The Calcutta Chromosome

Calcutta: August 1995. The Phulboni speech has just ended, and Urmila is catching up to Sonali at the end of the driveway leading back to the auditorium. Urmila is disappointed that Sonali has to leave so early. Sonali explains that she is expecting someone at her home. However, Urmila tells Sonali that she wants to talk to her about Phulboni because she has to write an article about him, and was told that Sonali is the best person to talk to. Sonali reluctantly agrees to have Urmila accompany her to her home, and then flags a taxi. When the taxi is forced to stop because of heavy traffic, Sonali decides to ask Urmila what she wants to ask her about. Urmila tells her that she wants to know about Phulboni’s early stories. This surprises Sonali, and she asks Urmila who had told her that Sonali was the one to ask about Phulboni. Urmila is hesitant at first, but then tells her it was “Mrs. Aratounian of Dutton’s Nursery on Russell Street” (62).

Sonali begins to think back and recalls a rather “forbidding woman, dressed in a black skirt and gold-rimmed glasses” (62). She had a ringing voice, was abrupt, and Sonali likened her to a nun. Sonali hadn’t seen her for years. Urmila suddenly interjects that it was at Dutton’s when she first saw Sonali, and goes on to tell her about the encounter: about how Mrs. Aratounian scared her; about seeing Sonali come into the nursery accompanied by “a tall, powerfully built man, with a massive, heavy-jawed face” (63); about how she accidentally knocked a flowerpot out of Sonali’s hand; and about how the man bent down to help her, despite his one hand being partly paralyzed. She remembers, too, how Sonali put her arms around her and offered to pay for the plant. Urmila also knew the man’s name: Romen Haldar.

Urmila had heard the name Romen Haldar talked about at home; he lived in a huge house just down the road, was a wealthy builder and contractor, and had a lot of influence in a major club.

Sonali doesn’t remember that day, but Urmila tells her how after the incident she and Mrs. Aratounian had become friends, and that she still visits her occasionally. Sonali then comments that she heard that Mrs. Aratounian had retired, having sold Dutton’s, probably for a lot of money. Urmila doesn’t think so, telling Sonali that Mrs. Aratounian is having trouble making ends meet, and is turning her flat into a businessman’s guesthouse to make money. She got the idea “because an old house on the other side of Robinson Street being converted into a hotel” (66) by Romen Haldar. Urmila remembers hearing how Romen Haldar had arrived at Calcutta’s Sealdah Station with nothing, which Sonali affirms, telling Urmila that Romen is not the person that people make him out to be. When they arrive at Sonali’s residence, they see that Romen is not there yet.

This chapter takes place back at the restaurant, sometime before August 1995. Murugan is telling Antar his version of Ross’s discovery of malaria. It’s May 1895, in a military hospital in Secunderabad, and Ross is just beginning his malaria research. Murugan tells how Ross has just come back from vacation in England, where he met Patrick Manson, the man who had discovered what causes elephantiasis. Manson wants to get the malaria prize for Britain, and believes the mosquito has something to do with malaria. He decides to have Ross undertake the research to determine there is a connection between malaria and mosquitoes, but believes the bug is transmitted via drinking water, and wants Ross to prove it.

Upon arriving in India, Ross begins offering money for samples of malarial blood, but can find no takers, despite the fact that many could use the money, and malaria is quite common in the region. Then his luck changes on May 17, 1895, when a patient named Abdul Kadir walks in. After exposing Kadir to a test-tube full of mosquitoes, he harvests the crop and discovers a large quantity of parasites. Ross also sees, for the first time, the crescent-sphere transformation, first mentioned by Alphonse Laveran, a French army surgeon in Algeria, suggesting that it is a parasite that causes malaria. This discovery from Kadir’s blood enables Ross to pass through all the critical phases of the research.

As Murugan tells it, prior to Kadir's arrival, Ross had not been able to confirm his findings in any other blood sample, yet never questions the sheer coincidence of Kadir showing up when he needs him most. Manson, however, thinks Ross has gotten sidetracked, and wants Ross to “make a cocktail from dead mosquitoes and feed it to someone” (73). Once again, Ross finds there are no volunteers, until May 25, 1895, when a guy named Lutchman walks in out of the blue and offers to drink Ross’s cocktail. As Murugan sees it, Ross gets lucky again.

The next morning, Lutchman comes down with a fever, and Ross believes that perhaps Manson’s theory is correct. Manson, though, is proven wrong when Ross realizes the next day that Lutchman is too healthy; he’s simply allergic to mosquito-dust. As Murugan tells Antar, Ross has been working for about a month when Kadir and Lutchman conveniently show up. It's as if someone was watching over Ross, and decides it’s time to bring in somebody to help, he says to Antar. First they send him Kadir, and when he gets sidetracked by Manson, they send him Lutchman to get him back on the right path.

In fact, Ross decides to hire Lutchman, and for the next thirty-four months, he works closely with Ross until Ross makes his breakthrough in Calcutta. Moreover, Murugan adds that Ross even wrote how it was Lutchman that had made some important connections for him.

Not long after, Ross comes down with malaria himself, and while he is recouping, according to Murugan, Lutchman succeeds in implanting the idea in Ross’s head that malaria might be caused by one particular species of mosquito. However, Ross can’t distinguish one mosquito from another. This is when, in Murugan’s words, Lutchman decides to intervene once more, by pointing to a “mosquito seated on the wall with its tail sticking outward” (78). Lutchman brings him a jar full of the same mosquitoes the next day and Ross makes a major breakthrough. The date is August 20, 1897. Murugan finds this too convenient, believing that Ross never had a clue as to what was really going on.

Calcutta: August 1995. After having the taxi driver stop and let him purchase a pair of rubber slippers, Murugan returns to the guest house on Robinson Street, where he is staying. He had found the guesthouse by chance. According to the receptionist at the airport’s tourist information desk, the guest house had been a recent entry on the list, and she knew of no one who had stayed there. But for Murugan, it was exactly where he wanted to be: on Robinson Street, near where Ross had stayed all those years ago.

The guest house was on the fourth floor of one of the older buildings, and was being rented out by a N. Aratounian, an ashen-faced elderly woman who lived in the apartment. Mrs. Aratounian tells Murugan that she doesn’t have much to offer by way of accommodation but that he is welcome to stay if he wants. Murugan is ushered into a large sunny room with a high ceiling fan and a mosquito-netted bed in the center of the room. Noticing a small balcony at the end of the room, Murugan walks over and catches a glimpse “of a large, old-fashioned colonial mansion, set within high walls and surrounded by ornamental palms” (82). The house appears to be under renovation. To Murugan he couldn’t hope for any better, and tells Mrs. Aratounian that he will take it. Shortly after taking a shower, Murugan goes looking for the Ross Memorial.

That was a few hours ago, and now Robinson Street is packed with cars. A wedding is in progress in a nearby block of flats, there is music blaring, and the whole street is lit up, except for the colonial mansion Murugan had spotted from his balcony. Murugan walks up to the steel gates and begins banging on them, in the hopes that there is a watchman inside to let him in. To his chagrin, no one answers.

All of a sudden, there is a power outage, and the lights go out all along the street. Everything becomes quiet, and in that moment, Murugan hears cymbals from within the mansion. He then sees a soft flickering light leaking through the edges of a window frame, before a generator restores power to the wedding next door.

Murugan is certain there is someone in the mansion, and upon testing the gate, realizes it’s not locked. Murugan proceeds to enter a large hallway in the mansion. Using his flashlight from his keychain, Murugan sees stacks of mattresses and mosquito nets piled in a corner. He then shouts is “Anyone in?” However, the nearby generator drowns out his voice, though Murugan thinks he can hear the pounding of a drum. Murugan wants to go further down the hallway, but abruptly encounters a watchman who angrily escorts him out, pointing to sign down the driveway. The sign reads, “site for the Robinson Hotel […] developer Romen Haldar” (85). After asking who Romen Haldar is, Murugan takes one last look before leaving and sees, hanging from a clothes line, “a T-shirt with a print of Palm trees and a beach” (86).