The Truth (13 page)

Melville extended his hand.

‘Well, good luck,’ he said. ‘And be careful. This is a tough part of town.’

And with that he nodded – not to Mabbut, but to someone behind him.

As Mabbut turned, he saw a battered green jeep detach itself from the crowds and move towards them. There were two or three people inside, all locals by the look of it. Melville gave a faint smile.

‘The real people aren’t always what you want them to be.’

Without a backward glance, Melville pulled open the passenger door, climbed in and with a salvo of horn blasts the jeep headed off up the street, turned a corner and was gone.

Back at the Farhan, Mabbut sat at the rickety table in his room. He was both embarrassed and surprised to find that his hands were still shaking as he opened his notebook. The tip-off about the hotel had worked better than he’d had any right to expect. Thank God he’d not been put off taking the room. He had not only made contact with Melville on his second day in India, he had found him without
any help from Latham. Less satisfactory had been his own reaction to his subject, more star-struck schoolboy than hard-nosed reporter.

He had sort of assumed that subterfuge wouldn’t be necessary, that if you admired someone as much as he did Melville then you’d be bound to get on. He had never really entertained the thought that Melville might not like him, or might not want to talk to him. Which of course was highly likely. This was a man with a pathological dislike of media scrutiny. A man no journalist had been able to get near to. But at least he was in the right place, Mabbut reflected. What he needed to do now was to prepare himself a lot more carefully before their next encounter.

From his window he looked down on a narrow, hard-earth alleyway on either side of which were low houses with long thatched roofs whose eaves provided a shady space in which women and children were preparing for the night. A beetle of some sort had crawled along the cracked plaster outside and was struggling to climb over the window frame. After several attempts it heaved itself up, ran along the sill and disappeared into a crack in the wall. Mabbut remained for some moments staring at the space. Then he took a deep breath, closed his notebook, pushed back his chair and stood up. He felt a welcome if uncharacteristic surge of self-belief, which he credited to the beetle. This was his Robert the Bruce moment. He would eat, wash, sleep off his jet-lag and by tomorrow would be refreshed and ready with a proper strategy for winning Melville’s confidence. He had been caught with his trousers down this afternoon, but it wouldn’t happen again.

It was a moment or two before he realised that someone was knocking. The raps sounded again, more insistently this time. Mabbut moved swiftly across the room and pulled open the door. The tall, strangely aristocratic figure of Mr Singh, the half-naked proprietor, stood there, his eyes flashing quickly around the room before returning to Mabbut.

‘How is your room, sir?’

‘It’s fine, absolutely fine. Thank you.’

‘It is my best.’

‘Well, I appreciate that.’

‘And this you must light in the evening.’ He handed Mabbut a green coil on a black stand. ‘For the mosquitoes.’

‘Thank you.’

‘There is a toilet and shower at the end of the passage. It is shared.’

Mabbut nodded.

‘That’s fine with me. I see I’m not the only British guest,’ he added, rather pleased with himself.

Parval Singh shook his head.

‘No. No British ever come here.’

Mabbut faltered, then pressed on.

‘I . . . er . . . I was recommended this place by someone who said their friend Mr Melville sometimes stays here.’

Mr Singh looked puzzled, and shook his head.

‘But I just met him in the street outside. A tall white man wearing Indian dress.’ Mabbut waved his hands around. ‘Lots of hair.’

Singh’s frown lifted.

‘Ah, Mr Steiner. Yes. He’s from Belgium.’

Mabbut risked a long hard look at Mr Singh. He returned Mabbut’s gaze evenly.

‘Well, he sounded English to me. Maybe when he comes back to the hotel we can ask him.’

Mr Singh shook his head.

‘He is not coming back to the hotel, sir. He’s gone.’

‘Gone?’

‘Mr Steiner has gone. Checked out. Left.’

There was a noise from the floor below. A door squeaked then slammed shut. The sound of footsteps receded down a passageway. Mr Singh mopped his neck with his cotton towel.

‘Do you have your passport, please?’

Mabbut went back inside his room, rooted about in his jacket, then handed it over.

Mr Singh turned to go.

‘I make you dinner in one hour.’

Mabbut followed him into the narrow passageway. It smelt of cinnamon.

‘Excuse me. The gentleman. The . . . the Belgian gentleman. Do you know where he’s gone?’

Mr Singh shook his head. ‘I don’t know. Mr Steiner comes and goes.’

Below them footsteps returned.

‘One hour. In the dining room?’

‘Can I eat outside?’

Parval Singh smiled firmly.

‘No.’

Mabbut ate alone in the dining room, a gloomy space at the back in which the atmosphere was not enhanced by a strip-light which kept flickering every now and then as if it were about to expire. Mr Singh was nowhere to be seen. A plate of rice and dhal was brought in by a young boy Mabbut had spotted earlier, shooing dogs from the yard. Mabbut asked him for a beer, but none appeared. His plate was then removed and replaced, a moment or two later, with a white saucer on which there was a banana and a small, squashy orange. It was marginally cooler down here than in his room, so Mabbut lingered over his fruit, trying to decide what he should do next. Find out why Melville was calling himself Steiner for a start. Having finished both the banana and the disappointingly tasteless orange, he stood up and, instead of taking the stairs, crossed the empty reception area and headed towards the front door. The balmy heat of the night and the sound of the streets rose to meet him, as did a myriad of subtle but distinctive scents. In the little yard where Farud had dropped him earlier there was now a crowd of crouching figures. Despite the great heat some were shivering, pulling blankets around them. There were lights in the gloom and Mabbut caught glimpses of liquid and foil. Some figures turned towards him but their eyes were unfocused and they quickly turned away.

The night was so hot when Mabbut returned to his room that he was forced to activate the air con, whose convulsive thumps and shudders brought him a semblance of cool air at the cost of some dreadful dreams. He was stumbling through a forest, falling to the ground and being dragged onwards by some unseen force when the grating cry of a cockerel plucked him from the nightmare. He
groped for his travel clock on the floor by the bed. Indignation was added to discomfort when the clock told him that it was half-past three. The cock sounded again, just below the window, then a dog barked and another dog answered from farther away, a donkey shrieked, and soon a whole arrhythmic animal chorus filled the night. Mabbut lay staring at the barely revolving fan, unable to recapture any of the elation of the day before. His mind was full of negatives. Melville was gone and Mabbut was clearly being told, in as many words, not even to think of following him.

He heard voices below the window; the slow, subdued chatter of families rising before dawn to prepare for the day ahead. Since leaving London he had kept his mind firmly on the job in hand, deliberately trying to keep at bay other, less welcome, trains of thought. But the voices below, and the intimate sounds of a family waking, brought his own fractured family to the forefront of his mind. Mabbut thought of his daughter, head over heels in love with someone he hardly knew, and Sam, receding into the distance. Most of all, he thought of Krystyna. In particular the new dilemma posed by his relationship with Rex Naismith. Rex, more than anyone, had helped him in his quest to find Melville, and yet at this moment Rex was probably climbing into bed with his wife. And he was completely powerless to do anything. Apart from think about it. Which, now, of course, he could not stop doing.

Mabbut switched on the light, walked to the window, shook out his sweat-soaked blanket and picked up a book, but nothing could comfort him.

It was only as dawn broke that sleep, irresistible sleep, finally embraced him.

THREE

H
e was woken by a loud hammering on the door. Light and noise streamed in from outside. The hammering stopped and he heard Mr Singh shouting, ‘Sir! Sir! There is telephone for you. Downstairs!’

It was Farud. He sounded concerned.

‘It is the feast day of King Rama. If we go to see the Temple of the Sun, we must go very early.’

‘I don’t think I’ll see the temple today, Farud, if you don’t mind.’

‘The giant chariots process at midday, Mr Keith, but you would not have to follow them with everyone else. We shall have a balcony in the old palace. There will be water for you and some small food. I will make sure I get you there. I think maybe we can be with you in less than one hour. Please be ready.’

‘Farud,
please
. I. Don’t. Want. To see. The temple. Today.’

But the line had already gone dead.

Mabbut went back to his room. He found his mobile but realised he didn’t have Farud’s number. He sat down on the bed and tried to think. If Steiner/Melville really wasn’t coming back to the guest house then Mabbut’s first task had to be to find him before the trail went completely cold.

He washed as best he could in the tiny bathroom along the passage, dressed then went down to breakfast. As he went by the reception area he saw, to his surprise, three very white men. They were dressed casually, but not cheaply, in heavy checked shirts and jeans. One was staring hard at a BlackBerry, another stood near the door, looking out at the yard with barely concealed disgust, while the third, an older man who seemed to be the leader of the group, was talking to Mr Singh.

‘Mr Steiner left yesterday, sir.’

‘We were supposed to meet him here. Today.’

They were Americans.

‘I’m sorry, sir. He is not here.’

‘Did he leave any message for us, any word where he might be?’

‘I think he was going to Kolkata, sir.’

Two of the men exchanged glances.

‘Calcutta?’

‘Yes, sir, I think he is doing some business there.’

‘Where does he stay, d’you know?’

‘I can’t tell you, sir.’

‘You
can’t
tell me, or you don’t know?’

‘I don’t know, sir.’

‘You don’t have a sister hotel in Calcutta?’ asked the man with the BlackBerry.

‘Great Undiscovered Shitholes of The World,’ muttered his companion.

The older man took out a wallet and leant across to Mr Singh.

‘A name would be helpful,’ he said quietly.

It was at that moment that all three of them became aware that there was someone else in the hallway. Four sets of eyes turned on Mabbut.

‘Er . . . breakfast?’ he asked Mr Singh brightly.

Mr Singh seemed grateful for the diversion.

‘Yes, sir.’ He indicated the dining room. ‘I will come through.’

To Mabbut’s surprise three or four tables were occupied. All by Indians, all of whom seemed to know each other. They were young to middle-aged men, who probably worked in business. They slouched on their chairs, listening and laughing every time the fattest one talked. The plate of sweet pastries on the table in front of them was rapidly diminishing.

Mabbut finished his banana and this time he left the orange. The room had emptied. He checked his watch. Farud would be here in half an hour and he would lose another day looking at temples. He was thinking what to do with a sticky sweet cake he regretted biting into when Mr Singh appeared at the doorway. He looked in Mabbut’s direction for quite some time, forcing Mabbut, out of
politeness, to take another bite of the titbit. Mr Singh came over to his table and sat down.

‘Good breakfast, sir?’

‘Yes, thank you. Very . . . very tasty.’

Mr Singh reached into a pocket.

‘Your passport.’

‘Oh, thank you.’

The proprietor sat watching Mabbut eat the cake. When it was finished, he leant forward and spoke quietly.

‘Why are you here, sir?’

Mabbut was caught unawares. He was still trying to frame a response when Mr Singh spoke again, and as he did so he cast a swift glance out into the hallway.

‘No one like you comes here by accident.’

‘I assure you, I’m just the kind of person who prefers a place like this. Somewhere I can find the real people, the real India . . .’

Mr Singh leant back and looked at Mabbut the way Melville had looked at him when he’d last burbled on about wanting to find the real people.

‘Sir, forgive me, but I think we must be honest with each other.’

Mabbut was aware for the first time of an electric clock ticking softly on the wall.