of criminal gangs paid by her party. Some ministers are even helping the gangs, providing official lists of Sikh homes and businesses. Otherwise, it’s not possible for the killers to work so efficiently, so accurately, in such a big city.”
They were passing through streets now where smouldering ruins and piles of rubble lined the road. Women and children sat amid the debris, dazed or weeping. The driver’s face contorted, and Maneck thought it was fear. “Don’t worry,” he said. “There will be no trouble because of my beard. If we are stopped, they’ll at once know I’m a Parsi — I’ll show them the sudra and kusti I am wearing.”
“Yes, but they might want to check my licence.”
“So?”
“You haven’t guessed? I am a Sikh — I shaved off my beard and cut my hair two days ago. But I’m still wearing my kara.” He held up his hand, displaying the iron bangle round his wrist.
Maneck studied the driver’s face, and suddenly the evidence became plain: his skin, unused to the razor’s scrape, had been cut in several places. Suddenly, all the incidents narrated by the man — of mutilation and bludgeoning and decapitation, the numerous ways that mobs had of breaking bones, piercing flesh, and spilling blood — everything that Maneck had been listening to with detachment now achieved a stark reality in the razor’s nicks. The coagulated specks of red on the chin and jowls might have been rivers of blood, so intense was their effect against the pale, newly shaven skin.
Maneck was nauseated, his face felt cold and sweaty. “The bastards!” he choked. “I hope they are all caught and hanged!”
“The real murderers will never be punished. For votes and power they play with human lives. Today it is Sikhs. Last year it was Muslims; before that, Harijans. One day, your sudra and kusti might not be enough to protect you.”
The taxi drew up to the railway station. Maneck checked the meter and counted out twice the amount from his wallet, but the driver refused to take more than the actual fare. “Please,” said Maneck, “please take it.” He pressed the money on him, as though that would help him survive the terror, and the driver finally accepted.
“Listen,” said Maneck, “why don’t you remove your kara and hide it for the time being?”
“It won’t come off.” He held up his wrist and pulled hard at the iron bangle. “I was planning to have it cut. But I have to find a reliable Lohar, one who won’t tell the wrong people.”
“Let me try.” Maneck grasped the driver’s hand, tugging and twisting the kara. It would not budge past the base of the thumb.
The driver smiled. “Solid as a handcuff. I am manacled to my religion — a happy prisoner.”
“At least wear long sleeves, then. Cover it up, keep your wrist hidden.”
“But sometimes I have to stick my hand out, to signal my turns. Or the traffic police will catch me for bad driving.”
Maneck gave up, releasing the kara. The driver took Maneck’s hand in both of his and clasped it tight. “Go safely,” he said.
Ab an Kohlah began to weep when her son arrived. How wonderful it was to see him again, she said, but why had he stayed away for eight years, was he angry about something, did he feel he was not wanted? She hugged him and patted his cheeks and stroked his hair while speaking.
“But I like your beard,” she said dutifully. “Makes you look very handsome. You should have sent us a photo, Daddy could also have seen it. But never mind, I am sure he is watching from above.”
Maneck listened silently. Not one day had passed during his long exile that he did not think about his home and his parents. In Dubai, he had felt trapped. Trapped, he thought, as surely as that young woman he had met during one of his domestic maintenance calls to service a refrigerator. She had come to the Gulf as a maidservant because the money promised had seemed so good.
“What is it, Maneck?” pleaded Mrs. Kohlah. “Don’t you want to live here in the hills anymore — is that it? Do you find this place too dull?”
“No, it’s beautiful,” he said, patting her hand absently. He could not stop wondering what had become of that maidservant. Overworked, molested repeatedly by the men of the house, locked up in her room at night, her passport confiscated, she had begged him for help, speaking in Hindi so her employer would not understand. But she had been called away from the kitchen before Maneck could say anything. Uneasy about intervening, all he had done was anonymously telephone the Indian Consulate.
How fortunate he was compared to that poor woman, he thought. Why, then, did he feel as helpless as she was, even here, at home?
And now, as his mother wept, he wished he had answers to her questions. But he was unable to explain, either to her or to himself. All he could offer were the trite, customary excuses: a demanding job, pressures at work, lack of time — a repeat of the empty words he would scribble in his annual letter to her.
“No, tell me the real reason,” she said. “Never mind, we will talk later, after you have rested. Poor Daddy, how much he missed you, and yet he never, ever complained. But I knew that inside it was eating him up.”
“So now you are blaming the cancer on me.”
“No! I didn’t mean it like that! I didn’t!” His mother held his face in her hands, repeating the denial till she was certain he believed her. “You know, Daddy once told me it was the worst day of his life when he let Brigadier Grewal persuade him that a job in the Gulf would be a good thing for you.”
They sat on the porch while she told him about the funeral arrangements for the next morning: dustoors were coming from the nearest fire-temple, which was still a considerable distance. It had been an effort to find two who were willing to perform the ceremony. Most had refused the assignment when they discovered the deceased was to be cremated, saying their services were available only to Zoroastrians bound for the Towers of Silence — never mind if it was a long trip by railway.
“How narrow-minded these people are,” she said, shaking her head. “Of course, we are cremating because it was Daddy’s wish, but what about people who cannot afford to transport the body? Would these priests deny them the prayers?”
It wasn’t going to be an open-air pyre, she explained. The electric crematorium had been booked in the valley — it would be more decorous. And Daddy wasn’t really specific on this point, so it didn’t matter.
The General Store had remained closed since his death. She meant to reopen it next week and continue as usual. “Are you planning to settle back here?” she ventured timidly, afraid of appearing to pry into his affairs.
“I haven’t thought about it yet.”
Daylight was starting to fade about them. He watched a lizard, motionless upon the stone wall. Every now and then, its thin body shot forward like an arrow to catch a fly.
“Are you happy in Dubai? Is your job interesting?”
“It’s okay.”
“Tell me more about it. You wrote that you are a manager now?”
“Supervisor. Looking after a maintenance team — central air-conditioning.”
She nodded. “And what is Dubai like?”
“It’s okay.” He searched his mind for things to add, and realized he did not know the place, didn’t want to. The people, their customs, the language — it was all as alien to him now as it had been when he had landed there eight years ago. His uprooting never seemed to end. “Lots of big hotels. And hundreds of shops selling gold jewellery and stereos and TVS.”
She nodded again. “Must be a very beautiful place.” His unhappiness afflicted her like something palpable. She felt the moment was right to talk again about his returning home. “The shop is yours, you know that. If you want to come back and run it, modernize it. Whatever you like. If you prefer to sell it and use the money to start your own refrigeration and air-conditioning business, that’s also possible.”
He heard the diffident note in her voice and felt miserable. A mother scared to talk to her own son — was he really so intimidating? “I haven’t thought about all that,” he repeated.
“Take your time, there is no rush. Whatever you wish.”
He winced at her efforts to mollify him. Why didn’t she say she was disgusted with his behaviour, with his long absence, his infrequent, superficial letters? And if she did say it — would he defend himself? Would he give reasons, try to explain how meaningless every endeavour seemed to him? No. For then she would start crying
