A Son of the Circus

“There was quite a lot of blood by one ear,” the actor said, as if he’d never stopped wondering about it.

“Very good—there absolutely was!” said the encouraging detective. “Mr. Lal was struck behind one ear, and also once in the temple—probably after he fell.”

“Struck by what?” Dr. Daruwalla asked.

“By what, we know—it was his putter!” said Detective Patel. “By whom, we don’t know.”

In the 130-year history of the Duckworth Sports Club-through all the perils of Independence and those many diverting occasions that could have led to violence (for example, those wild times when the inflammatory Lady Duckworth bared her breasts)—there had never been a murder! Dr. Daruwalla thought of how he would phrase this news to the Membership Committee.

It was characteristic of Farrokh not to consider his esteemed late father as the actual first murder victim in the 130-year history of Duckworthians in Bombay. The chief reason for this oversight was that Farrokh tried very hard not to think about his father’s murder at all, but a secondary reason was surely that the doctor didn’t want his father’s violent death to cloud his otherwise sunny feelings for the Duckworth Club, which has already been described as the only place (other than the circus) where Dr. Daruwalla felt at home.

Besides, Dr. Daruwalla’s father wasn’t murdered at the Duckworth Club. The car that he was driving exploded in Tardeo, not in Mahalaxmi, although these are neighboring districts. But it was generally admitted, even among Duckworthians, that the car bomb was probably installed while the senior Daruwalla’s car was parked in the Duckworth Club parking lot. Duckworthians were quick to point out that the only other person who was killed had no relationship to the club; the poor woman wasn’t even an employee. She was a construction worker, and she was said to be carrying a straw basket full of rocks on her head when the flying right-front fender of the senior Daruwalla’s car decapitated her.

But this was old news. The first Duckworthian to be murdered on the actual property of the Duckworth Club was Mr. Lal.

“Mr. Lal,” explained Detective Patel, “was engaged in swinging what I believe they call a ‘mashie,’ or is it a ‘wedgie’—what do they call the club you hit a chip shot with?” Neither Dr. Daruwalla nor Inspector Dhar was a golfer; a mashie or a wedgie sounded close enough to the real and stupid thing to them. “Well, it doesn’t matter,” the detective said. “Mr. Lal was holding one club when he was struck from behind with another—his own putter! We found it and his golf bag in the bougainvillea.”

Inspector Dhar had assumed a familiar film pose, or else he was merely thinking; he lifted his face as his fingers lightly stroked his chin, which enhanced his sneer. What he said was something that Dr. Daruwalla and Deputy Commissioner Patel had heard him say many times before; he said it in every movie.

“Forgive me for sounding most theoretical,” Dhar said. This favorite bit of dialogue was of that kind which Dhar preferred to deliver in English, although he’d delivered the line on more than one occasion in Hindi, too. “It seems,” Dhar said, “that the killer didn’t care especially who his victim was. Mr. Lal was not scheduled to meet anyone in the bougainvillea at the ninth green. It was an accident that he was there—the killer couldn’t have known.”

“Very good,” said D.C.P. Patel. “Please go on.”

“Since the killer didn’t seem to care who he killed,” Inspector Dhar said, “perhaps it was intended only that the victim be one of us.”

“Do you mean one of the members?” cried Dr. Daruwalla. “Do you mean a Duckworthian?”

“It’s just a theory,” said Inspector Dhar. Again, this was an echo; it was something he said in every movie.

“There is some evidence to support your theory, Mr. Dhar,” Detective Patel said almost casually. The deputy commissioner removed his sunglasses from the breast pocket of his crisp white shirt, which showed not a trace of evidence of his latest meal; he probed deeper into the pocket and extracted a folded square of plastic wrapping, large enough to cover a wedge of tomato or a slice of onion. From the plastic he unwrapped a two-rupee note that had previously been rolled into a typewriter, for typed on the serial-number side of the bill, in capital letters, was this warning: MORE MEMBERS DIE IF DHAR REMAINS A MEMBER.

“Forgive me, Mr. Dhar, if I ask you the obvious,” said Detective Patel.

“Yes, I have enemies,” Dhar said, without waiting for the question, “Yes, there are people who’d like to kill me.”

“But everyone would like to kill him!” cried Dr. Daruwalla. Then he touched the younger man’s hand. “Sorry,” he added.

Deputy Commissioner Patel returned the two-rupee note to his pocket. As he put on his sunglasses, the detective’s pencil-thin mustache suggested to Dr. Daruwalla a punctiliousness in shaving that the doctor had abandoned in his twenties. Such a mustache, etched both below the nose and above the lip, requires a younger man’s steady hand. At his age, the deputy commissioner must have had to prop his elbow fast against the mirror, for shaving of this kind could only be accomplished by removing the razor blade from the razor and holding the blade just so. A time-consuming vanity for a man in his forties, Farrokh imagined; or maybe someone else shaved the deputy commissioner—possibly a younger woman, with an untrembling hand.

“In summary,” the detective was saying to Dhar, “I don’t suppose you know who all your enemies are.” He didn’t wait for an answer. “I suppose we could start with all the prostitutes—not just the hijras—and most policemen.”

“I would start with the hijras,” Farrokh broke in; he was thinking like a screenwriter again.

“I wouldn’t,” said Detective Patel. “What do the hijras care if Dhar is or isn’t a member of this club? What they want is his penis and his testicles.”

“You’re telling me,” said Inspector Dhar.

“I very much doubt that the murderer is a member of this club,” said Dr. Daruwalla.

“Don’t rule that out,” Dhar said.

“I won’t,” said Detective Patel. He gave both Dr. Daruwalla and Inspector Dhar his card. “If you call me,” he said to Dhar, “you better call me at home—I wouldn’t leave any messages at Crime Branch Headquarters. You know all about how we policemen can’t be trusted.”

“Yes,” the actor said. “I know.”

“Excuse me, Detective Patel,” said Dr. Daruwalla. “Where did you find the two-rupee note?”

“It was folded in Mr. Lal’s mouth,” the detective said.