The Song of Kahunsha (23 page)

Guddi walks in front of Chamdi with three bananas in her hand. The old woman gave them to her and asked them to come back for chapattis and dal the next day. She also said she would let Guddi have a bath if she wished.

As they approach their kholi, Guddi increases the pace of her steps.

Amma is back at the kholi. She holds the baby in her arms, looks to the night sky, and whispers as though she is offering her own child to the sky
for safekeeping.

Guddi goes towards Amma and gently places her palm on Amma’s back. Amma keeps looking at the sky, but hands the baby to Guddi, then stops whispering. She shakes her head from side to side as she slowly lowers her gaze.

Guddi places the baby on a plastic sheet beneath the kholi. She peels a banana and feeds it to Amma. Amma holds on to Guddi’s hand—she does not want Guddi to let go of the banana. She swallows it down, like it is liquid. Chamdi wonders if the baby is still unwell. When morning comes, he will buy some milk for it. He will see to it that the baby does not die.

He spots something on the ground in a corner of the kholi. A lump forms in his throat as he holds Sumdi’s cream shirt in his hand. It smells of sweat and beedis. It must have been the last thing Sumdi touched. He must have thrown his shirt to the ground just before he positioned himself outside the temple. Chamdi wonders how a shirt can make him feel like this. He did not cry even once when the fire was burning Sumdi’s body, but now this shirt …

Amma finishes the banana and lies down next to the baby and closes her eyes. She does not even
know she has lost a son, thinks Chamdi. A couple of flies sit on her face and he drives them away. She licks her lips as he does this. He wipes off droplets of sweat from the baby’s stomach, but quickly takes his hand off it.

Now Guddi eats a banana, and she hands Chamdi the one that remains. He begins to peel it, but he does so very slowly, as though he fears eating it. He cannot bring himself to eat it. His eyes are still on the baby. He wants to tell Guddi that he has killed one just like it.

She knows. She knows what he has done.

Or she will find out in the days to come. Everyone will talk about the burning of a family in Shaan Gulley, and she will understand his part in it because Anand Bhai called him a hero.

Chamdi watches the baby’s belly move up and down as it breathes. The other baby … Hanif’s baby … it must have been sleeping too. No, he reminds himself. He heard the baby’s wail from inside the house. It was wide awake.

Something is clawing at his heart. He does not know how to make it stop.

Perhaps he should speak to Guddi, tell her exactly what he has done.

No, he will never tell her. He knows Guddi is
watching his every move. He is glad. He has been forced to commit a horrific act because of her.

Let her watch.

The moment he thinks this, he is ashamed. He must not blame her for what has happened. Sumdi or Guddi would have done the same for him.

Guddi leans over and steadies his hand. He did not even realize that it was shaking. He immediately takes his hand away from hers—it is the same hand that held the bottle.

“Whatever happened, it will be okay,” she whispers to him. “It’s okay.”

It will never be okay, he thinks.

“Come with me,” says Guddi. “I want to take you somewhere.”

Chamdi lies on the ground and closes his eyes. There is no use in going with her. No matter where she takes him, the flames of Shaan Gulley will always follow him.

A taxiwala’s car stereo plays an old Hindi song. As Chamdi walks, he looks in through the front window of the parked taxi, at a string of white jasmines that hangs from the rear-view mirror. Then he looks at the garland in his hand and tells himself that the one he holds is special. Not because it is made of marigolds and lilies, but because he has made it himself. He has made it for Sumdi.

Guddi has been wanting to bring Chamdi here for a while now. The only reason he has finally agreed to go with her today is because it was exactly a month ago that Sumdi died. But in the days that have passed, Chamdi has hardly spoken.

As they take the bend towards the Taj Mahal Hotel, crows caw in the trees. Through their branches, Chamdi can see the sky, a shy tinge of orange. In the dawn, the
tring-tring
of a milkman’s cycle can be heard. He trudges past them in khaki shorts and a blue shirt, a steel container hanging from the side of his cycle.

As they approach the sea wall, Chamdi notices the Gateway of India in front of him. He sees the brown structure, its four turrets, its central archway, and he wonders why it was built. The Taj Mahal Hotel opposite resembles an old palace, its corners flanked by orange domes, a larger dome in the middle. Pigeons chatter away on the white arches of windows and some flutter alongside its stone walls. Uniformed cleaners hum to themselves and mop the concrete steps of the hotel. To the right of the hotel, coconut trees line the compounds of residential buildings, and even though the buildings look old, their balconies are spacious, and they seem strong.

Around Chamdi, women sweepers clean up the night’s garbage with thick straw brooms and old men walk by the sea wall in white shorts. A man with a curling moustache sits on his haunches with a kerosene stove by his side and sells chai in
small paper cups. Stray dogs and pigeons share the footpath along with beggars, and a man without legs is asleep in his hand-operated wheelchair. A bus driver stands outside his blue tourist bus with an incense stick in his hand, which he circles round and round, and chants a prayer in a low, heavy voice. Chamdi wants to say a prayer too, for Hanif the taxiwala, but he closes his eyes and asks Hanif to forgive him instead.

“I used to come here with my father,” says Guddi. “We used to sit here all day and eat chana. This is my favourite place in Bombay.”

Guddi sits on the sea wall and dangles her feet over the edge, the water below her. She looks at Chamdi and he knows she wants him to do the same. As he takes his place beside her, the sun sends its soft glow all around. This area is very different from anything Chamdi has seen. There is so much space, the sea does not seem to end.

Chamdi feels the garland in his hands. The old woman has taught him to leave just the right amount of space between the flowers so that they can breathe. He liked it when she told him that. In a few hours, he will go to Darzi’s room, sit on the floor with a basket full of marigolds and lilies by his side, and thread garlands.

He looks towards the horizon and thinks of Sumdi. By now, Sumdi must have fulfilled his dream. He must have visited every single corner of Bombay, witnessed every cricket match, bet at every gambling den. Sumdi’s words rush to him:
Then I will fly over the sea like a champion bird, and never ever stop
. Even though the sea is so vast, Sumdi would cross it in no time. Who knows, he might even have a beedi in his mouth.

Chamdi has made this garland for Sumdi because he never had a chance to say goodbye. When the flames ate Sumdi’s body, all Chamdi did was watch. He hopes Sumdi forgives him. With this thought, Chamdi throws the garland into the sea. The garland moves farther and farther away. Where will the sea take it? he wonders. He wishes Guddi and he could float away in the same manner, to whatever country lies on the other side.

“Sometimes I dream Sumdi is in our village,” says Guddi, “and he’s pretending he cannot walk. Just for fun.”

Chamdi says nothing. He listens to the chatter of pigeons and is reminded of the orphanage wall. Perhaps by now the orphanage has already been destroyed. He hopes everyone is okay, especially Mrs. Sadiq and Pushpa.

“Chamdi, please talk to me,” says Guddi. “So what if we work for Anand Bhai? We are still good, no?”

He raises his head a little and catches a glimpse of her feet, the cracks lined with dirt, then at the brown dress that sits in her lap, loose and ill fitting, then at the orange bangles she never takes off, but he is unable to look any higher—at her face, into her eyes.

“Chamdi, you must talk to me,” she says. “You hardly talk to me.” Her voice begins to crack.

But he just stares at the water, at the small boats that sway from side to side. The sweeper’s broom makes a rustling sound behind them. The panting of dogs can also be heard.

Chamdi faces the horizon and runs his hands across his ribs. They are as sharp as ever, but he now knows that they will never transform into tusks. Nor will police-tigers emerge from the blue-and-yellow stripes of police station walls. He will have to find other ways to protect Guddi.

But he has nothing to hold on to. When he left the orphanage, he had Kahunsha. He saw it so clearly, like it was real, as though it did truly exist. Now even his bougainvilleas are of no use.

He hears Guddi take a deep breath. He still does not look her way because if she is crying, he will not be able to do much.

But Guddi begins to sing.

Her voice takes Chamdi by surprise, and for a moment, he watches the water directly below him gently push itself against the sea wall. Guddi’s voice is soft at first, but when it rises, he is reminded of the beauty in her song the first time he heard it, and he knows that even though she is sitting right next to him, she is far, far away.

He looks into the distance, at the manner in which the sea and sky meet as though they are friends. Soon the sea will nudge the sun into the sky, and the sea might do the same with her song so that it can reach her father, and even Sumdi.

But he feels that she is singing for him. He wonders how Guddi can bring herself to sing for him even though it is she who has lost a brother. She has hardly cried, and it might be because she wants Chamdi to feel better. He wonders where she gets the strength.

Chamdi looks at the way in which her left hand is outstretched in front of her, as though she is showing her voice where to go. She is guiding her voice over the water, and by the sway of her hand,
her voice will know what waves to jump over and which ones to crash into. Her orange bangles clink into each other as she does this, and he traces his way up her elbow, to the sleeve of her dress, when he notices her chest.

Guddi sings with so much power that her chest heaves up and down.

While it is her voice that travels seawards, it is her chest that releases her song.

That is where her song comes from. That is where her strength lies.

At that moment, Chamdi feels something move within his chest too.

He tells himself that it could be anything.

Perhaps it is a police-tiger.

Yes, the police-tigers are inside his chest, and even though they are silent now, someday they will roar. Someday he will let them out.

He wants to tell her this as her voice soars above the waves.

Just then, he hears a sound. It is the gallop of horses, mad and strong. All of Bombay’s horse carriages are by the sea, and that in itself is an unusual sight, but what dazzles Chamdi is the nature of the horses themselves. They are made from bougainvillea, every vein and fibre of these
magnificent beasts is flower. They race towards the sea wall, jump over the astonished heads of men and women, into the water.

This makes Chamdi’s heart race. He takes a deep breath.

He watches as the sun slowly takes its place in the sky and sends its light around in a sparkling dance.

Behind him, there is the sudden flutter of pigeons, as though they have all flown away at the same time.

As the water gurgles beneath them, Chamdi moves closer to Guddi, and lets his hand touch hers.