by Anita Nair
Michael gulped down his beer and poured himself a glass from the pitcher. ‘Well, here’s her number,’ he said, pulling out a paper from his wallet.
Gowda took the scrap of paper and let it lie on the table.
‘Call her, Mudde. C’mon, call her. We were all friends once, remember! What happened between the two of you is so far back…’
Gowda punched in the number with great reluctance. Something leaden sat in the pit of his stomach.
The phone at the other end rang six times before a woman’s voice murmured a ‘hello’.
Gowda’s heart stilled. She sounded the same after twenty-seven years.
‘Hello, who is this,’ she asked and then, ‘Borei, is that you? Do you know I have been trying to reach you for the last two days?’
‘Hello, Urmila,’ he said softly.
‘Ask her to join us,’ Michael mouthed from across the table.
‘Michael and I are at Pecos. Do you know the pub? It’s the one on Rest House Road…’
Gowda gestured to Michael. ‘She can’t come,’ he mouthed.
‘Sure, I understand. Tomorrow? I am not sure … Let me call you.’ Gowda clicked shut his phone. ‘There, satisfied?’ he asked Michael.
Michael peered into his beer mug gravely. ‘What’s the harm in meeting her? You were inseparable once.’
‘Once.’ Gowda’s face was grim. Once was the operative word.
It was almost half past one when Gowda rode into the two-storeyed family house on 7th Main, Jayanagar 5th Block.
As he parked his bike, he saw the two coconut trees were laden with coconuts ready for picking. He shrugged; it wasn’t his business any more. He had severed ties with this house and its demands. Now he could just be a guest here.
Gowda paused. Was this how Roshan felt when he was home? As if he no longer felt any ties to the place he had once called home? Gowda felt a physical jolt of pain at the thought.
When Roshan was a baby and even as a young toddler, Gowda would often cradle his sleeping son to his chest. And he would feel a fierce love, a great tenderness suffuse him. He would bend and nuzzle his son’s cheek and feel tears swell in his eyes at the milky sweet smell of his child’s skin. He would do anything to keep his son from harm’s way. Destroy anything that threatened his child. He would do everything he could for Roshan, he had sworn then. This was the child he had slapped. He flinched, thinking of how Roshan had reeled from the force of the slap.
‘What are you doing? Who are you frowning at?’ Nagendra asked from the doorway.
Gowda smiled at his brother. A thin watery smile as he sought to compose his emotions.
‘I thought I heard your bike,’ Nagendra said, looking at his brother carefully. ‘Are you all right?’
Gowda nodded.
‘The coconuts need to be plucked,’ he said. ‘Do you want me to send someone?’
Nagendra cocked his head ruefully. ‘It would be good if you did. Meena can’t seem to find anyone. As it is, she keeps threatening to chop the jackfruit tree down.’ He added, ‘It’s not the same without you at home, Borei.’
Gowda’s eyes flicked through the living room as he walked to the dining room. It was a little more than a month since he had visited. The TV and its cabinet had gone and instead there was a huge wall-mounted one. And there were new curtains.
Nagendra saw Gowda’s eyes settle on the TV. ‘The old one was giving trouble,’ he said. ‘There was a good exchange offer. And then Meena thought the old curtains needed to be changed. They were beginning to look tatty.’
Gowda smiled, trying hard to not show how unsettled he felt by the changes. ‘Good decision.’ He cocked his head. ‘I’ve been thinking of getting an LCD TV too, but with Mamtha and Roshan at Hassan, it seems pointless to invest so much money in a new TV.’
‘Aren’t you coming in for lunch?’ his sister-in-law called out.
‘You are late,’ his father grumbled as Gowda pulled a chair out and sat himself at the dining table. Lunch was in progress.
‘I thought you were not coming,’ his sister-in-law said, setting a plate before him.
Gowda said nothing but ladled the bisibele bath into his plate. His brother pushed a bowl of tomato and onion raita towards him. Gowda smiled gratefully and bit into a crisp.
‘How is Roshan?’ his father asked.
‘He is here. He arrived yesterday morning,’ Gowda said.
‘Why didn’t you bring him then?’ Meena asked.
‘Take it easy … the boy must have things to do on his own,’ his brother said. ‘He is not four years old to be dragged everywhere his parents go.’
Gowda shot his brother a grateful look. How could he tell them that through the night Roshan’s hurt face had kept slipping into his mind. He had skulked out of the house early, asking Shanthi to stay back to make sure Roshan had everything he needed.
‘I would like to have seen my grandson but it is all “take it easy” these days,’ their father growled. ‘That is the problem with your generation. Everywhere you go, everyone is taking it easy. The clerk at the bank would rather stand out and smoke while we pensioners wait. The doctor at the hospital is talking on his mobile phone while checking my BP … when I protest, they tell me: Aja, take it easy! The world is going to the dogs all because of this “take it easy” policy. And the two of you aren’t any better. Look at the coconut tree outside! And the state of this house…’
The brothers exchanged a glance. How was it that their seventy-nine-year-old father could still make them feel like incompetent eleven-year-olds?
And I do precisely the same to Roshan, Gowda thought, a stab of remorse twisting in him.
The household settled into its Sunday afternoon routine once lunch was eaten and the dishes cleared up. His father hobbled to his bedroom downstairs for a nap. His brother went up to his room to read the newspaper, he said. His sister-in-law went to the living room and switched on the TV for the afternoon movie. And Gowda found his way back to his room which his nephew had claimed for his own until he went away to BITS Pilani.
A cupboard still held Gowda’s books and some of his certificates from college. He lay on the bed and stared at the ceiling. He should have asked Roshan to come along, he thought. But he had been unable to meet his son’s eyes all evening. He shuddered. What had he been thinking of? How different was he from his father?
His father had come home in a rage. Someone had told him that he had spotted Borei at Bascos. His father had unclasped his belt and lashed out at Borei, who hadn’t even realized what he was being belted for. ‘You badvaa raascal, what were you doing at that place?’
‘What place?’ Borei had said again and again as the belt cut into his skin. He hadn’t known what to think, what to feel, except a deep sense of hurt. Why was his father doing this to him? What had he done that was so wrong?
Roshan had had the same expression on his face, Gowda thought with a great sense of shame.
He would apologize to Roshan, he decided. He would ask his forgiveness for his brutishness. For being such a lousy, miserable failure of a father.
At some point, Gowda slid into a deep sleep. It was almost five when he woke, his mouth dry and parched. He sat up and stared around him, disoriented. Where was he? Then he saw the familiar cupboard and it came back to him.
Gowda went to the bathroom, sluiced his face with water, combed his hair and stepped back into the room. He opened the cupboard and peered inside. The zoology text was where he had kept it. And inside the brown paper cover was a photograph he had placed there twenty-seven years ago. He slid it out of its hiding place and looked at it.
Urmila, just before they separated. He pushed the photograph into its place and took the book with him. Then he took the photo out again and placed it in his wallet and put the book back. What am I doing? he asked himself. He had a case to solve. Two homicides that seemed to have nothing in common and yet seemed to be linked. What could connect the middle-aged medical shop owner Kothandaraman and that yo
ung male prostitute Liaquat? And he had a young son back home, a teenage son he had slapped the previous day. What am I doing? he asked himself again.
He could hear the hum of conversation. His sister-in-law called out to him, ‘Borei, your coffee’s turning cold!’
Across the table, Borei Gowda watched his family drink their Sunday coffee and crunch their nippattu. In a little while, his father would start playing the kirtanas of the Kannada composers he favoured – Purandara Dasa and Vyasatirtha. His sister-in-law and brother would set out to a bhajan meeting they went to most Sundays. He felt removed from them and what their lives entailed. This was his family but they may as well be strangers, he thought. They haven’t once asked me how I am or what it is I am doing these days. And yet, if I skip a visit, they will be angry, hurt even.
Gowda mumbled his goodbyes and started his Bullet. At least in its saddle he felt as if he belonged.
From within the house, he could hear the stereo burst into his father’s favourite album Daasara Padagalu, Rajkumar Bharathi singing ‘Krishna nee Begane Baro’.
Gowda fled.
Chikka sat in the front seat beside King Kong. Not that Anna had asked him to. But he sensed that this evening that was how the corporator wished it, all of the back seat to himself. If there had been others in the car, Chikka would have sat with him.
The car was new; the corporator had bought it only a few weeks ago. The inside of the car had that new car smell. Add to it the rose fragrance of the car freshener, the two incense sticks that had been lit and the little garland of jasmine buds that had been draped around the little gold Ganesha who sat on the dashboard. And add to that the cologne the corporator seemed to have washed himself with and the fumes of the body spray King Kong had drenched himself with. Chikka felt bile rush up his throat; if he didn’t open the window, he would throw up any moment now.
At the traffic light, Chikka had King Kong slide down the tinted windows. ‘I need to buy a newspaper,’ he said, gulping in air and hoping some of the fug in the car would clear.
Chikka took one long breath as the window went up again.
‘What’s in the newspaper?’ the corporator asked.
‘Someone said there’s a report on a corporator from south Bangalore. I wanted to see what it said,’ Chikka said, turning around. ‘They are doing a series on corporators. “Know your corporator.” That’s what it’s called.’ Chikka tried to gauge his brother’s expression. ‘It will be your turn one of these days,’ he added softly.
‘Tell me what it said.’ The corporator glanced at his watch. ‘There’s something I want to see on Palace Cross Road. A place has come up for sale. Do you remember the apartments Amma used to work in? A first-floor apartment there is on the market … King Kong, we’ll go there before we head to the town hall.’
Chikka swallowed. He felt a bead of sweat run down his forehead.
‘Anna,’ Chikka began, ‘the meeting…’
‘No, Chikka, I need to see this place. The meeting can wait. Do you think they will start at six p.m. on the dot? Useless fellows, each one of them. It will be at least seven before everyone gets there … You haven’t heard a word of what I said, Chikka,’ the corporator said. ‘What are you thinking about?’
‘Nothing,’ Chikka murmured.
‘You can’t be thinking of nothing.’ The corporator’s voice was petulant. ‘What about the dog menace problem the fools will bring up when we go into the ward meeting next week?’
‘What dog menace?’
‘What’s with you, Chikka?’
Chikka felt King Kong’s glance linger on him. King Kong didn’t speak much but he didn’t miss a thing. His narrow eyes swooped on everything around Anna and gauged it for any potential threat to Anna’s well-being.
Chikka snapped, ‘What are you staring at me for?’
‘Don’t snap at him. He can see as I do that your mind is elsewhere,’ the corporator growled from the rear.
Chikka shook himself out of the strange apathy that seemed to have coiled around him. ‘I’m sorry, Anna,’ he said quietly. ‘I have a headache … we have to be careful with this dog business. The animal rights people can be a nuisance. The best thing to do would be to rope them in. Perhaps we can get one of them to go with us to the meeting.’
The corporator beamed. ‘I like that.’ Then he narrowed his eyes. ‘I don’t want any bad press about this. There’s always some nosy journalist who’s trying to climb to the top. How people want to move up in life is their business, but I won’t allow anyone to step on my back to reach where they want to.’
Chikka was silent. He saw King Kong look straight ahead. He knew what the man was thinking. Chikka was thinking the same.
When the corporator was elected, one of the newspapers had carried a story about him. His years as a garbage collector, his job at the gujri, his association with the gangs and his sudden affluence. The journalist had even found out that he had once been called Caddie Ravi. And had raked up the story of Caddie Ravi and Jackie Kumar.
It had begun as a friendship between two boys. One of whom wielded a car jack to great effect. And the other was apprenticed as a caddie at the Bangalore Golf Club under Ijas Mamu, his father’s friend, who assured them that there was nothing better in life than caddying. ‘All those rich men wouldn’t be able to play golf without us. That is real power. To help them decide if it should be a number eight iron or a number two iron.’
Anna hadn’t known better till the day a golf ball flew across the fence and cracked a scooterist’s head. The next day he hid a ball in his bag. Later, in the one-room tenement that was home, he pushed it into a cloth bag and swung it against the wall and saw the wall splinter. This was real power, he decided. Not placing a wedge in some bored rich man’s hand…
He showed his new weapon to Jackie Kumar, his best friend. Jackie Kumar was two years younger but he had been out on the streets since he was nine. Jackie approved and took him along on his next assignment. He gave him a name too – Caddie Ravi.
They had a routine. Caddie Ravi stunned his victims with one swing of the golf ball in a sock. This allowed him greater economy of movement than a cloth bag, and a harder impact. It was a move he had learnt on the greens. Not a flick of the wrist but a full swing of the arm as if he were wielding a number six iron at the skull of the victim. As the ball struck bone, he saw in his mind the splintering of the wall. He felt the outer layer of the skull cave in, the fracturing of the inner layer into two or more pieces. Jackie Kumar would do the rest, which was kitchen work really. But it was he who struck the first blow.
Trouble began when Anna wanted to move on to irons. Jackie Kumar wouldn’t let him. ‘Do you realize that the police still haven’t figured out what your weapon is? Once you use an iron, they’ll know. And do you think they won’t track you down? How many people have access to golf clubs?’
Anna relented. At first. Then he used an iron. He had his favourite. The sand wedge. Anna wiped the sole of the wedge carefully with a handkerchief he found in the victim’s pocket. ‘See this,’ he said, running his finger around the end of the wedge head, ‘it is angled in such a way that it will slide through mud, coarse grass and, of course, sand, lifting the ball off the ground in one smooth motion, and because there’s a lot more material here, it is heavier and the impact is that much more … beauty, isn’t she?’
Jackie didn’t reply. He stared at the victim on the ground, wondering if there was anything left for him to do.
‘I told you not to,’ he said, trying hard not to show his displeasure.
Anna saw that Jackie Kumar was displeased. But he had known the note of triumph when the iron struck the victim’s skull, felt the power of perfect impact. A single arc from shoulder to wrist to club, slicing through the air. Thwack. So he did it again.
When the police sprung him, Anna directed them to Jackie Kumar.
‘You are still underage, a minor, you’ll get sent into a delinquent home. I will go to prison. You understand, don�
�t you?’ Anna had been nineteen then.
But Jackie Kumar didn’t and he never forgave Anna either. There had been no direct confrontations, but they were not friends any more. Anna had moved on to politics while Jackie Kumar remained a man of the streets. But with every new triumph prised from beneath Anna’s nose, Jackie felt he was inching his way towards him. Anna didn’t retaliate. He would bide his time. That was the other thing he had learnt on the golf course: patience. And how essential it was.
But most of that had become a matter of memory. Until the journalist decided to build his story around it.
‘Caddie to Corporator’ was the headline. It was a rag of a newspaper that survived on the scurrilous stories it published. No one was spared. And the corporator was merely one among the many whose past had been raked through. But someone at the press had called Anna to let him know. Anna had made a few phone calls. The entire print run was bought and burnt. And the journalist had an accident. He would never walk again.
‘I’ll make sure that a press report is released by the animal rights group,’ Chikka said.
‘A favourable one,’ said the corporator. ‘No point otherwise. And make sure they know how much of a dog lover I am.’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘What about that PWD man’s problems?’ Chikka asked in the silence that had crept into the car.
The corporator didn’t hide his irritation. ‘Now you tell me…’
‘But, Anna, I reminded you last evening.’
‘When?’ The corporator frowned.
‘Just after dinner, when you were with the chha…’ Chikka almost bit his tongue and then hastened to add, ‘Chandini, Rupali and Nandini.’
The corporator leaned back into the plush comfort of his car and mumbled, ‘What do you have against them? I know what you were about to say. You were going to call them chhakkas, right? The girls tell me all about the way you abuse them. Behind their backs. It hurts them.’
‘They are not girls, Anna.’ Chikka’s mouth was grim. ‘They are bloody eunuchs; freaks of nature!’