I cried for Vikram. I knew that he wasn’t murdered, but released: a soul-prisoner, on the run forever. But still I filled the empty well with dancing, and tears.
And I ranted, and I raved, and I wrote strange things that should be true in my journal. My hand ran back and forth across the pages like an animal in a cage. When my eyes blurred, and the black words I’d written seemed like the black lace of Madame Zhou’s veil, I slept in a web of bad dreams: caught, and waiting for death to creep toward me.
Part Ten
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Sin is disconnection, and nothing disconnects us from one another more completely than the great sin, war. The struggle for control of southern crime caused friends to turn on one another, enemies to strike without warning and the cops to plead for peace, because the feud was ruining business for everyone.
The Scorpions regrouped under Vishnu’s leadership, bringing twenty more men to Bombay from the northern state of Uttar Pradesh. They were experienced street fighters, with a patriotic grudge, and within a week of their arrival they took Flora Fountain and the Fort area from the Sanjay Company.
The Sanjay Company, seeing their empire annexed piece by piece, reacted swiftly to the northern invasion: they killed their leader, not a hundred metres from his mansion.
Two-Hussein, the first soldier to fight for Khaderbhai decades before, stepped out in front of Sanjay’s car as the crime boss left his mansion. He fired his guns into the windows until Sanjay and his two Afghan guards were dead.
He renamed the Company after himself, as regicides often do, and raised the boy-king, Tariq, to a full place on the Council of the new Hussein Company. Tariq’s first act as a Council member was to call for death. Kill them all, the boy was widely reported to have said. Kill them all, and take everything they have.
It became the new motto of the Hussein Company – Take Everything They Have – where once it had been Truth and Courage.
Sin piled upon sin until the grave burden tore the last garment of tolerance, and frayed threads of honour and faith floated away on winter winds, leaving hatred naked, for all to see.
Karla started talking to me again, but she was much busier than before: too busy to share more than one meal with me, every other day. Vikram’s suicide struck her physically for a while, it seemed to me, but maybe she was just showing me what I wouldn’t face myself.
She stopped laughing and smiling. For a time, she was the Karla I’d first met: the Karla who didn’t smile. And there were no sleepovers.
It was an endurance test designed for released convicts, or musicians. I was walking through webs of testosterone and adrenaline and pheromones, disconnected from the woman I loved and couldn’t make love to, but spoke to, every other day.
And I was still testy. But testiness was the new normal in South Bombay, and nobody noticed.
The measure of a man is the distance between his human self, minute to minute, and his devoted self. I was devoted to Karla, but the distance between us left the devoted self all alone, guarding a candle in the wind, while the human self was outside, roaming the street.
As it happened, every street in town at that time was a carnival for roamers.
Fear is a poverty of Truth, and Greed is a poverty of Faith, Idriss said to me once. Fear and greed took turns to prowl the streets and slums of South Bombay for weeks: six long weeks of tension, pillage, profiteering, and blood in alleyways.
Hashish, marijuana, uppers, downers and flat-liners were all five times the usual price. The sharpest civil servants duly raised the price of bribery, setting off a cascade of corruption that made small fortunes for them, and doubled the ten-rupee bribe that traffic cops demanded at speed traps. Avarice made pay while the moon shone, and fear was the only constant friend on the streets.
I met a kid who’d just been recruited by the Hussein Company, and liked him, and heard that he’d been killed, an hour later. And it happened again, to another young Hussein Company fighter, a few days after that, with just a few hours between a handshake and a handful of dirt.
It hurt, both times, even though it had nothing to do with me. It made me uneasy every time I met a new street soldier, excited by war.
The Cycle Killers accepted contracts from the Hussein Company, and duly executed Scorpion Company men. Scorpions knocked Hussein men from their motorcycles. Hussein men fired-bombed a Scorpion bar.
The Scorpions robbed a bank in South Bombay and got away with it. The Hussein Company knocked over a money transport van in Scorpion territory, in revenge, and got away with it. Both gangs used the money they’d stolen in the robberies to bribe or threaten the bank officials and security guards. Without witnesses, the cases were dropped.
Every man with a gun to sell wanted three times the going price. Men who needed a gun sold their wives’ wedding jewellery to buy one. The age of hatchets and knives, which was eye to eye, passed away within a season of the winter sun, replaced by eye-for-an-eye shootings.
In a street war, any dark corner can kill you, and dark corners killed people at the rate of four a week until the violence stopped. I paid two of Comanche’s best young fighters to shadow Karla from a distance, and keep her safe during those weeks. I wanted to do it myself, but she wouldn’t let me.
As suddenly as it had started, the war for South Bombay ended in a day, with a truce between the Hussein Company and the Scorpion Company, and a sit-down between Hussein and Vishnu. Whatever they said to one another in private, the declaration they made when they left the room wasn’t just of peace, but of brotherhood and integration.
The two Companies agreed to unite as one. The name of the newly formed Company was an issue, because some Khaderbhai-Sanjay-Hussein men said that they’d shoot themselves before they’d call themselves Scorpions.
The new, combined mafia gang was named the Vishnu Company. Although he had more men, Vishnu had much less territory than Hussein, and it was decided that having the Company named after him would quell rebellion on the streets, and discourage foraging in South Bombay’s unrest by outside gangs.
Both leaders presided at Council meetings, and both acknowledged the power of the other. Places on the Council were appointed evenly between members of former gangs, and the spoils of peace were distributed fairly.
It was a complicated balance between limited trust and unlimited hatred, and to help the cooperation along, nephews and nieces from either side were sent to live with the enemy, and consolidated the truce with the pulse in their throats.
And when those hostages went to families whose task it was to care for them as if they were their own, and kill them if the truce failed, six weeks of war ended in a day, and the streets were safely unlawful again.
When peace was reimposed, I paid off the young fighters from Comanche’s gym, who’d been guarding Karla. They took the money, but told me they couldn’t work for me in future.
‘Why not?’
‘Because Karla hired us to work for her, as field agents for the Lost Love Bureau.’
‘Field agents?’
‘Yes, Linbaba. Pretty cool, na? I’m a field agent, investigating missing persons. It’s chained and brained, yaar. I was throwing drunks out of Manny’s bar, a few weeks ago.’
‘I like Manny’s bar,’ I protested.
‘I’m keeping a diary,’ his friend said. ‘I’m going to write a Bollywood movie. Cases we investigate, and stuff. Miss Karla, she’s reef, man. She’s totally reef. See you round, Lin. Thanks for the bonus!’
‘See you round.’
I rode the boundary of my shopkeeper money changers, being friendly and supportive when I could, and slap-nasty when required.
The truce seemed to be holding. I saw Scorpion guys driving around with Hussein guys, and men from both gangs were running the lottery, prostitution and drug rackets side by side, brothers in harm.
I took a break to sit on my mot
orcycle and watch the sun set on Marine Drive. A call of drummers was rehearsing on the wide footpath. It was the last week of the festival season, and drummers all over Bombay were perfecting their techniques for the processions and weddings that had hired them.
Kids ran from their parents’ hands to dance and jiggle next to the drummers. Parents stood behind them, clapping their hands and wagging their heads in time to the infallible rhythm. The children jumped like crickets, their thin arms and legs jerking and leaping. With an audience, the drummers pushed themselves to near-hysterical intensity, sending their heartbeat across the sea to the setting sun. I watched them as evening became night, spilling ink on the waves.
What are we doing, Karla? I thought. What are you doing?
I swung the bike around and headed back to Leopold’s. I was hoping to catch up with Kavita Singh, and tell her about Madame Zhou. In the weeks since Madame Zhou rose from her wave of shadows beneath the Amritsar hotel, I’d tried several times to contact Kavita, but without success. When the cold stares of reception staff at the newspaper office became a wall of unavailability, I realised that she was avoiding me. I didn’t know why Kavita would feel that way, or what I’d done to offend her, and decided to give Fate time to bring us together again. But Madame Zhou’s mention of her name worried me, and I couldn’t shake off the sense of duty to tell her about it. It was finally one of my street contacts who mentioned that Kavita had been hanging out with Didier, between three and four every afternoon at Leopold’s.
Didier had become something of a lost love at Leopold’s himself, and his frequent absences wounded the staff. They expressed their disapproval by being scrupulously polite whenever they served him, because nothing irritated him more.
He tried insulting them, to jolt them out of their insupportable civility. He gave it his best shot, calling up a few insults he’d always kept in reserve for emergencies. But they wouldn’t relent, and their cruel courtesy pushed a small thorn into his chest with every putrid please, and unforgivable thank you.
‘Lin,’ he said, sitting with Kavita Singh at his customary table. ‘What is your favourite crime?’
‘That again?’ I said.
I bent to kiss Kavita on the cheek but she raised her glass to her lips, so I waved hello instead. I shook Didier’s hand as I took a place beside him.
‘Yes, that again,’ Kavita said, drinking half her glass.
‘I already told you – mutiny.’
‘No, this is the second round,’ Didier said, smiling a secret. ‘Kavita and I have decided to play a game. We will ask everyone to nominate a second favourite crime, and then test our theories about them against both of their answers.’
‘You guys have theories about people?’
‘Come on, Lin,’ Kavita smiled. ‘You can’t tell me you don’t have a theory about me.’
‘Actually, I don’t. What’s your theory of me?’
‘Ah,’ Didier grinned. ‘That would spoil the game. First, you have to nominate a second favourite crime, and then we can confirm our theories.’
‘Okay, my second favourite crime? Resisting arrest. What’s your second favourite, Kavita?’
‘Heresy,’ she said.
‘Heresy isn’t a crime, in India,’ I objected, smiling for help from Didier. ‘Is that allowed in the rules of your game?’
‘I am afraid so, Lin. Whatever answer that people give to the question, is the answer they give.’
‘And you, Didier? Perjury was your first favourite, am I right?’
‘Indeed you are,’ he replied happily. ‘You should be playing this game with us.’
‘Thanks, and no thanks, but I’d like to know your second choice.’
‘Adultery,’ he said.
‘Why?’
‘Well, because it involves love and sex, of course,’ he replied. ‘But, also, because it is the only crime that every adult human being fully understands. More than that, because we are not permitted to marry, it is one of the few crimes that a gay man cannot commit.’
‘That’s because adultery’s a sin, not a crime.’
‘You’re not going all religious on us are you, Lin, talking about sin?’ Kavita sneered.
‘No. I’m using the word in a less specific and more widely human sense.’
‘Can we know any sins, but our own?’ Kavita asked, her jaw set in a muscular challenge.
‘Heavy!’ Didier said. ‘I love it. Waiter! Another round!’
‘If people don’t think there’s any collective understanding, in anything at all, I wish them well. If you accept a common language, you can talk about sin in a meaningful, non-religious way. That’s all I mean.’
‘Then what is it?’ she demanded. ‘What is sin?’
‘Sin is anything that wounds love.’
‘Oh!’ Didier cried. ‘I love it, Lin! Come on, Kavita, let the panther prowl. Riposte, girl!’
Kavita sat back in her chair. She was dressed in a black skirt and a sleeveless black top, unzipped to new moon. Her short black hair, city-chic anywhere in the world, fell in a feathered fringe over a face bare of make-up, thirty-one years old, and pretty enough to sell anything.
‘And what if your whole life is a sin?’ She sneered. ‘What if every breath you draw wounds love?’
‘The grace of love,’ I said, ‘is that it washes away sins.’
‘Quoting Karla, are you?’ Kavita spat at me. ‘How fitting!’
She was angry, and I couldn’t understand it.
‘I am,’ I said. ‘She’s quotable.’
‘I’ll bet she is,’ she said bitterly.
There was an aggressive edge to her voice and her tone. I didn’t see it, then, for what it was.
I’d come to Leopold’s to warn her about Madame Zhou’s new obsession with her. I hadn’t given any thought to the game that she and Didier were playing, because I was just waiting for a break in the conversation to tell her what I knew. If I’d paid closer attention, I might’ve been prepared for her next remark.
‘Sin? Love? How can you even say those words, without being struck down?’
‘Whoa, Kavita, wait a minute. What do you mean?’
‘I mean that Karla was never out of your mind, not even for a minute, when you were in bed with Lisa.’
‘Where the hell is that coming from?’
Didier hustled to avert the storm.
‘Naveen’s second favourite crime was Harbouring a fugitive. It completes his profile. Would you like to hear it?’
‘Shut up, Didier!’ Kavita snapped.
‘Kavita,’ I said, ‘if you’ve got something to say, spit it out.’
‘I’d like to spit it into your face,’ she said, putting down her glass.
‘Go ahead.’
‘Lisa was leaving you for me, Lin,’ Kavita said. ‘She’d been with Rosanna, at the art gallery, for a while before me, trying things out, but we’d been lovers for months. And if she’d left you sooner, to be with me, she’d be alive today.’
Okay, I thought, so now we know. The irony of accusing me of thinking about Karla while I was with Lisa, when she was with Lisa while Lisa was with me, was obviously lost on her. Jealousy has no mirror, and resentment has a tin ear for the truth.
‘Okay, Kavita,’ I said, standing to leave. ‘I came here to tell you that I ran into an unlicensed maniac the other night, named Madame Zhou, and she warned me to stay away from you. I can see that won’t be a problem.’
I walked out of the bar.
‘Lin, please!’ Didier called.
I started the bike and rode from my money changers to the black bank, and back again. I rode to my private stashes of funds. Hours passed, and I talked to a dozen people, but my thoughts couldn’t leave Lisa. Lovely Lisa.
Love is always a lotus, no matter where you find it. If Lisa found love or even fun with Kavi
ta Singh, a girl I’d always liked, I’d have been happy for her.
Were we so far apart, she couldn’t tell me that she was involved with Kavita?
Lisa was always surprising, and always at least a little confusing. But I’d rolled with the kisses, and I’d always supported her, no matter which direction her Aquarian mind led her. It hurt to think that we hadn’t been close enough. It hurt more to think that Kavita might be right, and that Lisa might still be alive and happy, if she’d left me sooner and made a life with Kavita: if I’d been more honest, maybe, and she’d been more willing to tell the truth.
It hurt so much, in fact, that I was glad when I received a message from the Tuareg. It obliged me to ride for good hours in bad traffic to visit one of the city’s most dangerous minds.
Chapter Fifty-Eight
The Tuareg was a retired specialist, who’d worked for years in the Khaderbhai Company. He was a full Council member, with a vote, but was never present at Council meetings, because he was the Company torturer.
His job was to ensure compliance, and extract information. It was a job that a lot of people in the Company wanted done, and nobody but the Tuareg wanted to do. But the Tuareg wasn’t a torturer by sadistic inclination: he’d simply discovered that he had a talent for it.
He’d been a psychiatrist, of the Freudian persuasion, in northern Africa. Nobody knew exactly where. He arrived in Bombay, and went to work for the Khaderbhai Company. He used his skills as a psychiatrist to discover his subjects’ deepest fears, and then magnified those fears until the subjects complied. His success rate, he quietly boasted, was better than Freudian psychoanalysis alone.
I hadn’t seen him for years; not since he’d retired from torture, and moved to Khar. I’d heard that he was operating a lottery-racket franchise from a children’s toy store.
The note asking me to visit him might’ve troubled me, on any other day: the Tuareg was a troubling man. On that day, I was glad to have something disturbing, to clear my mind.
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