“Not my favourite word in the
dictionary, you know”.
“No, sir. Unpleasant business, but of
the utmost necessity, General. Quite so in this sort of affair, I
assure your Imminent Highness.”.
“What about the Ujaama? A bit
bothersome, don't you surmise?”.
“Yes, they too like chocolate.”
“Chocolate?... Ah, choco-o-late”.
“On second thought, maybe cacao. A
little purer than the rest of us, one would like to believe...”
Both men burst into a cackle and raised
their glasses.
At which point the cartoonish depiction
of the rapacious strongman from the (worse left) anonymous
fruit-and-flies Republic and implied foul scheming with toady
henchman goes stops short and the stereotype goes mono-a-mono
with the typewriter (and no
longer la mano with, to apply a little flourish to the
metaphor).
A hushed silence fell as the Big
Moollah sat, carefully tucking his rumpled gown under his ill-padded
derriere. The ceremonious rustle of dusty paperwork being shuffled by
some designated clerk in a corner of the hall cued the start of
proceedings.
“The first order of today's
officiation relates to the allegations of revenue-embezzlement in the
province of Bad-e-Bambari. 200,000 junaih. Primary accused :
El-Fatir-um-Jabeel. Post: Second Assistant to the Honorable Deputy
Collector. Till any absolution, henceforth to be referred to as the
janja.”
The janja was henceforth ushered
into the court aloft in a metallic barred palanquin by three
stern-faced bare-chested helpers bathed in oil and sweat. He wore a
chomped-down forlorn look on his sweaty countenance, his bulbous chin
folded down against his throat and his lumpy appendages lay limp
against his lap.
El-Fatir had been noticeably happy
lately. His wife had remarked something to that effect the night
before the morning he was taken away. He had gone to the chocolate
shop on Fateh Square the previous day and bought seventeen mrammou
for the six little ones who were so excited once they found out that
they took turns hugging their daadi three times each. Tucking
them away for the night one after another, he had sat in the dark
staring at the near-full moon through the window for a full hour
listening to king-crickets simmering in visions of impending
prosperity.
Prosperity was an improbable dream
growing up in the delta. He was born to farmers stuck on a
hardscrabble patch of sorghum hostage to the Big River's declining
outpourings. School came his way only after his grand-uncle Jamaal
who worked for the Big Moollah's predecessor visited their farm when
he was seven and picked him over his eight siblings for distinct
physical disadvantages in both constitution and industry (his father
had thought him frail and brooding). The old man convinced his nephew
without much pleading to let him ease their burden by carrying the
boy off to the city – in secret he had thought Fatir to be bright
and with a decent chance of improving his (and possibly their) lot
with a little education.
Fatir at first appeared to flail about in deeper waters waiting to be gobbled up by the mighty cauldron that
was Dar-El-Insaaf. But avuncular benevolence intervened once again in
the form of Jabril-ul-Ruhman, assistant deputy-undersecretary in the
Home Ministry at the Secretariat, an elderly figure of more repute
and influence than his title might suggest who found young Fatir in
tears one cold January evening kneeling in a corner of the Grand Hall
at the Jamia Mosque. The young man had been troubled badly by homesickness and penury soon after Jamaal had passed on with little by way of inheritance, dreading the prospect of going back empty-handed to his folk with all the shame and boredom that was sure to follow (especially the boredom bit).
With a few flourishes of his beloved Parker 51, the copper-haired mandarin instated Fatir as an orderly in the Food Supplies department on the ground floor of the dusty nondescript six-storeyed edifice he lorded over. Hauling his master's weekly rations (in the loosest sense of the term) up to his villa on foot two blocks from the boat in the canal aroused his mistresses' long-dormant maternal instincts enough for him to be served a warm meal and dollops of concern and affection with dessert.
to be continued...
