Bribery, Corruption Also

by H. R. F. Keating

  Protima had been duly shocked at hearing the great industrialist named as the man who needed right of passage through her house and its compound. Shocked and, he secretly hoped, impressed by the way her husband had found out what he had.

  So, while she was thoughtfully silent, he went on to tell her that finding out about M. F. Tuntunwala was not the end of the business.

  'So it became next step,' he said, 'to learn from M. F. Tuntunwala himself perhaps just only one small fact that would provide enough to make a paper as powerful as The Statesman take up the matter. But, you understand, I could not just only go to Tuntunwala House and demand and demand to see M. F. Tuntunwala. But then I was learning it is his habit to visit the Marble Palace almost each and every Thursday a.m. And it was in order for me to meet him face-to-face that we were there just now.'

  At this Protima did look a little resentful.

  ‘And I was succeeding to meet him,' he plunged on. 'It was when I was claiming to have headache and you were going back into those gardens.'

  Now she bristled a little more.

  ‘Being sent back into gardens, as if I was too much of a fool to be allowed to talk with a great man like M. F. Tuntunwala.'

  ‘Well, yes. I mean, no. No. No. But I was thinking it would be easier if just only one person was trying to learn from him what I was needing.'

  ‘Well, what did you learn?'

  He had not quite expected that question, or not as soon as this in the course of his explanation. In fact, he had not really prepared himself for it.

  ‘Well. . . Well, it is not altogether simple to get from a man of the power of M. F. Tuntunwala what it is you are wanting to know. Not when he is deciding he will tell you something else.'

  ‘So you know nothing? Nothing that is worth knowing?'

  ‘Well... No. I suppose I do not.'

  ‘Then what did M. F. Tuntunwala say to you?'

  This was worse.

  ‘He was ... He was talking about corruption.'

  'What else would he talk? No doubt the man is corruption itself.'

  ‘But, yes. Yes, that is what, if you are liking, he was telling and explaining. That corruption is everywhere. That one and all are practising same. That he has no conscience about using corruption. That even it is a good thing to do for one and all.'

  'It is not.'

  'Oh, I am knowing that. But. . .'

  He was aware that his not being able to go on was in fact an inner admission that he felt still M. F. Tuntunwala, somehow, had it right.

  'What but?'

  The question shot out.

  He frowned in bewilderment.

  'Somehow,' he answered slowly, 'what M. F. Tuntunwala was saying had in it very much of conviction. You yourself should have been hearing.'

  'And why I was not? Because you, Inspector Ghote, Bombay Crime Branch, are believing yours is work for big-big men only and you were making sure I was just only walking in gardens looking at some ducks.'

  'No, no. No, it is not at all like that.'

  'Then why was I not inside Marble Palace listening to lies M. F. Tuntunwala was telling? And not, like Inspector Ghote, Bombay Crime Branch, believing each and every one of them?'

  'But- '

  'Then, after you had believed and believed those lies, you were saying to M. F. Tuntunwala, Oh, yes, maharaj, I would do whatsoever you are wishing? Yes? Yes?'

  And, yes, he inwardly admitted that was - two-three protests apart - almost what I was saying.

  'No. I was not saying that.'

  ‘So what you were saying?'

  'It was more what M. F. Tuntunwala was saying.'

  ‘And what he was?'

  He sighed. Sighed to the pit of his stomach.

  ‘He was in the end saying I should leave.'

  ‘Leave? Leave where? Leave just only Marble Palace where you were spoiling his mood? Or leave Calcutta itself? It was that, yes? He was telling you, telling myself also, to go back to Bombay and not be like whine-whining mosquitoes troubling the great sahib?'

  'Yes.'

  It was all there was to say.

  But not all Protima had to say.

  ‘And you were letting him give you that order? You were willing to go? To go from Calcutta back to Bombay, and leave that man to take my house, my house, just when he is wanting?'

  To go back to Bombay, where I am knowing who I am and what I am doing: yes, that is what I am very much willing to do. But. . .

  ‘My house, my house,' Protima repeated, her voice ringing round the dining-room, now mercifully empty except for one aged, turbaned waiter dolefully clearing a distant table. ‘And do you know I have not as much as seen one piece ownership paper for that house? What they are called? Deeds? Yes, deeds. That man Dutt-Dastar has been keeping and keeping from me even the deeds of my own house.'

  ‘Yes, he could have given,' he agreed quietly.

  He must make some concessions to her, even though if she got hold of those deeds they would not now do her any good. One way or another, by bribing here, by bribing there, M. F. Tuntunwala was going to get possession of her house.

  ‘He could have given, and he should have given. He is going to give. He is going to give now, just so soon as we can get round to his chamber. And then, when I am in possession of same, you are knowing what I am going to do?'

  ‘No,' he answered helplessly.

  Protima rose from her seat at the table.

  ‘I am going to that American gentleman who was sitting there' - She pointed with fiercely outstretched arm to the table where they had overheard occasional snatches of talk between the dog-faced American, Mr Deen Kogan, and his British friend - 'and I will ask him, as one expert on the restoring of ruined palaces, to come to see my house.'

  He sat in silent misery.

  How could she still think her house was going to be put into a state of repair? It was not. It was not. It was going to crumble before the mighty power of M. F. Tuntunwala. It was going, really and truly, to be ground down to nothingness. And Protima and myself are going to go, like whipped pi-dogs, back to Bombay where we came from.

  ‘Oh, ask, ask,' he said at last. ‘Ask as much as you are liking. But first see if you are able to get those deeds out of A. K. Dutt-Dastar.'

  It took them, however, an infuriatingly long time to get to A. K. Dutt-Dastar's chamber. First of all, out in Sudder Street, where usually there seemed to be nothing but frantic shouts of Want taxi? Want taxi? there was not a taxi to be seen. At last Ghote spotted one turning in from Chowringhee at the end of the street and by pelting hard in that direction managed to grab it before anyone else.

  But, coming up as it was from the Maidan, it was heading in the wrong direction for them. In consequence it took them what seemed like hours to thread their way through the tangled streets of North Calcutta, eventually to emerge into BBD Bagh, its vast Writers' Building and the glittering surface of the great tank at its centre. There they had to fight their way past buses abruptly pulling out from where they had been halted, past clanging trams and the whole jerky complexity of other traffic.

  So Protima, who had begun the journey no more than tight-lipped with suppressed anger, was by the time they came to a halt in Rabindra Sarani sputtering with rage.

  'How can a journey just only as short as that take so long?'

  'Traffic bad,' Ghote suggested peaceably. 'In Bombay. . .'

  He left it. He had been about to say that, though Bombay's traffic was seldom less than terrible, drivers there did usually manage to make reasonable, common-sense progress. But he decided comparisons in Bombay's favour were not what Protima would want to hear at this moment.

  But he had left it too late.

  'Bombay. Bombay. You are always and always stating how much better is Bombay. I am sick and tired to hear it.'

  He shrugged.

  What she had claimed was scarcely true. But it would be a good thing if she were in a little less of a fiery Bengali mood by the time they confronted A. K. Dutt-Dastar. Sh
outing at him was hardly likely to bring to light the deeds of the house, if the lawyer had not already been forbidden by M. F. Tuntunwala to part with them until the sale of the house was certain.

  In just two minutes more, however, it looked as if they were at least on the point of being able to make their demand. The clerk Haripada, still inkily thumping away at his ancient typewriter, had gone, upright and creaky of step, to ask if his master was free. Surprisingly, it appeared that he was. They had marched then into his book-lined chamber and found him behind his wide, gleaming desk, hands spread on its big green blotter, which today did not match the pale brown shirt he was wearing. For once, too, his eyes were not hidden behind his black wrap-around glasses.

  ‘Mrs Ghote, what a pleasure to see you. You, too, Inspector. Delighted to see you both. If, alas, it is for the last time. Calcutta's loss, Bombay's gain.' A swift insincere smile. ‘But let us get down to business. No delay. I know Bombay ways. Abandon idle Calcutta chit-chat, yes? Business before pleasure. Now, first of all I have to tell you - I am sorry indeed to say it - your purchaser is no longer as willing to pay as much as he was. You will have to accept the diminished return. But that— '

  And here pent-up Protima at last burst in.

  ‘Mr Dutt-Dastar, am I understanding you still think I am wishing to sell my house? Let me tell, you could not be more mistaken. I have never for one single moment wished to sell. And even less now do I wish.'

  The lawyer's face was suddenly a whole illustration of bewilderment.

  ‘But— But I underst— ' He licked at his lips. 'Mrs Ghote, Inspec— Mr Ghote . . . You have changed your minds? I— I— But, listen, I thought I had made it clear. Retaining possession of the house is not really an option for you. The state of the place . . . The legal difficulties . . .'

  Ghote decided it was time for plain speaking.

  'Mr Dutt-Dastar, we are well aware of your attempts to trick us into parting with the house. To parting with it to a nominee purchaser. We are aware, even, who is behind such a purchaser. And we are here— My wife is here to demand from you the deeds of the house she has legally inherited. The deeds which you now, as a lawyer, hold in trust.'

  'The— The deeds? You are coming here actually to request to have the deeds of that house?'

  'What else?' Protima banged in. 'It is my house. You are the lawyer executing the will of my late cousin. It is your duty to pass on to me, the rightful owner, those deeds.'

  'I— I shall have to think.'

  'What is there to think?' Protima snapped. 'There is to give only.'

  'Well. . . Well. . . Well, you see, naturally I have not been keeping such valuable and important papers here in my chamber. I would be failing in my duty had I done so. Yes, failing in my duty. The deeds, are, of course, lodged in the bank.'

  He looked up now from the green blotter to which he had been addressing most of what he had said.

  'And,' he added with new sharpness, ‘it is now too late to retrieve them. Banking hours have come to an end. Sadly to say.'

  Ghote looked at the watch on his wrist, although he had at once realized that the tricky lawyer had been speaking the truth. Yes, it was now definitely too far advanced into the afternoon. What a piece of pure bad luck. The lack of taxis in Sudder Street. The extra length of their trip here. But bad luck it was. Though good luck for A. K. Dutt-Dastar.

  'Mr Dutt-Dastar— ' Protima was beginning again, but the lawyer swiftly cut in.

  'However, do not worry.' He glinted out another flash of a smile. 'Tomorrow the banks are open. I can be there just as soon as the doors are parted. I can remove those deeds from the deposit-box where they are in safe keeping. You may have them at whatever hour will suit you.'

  Trickery. Some trickeries only are there.

  But, though this was Ghote's first thought, he could not see how A. K. Dutt-Dastar's smiling assurance was really going to help the fellow to withhold the deeds. True, earlier he had imposed delays in handing over money for Protima to pay an expert to look over the house. But, even if tomorrow he found some reason not to part with the deeds, he had admitted they were in his possession and that Protima had a right to them. So perhaps it could be only a matter of time before she had them in her hands.

  The deeds, he thought with a sudden inward descent, of the Calcutta house she still resolutely intends to stay in for the rest of her days. Something I must help her to do to my level best. For all that I know now M. F. Tuntunwala will, by hooks and by crooks, get his road to the wetlands through it.

  And plainly much the same thoughts about the deeds had been passing through Protima's mind, if without that depressing addition.

  'Very well, Mr Dutt-Dastar,' she said, laying the words down like so many winning cards, 'tomorrow at ten-thirty itself we shall be here. Here to receive those deeds.'

  'Madam, it will be my pleasure.'

  Protima, as soon as they had emerged from the lane into the noise and bustle of Rabindra Sarani, proposed, eyes alight with what she believed to be her triumph, that as soon as they could they should find none other than Mr Deen Kogan, American expert in restoring delapidated houses. They would arrange with him to go and inspect her house. She had not the least doubt he would agree. And then they would go that very evening to the Son-et-Lumiere display at the Victoria Memorial.

  'They are telling it gives a fine history of Calcutta.'

  But when Ghote ventured to say he lacked the heart to go after all the turmoil of the day she agreed to postpone the outing.

  'Perhaps you are right. Until and until I have those deeds in my hand I would not truly believe we are going to be able to stay here in Calcutta. And to watch that history, if somehow we are still going to be tricked, would be altogether cruel.'

  'So you also are wondering if we shall be tricked?' he asked, hoping that this was her way of preparing herself for the defeat he knew was inevitable.

  'With a man like Dutt-Dastar there, it is not easy to be hopeful.'

  He noted with an inward jump of pleasure that from having been - what was it? - a Bengali gentleman to the last the lawyer had been relegated now to a man like Dutt-Dastar. But such pleasure as he took from this concession was before very much longer to be swept utterly from his mind.

  Chapter Nineteen

  They failed to find Mr Deen Kogan anywhere in the Fairlawn. So Protima declared she would abandon everything and go once more to the Kalighat Tfemple to beg for Goddess Kali's aid. ‘She is, even you must be knowing, the destroyer of the wicked. And, if one thing only is sure, it is that M. F. Tuntunwala is wicked in wanting the house that is truly mine.'

  Ghote, unwilling, as he thought of it, to sink himself to begging to a goddess he had long ceased to believe in - though in a deep comer of his mind secretly hopeful Protima's prayers would work a miracle - prepared himself to spend a dull evening amid the insistent Britishness of the hotel, the framed photographs of the Queen of England with her little dogs, of a fading Prince Charles, of the Queen with her militarily stiff husband.

  For a few minutes after he had dutifully consumed the British fare at dinner, faintly spicy mulligatawny soup, lamb chops in a totally unspiced gravy, bread-and-butter pudding, he had gone out into Sudder Street, seeking distraction. But the sound of so many exuberant Bengalis talking, talking, talking in their over-excited way - Yes, in Bombay we are talking, but not as if it is our last chance to say all we have to say -filled him even more deeply with depression.

  What if Protima's prayers are after all succeeding, he asked himself in a sudden spat of fury. How would I endure to stay in this place for the rest of my life itself? In that too, too big house? Doing all these damn Bengali things? Must I also come to shout out at top volume each and every thought I am having?

  A terrible idea flitted into his mind then, as he stood half-watching the young foreign tourists crammed chattering in the Blue Sky Cafe.

  Should I go back to Bombay alone? I could resume duty. Even if I was not having any share of the money she i
s inheriting with the house, I could live. I have my pay and allowances. I will have my pension, that I am making so much of obligatory payments towards.

  But, no. No, he answered himself as quickly as the question had made its beguiling passage through his head. I could never leave Protima here, in this city. This city ruled by big men like M. F. Tuntunwala and his friends. M. F. Tuntunwala would not so easily forgive if she was succeeding somehow to keep the house against his wish. She would not be safe here. Not at all. Very well, Bombay also is a city with one full share of nefarious activities. But that is a lawlessness we are knowing how to put at a distance. But here, in this place she was once saying was so much more peaceful, it is turning out to be altogether different. No. No. No. I could not leave her here alone.

  He had tramped hastily back into the hotel then. Even a British ghostliness was better than the thought of Calcutta life. And perhaps death. What else but death was it that Khokon Roy warned me of?

  Glumly he sat with a sprinkling of the Fairlawn's foreign guests to watch an old black-and-white video of a film called In Which We Serve. Perhaps, he thought, after all I should have gone to Kalighat Temple and prayed, against all reason, that everything may turn out well.

  ‘Our film,' announced the hotel proprietress, presiding over the showing, ‘was made in days when we British set an example to the world. You know the ship that is sunk in it was based on H. M. S. Kelly, which went down commanded by Lord Mounbatten, last Viceroy of India?'

  She was rewarded with a murmur of appreciation from the handful of viewers. Ghote did not join in. On the small screen in front of them the video flickered by. Noel Coward proclaimed in his closed-up British voice, If they had to die what a grand way to go .. . There isn't one of you I wouldn't he proud and honoured to serve with again.

  But, Ghote thought in the surrounding darkness, were any of those hundred per cent British gentlemen actually taking bribes in secret, or offering them? Who would know?