The Setting Sun (13 page)

‘It might save time to go straight to Kolhapur and try to find Shinde and Bhosle?’

Rajeev shakes his head. ‘University vacation time by now. They could be away. Keep them for later; if we don’t find Modak then you can try down there.’

‘You think they’d be co-operative?’

My host shrugs. ‘Jealous types, these provincial historians. You’ve read Nirad Chaudhuri. Just don’t give the impression you want to write about the Patri Sarkar. They probably think they own the subject.’

Later, in my hotel room, I pore over Kamte’s
From Them to Us
, published in 1982. Disappointingly, there’s no mention of Bill. But the author describes how he himself was supposed to have been sent to Satara in May 1944, just as Bill left. This was in order to help suppress ‘the “Patri Sarkar” agitation, which was notorious for its treatment of informers, real or imagined’. While diverted at the last moment to Dharwar, some distance from the disturbances, Kamte nonetheless dismisses the ‘baseless reports’ of police brutality in Satara. This seems telling, given his occasional criticism of white colleagues, from whom he apparently suffered some degree of prejudice. On the other hand, Kamte’s a policeman himself, so he would probably protect his own, wouldn’t he? Indeed, his disclaimer about police brutality is somewhat undermined when Kamte describes a crowd of demonstrators he was confronted by early on in his appointment to Dharwar: ‘I asked them to disperse, failing which they would get a beating.’ Was this typical police strategy at the time? If so, what light might it shed on Bill’s alleged behaviour at Chafal?

All in all, this feels like a breakthrough. Here’s the first documentary counter-evidence to Shinde’s accusations. If only Rajeev can run down Modak. I wonder what he’s like. I can’t afford to think of him in the past tense. If he and Bill worked
side by side against the Parallel Government, presumably he’ll be pleased to see me and talk? His evidence may prove crucial. Suddenly, remembering Rajeev’s earlier comment, I’m arrested by a strange feeling. Perhaps I
am
becoming a detective, like Bill. Yet he’s the chief suspect in this case. However, I’m also acting for the defence. Are the roles compatible? Bill’s words echo across the decades from the Ugalla River.

‘You have to collect the evidence. Then it’s for other people to decide.’

CHAPTER 5

My Father’s Friend?

As I’m packing up my hotel room to leave for Nasik, Rajeev rings. He can’t keep the excitement out of his voice. ‘We’ve found Modak.’

‘What?’ My heart pounds.

He dictates an address in Pune. ‘You should go straight away. It seems his son has come over from the US for Christmas. They may go away somewhere or whatnot.’

‘Do you have a number?’

‘I’m sorry, no.’

I consider rapidly. Nasik will have to wait. In view of Shinde’s accusations, meeting Modak’s the priority.

‘I was just on my way to the train station.’

‘Good. My dear friend, please to keep me advised of your movements. I will always aid you with every helpfulness. Now, a little word.’

‘Yes?’

‘Modak has the reputation of being cranky. His fellow-officers rather avoided him.’

‘Why?’

‘He’s a bit … he always felt hard done by.’

‘Was he?’

‘Well, he was always something of an outsider. For one thing, he’s Christian. His father converted. He was a district magistrate under the British. A big fish. But they sacked him during the war.’

‘Why?’

‘I don’t know. Anyway, try to humour him. He could be a gold mine.’

‘I can’t thank you enough, Rajeev.’

‘Modak had a difficult career,’ he adds, almost absent-mindedly.

‘How so?’

‘It must have been very hard for him after Independence. Do you know, he actually shot his own future boss during the Patri Sarkar agitation? When Nana Patil tried to escape from Sangli jail – in 1943, I think. Shot him in the back as he was running away.’ His voice tails off meditatively. ‘Yes, then your intended victim becomes chief minister of Maharashtra and you’re still in the force. To Nana’s credit, he never held it against Modak. He could have finished his career at a stroke.’

Rajeev’s warning tone doesn’t detract from my elation. If Modak’s cranky, it won’t be on my account.

Victoria Terminus is heaving, except for an area cordoned off with plastic tape, which, apart from a guard or two, is ominously empty. It’s hard to believe that so many people were gunned down here barely three weeks ago. I get a train easily enough and we’re soon on our way. It’s a relief to escape the intensity of Mumbai. Tiredness and heartache are slowly soothed by the laboured rhythm of the train chugging inland towards the Sahyadri mountains, known to the British as the Western Ghats. We climb ponderously through run-down Raj-era stations, each a shade cooler than the last, where I sense the ghosts of Kipling’s lovers and clubmen hovering on the platforms. The landscape ripples into ever deeper gorges beneath forested crests, the occasional village in a clearing dwarfed by huge blue skies.

As we reach the Deccan plateau on which Pune is situated, my apprehension mounts. I’m investing hugely in finding Modak. If anyone can vindicate Bill, it’ll surely be his comrade-in-arms of eighteen months during the Parallel Government agitation. But will Modak be willing to talk? What if he’s drawn a line across those troubled times, given what was evidently an awkward transition between service
in the imperial Indian Police and its post-Independence successor? Yet he obviously did well enough, reaching the rank of commissioner. Now I think about it, I don’t remember any mention of him in Shinde’s account. Why not, if he was in Satara at the same time as Bill, and especially if he shot one of the leaders of the insurgency?

Central Pune is an unpleasant contrast to the still-gracious Fort area of Mumbai where I based myself; unsurprisingly, perhaps, since the city’s population has doubled to more than five million in just fifteen years, with no perceptible investment in infrastructure. At the station, long queues of Christmas travellers snake round the concourse, right into the road, each person clinging to the one in front like disaster victims.

‘Is for ticket offices. They do like that to stop queue-busters,’ my taxi-driver explains.

Getting around is one continuous dodgem-car snarl of close shaves, klaxons and frustrated drivers. For the first time, I see the kind of poverty I expected in Mumbai: disabled boys tapping at our windows, old men in rags, bewildered families squatting amongst their possessions on the teeming pavements, perhaps regretting their decision to migrate to the city. The driver weaves in and out of the bedlam, hand glued to his horn, overtaking any which way he can, mounting the pavement when all else fails.

Happily, the hotel I’ve booked turns out to be a delicious oasis of smoked glass and cool marble, with friendly and efficient staff. The receptionist shows me on the map where the Modaks live and recommends the German Bakery, on the same road, for a late lunch.

‘Everything’s prepared with sterilised water, only,’ she affirms.

I shower, change and catch an auto-rickshaw back through the mayhem round the station towards Koregaon Park. I feel as vulnerable as an egg in my open-sided carriage, staring aghast at the throbbing buses which bully beside us, inches away.

The pollution’s palpable as fog and I have to clamp a hankie over my nose against the fumes. Eventually we turn into the relative calm and green of ‘The Cantonment’, the old British garrison area and now HQ of the Indian Army’s Southern Command. Nothing’s visible behind the endless walls, with sentries at every corner, saluting the pennanted 4×4s which bustle past. Koregaon Park’s leafier still, though the greenery’s already gathering a rime of post-monsoon dust.

There are suddenly a fair number of Westerners, most clad in long maroon shifts. This area’s home to the Osho commune, where Bhagwan Rajneesh returned after being expelled from Oregon – with or without his collection of Rolls-Royces, I can’t remember. Along the pavements, shiny-faced acolytes greet each other with long hugs. Soon the tuk-tuk arrives at the German Bakery. But being this close to Modak, I’m suddenly too on edge for lunch. Instead I settle on cappuccino and a coconut macaroon.

As soon as I’ve finished, I head down Koregaon Park Road, searching for no. 22. Vendors’ stalls clog the pavement, evidently catering to Oshoites, displaying regulation maroon robes, sunglasses, curios and cases of Red Bull. To my surprise my destination turns out to be a scaffolded house with workers slapping render on the front. It’s a while before they can find someone who speaks English. His face and stick-like arms are caked with cement dust.

‘House empty. Before Mr Sinha. New owners now.’

There’s no answer when I phone Rajeev’s mobile out on the street. When I call Inquiries for his landline, he’s listed as ex-directory. Nor do they have any E.S. Modak. I feel crushed. My quest seems to have come to a dead end again. I wonder if I should return to Mumbai.

Since I’ve paid for my room, however, I decide to take a look around Pune while I work out a plan. The Osho commune is supposed to be interesting, so I head there first. It’s down one of the streets leading at right angles off Koregaon Park Road.
Strolling down Lane Two, as it’s called I realise I’ve stumbled on an architectural jewel. It’s all Art Deco buildings, in much better condition than those in Mumbai. Perhaps the monsoon’s not so damaging inland, or the owners more particular. I photograph a few houses, before finding myself outside a spectacular double-storeyed specimen with a curved frontage, painted fresh sage-green. The garden’s gorgeous, huge trees edging a smoothly shaved lawn. More vibrant colours, but the borders are clearly modelled on the English cottage garden. Seeing a man on the drive, I think it polite to ask permission for a photo. He doesn’t understand, but signals me to wait.

He soon returns, accompanied by a bent, white-haired woman with a deeply lined face, wearing a white sari with tinselly gold-embroidered hems. I explain my interest in architecture.

‘Of course you may take picture,’ she smiles.

‘Was this the British area during the Raj?’

‘No. We Parsis built here in the 1930s. What are you doing in Pune?’ She pronounces it the old way, Poona.

‘My father was in India in the 1940s, and I was told one of his colleagues lives in Koregaon Park.’

‘What did your father do?’

‘Indian Police.’

She nods with unmistakable approval. ‘Who are you looking for?’

‘E.S. Modak.’

She straightens up a little, beaming. ‘Emmanuel? He lives in Lane Four. I don’t remember the house number, but it’s next to an office block with plate-glass windows.’

‘22?’

‘Yes, that’s it, 22/4 Koregaon Park Road. Just after a sandy track on the left.’

It’s another huge stroke of luck. I can barely restrain myself from hugging her. Either Rajeev or his contact omitted the lane number. It might have proved catastrophic.

I race back to the main road, as though Modak may only
have minutes to live. I’m soon at the sandy lane and see the name plate, engraved in italics, on a low gate: ‘E.S. Modak, I.P. (ret’d.)’. I hesitate. What exactly am I going to ask? Will it be too much of a shock for him? I approach down a short drive lined with alternating pots of orange and mauve bougainvillea. Screening the house are lacy-leafed papayas and spiky shrubs with forsythia-yellow blooms. A dusty Christmas wreath hangs on the front door. It seems ominously quiet. A few moments after I ring the bell, however, the door’s opened by a plump young woman with glossy hair and tired eyes.

‘Hello,’ she says grumpily, ‘we were expecting you before lunch.’

I’m completely thrown. ‘Expecting me?’

‘Aren’t you here about buying the washing machine?’

I set her straight with a nervous laugh. ‘Is Mr Modak in?’

‘They’re having their nap. Can I help? I’m their daughter,’ she adds snappishly, sensing my reluctance.

Is there some mistake? She can’t be more than twenty-five. Perhaps Modak remarried. But I’ve had so many surprises in India that I simply nod and offer my visiting card.

‘My father and he were colleagues.’

Her expression softens. ‘Enter, enter, please.’

‘I can come back later?’

Her head wobbles deprecatingly as she shows me into a rectangular living room with ceiling fans and comfortable, old-fashioned furniture, before disappearing down a corridor. The Christmas cards are outnumbered by silver-framed photos of children and grandchildren. Above the mantlepiece hangs a scabbarded dress sword, identical to the one my younger brother inherited. The ornately chased hand-guard gleams against the faded white walls. It’s all very Western. Even the floral rugs could be from Peter Jones.

Eventually, nerves on fire, I hear shuffling. Out of the gloom of the corridor emerges a very old man in loose cream pyjamas. I recognise him at once, although age has whetted
the beaky nose and tautened the skin across his cheekbones. His ears are more pronounced than in the photo in Rajeev’s book, and his lips are string-thin now. In one trembling hand he holds my card.

‘Moore-Gilbert,’ he mutters after a moment, glancing from me to the card and back again, ‘Moore-Gilbert. Well I never.’ He signals me to sit, before lowering himself stiffly into an armchair.

The girl, who’s been hovering attentively, like a nurse, seems satisfied and disappears. Modak examines the card again before nodding uncertainly.

‘Do you realise, I last saw your father more than sixty-three years ago.’

The awful passage of time stuns both of us.

‘I understand he died in Africa in the 1960s. How did it happen?’

As I explain, Modak examines me forensically, as if verifying my connections to Bill.

‘Now tell me about yourself and why you’re here.’

He’s rather hard of hearing and I have to go slowly and repeat myself at times. His expression makes me wonder whether he’s in pain or perhaps displeased to have been tracked down. Once he’s grasped the outlines, my host starts to lever himself up. I’m about to offer help when his sharp look forestalls me.