At first, he could see only the eyes, glowing like fireflies in the dark, not far off the ground—perhaps no more than the height of the thickest of the banyan roots. Moonbeams reflected back from the eyes, the way they would in the black waters of a lake, so that he was surrounded by points of light. The smell was as thickly layered as paint; rich, oily, unpleasantly musky, like freshly turned earth where something rotten had been found underneath the clods. There were many of the oily trails, and slowly, Southpaw realized that the snuffling sound he had heard in his sleep came from the creatures. He raised his whiskers, letting them uncurl and curve into the night air: bandicoots, but more of the great grey rodents than he was used to facing in Nizamuddin.
He slid his claws out, preparing for battle if need be. The snuffles shifted an octave, intensifying and then slowing. The creatures seemed hushed, waiting for something.
In the long grass beyond the banyan tree, at the start of the smooth expanse of turf that marked what Thomas had called a “golfing hole,” one of the creatures grunted. It was a question, and it was answered by another set of grunts, closer to the roots; these were rough, menacing in a way Southpaw couldn’t understand.
He backed until he was almost pressed up to the massive trunk of the banyan, glad for the cover it gave him on one side; he still had three flanks open, but if it got to paw versus claw, he might have a chance.
“It’s a new boy,” said a rusty, hoarse voice.
“It doesn’t know the rules,” said another voice, grunting.
Southpaw’s fur crawled, and he saw that the creatures were shuffling in his direction.
“Not so fast!” he called, trying to keep his mew firm. “I do not wish to attack you since this is your territory; but come too close, and I’ll defend myself.”
The scuttling stopped, and he sensed that the bandicoots were assessing him, their tiny whiskers probing him for weaknesses.
“It doesn’t belong here, the new boy doesn’t,” said a third voice. This one was unpleasantly unctuous. “It hasn’t been introduced, has it? It isn’t with the other cats, is it?”
“It isn’t,” said the hoarse voice, consideringly. “It’s all on its own.”
“It hasn’t paid the price,” said the second voice. “You can smell it on its whiskers—it’s eaten, in our territory, and it hasn’t paid the price. Cheater!”
“If it’s alone,” said the unctuous voice, caressingly, “then it’s ours, it is.”
The bandicoots chittered, and Southpaw’s hackles rose. He let his fur inflate, and growled in low warning.
“I don’t know what price you mean,” he said. “I didn’t know this was your territory; Thomas said he’d introduce me to the cats, but he was busy. But what is this talk of prices? You’re just long-nosed rats, you lot.”
He didn’t care how many of them there were in the dark, though it seemed like several large runs of bandicoots to him, judging by the volume of the grunts and snuffles. No bandicoot, thought Southpaw, fury rippling through his fear, was going to talk to a tom—a hunting tom, a blooded tom—in this manner.
“Rats, it called us!” said the first voice, its grunt angry.
“The new boy doesn’t know who runs the Golf Course,” said the second voice.
“We should show it, then,” said the unctuous voice.
Southpaw heard the scrape on the earth as the bandicoots shuffled forward. He saw the glowing eyes start to come towards him, and felt his flanks tremble: there were far too many of them! He brushed the fear from his whiskers and hissed at them.
The bandicoots swarmed over the tree roots, and now he could see their black beady eyes up close. They were small, and would have reached only halfway up one of his paws, but he remembered his hunts with Miao and Hulo. “They’re terrible warriors on their own,” Hulo had said once as he’d cleaned out a bad flesh wound, scouring it with his tongue to make sure it would not rot, “but they’re such cowards, bandicoots, they like sneaking up on you in gangs. Nasty little creatures, attacking in packs, howling for help if they get into a brawl on their own. Ugh, and their fur’s so oily. They leave a bad taste in your mouth!”
And then they were rushing at the tom. Southpaw unleashed his battle cry—he had borrowed it from Hulo, but he was quite proud of the imitation—and prepared to swat his opponents. He smacked the first wave of bandicoots off the ground, sending them flying back into the grass. He swatted the second wave, and the third; but the bandicoots kept on coming at him, and the feel of their tiny pink paws on his fur began to disgust him. The moon illuminated the brown hordes, some swarming up the roots nearby and trying to get behind the cat so that they could rush him from the rear. Their grunts and snuffles took on a dangerous edge; the stink of their fur was sour in his nostrils. Southpaw backed, and found that he was pressed up against the tree trunk. A prickle of unease ran through his fur, and he felt himself tremble: surely this was not the way he was going to lose in battle, nibbled and pulled at by these cowardly creatures?
“You wouldn’t dare fight me if there weren’t so many of you!” he snarled, shaking off a few who had climbed onto his back, using his fur to haul themselves up. More than the scratches they had started to inflict on his skin—which hurt no more than going through a prickly pear hedge—it was their touch that made his fur crawl, and he felt a sudden sick sense of helplessness, at not being able to avoid their naked clutching paws.
“They wouldn’t, indeed,” said a polite voice behind him. “Off with you lot, or I’ll wake the owls. Where’s Chhota Poonch?”
The bandicoots snuffled frightfully, grumbling and complaining, but they began, reluctantly, to move back. A few jabbed at Southpaw’s fur and paws vengefully as they left.
“Come on, step up,” said the handsome Bengal cat who emerged from behind the banyan tree. He was a stately, plump cat, with an air of authority, black rosettes gracing his beautiful golden fur. “I know you’re there, Poonch, I can smell your black tracks ruining the jasmine-scented air, my friend.”
There was a sullen grunt, and one of the bandicoots reluctantly turned around.
“There you are, leading valiantly from the rear as usual,” said the Bengal cat pleasantly. “What’s the meaning of this ruckus, Poonch? I thought we had an agreement, my long-snouted friend. What was it again—yes, say it out loud, I want all of your lot of ragamuffins to hear it, since they’ve obviously forgotten all about it.”
“The agreement doesn’t hold, Mulligan,” said the bandicoot with the unctuous voice, rubbing his paws together. “We would never attack a Golf Course cat, oh my whiskers, no, no, no. But a stranger, who hunts on our territory, without a permit from Chhota Poonch, you must see that…”
The tip of Mulligan’s tail twitched very slightly, but it was a sharp twitch, and the second bandicoot stopped snuffling immediately.
“Our territory?” he said, his purr so soft that Southpaw knew someone was in trouble. “Poonch? Do I hear Chamcha right? Since when has the Golf Course become your territory?”
The third bandicoot cut in, his voice smooth. “Small misunderstanding, everything can be explained, no need to bring your claws out, it is all Chamcha’s fault,” he said.
“You interest me greatly, Moonch,” said Mulligan, his mew bored but his eyes gleaming in the dark.
“Of course this is your territory, we have always said, this is the kingdom of cats, yes? And ourselves only humble squatters,” said Moonch, slinking forwards, his nose twitching eagerly at Mulligan. “We live at the pleasure of the Golf Course cats, we die at the command of the Golf Course cats, that is the way it has been for my father, and my father’s father, and his father, and all of us who have lived on the Course for so long, so very long…”
“Moonch,” said Mulligan, his whiskers administering a light smack. Southpaw could feel the tingle of annoyance in the air.
“So there is no question that this is your territory, yours and the other esteemed cats, and of course the peacocks, the Mor family whose claws
and feathers we worship,” said Moonch, oiliness seeping into his whiskers.
“No question,” said Chhota Poonch, gesturing with a sweep of his tail to the bandicoots to return to their runs.
“But as you see,” continued Moonch, his tail lowered obsequiously, “we are in great need of space. Our cousins have come visiting, and sometimes uncles and auntyjis also, and you know how it is, you cannot say, now you must go, it would be the height of rudeness.”
“Moonch,” said Mulligan, his tail waving dangerously, “I am not interested in the intricacies of the bandicoot joint family system.”
“Yes, yes, of course, saheb, why would you—scion of such a proud species, even if though, these days, there are not so many of you or the illustrious peacocks, so sad—be interested in our overcrowding problems?” said Moonch, his belly brushing the ground in a way that made Southpaw cringe for the bandicoot. “But you can see for yourself what the outcome of such inflow has been. When Chamcha said ‘our’ territory, he meant only that there are so many of us here that we are feeling an obligation to look after the place, keep an eye on things, make sure that in your absence all is well, yes? No one is sneaking in from frontside or backside? Because, saheb, after all, you are busy cats, you cannot be everywhere on the Golf Course, and this is our duty, to serve you in whichever way we can, to travel to this place and that place and make sure that at least one of our clans—mostly us bandicoots—is always there.”
There was something about Moonch’s oleaginous voice that made Southpaw feel very sleepy, and he found his whiskers nodding in agreement at the bandicoot’s persuasive arguments. It seemed reasonable enough, the oily voice made good points—but what was that the bandicoots had said? Something about a price. He hadn’t paid the price, in their territory; there had been something about running the Golf Course.
But Moonch continued, rubbing his paws together, his scent heavier than the other bandicoots, filling the heavy spring air and adding to Southpaw’s odd tiredness, and whatever the bandicoots had said to him faded out of his memory. It was such an odd voice. Flat, he would have said, dull; just as Moonch’s heavy aroma was not offensive, merely pervasive, driving out all other scents from the place. Southpaw blinked, and some instinct made him stretch and move quietly to the far side of the banyan tree trunk. He could see and hear the bandicoots as clearly as before, but he was a little out of the way of Moonch’s voice and scent. A light breeze, one of the last of the delicate night breezes that would freshen the nights and touch them all with delicious coolness before the heat of summer brought its burning force to bear on the earth, played around the trunk of the banyan. It brought the aroma of magnolia and jasmine along with it, and cleared the tom’s aching head.
“Very persuasive, Moonch,” said Mulligan, his striking tail switching back and forth, “and let us suppose that for a moment, I ignore the scent of trepidation emanating from the burrows over there, while Poonch and Chamcha wonder whether I’m going to actually let my whiskers believe your pleasing faradiddle. None of this twaddle explains why a Golf Course cat was attacked by a complete thuggery of bandicoots.”
The ivory moonlight shone strong on the Bengal cat, and Southpaw saw the grimness in Mulligan’s hazel eyes.
“But a thousand apologies,” Moonch said, turning to Southpaw. “We thought we were merely defending the sacred land of the Golf Course cats against an intruder.”
“No,” said Southpaw slowly, his fur prickling in remembrance, and the whiskers over his eyes waking from their somnolence, “you said—or at least Poonch said—that I didn’t know who ran the Golf Course, and you would show me.”
Mulligan spat, and arched his back, the gleam in his eyes positively dangerous.
“I’ve warned you, Poonch! Remember how your tail was shortened in the first place!”
Southpaw’s whiskers bristled, sensing a shift in the wind. He peered into the darkness and his eyes widened: it couldn’t be his imagination, could it? Were the bandicoots waiting and listening at the very mouths of their burrows? Even his eyesight wasn’t good enough to penetrate that far into the dark earth and the long, shivering grasses, but he caught the thick black scent trails, like brushstrokes around the rim of the burrows, and he was sure. They were waiting, their eyes like small coals in the dark, for some sort of signal. The scents were shifting, becoming muddier, thicker, exuding a sourness like the ooze at the bottom of an old puddle: the bandicoots were sullen, not liking what Mulligan had said one bit.
Furtively, he slid his claws out, taking care not to let them click on the tree roots. If it came to a fight, he and Mulligan were probably as outnumbered as he had been on his own, but the tom didn’t mean to let the Bengal cat handle the—what had he called them—thuggery of bandicoots on his own. Two sets of teeth were better than one, eight sets of claws could rip and shred more flesh than four.
But Moonch had oiled his way in between them and Poonch. Southpaw had the strange sense that an urgent message passed between this bandicoot and his fellows. He thought he heard Moonch say, “Not yet!” in an urgent snuffle, but he might have been wrong.
“Oho, but I am now fully seized of the matter! What a mix-up, what a blunder, what a misapprehension you were under,” said Moonch, his whiskers sending small ingratiating twitches Southpaw’s way. “How were you to know who ran the Golf Course, no, no, no, you are fully blameless. The name of Mulligan may be famous, every blade of grass knows his esteemed clan, but you as an outsider—oho, of course not, you would not know who runs the Golf Course. We know. Poonch knows. Chamcha knows. And we were going to take you to the esteemed clan, but how were you to know, small wonder you attacked us, but of course, no blame attaches. We will accept apology, any time, no problem, any friend of the Golf Course cats is a friend of ours, what are a few scratches here and there?”
Mulligan’s tail twitched uncertainly, as he stared first at Southpaw, then at Moonch.
“I didn’t attack you!” Southpaw said, his mew so indignant it came out as a hiss. “Your friends attacked first, I only defended myself.”
Moonch looked down and dug at the ground with his long snout, not meeting Southpaw’s eyes.
“Whatever you say,” he said soothingly, “it shall all be as you say. I can see your whiskers are still mostly black, only one or two white, young toms have such hot blood, yes? But of course, no need for apologies among friends, and any friend of Mr. Mulligan’s is a friend of ours, all you have to do is to twitch your whiskers and we are at your service.” Behind him, Poonch grunted. It was a contented sound, as though the bandicoot had been given something that he had wanted all along.
“It would take all night to uncomb the tangles in this matter,” said Mulligan, his whiskers truculent, “and I don’t have all night. Thomas Mor told me Southpaw would be somewhere in these parts, and just so that we understand each other—any cat found on the course, whether of the clan or not, is to be considered a Golf Course cat until we mark him as an intruder. Is that clear?”
“Yes, yes,” said Moonch smoothly, “we shall treat all cats we meet exactly as they deserve.” Southpaw’s whiskers went up. Moonch’s voice had been as smooth as ever, but there had been the tiniest of shifts in his scent; a sudden flash of dark anger, or had he imagined that, too?
Mulligan lowered his head, the ears held upright so that he could listen at the widest range possible.
“Moonch,” he said, “how many bandicoots are there in your clan? Have the burrows expanded? I haven’t been this side for such a long time, and it seems…”
“Not at all!” said Moonch hurriedly. “You’re smelling the old runs. A rat snake lived on that side of the tall grasses, and he must have left behind many small corpses of prey. None of us go there, of course. If you’re smelling the skein of scents from the bushes near the water hazard, that is where the rats used to live, until they…they shifted. After the rat snake…he left too. Some time ago. These snakes, so restless.”
“I thought there were a lot of you,�
� said Southpaw, his nose picking up on Moonch’s unease. And there it was again, a sharp, hastily concealed but unmistakeable flash of anger, leaving a stain of black scent in the air. Then the breeze started up again, and jasmine’s dazzling white perfume filled his nostrils.
“So did I,” said Mulligan, and there was a distinct menace in his purr. “Poonch? The cousins who came visiting you last year, before the monsoons? Did they leave, or are they still here?”
Moonch snuffled before Poonch could answer. “Mulligan saheb!” he said. “You do us too much honour! I am so delighted, so touched—no cat, not even your honourable father and mother, no, no, no, none of you have ever asked after our families. Would you care to visit my humble abode one of these days, perhaps share an earthworm or two with us?”
Mulligan was silent for such a long time that Southpaw felt the unease spread in the air. His fur felt cold, touched by a hundred tiny beady eyes, and he felt that there were watchers whom they could not see, listeners taking care not to snuffle or grunt.
Then the Bengal cat spoke, and his mew was friendly enough. “It is kind of you to invite me, Moonch,” he said. “I may take you up on your invitation one of these days, before summer falls upon us. It seems to me that my clan has neglected this part of the Golf Course, for far too long.”
They heard Poonch’s nervous grunt, and then Moonch answered, his whiskers taut, his snuffle more sure this time.
“But of course, Mulligan saheb, at your pleasure,” he said. “We have not felt the neglect in this tiny corner of our…your…territory, but you and your clan will always be received in the appropriate manner. You must come. All of you must come. There are so few of you left, are there not? I remember tales of the days when every hole on the course had a clan of cats guarding the tee, but then times change, life moves on.”
“Some things don’t change that much,” said Mulligan, stretching and stropping his claws on the roots of the banyan tree. “The Golf Course will always be home to the peacocks and us cats, and the snakes will always patrol its borders, near and far. Along with the bandicoot clans, Moonch. It has been many generations since all of our tribes and clans have shared these wide greens, these vast acres between us—peaceably, I might add.”
The Hundred Names of Darkness Page 22