One day,
when Potol Babu was going home from office, his neighbour Keshob Babu called out to him from his window.
Potol Babu’s real and complete name was
Nobinchondro Bhottacharjyo. He worked as a head clerk in an accountant’s
office. He was very proud of his position, especially so when people asked him
for financial advice. Or, at least, he had been
very proud of his position until the accountant’s son had taken over the firm.
He thought it was for financial advice that Keshob Babu had called out to him
now, and that was why he made the bad mistake of waiting to talk.
“Habh you seen the newj?” Keshob Babu
asked, through the iron bars on the window. “They are saying a ghost has been
seen een the town.”
Potol Babu rubbed his bald head. “Who eej
saying thees?” he asked, reasonably enough. “You know eef eet eej een the
paypaar eet may be a lie.”
“No, no,” Keshob Babu hastened to assure
him. “Eet eej not in the paypaar. Eet eej on the telebheeshon.”
Potol Babu rubbed his bald head a little
harder. If it was on the television,
that was a different matter. He had total faith in the television, like everyone
else in Bunglistan. “Well then, what deed thees ghost do?” he asked.
“Eet was seen near the feesh maarket,”
Keshob Babu said. “Peepool going that way saw eet in a tree and told the
pulish. They are now haanting eet ebhrywhere.”
“They weel catch eet soon, I theenk,” Potol
Babu said. Inwardly, he was quaking. He was terrified
of ghosts, and the very thought of a ghost on the loose was enough to send shivers
down his spine. He’d always imagined that all the ghosts had been locked up in
zoos long ago. Besides, he had planned to visit the fish market afterwards, and
buy a kilo of carp. “Ghosts are not going to be able to esskep for long from
the pulish.”
“Maybe eet weel come thees way,” said
Keshob Babu, with relish. “Eet weel go into saam house and wreeng the necks of
ebhryone there.” It was all right for him,
because he had a wife and three children. One look at the wife would send any
ghost screaming for dear unlife, while the children were even worse. But Potol
Babu, whose own wife was enough to terrify a man-eating tiger, was away at her
parental house, and wasn’t due back until the day after tomorrow. He’d been
looking forward to an evening of peace, quiet and fish curry, but now fish
curry was out of the question, and probably peace and quiet as well.
“I theenk I weel go and rest a while,” he
muttered, and quickly walked home. As soon as he was inside, even before
turning on the light, he slammed the door shut behind him and pushed home all
the bolts. Then, wiping the sweat off his forehead, he hunted for the light
switches, and walked into his living room.
There was a ghost sitting on the sofa.
Potol Babu stood staring at the ghost, and
the ghost sat staring at Potol Babu. And both of them screamed together.
They were still screaming when the
telephone rang.
It was an old black telephone with a rotary
dial – Potol Babu did not hold with such fancy modern innovations as mobile
phones, which, he was convinced, sent bad electricity into people’s ears – and,
fortunately, was on a table right next to him. Still screaming, he picked up
the phone.
“Bhottacharjyo!” It was his employer, the
accountant’s son. His name was Amulyokumar Bishshash, so of course everyone
called him Binoy Babu. “Why are you shouting like that? Stop shouting, you are
making my ear hurt.”
Potol Babu bit off the scream so sharply he
bit his tongue hard enough to draw blood. When he’d finished blinking with
pain, he finally managed to reply. “Binoy Babu! There is a ghost here een my
house. Eet eej here een thees room weeth me!”
“There are no such theengs as ghosts.” Binoy
Babu sounded exasperated. “You are getting too old and too foolish,
Bhottacharjyo. That eej the reason I am calling, anyway. Tomorrow, you take
your back pay and clear out your theengs from the offish. You are fired!”
“Fired?” Potol Babu was so shocked that for
the moment he forgot the ghost. “Baat, Binoy Babu, I habh been working for your
faathar for thaarty years.”
“Yes, and that eej the problem. My faathar’s
staff eej all old and incompetent. We need young blaaad een thees day and age,
no? That eej why I am replacing ebhrybody een the offish. You are faarst, baat
I weel sack all the aathars too.”
“Baat...” Potol Babu repeated “Baat, what
weel I do for a leeveeng? I am too old to find anothaar job.” But there was no
point. His employer had already hung up.
Potol Babu dropped the phone back on its
cradle and then, as heavily as the phone, plopped down on the sofa. He plopped so
hard that the ghost couldn’t move out of the way in time, and Potol Babu sat
down on its tail. The ghost squeaked in pain and terror.
Potol Babu, startled, turned to see what
had squeaked, and found himself next to the ghost. For a moment he thought
about beginning screaming again, but his head was already spinning so badly
from the phone call he thought he might pass out if he began to scream. And
then, when he was passed out, the ghost would wring his neck. So he just gulped
a little.
It was a horrible ghost. It was black and
red and orange, as though it was on fire in patches. It had a huge mouth big
enough to bite Potol Babu’s head off, hands like slabs of coal and a head like
a charred pumpkin. And, worst of all, of course, it was a ghost.
The ghost opened its huge mouth big enough
to bite Potol Babu’s head off, and Potol Babu thought his last hour had come.
Which, given that he had no job any longer, was fine with him.
“Pleej don’t call the pulish,” the ghost
said. “I weel go right away een a leetle while, baat don’t call the pulish.”
Potol Babu blinked. “What? Aren’t you going
to wreeng my neck?”
“Wreeng your neck?” The ghost’s orange and
red charred pumpkin face looked horrified. “What a horribol idea! I don’t ebhen
know how to wreeng a neck.”
Potol Babu gathered a little courage. “What
are you doing here een my house?” he asked.
“Hiding,” the ghost said miserably. “The
pulish is saarching for me, so I ran away and looked for a place to hide. Your
house was empty and a weendow was open, so I jaamped in from the tree outside.
And now you are going to call the pulish and they weel come.”
Potol Babu was horrified by the very idea. “Of
course I weel not call the pulish,” he said. “My wife weel be back een two days
and she weel say eet ees deesgracefool that the pulish came to the house. The
neighbours weel be telling her and then she weel make my life hell. Of course,”
he added, “she weel make my life hell anyway.”
“Why?” the ghost asked. “Was eet becauje of
whatebhar you were saying on the telephone?”
“Yes,” Potol Babu confessed. “I habh lost
my job and I am too old to get anothaar job. My new bosh eej a bad man. Not
like heej faathar, who waj a good man, baat he died. Heej saan eej deesmeeseeng
all the offish people.”
“That eej bad,” the ghost said
sympathetically. “What do you theenk you weel do now?”
“What else can I do?” Potol Babu asked. “All
I can do eej go weeth my wife to work een her braathar’s school as a teachaar.
And I can’t stand cheeldren.” To his horror, he began to weep. “I may habh to
commit sooicide. And then I weel become a ghost.”
“And then pulish weel haant you,” the ghost
said, “and you weel be fleeing for your unlife. Like me. You theenk you habh
problems? You should see my problems.”
“Well,” Potol Babu asked, irritated at the
burden of misery being moved from him, “so what? What can they do to you? You
are a ghost.”
“You theenk ghosts can’t be haarmed?” The
ghost shuddered so hard that the sofa shook. Potol Babu grabbed hold of the
armrest so as not to be shaken off. “Eef you only knew the danger from
maastaard oil and gaarleec, you would not say that ghosts habh notheeng to
fear.”
“What were you doing out near the feesh maarket,
then?” Potol Babu challenged. “Deed you not theenk of the pulish then? Thees
ees not the olden dayj, when ghosts could go anywhere. Why were you out where
peepool could see you?”
“What was I to do?” the ghost whined. “Eet
eej not as though I wanted to be out. Eet eej not as though we ghosts don’t
know that theengs are not as they used to be once. Baat I deed not habh a
choice. I was thrown out obh the house we were haunting.”
“Thrown out?” Potol Babu blinked. “What?
Why?”
“Becauje obh obharpopulation,” the ghost explained
miserably. “Eet eej not like before when we could leebh anywhere, when each
tree and house was a home for a ghost. Now nowhere eej safe except a few
haunted houses, where nobody goes. And so all the ghosts are crowded in there.
And we are all getting angry weeth each aathar and fighting all the time.”
“And they threw you out becauje you were
fighting?” Potol Babu asked.
“No,” the ghost confessed. “I am too
cowardly to fight. They threw me out becauje...becauje...”
“Yes?” Potol Babu was fascinated. He had
never imagined the unlifes of ghosts had this particular kind of drama. “Why
deed they throw you out?”
“Becauje one new ghost came to the haunted
house,” the ghost said. “And thees waj a bhery bhery beeg and strong ghost. I
theenk een olden dayj he would habh been a zamindar, or a bandeet. He eej as
beeg as a palm tree and haj teeth like radishes and ears like weenowing baskets.
The aathar ghosts tried to throw heem out, and he began to fight them, aanteel
they agreed that he could stay. Baat to accommodate heem, they had to make
space, so they threw out two of aas.”
“Two? Why two? There waj only one of heem.”
“Becauje he eej twice as beeg as any aathar
ghost, so to make space for heem they had to throw out two. One was the ghost
who had arrived last. He died jaast one maanth ago. The aathar waj me, becauje
I could not fight them to keep from being thrown out.” The ghost began to make
horrible retching sounds. “And now I am a refoojee, being haanted like saamtheeng
eevil.”
Potol Babu realised that the retching noise
was meant to be sobbing. Instinctively he reached out to touch the ghost, and
flinched back at the last possible moment. The ghost noticed, of course.
“See,” it said triumphantly. “Even you habh
no real seempathy for me. You theenk I, an honourable bhoot, am beneath you. You
don’t waant to taach me.”
“No, no,” Potol Babu said hastily. “Eet eej
not that I am against you.”
“Then weel you let me stay in your house?”
the ghost asked hopefully.
“How can I do that?” Potol Babu asked
reasonably. “I am habhing my problems too.”
“Yes, your job. Baat whaat eej there to be
daan about eet? Nothing, jaast like there eej nothing to be daan about me being
weethout a house to go to. Me, and the aathar ghost who waj thrown out. Poor
fellow maast be roameeng around saamwhere and weel be haanted too.”
“Yes, the aathar ghost,” Potol Babu said
automatically. His mind was back on his lost job, and he was getting more
despondent by the minute. If only Binoy Babu’s father had not died, none of
this would have happened. Binoy Babu’s father had been a nice man, just and
fair, who couldn’t stand his own son, and who had seemed to be in the best of
health and all set to live many more years – until he’d been run over by a tram
a month ago. Just a month ago, Potol Babu thought bitterly, his future had
seemed secure and bright. And now...all of a sudden, something occurred to him.
“Wait, wait,” he said, interrupting the
ghost, who was still going on with its litany of complaints. “You say thees
ghost who waj thrown out weeth you only arrived one maanth ago? Who eej he?”
“Heej name eej Obonindrokumar Bishshash,”
the ghost replied peevishly. “Whay, what daaj eet matter who he waj? He eej
homeless now, like me.”
“I knew eet,” Potol Babu said. “He eej the
ghost obh my old bosh. Eef only he waj steel alive...” He stopped. His mouth
fell open. His eyes glazed over. He seemed to have stopped breathing. The ghost
grew concerned.
“Heeyar,” it said. “Don’t die, or you weel
be a ghost also, and there weel be three of aas trying to esskep the pulish,
not jaast two.”
Potol Babu didn’t even hear it. He was
getting the idea...or rather the Idea...or even the IDEA...of his life. Ideas
did not come to him naturally or often, and his brain had ceased all other
functions as it contemplated this one. At last, driven by the need to breathe –
and to blink – he came back to himself.
“Look, ghost,” he said. “Do you know wheyar
thees Obonindrokumar Bishshash eej hiding?”
“No,” the ghost said. “Baat I theenk I can
find heem weethout deefeecaalty. He maast be saamwhere neaar the old haunted
house. He doj not habh enough experience of being a ghost to wander far away
from eet. Why do you waant heem?”
“Becauje...” Potol Babu summoned up all his
cunning. It was even harder than working an IDEA, so it took effort. The ghost
looked curiously at the drops of sweat rolling down his bald head. “Look,
ghost, you can’t stay heeyar, right?”
“Jaast for a few dayj,” the ghost said
wheedlingly. “Een a few dayj the pulish weel habh forgotten about me and I can
go away.”
“A few dayj!” Potol Babu snorted. “The day
aftaar tomorrow my wife weel be caming back from haar parents’ house, and then
you weel be raaning fastaar from haar than from the pulish.” He got up, went to
the shelf, and picked up a photograph in a frame. “Thees ees a picture obh
haar. When she eej not at home I keep the photo taarned away, so aj not to
spoil my mood. Look!”
The ghost looked, and an instant later, as
though by magic, it was on the far side of the room. It had also gone so pale
with fear that it was now pink and grey. “Pleej,” it begged, “protect me from
that horribol monstaar. I weel do anytheeng you waant.”
Potol Babu didn’t resent his wife being
called a horrible monster. It was nothing more than, as he acknowledged to
himself, the truth. “So not only weel you be raaning away in two dayj,” he
said, “baat you weel habh nowhere to go. Even eef you could stay longaar you
would steel habh nowhere to go. Right?”
“Right,” the poor ghost agreed. “Whaat can
I do?”
“I weel find you a place to stay,” Potol
Babu said. “Eet eej more than large enough for two ghosts. You and thees Obonindrokumar
Bishshash. You breeng heem heeyar and I weel tell you what to do.”
“Really?” the ghost asked, the dawning hope
making it flush pink, like the morning sun. It was glowing so bright a pink
that the room began to look like the set of the only porn film Potol Babu had
ever seen in his life. It brought a blush to his face as bright as the pink of
the ghost, so that the room looked more like the porn set than ever. “I weel go
and look for heem right away.”
“Be careful of the pulish,” Potol Babu
said, but the ghost had already disappeared.
With a sigh of his own dawning hope, Potol
Babu got his shopping bag and went out to buy some fish for his dinner.
***********************************************
The next
morning Potol Babu went to work as usual. Without surprise, he noticed that
Binoy Babu was late coming to work.
“Maybe he eej seek,” one of the other
clerks said.
“Maybe,” Potol Babu suggested nonchalantly,
“he had veeseetors who kept heem awake all night.”
“Veeseetors?” the other clerk scoffed. “You
are getting stupeed een your old age, Potol Babu. Who gets veeseetors who keep
them awake all night?”
Potol Babu shrugged. “Eet waj jaast
saamtheeng I thought,” he said.
Binoy Babu stumbled in just after noon. He
looked horrible. He was unshaven, his eyes were bloodshot and his hair was
stuck up in spikes all over his head. He looked around and finally focussed on
Potol Babu.
“Bhottacharjyo,” he said. “I habh been
theenkeeng about that phone call I made to you laast night. I habh decided to
forget about the matter.”
“Yes?” Potol Babu said. “That eej nice,
saar.”
“More than that,” Binoy Babu gulped, “I
habh decided to eencreese your salary weeth eemediate effect. Een fact, I weel
daable eet.”
“Thank you bhery maach, saar,” Potol Babu
said.
As Binoy Babu turned, tottering, to go to
his cubicle, Potol Babu glanced at the corner of the office. Above the row of
bookcases stuffed with ledgers, he caught a glimpse of something dull orange,
and, beside it, another something that was black as midnight, except for a
white flash of grinning teeth.
Then he turned back to his work, and when
he looked again, the black thing and the orange thing had retreated into the
shadows, out of view.
***********************************************
Potol
Babu’s wife returned the next day. After stamping around the house like a rogue
elephant, as was her wont, she turned on Potol Babu.
“What habh you been doing when I waj away?”
she demanded. “Waatcheeng more obh those feelthy foreign feelms weeth naked
women?”
“No, no,” Potol Babu protested. “I deed
notheeng like that. I ebhen habh saam nice feesh caary for you. And the bosh
haj eencreesed my salary.”
Potol Babu’s wife grunted, like a rogue
elephant that has just found a bale of succulent grass. Potol Babu began to
breathe easier, hoping the crisis had passed. He hoped too soon.
He found that out when his wife wandered
into the living room. “What eej thees?” he heard her scream. “Why eej my photo
taarned backwards on the shelf?”
Potol Babu sighed. Maybe he should commit
suicide after all, he thought.
At least, as a ghost, he knew where he
could go.
Copyright
B
Purkayastha 2017
