Garden of Dreams, page 29
‘Yes, it’s me. How can you tell?’
‘This little hole right down here, I can see the colour of your sari.’
He saw the hole she was talking about, right at thigh level.
‘I need to talk to you, er …’
‘Niyati.’
‘Niyati, Ojal worked for me. I need someone to replace her.’
He heard water being poured down the hole next door, the door open and slam. ‘Come out, Kashish-ji. What’s the point of having this conversation in a fucking shithole?’
She had her hands on her boxy hips as he came out, pawing the dirt with one of her Adidas. The little bull.
‘I’m a cop, and I need information.’ He flashed her his police ID, taken from the band of his boxers, and a glimpse of his pistol, also concealed in his drawers. ‘Who’s trading underage kids, who’s dealing, who’s whacking who … that sort of thing. Of course the risks are great …’
Niyati drew a stubby forefinger across her throat.
‘But the rewards are greater.’ He slapped two thousand rupees into her palm. ‘Let’s call it an advance.’
She stared at the stack of rupees for only a few seconds before she smiled and started pushing him out the courtyard gate, out on to the road again. A tough little number, as he predicted.
‘Give my apologies to the girls,’ he yelled, louder than he meant to, as she locked the gate behind him.
The upper levels of the Road, where the girls lived, were now fully awake. Faces fleeting behind the balcony grillwork, hands and fingers poking through to hitch up another tropically coloured bra or pair of undies to dry in the sun. A few older whores hovered around the dark entryways to the kothas, one right beneath a message scrawled in lurid red paint: ‘Beware of the Pimps!’ Ha! These old girls were tough. How many years had it taken to harden them like that, he wondered, to a state of resignation, without prospect for any other life?
He walked too close to one entrance, and a pair of whores glared at him. Bagh ja chutiya! Go away fucker! Pleased that his appearance threatened them, even in drag.
So he had his new informer – but what did he want to know? As he wove his way down the road among the rickshaws and scores of male pedestrians, the Delhi underworld lit up in his mind’s eye like a huge display board, a vague map with little lights that glowed if you pressed the right button. Which buttons to push, though? Every time he focused on part of the map, closed in for the kill, another part of the map activated – madams, malkins, pimps, goondas, traffickers, cops, politicos. Even Bianca flashing up there, wanting to partner with him to bring down Lakshmi and declare herself the G.B. Queen. Interesting, but he’d decided she was useless. Just a lot of hot air emanating from those luscious lips.
Auntie L. was another story. She had offered to call off her henchmen from trailing and taking out his men if he backed off her scent. Let her operate freely. Possibly she’d even lead him to other traffickers in exchange for protection, or at least for turning a blind eye. Getting his fellow officers to do the same.
So far he had refused her offers.
But there, eight metres up the road, was her kotha, the new-old one. He had passed it countless times, not wanting to meet the woman – actually, if he was honest with himself, afraid to meet her. Yes, afraid. She had a lethal reputation, to be sure, but it wasn’t only that. He was afraid what a meeting with Auntie Lakshmi might start. The slippery slope it would send him down.
And what if he did bring her down, eventually? What then? There was no one guarding the entrance to her kotha, no signs, just a number, twenty-seven (she’d kept the old one), lucky or not who knew. As he climbed the dank, mouldy stairs, hemmed in by claustrophobic walls the colour of blood, covered in wildcat scratches, he ripped off his wig and dropped it behind him.
When he reached the threshold, with pale purple rooms opening out to each side, barren except for scummy mattresses shoved against the walls, he peered down the dark corridor ahead. He would meet her, and then decide. Because if he brought down Auntie Lakshmi, he brought down a large part of his raison d’etre, didn’t he? He needed her to keep putting him through the fire.
As he pondered the precarious balance of his little universe, a barely visible silhouette appeared at the end of the hallway and raised its arm. Just as he reached through the silky folds of his sari for his gun.
Chapter 39
Leave it to that bloody Gupta to be the bearer of bad news. The nerve, making an unholy ruckus with the goonda in the hallway, then walking in here this morning unannounced, not even a fake raid, to introduce himself. Stating proudly that the boy had been found, reunited with his father, safe now. Out of your clutches, Gupta had said, smiling from underneath all that make-up, ridiculous in that orange sari. She wondered if he were a transvestite as well as a cop. She had offered him chai, whisky even, the latter refused. They had talked; she had made offers; he hadn’t accepted them. But he would.
It was nearly lunchtime now and she contemplated getting dressed. She’d been wearing the same black silk dressing gown when Gupta had arrived, the one that slimmed away a few inches. Her hair had yet to be tamed, but luckily her ‘face’ was on properly.
Gratifying that he came here, entered her lair at last, but his news was unsettling. Beyond disappointing. The gods had let her down. All the charms, potions and totkas hadn’t brought the boy back. Now with his father, some high-profile big shot in Nepal, the boy would be under surveillance twenty-four-seven, she was sure of that. And she still hadn’t managed to contact the gangster ruling Thamel – Prem Thapa. Maybe he could help her. Maybe not.
She decided not to dress just yet and sat down at a little French writing desk with the new laptop she’d managed to wangle out of the Singhs before they were marched off to prison. At their suggestion, she had joined Facebook, and soon discovered its usefulness for stalking attractive girls and boys. For her own profile picture she had posted a photograph of herself as a girl, a lovely, alluring girl with deep black eyes and a bewitching half-smile. Wondering who would respond to it, to her, and how. So far she had received nine friend requests from young people all over the country. She needed more – more ‘friends’.
Prem Thapa, the Kathmandu trafficker and drug lord – was he on here? On impulse, she typed his name into the search bar, expecting ‘no results found’. But there he was, with a profile picture making him look almost ordinary, smiling and relaxed in grey sweats, shades and a silver neck chain, and a cover photo of him shaking hands with another youngish criminal.
She felt whiskers on her feet and started; she hadn’t even heard the creature pad across the floor. Anand rubbed his cold, wet nose on her shin, turned a few circles next to her as if modelling on the runway and lay down facing her. Greeny-gold marble eyes staring intently, tail flicking.
‘Should I write to this bugger, Anand? To this Prem Thapa?’ She looked back at his profile pic and wished she could see his eyes. ‘Why do these chuts all have to wear sunglasses?’
Feeling adventurous, she clicked on ‘+1 Add Friend’ and then on ‘Message’, and began writing:
Greetings Prem Thapa. How strange to find you here on FB. I am a newcomer myself. Perhaps you have heard of me, Lakshmi Kapoor, No. 27 G.B. Road, Delhi. I’m looking for a new partner in Kathmandu, and hear you’ve got a hand in many pots up there. Am also looking for a particular boy … Perhaps we can help each other? You won’t be disappointed with what I have to offer …
She was tempted to delete the line about Eli, maybe even the whole message, but took a breath and pushed ‘Send’. Rather than sit staring at the screen and waiting for a response, she went to lie down on her unmade bed, amid swirls of red satin.
As she closed her eyes, unwelcome images replayed from her dream last night. There were armies of children coming towards her with rocks in their little hands. All colours, shapes and sizes of children, marching in long lines to where she was cowering on the ground. Circling her. Stoning her and shouting, then moving off so the next line could move in. None crying; they were beyond tears. Eli was there, only one of hundreds. The children kept coming and coming, fierce grimaces on some faces, others grinning madly, all sinister and – ruined. The rocks got bigger and flew faster, until the last line of children approached. One pretty girl was the last to throw a stone, and she heaved the largest rock from over her head, sending it crashing down, smashing, with a diabolical sneer on her face. Just before the dream ended – did she die? – she saw the girl’s face. Her own, forty years ago. The Facebook photo.
Sitting up, she leaned over and pressed the ‘play’ button on the boom box on her night table. Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto had been there for weeks; she’d tried replacing it many times, but it always found its way back there. There’d been one man, years ago – one client out of the thousands – who’d treated her like a lady, bringing her a little CD player (which the madam later confiscated) and a Mozart CD. He was a European, had taste. He’d even given her headphones so she could listen to that sublime music in secret.
That piece stirred her more than any other, she wasn’t sure why. Except that the clarinet’s longing echoed her own, she knew that, and it kept longing through all the darkness and grief; in fact the longing intensified. But there was lightness in Mozart, too, almost a frivolity that laughed at life’s pain, skipped over it. Wolfgang. What a stupid name for such a genius.
From the mantel over the defunct fireplace, a happy ceramic statue of Ganesh smiled at her. She would not dwell on the pain, she decided, on the dark, disturbing dreams. She rose and opened the drawer of her writing desk, rummaged around through scattered piles of photographs from the near and distant past, until she finally found what she was searching for. A photo of the boy, Eli, in his pathan suit, standing at the window in his room at the old kotha, turning to face her, the camera, as she intruded. Taken with his camera, lost in the fire. Like so many other things.
She’d draped a marigold garland from puja yesterday over the back of a chair; she now removed it and broke it into shorter lengths to wrap around Ganesh and Eli’s photograph, which she taped to Ganesh’s lap. From the top drawer of her dresser she removed six votive candles, two sticks of jasmine incense, two small brass incense holders and a box of matches. She lit the incense, the candles, and breathed in the smoke from her makeshift shrine.
She prayed to Ganesh, the remover of obstacles. Not giving up quite yet.
When she thought the elephant god had heard enough of her pleas, she sat down at her desk again. Turned on the laptop, went to Facebook and to the Status Update page. She saw she had a little ‘1’ in the message inbox, and clicked on it.
There was the photo of Prem Thapa again, in his shades and sweats. Looking very cool. And a one-line message that sent a rush through her, not quite sexual, but borderline.
We can talk, Auntie-ji …
Anand the leopard stared at her in recognition, she thought. Telepathy. From the mind of one predator to another. Helplessly themselves in the cruel and beautiful world.
Chapter 40
It was not just another late afternoon in Kathmandu. His father had been sleeping for hours, and still lay face down on his single bed, lightly snoring with one leg protruding from the sheets. Eli sat on the other bed and watched him, this exhausted man in his brown T-shirt and blue briefs, with pale skin suggesting overwork, ill health. The bald spot on his crown was showing.
So this was the Grand Peacemaker of Nepal. An ordinary man.
They had talked themselves to sleep, early this morning. In this strange set of rooms under the eaves in the traditional Newar hotel, somewhere near Thamel, brick and carved wood everywhere, and several pictures of the all-seeing eye on the walls. Tall windows revealing the city skyline to the north, and the tips of the Himalaya in the distance. Like icebergs floating in the sky.
Last night his father, who lived in the hotel, had found the cook and ordered veg curry and rotis and tea for the two of them, which they took to their room and ate by candlelight. The lights were off again. They’d stopped crying by then, both of them, but once they started eating and talking and forgetting to eat they’d started crying again. Hugging. Eating. Crying.
There was so much to tell. His father had listened intently, occasionally asking a question, by turns shocked and amused, but mostly letting him talk. It had sounded incredible, even to his own ears, way beyond the wildest video game that he, not his avatar, had won. And then, a trace of shyness displacing bravado, there was Sanjana … a girl I met and need to find again …
When his father had told him his mother was missing, fear had carved a hollowness in his chest, plunging to his belly. His father had wrapped his solid arms around him and told him not to worry, she was possibly, probably, in Kerala, he’d heard reports from a reliable source. They would fly south as soon as they could get a flight, to find her. Yes, Eli had cried, feeling hope and despair at the same time. Yes. My mother told me about that place.
‘What’s wrong with Mom?’ he’d asked. ‘Why doesn’t she come back?’
‘She’ll be fine when she sees you again,’ his father had said gravely, not very convincing.
Part of him wanted to shake his father awake, leave now for the southern tip of India to find his mother. They’d already lost so much time together. Eight years. If the miracle of finding his father could happen, surely they could find his mother on a distant beach, her ‘soul-place’. They would find her, close the circle. He would forgive her for leaving him in the desert, if he could. His parents would forgive each other, if they could. The three of them together again. Things didn’t always go wrong.
But would that make everything right? He wasn’t sure. The world seemed so much bigger now. Was a world as wide as the three of them big enough?
As he quietly pulled on his trousers – he’d slept in everything else – and tied his shoes, his father still slept, and snored. He looked so helpless, and nearly a stranger. Eli wanted him to wake up and be a father again.
He grabbed his father’s cell phone and a wad of rupees lying on the night table. He’d let his father sleep. But what he had to do now, now that he had the means, couldn’t wait.
Downstairs at reception the hotel staff, young men in maroon striped topis and matching tunics, nodded to him as he came down the stairs and into the lobby, dim and cool. There were two older Nepali men sitting on a sofa together, but otherwise it was empty.
One of the men on the sofa stood and came towards him. He was short, not very old, with a round face and slicked black hair that gleamed as much as his leather jacket. Designer jeans, Nikes and the familiar gold chain completed his look. Whoever he was.
‘Namaste,’ he signed. ‘Your father still sleeping?’
Eli nodded, hesitant to say anything more.
The man reached out to shake his hand, which he extended. ‘Shyam my name. Your father’s driver. I can take you where?’
Eli wanted to walk, but this would get him there faster. For a fleeting moment, he thought he was insane, accepting a lift from a stranger. But the hotel staff seemed to know the man. So he took a chance and said: ‘The Garden of Dreams.’
Shyam smiled and wiggled his head, signed ‘namaste’ to the staff and led the way out the door. Outside a courtyard filled with statues of snarling lions and unnameable goddesses glowed in the long-shadowing sun. Shyam looked at his watch. ‘You have only twenty-one minutes in the garden.’
He slid into the driver’s seat of a beat-up cream-coloured Ambassador at the curb and motioned to Eli to sit beside him. He wore an overdose of cologne and had ears like a Buddha, but seemed nice enough. They drove down the narrow cobbled street, walled in by old houses and curving out of sight. Streets leading nowhere. You couldn’t see where you were going, just had to round the corner on faith that another vehicle wouldn’t be coming at high speed towards you. Hardly any people, just a few children playing on an old dump. But soon they turned on to a wider, much busier road lined with shops and clogged with pedestrians, bikes, tuk-tuks and scooters. The usual.
‘That Jyatha, this Thamel. You know Thamel?’ Shyam didn’t take his eyes off the road. The Ambassador crawled down the street, so slowly that one boy started drumming on its hood for a moment, grinning at them before he loped off.
Eli nodded, though he didn’t really know, didn’t want to know, Thamel.
‘This very bad place, Thamel,’ Shyam said, hawking and spitting out his window. ‘Not a good place for you. Very dangerous.’
Above the hooting and revving of the vehicles Eli thought he heard an animal moaning. ‘Are they still killing them?’
‘Who?’ Shyam looked at him quickly this time. ‘Who is killing who?’
‘The Nepal people. Killing the animals – for Durga.’
‘Ah, so you know about Dashain!’ Shyam smiled appreciatively. ‘No, killing has stopped. Today is last day – day for Lakshmi worship. You know who is Lakshmi?’
The name struck him like an arrow through his throat. He was speechless, just nodded, almost imperceptibly.
‘Goddess of wealth, prosperity. You pray to Lakshmi, and you become very rich. In garden is Lakshmi statue. Tonight is full moon night. You go to her and pray and see what happens.’
Shyam dropped him outside the high white wall enclosing the garden, pulling over to the curb as the traffic of Kantipath surged past. I’ll wait, he shouted after him, not that Eli wanted him to. He entered the way he had before, paid the entrance fee to the same sullen ticket man in the glass booth. This time, a small pale blue ticket with an arched pavilion on it emerged, stamped The Garden of Dreams.
He walked into the garden, past a small sphinx and out into the open. Scents of frangipani and jasmine in the air. To his right were the pavilion, the pond and the two loving elephants, recognisable from the postcard; to his left, a small amphitheatre and expanse of grass, so perfectly green he wondered if it were real.
