The Story of My Assassins Read Online Free PDF Page A

remember that in our line of work nine right and one wrong is wrong, but all ten wrong is right. And so we do what we are told and we are always right even though we are often wrong.’
    He said all this in his low flat tone, without a single inflection. His name was Hathi Ram—his father had served as a soldier in the British Indian army in Burma and developed a fascination for elephants. His father had told him to be like a hathi, gentle but strong, obedient but incapable of being pushed around. He said his father was a fool, a simple army man, from another world and time. In the force these days you had to be a bahurupiya, a quick-change artiste, a master of impersonation, capable of putting on a face for every occasion. A mouse in front of seniors, an elephant in front of juniors, a wolf with suspects, a tiger before convicts, a lamb around politicians, a fox with men of money. So he was not always Hathi Ram—sometimes he was Chooha Ram or Lomdi Ram or Sher Ram or BakriRam. In the force these days who you were depended on who was sitting in front of you.
    I said, ‘So who are you now?’
    A full smile cracked his face. His close cropped hair was more grey than black, though his bushy moustache was dark with dye. Thick salt and pepper tendrils spilled out from his open shirt collar. He riffled the pages of
The Naked Lunch
like a pack of cards, and said, ‘Now I am Dost Ram. I am here as a friend. We have to look after you. We don’t want any harm to come to you.’ Through his avuncular pudginess, his eyes were still and hard.
    I said, ‘What’s happening? Who’s trying to get me?’
    He said, ‘We don’t know too much. We are still trying to find out.’
    I said, ‘But surely …’
    He said, ‘I told you, sahib, those above us order us and we do. Our job is not to ask why—otherwise there will be a mountain of whys, and no job.’
    I said, ‘How many were they?’
    He said, ‘I think five, but I only know from what I heard on TV.’
    I said, ‘Hathi Ramji, if you know nothing, then why are you here? Surely not to find out from me?’
    He said, ‘Sahib, I did not become a sub-inspector by going to big colleges and answering three-hour examinations. The force is full of lovely boys whose teeth are still milky white and pubic hair still boot-polish black, and I am sure they know things of which I know nothing. I became an SI by dragging my khaki ass through the alleys and byways of this benighted city for thirty years, and one of the things I learnt, wearing out my soles, is that nothing in this city is what it seems. But I also learnt that one of the best ways to deal with things is to keep them simple. Small men like me can go deranged trying to figure out the motives and the means of big men. There are people in the force who spend all their time trying to find out these things. They take news to big men, and theybring back instructions. I don’t. I just do what my officers tell me. I am not washed in milk and I am no angel. But I am a bahurupiya out of necessity, and no more. Sometimes I do right and sometimes I do wrong. But I do it in the line of duty, and it is not for me to judge. I simply follow the Gita. Do what you have to do. Do you think it was right for Arjuna to kill the great Bhishma by shooting from behind Sikhandin? Do you think it was right for the noble Yudhishthira to speak a lie so that the great Dronacharya could be killed? Lord Krishna made them do these things. The Lord alone knows what is right and wrong. Men can only do their duty.’
    Not one inflection, just that low flat tone, and a continual riffling of
The Naked Lunch
. When he finished he picked up an orange-cream biscuit, opened its two halves and put into his mouth first the less creamy one and seconds later, the other.
    I said, ‘And what is your duty today?’
    He said, ‘To make sure you are safe, and you stay safe.’

2

REIGN OF THE SHADOWS
    I did not see SI Hathi Ram again for several weeks, but the fair boy