Night work (15 page)

"God, don't get me started on India," she said,
although in truth Kate had been wondering how to get her stopped.
"The ironies would make you howl. A people that worships a
warrior-goddess, a religion that clearly says the main god is
completely helpless without feminine energy, a country that has had a
woman prime minister when we can't even get one as a vice
president, at the same time allows children of seven and eight to be
married off, aborts female fetuses right and left, and sees six or
eight thousand dowry deaths a year. Ten thousand? More--who knows?

"I'm sorry, Kate--you're wondering what on
earth I'm rattling on about. What I'm trying to say here is
that we now have a bride burning in the city of San Francisco, a city
you have sworn to protect. What are you, as a police officer, going to
do about it?"

Kate was tired, overworked, and unconvinced, and she had no desire
to sit at the receiving end of Roz Hall's histrionic ire.

"Roz, enough with the drama, okay?" she chided. "I
don't work at City Hall. If you have evidence of a
homicide--evidence, not suspicion--let me see it, and
I'll pass it on to whoever's in charge of the case."

Roz's head snapped up and she fixed Kate with a look that for
an instant had the hardened cop beginning to quail, just as the church
members in the other room had done. Roz was a woman magnificent in her
rage, her eyes glittering with it, her hair seeming to crackle around
her head. Kate half expected sparks to come from her fingertips and
smoke from her ears, and she moved quickly to placate this particular
warrior-goddess.

"Roz, my friend, please. I'm just a cop. If someone
killed a girl in this city then, as you said, it's my job to put
them behind bars. Ninety-nine percent of the time, if someone is
murdered, there's evidence. If this death is being dismissed as
an accident, then of course I'll ask for a closer look. But I do
need to know why you think this girl was killed. Other than the fact
that a lot of women on the other side of the world are killed by their
husbands' families," she added.

Reason succeeded where honest emotion would have had Roz reaching
for her Rolodex to summon lawyers and tame media moguls into battle.
The waves of brute energy subsided, helped by the slowing effects of
the drink. "Right," said Roz, making an effort. "So,
what do you need to know?"

Kate reached into her pocket and drew out her notebook and pen. "We could start with her name," she suggested.

Chapter 8

THE GIRL HAD BEEN born Pramilla Barot a little less than sixteen
years before in a small village on the border of Rajasthan and Gujerat,
the disastrous third daughter of a struggling farmer and his
hardworking but increasingly ill wife. When Pramilla was seven, her
mother died giving birth to a son. The farmer, although he had been
very fond of his wife, considered it a fair trade.

His first daughter made a successful and gloriously inexpensive
marriage to a young schoolteacher with radical ideas, who declared
himself willing to take the girl with only the bare minimum of dowry,
and that to stay in the hands of his new wife. None of the wedding
guests actually approved of this bizarre notion (although in truth it
was closer to ancient dowry traditions than it was to the modern
interpretation of dowry as little more than payment to any family
willing to take a daughter off her father's hands). Secretly,
however, all the fathers were more than a little envious of how easily
Barot had gotten off, and all the mothers were more than a little
softhearted at the romance of the thing.

So it was that Barot embarked on the marriage arrangements of his
second daughter with mixed feelings, knowing how easy it could be, but
fearing that karma would come around and kick him in the teeth.

It did so, with a vengeance. The young man identified by the
astrologer as an ideal match looked good enough on paper, as it were
(although Barot was not exactly literate), but when his family got into
the act, Barot felt as if he'd clasped a basket of boa
constrictors to his chest.

They squeezed. Oh, not at first--oh no. Only when arrangements
were in their final stages, when the first gifts had been exchanged and
everyone knew the chosen date, did the boy's harping mother flex
her muscles and bare her teeth. The television chosen was not big
enough for her fine son. The kitchen stove Barot was providing was
inadequate. The rupees must be increased to cover the expenses they
were incurring.

Pulling out was impossible. The girl would be marked as having been
tried and found wanting, rejected by one man and therefore of
questionable value to the rest. Barot's future in-laws were
careful never to drive their demands so high he was forced to withdraw
entirely, but they upped the ante in stages that made him gulp, and
tear his hair, but in the end submit.

The alternative, after all, was to be burdened forever with an unmarriageable daughter.

The marriage took place, the demands continued after the wedding
parties returned to their homes, but by vast good fortune (and a vast
number of expensive
pujas
at the temple) the bride quickly
became pregnant, and to the joy of everyone except perhaps the
groom's mother (who had had her eye on a video player), she gave
birth to a son.

Demands ceased, Barot took a deep breath at last--and looked at his fourteen-year-old Pramilla.

There was simply no money for her to get married. If Barot managed
to raise it, he and his noble young son would starve. She was a pretty
little thing, to be sure, and as bright and as helpful to her menfolk
as a father could ask, but there was still no money.

There were offers, yes. A neighbor with an unfortunate facial
deformity that made his speech nearly impossible to comprehend was
willing to take the girl with only a small dowry. And a farmer in the
next village was looking for a pretty young wife, but he was of a lower
caste, and besides, Barot had heard talk about the man, and was too
fond of his third daughter to feel easy about handing her over to a man
who had not only gone through three wives already (all of whom had died
of unfortunate accidents) but was older than Barot himself.

So Barot went to see his cousin and the cousin's wife, who
between them seemed to know everything and everyone between Jaipur and
Delhi. It was the wife who came up with the idea of the advertisement
in the Delhi
Post.
When Barot saw the sorts of advertisements
the marriage column offered, he despaired, as it was full of girls with
university degrees and professional training, but his cousin pointed
out that he had little choice, and it was worth the investment as a
gamble. The three of them together decided on the wording.

Pretty young light-skinned village girl, hardworking, traditional, and respectful, no dowry but ideal for the right man.

Barot could see that even his cousin's wife had grave doubts
about the chances of a response, but she had to admit that the advert
was honest, and that in a market bristling with nursing certificates
and BA hon degrees, it had the advantage of its own simplicity. And
Pramilla did have skin as light as a farmer's daughter could hope
for. Maybe, just maybe, there was a rich man out there (or another
schoolteacher with radical ideas) who valued a cowlike, hardworking
girl of a respectable caste over an educated potential troublemaker
with her own money.

There was.

To everyone's astonishment, three weeks later a letter came,
on a piece of paper with a letterhead engraved on it, bearing a stamp
from the United States of America.

They read it at the house of Barot's cousin. The
cousin's wife read it to them, stumbling over the more unfamiliar
English words and translating tentatively as she went.

The letter in its magnificent crisp typescript was from a man who
called himself Peter Mehta. He was the Chief Executive Officer (a
vastly impressive phrase) of a company with branches in Bombay, Los
Angeles, and San Francisco (magic names all) whose business was not
specified but was quite patently successful.

Mehta had seen Barot's advertisement in the Marriages Offered section of the Delhi
Post
that was flown in to his office in San Francisco several days a week.
He was looking for a bride for his younger brother, Laxman, acting as
the family representative since their parents were both dead. Laxman
was a boy of simple tastes, according to the letter, and both brothers
preferred a traditional arranged marriage to the haphazard dangers of
the American system. If the girl's family was willing to have
their daughter emigrate to America, would they please send a
photograph, details of the girl's life and accomplishments, and a
signed letter from the village health worker to the effect that she was
healthy and capable of bearing children.

The letter was couched in terms both more flowery and less direct
than that, but all parties involved knew what was meant. She needed to
be certified a virgin, she had to be shown to have the normal
complement of eyes, ears, and teeth in a more or less pleasing
arrangement, and they wanted something in writing that said who she
was. Normally, a marriage broker or convenient uncle would take care of
this, but the family seemed to have no relatives in the area, and they
wanted assurance that their investment would reach them in an
acceptable manner. Otherwise they would have to ship her home again,
and the "no dowry" phrase had already established that
Barot would be unable to reimburse them for the transportation costs.

Barot held the pristine white sheet of paper in his trembling,
work-roughened fingers, examining the bold signature of the Chief
Executive Officer as if it were the stamp of a god. Salvation was at
hand; Pramilla was saved from the clutches of a freak or a wife-beater;
he and his son would not starve. And America--unbelievable! The
land of golden opportunity had opened up, reaching out to a dusty
village in Rajasthan, for surely this would mean that when
Pramilla's brother was grown to be a man, her husband, this
godlike Laxman Mehta who was younger brother to an American Chief
Executive Officer named Peter, would reach out again to bring the boy
into the fold of his extended family.

It was only the cousin's wife who had doubts. Barot was from a
good caste, granted, but the Mehtas were much higher. What did they
want with a girl like Pramilla, when they could have someone both
higher and with a degree? And San Francisco was so very far away, and
Pramilla so young. Who knew this family of Mehtas? Was there no one
here to speak for them?

But her protests, admittedly mild, went unheard, for Barot and his
cousin and the entire village were filled with joy and excitement. Even
Pramilla herself was speechless with the thrill of it (for she had
known of the two other suitors hovering in the wings of her
father's vision, and had shuddered at both of them).

The photographer was summoned from the next town, arriving with his
heavy ancient camera and a choice of three grubby saris for the
occasion. Pramilla yearned for the white sari heavy with silver thread,
but the cousin's wife disapproved, saying it would make her look
as if she could afford a dowry after all, and besides, the white would
make her skin look much too dark even with rice powder. So she chose
the sari with small sprigs of blue flowers on it, and dusted
Pramilla's face and arms with the powder, and pronounced herself
satisfied with the result.

Pramilla was fourteen and a half years old, and looked twelve in the
picture that landed on Peter Mehta's desk two weeks later. He
grunted, felt a brief regret that he was not himself in need of a
luscious young bride, and passed it over to Laxman for
approval--unnecessary, perhaps, but this was America after all,
and there was no reason to be too medieval about this.

Laxman blushed and nodded, and the arrangements went ahead.

One thing the bride's father had asked (with fawning
trepidation in his ornate phrases, and at the firm suggestion of the
cousin's wife), and that was whether the wedding might not take
place in India, preferably in Jaipur or, if that was not convenient,
then Delhi--although the writer of the letter could fully
understand if the Mehtas were to find this impossible, and it was only
asked by the love Barot felt for this his last and most precious jewel
of a daughter.

Actually, visa arrangements were vastly simpler if the wedding took
place outside the United States and the bride could be introduced as a
fait accompli.
It would mean fiddling with the date on her birth certificate, but
Peter knew a man in Pune who was good at that sort of thing. No, it
would not be a problem, and would all in all be preferable to deal with
the matter in India. He even sent three third-class rail tickets, so
the bride's family could accompany her.

It was a full, no-expenses-spared Hindu wedding, with
shamiana
tents in the garden of the second-best hotel in Delhi, a white horse
for the groom and rented jewelry for the bride, music until the early
hours, and even some fireworks to light up the neighborhood and wake
the restless beggars sleeping at the hotel gates. Barot was frankly
terrified by Peter Mehta and had to fight down a sudden impulse to
thrust Pramilla into the arms of the Chief Executive Officer who would
soon be her brother-in-law and run away, but his first view of the
younger brother, Laxman, brought with it a wave of relief mixed heavily
with guilt.

Relief because the lad was more than presentable, he was beautiful,
long-lashed as a cow, slim as a young Krishna, and he looked not much
older than his bride. He was older, Barot knew that, twice
Pramilla's age, but he looked very like a young boy, white-faced
and plucking at the front of his white silk
kurta
pajamas--more like a farm boy than a hard-driving company
director, and infinitely more suited to Pramilla. And Barot knew guilt
because he suspected that Pramilla was not really being given the man
she deserved, but an immature boy who might never become anything else.
All through that long day and night the farmer kept casting glances at
the boy who would take his daughter, and in the end he decided that
there was definitely something wrong with him. Not greatly so--he
wasn't a drooling idiot by any means, just... slow.