Rajmahal (14 page)

When Proshanto Mojumdar's memory played tricks, Shudhangshu at first protested. But later, with Proshanto's insistent reinventions he often had to shake himself out of an almost willing suspension of memory.

And here he was, so irritated by his brother's memory tricks, yet forgetting he had manipulated that very memory for his own ends. It was he, Shudhangshu, who had planted the worry in his brother's mind about his imaginary cardiac problems. The strange thing was that Shudhangshu
sometimes caught himself believing in his own inventions, and this increased his irritation with his innocent elder brother.

“No,” he would say, “don't you remember? So and so wasn't there. Look. Here's the picture. Can you see him? He's not there. He couldn't come. Remember?' Proshanto would nod absentmindedly. But soon, he would be reinventing again, chortling at the typically amusing behavior of the same so-and-so at the same event. And after a period of this, Shudhangshu would no longer trouble to take out the picture, but would almost remember so-and-so at the event himself. He would have to shake himself not to “see” so-and-so in a particular position with a particular expression in the picture when he wasn't there at all! There would be an almost willing suspension of memory with Pro's insistent reinventions.

Petrov's Diary:
Is forgetfulness invariable with old age? Today Proshanto Mojumdar spoke of the Metro again, the wonderful, incomparable Calcutta Metro! His brother Shudo complained that Proshanto was forgetful and had completely obliterated the years of torture to Calcutta's citizens while the Metro was being built. In fact, most Calcutta citizens have obliterated this memory of torture in their swollen-headed pride over the Metro! Memory, can do many harmful acrobatics, denying an inconvenient fact which simply ceases, never was . . . In this arena of memory and forgetting , truth and hallucination, people often cannot place themselves or identify their own roles. Taking the logic beyond its limit, one wonders if old age doesn't bring one's brain into the region of the absurd, to confuse invention with reality because it is made reality, because invention sublimates fact.

Shudhangshu's relief at seeing his son's letter was short-lived. After a simple query to the shipping line, he discovered Rudrangshu was nothing but a steward, a waiter, on board the QE II. “Mojumdar, Rudolph: Steward. Duties: Serving meals in first class dining hall,” was the terse reply.

“I didn't have a son for him to become a waiter! And exchange his name for a red-nosed reindeer!” he moaned. He couldn't accept that “Rudolph” was unmitigatingly happy. Non-threatening and unthreatened in turn, he was in paradise. And it was only Rudrangshu's Mini-ma who could appreciate his success, his happiness, actually. When Mohini's ghost read the letter from the QE II over Shudhangshu's shoulder, she chuckled with joy.

Shudhangshu's reaction was the opposite. “By Jove!” he declared. “That boy is back to his lazy, tranquil self !” Shattered with the shame of the news,
he felt a resurgent vicarious ambition for his offspring. Mohini's ghost was in a turmoil of speculation. “I hope he's not on that track again!” she said.

That night, Shudhangshu went into a frenzy when he found the last crate of whiskey innocent of bottles, the last bottle innocent of whiskey, and all the shops closed. He shouted at the servants who had nothing to say, having themselves contributed unstintingly to the crisis. He foraged desperately and found a stock of gin. “Inferior stuff compared to that noble drink,” he grumbled. “But what choice do I have?”

The apartment had been locked, the servants had left, and Proshanto was watching the late night news, a blind habit.

Shudhangshu came into the room. “
Dada,
” he slurred, making an effort to keep a straight course. “I've had enough nonsense from you! Now sign this!” He thrust a checkbook at Proshanto.

“No I will not!” said Proshanto with astonishing alacrity. “I most certainly will not! I know what you are up to!”

Shudhangshu balked. “But it's for Rudro!” he pleaded. “Don't you want to do this for Rudro? He's like your own son!”

Proshanto smiled fondly and foolishly. “Where is the dear boy? Rudro, Rudro!”

“Bloody hell!” shouted Shudhangshu. He tried to push a pen into Proshanto's hand, but there was no cooperation. The pen fell to the ground. The dog's growling could be heard from the next room.

“Damn, damn, damn . . . !” Shudhangshu lurched out of the room in a blurring trail of curses. Proshanto was lost in a vintage cowboy film when Shudhangshu came back, chortling to himself, with a gun in his hand. It was Proshanto's turn to balk.

Shudhangshu banged the checkbook down on the table next to Proshanto. “Sign! On each and every check!” His gun was limp in a shaky hand. But Proshanto, without hearing, and reacting to the scene on the TV screen, was raising both his arms above his head. Shudhangshu backed away, and pointed the gun at his elder brother in a reversal of the cowboy sequence. “Come on, you old skinflint! Sign!”

Proshanto's arms were paining, and he missed the rudeness. “Can I put my arms down? Please. The pain is most intense.” His arms trembled like the Sardar Bahadur's when he had held the
Guru Granth Sahib
over his head.

“Who asked you to put them up in the first place?” said Shudhangshu
without answering the question. He came closer, bumping into things. The enclosed room reeked with a distasteful odor.

“I cannot keep my arms up for such a long period. It is impossible!” insisted Proshanto.

“For god's sake put them down and sign!” The gun in Shudhangshu's hand was unsteady, he was rocking as he tried to keep standing. He put out a hand and lurched against a table. The table fell over and there was a crash of china.

“Ei! That is Mini's favorite piece! What are you doing?” said Proshanto, bringing down his arms at last. Shudhangshu's gun lay where it had fallen, in a heap of broken china.

“Mini, Mini! I remember the time when you and your Mini were fighting like cat and dog. Why this sudden devotion now that she's dead and gone!”

Shudhangshu bent down shakily to pick up his gun and dropped it again. “It's this damn silencer! Too heavy!”

“Here,” Proshanto said kindly, getting up. “Let me get it for you.”

“Fool!” Shudhangshu furiously grabbed the gun and whacked Proshanto on the shoulder with the butt end, falling on to him and knocking him over. “Bloody fool!”

Mohini's ghost groaned. Shudhangshu pushed himself upright, gun in one hand, waving the checkbook with the other.

“Why are you doing this?” said Proshanto from the floor, just refraining from holding his nose. “Have you gone mad? Have you forgotten my age?”

“Not at all, you old skinflint. I can hear your bones rattling. They should be rattling in heaven soon! Or better still, hell!”

The rudeness precipitated the dog's image. “Bonzo, Bonzo!” called Proshanto from the floor. No sound and no dog. A thought tickled Proshanto's memory. Had he not heard a dog's short yelp, and an abrupt pop with it? Was it his imagination, or some other memory? “Forgetfulness is the premier sign of age. Without memory one is nothing. And yet memory is the chief cause of all our misery!” he mused out loud.

“Shut up!”

“Bonzo, Bonzo!” he called again.

“Shut up!” screamed Shudhangshu, jumping up and down.

The city authorities, or an accident, activated a power failure at that very moment. There was a click and a total blackout just as the gun went off with a familiar pop. Mohini's ghost screamed unheard as the two men
were thrown in opposite directions as if pulled by a puppeteer's strings. Proshanto, who had just got himself up from the floor, fell on to a chair, quite sure he was about to die. The procedure was surprisingly painless. “I have been hit!” he thought, feeling a warm wet streak down his pajama leg. Then realizing he was unharmed, he moaned with the belated shock and shame of having urinated in his pajamas. The dog was utterly silent and it was steadfastly dark.

“Such a thing—at my age . . . ”

The violence and complete demonization of Shudhangshu had twisted up in Proshanto's mind in a tangle, a Gordian knot, a contortion of the brain. This was a burglar, no longer Shudo, his younger brother. In fact, where
was
Shudo? “Where is he, where is that Shudo? Why are the lights off? Shudo, Shudo! Where are you?”

Shudhangshu was too astonished to react. And then, the full moon appeared behind the glassed veranda doors, and a beam lit up Shudhangshu's shoe. Proshanto started nervously. “Perhaps hallucinations occur at full moon time, and lunacy ensues.” That frayed shoelace! Shudo! It was his own brother! That dreadful and well-known odor! Or was he himself, Proshanto Mojumdar, losing his mind? Can the identification of a criminal be based on a shoelace? And a hum? Is such evidence acceptable in a court of law? And then, that sharp yip, and pop? Was it some other memory? Proshanto Mojumdar's mind strained. His head pounded. He blacked out just as the room lit up again with a click.

When Proshanto came around in a second and saw Shudhangshu he was relieved. “Thank the good lord!” he said. “Where were you when the lights went off? Absent when you are most needed! And where is the dear boy? Rudro, Rudro!” Shudhangshu walked up to him in a fury, whipped up a hand and knocked his brother's jaw right, left, whack, smack! Mohini's ghost exclaimed and hit out ineffectively at Shudhangshu.

Proshanto slumped into his chair, and allowed the tears to roll down his cheeks. His thoughts careened crazily in his aching head. He started sobbing. When he could see again, he found Shudhangshu sitting on the opposite chair with a glass of water in his hands.

“Have some water,
Dada.
Come on. What is this? A grown man like you weeping. Are you a baby?”

Shudhangshu helped his trembling elder brother to sit up straight and put the glass into his hands, while Proshanto automatically held his breath and drank. He felt clearer in the head.

“It's Rudro. He has a problem,” said Shudhangshu.

“What is the problem?”

“You're so bloody tightfisted,” shouted Shudhangshu irascibly again. How can you forget that I've asked you a thousand times already. Would you ever oblige me? ‘No, no, no' that's what you always say, without hesitation! No, no, no . . . ?”

“But you said nothing about Rudro. Why did you not tell me about Rudro?”

“Dammit! How many times have I not told you? Have you forgotten how you insulted me, told me I couldn't fool you? Wouldn't do it for me, would you, you old skinflint!”

Proshanto's mouth snapped shut.

“Oh. Now you're sulking is it? And if you're so attached to your nephew why haven't you taken my hints yet? Did you try to help? Ever?” Shudhangshu fell into a brown study, equally hurt. “However desperate I am on Rudro's behalf, how can I pull this off?”

He sat with the gun slack in his hands, moodily biting his lip while expletives revolved ceaselessly in his head.

Proshanto Mojumdar dozed off. His weighing scale of life had tilted decisively toward happiness after the swimming pool triumph and the revival of his libido, manifesting that very night with his hearty dream laughter. People at times weep or laugh in dreams, waking up expecting tears on their cheeks, or aching ribs, but with no such outward manifestation. They are unaroused after erotic dreams in spite of the power of the dream emotion. Others wake up to find the tears, the aching ribs, and the arousal in reality. Proshanto Mojumdar was one of the latter. He usually laughed loud and long, a thick, phantasmagoric laughter, with a garbling of words. When Mohini was there, she would prod him and ask “What are you laughing about?” And Proshanto would wake up, his face wreathed in smiles, guffawing still, and say, “Laughing? What do you mean?” And Mohini would say, “But you were laughing and talking so loud! Look! You are still grinning all over your face!” But then Proshanto would get into an erotic mood, and Mohini would put aside her questions.

So here were Proshanto Mojumdar and his sibling on a nocturnal adventure, the one just about to begin a laughing dream, the other deeply lost in stressful thought.

“Quite a pair!” Mohini Mojumdar's ghost thought, watching excitedly over them.

Shudhangshu got out of his chair with an effort, overcome by exhaustion and emotion. He could sense the nasty atmosphere caused by his own nervous sweating. He walked over to the glassed doors with thoughts of opening them, looked out, and was shocked! The sky was bright, a tinge of pink instead of the gray-gold glow of city lights.

Frantically, he rushed to his brother. Proshanto's mouth had fallen open in a big, slack grin with the spittle drooling from a corner. His white stubble gleamed in the lamplight, and he looked positively evil. Shudhangshu pushed the nozzle of his gun against Proshanto's cheek and almost fainted at the response, an unnaturally deep guffaw. It sounded to Shudhangshu like the mockery of the devil. Angrily, he prodded his old brother hard in the ribs, waking him up groaning and giggling at the same time.

“Don't tickle me like that,” said the devil incarnate, opening one eye. “Oh, it's you, Shudo,” he said fondly, his face descending gradually as he slid off the chair. He shook with laughter like a drunk. “What is this, a joke? Father! Father! I' ll tell Father.” He fell asleep immediately on the carpet still laughing away merrily.

Shudhangshu groaned and sat down with his head in his hands. What could he do, his wonderful and crazy and daring plan in ruins?
Dada
, the poor old senile thing, was unlikely to remember this long night. He was least worried about that. But it was back to the impasse. Rudro's failed life. His degrading, shameful occupation.