Night Train to Jamalpur(29)

We traversed the waterfront, and the barges being unloaded by derricks that spat out black smoke and made a machine-gun rattle as they strained to lift the swinging white bales of cotton, jute and tobacco. The crane operators and dockers kept up a constant shouted commentary on the transportation of the bales, rising to a peak of agitation as the loads dangled between barge and bank . . . or perhaps they were speaking about something else entirely. On the right side stood the railway lines, leaving the road at right angles, with low, red one-storey buildings in between, some with the benefit of a platform to raise them above the black ash, and all with wide green doors open to receive or discharge goods. On the lines were wagons – ‘mixed goods’ they’d be called in Britain, but all goods in India were mixed. The contents were sometimes branded on the sides. I read ‘Kerosene’, ‘Sugar machinery’, ‘Tea’, ‘Copper wire’.

We were walking alongside a train. The bales loaded on to it put a spicy haze into the air that made you want to sneeze. Still with the train to our right, we climbed up on to one of the platforms, and walked past the open doors of one of the low red houses. Men sat around a rough table drinking tea from a big brown pot. There was a stone sink with a tap, empty gunny sacks folded on the bare wooden floor, and framed photographs around the walls showing cricketing scenes; also a sign reading ‘ALWAYS TAKE CARE’. The men looked out at us with moderate curiosity, but not enough to check their talk. A white-suited sahib and a railway policemen – they probably thought I was someone making a complaint about theft of goods. We descended from the platform, and carried on, still shadowing the long train. It had been made up, yes, but there didn’t seem any question of it going anywhere, and when we got to the end of it, I was not in the least surprised to see there was no engine.

Beyond the train, and beyond the other waiting trains, the tracks curved away right towards Howrah, but Deo Rana was leading me left, where the goods yard began to fade. There might be tracks in this territory but they went nowhere in particular, and there might be engines, but they were likely to be crocks. I had my eye on a little saddle tank with no cab, just a pressure gauge on top of the boiler like an eye on a stalk. There were two men on the back of this queer-looking bug, and I thought they must have been in the process of dismantling it, but then it coughed into life, ejecting one foul ball of smoke like a man spitting phlegm, and it clanked away towards the Howrah main line, becoming bent as it disappeared into the heat haze.

Deo Rana was leading me towards one of the long red loading bays. It had a platform, but not any tracks. Over the wide door, a sign said ‘Trainlighting Office’, but it hadn’t been that for a while. Some mill or factory over to the left was making an orange cloud, and beyond that was the native city of Howrah, the Black Town, a maze of shacks and litter, with hundreds of crows circling above. Indicating the loading bay, Deo said, ‘Snake men.’ There were two, sitting on the platform. Another two came out of the trainlighting office as we approached. The snake men looked like men in a Bible story. One – the governor, I supposed – came down from the platform and salaamed to Deo, who turned to me and said, ‘Baksheesh, sahib.’

I took out my pocket book and gave the fifteen rupees to Deo who gave it to the snake man. By filling out three forms, I had got the money from the petty cash guarded by one of Jogendra Babu’s men, but the sum was not so petty. The head snake man reminded me of the Arabs I had seen in Mespot, resembling a sort of scarred hawk. Having safely stowed the money – he had a cloth purse rolled into his dhoti – he spoke again in Hindustani (I assumed that was the lingo) to Deo Rana, who turned to me and translated: ‘You will take one tea?’

I had been eyeing the dark interior of the trainlighting office, hoping to go in there and escape the sun. But we all walked over to a smouldering fire at some thirty yards’ distance – a fire made of railway sleepers bleached and worn down to something like driftwood. Tea was made and the snake men rolled cigarettes. I declined the offer, but lit a Gold Flake. Deo Rana did smoke but never on duty. Indicating the trainlighting office, I asked the head snake man, ‘Do you live there?’ and I looked to Deo to translate. The answer that came back via Deo – ‘We don’t live anywhere’ – couldn’t have been quite right.

I said, ‘Are you gentlemen snake charmers?’ and the question, when put by Deo, caused amusement. The answer came back: ‘Sometimes, sahib.’

I was about to ask where all the bloody snakes had got to, when a small Indian boy came running over the ash from the edge of the Black Town. He wore a European shirt and shorts, and he was fairly clean, but he knew the snake men all right. He was laughing, and calling out to the head snake man, indicating a certain spot in the ground. All the snake men got up, and went towards the kid, and Deo Rana turned to me, saying, ‘Hamadryad.’