A Son of the Circus

the furniture and still she would never have awakened Dr. Daruwalla.

The doctor’s lunch has been described. It would be superfluous to provide similar detail regarding the doctor’s dinner; suffice it to say that he substituted the vindaloo-style pork for the fish, and he further indulged in a pork stew called sorpotel, which features pig’s liver and is abundantly flavored with vinegar. Yet it was the dried duckling with tamarind that dominated the aroma of his heavy breathing, and his snores were scented with sharp blasts of a raw red wine, which he would deeply regret in the morning. He should have stuck to beer. Julia was grateful that Dr. Daruwalla had elected to sleep in the hammock on the balcony, where only the Arabian Sea—and the lizards and insects that in the night were legion—would be disturbed by the doctor’s windy noises. Julia also desired a rest from the passions inspired by Mr. James Salter’s artistry. For the moment, her private speculations concerning the departed hippie’s dildo had cooled Julia’s sexual ardor.

As for the insect and lizard life that clung to the mosquito net enclosing the cherubic doctor in his hammock, the gecko and mosquito world appeared to be charmed by both the doctor’s music and his vapors. The doctor had bathed just before retiring, and his plump pale-brown body was everywhere dusted with Cuticura powder—from his neck to between his toes. His closely shaven throat and cheeks were refreshed with a powerful astringent redolent of lemons. He’d even shaved his mustache off, leaving only a little clump of a beard on his chin; he was almost as smooth-faced as a baby. Dr. Daruwalla was so clean and he smelled so wonderful that Nancy had the impression that only the mosquito net prevented the geckos and mosquitoes from devouring him.

At a level of sleep so deep it seemed to Farrokh that he had died and lay buried somewhere in China, the doctor dreamed that his most ardent admirers were digging up his body—to prove a point. The doctor wished they would leave him undisturbed, for he felt he was at peace; in truth, he’d passed out in the hammock in a stupor of overeating—not to mention the effect of the wine. To dream that he was prey to gravediggers was surely an indication of his overindulgence.

So what if my body is a miracle, he was dreaming—please just leave it alone!

Meanwhile, Nancy found what she was looking for; in the ashtray, where it had left only a spot of dried blood, lay the half-moon-shaped piece of glass. As she took it, she heard Dr. Daruwalla cry out, “Leave me in China!” The doctor thrashed his legs, and Nancy saw that one of his beautiful eggshell-brown feet had escaped the mosquito net and was protruding from the hammock—exposed to the terrors of the night. This disturbance sent the geckos darting in all directions and caused the mosquitoes to swarm.

Well, Nancy thought, the doctor had done her a favor, hadn’t he? She stood stock-still until she was sure Dr. Daruwalla was sound asleep; she didn’t want to wake him up, but it was hard for her to leave him when his gorgeous foot was prey to the elements. Nancy contemplated how she might safely return Farrokh’s foot to the mosquito net, but her newfound good sense persuaded her not to risk it. She descended the vine from the balcony to the patio; this required the use of both her hands, and so she delicately held the piece of broken glass in her teeth—careful that it not cut her tongue or her lips. She was limping along the dark road to Calangute when she threw the glass away. It was lost in a dense grove of palms, where it disappeared without a sound—as unseen by any living eye as Nancy’s lost innocence.

The Wrong Toe

Nancy had been fortunate to leave the Hotel Bardez when she had. She never knew that Rahul was a guest there, nor did Rahul know that Nancy had been Dr. Daruwalla’s patient. This was extremely lucky, because Rahul also climbed the vine to the Daruwallas’ second-floor balcony—on the very same night. Nancy had come and gone; but when Rahul arrived on the balcony, Dr. Daruwalla’s poor foot was still vulnerable to the nighttime predators.

Rahul himself had come as a predator. He’d learned from Dr. Daruwalla’s innocent daughters that John D. usually slept in the hammock on the balcony. Rahul had come to the balcony to seduce John D. The sexually curious may find it interesting to speculate whether or not Rahul would have met with success in his attempted seduction of the beautiful young man, but John D. was spared this test because Dr. Daruwalla was sleeping in the hammock on this busy night.

In the darkness—not to mention that he was blinded by his overeagerness—Rahul was confused. The body asleep under the mosquito net was certainly of a desirable fragrance. Maybe it was the moonlight that played tricks with skin color. Possibly it was only the moonlight which gave Rahul the impression that John D. had grown a little clump of a beard. As for the toes of the doctor’s exposed foot, they were tiny and hairless, and the foot itself was as small as a young girl’s. Rahul found that the ball of the foot was endearingly fleshy and soft, and he thought that the sole of Dr. Daruwalla’s foot was almost indecently pink—in contrast to the doctor’s sleek, brown ankle.

Rahul knelt by the doctor’s small foot; he stroked it with his large hand; he brushed his cheek against the doctor’s freshly scented toes. Naturally, it would have startled him if Dr. Daruwalla had cried out, “But I don’t want to be a miracle!”

The doctor was dreaming that he was Francis Xavier, dug up from his grave and taken against his will to the Basilica de Bom Jesus in Goa. More accurately, he was dreaming that he was Francis Xavier’s miraculously preserved body, and things were about to be done to his body—also against his will. But despite the terror of what was happening to him, in his dream Farrokh couldn’t give utterance to his fears; he was so heavily sedated with food and wine that he was forced to suffer in silence—even though he anticipated that a crazed pilgrim was about to eat his toe. After all, he knew the story.

Rahul ran his tongue along the sole of the doctor’s fragrant foot, which tasted strongly of Cuticura powder and vaguely of garlic. Because Dr. Daruwalla’s foot was the single part of him that was unprotected by the mosquito net, Rahul could manifest his powerful attraction to the delicious John D. only by enclosing what he presumed to be the big toe of John D.’s right foot in his warm mouth. Rahul then sucked on this toe with such force that Dr. Daruwalla moaned. Rahul at first fought against the desire to bite him, but he gave in to this urge and slowly sank his teeth into the squirming toe; then he once more resisted the compelling impulse to bite—then he weakened and bit down harder. It was torture for Rahul to stop himself from going too far—from swallowing Dr. Daruwalla, either whole or in pieces. When he at last released the doctor’s foot, both Rahul and Dr. Daruwalla were gasping. In his dream, the doctor was certain that the obsessed woman had already done her damage; she’d bitten off the sacred relic of his toe, and now there was tragically less of his miraculous body than they had buried.

As Rahul undressed himself, Dr. Daruwalla withdrew his maimed foot from the dangerous world; he curled himself tightly into his hammock under the mosquito net, for in his dream he was fearing that the emissaries from the Vatican were approaching—to take his arm to Rome. As Farrokh struggled to give voice to his terror of amputation, Rahul attempted to penetrate the mysteries of the mosquito net.

Rahul thought it would be best if John D. awoke to find his face firmly between Rahul’s breasts, for these latter creations were surely to be counted among Rahul’s best features. But then, since Rahul thought that the young man appeared to have been aroused by the oddity of having his big toe sucked and bitten, perhaps a bolder approach would succeed. It was frustrating to Rahul that he could proceed with no approach until he solved the puzzle of entrance to the mosquito net, which was vexing. And it was at this complicated juncture in Rahul’s attempted seduction that Farrokh finally found the voice to express his fears. Rahul, who recognized the doctor’s voice, distinctly heard Dr. Daruwalla shout, “I don’t want to be a saint! I need that arm—it’s a very good arm!”

At this, the boy’s dog in the lobby barked briefly; the boy once more began to talk to the animal. Rahul hated Dr. Daruwalla as fervently as he desired John D.; therefore, Rahul was appalled that he’d caressed the doctor’s foot, and he was nauseated that he’d sucked and bitten the doctor’s big toe. As he hurriedly dressed himself, Rahul was also embarrassed. The taste of Cuticura powder was bitter on his tongue as he climbed down the vine to the patio, where the dog in the lobby heard him spit; the dog barked again, and this time the boy unlocked the door to the lobby and peered anxiously at the misty beach.

The boy heard Dr. Daruwalla cry out from the balcony: “Cannibals! Catholic maniacs!” Even to an inexperienced Hindu boy, this seemed a fearful combination. Then the dog’s barking exploded at the door to the lobby, where both the boy and the dog were surprised by the sudden appearance of Rahul.

“Don’t lock me out,” Rahul said. The boy let him in and gave him his room key. Rahul wore a loose-fitting