The Return of the Retired Civil Servant - Part 2
The bus rattled northward with the tired confidence of a creature that had done this journey longer than most of its passengers had been alive. The upper deck lights flickered once, reconsidered, and settled into a steady glow. Below them, the city rearranged itself into night-shift geometry: shuttered shops, neon reflections, late dinners in stainless steel plates.
Sanjiv watched Chakrapani adjust the cotton bag on his lap with exaggerated care, as though the fall had offended him. The old man ran his fingers over the cloth, feeling for something. His expression shifted—not dramatically, not in a way that would alarm a casual observer—but enough to sharpen the air between them. His shoulders stiffened. His breath paused.
He opened the bag.
Not wide. Just enough to slip two fingers inside and draw out a sealed envelope. It was thick, cream-colored, the sort of paper that belonged to government offices that still believed in gravity. A faint emblem was stamped in one corner. Chakrapani stared at it for a full second.
Then he gasped.
It was a small sound, strangled and involuntary, but in the tight theatre of the bus it rang loud. Sanjiv turned fully toward him.
“Sir? What happened?”
Chakrapani did not answer immediately. He turned the envelope over once, twice, as if hoping it would change identity under inspection. His lips moved without sound. Finally he leaned closer to Sanjiv and spoke in a voice so low it seemed to crawl rather than travel.
“This… this is not the cover I collected.”
Sanjiv frowned. “Not yours?”
“The bag is mine. I have been carrying it all day. But this envelope…” He shook his head slowly. “I went to an office near Crawford Market this afternoon. They handed me a sealed cover. My papers were routine. Background material. Harmless.” He swallowed. “This is not harmless.”
The bus swayed. A woman laughed somewhere behind them. A conductor clanged his ticket machine like a bell announcing normalcy. The city continued, indifferent.
“Check the name,” Sanjiv said quietly. “Maybe it’s written. Maybe there’s a number. We can call.”
Chakrapani’s fingers tightened around the envelope. For a moment Sanjiv thought the old man might tear it open out of pure panic. Instead he slid it back into the bag with precise, controlled movements.
“It is not so simple,” he said.
His tone had changed. It had shed age. The voice that remained was clipped, administrative, a voice trained in rooms where every word could become a record.
“I do not carry a cellphone,” he continued.
Sanjiv blinked. “You don’t… carry one?”
“I am not allowed to.”
The sentence landed with absurd weight. Sanjiv stared at him, searching his face for humor. There was none. Only a hard, practiced calm that seemed to push outward, creating a small perimeter of seriousness in the crowded bus.
“You’re retired,” Sanjiv whispered. “Why would anyone stop you from carrying a phone?”
Chakrapani gave a humorless smile. “Retirement is a flexible word. Some files do not retire with you. They linger. Like unpaid debts.”
Sanjiv felt a chill that had nothing to do with the night air. He leaned closer.
“What is in the envelope?”
“I cannot tell you.”
“Even in general?”
“Especially in general.”
The old man’s gaze flicked briefly to the aisle, to the rows of commuters hunched in private fatigue. He lowered his voice further.
“It concerns an unresolved matter from my service days. On paper, it is small. A land issue. A pension trail. Something that could be filed under ‘miscellaneous’ and forgotten.” He paused. “But the trail intersects with something else. Something… sensitive. Sensitive enough that I was asked to review certain background notes. That is why I visited the office today.”
“And you picked up the wrong cover.”
“Yes.”
They sat with that fact between them. The bus engine roared, a mechanical heartbeat.
Sanjiv’s instinct was to offer immediate solutions. That was how his life worked: shirts misplaced, customers confused, stock counted, errors corrected. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone.
“Use mine,” he said. “We’ll call the office.”
Chakrapani recoiled as if the device were hot metal.
“No.”
“It’s just a call—”
“No.” The word was sharper than intended. He softened it. “If I use your phone, you become a participant. Your number enters a chain. Your identity becomes attached to a conversation that should not include you. Information spreads not by intention, but by association. I will not pull you into that circle.”
Sanjiv hesitated, phone still in his hand. He looked at the old man, really looked. The fear was there now, carefully folded but undeniable. Not fear for himself, he realized. Fear of contamination. Of mishandling something invisible and vast.
“My father was army,” Sanjiv said quietly. “And my father-in-law. I grew up hearing about what happens when small mistakes travel upward. I understand… at least a little.”
Chakrapani studied him. The bus lights carved shadows into the old man’s face, turning his wrinkles into contour lines on a map of long service.
“I believe you,” he said.
Sanjiv put the phone away.
“Then let me help in a way that doesn’t break your rules. I won’t touch the envelope. I won’t look at it. I won’t ask what’s inside. But you’re shaken. You shouldn’t go alone. Let me come with you. I’ll walk you home. That’s all.”
Chakrapani opened his mouth to refuse. Closed it again. Outside, the bus thundered past a flyover, the city opening briefly into dark space before closing again. He seemed to weigh invisible protocols against a very human fatigue.
“You would do this,” he asked slowly, “for a stranger?”
Sanjiv shrugged. “We’re not strangers. We share a bus route.”
For the first time since the envelope appeared, a genuine smile touched the old man’s mouth.
“That is the most Mumbai logic I have heard in years.”
They fell silent. The bag remained on Chakrapani’s lap, his hand resting on it possessively. Every time the bus jerked, his grip tightened. Sanjiv became acutely aware of the ordinary world continuing around an extraordinary secret. A man argued about ticket change. A student memorized notes under the dim light. A couple shared earphones, nodding to a rhythm only they could hear.
He wondered, briefly, how many lives around him carried sealed envelopes of their own. Hidden burdens. Quiet missions. The city, he thought, must be full of them—millions of private thrillers moving in parallel, intersecting only by accident.
“Where did you sit in the office?” Sanjiv asked suddenly.
Chakrapani glanced at him, surprised. “Why?”
“I’m thinking how the mix-up happened.”
The old man considered. “A long counter. Three clerks. Files stacked like fortifications. My cover was placed on the table. Another man was called forward. In the shuffle…” He exhaled. “Routine chaos. The most dangerous kind.”
“You didn’t notice the weight?”
“My envelope was similar. Same paper. Same seal family. These offices manufacture uniformity like a religion.”
They both chuckled softly. The laughter was thin but necessary.
As the bus entered Chembur, the air changed. It always did. The sea-salt edge dulled, replaced by the familiar mix of diesel, frying snacks, and domestic evening. Sanjiv felt his body recognize home before his eyes did.
“We get down together,” he said.
“Yes,” Chakrapani replied. “Together.”
The word carried more than logistics. It was an agreement, small and solemn.
When the bus hissed to a stop near the station, they descended into the thick, moving river of people. The night market buzzed. Vendors shouted prices. A radio played an old song about impossible love. The world looked exactly as it should, which made the envelope feel even more unreal.
They walked side by side toward Diamond Gardens. Chakrapani’s pace was measured but steady. Neither spoke for several minutes. The silence was not empty; it was watchful.
At the gate of a modest bungalow shaded by an old tree, Chakrapani stopped. He turned to Sanjiv.
“This is far enough.”
Sanjiv nodded. Relief and disappointment mingled strangely in his chest.
“You’ll be alright?” he asked.
The old man lifted the cotton bag slightly.
“I have carried heavier things,” he said. Then, after a beat: “But not always alone. Tonight… thank you.”
(c) Bharat Bhushan
16 February 2026
No comments:
Post a Comment