The White Tiger

'Let's see it.'

I opened the glove compartment and handed him the bottle.

'It's good stuff. Johnnie Walker Black. Son, do you have glasses too?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Ice?'

'No, sir.'

'It's all right. Let's drink it neat. Son, pour us a drink.'

I did so, while keeping the Honda City going with my left hand. They took the glasses and drank the whiskey like it was lemon juice.

'If he doesn't have it ready, let me know. I'll send some boys over to have a word with him.'

'No, don't worry. His father always paid up in the end. This kid has been to America and has his head full of shit. But he'll pay up too, in the end.'

'How much?'

'Seven. I was going to settle for five, but the sister-fucker himself offered six-he's a bit soft in the head-and then I said seven, and he said okay. I told him if he didn't pay, we'd screw him and his father and his brother and the whole coal-pilfering and tax-evading racket they have. So he began to sweat, and I know he'll pay up.'

'Are you sure? I'd love to send some boys over. I just love to see a rich man roughed up. It's better than an erection.'

'There will be others. This one isn't worth the trouble. He said he'll bring it on Monday. We're going to do it at the Sheraton. There's a nice restaurant down in the basement. Quiet place.'

'Good. He can buy us dinner as well.'

'Goes without saying. They have lovely kebabs there.'

One of the two men gargled the scotch in his mouth, gulped it in, burped, and sucked his teeth.

'You know what the best part of this election is?'

'What?'

'The way we've spread down south. We've got a foothold in Bangalore too. And you know that's where the future is.'

'The south? Bullshit.'

'Why not? One in every three new office buildings in India is being built in Bangalore. It is the future.'

'Fuck all that. I don't believe a word. The south is full of Tamils. You know who the Tamils are? Negroes. We're the sons of the Aryans who came to India. We made them our slaves. And now they give us lectures. Negroes.'

'Son'-Vijay leaned forward with his glass-'another drink for me.'

I poured them out the rest of the bottle that night.

At around three in the morning, I drove the City back to the apartment block in Gurgaon. My heart was beating so fast, I didn't want to leave the car at once. I wiped it down and washed it three times over. The bottle was lying on the floor of the car. Johnnie Walker Black-even an empty one is worth money on the black market. I picked it up and went toward the servants' dormitory.

For a Johnnie Walker Black, Vitiligo-Lips wouldn't mind being woken up.

I walked rotating the bottle with my wrist, feeling its weight. Even empty, it wasn't so light.

I noticed that my feet were slowing down, and the bottle was rotating faster and faster.

I was looking for the key for years…

The smashing of the bottle echoed through the hollow of the parking lot-the sound must have reached the lobby and ricocheted through all the floors of the building, even to the thirteenth floor.

I waited for a few minutes, expecting someone to come running down.

No one. I was safe.

I held what was left of the bottle up to the light. Long and cruel and clawlike jags.

Perfect.

With my foot I gathered the broken pieces of the bottle, which lay all around me, into a pile. I wiped the blood off my hand, found a broom, and swept the area clean. Then I got down on my knees and looked around for any pieces I had failed to pick up; the parking lot echoed with the line of a poem that was being recited over and over:

But the door was always open.

Dharam was sleeping on the floor; cockroaches were crawling about his head. I shook him awake and said, 'Lie inside the mosquito net.' He got in sleepily; I lay on the floor, braving the cockroaches. There was still some blood on my palm: three small red drops had formed on my flesh, like a row of ladybirds on a leaf. Sucking my palm like a boy, I went to sleep.

Mr. Ashok did not want me to drive him anywhere on Sunday morning. I washed the dishes in the kitchen, wiped the fridge, and said, 'I'd like to take the morning off, sir.'

'Why?' he asked, lowering the newspaper. 'You've never asked for a whole morning off before. Where are you off to?'

And you have never before asked me where I was going when I left the house. What has Ms. Uma done to you?

'I want to spend some time with the boy, sir. At the zoo. I thought he would like to see all those animals.'

He smiled. 'You're a good family man, Balram. Go, have fun with the boy.' He went back to reading his newspaper-but I caught a gleam of cunning in his eye as he went over the English print of the newspaper.

As we walked out of Buckingham Towers B Block, I told Dharam to wait for me, then went back and watched the entrance to the building. Half an hour passed, and then Mr. Ashok was down at the lobby. A small dark man-of the servant class-had come to see him. Mr. Ashok and he talked for a while, and then the small man bowed and left. They looked like two men who had just concluded a deal.

I went back to where Dharam was waiting. 'Let's go!'

He and I took the bus to the Old Fort, which is where the National Zoo is. I kept my hand on Dharam's head the whole time-he must have thought it was out of affection, but it was only to stop my hand from trembling-it had been shaking all morning like a lizard's tail that has fallen off.

The first strike would be mine. Everything was in place now, nothing could go wrong-but like I told you, I am not a brave man.

The bus was crowded, and the two of us had to stand for the entire journey. We both sweated like pigs. I had forgotten what a bus trip in summer was like. When we stopped at a red light, a Mercedes-Benz pulled up alongside the bus. Behind his upraised window, cool in his egg, the chauffeur grinned at us, exposing red teeth.

There was a long line at the ticket counter of the zoo. There were lots of families wanting to go into the zoo, and that I could understand. What puzzled me, though, was the sight of so many young men and women going into the zoo, hand in hand: giggling, pinching each other, and making eyes, as if the zoo were a romantic place. That made no sense to me.

Now, Mr. Premier, every day thousands of foreigners fly into my country for enlightenment. They go to the Himalayas, or to Benaras, or to Bodh Gaya. They get into weird poses of yoga, smoke hashish, shag a sadhu or two, and think they're getting enlightened.

Ha!

If it is enlightenment you have come to India for, you people, forget the Ganga-forget the ashrams-go straight to the National Zoo in the heart of New Delhi.

Dharam and I saw the golden-beaked storks sitting on palm trees in the middle of an artificial lake. They swooped down over the green water of the lake, and showed us traces of pink on their wings. In the background, you could see the broken walls of the Old Fort.

Iqbal, that great poet, was so right. The moment you recognize what is beautiful in this world, you stop being a slave. To hell with the Naxals and their guns shipped from China. If you taught every poor boy how to paint, that would be the end of the rich in India.

I made sure Dharam appreciated the gorgeous rise and fall of the fort's outline-the way its loopholes filled up with blue sky-the way the old stones glittered in the light.