V. Naipaul - The nightwatchman's occurrence book - and other comic inventions

Rampiari’s husband tightened his broad leather belt. ‘They putting money in your pocket, Mr Harbans. Five years’ regular pay. And the committee get pay for what they do. But look at these poor people. You drag them out from Cordoba and Ravine Road and Pueblo Road. I can’t hold back the people, Mr Harbans.’

Harbans yielded. He rose, held his hands together, cracked his fingers, shifted his gaze from his feet to his hands and said, cooing like the old Harbans, ‘The good people of Elvira work hard for me and I going to give Ramlogan a order to give ten case of whisky to the committee to give you.’ It would cost him about four hundred dollars, but it seemed the only way out. He couldn’t make a run for his Jaguar. ‘Ten case of whisky. Good whisky.’ He gave a little coo and showed his false teeth. ‘Not White Horse, though. You can’t get that every day.’

Almost miraculously, the crowd was appeased. They laughed at Harbans’s little joke and chattered happily among themselves.

But Chittaranjan was in the devil of a temper. He was annoyed with the crowd; annoyed with Harbans for giving in so easily to them; annoyed because he knew for sure now that Harbans never had any intention of marrying his son to Nelly; annoyed with Ramlogan for offering the whisky and making so much noise about it.

He jumped up and shouted, ‘No!’ It was his firm fighting voice. It stilled the crowd. ‘You people ain’t got no shame at all. Instead of Mr Harbans giving you anything more, you should be giving him something, for a change.’

The crowd was taken by surprise.

‘Most of you is Hindus. Mr Harbans is a Hindu. He win a election. You should be giving him something. You should be saying prayers for him.’

There was a murmur. Not of annoyance, but incomprehension.

‘Say a kattha for him. Get Pundit Dhaniram to read from the Hindu scriptures.’

The effect was wonderful. Even Rampiari’s husband was shamed. He took off his hat and came a step or two nearer the case of whisky. ‘But Goldsmith, a kattha going to cost a lot of money.’

‘Course it going to cost money!’

Rampiari’s husband withdrew.

Harbans got up, cooing. ‘Ooh, Goldsmith. If they want to honour me with a kattha, we must let them honour me with a kattha. Ooh. Tell you what, eh, good people of Elvira. Make a little collection among yourself fust.’

The crowd was too astonished to protest.

Only Haq staggered up and said, ‘Why for we should make a collection for a Hindu kattha? We is Muslims.’

But no one heard him. Harbans was still speaking: ‘Make your collection fust.’ He flashed the false teeth again. ‘And for every dollar you collect, I go put a dollar, and with the money all of we put up, we go have the kattha.’ Harbans had heard Haq though; so he turned to Foam, as a Muslim, for support ‘Eh, Foreman? You don’t think is the best idea?’

Foam rose. ‘Is the best thing. And I agree with the goldsmith that the people of Elvira should give something to their own Onble Member.’

That really caused the trouble.

Rampiari’s husband didn’t mind when Chittaranjan had said it. Everyone respected Chittaranjan as an honourable man, and everyone knew that he hadn’t got a penny from Harbans. But when Foam said it, that was different.

‘Is all right for you to talk, Foreman Baksh,’ Rampiari’s husband said. ‘Your pocket full. You get your two hundred dollars a month campaign-managing for Harbans.’

‘And your father get a whole loudspeaking van,’ Harichand chipped in. ‘And everybody in Elvira damn well know that out of the fifty-six votes your father get, your father vote was one.’

Baksh danced to the front of the crowd.

‘What loudspeaking van?’ he asked.

Chittaranjan was on his feet again. ‘And we, the members of the committee, going to give back the case of whisky to Mr Ramlogan.’

This made Mahadeo lose his temper.

‘Why? Why for we must give back the case of whisky?’

‘And how the hell you know I ain’t vote for Harbans, Harichand?’

‘The clerk tell me,’ Harichand said.

For a moment Baksh was nonplussed. Than he shouted, ‘Harbans, if you going to give money for a Hindu kattha, you damn well got to give the Muslims a kitab.’

Mahadeo said, ‘Goldsmith, why for we must give back the whisky?’

‘Hush your mouth, you damn fool,’ Chittaranjan whispered. ‘We not giving it back really.’

Haq had limped right up to the whisky and was saying, ‘Muslim vote for Harbans too. What happen? They stop counting Muslim vote these days?’

‘All right,’ Harbans cooed. ‘All you Muslim make your collection for your kitab. And for every dollar you put, I go put one. Eh?’

Then somebody else leapt up and asked what about the Christians.

Rampiari’s husband shouted, ‘Haq, what the hell you doing there? You vote for Harbans?’

‘Who I vote for is my business. Nobody ain’t make you a policeman yet.’

Then it was chaos. Rampiari’s husband switched his attack to Baksh. Baksh was attacking Harbans. Foam was being attacked by innumerable anonymous people. Mahadeo was being attacked by people whose illness he had spurned. Haq was poking questions directly under Harbans’s nose. Harbans was saying, ‘Ooh, ooh,’ and trying to pacify everybody. Only two objects remained immovable and constant: Chittaranjan and the case of whisky.

Somehow, after minutes of tortuous altercation, something was decided. The committee were to give back the case of whisky. The people of Elvira were to get religious consolation. The Muslims were to get their kitab, the Hindus their kattha, the Christians their service.

But nobody was really pleased.

Ramlogan insisted that Harbans should give him back the case of whisky ceremonially.

Harbans said, “Ladies and gentlemen, was nice of all-you to ask me down here today to give away this whisky. But I can’t tell you how happy and proud it make me to see that the committee ain’t want it. Committee do their duty, and duty is their reward.’

There was some derisory cheering.

‘So, Mr Ramlogan, I give you back your whisky. And I glad to see that at this moment the people of Elvira putting God in their heart.’

Foam said, ‘Three cheers for the Onble Surujpat Harbans. Hip-hip.’

He got no response.

Only, Baksh ran up.

‘Jordan sick, Mr Harbans.’

‘I hope he get better.’

‘For the last time, Mr Harbans. Jordan sick.’

The crowd pressed forward silently around the committee.

Harbans buttoned his over-large coat and prepared to leave. He put his hand on the arm of Rampiari’s husband, to show that he wasn’t cowed. ‘Give me a little break. Let me get through.’

Rampiari’s husband folded his arms.

‘Give me a break, man. Last time I come to Elvira, I telling you. All you people driving me away.’

Rampiari’s husband said, ‘We know you is a Onble and thing now, but you deaf? You ain’t hear what the man saying? Jordan sick.’ Rampiari’s husband turned his back to Harbans and addressed the crowd. ‘All-you see Jordan tonight?’

The reply came in chorus: ‘No, we ain’t see Jordan.’

‘What happen to Jordan?’ Rampiari’s husband asked.

‘Jordan sick,’ the crowd replied.

Harbans looked at Chittaranjan.

Chittaranjan said, ‘You better go.’

Jordan lived in one of the many traces off the main road. It was a moonless night and the occasional oil lamps in the houses far back from the trace only made the darkness more terrible. At the heels of Harbans and his committee there was nearly half the crowd that had gathered outside Chittaranjan’s shop. Tiger ran yapping in and out of the procession. One horrible young labourer with glasses, gold teeth and a flowerpot hat pushed his face close to Harbans and said, ‘Don’t worry with the old generation. Is the young generation like me you got to worry about.’