The PuppetMaster (50 page)

“I’ll be sending you the forward by courier in a few days,” I explained.

“I shall be honored to add it to such an opus, Sir.”

I was surprised. “You’ve read this already?” I asked.

“Only the first three divisions, Sir, but such a magnificent compendium. Such language and vision, we see once in a millennium if we are fortunate.”

I bid the old man well and laughed as I made my way back to the taxi. Look for the good things, Marty.

Sixteen hours, two sweltering bus rides, and a forlorn journey by taxi later, and I was in the maze of Varanasi again. Outwardly, the city appeared as I had left it, overflowing avenues, Ghats layered in gauzy haze, spires jutting into the sky, but below the familiarity there were profound transformations. The crowds in the Chowk district walked lighter. Heads were held higher and eyes looked into others’ without suspicion. The monsoon rains were steady now, and Sutradharak, though not apprehended, was running. Away from the city. The coils of fear were unwinding, the air cooler, the burdens less heavy. In that respect it felt better, but I found out quickly that there was another tension brewing. Small groups of Muslims had clashed with police outside Alamqir Mosque, and a car bomb had killed six and injured thirty outside the Danish Embassy in Pakistan. Presenting a Danish passport in any café or hotel was not safe.

My taxi driver provided a few pertinent details about this, and then dropped me outside the locked gate of my villa. Standing in the courtyard was another change, Lalji. He was decked out in cream-colored trousers and fitted cotton shirt. His hair was clipped, clean, and combed, with no evidence of coconut oil to be seen or smelled. I suspected my weary eyes were playing tricks on me.

He drew back the gate with a gentlemanly flourish and lifted my bags in each arm. “Welcome home, Master Bhim. My prayers for your safety have been answered. Does your leg pain you much?” I quickly understood--the effects of Ramuna, the tailor’s daughter. What I had tried for three years to do, she had accomplished in three days.

“Thank you, Lalji. A sore ankle, nothing serious. How are you and Sahr? You look rather . . . pakka, quite polished.”

“Thank you, Saab. Maam and I are well, and all is safe here, although we did have some unwanted visitors last night that I had to chase off.”

“By yourself?”

“Oh no, Saab. My partners were with me. We charged from the gate like tigers from the mountains.”

I patted him warmly on the shoulder, the cleanliness of the cloth feeling quite odd to my touch. “Partners?” I asked with a growing smile.

“Yes, Saab. The brave men who guarded your house during the riots last week are my partners now.”

“Ah . . . I see,” I said, trying to guess what form of partnership this might be. It would undoubtedly be detailed later, but right now I needed food and my bed beneath the fan. “You may tell me tomorrow, now please set my bags in the bedroom.” He took the steps by twos.

Sahr, true to her word, had made my favorite dish and set the table with china, silverware, and an iced tumbler. One setting. I sighed and took my place, while she came out to silently place a steaming plate in front of me and pour the ale. She paused to study me, look at my eyes and the lines of my face, to see where I had gone. She saw the cane in the corner and then I held out my hand to her. We hugged and I felt her sobbing. “I was sure you were with the spirits, Bhimaji.” She shook her head. “Durgubal was right; death came at dawn and I thought . . . ” She left it unsaid.

“He was right, Sahr. You were right, but I didn’t die, and neither did Uli or Jitka. Innocent people did, and the fiend responsible for all of it has escaped the country.” I took a bite and savored the chicken and vegetables and the peace of a quiet meal in the villa.

“Sutradharak?” she asked.

“Yes,” I answered wearily. “The same one I played Frisbee with twice a week, it would seem.”

“You look exhausted, Saab. I will not ask more questions.”

I smiled to myself. She was right, I was bone weary, but her questions were simmering more than the bhiryani. A few more wouldn’t add to my fatigue. “What do you want to know, Oh Curious one?” That brought a smile.

“The Memsahib, did she do what the Imams say?”

I took another bite and thought about it. “That depends on what they say she did, I suppose. She did help her father with an idea for the cartoons they hate so much. She also saved five people in the explosion at Bareilly.”

Sahr nodded. “They say that also.”

That stunned me. “Who says that?”

“Most of the city. Even the Imam Nomani acknowledges that she saved Muslim lives. Qereshy is unnaturally silent on these matters, and some say he is being questioned by the authorities from Delhi.”

“Intelligence agencies?”

“Yes, about his connection to Madru Ralki.” She changed the subject. “The radio says Miss Uliana saved sixteen people from drowning. Is it true?”

I took a long draught of the ale, almost draining the glass. “That’s exaggerating it about threefold.”

“And they say you saved them also?”

“I did. It was only what I had to do, and it probably wouldn’t have turned out so well if your warning hadn’t come back to me at the right time.” That brought another smile. “Okay, one more question before I fall face-first into the bhyriani.”

She topped off the tumbler with more ale. “When will you leave us?” This question didn’t surprise me.

“It’s that obvious?”

“You forget too often that I am a nabi. Even without my cards it would be clear. You must go to your premika as soon as you can.”

“I know,” I sighed, “but I will bee here long enough to see to your well-being and finish my work here. It’s very important to me, Sahr.”

She patted my hand. “My well-being is already seen to, Bhimaji. Mr. Vinduram Singh has…”

“Asked you to marry him?” I interrupted.

She thrust her shoulders back in mock indignation, refocusing me of the enormity of her bosom, and laughed. “No, he wishes that we go steady for now, I think that is how the young people call it. But he is calling every hour and making excuses to drive by a dozen time a day. We went to the cinema last night, and now he is more nervous and more respectful.” She squeezed my wrist. “He will ask me soon. It is in my cards. He has also asked me if I wish to take a job in a restaurant in Bhelpura.”

“Really? Let me guess, cooking?”

She nodded. “It is a very popular place, quite modern, and they want new dishes for their menu.”

“That’s perfect, Sahr, your talents will fit in perfectly. What about Lalji? What will he do?”

“Did he not tell you? He and his friends are starting a security company to guard the houses of the wealthy. One of them actually seems to know what he is doing, and my boy is motivated.” She made a fleeting attempt to look motherly. “And he has a girlfriend.”

“Yes,” I replied. “I noticed.”

I dined on the last of the meal, indulged myself with a second lager, and then crawled beneath the fan and a single sheet to sleep without dreams.

The swelling in my ankle had relocated to my head the following morning. It ached more from the effects of three days of travel and my empty bed than the previous night’s lager. A long, tepid shower, pakoras, fresh fruit, and two cups of Nilgiri coffee had me reasonably recuperated by nine. I selected light cotton trousers and a favorite kurta, then phoned Devamukti’s house on Chandragupta’s cell phone.

Sukshmi answered. “And how is my number one dancing partner and hero of the decade?”

“Feeling very fortunate to be alive,” I laughed. “I assume you have heard the newest gossip?”

“I have, and so have mother and father. Father wishes to see you about two minutes ago.”

“His watch is still functioning correctly?”

I heard her smiling through the phone. “Even less so now. By the way I have a large bone to pick with you.”

I winced. “You really must stop using those types of phrases, Sukshmi. Your own are much prettier than your modern friends who use that stuff. So, what have I done wrong now?”

She laughed breezely. “Now I wonder who kidnapped the shy Bhimaji I once knew, the one who always mumbled namaste with his eyes dropping nervously to his feet.”

“Still here, Sukshmi, along with the old Martin Scott and the new one. All here, just grown together now.”

A quiet followed and in a husky voice she said, “I shall miss them, BhimajiMartinScott, all of them. But I am still displeased that you didn’t ask me to dance one last time. I am to be married next month, you know, a big fancy affair that father has taken over all the plans for. Dipak and I would have had a small ceremony, you know, just friends and family. But father has invited every Brahmin in the province and most other castes as well. So . . . enough of that. Uliana is safely away, and rumor tells me that you will follow her?”

“Yes,” I admitted quietly, “How could I not, Sukshmi? I came here running away. What I run to now is everything to do with love. It is a good place to be running to. Listen, I have some place I must be this morning. Can you tell Devamukti that I will come to the house at two?”

I felt her smiling. “Your Uli is a fortunate woman, Bhim. You run to her as fast as you can. I will tell father that you will be here. He will be tapping his cane until you arrive.”

“Undoubtedly,” I sighed.

We hung up and I hailed a taxi to Benares Hindu University.

Seventy-Seven

Adam was also walking with a cane when I found him, hobbling along the walkway near the great library. Even that he did with grace. An entourage of students and disciples moved about him like magnetized metal shavings. As usual, he didn’t seem surprised to see my approach, and hailed me from a good distance away. “Martin, my good friend. We wear our battle wounds proudly, do we not? Come, let us retell our tales and share a Fanta in the shade.” With that, a bottle of the orange soda materialized from an unseen cooler within the crowd. He whispered something to one of the followers, who in turn spoke to the others, and the group moved off and melted into the gardens beside the path. Almost instantly Adam and I were alone with nothing but the cold drink between us.

I went to fold my hands, but he reached out and took one in his.

“You referred to me as Martin,” I said with a laugh, “but you realized that, of course,”

He offered me the bottle, and I took it, feeling the cold against my palm, the moisture on the cracked lettering, and the release of carbonation and sweet flavor into the air. “Of course,’ he replied, “there is little that I don’t pay attention to in my actions and thoughts these days. It comes with practice.”

I nodded. “I’ve come to understand that about you. You’re aware of all of it, aren’t you? From your words and movements to your breath and beating of your heart. It’s as if you’re measuring each one.”

He smiled and led us through the arched walkway that ran the length of the library. “Yes, I do. I feel it, my respiration, my blood, digestive juices, the synapses of my brain. It is all rather fascinating and it takes practice, of course, but I feel life inside me and out. There is no difference between, just space and the great energy.”

He stopped at a stone seat underneath one of the arches and lowered himself slowly, his healing leg stretched out in front of him. I took the space next to him, and for a few moments we sat listening to the far off lowing of cows and the melody of the city. When eventually I spoke, it was from a place of sadness. “He nearly succeeded, Adam. I keep thinking about that, the thousands that would have died.”

He turned to face me. “But he didn’t succeed, did he? He has come and passed, and now it is time for the good people to focus on the good things.”

I let out a small laugh. “You sounded like Uliana just then. She says the exact same words to me.”

“That’s because she knows it in her heart, Martin, and the faster you go to her, the faster you will do greater things together.” He tapped the ground lightly with his cane. “You have your entire lives to accomplish it together. Already you have done so much.”

I looked at our legs wrapped in bandages and thought of the other scars we bore. “You really do see it as a battle don’t you?”

He didn’t answer immediately, instead he ran his hand across the surface of the bench where we sat. “You know,” he said finally, “right here is where I had my first revelation, Adam’s epiphany, if you will. It was right on this bench in the exact place where you are sitting.”

I looked at him, puzzled.

“It was my twelfth birthday and C.G. brought me to this spot. I remember the detail as if it were yesterday. It was evening, and we had been to the cinema and the park, and it was winter and cold, and no students were about. He was my father to me and Mundika was my mother, the only parents I had ever known. But twelve is the proper age to know the truth, so C.G. made certain I understood exactly who my birth mother was, where I came from. Right where you are sitting I learned about the evil of hatred, about my caste, my supposed place in life. It was then that I chose to fight against it. I have seen it as a battle since. Not too long afterwards they sent me to England.”

“He was trying to protect you, wasn’t he?”