Truth Lake

by Shakuntala Banaji

  'We never intended to stay long.' Sara had said, while Adam had used different words but implied exactly that. Karmel remembered how they had both wet their lips before continuing and something about the gesture had struck him as dishonest, despite the fact that much of what they said, as well as their shock, clearly rang true.

  'We started at a wee village … called Dilgum, because that's where Cameron had written us from last,' she'd said; 'That's where the Keshi-Dilgham bus dropped us' had been his version, and, despite such continuing and minor variations, the story they'd told him had been, for them, the same shocking one. Adam's voice had become more and more choked as he reached his conclusion.

  'We'd walked for days, see, and we were really panicking about food because such a long time, no people, and I was all set to go on to Bookta or somewhere like that, where we knew there were some guys using the government cottages. It's not like it's a very populated area or anything and all the pilgrims were off on the glacier trail in the Northeast. So we came to this lake and we camped 'cause we hoped, um, wanted to see our friend somewhere there. Sara thought she'd seen someone in the dawn but we called and they weren't there when we got to the spot so I guess she was mistaken but we did know from Cam that he was living in a village called Saahitaal' – he pronounced it Sayheetell and it had taken four repetitions before they were clear about the name. Saahitaal. The Truth Lake.

  'We stayed up there . . . a few hours. We were sure he'd written about it. This place. Trees all around the rim and the lake totally glassy and perfect skies. Did we see anyone in all that time? Well, we might have in the distance, you know, carrying things, but we didn't go barging into them.'

  'Weren't you both eager to see your friend? Cameron Croft.'

  Adam had paused, sweating, raised a hand to his chest as if breathing hurt him then allowed it to drop back onto his lap as if its weight were simply too great for his wrist to bear.

  'Cam had been there several weeks ago so we weren't even sure he was still in that part of the country.’ A sudden blink and barely noticeable grimace of annoyance – at himself? At his the memory of his friend’s feckless wanderings? And then the narrative continued smoothly, as if rehearsed, ‘His father'd asked us to pop over and check on him 'cause he hadn't heard from him in a while, like ages – and his ma was sick. God, like he knew how far away it was … but I'm not blaming the old man, he's not to know how bloody BIG the Himalayas are, reckoned on a short walk from Delhi! So we guessed Cam had moved on, that's all, and didn't rush it.’ Througout this speech Adam had kept his bloodshot eyes steadily wide, staring at Karmel as if daring him to interrupt or call him a liar and Karmel had remained still, listening with his heart as well as his ears.

  'Anyway, after that we were seriously short of food so we had to find the village and stock up at least for a couple of days. Well, we found it, no problem, just off to the right, below the lake, about a mile, maybe less, quite cut off with trees all over the place and not many houses – cabins really, a bit of a different atmosphere from other villages round that place actually, we thought, no men about and the women wouldn't speak to me 'n Sara at first. We got a bit of food out of one of them at last, then headed straight off thinking what was Cameron on about, it was a fucking spooky place – I apologise for the language – but no way were we waiting around there!'

  In Karmel's head, Adam's narrative faded seamlessly into Sara's; the night sounds surrounding the tent – rustlings and patterings and occasionally the howl of an animal that he would rather not face – accompanied her version in a lower key; her voice had been higher pitched and more insistent, her command of herself less certain than Adam’s.

  'We decided to camp some way below the village because it was getting dark and I hate climbing in the dark. I'd paid one of the women to make us some chapattis, that’s how you say it, yes? and spuds – potato curry – I think it was, and we had this pot of theirs so we didn't want to go far; guess they knew we had to go back the way we came so we'd return the pot or else they just wanted to be rid of us. Seemed like everywhere else we went we'd been greeted by these ultra friendly bodies, wanted to know how many bairns we had and that kinda stuff' – a frown – 'and then boom, we hadn't expected the red carpet but these ladies at Saahitaal were seriously not keen to have us around or maybe it was just Adam, because their men were up on the pastures, aye, but I didn't want to upset him by saying that; it would have been bliss to spend a night out a' the tent and in one a' their rooms.'

  Karmel recollected how he had covertly watched every movement of her eyebrows, every jittery blink of her striking eyes. Had Adam been allowed in the room during the telling of her tale, Karmel had no doubt she would have glanced at him from time to time, seeking reassurance, a little girl wanting to be told she was doing okay. As it was, she’d spoken faster and faster, desperate to get the telling over. She was nervous way before she reached the climax of her tale.

  'We were washing the pot when we found him. I mean it. Down by the Saahi, near this big tree. I yelled out and Adam hugged me to make me shut up.' She had touched her face then, moistened her lips again and lowered her lashes as if seeking his pity. Karmel listened to her, memorising every detail of her response so that he could roll it out before his imagination again like a canvas, as he was doing now on this damp hillside, but did not offer any comment. She had been forced to resume her story.

  'A body, Mr Karmel. It smelt so, so repulsive, that was what made me look in the first place. I had dropped my bar of soap into the leaves and was scrabbling about to get it, brushed some earth away. . ..Then there it was under some squelchy leaves, half a face, a cheek, teeth, a hand, kind of bloated and lumpy – oh my lord, Jesus god.’ She bent her head to her knees as if overcome by sudden vertigo. He waited.

  ‘We knew we should search for identification, yeah, something with a name. But I couldn't, can you understand that? I just could not! You're not supposed to touch a body, are you, Mr. Karmel? It might interfere with evidence. I'm a junior doctor back home . . ..' A self-deprecating shrug, no smile, to which he had responded with a kind nod, helping her to continue. 'Adam was puking up and I was nearly the same; it was like some dreadful horror movie.’ She started to cough. ‘Excuse me. Water. Could I have a glass?' And that was about it.

  According to them they'd dumped the pan, abandoned the corpse and done what most other normal people would do – freaked out, run away, stumbled down the hillside until they were nearly blinded by trees and roots and falling darkness.

  It had taken them several days leisurely trekking to reach Saahitaal. They made the return journey in three, refusing invitations to stay in villages they passed, refusing smiles and food, barely sleeping, huddled together in their dark tent, ultimately merely wrapping themselves in it, too tired to put it up. They caught the mail-bus from some unnamed village to the plains and then another bus from there. And, when they reached Delhi, they decided to go see Antonio Sinbari.

  Why him?

  It made sense, see, as they along with their friend Cameron had once taken Vincent, Sinbari Junior, that is, around Edinburgh; and in the friendship that ensued had been given invitations to his tycoon father’s many global residences.

  They had agreed between themselves not to speak to anyone about their experience before telling the police; but the first night of beer and heat had broken them down and they had sobbed it all out to Antonio in his fragrant drawing room. Antonio had been kindness personified. He had offered them advice and culinary solace and, when he discovered that Sara wished to call the police, it was he who had suggested that they go to his acquaintance, the Deputy Chief of Police. On one point both young foreigners were adamant: neither of them recognised the corpse they had unearthed. Why should they? They'd only just arrived in the area. And they were never returning to the Himalayas ever again. End of story. Of both their stories.

  Except that Karmel didn't believe them.

  On the seventh day of his quest, Karmel woke much later than on any
of the previous mornings. His watch told him it was nearly six and he could hear noises that were both human and animal coming rapidly towards him. Before he had time even to step out of the tent, they were upon him; several butted their heads through the opening of his tent and trampled his ropes as he struggled to stay upright. When at last he managed to step out, he was greeted by two boys whose hilarity matched their raggedness.

  'You chose the wrong place to sleep, stranger!' They chorused, as a second skinny goat charged through the open doorway of the tent and became entangled in Karmel's sleeping bag; their mirth exploded again and Karmel joined them, feeling foolish. He could see now why the ground had been so damp, for he was barely ten yards from the river and somehow had failed in the dark to notice the trampled mud around him.

  The boys were fair haired and fragile-looking, with colourful caps and bare feet. He was drawn to them instantly and did not want them to leave.

  'I'm from Delhi.' He said, inviting them to share their names with him. The smaller of the two boys responded by introducing himself as Chand while his brother's name was Sonu. Their grandfather was called Devsingh and was, according to his grandsons, an extremely stern man – they looked at each other when they said it, chewing their lips and frowning – who was not in Saahitaal at the moment as he had gone to a distant village to intervene in a dispute over land. Their father had left their village when they were very young and worked in Delhi, they had been told; they barely remembered him. They had many cousins and other relatives all over the place but several also resided in Saahitaal.

  As Chand spoke, Karmel was busy rolling his tent and stuffing his belongings back into the rucksack.

  Sonu kept laughing shyly and touching bits of the dismantled tent. The boys seemed to be in a hurry to follow their animals which had halted restlessly by the river, their bells creating a kind of eerie music that made Karmel hunger even more for the company of humans. Chand, who appeared to be older than his brother despite his size, gave a long list of convoluted directions to Saahitaal and promised to see Karmel there at nightfall. Karmel thanked them and began to descend in the direction indicated.

  The day was warm. Sunshine broke through foliage all along the riverbank. Drops of water sailed through the slightly misted air and swirled around him whenever he bent down. He only realised that he was sweating when he stopped. His garments clung to him and sent shivers of discomfort rippling over his skin.

  He had walked for several hours and the ground was beginning to climb steeply again, trees springing from the earth like gnarled phantoms. Interspersed with these, great boulders made of some shiny substance embedded in a darker slate-coloured rock cast blunt shadows towards the river, which was now silent and slow flowing. Looking around him he wondered if he had somehow missed his way. His sense of isolation became acute.

  Making a quick decision, he began to ascend into the forest.

  Flowers clung to the branches all around him, deep blushing bunches forcing him to breathlessness with their perfection. Looking around he remembered Adam's description and thought irrelevantly, you didn't tell about the flowers. I'm glad you missed the flowers. I needed to see this for myself.

  He had never known such abundance of colour before and the long-tamed anguish of not being able to share his vision with anyone flared up again and kept him steady company for the next ten minutes.

  Then the forest was gone and he was staring out at a wide, still lake.

  Inside the forest, the brushing of his body against branches had created a kind of self-referential noise that had preoccupied his ears and stopped him from listening to the silence. Out on the rim of this placid pool he could no longer deceive himself. He didn't even dare to breathe aloud, for fear of missing something. But there was nothing to hear.

  He looked at his watch and realised with a sense of having lost time that it was almost noon. He began to search for the path that he knew must exist, down to the village. As he walked, he became engrossed in a memory about flowers. His first paid job had been to deliver bouquets to rich women. He was eleven, had run from the Manek Foundation and kept going all the way to the heart of Delhi, to fresh flowers fallen from stalls at the flower bazaar, to nights of thieving and days of sweet, unexpected sleep. Then he stole some rare orchids to sell to passing rich folk at traffic lights; he was caught and beaten and made to work for the stallholders. Throughout that period of his life he had continued to sleep deeply, whenever and wherever he could, usually on pavements and porches scented with the bizarre fragrance of crushed and rotting petals. The smell rising up from beneath his boots now was fresher and more wholesome but still recognisably kin to that one.

  Saahitaal ambushed him the way fear did in dreams, springing up around him before he was aware, like all the other things on this strange quest. A village of raised stone and wood cabins, layer upon layer stretching around and down the hillside, in clearings made by cutting away trees. A maze of narrow lanes ran towards him in every direction, dizzying and inviting at the same time. He stumbled forward and suddenly became aware of women watching.

  On doorsteps, old women stood and gazed at him: little girls were on the paths, where they had not been seconds previously, smiling behind their hands or glaring solemnly, pulling their own pigtails and biting nervously at their lips. A hushed but expectant noise – the purring of a multitude of cats – made its way through the village. Stranger. It seemed to murmur. Stranger.

  He felt the hair rise on the backs of his sweater-clad arms, on his chest, on the nape of his neck.

  5

  For several years it had been Antonio Sinbari's habit to go for a pre-dawn jog around the deserted lanes of the exclusive colony that housed his spacious New Delhi home. He believed in keeping fit, in keeping the years at bay. Even when he was a young man travelling from city to city and improving his father’s legacy, he had always taken the time to go running. On the twenty-eight of July he began his run as he always did, with a slight smile on his cleanly shaven face and shades to cover his swollen eyes; he was not an easy sleeper.

  About a mile into the jog, he was joined by Sadrettin. Lithe and handsome in white shorts and a cotton pullover, Sinbari's personal assistant was alert to any small changes in his boss's routine or manner; he noticed the grim lines of fatigue around Sinbari's mouth and the slight stoop of his shoulders as he moved. He knew, however, that their daily briefing which took place during this ritual run could not be foregone on any impulse of his own. So he started to speak.

  'Our foreman at Mahanta Island has quit. I won't bore you with the details of his quarrel with us but he is threatening litigation for unfair dismissal so I thought you'd be amused to know that we actually have his signed resignation on file! Oh and your wife called from Florence about Vincent's graduation. Do you want to call her back or shall I fax her? You're planning on being there? Yes. What's she doing in Florence? Visiting an aunt of yours, she said. You’ll know who she means when I say the word ‘Luisa’. Ah, she was right.' As usual, Sadrettin answered questions that were never put into words.

  He paused occasionally but Sinbari's heavy breathing and the plok plok of their trainer-clad feet were the only sounds to be heard so he continued. 'We have received authorisation to begin construction at Konali, Sir. The truckers are all loaded up and waiting for our signal. The design team is standing by to fly out there, all plans finished, and I thought that if you don’t need me for anything else, I should go with them, at least for the initial period. I had Mrs Pillai telephone to thank Raja Jobal for clearing those wretched labourers off that land. She sent over a bottle of Glenfiddich and something to keep him smiling. Very discreet, as you requested. I'll need clearance to send out cheques to Ma Randhor this week or else we'll be hearing from her lawyers.' The whisper of cloth against flesh muffled Sinbari's response.

  'I beg your pardon, sir?'

  'Pull out of the Konali project.'

  'Sir?' Sadrettin almost stopped running. A bird shot up sleepily from a tree a
nd cawed at them, then flopped back down again.

  'You heard me, son.'

  'But . . . but aren't we committed? Haven't you signed a land reclamation form? And Raja Jobal . . . ' Sadrettin's voice was rising in pitch. He was normally so calm, so intrepid, that his near hysteria infuriated Sinbari even more than it might have done, coming from another man.

  'I pay you to look after my interests, not Jobal's, stupido! So if I say I want out of some bullshit little deal then that's what you do. Get us out of that project and no, you won't be apologising to anyone! Jobal sat on his ass for long enough without calling, now it’s our turn to play poker.' When he was annoyed Sinbari sounded like a magnate in an American film. It might have been the influence of the years he spent building out in California with his American ex-wife Mimi. Although he claimed he’d never watched a single movie.

  'Can I ask why you're doing this, sir?' Sadrettin once more had his voice under control. Only the sweat that poured off him gave any indication of the pressure he was under.

  'You can ask . . ..' Sinbari stopped running and stared hard at his handsome assistant. Then he relented. 'The capital's needed elsewhere. Is that a good enough reason for you?'

  A man carrying a pile of rolled up newspapers cycled by and stared at them. Sadrettin gave him an evil look and the man turned his head sharply away. Sadrettin was breathing heavily; he felt nauseous but calm.

  He had made the choice as a very young man to leave the small family firm in Bihar and strike out on his own in Delhi. He'd worked as a p.a. for almost four years before he was headhunted by the Randhor-Sinbari group. He'd gone to them eagerly and so far he had never had cause to rue his decision.