by HM Naqvi
Addressing the keyhole in a wheezy pitch, I begin, “Good afternoon. I’m sorry to disturb you but was hoping for an audience. I am Abdullah, known once to all and sundry as the Cossack—”
“You’re mistaken, mister. You want the man upstairs.”
I stand in the dark a few moments, contemplating, calculating: some count from the mezzanine up, some from the second storey—and some never make it to their destination. Cursing the lad, fate, and the gradient, I climb another flight, sweating, seeing stars, streaking comets, and knock on the door of the flat immediately above the one below. A hatch promptly slides open, and a probing, disembodied eye materializes. “How many?” it inquires.
“One?”
The eye squints. “Two thousand.”
Out of idle intellectual curiosity, I hand over a wad of currency in exchange for a heavy brown bag rattling with bottles. Now what, friend? I ask myself, now where? I consider abandoning the expedition—Oh dash it, dash it all!—but tell myself I have to give it one last chance.
“You again?” the lady exclaims.
“I am a friend of the Caliph of Cool—”
“Please leave before I report you—”
“I am the custodian of one Bosco.”
When the door opens, I find myself face to face with a smart, dark, freckled lass in a nurse’s uniform who stands in the frame like a sentry. “One cannot be too careful these days,” she says. “Come in.”
The flat is neat and spare and the clean aroma of cinnamon permeates the still air. The walls are painted a hue of aquamarine that recalls an aquarium. A portrait of the Lord, wreathed with a garland of drying roses, hangs in the centre. There is a shelf housing several stacks of magazines, a battered Scrabble set, and a forlorn black & white polka-dot backpack on one side of the room, and several cane chairs arranged around an oval table on the other. Parking myself at the head, I ask, “Do you mind if I sit down?”
“Suit yourself—”
“Could I trouble you for a glass of water, and a pillow perhaps?” The ride has stirred anarchy amongst my piles.
Combing her greying bob with the flat of her hand, she considers the request. “I have to leave soon,” she replies. “My shift begins in exactly seventeen minutes. What can I do for you?”
“Aren’t you going to ask about Bosco?”
“No.”
“You don’t care?”
“Have you come here to ask whether or not I care for him?”
“Not really,” I reply, but this seems odd, very odd, unless, of course, the lass before me is not Bosco’s mother. She might be a sister, aunt, a cousin twice removed? “I wanted to stop by to ascertain the situation.”
“What situation?”
“With the father?”
“The less you know, Mister Cossack, the better,” she says. “It’s best you leave.”
I stand up and nod respectfully as if I have lost a game of snakes and ladders: there is nowhere to go but down. As I shuffle towards the door, however, the thought of the stairs emboldens me. “Miss,” I begin, turning on my heel, “excuse my impudence but I’m an old man—I would like to believe I am entitled to a certain decorum. I did not travel across town, climb those treacherous stairs, for a glass of water. I won’t leave unless I have been adequately briefed about the circumstances surrounding Bosco’s departure.”
The girl manages a smile, revealing a perfect set of pearly teeth. “I’m sorry, Mister Cossack. I’m a little overwrought these days … Let me fetch you that water.”
“And a pillow please.”
After bearing a glass of lukewarm water and producing a small tasseled cushion, she pulls up a chair, and sighs. “I don’t know where to begin.”
“Please try.”
“Bosco’s father lost his job at the Council two years ago and has, let’s say, developed some very bad habits. He hasn’t been much of a father or husband, or a man. I need somebody to stand up to these people. I’ve lived here all my life. What should I do? Where should I go?”
“Who—wait, what?”
“The land mafia, Mister Cossack, the land mafia.”
Jesus, Joseph, and Mary! The cloak and dagger suddenly makes sense: Bosco has, in effect, been dispatched to me for protective custody. As we all know, the land mafia is not some ragtag ruffian outfit—no, it is a fearsome, formidable institution anywhere in the world, one that possesses the power to create and destroy entire cantons, communities, if there is a meaningful Rate of Return in it.75 If they coopt the police and local government machinery, what is a lone nurse with pearly teeth to do? And a heavyset phenomenologist? Draining the glass of lukewarm water, I feebly suggest, “You might consider getting the courts involved.”
“I don’t have the resources to hire a lawyer.”
“I have some contacts in the legal community,” I blurt. My advocate, however, the legendary, mercurial Kapadia, has a mixed record: in the lawsuits that Comrade Bakaullah has brought against me, I have won one, lost one, and one is outstanding.
“What can a lawyer do? Stand guard outside? They have intimidated me and my family. Believe you me, I’m tough—I can abide threats and insults, I can even take a knock, but Bosco …”
I want to clasp my head, heart, but will not allow myself to despair before the lass. “Rest assured, Miss,” I declare stoutly, “I will look into this.”
The nurse smiles again—it might be obvious to her that I am talking through my hat.
“Thank you for your hospitality.”
Before shutting the door on me, she hands over Bosco’s backpack and whispers, “How is he?”
“Don’t worry.”
“I know he’s in good hands.”
“Could you, by any chance, also give me the yo-yo?”
Standing in the dark as if teetering on a cliff on a moonless night, I take in the sour air of the corridor before making my way down, cradling a brown paper bag and backback, yo-yo stuffed in pocket like a stale macaroon. Bosco emerges from the shadows, adjusting the brim of the trilby like a gangster. “You and I, my friend,” I say, handing him the backpack, “have the same problem.”
“What?”
“Two words: Cosa Nostra.”
“What?”
“You need to read Puzo.”
“Who?”
“Don’t worry,” I reply. “I’ve got a plan.”
I have no plan.
71. Since there were 119 cinemas in the city once upon a time, almost 50 in Saddar alone, bus stops were often named after venues: Jubilee, Lighthouse, Paradise, Rex, Ritz, Khayyam in Nursery Market, Crown on Mauripur Road.
72. Other favourite landmarks include the Port Trust, Frere Hall & DJ Science College. There is a veritable trove of architectural delights scattered across the old city but the land mafia is working double-time to level our heritage. Make it anew! Mary Road changed only yesterday. I understand Bholu Pahalwan’s family is behind the riotous development.
73. The recipe was a secret but one night, several drinks into that night, he told me. I have, however, since forgotten. It’s funny: the important things in life, one forgets.
74. Of course Tony, who completed his primary schooling from Jufelhurst and Senior Cambridge from St. Pat’s, was once hauled up by the nuns along with his chum Hur, a.k.a. Hawkeye, for sneaking into the loos of St. Joseph’s Convent next door. Tugged by the ear to the principal for a proper caning, he said, “We wanted to witness God’s beauty.”
75. Mac, a friend of Tony’s from St. Patrick’s who left for the United States of America with him, said he would cower in his portion of a “brownstone” in the hamlet of Harlem, afraid the local land mafia who routinely set buildings on fire to collect insurance would set his place ablaze. Since then, he has become a real estate baron, the proprietor of several multimillion dollar properties, but the point is that pyromancy is one of the dark arts at the disposal of the land mafia. In the white-hot heart of the flames, they can perceive single family homes with remodeled kitchens and parq
uet flooring: Eden.
ON THE POSSIBILITIES OF LOVE & LITERATURE
(or A MOSTLY SENTIMENTAL EDUCATION)
As appointed father figure, mentor, what you will—there must be a Teutonic term incorporating all three like freundlicheziehvater—one makes adjustments: one sleeps earlier, rises earlier, and after breakfasting, repairs to the balcony. Bosco works on exercises in astrophysics or alchemy, subjects outside the purview of my knowledge—he has been given homework over the summer—whilst I write; then we undertake Readings in Literature together, a scattershot course derived from my dusty volumes: (1) Cooper, James, The Leatherstocking Tales; (2) Defoe, Daniel, Capt. Singleton; (3) Hughes, Thomas, Tom Brown’s School Days; (4) Chandler, Raymond, The Long Goodbye; (5) Puzo, Mario, The Godfather, etcetera.76 Yo-yos be damned—what better way to become a good man? Several sessions into our regime—we must have been reading Hero of Our Time or some dreary tract that ought to make any sensible reader cringe—I suggest we recite from the Romantic Canon, The New Golden Treasury. I clear my throat, adjust my robe & address the street, arm’s distance from the railing: “In Xanadu did Kubla Khan / A stately pleasure dome decree!”
Though initially dubious, Master Bosco cannot help himself after my rousing rendition: stepping up to the railing in the zippy joggers I purchased—Velcro straps, suction cups on the soles—he squeezes his fingers into fists like a nervy, determined pugilist, enunciating, “A savage place! As holy and enchanted / As e’er beneath a waning moon was haunted / By woman wailing for her demon-lover!” There is catharsis in it.
The recital, the display of raw lung capacity, is an attempt to make the lad sensitive to the joys of poetry, though not unlike the Courtship Practices of Certain Tropical Primates, it is also informed by the possibility that the vociferous verses will attract the attention of my demon love. Whilst the probability that she is sauntering outside, flashing those obsidian eyes, is insignificant, it’s worth a cry.
Our strolls are partly informed by such misplaced expectations as well. Donning a bush-shirt, shalwar & deerstalker one evening, I tell my confrere, “You need to make use of those joggers.” Avoiding puddles, red spews of tobacco, Bosco follows as if flouncing down the aisles at Bata. We walk to the Gymkhana where once upon a time, amid great foon fan, the Agha Khan was weighed in gold & then the other way to the Imambargah where we congregate to commemorate the martyrdom of the Prophet’s (PBUH) grandson.
Ordinarily, however, Bosco & I gravitate to the zoo. I tell him of the time when the gentry promenaded in Gandhi Garden: Mr. Fida of Lover’s Lane, the Alvis of Chestnut St., Mr. Lanewallah, Director of Zoology. And there would be marriages in the winter,77 those famous red grapes in spring which Tony & I picked off the vines like toffees. What times! How I miss Tony, my brother, my boon companion!
Gandhi Garden, like Currachee, has changed in the intervening half century. The main entrance, once due east, has been shifted south, within the compass of a shabby unpaved parking lot populated by loitering goats. Although the fee remains nominal—five rupees for minors, ten for adults—the park has been claimed by the sort of families who lob popcorn at the lone American Turkey. The amusement park, featuring noisy mechanical rides, is a vulgar development. The Shalimar Lawn, however, remains lush & well-tended. Our regular round takes us past the Reptile House, over the slat footbridge (Tony called it the Bridge on the River Kwai) spanning the basin of hoary crocodiles soaking in bright green water, around the cage of the delightful wallabies, the aquarium shaped like a bosom and the plaque that reads: THESE LAWNS ARE NAMED AFTER THE LATE T. L. F. BEAUMONT, PRESIDENT, CURRACHEE MUNICIPALITY & CHAIRMAN COMMITTEE NOV. 1905 TO MAR. 1910. The regime is welcome for both of us. Bosco and I eat well, sleep well, and wake invigorated.
One morning the Childoos appear after overhearing us reciting Twelfth Night on the balcony. Naturally, we put on a show. When I emerge from my quarters in Mummy’s purple, hand-embroidered kaftan folded with pins, Guddu and Toto chortle and clap. There is no doubt that great theatre engages young and old, academic and rabble alike. Just before Act 2, however, just as Bosco cries, “Thy tongue, thy face, thy limbs, actions and spirit / Do give thee five-fold blazon—” Nargis happens upon us.
“This is what happens up here?” she yawps uncharitably. “Unholy spectacles? Men dressed up as women!”
“But,” Bosco interjects quite unexpectedly, “Uncle Cossack is a woman dressed up like a man.”
“And you?”
Bowing, broom in hand, he states, “The Duke of Illyria at your service.”
“Not right!” she cries.
“Auguries of Judgment Day,” I mutter.
“All wrong!” she elucidates, storming off with my nephews.
“Perhaps she doesn’t care for the comedies.”
“We could do Coriolanus next time,” Bosco quips. “With puppets, of course.”
Ha!
Another time, one of our famous familial squawkers, Badbakht Begum, shows up, threatening to interrupt our regime since there is nobody downstairs. Once upon a time, Badbakht was one of the fairest, most coveted maidens in the land; it is said she resembled Mummy, a telling though misconceived comparison because nobody could be as comely as Mummy. The irony was that Badbakht was so fetching & accomplished—she is M.A.-pass—that she never found a suitable mate, and then it was too late. Although we grew up together, she never took an interest in me except during my turn as the Cossack: our only rendezvous went awry, however, when I found myself under the sheets with another cousin, Gulbadan, during a power outage.
“Madam,” I cry through the crack in the door. “We are in quarantine! We have the Bug!”
“Oh dear,” Badbakht exclaims. “Which one?”
“Naegleria,” I blurt—a malady I heard being discussed in passing on the transistor.
“The brain-eating amoeba?”
Slapping my head, I turn to Bosco. “Listeria,” he whispers.
“Listeria,” I repeat, “it’s listeria.”
“What’s that?”
I repeat what Bosco whispers to me: “Bacteria … found in unpasteurized milk … smoked seafood … hot dogs … a cousin of botulism.”
“It’s contagious?”
“No but it’s foul, funky, fetid—”
“Okay, okay, okay. Get better, Abdullah. I’ll wait downstairs.”
Bosco raises his hand. I slap it. The lad is turning out to be a fine companion—attentive, sporting, endowed with certain humour.
I would like to take him on a field trip to the shrine of Abdullah Shah Ghazi (RA) but I reckon he will take more interest in a jaunt to Sandspit for the nesting season of the green turtles. The expedition requires an automobile, as a rickshaw ride to the beach would devastate my rectal harmony for weeks. There are three parked in the garages in the back—Papa’s legendary ’58 Impala, a burgundy BMW 1600 & Felix’s old Foxy, which I purchased during the lean times as a favour to him— but since not one functions, I am compelled to borrow Babu’s Starlet. Feigning a headache one evening, I wander downstairs for a pair of paracetamols and purloin the keys when my brother wanders off to retrieve the bottle. It’s a cinch.
But I have not driven since the invention of the Digital Video Disk, and downtown is a jungle. Lorries lumber up and down Bandar Road like elephants, motorcyclists like a sounder of boars. Slowly, steadily, high beams blazing, hands clutching the top of the steering, I negotiate the artery to the port. Although the traffic thins towards the end of Mauripur Road, save the occasional swinging gas lantern, gloom pervades. Past the deserted checkpost leading to the narrow bridge over the salt flats, one can only discern one’s coordinates in time and space by the crunch of the gravel and the sighing sea. Parking by the mangroves, we disembark like Ninja Warriors on a mission but there is nothing to do except sit on the warm sand & wait.
It is a gorgeous evening, the sort that reminds you why one resides in Currachee: the stars are like spilled sugar across the sky, and the breeze is cool and salty like lassi. “Th
ere was a time we picnicked here through the year,” I whisper. “We would take a boat in low tide. We would sing songs,78 play cards, charades, badminton, hurl ourselves into the waves. Then we had sandwiches, rolls, Pakola.”
There would be others, doughy children, lasses in polka-dot one-piece bathing suits & once we even ran into our genial, tubby then-PM. When Papa introduced me to him, he noted, “If you weren’t so fair, you could be my son.” Papa also introduced me to green turtles. There is something marvelous in the rituals of the ancient creatures. Where do they come from? Where do they go? I still do not quite know. Nobody knows. It’s one of the Bona Fide Mysteries of the Universe.79
Suddenly, Bosco falls on all fours. I cannot see anything at first but gradually discern a shadow inching towards us. The form settles not more than a metre away. I can make out a head, a variegated carapace, massive flippers. It is larger than me and presumably older. It has travelled thousands of kilometres, propelled by currents, by will, and knows what it has to do. If only I had been bestowed with such uncanny instincts!
Still as statues, we watch the creature digging in the dirt, flippers working like spades. Once the nest is fashioned, a trench of sorts, the clutch is laid, a secret spectacle that lasts about an hour, after which she covers the hollow and drags herself into the sea. Brushing our clothes, hands, we make our way back as well. We will not witness the hatchlings waddle towards the waves—feeble, frightened, and motherless. Most will die immediately, devoured by pye-dogs and gulls. The world is oft cruel, bizarre, a series of tragedies.