A Rising Man

by Abir Mukherjee

  She smiled coyly. ‘As you will appreciate, Captain, my clients value their privacy. As the gentleman was not murdered in my house or on my property, I saw no need to sully his reputation.’

  ‘You know it’s a criminal offence to withhold information from the police?’

  Mrs Bose sighed. ‘I lose track of exactly what is and isn’t illegal for Indians these days. From what we are hearing from the Punjab, it seems even peaceful gatherings are now a capital offence.’

  ‘What exactly was MacAuley doing at your establishment last Tuesday night?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, the usual, I expect. He was quite orthodox in terms of what he liked. No peccadilloes, no imagination; but in my experience that’s quite normal for a Scotsman. At first I thought it may be due to the climate of their native land, which I understand is rather unpleasant for ten months of the year and downright inhospitable for the other two, but over the years I have come to the conclusion that it is down to that fundamentalist religion of theirs, which I believe considers almost everything enjoyable to be a sin.’

  ‘So he wasn’t there to procure girls for one of Mr Buchan’s parties?’

  She shook her head. ‘I can assure you he was not.’

  ‘Did he ever do so?’

  She gave a derisive laugh. ‘You don’t really expect me to divulge that sort of information, do you?’

  I could feel myself beginning to lose my temper. I felt as though I was banging my head against a wall. The heat wasn’t helping. Neither was my need for a fix.

  ‘Do I need to remind you that this is a murder inquiry? A sahib has been killed yards from your front door and one of your own girls is now dead. I can make things very unpleasant for you if you aren’t a little more cooperative.’

  ‘As you say, Captain, the man was killed outside of my premises, not in them. And as for Devi, you of all people don’t need to remind me of the poor girl’s fate.’

  I had to admit, the woman had spirit. Under different circumstances I might have liked her, a lot. As it was, though, she was hampering a murder investigation and that rather soured things. It was time to show her I could be difficult too. Maybe a night in the cells would change her attitude.

  ‘We’ll continue this tomorrow,’ I said. ‘Hopefully you’ll be feeling a little more cooperative then. If not, charges of obstructing a police investigation, and maybe others, will be laid against you.’

  Digby led Mrs Bose off to a cell. I was on my way back to my office when Surrender-not pulled me to one side. He looked troubled.

  ‘What is it, Sergeant?’ I asked.

  ‘There’s one thing I don’t understand sir. Mrs Bose knew that we’d talked to Devi yesterday. Back at the house she said that Devi told her personally. But now she says she never saw Devi after returning from her house call to her client. I’m wondering, then, how she could have known.’

  The sergeant was right. The woman was lying to us.

  ‘Would you like to recommence the interview?’ he asked.

  I thought about it and decided against. She’d only clam up, and time was fast running out.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘Let’s keep that up our sleeve for now.’

  THIRTY

  THERE WAS A note on my desk. A summons to Lord Taggart’s office. I made my way up there, and his secretary Daniels hurried me to a chair in the anteroom.

  ‘His Lordship is being briefed on the situation in Black Town. He should be free shortly.’

  The telephone on his desk buzzed and he picked up the receiver and listened with his eyes closed. I studied him more closely: dirty spectacles; lank, greasy hair plastered onto his skull. It looked like he hadn’t slept for a week. The caller did most of the talking. Daniels tried to interject once or twice, but the voice on the other end cut him off. Finally, Daniels sighed and launched into a monologue of his own.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘it’s impossible. Even if we had any men left, which we don’t, we couldn’t dispatch them to South Calcutta. Not while Black Town is going up in flames.’

  The door to Taggart’s office burst open and several uniformed officers, military types by the look of them, strode out. Ignoring Daniels and me, they headed for the corridor. Without waiting for Daniels to finish his call, I put my head round the door. The Commissioner was standing behind his desk, poring over a map laid out in front of him. I coughed and he looked up.

  ‘Come in, Sam,’ he said. ‘I hope you’ve got good news. It’s been a rather trying day so far.’

  The death of my only witness could hardly be described as good news, so it seemed better to change the subject.

  ‘How bad are things up in Black Town?’ I asked as I walked over. ‘Any truth to what the natives are saying?’

  Taggart looked up. ‘What do you know about what the natives are saying?’

  ‘One of my Indian officers threatened to resign earlier. I talked him out of it but he was quite upset. Claims what happened in the Punjab was a massacre.’

  Taggart’s face hardened. ‘He may be right. Some damn fool of a general thought he could persuade a crowd of civilians to disperse by shooting at them in an enclosed space. The military are trying to put a gloss on it, but the truth is the whole thing’s a bloody disaster. The imbecile thought a show of force would teach the natives a lesson. All he’s done is throw the whole country into turmoil. Mark my words, thanks to that idiot, every white man and woman in India may soon be a target for revenge. And as for our dear city, I don’t need to tell you how much of a tinderbox it is. This could be just the excuse the terrorists have been waiting for. We’ll be extremely lucky if we can get through this without further bloodshed.’

  ‘There’s more bad news on that front,’ I said, before repeating what Dawson had told me of the raid on the Bengal Burma Bank. ‘Whoever it was got away with over two hundred thousand rupees.’

  He looked grave. ‘I see what you mean.’

  He picked up the map, folded it in half and placed it to one side as he took his seat behind the desk.

  ‘The reason I called you up here,’ he said, ‘is to see if you’ve made any progress on the MacAuley case.’

  I apprised him of developments: the meeting with Reverend Gunn, MacAuley’s sourcing of prostitutes for Buchan, and the Reverend’s view that MacAuley had a darker secret which had pushed him over the edge. I told him of Devi’s account that MacAuley had been in the brothel minutes before his murder and that she believed the killer was a white man. The good news, if it could be called that, was that I was now convinced of Sen’s innocence and that there was no real link between MacAuley’s death and the attack on the Darjeeling Mail. The other side of that coin, though, was that Section H, despite tracking down Sen in record time, didn’t seem to have the first clue as to who might be behind the train attack or this latest attack on the bank.

  ‘There’s been a development on the Sen front,’ said Taggart. ‘His trial took place in camera this morning. He’s to be hanged. The sentence is to be carried out the day after tomorrow at dawn.’

  ‘That was fast,’ I said. ‘With half of Calcutta burning and a terrorist cell on the loose, I’d have thought Section H would have more pressing matters to attend to than staging some sham of a trial.’

  ‘Yes, well,’ he said, ‘facts are facts. If you are going to get to the bottom of this, I suggest you do it quickly. Once Sen’s executed I won’t be able to justify any further investigation.’

  ‘In that case, I’d like to pay Sen a visit. Can you get me permission?’

  Taggart thought for a moment, then nodded. ‘He’s being held at Fort William until his execution. I’ll have Daniels type up a note authorising your access to the prisoner. Use what time you have left wisely, Sam,’ he said, rising from his seat. ‘I think you’re on to something but time’s running out. Whatever you plan on doing, do it soon.’

  Surrender-not and I followed several paces behind a stone-faced sepoy, along a corridor deep underneath Fort William. Footsteps echoed on the cobbled fl
oor and across dank walls. To one side, iron doors barred the entrance to small cells. The place felt like a dungeon, the air was cool and damp but with none of the stench of vomit and urine that hangs over most holding cell blocks. On the contrary, this one smelled of disinfectant, as though it was regularly scrubbed clean. That was interesting. No one cleans a cell block so clinically unless they’ve something to hide.

  Sen’s cell was little more than an alcove built into one wall. He lay on a stone shelf which passed for a cot, and looked over as the guard unlocked the cell door, before slowly sitting up. His face was bruised, one eye swollen shut.

  ‘Captain Wyndham,’ he said, ‘it seems you were right about the accommodation at Fort William. It’s not quite five star.’

  ‘From the look of you, it seems you’ve had a bit of a disagreement with the management.’

  He laughed awkwardly. ‘Still, I shouldn’t be staying much longer.’

  ‘I heard about the trial,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, it was all very… efficient. Done and dusted in a matter of minutes. Somehow I expected the wheels of justice to turn a little more sedately. Such haste appears somewhat unseemly, don’t you think?’

  ‘Did you have counsel?’

  Sen smiled through a burst lip. ‘Oh yes, a court-appointed chap. An Englishman. A nice fellow but he seemed rather unfamiliar with the basics of mounting a defence. At one point I feared he might apologise to the court for wasting its time. Not that there was much he could have done. I don’t suppose the best barrister in India would have fared any better given the system of justice that operates in this country. You wouldn’t happen to have a cigarette, would you?’ He pointed to the sepoy who stood stern-faced at the cell door. ‘These military wallahs haven’t given me a single one.’

  I fished out a crumpled packet of Capstans and handed it to him.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said, extracting one of the remaining cigarettes. ‘I appreciate the gesture. I just hope these gentlemen’s generosity will extend to offering me a light once you’ve gone.’

  I lit a match and held it out for him. The flame illuminated the bruising and blood encrusted on Sen’s lip.

  ‘What happened to your face?’ I asked.

  ‘This?’ he said, pointing to his closed eye. ‘Your friends here were rather keen that I sign a confession.’

  ‘Did you?’

  Sen shook his head. ‘No. They gave up after about an hour. To be honest, I think they were rather half-hearted about it. I suppose in the end they felt they didn’t really need one. Seems they were right.’

  ‘I’ve got some bad news,’ I said. ‘Your execution’s been scheduled for six o’clock on Wednesday morning.’ I watched as he took in the information. ‘I suggest you get your counsel to lodge an appeal.’

  ‘A wonderful idea, Captain,’ Sen replied, ‘assuming I had any ability to contact him.’

  ‘You could seek alternative counsel?’ Surrender-not suddenly interjected. ‘An Indian maybe? There must be a dozen top barristers who’d jump at the chance of representing you, especially after yesterday’s developments.’

  Sen stared at him quizzically. It appeared the cells at Fort William were one place the government’s news blackout had worked. I recounted the events in Amritsar to him, a sanitised version at any rate, though not as whitewashed as the official version. That seemed pointless with Surrender-not in the room.

  ‘Unarmed civilians?’ he asked.

  ‘Possibly.’

  ‘And the reaction?’

  ‘There are reports of rioting from across the country. It doesn’t look like your hopes for non-violent protest are going to be realised any time soon.’

  He shook his head. ‘A tragedy, Captain. For my people and yours. However, all it does is redouble the need for non-violence. The actions of this General Dyer are an act of weakness, motivated by fear. We must show him, and others like him, that they have nothing to fear from change.’

  There was silence for a minute as Sen sucked on his cigarette.

  ‘There’s something else I need to ask you,’ I said.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘There was an attack on a bank on Saturday night. I suspect it’s linked to the attack on the Darjeeling Mail. I think the perpetrators were looking for funds to buy arms and finance a terrorist campaign. With what’s happened in Amritsar, an attack now could spiral into something uncontrollable and engulf the whole country. Thousands of innocents could die. If you truly believe what you say about non-violence, you need to tell me anything you know about who may be behind it, if not for me, then for the sake of your own conscience.’

  Sen gave a short laugh.

  ‘My conscience? Are you a priest come to give absolution for my sins, Captain? You forget, I’m not a Christian. My sins are part of my karma, and the law of karma does not allow for the possibility of forgiveness. Its consequences are inescapable.’

  ‘I only meant that you might wish to tell me something that may help avert a potential bloodbath. Maybe the names of individuals who are still involved in the violent struggle?’

  Sen shook his head. ‘I’m sorry, Captain. I cannot do that. Maybe if I could be assured that they would receive a fair trial but under the circumstances…’ He held a hand up to his bruised face. ‘We both know that would be impossible. Anything I told you would simply lead to their execution. I cannot allow that to happen to former comrades just because I no longer agree with their methods.’

  ‘What about foreigners?’ I asked. ‘Men who foment such violence for their own political ends?’

  He looked at me like a professor lecturing a student. ‘In my time, Captain, I have been accused by your press of being in the pay of whoever happens to be the foreign bogeyman of the day, everyone from the Kaiser to the Bolsheviks. I can tell you that neither I nor any other Indian patriot has ever acted in the interests of any nation other than Mother India. We may have taken assistance from outsiders, but we have never followed their agenda. I doubt you would act any differently if you were in our position. After all, don’t you English say, My enemy’s enemy is my friend?’

  With that, he gave a mischievous smile and held out his hand. The meeting was over. He was reconciled to his fate. In truth, I suspected he was secretly happy with a martyr’s death. It fitted nicely with what I was beginning to understand of the Bengali psyche. For him, there could be no finer outcome to a life of struggle against injustice, both real and imagined, than a pointless but glorious martyrdom. A death that might inspire others to take up the cause.

  I took his hand and shook it.

  The journey back to Lal Bazar was quick. We hitched another lift courtesy of the army, this time in a staff car. The roads were surprisingly quiet, and you might have been forgiven for thinking it was a Sunday. At least you would have if it wasn’t for the sandbags and heavily armed troops at every street corner.

  Surrender-not and I didn’t speak much on the way. Too many things were troubling me, and the sergeant was hardly one for conversation at the best of times.

  ‘We need to see Buchan again,’ I said finally.

  Surrender-not stared wide-eyed. ‘You want to question him again?’

  ‘I think “confront” may be a more appropriate term.’

  ‘With what, sir? We’ve no evidence, just speculation, and our one and only witness is dead.’

  He was right. We had precious little. Only the word of an old priest who stated that Buchan was involved, and who made no attempt to hide his contempt for the man. But confronting Buchan was the only card I had left. I had no choice but to play it.

  ‘See if you can find out where he is,’ I said. ‘I want to see him as soon as possible.’

  An hour later, Surrender-not knocked on my door. His face suggested even more bad news. Then again, it may have just been coincidence. His face always tended to look like that and the news always seemed to be bad.

  ‘Buchan’s uncontactable, sir.’

  ‘Is he in Serampore?’

  �
�No, sir. His secretary doesn’t know where he is. He was supposed to return to Serampore today but his travel plans have been disrupted by the… situation in the country. He’s hoping Mr Buchan will be back by tomorrow morning. Even then, the road and rail links to the north are closed. The only way up to Serampore will be by boat.’

  That was less than ideal. Things seemed much easier back in England, where you could make pretty much any journey in a matter of hours. Hell, things were probably easier in wartime France, even with three million heavily armed Germans trying to get in your way.

  ‘Very well. See if you can organise transport for tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘There is one thing, sir. The report from Companies House on Mr Stevens. He’s not listed as a shareholder in any company that’s registered in Calcutta or Rangoon… but his wife is.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘She’s the majority shareholder in a rubber plantation near Mandalay. I only found out because Stevens is listed as the company secretary. I took the liberty of examining a copy of the accounts and it appears that the company is not in good shape. It’s heavily indebted to several banks, primarily the Bengal Burma Banking Corporation.’

  That made me sit up.

  Suddenly Stevens had become a lot more interesting to me. His wife owned a rubber plantation in hock to the banks, and Annie had mentioned he’d argued with MacAuley over import tariffs on products from Burma. All at once he had a real motive: money. It was one of the unholy trinity of motives. The other two were sex and power. This case now had all three. At first, I’d thought it was about power on the largest possible scale, a murder aimed at changing who ruled the country. With Sen no longer my prime suspect, the focus had changed to sex, specifically Buchan and his procuring of prostitutes. Now, it seemed, I had another serious contender: Stevens’ financial problems. That muddied the waters further.

  ‘Come on,’ I said to Banerjee as I rose and picked up my cap. ‘Back to Writers’ Building.’