should be more humble about his own, merely human role. Martin was a member of the Society of Jesus, and he should behave accordingly; he wasn’t just another egocentric social worker—a do-gooder who was constantly evaluating, criticizing and congratulating himself.
“The fate of these children isn’t in your hands,” Father Julian told the scholastic, “nor will one of them suffer, more or less, because of
This not only struck the zealot as blunt; Martin Mills was confused. That the Father Rector saw the children as already consigned to their fate seemed remarkably Calvinistic for a Jesuit; Martin feared that Father Julian might also be suffering from the influence of Hinduism, for this notion of the children’s “fate” had a karmic ring. And what was wrong with being a social worker? Hadn’t St. Ignatius Loyola himself been a social worker of unflagging zeal? Or did the Father Rector mean only that Martin shouldn’t take the fate of the circus children too
It was in such a spiritual fog that Martin Mills took a walk in Mazagaon; he hadn’t wandered far from the mission before he encountered that slum which Dr. Daruwalla had first shown to him—the former movie-set slum where his evil mother had fainted when she was stepped on and licked by a cow. Martin remembered that he’d vomited from the moving car.
At midmorning, on this busy Monday, the slum was teeming, but the missionary found that it was better to focus on such abjectness in a microcosmic fashion; rather than look up the length of Sophia Zuber Road for as far as he could see, Martin kept his eyes cast down—at his slowly moving feet. He never allowed his gaze to wander above ground level. Most of the slum dwellers were thus cut off at their ankles; he saw only the children’s faces— naturally, the children were begging. He saw the paws and the inquiring noses of scavenging dogs. He saw a moped that had fallen or crashed in the gutter; a garland of marigolds was entwined on its handlebars, as if the moped were being prepared for cremation. He came upon a cow—a whole cow, not just the hooves, because the cow was lying down. It was hard to navigate around the cow. But when Martin Mills stopped walking, even though he’d been walking slowly, he found himself quickly surrounded; it should be stated clearly in every guidebook for tourists— never stand still in a slum.
The cow’s long sad dignified face gazed up at him; its eyes were rimmed with flies. On the cow’s tawny flank, a patch of the smooth hide was abraded—the raw spot was no bigger than a human fist, but it was encrusted with flies. This apparent abrasion was actually the entrance to a deep hole that had been made in the cow by a vehicle transporting a ship’s mast; but Martin hadn’t witnessed the collision, nor did the milling crowd permit him a comprehensive view of the cow’s mortal wound.
Suddenly, the crowd parted; a procession was passing—all Martin saw was a lunatic mob of flower throwers. When the worshipers had filed by, the cow lay sprinkled with rose petals; some of the flowers were stuck to the wound, alongside the flies. One of the cow’s long legs was extended, for the animal was lying on its side; the hoof almost reached the curb. There in the gutter, within inches of the hoof but entirely untouched, was (unmistakably) a human turd. Beyond the serenely undisturbed turd was a vendor’s stall. They were selling something that looked purposeless to Martin Mills; it was a vivid scarlet powder, but the missionary doubted that it was a spice or anything edible. Some of it spilled into the gutter, where its dazzling red particles coated both the cow’s hoof and the human turd.
That was Martin’s microcosm of India: the mortally wounded animal, the religious ritual, the incessant flies, the unbelievably bright colors, the evidence of casual human shit—and of course the confusion of smells. The missionary had been forewarned: if he couldn’t see beyond such abjectness, he would be of scant use to St. Ignatius—or to any mission in such a world. Shaken, the scholastic wondered if he had the stomach to be a priest. So vulnerable was his state of mind, Martin Mills was fortunate that the news about Madhu was still a day away.
In the Ladies’ Garden at the Duckworth Club, the noon sun shimmered above the bower. So dense was the bougainvillea, the sun shot through the flowers in pinholes; these beads of bright light dappled the tablecloths like sprinkled diamonds. Nancy passed her hands under the needle-thin rays. She was playing with the sun, trying to reflect its light in her wedding ring, when Detective Patel spoke to her. “You don’t have to be here, sweetie,” her husband said. “You can go home, you know.”
“I want to be here,” Nancy told him.
“I just want to warn you—don’t expect this to be satisfying,” the deputy commissioner said. “Somehow, even when you catch them, it’s never quite satisfying.”
Dr. Daruwalla, who kept looking at his watch, then remarked, “She’s late.”
“They’re
“Dhar is
Dhar was waiting in the kitchen. When the second Mrs. Dogar arrived, Mr. Sethna would observe the increasing degrees of her irritation; when the steward saw that she was clearly agitated, he would send Dhar to her table. Dr. Daruwalla was operating on the theory that agitation inspired Rahul to act rashly.
But when she arrived, they almost didn’t recognize her. She was wearing what Western women familiarly call a little black dress; the skirt was short, with a slight flare, the waist very long and slimming. Mrs. Dogar’s small, high breasts were displayed to good effect. If she’d worn a black-linen jacket, she would have looked almost businesslike, Dr. Daruwalla believed; without a jacket, the dress was more suitable for a cocktail party in Toronto. As if intended to offend Duckworthians, the dress was sleeveless, with spaghetti straps; the brawniness of Rahul’s bare shoulders and upper arms, not to mention the breadth of her chest, hulked ostentatiously. She was too muscular for a dress like that, Farrokh decided; then it occurred to him that this was what she thought Dhar liked.
Yet Mrs. Dogar didn’t move as if she were at all conscious that she was a woman of great strength or noticeable size. Her entry into the Duckworth Club dining room wasn’t in the least aggressive. Her attitude was shy and girlish; rather than stride to her table, she allowed old Mr. Sethna to escort her on his arm—Dr. Daruwalla had never seen her this way. This wasn’t a woman who would ever pick up a spoon or a fork and ring it against her water glass; this was an extremely feminine woman—she would rather starve at her table than cause herself any unflattering attention. She would sit smiling and waiting for Dhar until the club closed and someone sent her home. Apparently, Detective Patel was prepared for this change in her, because the deputy commissioner spoke quickly to the screenwriter; Mrs. Dogar had barely been seated at her table.
“Don’t bother to keep her waiting,” the policeman said. “She’s a different woman today.”
Farrokh summoned Mr. Sethna—to have John D. “arrive”—but all the while the deputy commissioner was watching what Mrs. Dogar did with her purse. It was a table for four, as the screenwriter had suggested; this had been Julia’s idea. When there were only two people at a table for four, Julia said, a woman usually put her purse on one of the empty chairs—not on the floor—and Farrokh had wanted the purse on a chair.
“She put it on the floor, anyway,” Detective Patel observed.
Dr. Daruwalla had been unable to prevent Julia from attending
“Dhar will take care of it,” the deputy commissioner said.
All Farrokh could think was that the change in Mrs. Dogar was terrifying.
“It was the murder, wasn’t it?” the doctor asked the policeman. “I mean, the murder has totally calmed her—it’s had a completely soothing effect on her, hasn’t it?”
“It appears to have made her feel like a young girl,” Patel replied.
“She must have a hard time feeling like a young girl,” Nancy remarked. “What a lot to do—just to feel like a young girl.”
Then Dhar was there, at Mrs. Dogar’s table; he didn’t kiss her. He approached her unseen, from behind, and he put both his hands on her bare shoulders; perhaps he leaned on her, because she appeared to stiffen, but he
