The air smells of fresh flowers and trees, with the occasional whiff of something frying. I recognise the rumbling beyond the tall trees whose names I do not know. It is water, moving down an incline. Peeping between trees I see turrets of cool grey stone, overlapping tiles and varnished railings.
Kuga has to take a phone call and I have to contend with Daniel who is now more than a little tipsy. ‘OK. OK. Mr Karuna. I will give you one name. That is all. But don’t tell Kuga Anna.’
‘Kuga Anna? Aren’t you older than him?’
‘Doesn’t matter.’
He tells me most of these houses were designed in the 1950s by architect Geoffrey Bawa, that none of them face each other, though some share balconies. That the road is shaped like a spiral and a famous river runs around it like a moat on a conveyor belt.
I hear the cuckoo clock, hung next to the portrait in the next room. It makes the koha sound fifteen times.
‘Is that a twenty-four-hour cuckoo clock?’
‘Upali Wijegunawardena.’
‘What about him?’
‘See that house with the helipad?’
I follow his jewelled arm and the finger on the end of it. Wijegunawardena, magnate, political prince and owner of several publications I had been fired from, went missing in 1983.
‘I thought they found the plane and the body.’
Daniel winks at me.
‘They did. That house near the maara tree? Parakrama Ekanayake.’
‘The hijacker?’
Parakrama Ekanayake was proof of the lengths Sri Lankans would go to get a visa. In June 1982, estranged from his Italian wife and young son by immigration, Ekanayake threatened to blow up an Alitalia Boeing 747 en route to Tokyo with ‘the most sophisticated bombs manufactured in Italy’ unless his demands were met. They were. He returned to Sri Lanka, a folk hero to some, with his wife and son and ransom, while Italian and Sri Lankan authorities argued over who would arrest him.
‘Far back there, below the hill is Rudi Solheim.’
‘Who?’
‘Importer of Dutch hoffman, Malali chocolate and Colombian charlie.’
‘What?’
‘You don’t want to know, Uncle.’
‘Why does every house have bodyguards? No one can find this place anyway.’
‘Bodyguards,’ laughs Daniel. ‘Those are no bodyguards.’
‘Then?’
He winks again and walks off.
* * *
I set up the meeting with Alvin Rowe and Laurence Kallicharran.
The great West Indians?
Those days all the West Indians were great. Even the ones who couldn’t make Lloyd’s team. Colis King. Franklyn Stephenson. Sylvester Clarke.
What was the meeting about?
A second Sri Lankan rebel tour of South Africa.
I heard the first one was a disaster.
That’s because we didn’t have the players. In ’91, not only did we have the players, almost all were willing to do it.
You mean …
Don’t ask names. Pradeepan got me fifteen signatures of some of the leading players in the country. Kallicharran was liaising with the South African Cricket Board, SACB.
What was the catch?
The two rebel West Indian tours of South Africa not only made huge money, they provided some great cricket. Rowe thought if he could get a hungry Sri Lankan team, it would pave the way for another West Indian tour.
How much money?
More than any of those guys would’ve seen. Pradeepan could’ve looked after his father, married Shirali and retired. Sri Lankan cricket had no future for him.
So?
Mandela was released the day we started negotiations. Who knew apartheid would end? By the time we had all the signatures, South Africa were being welcomed back. In vain.
Didn’t SLBCC punish the organisers?
I had fifteen signatures. If they touched Mathew I would’ve sent them to the newspapers. I was even able to negotiate Mathew back into the side.
Was the 1992 Aussie test fixed?
That, Uncle, is a very long story.
* * *
Days later Ari brought me a copy of the Sunday Leader, a sensational tabloid, the only paper with the balls to take shots at the government. Many feared that the government would one day take shots at them. That Sunday there was a double-page spread outlining connections between prominent politicians and the criminal underworld.
Cheques signed by the president and members of cabinet for vast sums to the likes of Soththi Upali, Baddagana Sanjeewa and Nawala Nihal. Mentioned in the article is a kasippu mudalali called Kalu Daniel and a betting tycoon called Kuga Anna. Unfortunately there are no photographs.
* * *
I was called in for special ops in ‘93. I didn’t see much of Pradeepan.
Did he have something with a girl called Danila?
After Shirali, there were a lot of women. I was happy for the fellow.
What kind of special ops?
Special ops that got me arrested. I didn’t get to see Pradeepan’s ’94 season for Bloomfield.
I saw it. My. He was lethal in the final against SSC. Demon fast.
Did you follow his African tour?
I didn’t know he toured Africa. I thought his last tour was against New Zealand in ’95.
Zimbabwe, South Africa and then New Zealand. And then he vanished.
When were you released?
Who said I was released?
I didn’t know prisons came with driveways and TVs and laser discs.
There is a lot, Mr Karuna, that you don’t know.
Matthews
We sent Jabir with our ID cards and he returned empty-handed, cursing the post office staff. ‘Dumb bloody lazy bloody buffaloes. Two hours I had to wait, Uncle. Then this ugly woman tells me to see this smelly man, then they go for tea break, then they tell me they can’t hand over the parcels.’
I am sent to the third floor where my chit is signed by a large yawn wrapped in a sari, then I go to the first floor where twelve grotesques surround my parcel and make me fill out seven identical forms. I resist the compulsion to break my walking stick across someone’s nose, and take a seat with other seething customers. We watch burly bureaucrats sign papers, which they paste onto other papers and put into crumpled files. They then disappear for a tea break at 11 and return at 12 to say the postmaster is bath kanawa. Eating rice. We wait a further hour till he finishes.
In the West, the term ‘going postal’ refers to alienated postal workers turning up to work with machine guns and opening fire on random customers. In Sri Lanka, it would not surprise me if one day the reverse occurred. In the absence of a gun, I use the only weapon I have a licence for, my foul mouth. I call the postmaster a donkey, refer to the staff as mules and threaten to write to every paper in the land. They hand over my parcels without opening them.
I lean on my walking stick and wait for Jabir to U-turn. He pulls up to the kerb grinning. ‘See, I told you, Wije sir. I went and watched a blue film at the Ruby while you were inside.’
Back at Ari’s house, we sit at the dining table and stare at the square parcels. ‘They could be bombs,’ says Ari, a little too hopefully.
‘Who would want to bomb us?’
‘Maybe Uncle Kuga.’
‘If I was him, I’d drop napalm on the parcel office.’
I claw at the cellotape. Ari tears the brown wrapping. On top is a hardcover book with our friend in his straw hat holding a microphone and smirking at the camera. Graham Snow: Middle of the Bat. We compare books and grin. Both our books are signed, but Ari’s has the inscription:
To the wise Ari Byrd,
I owe you my career.
Your friend, Graham
Page ix is the acknowledgements page. ‘This book could not have been written without …’
The list is twenty-seven names long; it contains the names of a few great cricketers, an Indian film star, a British novelist and seven commentators
. It also contains the names ‘Ariyaratne Byrd’ high up and ‘W.G. Karunasena’ around the middle.
‘See, see. My name is above Kapil Dev,’ coos Ari.
‘It’s alphabetical, Putha.’
Ari counts the names. ‘At least we made Graham’s squad.’
‘Of what?’
‘Of brilliant cricketing minds that have inspired him.’
‘It looks like a list of people he’s stolen ideas from. He must be scared that we’ll sue.’
Ari’s parcel contains a manuscript. He frowns at it, then his eyes widen.
‘I say. You know what this is? An original draft of the Duckworth–Lewis with scribbles by Tony Duckworth and Frank Lewis themselves.’
He reads the accompanying note and chuckles. ‘Graham found it in an ICC wastepaper basket. Ade pukka! Finally I can understand it.’
My box contains two more books. Sport is War by Simon Marqusee, about the West Indian rebel team of the 1980s, signed by Kallicharran, Rowe, Rice and Croft. I gasp and smell the fresh pages. The other book is a hardcover biography, The Great Anton Rose by Booth Beckmann. This book is not autographed, though there is a bookmark sticking from its last pages. On it in a familiar scrawl:
To the other great W.G.,
You may find this interesting.
Graham
I open at the marked page and find an index which includes the following:
Matthews, Craig, 59, 72–73
Matthews, Greg, 32, 59, 111, 16–173
Matthews, Jimmy, 8
Matthews, Pradeep, 17, 98, 122–137, 212, 258, 290–297, 320
I begin flipping pages.
I Declare
A captain will declare an innings closed if he believes his side has enough runs on the board, if he wants to give his bowlers more time to bowl out the opposition, or if a player he doesn’t like very much is about to break a record.
When Anton Rose declared 117 runs behind in the Robert Mugabe XI vs Sri Lanka in 1994, it was not a sporting gesture to force a result. It was to deny a Sri Lankan spinner from getting 10 wickets. And it was because he knew torrential rains were expected the next day.
The 1994 Zimbabwe test series is not remembered at all. Every match was either rain affected or deathly dull. Neither team wanted to lose and be branded the worst in the world. So everyone from the groundsmen to the selectors to the players played it safe.
Those who were on that tour remember it for a string of brilliant individual performances from Rose and Lankan spinner Pradeep Mathew.
‘Like only two players were playing cricket on that tour,’ remembers Reggie Ranwala, Sri Lanka’s trumpet tooting cheerleader.
The Sri Lankans played the last test in black armbands to commemorate the death of Minister Tyronne Cooray, long-time patron of Sri Lankan cricket. The Minister, builder of stadiums and burner of libraries, was killed by a suicide bomber in Colombo.
The RM XI declared at 270 for 9, having slumped from 232 for 2. Mathew was brought on late and his figures were a remarkable 9 for 8. One more wicket would have given him the best ever first-class figures, beating H. Verity’s 1932 feat of 10 for 10.
Rose hit the ball into the air to where Sajeewa Liyanage stood, awaiting the unlikelihood of such a lapse in Rose’s concentration. While the ball dangled in the air, Rose glared at the bowler, then at the umpire, and yelled, ‘We declare! We declare!’ The Zimbabweans walked off the pitch and Liyanage bungled the catch. Mathew didn’t get his record.
Saving Private Jonny
On TV, the sign held by the English crowd says, ‘Forget Private Ryan. Save Sri Lanka.’ Ari and Jonny laugh, I do not understand the joke. They explain it to me and I do not think it is funny.
Jonny’s place is beginning to look more homely. No more cardboard boxes spilling over into furniture. Masks, ornaments, wooden carvings and handlooms decorate the drawing room.
Outside the May monsoon arrives four months late and appears to be making up in ferocity what it lacked in punctuality. We used to have defined monsoon seasons. Now it just rains when it feels like it. Maybe there is something to this warming of the globe business.
‘You been shopping, Jonny boy?’ asks Ari.
‘Just been enjoying my retirement.’
‘At Barefoot?’
The High Commission had been generous with their severance package. Jonny is thinking of buying land in the hill country once the dust has settled.
‘You been to Diyatalawa, WeeGee? It’s better than New Zealand.’
‘I lived in Badulla for almost five years.’
‘What? Didn’t know they played cricket in the tea fields.’
‘Those days I used to follow boxing.’
I wasn’t a sportswriter in those days. I was a newlywed. Sheila and I honeymooned in the hills and stayed there. The Observer was looking for a journalist to assist the plantation correspondent; she was escaping Kotahena and I was fleeing Kurunegala. The views from our bungalow were magical and the climate was cool. Though reporting on tea auctions and earth slips was as mundane as it got.
I would travel to Kandy at my own expense to watch rugby games and boxing matches. Over the years I became a fan of both. Muhammad Ali had just been stripped of his title and had his licence revoked for refusing to fight in Vietnam. Like the rest of the world I was stirred by his stance. ‘No Viet Cong ever called me nigger.’
My freelance article ‘The Golden Age of Ceylon Boxing’, covering the present but also harking back to the 1950s, was more a hobby piece to while away the hours between hill gazing, love making and transcribing plantation labour negotiations. I did not expect it to win me Ceylon Sportswriter of the Year in 1969.
‘Diyatalawa is a beautiful place,’ I say. ‘Are foreigners allowed to buy land?’
Jonny taps a wooden elephant with a curved trunk freshly purchased from Paradise Road and winks. I am glad the colour has returned to his cheeks and the twinkle to his eye.
Our drinks coasters show etchings of the topless women of Sigiriya. Jonny sips Scotch while Ari and I drink tea. I pretend this is no longer an issue, even though it very much is.
Outside, the thunder sounds like the cracking open of a thousand skulls. Rain beats down on our roof, drowning out the commentary on TV. We are playing a one-off test against England. The home team are batting and have just crossed 400.
Growing up, I never thought I’d befriend an Englishman. Or if I did, I didn’t think he’d be a Geordie with a penchant for sports and decorating rooms.
‘How’s the Twelve Steps, WeeGee?’
‘I’ve stayed clean, but I hate it.’
‘No, you don’t.’
‘I can get through the day, but is that a good thing?’
‘Shall we change the subject?’ asks Ari.
‘No, Ari,’ says Jonny. ‘We should talk about it.’
‘Stop putting that stuff into his head, Jonny. Look at me. I stopped after the ’96 World Cup. I haven’t relapsed.’
‘That’s because you don’t have psychological baggage. WeeGee has got over his physical withdrawal, but he’s still tied to it emotionally.’
Outside the late monsoon is still hammering away at Jonny’s roof.
‘Can we get back to watching this boring match?’ I say.
‘I’m serious, WeeGee. You thought about getting counselling?’
Jonny is getting on my nerves.
‘Discuss with a quack why I shat in my bed when I was two? Whether my ayah tickled my balls when I was three? Fine. Sign me up.’
‘Don’t be a twat. What about those letters to your brothers?’
He is now using my nerves as a trampoline.
‘Ari, can you tell this bugger to shut up?’
‘He’s right, Wije, you should make your peace.’
‘Then why don’t you leave me in peace?’ I say, a tad too loudly.
There is silence. Lightning flashes like a broken tubelight. I glare at my friends and they look away. And then there is a terrible pounding on the d
oor.
‘Arinawa dora! This is police.’
‘What the fuck …’ says Jonny with widening eyes.
‘You wait,’ says Ari. ‘Wije, come. Let’s go talk.’
We open the door to find six raincoated police officers with batons. Outside, there is a crowd with umbrellas peeping over the wall. At the gate is a fat man in a sarong, holding two boys by the scruffs of their necks. The boys are crying and the man is screaming. ‘Where’s that fucking suddha?’
The policemen barge past us.
‘Move, Uncle.’
The road is filled with police vehicles. Before we know what’s what, Jonny is being pushed forward in handcuffs. And that’s when the men with cameras arrive. The walk from Jonny’s gate to the road can be done in ten seconds at a leisurely pace. This time it takes as many minutes.
Projectiles of invective and venomous curses are hurled by the crowd. The policemen hold back the mob, but are powerless to prevent the snapping of cameras.
‘Call my lawyer. Call him,’ pleads Jonny.
We can do nothing except look on in horror.
Squirrels and Rats
Two similar problems. Two very different solutions.
Ever since the sparrows vanished from de Saram Road, squirrels have taken their place, scurrying into our homes and helping themselves to fruit. Kusuma and Sheila position a stool under the araliya tree and place a tray of nuts upon it. They convert a broken clock into a makeshift bird bath. As the man of the house I should be helping, but I have typing to do. They sit on the veranda and coo at the bushy tails helping themselves to my beer snacks. ‘Aney darling, sweet, no?’ says Sheila.
Rats have been enjoying free dinners from our kitchen bin. Every other evening we hear Kusuma’s shrieks as a well-fed pig-rat escapes into the pantry. We respond with carpenters who mesh-wire the windows and lay poison behind the cooker and rat-traps in the cupboards. Three days later, when the kitchen starts to smell of corpses, I am called to locate and dispose of twitching bodies.
It is while scraping bloodied fur wrapped in tail and innards into rubbish bags that I spy three squirrels fighting over my manyokka crisps. I realise that humans respond to squirrels and rats on a primal level. One makes us want to squeeze cheeks and go aney, the other makes our skin curl.
The Legend of Pradeep Mathew Page 28