Night Train to Jamalpur(20)

‘Will the C.I.D. take an interest, you reckon?’ I said, nodding towards the statements.

‘They’ve been sent copies, of course,’ he said.

I took out my cigarettes.

‘Mind if I?’

He could hardly object, given the fug he was blowing my way, ‘cool and fragrant’ though it may be.

‘I think they have their hands full with revolutionary plots,’ said Bennett.

The nationalist agitation was taking an ever more violent turn. The trouble at Amritsar had brought it on. And then there was Mr Ghandi – the Mahatma. He himself was non-violent – a sort of black Jesus in glasses. The wife was always talking him up when she considered she was in progressive company, and sometimes when not. I’d had to warn her about that; she could queer the pitch for me as a copper. Of course, she’d taken not the slightest notice. A chap had recently been drummed out of the Tollygunge golf club for being too easy on the Mahatma. But secretly, I thought he was right. We had our patriotism, why shouldn’t the Indians have theirs?

Bennett said, ‘It was good to see you at Firpo’s on Saturday, Jim.’

I nodded.

‘A very good “do”, sir.’

Firpo’s was a good Italian restaurant, as Harrington in London had told me, and Bennett had booked it for a supper dance to celebrate his marriage: a party for those who had not been at the wedding, which had been held some weeks before my own arrival in Calcutta. It was all at the instigation of his new wife, Mary, who was very pleased indeed to have married Detective Superintendent Bennett, and wanted the world to know it. I hadn’t much enjoyed the occasion. I’d spent the whole time fretting about the burglary of the Thursday.

Firpo’s was the ‘in’ place for a celebration. Bernadette and her friends spent half their lives there, eating astronomically expensive ice-cream. Their famous Desert Sunrises were heavenly. Suddenly everything was ‘heavenly’ with Bernadette; that was when it wasn’t ‘septic’ . . . or some people were ‘lethal’ (boring, that meant).

From along the corridor, I heard an Indian voice at the end of its tether: ‘But Major Fisher, that is impossibility!’

‘You’d better go and see what’s happening,’ said Bennett.


V

Fisher and Jogendra Babu were in a dusty room full of files. This was our office. Since the burglary, a sign had been put on the door: ‘Private’, but the door now stood open. Fisher was studying the shelves and muttering to himself, and the clerk sat at a table piled high with ledgers. Fisher’s outsized sola topee was also on the table. Seeing me in the doorway, the clerk made a half salaam and began his complaint.

‘He is wanting occurrence books for all similar incidents going back years.’

‘Jogendra Babu,’ I said, and he gave a half nod, as if to say thanks for at least trying to get my name right, ‘similar to what?’

Fisher answered from over at the bookshelf.

‘Gun attacks by dacoits on trains in the Jamalpur sub-district, what do you think?’

It seemed he was more interested in the Jamalpur shooting than the snakes, but he was only dabbling in it. Our job was the Commission of Enquiry work, not finding killers. Jogendra Babu removed his wire glasses. He was a chubby, round-faced man with what I supposed had to be counted very beautiful skin. His elderly mother had recently died, and he gone ‘up country’ somewhere to attend to the funeral. ‘Stringer sahib and Fisher sahib,’ he said, in a tone of great exasperation, ‘there is no such category as “gun attacks”, any more than there is “putting snakes”.’

‘Forget the bloody snakes,’ Fisher cut in

‘There is murder, there is assault, there is robbery, there is unlicensed transportation of an animal; there are no gun attacks.’

‘Tell that to Mr John bloody Young,’ said Fisher, who now collected up his sola topee, and made ready to quit the room. Judging by his face, Jogendra Babu could hardly believe his luck at this development. He had told me that he found Fisher ‘extremely overbearing’, and he used to repeatedly ask whether I was in charge of Fisher (‘Who is sahib?’ he would say, or ‘Who is running show?’) in hopes I might bring him to heel. But I had to explain that Fisher and I ranked equally in our enquiry team.

‘What are you up to tomorrow?’ I asked Fisher as he marched out.

‘I don’t bloody know, do I?’ he called over his shoulder. ‘Probably be back here playing hunt the bloody thimble.’

When he’d gone, Jogendra Babu removed his handkerchief from his top pocket, and wiped his spectacles. He lived in a world of spectacles, ink, ledgers, dust. The golden sunlight that continually flowed into the rooms in which he worked – and that was coming through the window now, with a soft evening tone – seemed entirely wasted on him. In the corner of the room stood his black umbrella, neatly furled. He carried it against the sun. Shortly after meeting him, I had asked whether he would also use it against the rain, come the monsoon. ‘Yes, yes,’ he had said, ‘it is very versatile.’ He folded his handkerchief, and replaced in his top pocket. Jogendra always wore a tight black suit coat above loose white trousers, but then there was a reversion to formality at ground level with the black patent shoes he wore. ‘I am having enough on my plate with Commission of Enquiry,’ he said.