The Assassin's Song (21 page)

Postmaster Flat, Shimla.

Major Narang is concerned
.

There are worry lines on his forehead.

“You have relations in Pakistan,” he says, or rather, asserts.

“Yes,” I reply. “I thought you knew that.”

The name of our neighbour to the north arouses many emotions, among them raw hatred and contempt. Many would wish they had a device in their hand that they could drop or fling that way and rid us of this nagging problem once and for all. But the major is more sophisticated than average, his tone is neutral, curious. Nevertheless, you don't invoke that name P_____ lightly. I think I know why he is concerned.

Moderately tall and straight backed, the military man that he is, he has a round face, greying hair thinning at the front, where he becomes bald, and he is dark in the way Indians become with age. He tends to smile a lot, and this exaggerates his droopy lower lip.

Since the stated reason for my presence here at the Institute is to research, recall, and write about the famous (the description is the major's) medieval shrine of Pirbaag, it is natural that I be encouraged to speak about it. Recently the Institute director, Professor Barua, called upon me to do so, in one of the weekly seminars. It is Friday; on Wednesday the major (whose visit is never coincidental) and I sat in the director's office, and I gave the two men a spiel on the shrine, as a preamble to my upcoming talk. Barua was intrigued by the more academic question of the sufi's identity, and we agreed to discuss it in detail another time. My interest for now
was simply to recapitulate concisely the life of the shrine as I remembered living it. My research notes, transcripts of ginans, etc., would form an appendix. The major thought that was best.

He has nothing on me, of course, couldn't conceivably suspect me— a returning Nonresident Indian—of anything, except possibly shielding my hot-blooded brother, whom he suspects. And so I, the elder brother, am bait.

Yesterday I gave my seminar. There was a large number in attendance, the draw being the freak that I am—the singing, secretive scholar, son or descendant of a pir. The venue for these events is the seminar room with its oval teak table, where perhaps the last viceroy—Lord Mountbatten— met with Nehru, Gandhi, and Jinnah to discuss the future of India; where perhaps the subcontinent was cleaved into India and Pakistan on a map. The scholars positively glow in such an empyreal ambience, where tea in dainty cups and biscuits are individually served by the peons. They are like the poor orphan in the house of a rich auntie, hailing as they do from the deprived small-town colleges of our nation.

I sound bitter; I am. As I sit in on these seminars, of which I have attended only a handful, I cannot help but be struck by this question: Why not a single Muslim presence here, among these scholars? But we are all Indians here, you might say, does one's religion matter? Of course not, especially not here. But with habit one simply notices a trend when it glares at you; and you realize it's been glaring at you for decades. Perhaps I've lived too long in foreign places where such numbers are a matter of concern and debate. And so I cannot help also noticing that there is no one from the so-called lower castes—except the fellow who asks you in hushed tones (you could be Mountbatten's secretary) how much sugar you need. Don't give me that!—you will say; they were given more than fair chance, do you know how many boys from the higher castes set themselves on fire in protest when the Mandal Commission report was put into effect? Lower-caste boys with much lesser grades were given places in universities, while they with excellent grades were denied them. Hard, gruelling work, middle-class sacrifice went unrewarded, futures were destroyed, and mediocrity was promoted. Yes, I know how complex it all gets. And I know of course that India's president is a Muslim.

Caste, class, faith, language. I never gave them much heed as a child. I
was tutored by my father in the garden of my ancestors to believe that our differences are superficial; in fact, nonexistent. My brother was less fortunate; and for him life is all division. And so my bitterness is gentle— stereotypically Indian, you might say—compared to the rage he harbours.

Now back to Major Narang and me, as we sit at a table of the Institute's outdoor café, at the edge of a cliff overlooking a deep green valley. Right behind us is the library, in what once was the viceroys' ballroom, with tall windows and high ceilings. Was Gandhi, the half-naked fakir, as Churchill called him once, invited to a dance, one muses. Did he look out the window onto this same view? In the distance, hills falling upon hills, shadows alternate with soft late afternoon light; shades of forest green merging with black. The light blue of the sky has abruptly met the orange glow of the setting sun in a perceptibly sharp line, behind which the peaks of the mighty Himalayas peep out, dim and shadowy. Home of the gods, keeping their own majesty at bay. Shiva resides among them. From the coils of his hair flows the water of the Ganges—which through some mystical magic we drank at Pirbaag every day. A thin haze hangs in the air. In the distance a road curves round the hills and out of town. A train whistle blows somewhere close by, below us, but the train is not visible. Two Tibetan coolies, distinct by their hardened features, their cheeks and eyes, appear from a trail on the cliffside, bearing loads on their heads, heading off perhaps towards the Mall. A whiff of oily smoke—but that's from the kitchen, frying samosas and pakodas.

The major has a style of his own. He gets ignored by the waiters, until he says, “Ay—” and raises a finger. They come scuppering over. When he orders our tea, he instructs, “Chini alag,” sugar separate, because otherwise the tea is cloyingly sweet. Though he doesn't ask me if that is how I prefer my tea. It is.

“Karsan-ji—” he says, with a deference ever so slightly spiked with mockery, or perhaps in simple jest.

“Major Sah'b,” I return.

He smiles approvingly, continues our conversation.

“It does not look good—it looks suspicious, smuggling a letter to Pakistan.”

“Surely not smuggling, Major—how else does one send a letter to Pakistan, except by sending it first to someone in another country to post it?”

I had sent it, sealed and addressed, inside another envelope, to an
acquaintance in Canada. Major Narang obviously had intercepted it, read it first before sending it on its way. And I know he's already read the reply that arrived earlier today.

“It looks suspicious—you know we are in a state of hostility.”

“I am not quite sure what that means. People do travel there from here? Doesn't a bus run from Delhi to Lahore now?”

“It has been stopped—for the time being.”

“I didn't know that.”

Suddenly the air has turned cold, a draft blows in, sweeping away a napkin, spreading a thin shower of dust over us. We both turn westwards, whence it came, like a signal. The sun is now a bright yellow disk no bigger than a fat full moon, no harder on the eye, but infinitely more intriguing. And the sky is hued from blue through green and purple to orange in the farthest distance, all in soft tones to gladden the heart. We are both struck speechless.

The major says softly,

“udu tyam jatavedasam devam vahanti ketavah—”

which verse from the Rig Veda I complete,

“drshe vishvaya suryam …,”

for all to see, the sun.

His surprise equals mine. We stop to stare at each other.

“My father used to recite it early in the morning, sometimes,” I tell him, “when he looked out the window and the sun shone brilliantly.”

The crows cawed in chorus, raucous witnesses to our history, perhaps mocking us, I now think. The last time I was there I did not hear them; perhaps they were driven away by the smell of smoke and burnt flesh.

That was a rare mood for Bapu-ji; it would be a Sunday and we would be awaiting our breakfast of puri and potato; or paratha with methi. Whatever Ma had planned. Always tea for Mansoor and me, milk for Bapu. Perhaps the poison was in the tea, and it was the substance that led me astray?

Major Narang scoops off a handsome dollop of ketchup with a potato pakoda, from which he takes a bite with relish. He has to wipe his mouth.

“I wrote to my uncle,” I continue, “for what he may remember and recall about Pirbaag—to inquire if he happens to have any material from it—books and so on.” He nods, I continue: “What an irony if the material were preserved in Pakistan. Irony for me, that is, and my family.”

“What do you think of the Partition?” he asks.

“It happened,” I reply, too quickly. And then, thinking the better of it, I add: “It meant nothing to us at the shrine.”

One has to explain, you see. Though what I tell him is a lie. How could the Partition not mean anything when my family was split by its occurrence? And in any case, what Indian or Pakistani or Bangladeshi has not been affected by the politics of its aftermath?

“Have you heard from your brother, Mansoor?”

The repeated question. The same answer, another lie: No. What does he want from Mansoor?

“As you know, he is wanted for questioning regarding the Godhra incident.”

The match that set off the violence in Gujarat three months ago. Sixty people, all Hindus, were burnt alive at Godhra station inside a sealed railway bogie that was set on fire. The result was a twenty-fold revenge of rape, murder, and destruction on the Muslims. Pirbaag was one of the casualties. And now Mansoor is on the run.

We both fall silent, perhaps with the same images of grisly death on our minds. In the west the sun has almost gone down, only a red section of a disk now visible between two peaks. Eastwards in the sky, a silver crescent moon slices blithely through the clouds. We stand up together, as if by agreement, and make our way on the gravelled pathway past trimmed green lawns towards the front. The major has put up here in the main building, in a room that once belonged to Lady Curzon, wife of a former viceroy. The room is believed by some of the workers here to be haunted by her ghost, even though she herself died in England.

As we walk together, he says to me: “We have to be vigilant.”

I don't quite understand—is he speaking of ghosts?—and so I stare at him.

“Imagine,” he says, “nine-eleven happening in our country— Taj Mahal, Puri temple, Mathura, the president's palace. Unimaginable consequences.”

“Yes,” I agree. “That would be terrible. We have to be vigilant.”

I walk back to the Postmaster Flat.

Darkness has fallen, the stars are out; the night is so pure and spare on this hill it is just possible there is no one else left in the world; a perfect place in
which to lose the self, contemplate that Oneness. Kill the mind, the sufi sang, in a punning alliterative line:
man-né maaro to mané malo.
I recall my father instructing his devotees, when he gave them a mantra to meditate on. At that time of contemplation of the One, he said, the mind and its thoughts are still, the body is still, like a cat waiting at a mouse hole.

Seated on the sofa with my cup of tea, my only companions two spiders on a wall, waiting. From the centre table that I always draw close to me, I pick up the letter from my uncle Iqbal. It was mailed from Dubai and the envelope was rather flappy at the seal when I got it. It must have steamed open easily enough, I suppose, and then the glue was too scant to reseal.

“My dear farzand Karsan.

“… We had already heard of the tragedy at Pirbaag, the destruction of property and loss of life. And we gave prayers for the departed. May Allah in His infinite mercy take them into His bosom. Amen.

“We are most delighted however that you and Mansoor are safe, that God saved you from the clutches of the bloodthirsty Hindus.

“Dear Karsan, to answer your question, we have nothing left from Pirbaag save for a photograph of the family—but it is from before your birth. There were a few books, but they rotted over the years and were thrown away. Mashallah, I have been able to bring prosperity to my family. Now what about your future, Karsan? It will please me and my children immensely to offer my brother's sons, you and Mansoor, shelter and livelihood here in Pakistan …”

One of his daughters, Shabnam, is younger than me and divorced, he says. It would please him to see her settled with an educated, responsible man. I need to settle down too. The destruction of Pirbaag was a punishment from the Almighty, because idolatry is sin. I should change my name appropriately—he suggests the name Kassim—accept the right faith, and make the move that my Dada should have made fifty years before.

I am beginning to think that writing to my uncle was a bad idea. Major Narang will surely increase his surveillance of me and await the inevitable.

I did not go for dinner to the Guest House, because I did not fancy sitting again so soon with the major, who was bound to be there. And so Ajay from the kitchen arrived at the back door and brought me a tray—tinda and chappati, rice and daal. Later he brought the tea. Ajay is the son of
Reverend Yesudas of the dilapidated Anglican church, who also wants me to make a move and accept the right faith; different from my uncle's, of course.

One night there came a loud crash outside my front door. I got up and shone my torch through the glass pane, expecting a stray langur to have landed. It turned out to be the reverend. As I opened the door a gust of wind almost blew the frail churchman inside. He was a bit drunk.

It seemed that while he was walking outside on the driveway, a revelation had hit him. Why doesn't the unhappy but good Karsan-ji accept Christ, who died for all our sins?

Fortunately for me, Ajay was not far behind his father and took him away, scolding him mercilessly. The reverend left me the cross from his neck. It hangs around a Ganesh.

In the morning, at breakfast, I ask Major Narang if he saw Lady Curzon's ghost in his room.

“Hey—” he begins, with a grin.

This morning in his bathroom he took out his shaving kit and put it on the basin. Going back to the bedroom to get his towel, he returned to find the kit missing, leather case and all, made in England. He couldn't shave (he rubs his chin to show me), but as he came outside the front entrance of the Institute, there on the steps lay his precious equipment. The man at the desk assured him that this was the kind of trick Lady Curzon plays on visitors.