Amitav Ghosh - Flood of Fire

It so happened that the festival of Nag Panchami was just a few days away. This being an occasion of great significance for wrestlers Kesri had planned a tournament to mark the day: only the more accomplished wrestlers were to participate in this special dangal. He told Captain Mee that the lascar was welcome to try his luck.

The dangal was well under way when a cutter, rowed by a dozen oarsmen, drew up. A square-jawed, broad-shouldered young man got out and went to shake hands with Captain Mee — he was dressed in Western clothes and to Kesri’s eye he looked every inch an Angrez. But when Captain Mee brought him over Kesri understood that he was the Parsi shipowner that he had mentioned: his name was Dinyar Ferdoonjee.

After exchanging a few words with Kesri, the young merchant gestured in the direction of his cutter: the wrestler, he said, was one of the oarsmen on his boat. There was no need to point the man out: even while seated he towered over the other rowers. When he started to rise it was as though his body were slowly unfolding, like a ladder with multiple sections. Once he was fully upright his shoulders were seen to be almost as broad as the boat; as for the oar, it looked like a piece of kindling in his hands. Unlike most lascars, he was dressed not in jama-pyjamas but in grey trowsers and a white shirt, which contrasted vividly with his dark skin. His head was of a piece with his frame, square, broad and massive — but as if to compensate for his intimidating dimensions, the expression on his face was one of extreme forbearance and gentleness. In his gait too there was a shambling quality which led Kesri to think that he might be slow of movement, and that his size and weight might be used against him in the pit.

But after he had stripped down to his wrestling drawers the lascar’s demeanour underwent an abrupt change. Kesri watched him carefully as he was loosening up by slapping his arms and chest: his performance of these dand-thonk exercises was impressively fluid and supple. When he stepped into the ring, his stance was as fine as any that Kesri had seen: perfectly balanced, with his head poised over his leading leg, the chin in exact alignment with his knee.

The lascar’s first opponent was a muscular young sepoy, one of Kesri’s best students. The sepoy had recently mastered a move called sakhi and he tried it just as the bout was beginning, lunging for the lascar’s right arm while trying to throw him over by hooking his knee with his foot.

But the lascar countered effortlessly, blocking the foot and pivoting smoothly into the attack, with a hold that Kesri recognized as a perfectly executed dhak . Within seconds the sepoy was pinned and the bout was over.

The next to enter the ring was a powerfully built marine: his best move was a throw called the kalajangh which was intended to flip the opponent over, by sliding under his chest and grabbing hold of his thigh. It was a common move and Kesri guessed that the lascar would know a pech with which to counter it. This proved to be exactly the case. The marine found himself grappling with thin air when he made his lunge; a moment later he was down on his belly, vainly trying to prevent himself from being rolled over.

The curious thing was that the lascar seemed to take little pleasure in his victories: instead of making a winning pehlwan’s customary gestures of triumph he hung his head, as if in embarrassment. This encouraged a couple of others to try their luck; but they fared no better than those who had gone before them: the lascar pinned them both, displaying in the process a mastery of complicated moves like the bhakuri and bagal dabba .

At this point Kesri could feel the eyes of his men turning to him, as if to see whether he would salvage their honour by entering the pit himself. He could not disappoint them — besides, he was curious to see how he would fare against the lascar. Murmuring a prayer to Hanumanji he stepped into the pit.

For a couple of minutes Kesri and the lascar circled experimentally, feinting, each trying to trick the other into a hasty move. Then Kesri went on the attack, with a multani , spinning around on his back foot and trying to come at the lascar from the rear. Instead it was the lascar who ended up behind him, forcing him into a defensive crouch.

In the past Kesri had sometimes turned this position to his advantage by using the dhobi pât — a move in which the opponent was hauled over the shoulder, in the manner of a dhobi beating clothes. But it turned out that the lascar knew the counter-move for this too. All of a sudden Kesri was sprawled on his back, struggling to keep his shoulders off the ground.

Sensing that the pin was near, the lascar stuck his shoulder into Kesri’s chest as he prepared to bring his full weight to bear. Their faces were now less than a foot apart, and suddenly their eyes met and locked. Now, just as the lascar was about to make the final thrust, an extraordinary thing happened: he was jolted into easing his grip — it was as if he had looked into Kesri’s eyes and seen something that he could not quite believe. All at once the fight went out of him and the relentless pressure that he had been exerting lessened. Kesri seized his chance and flipped him over: a second later he had the pin.

The reversal of fortune was so inexplicable that it left Kesri feeling strangely grateful to the lascar: he would not have liked to lose in front of his own men and was glad to have been spared that fate. But he knew also that the lascar was the better wrestler and later, when they were out of the ring he asked: What happened? Kya hua?

Even though he had asked in Hindustani, the lascar answered in Kesri’s own mother tongue: Hamaar saans ruk goel — I just lost my breath.

Taken by surprise, Kesri said: tu bhojpuri kahã se sikhala? Where did you learn Bhojpuri? Where are you from?

The lascar told him that he had been brought up in Ghazipur, in a Christian orphanage; his name came from the surnames of two of the priests: Maddow Colver.

Ghazipur? said Kesri: for him that town was indelibly linked to his sister Deeti. Do you mean the town with the opium factory?

Yes, that very one.

Kesri fell silent, seized by a strange sense of affinity with the man: that they were both wrestlers, that their paths had crossed on Nag Panchami, that they both had associations with Ghazipur — all of this seemed to imply that their fates were somehow intertwined.

All of a sudden a thought came to Kesri and he said to the lascar: Sunn — listen, my unit needs some strong men to haul our heavy guns. Would you be willing to join us? Just for the time that we are here? The pay will be good.

The man took his time in answering, looking towards the sea and scratching his head before turning back to Kesri.

Yes, he said at last, with a slow, thoughtful nod; if you can arrange it and if my present employer agrees, I will join you.

*

Zachary’s return to the Ibis was like a homecoming.

This was the vessel on which he had shipped out from Baltimore, as a novice seaman, a ship’s carpenter. Now, three years later, here he was boarding her again, as the skipper! The change was so great as to suggest the intervention of some other-wordly power: as a sailor Zachary knew that certain ships possess their own minds, even souls — and he did not doubt that the Ibis had conspired in making his transformation possible.

Nor was he surprised when the Ibis seemed to recognize him, bobbing her bowsprit up and down, as if in welcome. Yet, amongst the crew there was not a single face that was familiar to him. The lascars who had sailed with him on his earlier voyages were all gone; the new crew had been recruited in Singapore and consisted mainly of Malays and Manila-men. The mates too were strangers to Zachary: one was a tall, taciturn Finn and the other a dour Dutchman from Batavia. There wasn’t much they could say to each other, beyond what was required for the running of the schooner. But this was soon discovered to be a blessing; lacking the words to run afoul of each other, they got on very well.