Banquet on the Dead Read Online Free PDF Page A

your legs, memsaab? Arthritis?’
    ‘No,’ said the woman. ‘It’s a chronic pain disorder. Hereditary, they say. My brother has it too.’
    ‘Who, the doctor?’
    ‘Yes.’
    They approached the main door of the house from the right. They climbed onto a concrete ledge by means of a short flight of stairs on which the house had been erected. The door looked onto the front yard and the main gate, the same one beyond which Hamid Pasha and Inspector Nagarajan had stood a while back.
    ‘Now,’ she said, turning to face them. ‘Here we are. I suppose you will take a room and want us all to come in one by one?’
    Nagarajan said, ‘That won’t be necessary, madam. We just want to talk.’
    ‘Yes, yes, of course.’
    ‘Now that we are here, memsaab,’ Hamid Pasha murmured softly, ‘may we talk to you for a while?’
    She looked at him and smiled. ‘Yes, of course, sir. I suppose you want to know where I was when the old woman fell over?’
    ‘Actually, memsaab, I was going to ask you how long you have been affected by this—disorder, you call it?’
    Taken aback for an instant, she looked down at her feet and said, ‘Longer than I remember, sir.’ Her voice went down a couple of notches. ‘I was fine when I was in college, even after I got married. Yes, it started around that time.’
    ‘Must have been a big blow, memsaab, for a lady as young and as active as you must have been.’
    She stared at her feet for a long time. ‘There are some things best not talked about, sir.’
    ‘I understand, memsaab. May Khuda cure this disorder of yours soon so that you can run and prance about as you wish.’
    ‘There is no hope of that now, sir. Anyway, I don’t think you came here to talk about my condition.’
    ‘Ah, no, memsaab. I did not come here to talk about anything in particular. I came here... just to observe and ask questions. I observed your condition, and I asked questions. That is all.’
    She gave a short laugh. ‘This is so not the “routine formality” that I expected. Aren’t you even going to ask me my name?’
    Nagarajan said, ‘I sort of guessed who you might be. You’re Prameela’s daughter, aren’t you? Karuna Mayi?’
    ‘Ah, Karuna Mayi, the kind-hearted one.’
    ‘Ha,’ she said, sneering. ‘Yes, kind-hearted. I will let you talk to everyone in my family and then tell me if I am kind-hearted.’
    ‘They don’t like you, memsaab?’
    ‘I will let you figure that out for yourself, sir,’ she said.
    ‘But maybe you could tell us what you think of them ?’
    ‘Louts, all of them,’ she said flatly. ‘Not one of them amount to anything as men.’
    ‘Ah,’ said Hamid Pasha, ‘I take it you are talking of the sons?’
    ‘Yes,’ she said, and looked through the window adjoining the open door. Hamid Pasha and the inspector could see the shadow of someone fidgeting about on the bed inside. Karuna looked back at them and said in an even louder voice, ‘Not worth the food that they eat. Not one of them!’ She smiled; a thin, derisive smile. ‘As you will see, the dislike is mutual, sir.’
    ‘It is so in all families, memsaab,’ Hamid Pasha said, stroking his beard and staring at the window. He asked, ‘And your mother is not “one of them”, as you say?’
    ‘Oh she is no good herself. But she is a woman, you know. A woman can only cause so much damage.’ Her face darkened as she finished those words. ‘Actually,’ she said, ‘that’s not quite true...’
    ‘Indeed?’ said Hamid Pasha. ‘I wonder—’
    A sound came from inside; the sound of steel utensils dropped on polished granite and clattering away. Karuna waited until the clanging died down, and told Hamid Pasha apologetically, ‘It sounds like I am wanted in the kitchen, sir. We will have to continue our conversation later.’
    She turned and hobbled away, hands on hips.
    They stood at the entrance for a minute, looking in. Then, after throwing a glance at one another, they took off their sandals and walked