A headless bandicoot lay in a dark, red-brown puddle that had collected at the base of the vinca. The cleanly severed head was beside the body. Despite the progress made by the crows’ beaks, it was immediately apparent that the cause of decapitation had been a sharp instrument of human design.
‘This is the absolute limit!’ said Gustad. Simultaneously, the two thought of Tehmul, of his fascination with rats. But Gustad said, ‘No, I don’t think so. Even if he did it, he would never throw it in the vinca. He would go to the municipality for his twenty-five paise.’
Dilnavaz was more anxious to be rid of the half-eaten carcass than to find the culprit. ‘I’ll call the kuchrawalli right now to sweep it away.’
‘Who is it that hates my vinca so much?’ wondered Gustad. ‘And where was that bloody Gurkha, what kind of watchman is he?’ Meanwhile, wakened by the noise, Darius came to the window. He was ordered to summon the Gurkha from the office building.
‘But I am in my pyjamas,’ said Darius.
‘And what am I wearing, a wedding dress? Go right now!’ Grumbling and frowning, Darius hurried through the compound, keeping well towards the inside so no one in the building saw him. Particularly the soft brown eyes of Jasmine Rabadi. If those melting, soft brown fourteen-year-old eyes were to spy him in his silly pyjamas, it would destroy his chances for ever, he was certain of that.
‘You know where the Gurkha sleeps in the daytime?’ Gustad called after him. ‘In the little room, next to the lift.’
‘Yes, yes, I know,’ he said, scowling and jerking his head angrily. He returned shortly with the Gurkha, and conducted a cautious but dignified retreat.
The Gurkha was a small, bow-legged man whose calf muscles bulged powerfully, as did the sinews of his forearms. When he did his rounds at night for the office building next door, he included the compound of Khodadad Building in his circuit, and for his pains, each tenant paid him two rupees a month. He had not yet changed out of his uniform: khaki shirt and khaki short pants, with a khaki cap. Round his waist was the leather belt carrying the ceremonial Gurkha kukri: a short broad-bladed sword, and nestling near the hilt, two tiny daggers in their separate sheaths.
He saluted smartly, his almond-shaped Nepali eyes twinkling. ‘Salaam, seth,’ he said, and then to Dilnavaz, ‘Salaam, bai. How is baby?’ He was very fond of Roshan. Sometimes, when she was dropped off by the school bus across the road, he would, if he was awake, race over and escort her safely into the compound. Roshan called his family of daggers mummy-knife and the twins.
‘Baby is all right,’ said Dilnavaz.
‘And what is the meaning of this?’ said Gustad, pointing at the torn, crow-eaten bandicoot.
‘Arré baap! What a very big rat!’
‘That I know, thank you,’ said Gustad. ‘But who cut its head, who threw it in my flowers, that I don’t know. And that is what you should know, because you are night-watching in the compound.’ He paused. ‘Or are you taking money from us for sleeping all night?’
‘Arré no, seth. Not like that, never. Every night I walk here, banging my stick on the black wall. One o’clock, two o’clock, three o’clock. All night. But I heard nothing, saw nothing.’
Gustad looked at him disbelievingly. Dilnavaz said, from the corner of her mouth, using the Gujarati asmai-kasmai code so the Gurkha would not understand, ‘Masmaybisme hisme wasmas sleasmepisming beasmecausmause ismit wasmas raismainisming.’
So Gustad tried a different approach to the cross-examination. ‘How do you make rounds when it rains?’
The Gurkha smiled, revealing perfect neem-nurtured white teeth. ‘Office people have given me very good long raincoat. I wear that when rain is falling. And plastic cap, with flaps to cover the ears, which go like this, over the cheeks, then there is a button under the chin which—’
‘OK, OK. So last night you walked in your long raincoat and cap. But I heard no banging of stick.’
‘O seth, so much noise of rain and thunder, how can you hear my stick?’
Gustad had to concede the point. ‘But from now on, I want to hear the stick, rain or no rain. Bang harder, bang under my window, but bang, I am warning you. I must hear it every night.’ The Gurkha nodded vigorously to placate him, sensing that the matter was almost concluded. ‘And on your way out, tell the kuchrawalli to clean this at once.’
The crows began converging again when Gustad and Dilnavaz turned to go in. He decided to stay. ‘You will be late for work,’ said Dilnavaz. ‘I’ll wait till kuchrawalli comes.’
‘It’s OK. There is enough time.’ By now, he was feeling bad about having made her view the bandicoot’s torn entrails.
iv
It rained through Saturday but stopped during the night. Gustad lay awake to hear the Gurkha’s nightstick. By and by, the reassuring knock of wood against stone started to punctuate and measure out the hours of darkness. Satisfied that the scolding had worked, he turned over and fell asleep.
Sunday dawned with a clear sky. Gustad was wakened by a ray of light entering through a corner of ventilator glass where the blackout paper had come untacked. No rain, he thought. Prayers in the compound? It will still be soft and squelchy. Better stay inside, took too long to clean mud from slippers yesterday.
He sat up, stretched, and rubbed his eyes. The cawing started. Just one crow at first, as though it was calling the faithful to prayer, but soon joined by others, fervent recruits who lent their eager throats. Then the sound grew frantic, the entire assembly raising its voice in a strident chorus of ecstasy, and Gustad bounded out of bed.
The mattress lurched wildly in reaction, waking Dilnavaz. ‘What happened?’
He pointed to the window. ‘You can’t hear?’ The cawing made her sit up; she reached for her duster-coat.
The morning was windless, and the rain puddles were still as glass, reflecting a cloudless sky. But only a few feet away, by the vinca bush, was a different world. The competition was rough, and the crows, in their urgency, were flapping and pecking, sometimes attacking one another. A few withdrew now and then to gird their loins, then re-entered the fray. It was hard to see what was in the bush because of the frenetic, fluttering multitude of grey-black wings and feathers.
‘Aaaaahhh!’ roared Gustad, waving his arms wildly. ‘Caaaah! Caaaah!’ Like a black curtain lifting, the crows ascended and settled some distance away. He saw the dead cat: brown with patches of white, its eyelids not shut, and the eyes still unpecked. The mouth was slightly open, displaying a pink tongue. Wet whiskers skimmed the water surface. Were it not for the fact that the cat’s head, like the rat’s the morning before, was severed from its body, it would have seemed that the creature was thirsty, lapping water from the puddle. Gustad realized with detachment that this was how he used to imagine the sliced-off heads of dragons in his childhood kusti fantasies: intact, looking as if they were capable of continuing a separate existence.
‘Don’t look,’ he said to Dilnavaz, too late. She retched twice, then was in control. ‘What is going on, I’d like to know,’ he said quietly. ‘Darius!’