Amballore House (13 page)

A shady collaborative relationship sprang up between the treacherous Number-Six and the spineless, untrustworthy Number-Nine to isolate Josh, and take away his share. This happened sometime down the road since the property acquisition. Josh was far away in Canada, and therefore it was not practical for him to be involved in the decision-making.

The property documents of Josh were stolen by Number-Six. This happened while Number-Six left the ancestral home that Josh had bought. He plundered the ancestral home and took possession of all its proceeds prior to taking off to build his own home in his designated land. Josh’s property documents were pilfered in this process. After illegally taking possession of the said documents, Number-Six handed them over to Number-Nine for safekeeping, and also to shift blame to Number-Nine in case any legal complication arose. This step of hoarding the document was highly irregular at one end of the spectrum, and criminal at the other end. Believe it or not, this act was orchestrated by two evil brothers who should have known better.

Their plot was to take over the documents by virtue of the fact that Josh was out of the scene, and to strand him out in the open without the legitimate papers for him to place a claim. This enabled Number-Nine to get thirteen cents of the land, Josh’s share. According to an unwritten deal between Number-Six and Number-Nine, the latter would give thirteen cents to the former, a stolen gift from one sly brother to another. Effectively, Number-Six and Number-Nine scratched each other’s back, and stabbed Josh in the back!

This sinister action proved that the vile brothers had plotted all along to take possession of Josh’s share. This was in spite of the free land they had received and in spite of the paid education that they availed, both thanks to Josh.

Josh realized that he was the one who laid the foundation stone to the story of betrayal, because he ventured out of the country to the uncharted phase of his life in Canada, to save his family. He had only himself to blame for the consequences of this action, so he concluded. He nevertheless knew that he was massively shortchanged by his beneficiary siblings, and that he lost heavily in the whole process. It did not require a rocket scientist to realize the unfairness of the whole operation where Josh distributed two acres of land among family members, and was getting only thirteen cents back, less than seven percent.

That mediocre share too was taken from him at the last moment through deception.

***

The final land disposal took place in 2013, when Josh paid his second visit from Canada since he left India. The concluding tally was done by the land registrar. All the recipients of the property were present at the registry office in Amballore, except Rita who passed away in 2005.

Chicken Little suddenly appeared at the office, surprising everyone. He crowed wildly, “Cock-a-doodle-doo! The sky is falling!”

While the registrar was puzzled by this unannounced appearance of a wild rooster in his office, Thoma’s children were seized by uproarious laughter. They recognized the intruder as the same cock who predicted sky’s fall in 1975. Their excited conversation followed, and they saw a roasted chicken and salivated when they looked at the little visitor, Chicken Little.

They then climbed up one by one to approach a platform which hosted a temporarily-erected podium for them to make the public announcement. Their wives and children were present in the room, to share the celebratory moment. Their lawyers also were there to witness the statements.

The first turn was of Number-Five who grabbed his share immediately after the land purchase.

Number-Five said, “Cock-a-doodle-doo! Land is falling! I got 12 cents free! It fell from the sky!”

He would sell the land immediately after he grabbed his share, and would be able to get married, and start his family life comfortably.

The next turn was of Number-Six, the villain of the family. He availed of the largest share of the land, a whopping twenty-eight percent. This allocation was in addition to the proceeds this man availed by plundering the ancestral home.

Number-Six got its total proceeds along with Ann’s gold ornaments. This villain stuck around in Amballore to enjoy a free home ever since it was purchased, saving him rental money over a period of thirty eight years. This was in contrast to the story of other siblings who left home over various points in time, to make their fortunes far away from home.

The one-legged man emerged from the crowd, and used crutches to move forward. He limped slowly but surely, and approached the podium after expertly hopping over the steps leading to the stage.

Number-Six said, “Cock-a-doodle-doo! Land and house are falling! I got fifty six cents that fell from the sky. Guess what, I also got the proceeds from the ancestral home.”

He then winked at Number-Nine for colluding with him to steal Josh’s share of the land.

He continued, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the luckiest of them all? I am the luckiest of us all, because I won the biggest share!”

He continued, “I got to build a home in the free land that fell out of the sky, and I was able to bring up my family there!” He built a house in his share of the land, and brought up his children with dignity he would never have enjoyed but for the gift that sky dropped in his path.

He continued, “Don’t forget that I got university education, a free
one at that, a gift that landed in my lap. But for that education, I would be driving an auto-riksha today! I am comfortably employed in a bank, and I count money all day long, and this makes me immensely happy!”

The registar was afraid Number-Six was going to narrate his life story from the podium, since he had a captive audience, and he showed no sign of stopping his speech. He called the security, and they escorted Number-Six out of the stage.

The next was the turn of Number-Seven.

Number-Seven said, “Cock-a-doodle-doo! Land is falling! I got ten cents of land free! It fell from the sky!”

He had sold the land and used the proceeds to build his life.

Number-Eight was clad in a black sari. She climbed up the steps, escorted by her goldsmith husband.

Number-Eight said, “Cock-a-doodle-doo! Land is falling! I got forty four cents, the second biggest share of the land that fell from the sky.”

She continued, “I want to thank goddess Kali for giving me ten cents of land for my dowry.” She then pointed to her neck that was adorned with a gold necklace.

It was Josh’s decision to give Number-Eight a piece of land so that she could sell it and raise money for her dowry. Goddess Kali had nothing to do with it.

Number-Nine approached the podium and said, “Cock-a-doodle-doo! Land is falling! I got thirty four cents of the land, the third largest share. The land fell from the sky!” He then winked at Number-Six for helping him backstab Josh.

He had sold his share to fund the university education which in turn led him to a decent job in the Middle East.

Finally, it was Number-Ten’s turn. She approached the podium to make her announcement.

Number-Ten said, “Cock-a-doodle-doo! Land is falling! I got thirty-four cents of the land that fell from the sky!”

She sold her land to fund the university education, leading to a nursing job in Europe.

None of the speakers acknowledged Josh. All of them claimed that the land fell from the sky.

Chicken Little’s turn came to approach the podium and make a statement. It was his little turn and jump into that opportunity is what he did. He flew over the steps valiantly, reached the podium, and made a final announcement, “Cock-a-doodle-doo! The sky is falling!”

That was the last announcement he would ever make in his life, because Number-Six would catch the rooster after coming at him by limping on his one leg. He would then make chicken curry out of him. He shared the curry with Number-Nine. While enjoying the spicy curry, the brothers complimented each other on the smart job they had done. They ridiculed Chicken Little for mistaking the sky as falling. They knew all along, over the years, that it was the free land that was falling, for seven children of Thoma’s family and for the seven of them only.

It was irony of fate that the three members of the family, George, Kareena, and Josh, received no share of the land. These three were the only ones who supported the family in its various stages of misery, and yet they ended up getting the proverbial short end of the stick.

Another irony of fate was in plain sight, appearing in the stark red color of blood. It had to do with blood relation and hence the reason why the irony appeared in color red. The irony was that the biggest beneficiary of Thoma’s household, Number-Six, was the only non-child of Thoma. He was landlord Chettiar’s son!

***

Josh’s decision to give an additional ten cents of land to Number-Eight was prompted by an extraordinary event that shook his family in 1986, while the family was residing in Amballore.

Even though she capitalized on her share of thirty four cents of land given her by Josh, by selling the land and using the proceeds to
make her way through the university system by paying the fees and meeting expenses for room and board, she did not do well in the career market, even after finishing a master of arts in sociology. At that time in the history of Kerala and even today, to some extent, parents were anxious to marry off their daughters as soon as possible, because none was getting younger, especially the girls. There was something called “marriageable age” for women, which meant before their beauty wore off (unless they were exceptionally rich, which helped them to meet any dowry demand, whoever it came from). Well, Number-Eight was not of marriageable commodity, being barely presentable looking and hardly able to furnish even the bare minimum dowry. This double knot effectively hung her intact to the gallows of spinsterhood.

This situation worried Thoma and Ann and all her siblings. Number-Eight was stuck at home after her university education, living with her parents, with nowhere to go and no one willing to marry her. Her friends and classmates were on normal paths of life, getting married and leaving their parental homes to start out their own lives. She started going to church, if only to kill the boredom of being stuck with home life. As time went on, she came to shun even that, as well as going outside the home under any circumstance. This was because she was faced with a barrage of questions from curious acquaintances and well-wishing friends on when she was getting married. It was customary at that time in the eighties, just as it had been in the previous decades, for the entire state of Kerala to ask a girl when she was getting married, since everyone considered it within his or her right to know the answer, as if everyone was preparing for a professional exam where a mandatory question would be when a certain girl in such-and-such village would get married.

Monsoon rains would give way to the cold season of December followed by the scorching sun of March and April and Number-Eight would still be staying at home, unmarried. When she was no more seen with Ann in the church, curious neighbors would ask Ann about Number-Eight and inquire if she already got married. Ann started telling people that Number-Eight had gone to become a
nun. Though a full-fledged lie, Ann thought it was a white lie and therefore did not qualify to be confessed at the confessional stand in the church. It appeared to Ann that she delivered her white lie to the entire population of Kerala—because, countless people asked Ann about what happened to Number-Eight.

Fortunately, some proposals started trickling in. Thoma was willing to consider any proposal. Ann was even more eager to consider them, from even the lowest stratum of society. As soon as the family of the prospective husband would know of the no-dowry situation, they would quietly leave Thoma’s home, not to be heard from again.

The neighbors of Thoma woke up early morning of a Saturday, alerted by a commotion originating from Thoma’s home. The home was lit by a kerosene lamp, since there was a power outage. Wild sounds of wailing were coming from Ann and her children. The uproar woke up the entire neighborhood. The good neighbor Annamma thought that someone died and ran to Ann’s home to offer help. Other neighbors also reached Ann’s home in the middle of the pitch darkness. Most of them were attired in nightgowns, since they did not want to waste time changing clothes prior to rushing to lend a hand to Ann. When they nervously reached the destination, neighbors saw the entire family was concentrated in a bedroom and all of them were wailing their looks riveted to the ceiling. The night time visitors got inside the bedroom and saw the unbelievable: Number-Eight was hanging from the ceiling.

Mathettan was the first one to notice something strange about the hanging body. There was not enough light in the room for everyone to take a keen look at the body. But Mathettan was a keen observer and he noticed something strange about Number-Eight’s face. There was no tongue protruding from the mouth, a tell-tale sign of someone having committed suicide by hanging.

He pointed his kerosene lamp closer to the face and noticed another strange thing about Number-Eight—there was no noose around her neck! Instead, the noose was around her upper chest, above her breasts, wrapping around both of her armpits and tied at the mid-laterals at the arm-pit level. This noose was hooked to another loop
that hung from the ceiling!

When Number-Eight had committed the atrocious act of apparently committing suicide, she had jumped from a stool made high by stacking books on it. The force of the jumping made the knot at the meeting point of the loops go up, making it appear at the midneck, giving the false impression that the loop was around the neck. To everyone in the room, at the first appearance, Number-Eight appeared to have hung herself to death. The dim light in the room did not help the observation any easier.

But not to Mathettan—he saw through what happened. He knew that the suicide attempt was quite amateurish.

Extreme fear can cause fainting—probably a protective mechanism of the mysterious body of a human being—and that was what caused Number-Eight to faint at the moment of jumping, since she knew she was going to die, although the assumption was wrong, since the noose was in the wrong place. This fainting explained why she was hanging limp, as if dead, fooling everyone who looked at her in the faint light. She did the jumping on a night of no electricity and was guided by a kerosene lamp in performing her clumsy suicide act.