by Manil Suri
The girl’s voice sounds a bit thin at first, her words shaky, but she quickly seems to gain confidence. Bhim nods in approval. “I knew, the moment I saw her in her slum at Dharavi, that she would be the one.” He shushes Karun, who’s now switched to earnest appeals to save Jaz. “Not now. I want to see if she delivers this part properly—it’s about the bomb.”
Like an anxious parent tracking a school play debut, Bhim mouths the words along. But his youngster doesn’t quite pull it off. “Come to me, and I will save you from the fire,” she says, then gets stuck. The seconds tick by, and Bhim gets increasingly fraught. He’s about to give the signal to switch to the canned version when she sputters back to life. “I will save you from the destruction of our city, I will save you from the bomb.”
Bhim claps at the end of the recitation, causing his entire entourage to burst into applause. Seizing the opportunity of Bhim’s genial mood, Karun pleads again on Jaz’s behalf. “Ah yes, your friend. Don’t worry, I hadn’t forgotten. But first, let me ask—this lady by your side—are you his lovely missus?” He bids me namaste and I instinctively fold my hands to respond. “Such an honor to meet you, so wonderful to unite you with your husband. But tell me, has he informed you about the secret Muslim hobby he’s developed?”
There’s nothing to do but look away, which prompts Bhim to emit a horrid little laugh. “So you know already. And what do you think? Should I release this Gaurav so you can be one happy family from now on? Or would you rather remain a twosome, prefer I remove this impediment once and for all?”
“If you think I want anyone killed, you’re crazy. Release him at once.”
“Bravo! Putting your husband’s interests over your own—spoken like Sita herself. The ground should part open any moment now to acknowledge such a noble sacrifice. But why do I feel our Sita’s not quite ready to be welcomed back into the earth’s fold just yet? That she wouldn’t mind if instead of her, the Muslim got swallowed instead?”
“That’s such a lie. I would never want—”
“No, of course not. You’d never want it on your conscience, I understand. How could you even face your husband afterwards if he’s so sad and hobby-less? But fear not. We won’t let your hands get dirty—we’ll leave that to Devi ma instead. Look, here comes her magic buffalo, in fact. I had them move it to the earlier show so we could all enjoy its sacrifice.”
I turn around to behold the airborne buffalo, bobbing just inside the parapet. The body looks plumper than yesterday, as if it’s been gorging all night to fatten itself. A line of green swastikas runs along its brow like dots adorning a bride’s forehead. “I am the demon Manisha,” it bellows through the speakers, and the Devi stands defiant against its threats.
“This part’s still prerecorded,” Bhim apologizes. “Devi ma hasn’t been able to memorize the lines yet.” He seems to know all the words—so well that I wonder if he’s composed the script himself. “Repent, or I will cut your buffalo head and incinerate your sinful flesh,” he booms at Karun, mimicking the metallic voice that blusters across the terrace. “But yes, as for your request. Watch carefully, because here comes the good part, the one that concerns your friend.”
Bhim grins impishly and I start to feel chilled. “I promised not to lay a finger on him,” he says, winking, as a trident appears in the girl’s hand. “This way I get to keep my word, and bestow a bit of happiness on Sita as well.”
“It couldn’t be,” I whisper, almost to myself. Last night’s image, of the spirit, as Chitra called it, flailing inside the buffalo frame, fills my mind. “He couldn’t be inside.”
“Excellent,” Bhim exclaims, his head eagerly cocked to catch everything I’ve said. “Even though you’ve spoiled my surprise, even though I was going to save it for after the show.” He beams as if we can’t help but be delighted at this twist he’s engineered for our entertainment. “Of course, with all the fireworks shooting off, you’ll barely catch a glimpse of your friend.”
“He’s inside,” I shout, clutching at Karun, who hasn’t quite understood. “Jaz is inside the buffalo—they’ll light it and set him aflame as well.” From her stand, the Devi waves her trident, hurling more threats at the buffalo, which floats in bloated obliviousness. “I saw it yesterday—someone burning alive—we only have a few seconds left.”
My words galvanize Karun. “Stop,” he shouts, waving his arms to catch the Devi’s attention. “Stop, Devi ma, stop, your Gaurav-ghoda is inside.” He charges off, sprinting halfway down the length of the pool before the guards catch up with him. “Stop,” he screams, struggling to break free from their grip.
Bhim shakes his head. “Tell your husband to relax and enjoy the show—there’s nothing he can do to help. Devi ma just imagines she’s doing the igniting—we light it by remote from up here.” As he speaks, a burst of laser-like rays sparks from the girl’s trident.
Karun is still screaming when a small flame pops alive on the buffalo’s skin. It climbs up the face and leaps onto the neck, burning along the nape like a fiery mane. Smoke wafts out of the nostrils, buds of orange sprout along the legs. As they burgeon and flower, people start cheering from the beach below.
With a luxurious whoosh, a cloak of flame enwraps the buffalo. Strings of firecrackers burst forth from the eyes, a volley of rockets zooms out of the mouth. Responding to the crowd’s acclamation, the Devi holds her trident victoriously aloft. The fire burns right through the posterior from tail to haunches, leaving the underlying frame exposed. I try to make out the grisly sight I know the interior imprisons, but already there is too much smoke.
A tremendous explosion rips the belly apart, generating a fireball large enough to swallow the entire animal. Bits of debris flame through the sky like meteor remnants, a shower of cinders drops sizzling into the infinity pool. The heat is so intense that the cable holding the frame melts right through, the remnants crash out of view below. Attendants rush down the terrace to douse the fronds of a palm set ablaze in its pot.
“Good show,” Bhim says. He inhales deeply, as if pleased to be breathing in smoke from the air. “See, that wasn’t too traumatic. Stop looking so horrified—don’t you realize this means you’re free? One day you’ll thank me—competing with such a hobby is not so easy.”
The guards try to lead Karun back, but his legs give way under him. I rush over as they prop him up against a ledge by the pool. I cradle him in my arms, tell him neither he nor I could have done anything. But my efforts barely penetrate. “So little time. We had so little time together,” he keeps repeating.
Holding his stricken face between my hands, I see what he has managed to hide so well even this afternoon (or is it simply something I have refused to acknowledge?). The bond I ascribed to sexual attraction is deeper, more threatening. Despite the horror of what has passed, I want to ask: What if it had been me in the fire instead? Would his expression be as tortured, his devastation as complete? Or would his grief be more sculpted, staid—a bereaved spouse’s dutiful mourning? “So little time,” he says again. Hasn’t he spent even fewer years with me?
But then his suffering overwhelms me. I find myself dissolve in his anguish, cry for the love he has felt and lost, for the love I have for him, and for the love, even if not as strong, I know he has for me. I hold him close to my body, kiss his face repeatedly, tell him I’m there to comfort him, I will always be by his side. Somehow, I think, we will put Jaz behind us, find a way, no matter how painful, to focus again on the two of us.
I’m wondering where we go from here, what tentative steps we take into our future, when the first shots ring out. The Devi screams, as Das, accompanying her back from the turret, slaps his neck as though bitten by a gnat, and crumples.
JAZ
16
THE FIRST THING I DO WHEN SARAHAN’S MEN PULL ME OUT IS retch. My tongue feels coated with gunpowder, my throat with fear—I double up on the ground, trying to expel the taste, the smell. Sarahan, meanwhile, gets busy smacking the person who unties his hands. �
�What were you waiting for? A few more minutes and I’d be a tandoori chicken, roasting in the air.”
“Forgive us, sahib—the guards we managed to bribe, but they told us Das usually stops by just before the end.” The man looks down morosely at his feet, trying not to flinch as Sarahan rains down more slaps.
Although the small courtyard in which Sarahan delivers his whispered upbraiding (right next to Birbal the buffalo) is, indeed, unguarded, there’s no point tempting fate. “Couldn’t we continue this somewhere else?” I suggest.
We repair to the nearby emergency stairwell, where Sarahan unveils the grand plans for the revolution. “Kill Bhim. It’s not terribly complicated.” He seems to have recovered enough from the near-death ordeal to affect his earlier nonchalance. “Have you handled a gun before?” he asks, and I nod vigorously—a technical truth, given the way the question is phrased. “Good. I want you to be the one to do it.”
“You want me to—?”
“Don’t worry, we’ll back you up, shoot from our hiding places as well. I’ve thought things over and it really makes the most sense. We can simply blame it on a Muslim infiltration this way—we won’t have any problem afterwards rallying Bhim’s men.” He hands me a revolver weighing twice as much as the pistol I’ve stashed in Guddi’s bathroom. “Of course, they’ll probably want to kill you, tear you apart and chop up your limbs. But you have my word, I’ll personally make sure you escape with your friend.”
Sarahan flicks his eyes between the revolver and my face, as if aware of the risk he’s taking with the firearm, of the calculations spooling in my brain. Except he’s wrong—I don’t have the slightest intention of trying out my marksmanship on him. I stuff the gun into my waistband—with the most macho swagger I can muster, I tell him to lead the way.
We take the steps up to the Devi’s level. A single follower awaits us on the landing, instead of the army I expect. I’m no expert at coups, but surely four people (five with the newly recruited Jazter) is a bit skimpy. Sarahan brushes this number off. “They’ll join us in swarms. Once you’ve slain Bhim.”
We slip in during Devi ma’s show, right as Karun races along the pool to save me (the Jazter’s insides wrench with emotion). Our deployment leaves much to be desired—all five of us clump around the entrance to the stairs. The plan seems so rickety, so harebrained, that I almost make a break for it, dive back into the stairwell. But Sarahan and his men are too jumpy for me to take the chance. They gesture at me to advance, and when I don’t, one uses his gun to prod me along.
Das drops as soon as the shots start flying. Sadly, I fail to discharge my gun yet again, ducking behind a storage tank as soon as a volley of fire comes our way. When I emerge, one of Sarahan’s men is dead, and the rest (including Sarahan himself) have fled. “Don’t shoot,” I say, and raise my hands into the air.
They bring me to Bhim, for whose unscathed condition the Jazter head must surely hang in shame. At least we got Das, I think, but his wound turns out to be no more than a skin graze. Both of them express astonishment—not only at my escape from the buffalo pyre, but also at my apparent intrepidity at masterminding this coup (a failure, but still). Then they remember Sarahan. “He’s the one behind this, not you, isn’t it?” Bhim asks, and I’m only too glad to relinquish credit.
Which doesn’t quite save me, since they start discussing the relative merits of immediate execution versus torturing me for information first. Das wants to investigate whether I’m part of some larger Muslim conspiracy, but Bhim deems it a waste of time. “We already talked to him, didn’t we?—at the annex with his friend. Just do away with the gandu—he didn’t seem to know anything back then.”
By now, Karun has realized I’m still alive—I see him run up, Sarita in tow, and struggle to get through the encirclement of guards. Bhim notices too, pointing him out to Das with a tilt of his head. “See—a gandu, nothing more, just like I said. Surely if it were a plot, they’d send a proper man.” He inquires if they have more buffaloes ready. “Go find Sarahan—I like them stuffed in as a pair. Two sacrifices in one night—the crowd will be thrilled.”
Since I’ve just escaped the hospitality of Hotel Birbal, these new preparations make me very uncomfortable. As the dread seeps back in, I catch my name called out in a voice I never thought I’d take such delight in hearing again. “Gaurav-ghoda? Where were you? I’ve missed you so much.” Devi ma squeezes through the human cordon surrounding us and attaches herself to my leg. “You promised we’d spend the day together, but I waited and waited after pooja and you never came.”
Her thick girl-neck has never felt so welcome as I lift her up against my body. The laddoo-fed kilos seem to simply evaporate. I nuzzle my nose against her belly, kiss every digital nub, every cherubic appendage. She smiles at me happily. “What were you talking about with Bhim kaka? What’s happening?”
“Your Bhim kaka wants to kill me,” I announce, and make a sad face. “I escaped from the buffalo you just sacrificed, so now he wants to stick me in another and have you also set that one aflame.”
“Why would he want to do that?”
“I don’t know. Ask him.”
“He’s lying,” Bhim tries to scoop the girl out of my arms, but she evades his grasp. “Tell me, would you rather trust Bhim kaka, whom you’ve known all this time, or him?”
Perhaps it’s because I’m holding her—the reassurance of my arms, the sincerity transmitted with every thump of the Jazter heart, that she picks me. “Gaurav-ghoda is my friend. Don’t anyone dare touch him.”
Seeing Bhim bow, I decide to press my advantage. “Also, if it pleases Dev ma, could she tell him to release my friend?” Grudgingly, Bhim nods, and both Karun and Sarita break free through the ring of guards.
“And my gun. He took my gun. I need it back to protect you, Devi ma.”
As expected, Bhim balks, which causes the girl to flare up. “Do as Gaurav-ghoda says,” she commands. Bhim pretends not to hear, which excites her so much that she scrambles out of my arms onto the ledge I’m standing next to. “Didn’t you hear me?” she shouts, stomping her foot. “Return his gun at once.”
Bhim bows again, even deeper this time, then straightens. “Forgive me, Devi ma. But this has gone far enough.” With a quick swoop, he picks her up by her shortest arm.
The girl screams as he swings her at the end of her stub. She tries to claw at him, but Bhim holds her further away from his body, then walks to the infinity pool and dangles her over the water. “Does Devi ma know how to swim? It would be such a pity if she drowned.” He dips her feet in, then dunks her up to the waist. She kicks and thrashes and tries to wrap all her appendages, like a panicked squid, around his arm. “Will you behave yourself if I set you down?”
Her eyes streaming tears, she nods. But she spits in his face the instant he deposits her on the ground. Then she kicks him in the shins and runs. “Guards! Attendants! Quick, get him, someone.” The maidens all look stricken, but none of them makes a move to respond. “Didn’t you see how he treated me? Kill him at once.” Anupam steps forward to help, but freezes under Chitra’s disapproving glance. “It’s my order. From your Devi ma.” Still shrieking her commands, she trips and falls.
Bhim takes his time lumbering up to her. “Did you really think you run the show here? Go ahead, shout all you want.” He stands over her, smiling indulgently at her cries, then bends down and slaps her hard. She screams throatily as he lifts her by the hair, then tries to crawl away whimpering, after he punches her in the mouth and lets her drop. “Do you understand now? Most respected Devi ma?”
He’s about to hit her once more when the rumble from the devotees distracts him. They’re milling around, riled at their devi’s treatment, their outrage barely contained by the guards. Bhim lets off several shots in the air to calm them down. “Look, she’s fine,” he says, lifting the girl to her feet and trying to wipe away the blood. “They’ll have her fixed in no time.” He thrusts her into the weeping maidens’ arms.
Unfortunately, the gun he’s fired seems to jog his memory. “Ah yes, the Muslim. We were about to do away with you, weren’t we, before the interruption?” He checks to see if the gun still has bullets, then waves the guards closest to me away from my body.
Suddenly, I feel very exposed. The wind blows in from the sea to swirl around my frame, highlighting its vulnerability, its isolation. “Ordinarily, I’d prefer something with a little more flair, but packing you back in a buffalo would take much too long.” He points the gun at my chest, and I feel my stomach contract, my breath stop. It seems too soon, too abrupt—I can think of nothing to say to give myself even another few seconds, nothing to do except stare paralyzed into the point-blank muzzle.
“Jaz!” Karun runs up and pushes away Bhim’s hand just as the gun discharges.
The bullet goes off into space. Karun falls against me, and I hold him in my arms and look into his face—in that one instant, I witness something I’ve never known, never even believed existed. The love I see there, the lips mouthing my name—this is what people live and die for, what they spend their entire existence seeking. It is the most intimate moment we’ve shared, conveyed entirely through touch and gaze, with nothing left to articulate. What good deeds did the Jazter perform to deserve such a moment?
Then I hear Bhim shout to get Karun off me, as Sarita, screaming, flings her body at us. Das tries to pull her away, the guards join in to separate the tangle, and at the edge of this drama, I notice the Devi creeping up on Bhim. This time, she carries her trident—with a yell, she plunges it with all her might into his thigh.
Bhim bellows in pain—so loudly, that for a moment, we all stop. The girl steps back to gaze regally at him—a devi staring down at her vanquished demon in triumph. But then he pulls the trident out, and she retreats a few paces. He raises the weapon and aims it at her—she gives a yelp and scurries away. The crowd parts to let Bhim through as he limps after her. A guard comes to his assistance, but he waves him away. “Come back. Bhim kaka has a lesson to teach you.” He hurls the trident after the girl, but it clatters harmlessly across the terrace.