Authors: Shakuntala Banaji
Tanya didn't know what to do: she was afraid to show herself but loathe to remain concealed.
He would notice her stomach at once and she would have to watch as he drew his own conclusions.
Anxiety and anticipation curdled her lunch inside her and made her dash for the bathroom. Five minutes later she was back at her post in the hall just beyond his line of sight, where she'd been hovering throughout her father's hour-long conference with Karmel. As she took in drinks, their kindly old maid had grimaced at her and nudged her towards the room, but she'd demurred.
She could hear her father telling him about Sinbari's fall from grace and about what Tanya had done, how she'd flown to Goa all by herself and interviewed the foreign tourists; and confirmed so many of Karmel's intuitions.
There was a moment of silence, then she heard Karmel ask, almost as if it mattered to him personally, 'Did Tanya get a description of the two women at the scene?' There was so much pride in her father's voice.
In response, Hàrélal coughed. 'Why don't I let you read her report, heh? Or better still, talk to the girl herself!' Then he dropped what he was saying to a whisper. That made Tanya even more nervous because it probably meant that daddy was discussing her faults and wrongdoing.
She jumped when Karmel appeared in the hall. She wanted to turn and run but it would have seemed too absurd. Like the fighter she was, she decided to face it out.
They stared at each other for a moment then he came towards her with a hand outstretched, greeting her softly. 'Tani. Didn't know you were home.'
'Liar. Daddy's just been telling you.' She kept her voice equally low.
'You caught me out. He has. Becoming an unwed mother now, are you?’ So, he was choosing to joke about it. She wasn't sure if she'd wanted him to take it seriously. She wasn't sure
what
she wanted him to feel about her or the tiny being that had taken up residence in her body. There was certainly no one else in this fucking city who'd be able to laugh at her news, so she might as well take it in the right spirit. She giggled loudly, but unaccountably felt her eyes fill.
Karmel pulled her against his chest before her first sob, and was stroking her back. Their heartbeats knocked against each other, echo for echo, the oxygen receding.
'I'm so sorry, so sorry, my life.' The endearment slipped out. Was it just a meaningless phrase or did he think of her like that?
'Oh shit, Kailash. Don't.' She stepped away from him as her mother appeared in the hallway. She gave them a quizzical look, but Mrs Hàrélal didn't seem particularly perturbed by Karmel's proximity to her daughter. She moved off into the garden carrying her magazine and a pair of pruning shears, her thin hips swaying slightly beneath her sari. Tanya looked after her, feeling puzzled. Was there a conspiracy to be nice to her or was the unconcern due to the fact that no one would ever suspect the sublimely honest Karmel of a harbouring a bad motive? Tension stewed in her heart, her stomach, her lungs. She would explode if he went on looking at her like that. ... She bit down hard on her lower lip and a small claret stain appeared just below the fragile skin. He touched his finger to it silently and experienced its warmth and texture as he'd judged its colour: honey in the rock.
Trembling with suppressed passion, Tanya brushed his hand away, then fell back on habit and started telling him about her adventures with Lal Bahuba and with the foreign tourists.
They sat on the antique swing just outside the back door. He clicked his tongue when she described the confrontation between Saané, whom he knew by sight, and her father; and listened with keen interest to her thoughts on Adam and Sara. As he'd assumed, she hadn't told her father everything: neither had he. Pieces that had puzzled each of them fell into place. The relationship between Cameron Croft and Adam. Cameron’s casual polyamory. All these other lives which had swirled willing or unwilling against each other because of him. There was no doubt that he had invited both his British lovers to the village intending them to meet, hoping for… what?
Tanya fell silent; so did Karmel. It felt good to be together, to be in a neat and orderly place. So far away from that memory-stained warehouse in Daubaba Lane and the chill chaos of the hills.
Karmel's face twitched as he thought about what had happened: his farewells, the biting regret he'd felt on the downward climb. How had he screwed up so badly? The women had approached him with such candour in the last few hours, asking his forgiveness if they had seemed rude, giving him food for his journey and begging him to return in the spring when their lake was wreathed in sunshine and flowers. He was so moved by their words that he could barely speak. What had they done that anyone in the plains would not have: they were protecting their own, that was all. Perhaps if Thahéra had been less well loved, if she had not been the woman she was, his task might have been easier. But even then, he was guilty of so much: mistrust, paranoia, foolish fantasies which had almost led, in the end, to Thahéra's death.
Seeing Tanya's glowing face he shook off his mood and began to tell his part of the tale. She closed her eyes when he described the way Thahéra had looked after her father attacked her, the torn cheeks and bloodied eyelids, the broken teeth and swollen lips, distended almost beyond recognition.
'So the old man just battered her all the time – since she was a little kid?'
'Seems so. Who was going to stop him? Everyone who cared about her was either too young or too scared; you could tell they loved her though.'
'So, why didn't anyone
do
anything?'
'It's more complicated than that – she'd developed a kind of coping mechanism.'
'What? Hit out at anyone who was nice to her?' Hearing her words, he shuddered, thinking of the way he'd been hurt outside Gauri's house. He still didn't know who had done it but the odds were stacked in Thahéra's favour. Recollecting the curtain across Gauri's room, the hastily hidden implements, he guessed why he'd been struck. She had been there all along, listening. She'd thought she was his prime suspect. Tortured by anxiety, she had tried to make him forget what Gauri had been saying. It was obviously a foolish, impulsive action and she had regretted it. All those kisses she'd showered on him when he woke had evidently been a sign of her repentance.
He saw that Tanya was staring at him, waiting for an answer.
'I don't think she attacked people often. Could be that day she just stopped Croft to get him to talk to her. Perhaps her father lunged for her and Croft stepped in between. Or perhaps her father really did intend to kill Croft . ... We'll never know.
'Is that what you put in your official report?' Tanya was twisting and untwisting a strand of her hair, peering at him as if she would read his mind.
'Yes.' Karmel didn't meet her eyes. He knew she didn't buy it.
'But your gut instinct tells you –?'
'
That
Thahéra did it.
And it wasn't intentional. It was an accident but her father witnessed it. Then later she snapped and finished off her old man.'
'Then she's guilty as hell and you know it. She's committed two murders!' Tanya's voice was choked. She was breathing fast, remembering Sara's sorrow; Adam's self-destructive rage. Their eyes met at last.
Karmel and Tanya stared at each other in silence as this dreaded version of that day in the woods unfurled in Karmel's mind.
The damp leafy bank, the dappled sunlight, no hint of pain or menace.
The sounds of running water and laughter as the two white men tramped downhill, fingers loosely intertwined.
Their cheerful greetings when they met the village woman; then her bitter anguish when Croft told her he'd be leaving.
Poor woman, she had started to live again for him; and he, casual about his body, his charms, delighting in intimacy, he'd allowed too many hopes to be pinned on his love. The woman and Cameron had argued; and Adam – petulant, because he could not understand the language, and bored, by his position as a passive bystander – had stomped off in disgust.
Then they started to talk in earnest – one begging for fidelity, the other spinning explanations for his apparent duplicity – only to be interrupted by the hoarse shouts of her frenzied father. Devsingh. A man who despised women.
What a drama it must have been.
While his body went through the motions of drinking tea, and admiring Mrs Hàrélal's freshly watered lawn, while Tanya rocked the swing gently and gazed at his hands on the teacup, Karmel's mind followed the contours of that last fateful meeting in Saahital, feeling out nuances that had escaped him before.
When Thahéra's father had burst upon them all, dragging his accomplice, Gauri's unfortunate son, Thahéra must have been stunned; humiliated into silence. Devsingh would have been bellowing, most probably some putrid curses, and Croft would have put out his hand to touch her, to reassure her or offer comfort in the manner of such foreign men.
That touch would have been the last straw.
Still yards away, the old man would have shrieked and thrown his cane, aiming for his daughter. Rushing towards her, he must have seemed possessed, superhuman.
Gauri, watching, had feared for her friend's life and called out, without thinking, for her to defend herself.
So.
She'd have picked up the gnarled wooden stick – which had been used to beat her on so many occasions – raised it above her head in terror and brought it down with all her strength. Only to find that she had felled not her father but her lover, who'd stepped in between them. A Shakespearean moment.
Karmel remembered her muscled back, her powerful shoulders. She was a strong woman. Croft's head wound – a crushing blow to the skull from the side – was consistent with this scenario.
As for the old man – Karmel pushed the thought of poison from his mind, banished images of the swollen tongue and pulpy lips, the livid, flaking skin: Thahéra's father had had a stroke in the process of thrashing his younger daughter to death.
She had survived; but only just.
Who was to say it hadn't happened like that?
Once they'd read his report and uncovered the architect's corpse, none of the local detectives he'd directed to the village had bothered to ask more questions about the death of the old man suspected of the murder. Escaping from the mud, the insects and the relentless rain, they had quickly returned to their own quarters, glad that Delhi would handle it.
Tanya was looking quizzical. She'd called Thahéra a
murderer
. He had to answer her.
'Tani. Think about it. The
law
had nothing to do with it. At least to her people. You're always telling me that things are unfair, that women are treated twice as severely when they do anything unusual. I've always agreed with you. Everyone knew what she'd done yet they were sorry for her;
they
didn't think she should be punished.' It sounded reasonable now, and it had felt reasonable to him, the day he made the decision not to pursue her out to the lake: but would the rest of the world see it that way? Karmel thought not.
'What d'you think made her snap? You know, at the end, when she poisoned her old man. She must have planned it, after all, otherwise how did her children survive? He wouldn't just have stopped in the middle of his attack and eaten the poison. It stands to reason that she gave it to him
before
he hit her.' Tanya had pulled her own emotions under control. She was upright and cool now, staring at him with discerning eyes.
He looked away. He didn't want to tell her about his infatuation with Thahéra or its aftermath. He felt somehow ashamed and vulnerable. But then, Tanya had slept with a man she didn't love and become pregnant with his baby. So they were more than equals, in a manner of speaking.
Still, he couldn't tell her here, in this house with its servants and polished mirrors and ugly stone icons. Because telling her would mean reigniting a kind of ease he hadn't shared with her in a long while, an intimacy that, perhaps, had never existed between them; and if he allowed that to happen, he'd be lost. Lost.
She wasn't a child any more. He caught himself staring at her lips, full and dark as bitter chocolate with that tiny cut on the bottom lip. The longing he felt was neither cursory nor fleeting but the continuation of a desire he'd suppressed for half a dozen years.
Forcing himself to look away, he made his voice casual.
'Shall we go for a ride? I've brought the bike.' He was watching a bird alight on the lawn.
'Are you
sure
?' She put a hand up to his shoulder and turned him towards her. He hadn't offered to take her anywhere on the bike since she was a teenager, shying away from such physical proximity. She hadn't been expecting him to seek further time with her. In fact, his silences during their discussion had convinced her that he'd abandoned his heart somewhere up in the mountains. She'd been steeling herself for a separation.
'Would I ask, otherwise?'
She changed into jeans while Karmel spoke to her parents, assuring them that he would return her before nightfall and telling Hàrélal that he'd be available for duty on Monday morning. He was vaguely unnerved by the equanimity with which all his speeches were met but too distracted by the thought of the conversation he was about to have with Tanya to question her parents' quiescence.