A Madras Admiral

A MADRAS ADMIRAL
(Story)

By MANJERI S. ISWARAN

The sight was common; yet it was like seeing a bright peacock plume slipping unexpectedly from the book of a sprightly little schoolgirl or, for its element of surprise, a glittering diamond ring on the finger of a ragged beggar. There was nothing in the hour or the circumstance to foreshadow the revelation; it happened as many things do happen; but inclined to ponder over, it seemed to be one of life’s strangest evocations.

It was the time of the year when the days were getting longer, and a long day was drawing to a close. Rain had fallen till early if afternoon, then a sudden sun had dried up the tarred roads and the sky was unrolled as a vast sheet of flawless blue ready to be a manifesto of the stars. Five years ago the German cruiser Emden had bombarded Madras, smashing a portion of the compound wall of the High Court Buildings–one can still see the stone slab bearing the inscription of the bombardment fixed as a souvenir here–throwing the City into a dreadful panic. I remember it all vividly to this day; the petrol tanks of the Burma Oil Company hit by a shell into a raging conflagration which no fire brigade could put out and dying of itself after fifteen hours, the din of the cannonade, the wild exodus of the people, streets near the beach cluttered up with splintered wood and glass, twisted tramcar posts, burrowed walls, barrels of tar honeycombed with bullet-holes disgorging their stuff as though the pit of Acheron had overflowed–I remember it all, but more vividly than everything I remember the dead body of a constable attached to the Beach Division who was on beat that fateful night in September 1914, floating in the Springhaven, his skull split open by a shrapnel.

But this evening, to my eyes, Madras looked like a new City, not as I had seen it in the shadow of a war, but in peacetime newly planned and built, and the people hurrying along the thoroughfare were the architects and masons who had raised it with their own hands. What a thought! But the human imagination is such that it can picturize what it wills and wants.

I had stepped out of a grocer’s shop with a packet of dried fruits under my arm, on a road in Royapuram to walk to my house which was a mile away northward and more than half the distance within sight of the sea. A nip in the air put extra vigour into my stride; both wayfarers and wheeled traffic were thin along the route at this hour of near nightfall and I was free to enjoy the loveliness of the lingering daylight as a final enchantment of evening always accorded to man by the passionate sun of the tropics. Clear air, blue sky, bright stars–their beauty is stimulus to the mind for fresh ideas, for flights of fancy, but are these always as beautiful? I am not certain. For my mind while apprehending Nature’s charm at that moment suddenly registered the image of that dead constable floating in the Springhaven. But are not the dead beautiful too? Yes, only when they die a natural death and not violently as did this policeman his head cleft in twain. Abruptly the train of my reflections was sundered by the sharp rataplan of a drum, and I saw a procession emerge from a bye-street into the high road. Even at about a hundred yards away I knew what it was a corpse was being borne to the burial ground. I stopped. The procession approached nearer. Two sturdy young fellows walking in front of the drummer, their torsos bare, turned double, treble somersaults in the air, while the drummer himself seemed sunk in a trance, his instrument producing such sad, staccato notes, and often so brazen that it looked as though the shindy would make the corpse rise and sit up in its bier. A steady drone travelled over the drumbeats: a low hum which rose from the whispered talks among the crowd of mourners.

I had not moved from where I stopped. While walking or riding on a rickshaw, bicycle, bus, tram, or car, if a funeral cortege met my sight, I have never failed to pause, shuffle the sandals off my feet, and pray for the soul of the dead, irrespective of caste, creed or colour. I have managed to do the requiescat as unobtrusively as possible but once I had the misfortune of being caught in the act by a friend who ridiculed me for what he called my mawkishness. May be, but I don’t mind being dubbed a sentimental bloke; often what in the view of others is a weakness in one has proved to be a more authentic sanctuary than any kind or degree of strength. I am not ashamed to admit my weakness.

The bier had come close to me now. For a moment I shut my eyes and prayed and when I opened them again to look at the corpse the surprise it presented left them lidless indeed–for how long I cannot tell–presumably till it had passed the line of my vision. No shroud covered the body. It was dressed in the uniform of a naval officer of the highest rank–an admiral’s to be sure–complete with cap, coat, trousers and boots, and on its side rested a long sword. Its face seemed as ancient as the earth, black, many-wrinkled through the grey stubble of a beard, weather-beaten; the nose jutted like a veritable beak, as of a bird of prey, and the mouth was drawn in, being absolutely toothless. The uniform too looked as ancient as the earth; with its motley patches it was an admiral’s uniform still, wrapped round the cadaver as about a scarecrow that ever was set up in a field. Was it some huge joke, I asked myself, at the absurdity of the spectacle. No, it couldn’t be, for who among the living dare make fun of the dead? Here, surely, was something that staggered belief and called for investigation. My intense surprise gave place to an equally intense curiosity. I had noticed that the mourners belonged to the fishermen tribe. And someone among them had marked my astonishment, for as I followed the throng with doubtful steps and slow, he dropped behind and joined me presently which obviously attracted the attention of those in the rear, who, with every few yards they advanced turned round to look at us and exchange remarks among themselves. I thought I heard a low guttural laugh which went ill with the solemnness of the occasion.

‘Don’t mind them,’ said my companion to me, ‘they don’t mean a thing.’

‘Sure. You know your own people better, and that’s saying a great deal,’ I ventured to answer.

‘You are intrigued about that uniform, aren’t you?’

‘That’s right.’

He coughed, clearing his throat. I understood its special significance.

‘It’s the first time I’m telling it to anybody,’ he said, his tone modulated in such a manner to impart a darker shade to whatsoever the mystery might be.

Perhaps sensing the magnitude of my curiosity he meant that it was his first real opportunity to say what he had to say and hoped to make the best out of it, expecting that this particular instance would yield a better harvest than all the previous occasions he had been induced to reveal the secret.

‘Go ahead, and you shall have your reward after you finish your story.’

‘Pechi–that’s the name of the dead man in the uniform,’ he began, ‘and it was his dying wish that he should be buried with it...’

‘To be buried with it!’ I interrupted, deciding at once that the deceased must have been a character. The quirk was unlooked for, quite fascinating.

‘Yes, he made us take an oath on it before he lost consciousness. He has no son to inherit the uniform and continue the line of admirals in his family. I see your wonder, but that’s the truth. The uniform came into the possession of Pechi’s grandfather many, many years ago–I was not born then, I heard the story from my father..its coming was a marvel indeed. Nochi was his name and there was none in the entire Mettukuppam who could tie a catamaran as well as he; he made hoops of steel of an ordinary rope and rode the surf like a king. When Nochi was a young man of thirty, he saw one evening as he was returning ashore after the day’s fishing, a big ship lying off at some considerable distance from the harbour. He had not seen such a huge ship anytime in his life before. He gazed and gazed at it not knowing whether he was standing on his head or his heels. He wished to go near it, so moved was he by its size, to look at it closely, but as it was growing dark he postponed his decision for the morrow. But a terrible thing happened on the following day. All through the previous night a tempest blowed with the fury of hell, and early in the morning the sky cracked and rain started to pour in torrents, continuing to pour like that unabated for ten days and the fisherfolk, men, women, and children huddled together like rats frighted to death in their huts. A darkness fell on the land and the time of the floods seemed to be at hand. No noise was heard except the thunder of the sea. Then suddenly they found Nochi missing in his hut, its thatch had been torn off by the storm and his wife with their son, a stripling of twelve, rushed for refuge to a neighbouring hut. Where could Nochi have gone in that awful weather? Nobody could think, nobody could say. His wife was on the verge of a collapse. Then when rains stopped and the storm went elsewhere and the pale light of the rising sun showed that it was a real day and the waters of the sea stretched beneath a glittering haze, a knot of fishermen standing on the shore saw a sight which they could not forget for the rest of their lives. It was a catamaran leaping and careering over the waves; soon with a dive of its nose it touched the sand-floor nimbly, and who did jump out but Nochi, grinning an over his face? Eluding every eye had he gone fishing in that horrid sleet? No. There was no net in the catamaran, he walked up holding a big-sized bundle in his hand. Once in his hut whose thatch had been mended by friendly hands, and his wife collapsing again at the sudden sight of him and then recovering and smiling through her tears, Nochi told his adventure amid spurts of amazed chucklings, tiltings of heads, and applauding exclamations. He had been inside the big ship and seen its many wonders. Fearing that it might move off any time during those days of rain and storm and he would have to die of disappointment, he had put to sea on his catamaran, defying the angry, hill-high waves with prayers in his heart to Mariamman. And he had had an idea before he set out. The Great Goddess gave him that–she made him carry with him a dozen eggs, a fowl, a goodly bunch of plantain fruits and a solid pumpkin. He had reached the ship safely, and laid his tribute before the biggest of men who had talked to him in a language he could not understand, but whose hearty laughter and smiles he understood fully. He had patted his for his bravery, and for his tribute–the eggs and the fowl he had liked especially–had presented him with a set of dress exactly as he, the great white man, wore. He had given him, too, apiece of paper on which some words were written, and when Nochi had put on the uniform at his bidding, the great white man had buckled a sword to his belt while all the other white men in the ship had stood in a line and saluted him.

‘A piece of paper,’ I broke in, visualising the scene of the ceremony on board the vessel which I had concluded to be a man-of-war, ‘a piece of paper along with the uniform and the sword. In whose keeping is it now?’

‘It’s in the pocket of the coat Pechi wears. He inherited all the three from his father. And because Pechi has no son to whom these naturally should go, he had ordered for their burial too. I told you at the outset that we consented to do so under an oath.’

‘Yes, I do recollect your mentioning it, but will you help me to see it just for a while before it goes into the bowels of the earth?’

‘I shall try, but I don’t know what the others will feel about it. Moreover, the final consent should come from Pechi’s cousin–his uncle’s son–who is the chief mourner in the group. He’s aggrieved, poor fellow; he thought to the last moment that the regimentals would go to him. But he didn’t reckon with Pechi’s mind–a hard nut to crack. He coveted them really. For the heir to the uniform had important privileges both inside and outside the Kuppam. He became a sort of leader of the community, empowered to settle disputes, and have a share of the daily catch. And without any let he could visit all the ships arriving in the harbour, which enabled him to collect appreciably in cash and in kind from sailors of all the lands. Pechi himself, his father and grandfather had all benefited themselves greatly in this way.’

I was not aware that we had trudged nearly three miles, that the sun had set and the lamps on either side of the road had been lit–for what I had heard was so absorbing–when my companion told me, a little loudly, noting my absorption, that we had reached the entrance gate to the burial ground. I recalled at once what I had so much wanted to see: that piece of paper in the dead man’s bosom, tucked away in the pocket of his admiral’s coat, ready to be swallowed by the grave. Realizing quickly what was passing in my mind my companion said:

‘Follow me, for I think I may succeed.’

I have no positive aversion for Rudra’s land, but just then a sudden disquietude as to how my venturesomeness would turn out, made me hang for a second; at the next, with firm steps, I had passed through the gate, my companion marching abreast of me.

At a short distance to my right I saw the yawning pit, and on its edge the dead man on the bier. Torches flared all around, and the outlandish dress of the corpse, dyed a dull red by their flames, looked more bizarre in a native setting. It was a world of shadows and as the thought crossed my mind, I felt a soft touch on my shoulder which sent a shiver through my frame: it was only the hand of my companion and I felt reassured.

‘Quick, read it,’ he whispered, holding a crumpled, dirty quarter sheet of paper whose was pasted over with a thicker brown paper. ‘You are lucky, I was able to persuade Pechi’s cousin. None else knows. Quick,’ he urged me again, his voice hoarse with excitement.

By the light of the lantern which he held, I glanced over the paper, excited myself. I could make out nothing. I concentrated, bringing it closer to my eyes, beckoning to my companion to move the lantern to the angle I needed. It seemed futile to decipher the words, if words they were; age had turned the black ink brown, and the brown for the most part was obliterated by overmuch thumbing. Some dashes, some flourishes about the letters were a little clear; it certainly was the written commission given to Pechi’s grandfather by the commander of the man-of-war, but now God alone knew the names of man and vessel. There were nearly a score of signatures in the left bottom corner of the sheet–obviously of captains of sailing ships and admirals of battle ships–all ornamented with Loops and flexions. I strained and strained my eyes and succeeded in spelling out at last ‘admiral of the catamaran fleet’in the text of the commission, and among the signatures: ‘WM. Anderson, S. S. Clan Menzies.’

The time allowed me had run out. I surrendered the sheet of paper and I saw it following the dead to his final resting place, and a particular line of admirals becoming extinct. I then put a rupee into the hands of the man who had told me the story and walked briskly out of the burial ground, not waiting to know if he was satisfied with what he was given. He might or might not have grumbled or should have grumbled having to share the tip
with Pechi’s cousin; he might have intended to follow me to ask me for more but thought better of it and stayed –it might have appeared unseemly to him to Leave a burial in the middle; but I never came upon him again to know whatsoever his feelings were.

That night I didn’t sleep, although I was physically and mentally exhausted, and tossing about in bed, I thought and thought again: Next to being a nation of shopkeepers the English really are a nation of humorists, and in their time, as empire builders, they have made tunnycatches¹ into tahsildars² and messengers intomagistrates. But to have made a Coromandel fisherman an Admiral–that beats everything.
(Originally contributed to Swarajya)

¹ Water-carriers.
² Head of an administrative division of a district.