Warren Murphy: Sue Me

In the city of Gupta, India, dawn came as it had for aeons over the sacred mountains of Kalil, the sun representing one of the million Hindu gods, shining blood-red through the haze of morning.

From the first days of man-made fires, Gupta had always been hazy. The dung used for fuel burned in acrid smoky clouds, hardly lifted by passing breezes, for Gupta was at the bottom of a bowl-shaped valley ringed by mountains. He who controlled the mountains controlled Gupta. Warrior princes had ruled here. Mogul invaders had ruled here. The British had ruled here, and now the remnants of all their seeds calling themselves Indians ruled here, Muslim and Hindu and Sikh and Christian.

No one noticed the great death come upon them because it walked surely like one who knew how Gupta worked. It came first to the wife of a government official. It came with the hiss of jealousy.

How much more important she would be if her husband was recognized as a true Indian in the central government. But alas, in Gupta the colonialists still ruled.

She did not know where the voice came from. She knew it was somewhere and that if it were some intruder in her courtyard her husband would have him beaten.

"There are no colonialists here. India is free."

"Then what is that International Carborundum factory doing here?"

"The people love it. It gives work. It gives high positions. It employs engineers and laborers. It makes us industrialized. "

"It makes your husband, I am sorry to say, less respected in Delhi."

"You are a liar. You will be beaten. You will have your tongue cut in a thousand places."

The voice seemed to be coming from the walls. It was an American voice. International Carborundum was American. Were they playing some trick? She turned so quickly she almost got tangled in her peach-colored sari. Was a god talking to her? Did she fail to make the proper sacrifices? Was her home made unclean by some act during a wrong time of her menstrual cycle? There were so many things this voice could be, but the last thing it could be was what it said it was.

"I am your friend, good woman. Look at all the major government ministers. Is there another who in his own domain has so many whites in high positions?"

"Oh, voice, you spread lies. And if you had a body it would die with a thousand cuts. If you had eyes they would be punctured. My husband is a regional administrator. Even the police chief bows to him."

"But, good woman, your husband does not have a major post in Delhi. Your husband does not sit in council with the ministers. Your husband follows orders and is kept at a distance like an untouchable."

"I will not listen to another word," said the woman. She clasped her hands to her ears and left the room. But in a few minutes she was back.

"Do not be insulting, voice, and I will listen to you. What is wrong at International Carborundum ? Not that my husband is at fault. "

"The Americans do not respect you. Certainly there are important jobs Indians have with the company, but not the crucial ones."

"An Indian is president of the Gupta installation," she answered. She had even seen his office, so large. So important, with so many wooden cabinets. It looked out over the fifteen-acre chemical plant like a tower of a Mogul prince. It was as modern, she was told when on tour of the factory, as any in America. She saw many impressive buttons and dials in many rooms.

The president of the local installation, a Brahman who had graduated from a British engineering school, had personally greeted all the wives of the important ministers.

"What are those wonderful buttons and dials?" asked one of the wives. "What magic do they perform?"

"I know what every one of them does," the president answered sharply.

"What does the shiny one with the light do?" asked the woman.

"It keeps nosy women in their place," he said, and laughed at his own joke. She bowed to the rebuke. But later it was revealed that one should never ask the president how any of the complicated controls and gauges worked. He knew exactly what he had to know: that there were always Americans to take care of everything. He was not to be bothered with the petty tasks, but dealt with the higher concepts. He sat behind a big desk and ordered people about. If ever he wanted to know how any dial or button worked, he would call in an American and order him to explain.

But why should he ask? Did he ask the untouchables how they collected dung for the fires that burned throughout the Gupta valley? This the woman remembered as the invisible voice spoke to her, and the invisible voice began to make sense.

"The Americans are smarter than the British. The British sat on horses, parading in fine uniforms, and let others do the work. But the Americans know those are not the people who run things. The people who run things know how they work. And look at the American factory in Gupta. Look at the jobs Indians have. They sit at desks and collect money and they are happy. But they do not know how to run the factory. And the moment the Americans leave, all they will have will be their fancy desks and fancy offices and nothing and no one to order about. Do you think the important ministers in Delhi do not know this?"

"But my husband is blameless," pleaded the woman.

"Your husband is regional director. He is most to be blamed."

"What can we do?"

"You can begin by insisting that Indians hold crucial, not ceremonial, posts."

"What is a crucial post?"

"Safety engineer."

"That is crucial?"

"That is most crucial. If the safety engineer does not do his job, no one will be safe. If the president of the factory does not show up for a week, who even notices he is gone?"

"What if my husband beats me for my insolence?"

"He most certainly will beat you, but then he will do what you told him."

"You know my husband."

"I know how things work."

In the offices of the English-language Times of Gupta, a voice spoke to an editorial writer. The voice sounded like it was coming from outside his window. It sounded American.

"What you want Indians for is to let them sit around and pretend they run things. Now, we're lucky. We give them these phony jobs, call them 'president' and such. That's fine. Paying them salaries is just another form of local bribe. We can accept that cost. But heaven help us if one of these brown bastards ever insists on being safety engineer."

"How do you keep them from it?"

"Simple. We make them believe the crucial jobs are some form of janitorial work. Safety engineer is close to maintenance engineer, which is another word for broom-pusher. That's untouchable work to these buggers."

"You mean they're the laughingstock of the home offices of International Carborundum ?" said the writer.

"Shhh. Not so loud. We're near a newspaper." The editorial writer looked out the window to see which American was ridiculing his race. But outside, he saw nothing but the rotting garbage of the streets and a cow lazily strolling along with an untouchable running behind waiting for fuel for the countless fires that laid an eternal haze over Gupta.

And so, in a seemingly spontaneous eruption, the leaders of Gupta rose to demand that the American company employ Indians for what they called the most important jobs. The regional director led the demands but he had support o. the local newspaper, whose banner editorial read: "WHAT FOOLS DO THEY TAKE US FOR?"

Since no one wanted to be a fool, a raging storm engulfed the home office of International Carborundum in Dover, Delaware, offices far less plush than those in Gupta, India.

"What the hell do they want to be safety engineers for? What the hell do they want to be maintenance engineers for? We couldn't give those jobs away there two years ago."

"Better give in to them, chief. Where else can we manufacture Cyclod B?" said the subordinate. Cyclod B was the main active ingredient of the insecticide Goodbye Bug. It sold enormously well in America in its attractive lemon-yellow can with a cartoon bug happily keeling over dead and being swept up by a dustpan and broom. Combined with other chemicals, Cyclod B killed bugs very effectively and made the countryside only moderately toxic. But alone, uncombined in formula, it contained two of the deadliest gases known to man, one of them a derivative of a now-outlawed World War I warfare agent.