Animal's People (16 page)

I congratulate him on a fine performance.

“A little rusty.” We've left the bus station, Faqri checks the mark's wallet, extracts folded notes fresh from some Nagpur bank, tucks them in his pocket. “These days I am more in the pharmaceutical line.”

“I know. It's that I've come to talk to you about.”

“Shop's not open today, so let's go to my place.”

Just outside the galla mandi, the vegetable market, on certain days you will find Faqri sat on a stool with packages of herbs and powders spread out on newspapers by his feet. This is his shop. The packets are unwrapped to show their contents, leaves, seeds, petals, roots. He sends kids to gather these things from all over the city. Some even grow in corners of the Kampani's factory. He employs women to grind them and mix up with molasses to make pills, one rupee per pill, buy half a dozen he'll pop them in a matchbox for you. Faqri's pills can cure whatever you want and in a city like Khaufpur there's no shortage of illnesses. He has pills for coughs and breathlessness and aches and pains plus the type of problems people don't like to talk about. He tells me of the patients he's cured. Woman had white water discharge. Man couldn't get it up. Chap was worried because he has feelings for men instead of women. Faqri's now such a medical expert, he's thinking of calling himself “doctor.”

“So you're a sex-specialist?”

“Specialist in everything,” he says proudly. It should be his motto. Look at his razor-crease pants, shirt with hoisted collar, Faqri is twenty years old, already you can see the man that's coming, prosperous, devious, can't give a straight answer, would make a perfect politician.

Subtlety is of no use, I'll have to be blunt. “I'm after something that takes away the sex urge.”

“Takes it away? What? Your famous lund is out of control?”

“Not for me.”

“Lady friend?”

Having no choice, I tell him the story.

“Are they already doing it?” he asks.

“How would I know?”

“Jealous,” sniggers Faqri. “Wish it was you?”

“Don't be disgusting,” I say. “She is like my sister.”

“Some sister,” says he. “Kuala Lumpur Police Department.”

“Fuck off.” Kuala Lumpur Police Department, it's a way of saying KLPD, which in turn is a way to say Khade Lund Pe Dhoka, or deception of the standing cock, c'est à dire, a pricktease.

When we reach his place, Faqri sets about grinding some black seeds into a powder. A little bit later he shows me a thing that looks like a goat dropping.

“One of these, he'll feel sick as a dog, in no mood even to speak to a girl let alone get sexy with her.”

“How long do they work for?”

“One pill per day,” he says. “If things look really bad you could give one and a half. Do not exceed prescribed dose. How many do you want?”

“Discount for quantity?”

I go away with a plastic jar containing thirty-six pills.

The first pill I give Zafar on the day of the big democracy. The democracy is a meeting where everyone has their say, followed by a big fucking row, after which everyone does what Zafar wants. This one happens in Somraj's music room which he keeps sacred to goddess Saraswati and blue-throated god Siva. It's a beautiful room to my eyes, it has walls of white, hung all over with instruments that make many types of sounds. There are bolsters, cushions, plus rugs spread on the floor, one came from Afghanistan, it was brought by a Hazara who traded it for singing lessons, pictures of helicopters and guns are woven into it. Zafar despises possessions, but these carpets are the only things I've seen him take pleasure in. “In Khorasan,” he told us, “the weavers tie one knot of the wrong colour because only god can make something perfect.”

“Since when did you start believing in the upstairs-one?”

“Hark at Animal,” says Farouq, “god's knot in humanity.”

Zafar was well pissed-off with Farouq, but I don't think he was sticking up for me, Zafar hates all mention of god, but even more hates being caught praising him.

So now let's tell you who all were at this durbar. The room's so full it's like a bladder bursting with important types. Zafar and his mates, they're on one side. Opposite is Somraj, with a couple of his musical chums, in between are all the rest. Ram Nekchalan the shopkeeper is there looking mighty pleased, first time he's been invited to a meeting so grand. He's sat next to a sardarji Timecheck Singh. Ask Timecheck anything, he'll look at his watch. Lawyers charge per minute. Say “Hello,” he'll check the time, can't help it. All these are from the Chicken Claw, there are a half-dozen others from elsewhere in Khaufpur, plus two from the Nutcracker. Last of all's me, I'm hanging in the door, Zafar sees and calls me in. No room there's, but Nisha signs for me to sit between her and Zafar, so I've squeezed in. Oh joy, Nisha puts her arm round my shoulder, from the other side Zafar drops his arm round me, I'm truly among friends, chuffed to be included in the council of the great.

Zafar starts the meeting by telling how this Amrikan woman's appeared in Khaufpur and bought the building, what the
Khaufpur Gazette
wrote, she was doing a wonderful act of charity, and how Zahreel Khan, the Minister for Poison Relief, will open this so-called clinic.

“So-called?” asks a woman I don't know. “Isn't it a real clinic?”

“I am sure it is a real clinic, Dr. Misra,” Zafar replies, “the question is, what is its real purpose?” He then reports what we've learned from Dayanand and Co. about the kind of medical work that will go on across the road.

“Excuse me, Zafar bhai,” says someone else, “but these things, they're exactly what is needed here.”

Zafar's not having it all his own way, but I'm no longer listening. Eyes, I don't give a twisted fuck about politics, I'm in Zafar's group for one reason which is to be near Nisha, and you can't get much nearer than I'm at that moment. Her thigh's pressed tight against my knee, my nostrils are full of the scent of her, she is warm and her flesh is soft. I begin thinking about certain things I've seen in the frangipani and the monster down there stirs. It shifts, gives a throb, I feel it thickening. My kakadus are changing shape. Fuck! No! Not in front of all these people. I dive a hand into my pocket to clamp the unruly beast against my leg, my fingers find Faqri's box of pills. Desperate I'm, will have to pop one, but can't slide it open without letting go of my unruly lund, which immediately starts to rear and buck, damn that fucking thing, it has no respect. Well, there's nothing for it but to lean right forward and plant my other elbow on the creature, but this in turn leaves the hand twitching to no purpose, so I rest my chin on it like I'm concentrating, must look peculiar for Nisha whispers, “Are you okay?”

“Fully. This discussion is very fascinating.”

By the time I return to what's being said, it's to hear Ram Nekchalan, the man who wants to be everyone's best friend. “We shouldn't help the Kampani to gather its false information. We should fight.”

Hypocrite! I can't help it, I say, “What's changed, Nekchalan? Last week you were talking as if this clinic was your idea.”

Someone laughs, it's Farouq. Ram Nekchalan looks like he wants to kill.

Now everyone is looking at me, who's crouched forward to hide the shape in his pants. Fool that I am, why did I speak? Was there ever a worse fucking time to draw attention to myself?

“Hah!” I give a shout.

Instantly there's a loud ringing in the air, people are looking round to see from where it has come. It's the instruments. Hundreds of strings singing tiny songs. Somraj whose eyes were closed as if to escape this futile discussion, now opens them and comes back from wherever he's been. He says, “The boy is right. You people have no proof, yet you'd start fighting. This clinic is much needed, I for one will not support a boycott.”

Nisha's arm round my shoulder tightens. Oh dear, caught between her dad and her lover, this means trouble. Somraj's friends make matters no better by loudly agreeing with him. Says his student Shastri, who resembles a lizard, his jaw juts from beneath his ears like an iguana's, “In a just society, a person is innocent until proven guilty.”

“Of women it's said, do not despise them,” chimes in Somraj's other pal, a rough and ready beardo is he, Somraj's best friend plus his tabla player from the old days, I don't remember his name, Something Khan, all tabla players in this city are something Khans. “Why should we not despise them? Because we might be despising a thing through which god has planned much good.”

The debate goes back and forth with the three musicians ganged up anti the rest. Why are they opposed? Is it because Elli too is a musician? Somraj, who listens to all sounds, maybe he's heard her playing her piano.

On Zafar's face, I guess because of Something Khan's bringing god into it, are signs of irritation. “Is poison presumed harmless until it kills?” he retorts. “Isn't this the lesson of Khaufpur, that you don't wait to be harmed before you take action to protect? Friends, at long last we have a chance, however slim, of forcing the Kampani to court and winning proper compensation for our folk. We dare not put that at risk. We have to act together, so if you can't support, at least don't oppose.”

At this everyone starts talking at once. Some are grumbling, from other quarters comes loud support.

“I am not comfortable with this,” says Somraj, the only one who dares speak openly against Zafar's proposal. “We need better evidence before we deny to people something that could help them.”

Says Zafar, “Abba, we have failed to find any trace of this woman's history. This alone is suspicious, she's almost certainly operating under a false name. We have tried all usual channels. Nisha has searched on the internest, nothing.”

“Nothing is not evidence,” says the stubborn Voice of Khaufpur.

“Abba,” says Zafar again, I hate to hear him calling Somraj father, “Animal is cultivating a friendship with Elli Barber. I feel confident that he'll soon extract some useful information, then we will be in a position to judge.”

“Papa, if we could win this compensation,” says Nisha to her father, “think what a difference it will make to people.”

Still he's not looking happy. I am happy, Nisha's warm thigh is pressing against me, the demon below is thank god back to sleep.

“Just think, papa,” wheedles Nisha, “what the Kampani has paid till now is so small, hardly does it amount to the price of one cup of daal a day.”

Somraj sighs. “All right, I can't support, but I won't oppose.”

Now all can relax, what a wonderful thing is democracy. A general hubbub starts up, Timecheck looks at his watch.

Nekchalan giggles and says, “Three rupees.”

“Three rupees, what?” asks Farouq.

“Three rupees for a cup of daal.”

“Depends which daal,” someone else says.

“Urad daal, tuwar is dearer,” says the shopkeeper. “But it costs me more to get it in,” he adds quickly lest anyone should suspect him of profiteering.

“Pitiful it's,” says Zafar. “What else does three rupees buy? Pir Gate tea, one glass? Yes, Animal?” This time I've raised my hand to speak.

“One tea plus one samosa at Chunaram's.”

They laugh, so things are back to normal, good even, lund's back under control, two speeches made at this important meeting.

“Talking of tea,” says Nisha, “would everybody like some?”

I'm up onto my four feet. Thé pour tous. The gurgling and bubbling of the pan on the fire sounds like laughter. We return bearing uneven loads, Nisha carrying a tray loaded with glasses, me with a single glass.

“Zafar brother, this is for you.”

The unsuspecting bugger accepts it gratefully, pulls me down beside him.

“Sit here, Animal,” he says to me. “You have a wise head. Let us plan how you shall interrogate Elli Barber.”

“What do you really think of her?” asks Nisha on my other side.

“What do I think?” I say, watching him drink. I can't say what I really think. Poor Elli, you're about to be betrayed by these undeserving arse-holes you came to help.

“I think she has blue legs.”

The last few days before Elli doctress's clinic opens Zafar brother can be seen wandering with gleaming specs, frowning to himself, tugging at his beard. I whistle this tune whenever I see him, it's that one, you know, that goes

“Yaar Animal,” says Zafar, “do me a favour, don't drive me mad.”

“Don't you like my singing?”