that wasn’t the only thing the librarian told Tinku. He said: they are going to see a lawyer. Tomorrow.’
‘Where?’
‘That I don’t know. They may bring something back with them. Business card, brochure. It will end up in their rubbish.’
‘Let’s call them right now. You call them. You’re so good at it.’
Ajwani chuckled. He picked up an imaginary phone receiver and lowered his voice an octave. ‘Old man, sign the paper. Or we’ll break your head. We’ll play with your wife. They were more frightened when I spoke to them.’ Ajwani beamed. ‘Admit it.’
Shanmugham picked up a coconut and tapped it with his finger. ‘You’re a natural at this, Ajwani. You should be working for us full-time. You and your wife.’
‘Wife? She just text-messages me when Masterji enters or leaves his room. I’m the one making the calls. It’s good that you’re giving me a sweetener, but I’d do it anyway. I like this work.’
The broker’s face broadened with pleasure. Even though they were alone in the room, he moved closer to the Tamilian, and lowered his voice.
‘Tell me what you’ve done. A few things you’ve done.’
With his fingers poised above the coconut, Shanmugham looked up.
‘What do you mean, done?’
Ajwani winked. ‘You know. For Mr Shah. Things like this. Phone calls, threats, action. Tell me a few stories.’
‘You don’t do these things yourself,’ Shanmugham said. ‘Usually get someone else. Some eager fellow from the slums. No shortage.’
‘Tell me. I won’t tell anyone. I promise.’
A corner of Shanmugham’s lip rose; his tongue cleaned his angular tooth. ‘We’re partners now. Why not?’ He rotated the coconut in his hands.
Three years ago. A tough redevelopment project in Chembur. One old man had refused to sell his flat. Mr Shah said: ‘Get him out of there, Shanmugham.’ He had hired two boys to smash chairs to pieces outside his window. No implements. The old man stared out of his window and watched them break wood with their bare hands and feet all day long. When he looked out, they grinned and showed him their teeth. He sold out after a couple of days.
‘That’s clever,’ Ajwani said. ‘Very clever. The poli
ce can’t do a thing to you.’
Shanmugham dropped the coconut on to the pile; then he gave the basket a kick. ‘Always use your brains, the boss says.’
The nuts trembled together.
‘There was once a Muslim man in a chawl, a Khan. This fellow fancied himself tough. Boss made him an offer to leave. Generous offer. “I have no pity for a greedy man,” Boss said. I paid a boy to sit on the steps of a building opposite and watch this Khan. That was all. Just watch him. This Khan who would not have left if threatened by a gang of goondas signed and left the building within a week.’
Ajwani rubbed his hands together.
‘You’re a genius at this, Mr Shanmugham.’
‘It can’t always be brains, though. Sometimes, you just have to…’
Picking up the curved black knife that lay on the coconuts, Shanmugham stuck it into a green nut. Ajwani shivered.
‘Tell me. Please. What have you done? Broken a leg?’ He dropped his voice. ‘Killed a man?’
Shanmugham looked at the black knife.
‘Just a year ago. A project in Sion. One old man kept saying no, no. We kept offering money, and it was always no, no. Boss was getting angry.’
‘So?’ Ajwani came as close as he could.
So, in a bolt of rage and calculation, six-foot-two-inch-tall Shanmugham ran up the stairs of the building, kicked open a door, grabbed something that was playing backgammon with its grandson, shoved its head out of a window, saying: Sign, mother-fucker.
‘You really did that?’ Ajwani stared at the black knife.
Shanmugham nodded. He took the knife out of the coconut. ‘The old man signed on the spot. I was scared, I tell you that. I thought I might go to jail. But… the truth is, even if they say no, deep down’ – he pointed the knife at Ajwani – ‘they want money. Once you make them sign, they’re grateful to you. Never go to the police. So all I’m doing is making them aware of their own inner intentions.’
He threw the knife back into the pile of coconuts.
Ajwani gazed in admiration at Shanmugham’s hands. ‘What else have you done for Mr Shah?’
‘Anything he wants. The call can come any time, day or night. You have to be ready.’
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