The Inheritance Powder

By Hilary Standing

Tired of life and disillusioned with his work, economist Carl Simonovsky would rather stay at home tending his beloved trilliums than work on yet another aid project pretending he knows how to solve complex dilemmas faced by poor countries. When he reluctantly finds himself in Bangladesh, dealing with a case of mass arsenic poisoning caused by a well-meant aid programme, he soon discovers that ignorance of the subject is the least of his problems.

Rumours of scandal and corruption surround the international agency that hired him. When Carl meets Zafirah, the passionate leader of a local grassroots organisation and campaigner on arsenic, he realises he cannot ignore the rumours and must dig deeper. But as the two of them grow closer, it becomes clear that they are on a collision course in relation to the arsenic crisis. If their relationship is to have a future, both face painful compromises, and Carl has to make a decision that will change the course of his personal and professional life for ever.

• Language: English
• Publisher: RedDoor Publishing
• Release date: Oct 8, 2015
• ISBN: 9781910453148

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Gombos

PREFACE

This novel is a work of fiction based on a real situation. A well-intentioned development programme, executed over many years, to provide clean drinking water to rural people in Bangladesh produced what has been described as the worst mass chemical poisoning in human history. The novel is set in 2003 but the slow poisoning by arsenic of millions of people in the affected areas continues to this day. A comprehensive, long term solution remains elusive.

Bangladesh is not alone in having this problem. Naturally occurring arsenic is a common contaminant of groundwater across the world, particularly in deltaic regions, but Bangladesh remains by far the worst affected country. One of the most detailed accounts of this catastrophe can be found in Venomous Earth: How arsenic caused the world’s worst mass poisoning (Macmillan 2005) by Andrew Meharg, then Professor of Biogeochemistry at Aberdeen University and a world expert on arsenic contamination. In the writing of this noveI, I have drawn on this and many other international and local sources on arsenic contamination. I have also drawn on the legal judgement in the House of Lords in 2006 relating to a court case taken out by a group of Bangladeshi citizens. The case alleged that a UK agency involved in the geological assessment of aquifers for Bangladesh’s tubewell digging programme was negligent for not testing for arsenic in the groundwater.

These facts provided inspiration, but the story is entirely fictional. All characters, organisations and events are imaginary, including all named agencies and Government departments. The town and district of Shimulganj are also my inventions. The city of Dhaka is real, as are major landmarks such as the Liberation War Museum, but readers who know the city intimately may spot one or two small liberties with its geography. Beyond this, any resemblance to existing or former organisations and to individuals, alive or dead, is purely coincidental.

PROLOGUE

Arsenic is versatile. It has many forms. It kills quickly. It kills slowly. It makes the face look beautiful. It disfigures the skin. It is the only effective remedy for sleeping sickness. It is a homeopathic remedy for diarrhoea. Taxidermists used arsenic to preserve animal skins and keep pests at bay. Its colouring properties caused the European wallpaper industry to boom – and the vapours killed countless numbers of their customers and their customers’ children. Until the advent of forensic testing it was a fast and foolproof way to secure an early inheritance.

*

In a poor country like Bangladesh there are many bad deaths. In ancient, overcrowded ferries that sink, in shock from septicaemia after childbirth without any healthcare, under collapsed buildings made of shoddy cement and with no foundations, in fires that sweep through flimsy shacks; death from waves and cyclones and cold and heat. It seemed particularly unfair, he reflected afterwards, that an accident of geology added slow poisoning by arsenic.

CHAPTER 1

Carl Simonovsky was thinking about the chemistry of soil fertilisers as he inspected his new trillium hybrids on a late May morning. He was conducting his routine round of the shaded garden while he waited for his computer to warm up. After an initial anxious, sickly period, the plants were pushing up strongly, bending to the filtering light. The foliage was turning the ochre-green that heralds both bloom and senescence. He thought that the flowers might be only days away from their debut. He straightened up, pushed flopping strands of hair out of his eyes and smiled to himself.

Returning to his computer, marooned on the kitchen table amid the detritus of breakfast and last night’s supper, he checked his emails; the usual stuff – three advertisements for potency enhancing supplements, two invitations to reveal his bank account details to people who had suddenly acquired a few million dollars and an altruistic desire to share them with him, an update on his airmiles and a request from a student for some references on the economic prospects of Namibia. There was also one from Marianne. That can wait. Then he saw the email from Professor Sayers:

From: Director’s Office

To: Carl Simonovsky

Date: 27 May 2003

Subject: An opportunity for you?

My dear Carl, this is apropos our discussion last week on your current difficulties re finding sufficient income generating work this year. I was talking to a chap I know in EUROPOV. They are looking for someone to do a quickie in Bangladesh. Something about economic analysis of interventions for dealing with the arsenic situation – apparently there’s lots of it in the groundwater there. I presume it’s something to do with being a delta. Poor buggers – can’t win, can they? But anyway, I immediately thought of you. I know it’s not your part of the world, and not exactly agriculture, but bound to be the same cost-benefit stuff, do it with your eyes closed. What say? Only catch is they need it yesterday. I had the info faxed over. Can you come in today to pick it up? Regards, Hugh.

The message implied a choice he knew he did not have. And it meant foregoing the luxury of a day spent dressing-gowned and unshaven, moving at will between the computer and the garden. Tripping over the worn kitchen carpet that he never seemed to get round to replacing, he headed for the bathroom. He showered and shaved quickly, nicking his chin in several places. Back in the bedroom, the wardrobe yielded no ironed shirts. He had forgotten to call the agency about replacing his regular cleaner. He pulled on an almost respectable teeshirt and left the house.

*

At some point between stepping out of the station and reaching the office Carl’s spirits always sagged. If he thought about it, then it was where he stopped to buy his third copy of that week’s Big Issue from Jimmy, the last of the regular vendors on his route. The road was a traffic-harried stretch of bleakness. And from Jimmy’s patch the grey façade of the office of the Institute for Poverty Alleviation was first visible. Ah, the bunker. The term had dropped straight into his head on his first day at work there – God, nearly 20 years ago. Built in the brutalist style of 1970s London architecture, the location had been chosen for its convenience to Heathrow airport. The business of ‘ippa,’ as the Institute was generally known, was in the poorer parts of the world, researching poverty trends and advising Governments on how to improve the lot of their citizens. Its renowned economists, hurrying around the world, could leave the office with a bare half-hour to their check-in time.

But the once-smart suburb had declined into blight. Ippa reminded him of a stranded whale washed up on a large traffic island that was surrounded by half-inhabited streets. His route from the station took him past boarded-up houses and abandoned cars. The decay oppressed him. It felt unyielding to any strategy his mind could devise. The bunker itself was daubed regularly with graffiti, causing the Bursar to rail at the local police-community liaison officer to ‘do something about these illiterate louts.’ Now, it seemed to him, the term bunker described more than just the architecture.

Fresh graffiti had appeared since he last went into the office. The word ‘WANKERS’ was scrawled in giant letters by the entrance. At least, he thought, they could spell it. Seeing the Bursar in the reception area making an irritated phone call, he turned abruptly, took a longer route to collect the fax from Professor Sayers’ secretary and went on to his room.

Its disarray never failed to surprise him. He made heroic efforts to keep on top of the filing but papers lay everywhere, as if scattered by a studious but careless poltergeist. Ignoring the mess as best he could he switched on the computer and then turned reluctantly to the fax.

From the Office of the European Agency for Poverty Reduction (EUROPOV)

Att: Professor Hugh Sayers, ippa

Sender: Director, Asia Operations

Hugh – good to speak to you, here’s the

arsenic job, Grateful if you can follow up

with your contact. Regards, Lars

Consultant needed for assignment in

Bangladesh.

Task: undertake cost-benefit analysis of

proposed EUROPOV supported interventions

in arsenic mitigation. Advise on best

policy options.

Person required: Economist with minimum 10

years experience in cost-benefit analysis

of environmental (water and sanitation)

interventions. Experience of region

preferred but not essential.

Length: three weeks in-country plus 5 days

report writing.

Start date: as soon as possible.

Send CV to Paoul Andersson marked arsenic

– urgent.

He sighed. He was an agricultural economist who had spent his working life in the dry farming zones of Africa. He had never been to ‘the region’. He had never heard of the arsenic crisis in Bangladesh, let alone had any idea about mitigating it. And he had grave doubts about cost-benefit analysis. What, he wondered, would he be expected to value a life at in a poor, crowded, disaster-prone country? However, he reminded himself that in the last year, considerations of ignorance, ethics and scepticism had not stopped him from providing policy advice on economic regeneration of the tourist industry in Bosnia-Herzegovina and alternative strategies for financing hospital care in Kazakhstan. Indeed, and rather to his chagrin, his reports had been very well received. He was building up a profile as a flexible consultant who could deliver what was needed.

He called the administration office. ‘Hi Tahera, it’s me flushed out of my garden at last. Can you pull out one of my CVs for me? Not the research one. I need the consultancy one that’s got the highlighted section on policy advice to Governments and international agencies. It’s a bit urgent, I’ll come by in a minute and give you the fax sheet and number.’

‘I thought you’d decided to give up on international development and open a nursery.’ She was giggling.

‘Now you are giving me dangerous ideas, I’d need to enlarge the garden a bit.’ They both laughed.

For a few minutes, Carl watched the pair of strutting, cooing pigeons that had taken up residence on his window ledge. The bursar had sent out several reminders that ‘pigeon nuisance must be reported immediately.’ Ignoring these was one of his small acts of rebellion. Then he walked down two flights of stairs to the administration office.

It was a windowless cubbyhole in the basement, sandwiched between the kitchen and the washrooms. Carl put his head round the door. There was barely room for the one cluttered desk. Tahera shone out of the gloom in a pale yellow jacket and blue chiffon scarf, a welcoming smile turned in his direction. How does she manage to look so good and stay so cheerful?

‘Here’s the CV. I’ve tidied it up a bit. Your dates were all out of date, if you know what I mean.’

‘Yes, I do and thanks, and by the way it’s for an assignment in your birthplace.’

Her eyes widened. ‘You’re going to Bangladesh?’

‘Well, possibly. They have to accept my CV first.’

‘Oh, that’s really exciting. I can’t believe it! Take me along as your assistant.’

‘Wish I could, a local would be really helpful.’

She laughed. ‘But I don’t know it any better than you do, unless you count growing up in Tower Hamlets.’

‘Well, that’s still a big step closer than where I start from.’

‘Don’t worry. If you go I’ll ask my mum for some tips, although she’ll probably expect you to bring back a jar of pickles in return.’

Carl handed the fax to her.

‘Thanks, and here’s your updated one.’ She snapped the CV into his hand as if to seal the outcome on the spot.

*

Carl headed next to the coffee bar to find his old friend Bill Simmons. Bill’s coffee habits were inviolable, extending to the same time, newspaper, chair and coffee mug in a particularly ill-lit corner of the room. The mug was so stained that it fused into the indifferent brown of the table. Carl put his scalding plastic cup of coffee down and forced his frame into a stunted chair opposite Bill.

‘So, how’s the report going?’

Bill looked up from his newspaper, smiled a greeting and then grimaced into his coffee grounds. ‘Slowly and miserably. Those crooks in the Ministry keep sending excuses instead of figures. I had a draft ready to send to Geneva, just needed that stuff they agreed to dig out weeks ago. First they said it would take longer because the person who’s supposed to do it has gone on overseas training. Probably paid for by the bloody British tax payer or some daft Scandinavians. Now they’re saying the computer went down and they can’t get the spare parts. Spare parts, my eye. The Japanese gave them enough computer power last year to work out the dimensions of the next galaxy. They know damn well that I know damn well that they’ve been cooking the books since the programme started. Why am I doing this? I could retire, get a life. How’re those trilliums doing?’

‘They’re doing well but I think I’ll miss the denouement.’

‘How so?’

‘Let’s just say that the Director has put a consultancy in my way.’

‘Oh, sorry. I suppose you can hardly refuse now that dryland agriculture grant has fallen through.’

‘No, I can’t really refuse. The bursar is enjoying reminding me that there’s not enough in my income account to cover my salary this year.’

‘I know the problem. Anything interesting?’

‘It’s in Bangladesh, something for EUROPOV on arsenic interventions.’

‘Arsenic? You mean we are now proposing poisoning as a development alternative?’

‘No, no!’ Carl grinned. ‘There are high levels of arsenic in the groundwater. They need a cost-benefit analysis of mitigation interventions. It’s a delta, you know.’ He felt himself becoming authoritative already.

‘Bangladesh? It’s a bit, well, humid for you savannah types, isn’t it?’

Carl had not considered the climate, or indeed anything else about it. ‘Oh, I don’t suppose it’s any worse than Cameroun.’

‘Well, good luck with it. Pity about the trilliums. How’s life otherwise?’

Carl paused. ‘Oh, you know….’

Bill was being kind, inviting a small measure of unburdening. He wanted to respond but felt emptied of language, as if the words themselves had fallen into the very voids he would need to describe. He stared at a soil stain on his index finger. It had slipped through his faster than usual morning shower. ‘Perhaps I need a holiday.’

Bill’s grey flecked eyebrows rose and fell. ‘Hmm. Well, I think I need another coffee,’ he said.

*

Carl returned to his office discomfited. A tacit comradeship of unrealised hopes and dreams sustained his long relationship with Bill. Both had wanted to make things better. But he lacked Bill’s capacity to survive disillusionment through cheerful cynicism or to temper his expectations of what could be, if only…. What? Dammit, he couldn’t even manage to synchronise his work with the one-shot-in-nine-years flowering of a brand new trillium hybrid. He should have stuck with botany. Perhaps Tahera in her sweet joking way had put her finger on it, a nursery instead of a bunker. Back when he had those choices, botany had almost won. It appealed to his sense of order, his forensic mind. It was a science of precision, of naming and classifying and putting things in their correct places.

He had wanted the same precision about human behaviour – to be able to pare it down to its essences, order all its manifestations into a simple schema. This was what had attracted him to economics, the claim to a few universal principles that animate human behaviour from Sweden to the Solomon Islands. But economics went one better. While botany produced ever-proliferating categories and botanists were constantly reclassifying specimens, economics stuck to the principle of greatest economy. The fewer the variables to explain a finding, the better the model. Aha! It seemed perfect at the time.

His loss of belief had been a steady drip of doubting moments. The more he wrestled with the ragged realities of people’s lives, the less his neat models seemed to explain anything. But the defining moment had come some years ago in the ippa coffee bar. Joanie, the friendly face behind the counter, had run the bar for as long as anyone could remember. She presided over a never-changing menu of buns and cakes, some of which, known as ‘Joanie’s specials’ she made herself. Everyday, at around three, regardless of how few or many specials were left, Joanie would put a little Post-it note on the counter.

all Jspecials 50p off

Carl winced whenever he remembered that conversation. He had tried to explain a basic economic principle to her; that the laws of supply and demand dictate that when a good is scarce and desired, the price rises. Here was a woman acting against her own economic interest.

He had pursued it with her one day when he noticed there were just two chocolate cupcakes left on the counter. These were one of her most popular items. Although there was still an hour to go to closing time, the plate was adorned with the same yellow Post-it. He concluded the lesson by pointing out that even if she could not bring herself to raise the price, at least she should keep it the same. Joanie had regarded him with amusement, hands busy as if with independent powers of their own.

‘But I want to get shot of them, don’t I? What’s the good of being left with them? I’ll only eat them myself if they’re left over and look at me, I’m big enough as it is. Anyway, you’ve come to expect it now. I can’t just stop doing my specials offer, you’d all think I was being stingy.’

This revelation had set off a flood of similar recollections of economic logic undone by human perversity. He thought of all the painstaking modelling he had done in his time in Africa. He had been most proud of one piece of work that showed how much better off poor farmers would be if they adopted ‘high-yielding’ seeds to replace the ones they had used for generations. But the seeds were not popular. There was always a litany of excuses – they were expensive, they needed too much labour, they might not crop if it was too dry, they did not taste as good….

Perplexed, he had tried to fit these messy bits of reality into his econometric models. Economists, of course, had a name for them. They were called exogenous variables. However, the more he tried, the more it felt that the messy bits were neither bits nor exogenous. They had taken over the frame, staring through his rows of figures and drumming their fingers in his brain just as he thought he had arrived at an elegant solution.

The phone on his desk rang. He let it ring a few times before picking it up.

‘Hello Carl, it’s Tahera. Sorry to bother you again. I just thought, do you want me to do a highlight on your Kazakhstan consultancy? Only I saw it said something about experience of the region and Kazakhstan’s sort of Asia, isn’t it?’

‘Oh, good idea, thanks for thinking of it.’ Must encourage her, she’s got initiative.

‘Okay, I’m sending it now.’

‘Thanks Tahera, you’re a star.’

He replaced the phone. Welcome back to your real world. Bill’s favourite catchphrase was ringing in his head so he decided to do a quick internet search on ‘Bangladesh’ and ‘arsenic’ to get up to speed on the new assignment. EUROPOV paid parsimonious rates and he was not expecting a lot of competition. He turned back to the computer and typed ‘Bangladesh arsenic’. There were thousands of hits. Oh God, this was serious. This was going to require effort… An hour later he emerged, shaken, from his search.

NOTES ON ARSENIC PROB IN BANGLADESH

Background – major development agency

intervention 1970s to 1990s – dig millions of

tubewells for clean safe drinking water.

Well meant – huge numbers of child deaths from

diarrhoea, other infectious diseases – brought these

down. (Agencies must have been pleased, something

worked!)

But arsenic trapped under sediment in Bay of

Bengal region liberated through tubewell digging.

(God, this has been going on for the last decade!).

Estimated 30 to 80 million people at risk. "Largest

mass poisoning of a population in history" (Oh no,

exchanged one poison for another…).

No known cure for chronic arsenic poisoning

(really??)

No projections of numbers who will be seriously affected/die in the future.

No agreed plan for dealing with the crisis.

Carl stared for a while at his notes. He had seen plenty of droughts. But he had also seen resilience and recovery, how quickly farmers could restore a desolate landscape with some rain and a supply of seeds. He had never encountered a crisis caused by slow chemical poisoning. And one that hardly anyone in the rest of the world seemed to know about, let alone had any answers to. He picked up the phone and called the Director’s office.

‘Hello, this is Hugh speaking.’

‘Hugh, it’s…’

‘Carl, my dear fellow did you get the fax okay? Hope you sent your CV. I told Lars you were just the right person for this, very flexible and reliable. They’re a bit desperate. Apparently had some Australian chap lined up but he got snapped up by one of the big water companies expanding into South Asia. Anyway, I digress.’

‘Actually, I was thinking this one isn’t….’

‘What, worried about Bangladesh? You’ll be fine, remember how you felt about that Bosnia work? And you did it brilliantly. It’ll be good for you to see another part of the world. And there is of course the matter of your income account this year, so to speak.’

‘Sure,’ said Carl. ‘The CV is on its way.’ He put the phone down and stared at his arsenic notes, thinking about the small, slippery compromises with integrity.

*

The answerphone was winking when he got home. He knew who that would be without checking. Let it wait a bit longer. The day was still pleasant and he wanted to empty his mind of thoughts of arsenic and a likely trip to Bangladesh. Visions of ghost-like people covered in black sores had disturbed his thoughts all day. And Bangladesh felt alien, a flat place of endless stretches of water and flora that he would not recognise. Worse still, he would miss the annual Specialist Woodland Plant Growers Show, where he was hoping to display the new hybrid.

He poured himself a beer and headed back to the garden, stretching his legs over an old iron bench positioned so that he could see the shaded corner. A London-filtered sun caught the ribbed leaves of the trilliums and split the colours into a light dance of alternating greens and yellows.

It reminded him of the first time he had ever seen the plants in their natural habitat. He and Gina, walking through a New England wood of beech and scattered pine trees in late spring with a dappling sun playing across the undergrowth. Happier days. It was only a few months after their wedding and he had just taken up a one-year visiting fellowship at the University of Boston. They had lived in the house of a professor who was on leave. The house was surrounded by woods and they would walk there every day, alternating the early mornings and evenings to catch the different play of the light. He had spotted what he thought were small white crocuses nestling under a broad stand of beech trees. But Gina said no, they’re trilliums, it’s the official flower of Ontario. She had spent time in Canada as a student. Captivated, he stooped over them to take photographs for so long that the normally patient Gina had walked on. He was gripped by their unshowy, geometric beauty, every leaf a perfect bifurcated heart shape in a circle of three, cupping a triangular three-petalled flower within a three-sepal ring, each layered threesome in complete symmetry. It was the beginning of a long love affair and one which Gina, for all her good humour, never felt part of.

A spring breeze was gathering. He drank the rest of the beer and went back inside. The answerphone was not well positioned, its incessant wink impossible to ignore. He pressed the button.

‘Carl, didn’t you get my email? As I said, I need to pick those things up today. I’ve got to go to New York tomorrow for this work meeting and I really need that suit. Can you call me?’

Oh God, he had jumped to the wrong conclusion. Again. Now, phone or email? Oh, don’t be ridiculous! He picked up the phone.

*

Marianne arrived just after eight as he piled the rest of the dirty dishes into the sink and was about to wipe the dining table. He opened the door. She looked great, he thought, her face filled out, not drawn tight as it was in those last few weeks. Smart new clothes and, oh yes, a different hairstyle, longer and fuller. In the five years he had known her it had never changed from the workaday cut she used to get from the barber down the road. Marianne had not believed in spending money unnecessarily, as she put it.

‘Hello.’

‘Hello.’ She came in, allowing him a slight brush of the cheek as they passed.

‘How are you?’ she said. ‘You look well.’

He wondered which of them she was trying to convince. He could not avoid glimpsing himself in the full-length hall mirror each time he went out or upstairs. His natural leanness seemed to have fallen in on itself and the greyish tinge of his green eyes had taken command of his face. He sometimes thought he was in danger of disappearing. ‘I’m fine. Very busy. You look….’

‘Different. Yes, I decided to change my hairstyle. Do you like it?’

‘Yes, it’s really nice, very… smart.’

‘Thank you. I’m getting asked to many more business meetings now that the charity is growing so fast.’

‘New York does seem a bit of a departure.’ He was more familiar with the Marianne who laboured in the dingy office in New Cross Gate.

‘It is, but I’m enjoying it.’

He caught the hint of defiance, as if he was the one who would disapprove of this. ‘Would you like a drink?’

‘No, thanks, I really must get on, I’ve got so much to do this evening.’ She was looking round anxiously.

‘Your bag’s here.’ He pulled it out from behind a pile of work files.

‘Oh, great, thanks and we really must have that drink and chat when I get back.’ She stepped towards the door.

‘Well, I may be going to Bangladesh for a while.’

‘Oh? That’s not your usual part of the world.’

‘No, it’s… oh, it’s just something that came up.’

‘Okay, well then definitely after you get back.’

He had intended an anodyne reply. Instead he said, ‘Is there anything you miss… since you left?’ He caught her off-guard and in mid-turn towards the door.

‘Umm…’ The pause was indecently long. Why on earth had he asked her that?

‘Well… your cooking, I suppose. I really liked the Thai curries, oh, and those fruity things you made for breakfast… and the banana cake…’

Pleased to have been at your culinary service. At least he managed to restrain this to a thought. What Marianne used to call The Daily Sarcasm, like an unwelcome freesheet forever dropping through the letterbox, had played its part in their undoing. ‘Carl, you’re so English.’ Her parting shot would echo through the slammed doors.

‘Look, I know how painful this is for you.’ She touched his arm lightly. ‘Let’s talk about it when we’re both back. Okay?’

How can you know, he thought. You’re the one who left.

*

‘Carl?’ Tahera was calling him from the bottom of the stairs as he headed towards his office a few days before his departure. ‘I’ve got all your travel docs and some options on accommodation in Dhaka for you.’

‘Oh thanks, Tahera, I’ll come down to the office.’ He was grateful that she had taken personal charge of his trip arrangements. It was really the job of the travel office. He walked downstairs.

She was there ahead of him, picking up the familiar pink folder with his name on it. Since joining ippa, the previous year, she had overhauled its filing systems. One of her innovations was to colour-code all the staff folders. Each member of staff was assigned their own colour and she had a remarkable facility to remember which folder was which individual. It lent the gloomy office a festive appearance as she had arranged them in glass cabinets in blocks of contrasting colours. Carl had been disconcerted by her choice for him but too embarrassed to raise it at first. After he got to know her better, he asked her.

She had laughed. ‘Well, you see, I’ve always thought in colours. And pink is friendly and cheers me up and it’s got a sense of humour. Like you.’ Then she had pointed to a turd coloured file. ‘Guess whose that one is?’

‘Umm… the Bursar?’

‘So you see how my mind works.’ She had clapped her hands in delight.

Opening the file she pulled out the top sheet