Grand Menteur Read online

  Malbar never returned from his final trip to Mauritius. At the suggestion that he had gone off knowing that he had not long to live, my father said nothing, but instead reached into his pocket and handed me a gritty five-rupee coin, which felt heavy in my palms. I asked the ornery old goat if he wanted to be left alone and what he meant by the gesture, but met with silence, I handed the coin back. He held it between his thumb and little finger, twirling it restively, as though with significance. He smiled in a knowing way and chuckled as if he were the only person in the room, staring into the darkness, whispering, “Montagnes pas zoine – dimounes zoine. Montagnes pas zoine – dimounes zoine.”

  3.

  Sous fable, originally published 1944 in Soustyricon newspaper

  THE HUSBAND AND WIFE approached the gilt, spatchcock throne of the pushcart poulterer with an offering of fruit. The poulterer waved them forward to her feet, where they placed the tureen of braised guavas. She signalled with a gesture that the fruit be accepted and removed to a banquet table in the adjoining room. A young attendant collected the warm container before placing it among all the other offerings that had been made that morning. The attendant returned, closing the door behind him, so that the odours of the tannery would not permeate the chamber. The poulterer held her palm upward with her fingers converging into a point, and then shook it so that the fingers expanded like a trap opening. The couple realized this to be a signal admission to hear their request.

  The wife began by saying, “We desire your best capon to celebrate our son’s return. He has been gone for nigh on five years into a life of reckless ruin. These guavas were a gift from him and we make them a gift to you.” The poulterer stood up and weaved her way behind the throne chair, her mantelet snagging on one of its corners. A thump was heard from behind, followed by a howl of pain. She returned, checked her mouth for missing teeth, and extended nine featherless chickens to the couple, clasped together at the feet with a long piece of tether. Overjoyed, the wife bowed her head in respect, and began to walk out of the chamber room. Just as the husband was about to pass the threshold of the doorway into the fading light, he paused and addressed the poulterer as follows: “What’s he done for you for us to deserve this indulgence? I didn’t ask for nine chickens. Is this tainted meat you’re offering me?”

  Immediately, the couple were seized by two puckish guards who followed the poulterer into the room where all the offerings had been laid out. Decoratively arranged on the tables were every variety of halva, jaggery, cendol, barfi, colodent, rasgoula, napolitaine, compote, pie, clafloutis, broodpap, jalebi, yoghurt, kulfi – all with a guava-tinged variation to the respective dishes. The poulterer took a spoonful of the couple’s offering and pressed the fruit deep within her mouth. She then hissed out its contents onto the husband’s face and bowled him over with a dimpled blackjack. “Morality is for the mountains, fair stranger,” she said bending over his crumpled frame. “People are made of thinner stuffs, but not so thin that we can’t expect a little good courtesy in one’s home.”

  The husband was carried forth along a corridor and thrown out across some steps, where he struggled like a purblind animal to regain his footing, before crashing onto a hard and wet theatre of stained paving stones. His wife collected the loose articles which had fallen out of his pockets and helped his broken body to his feet. They left the tannery ruefully, while behind them a trail of nine dead chickens collected dirt on the floor and absorbed the chemicals from overflowing liming vats. From the roof above them, a lone figure looked on, before descending hurriedly to the liming floor to grub up what meat he could that clung to the sticky fatliquoring oils, determined one way or another that his return would be celebrated in the exact manner he was promised.

  Mountains don’t meet. People meet.

  4.

  Blue Boar service station, Northamptonshire, England, 1965

  when the condolence notices began arriving at our home, the effect of Malbar’s death on my father became pronounced. His first feat of dissipation, outwith his immoderate drinking, was to buy a potato to which he applied a failing proficiency in woodworking to render a likeness of his departed comrade. The tribute lasted no longer than a few days before it began to fall in on itself and attract a battery of flies, then maggots, that were no doubt working the same deft magic some ten thousand kilometres away on the master copy. I was forbidden to remove this rotting effigy from the mantlepiece, and any attempt to reintegrate the mash-like features into the shape of a nose threatened outrage. On the day that I could no longer tolerate the putridity that now clung to the loose fibres of our clothing, and even befouled the reserves of the brazier, I carefully extracted and buried it by the retaining wall at the edge of the property line. I received such a thrashing that night that even Sergent could not help cradling my small, adolescent body as he removed the dirt and potato skins he’d earlier shovelled into my mouth. His rage was spent, shame now overtaking him.

  The following morning I was rewarded, presumably in exchange for my silence, with sweets and a trip to the pictures. We watched the gaucherie of Norman Wisdom’s There Was a Crooked Man (again . . .), which is as close to an apology as my father has ever brooked. Serge, unlike myself, was a nutter for all of Wisdom’s films, especially anything that included Wisdom’s one-man, pratfalling double act – his turn as Norman Pitkin and Giulio Napolitani in On the Beat, as Pitkin and General Schreiber in The Square Peg, as the entire cast of Press for Time . . . Which goes to show you to what extent I could cash in on this precious act of contrition.

  Serge sat in the theatre taking notes, while I encountered twinges of recognition on the screen, regardless of which Wisdom picture we watched: wasn’t Pourri wrongfully imprisoned by my father’s hand like Davy Cooper in Crooked Man? Hadn’t the Derwish once masqueraded as a priest to squeeze information out of someone à la The Early Bird? Didn’t the Green look after a horse named Nellie? These connections never amounted to anything much in my mind; they were just stragglers of thought looking for a repository. The lights always came back on, and always we left the theatre with no further business. Like so many times before, we returned to the squat afterwards, only this time we had condolence notices to burn together. Then, we retired to our separate rooms.

  When I awoke, my father was gone and did not return until after the sun had set on our little street. The sky out my window was littered with trembling celestials. Serge did not bother with his shoes and instead tracked in soot and mud and God knows what else over the living room moquette. He was soon bathed in the light of a dying flame. I had forgotten to extinguish the brazier and feared Sergent would come looking for me to exact a comeuppance a second time. The dimness in his eyes relieved me of my incertitude, for I could tell his mind was elsewhere. He held in his hands a sheet of paper torn into shreds. He threw the pieces into the fire. Without raising his head to look at me, he said, “We leave early in the morning. We won’t be gone long.” He then retreated back outside into the necropolitan darkness of the city, to prepare for the recondite business of tomorrow, locking the door behind him.

  The following morning he roused me from my sleep with insistent shaking. He released my shoulder and placed a bag in front of me.

  “It’s packed with biscuits and fruit,” he indicated. “Put anything else you want inside but leave me some room. We’ll be home before nightfall. Five minutes.”

  After putting a few school books and some aniseed twists in my bag, I dozed off on the floor by the base of my bed, then intermittently awoke on my father’s shoulder as we descended the stairs leading out of our apartment. I finally found myself in the back of a car that looked somewhat familiar; it was filled with tarry faces, all of whom I recognized. To my right was the man whose moniker was the Bowling Green, a diminutive man with beak-like features who made his living in England as he did in Mauritius as a farrier. The Green was rechristened by my father because his given name, Sylvan, did not appositely convey his appreciation for an uncommon women’s h
air couture of the time. The Green’s mother in this way had erred in naming him in tribute to his dead father whose life had been claimed too early on in the scheme of things. In front of me in the passenger’s side was my father, who was fast asleep, and driving us to our destination while reading an eight-day-old newspaper was Ti Pourri, who unfortunately for all of us present, given his disinclination to bathe, had grown his hair out as an outward sign of acquiescence to the fashion of the time.

  The beat-up Morris Minor slithered its way to a hasty stop at Watford Gap. Everyone got out except for me, but Sergent opened my door and bade me to follow him. In the time it took to unfasten my belt, Pourri and Green had gone inside, carrying a large canvas-covered object from the boot. Sergent took my hand and led me through the wide front entrance, where we weaved through a bevy of travellers, given that it was early in the day and a bank holiday. Inside the stuffy building, restaurants were arranged in such a way as to convey that no one gave a toss about anything; it rather seemed as if Charon himself had sneezed out the contents of his nose at the one corner of the earth where people cared even less about their surroundings than he did his own cheerless domain. Suddenly, in the back wall between two kiosks offering wrapped sandwiches and maps all along the M1, a door opened cautiously. A plump, mustachioed face poked through the crack and vengeful eyes flickered to life. Catching sight of the two of us, the head arched back like a viper, but before the door fastened shut, a polished winklepicker zipped out at the door’s butt hinge.

  Sergent picked at the handle, and making sure not to leave the door ajar, lifted me up over one of his arms and we sidled our way through together; he pulled the door back with vigour, snapping it shut. The craggiest set of misaligned teeth I ever beheld stared back at me. It made me think of war ration books and I asked myself why the owner still felt compelled to use them.

  “Hello Derwish,” Sergent greeted, extending his free hand.

  “Have a seat, dingbat. I’ll bring a stool for your little one,” the Derwish replied coldly.

  The stool was brought forward to one side of a large round table that had been worked over with knives, keys, and razor-edged fingernails. Green and Ti Pourri had already taken their seats, and once our refreshments (drinks of an unknown composition) were handed out, Derwish took his place beside his compotators.

  “First District Sous Appellate Court now in session, the right honourable Black Derwish presiding,” a voice from beyond the vale of tears seemed to say, her head leaning back out of the range of the paraffin lamp that rested at the table’s centre. “Also in attendance, Lord Justice Clerk Green, Clerk of the Privy Council Ti Pourri, and on loan from the secretariat’s office, Sergent Mayacou. Also present, in unofficial capacity, two juveniles. Ahem.”

  I diverted my attention from these opening remarks and had it confirmed that the disembodied voice belonged to another girl who had been placed in a corner of the cramped storage room. In her hands rested a clacking Tomy Tutor Typer that accented the solemnity of the proceedings.

  “On appeal on the order of Puisne Justice Madeaux,” she continued. “Dated this June 17th. Pursuant to Malbar’s final wishes, outlined in the last will and testament, we are gathered to take stock of its contents, debts, codicils, hereditament, hotchpot, and then finally, the division of assets. Lord Justice Clerk: the receipt of probate.”

  “Receipt of probate Derwish, your honourless,” Green said.

  “Thank you,” the Derwish acknowledged.

  The sloe-eyed girl in the corner of the room bore a strange likeness to the Derwish. She had the same jet-black hair, the same crooked posture; on the other hand, she had the Bowling Green’s aquiline nose too, and the Green and Derwish being brothers-in-law, I assumed (correctly) a familial relationship. I waved at the girl across the table, who smiled diffidently at me in return. She hammered on over the stentorian voices of the assembled party.

  “The floor is open to disputes to the articles contained in the will and testament,” the Derwish announced. “You have your mimeographed copies before you. You may begin. Madame speaker.”

  The Derwish’s daughter (he gave himself away in the manner he phrased “Madame Speaker”: familiar, imperious, disappointed) put away her Typer at his beckoning, and approached the table. She cleared her throat, remarking, “Petitionary motions now being accepted. Petitionary motions now being accepted.”

  The room acceded to her order. Sergent leaned forward on his elbows and addressed the girl.

  “Thank you, Madame Speaker. Forgoing the event of intestacy, as I believe the document’s veracity has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt, even if we haven’t been able to locate Malbar’s codex, I’d like to petition for the disbursement of Malbar’s courtesies and goodwill. My understanding is that he has amassed a considerable fortune in favours.”

  “You shut the door after the steed is stolen, Sergent,” Ti Pourri said weakly.

  “No proverbs,” Green droned. “First warning.”

  “I am in agreement with Pourri,” Derwish said. “I won’t countenance the motion – yet.”

  “Nonsense,” my father went on. “The man is dead, last I checked. He’ll be buried the way he wanted to be – to our financial misfortune, and in Green’s case, his ruin – so I see no reason to help ceremony keep her frills on, when we all look to his assets covetously, one way or another. The Devil take the hindmost.”

  “Second warning,” Green said.

  My father nudged me; whoever broke the law last would suffer its injuries in toto, or so the game stipulated. The three other men looked about the room at each other, counting the seconds of respect for the departed. When ceremony was sufficiently given her due, they assented to my father’s motion.

  “The knocking shop,” Green said.

  “What about it?” my father asked.

  “Eskiz mwa. I want Malbar’s credit.”

  “That’ll be the day. Amrita will tell you Malbar’s credit is buried with him.”

  “I am owed two hundred quid, which he can no longer make good on.”

  “Derwish? Don’t forget the priority of claims,” Pourri said, remembering protocol after years of exile. He rejoiced at his own savviness almost superciliously.

  Derwish leaned back in his seat and mentally consulted his knowledge of legal precedent.

  “If Green thinks it in reciprocal equivalence, we cannot argue; he is the injured party, what? We can’t have a whip round, now can we? All in favour of the motion passing?”

  “Aye,” hummed Green.

  “Aye,” Pourri repeated.

  Thinking it a game, I raised my hand and mirrored the echo. The Derwish reached across the desk and slapped me across the face with enough force to hurl a volleyball across a car park.

  “I’ll not have my court made mockery of Sergent. Mo pa pou repeter.”

  Sergent pulled me close to his side and suffocated my cries against his chest. He produced from his pocket a Barlow knife, extended the blade open, and placed the knife butt-first into my hand, putting pressure on my fingers over the thumb rise. I held it the way he wanted it manoeuvred.

  “To tousse mo ti fi encore, mo pu casse to les reine, pilon,” my father warned.

  “Order, we want some order, please! No one will touch your daughter again, Sergent. We are among friends, or have we so soon forgotten?” Pourri said uselessly while the tension in the room stalked around corners. “Would one of Derwish’s treasury stocks satisfy you? That sounds more than fair for the insult, eh Derwish?”

  “If it will ensure violence is left at the door and if it acts in furtherance to the goals of the session, I see no reason why such a solution should not be encouraged,” the Derwish said.

  “Easy for you to say when you’ve got your licks in,” my father concluded. “Move on then. Erezman toulmonde conne to fatigan.”

  “Trwazyem fois mon dire laisse ti enfants a lakaz,” Derwish muttered. “Pe nas sulazman ici.”

  “I don’t mean to prove countervai
ling Derwish, but it was you who put forward a regulation allowing children to be present at meetings on Cherelle’s account.”

  The Derwish glowered at the Green.

  “There is still the matter of naming his uh, spiritual successor,” Green put forward hastily.

  “Yes, I’ve given it some thought,” Derwish began. “I think naturally the onus would fall on Sergent’s shoulders. You two were always closest in frame of mind.”

  A cloud of forced consternation spread over my father’s features, settling like a shroud. He played his part and stymied the protest that raced to the edge of his lips. He simply looked at his peers to analyze the sway of opinion.

  “You understand the responsibilities that would be conferred upon you, Serge, have not changed since Malbar bore them? Not to mention the benefits that would follow as well no doubt. It’s fitting, however, since you made arrangements for Malbar to occupy the post for so long, that you carry on in his stead in the end.”

  My father did not answer the Derwish immediately, though his grinding teeth seemed to do that just as well.