Gregory David Roberts - Shantaram

"Listen, if we wait, we can get thirty more men and thirty guns to go in with us. You know that. But we might miss them. As it is, we've already talked for ten minutes too long. If we hit them now, quick and hard, before they know it, we can take them out, and none of them will get away. I want to finish them, and finish this business, right now, tonight. But I want to leave it up to you. I don't want to make you go in if you don't feel ready. Do you want to wait for more men, or go now?"

One by one the men spoke, quickly, most of them using the one word, Abi, meaning now. Salman nodded, then closed his eyes and muttered a prayer in Arabic. When he looked up again, he was committed, fully committed for the first time. His eyes were blazing with hatred and the fearsome killing rage he'd kept at bay.

"_Saatch... _aur _himmat," he said, looking each man in the eye.

_Truth... _and _courage.

"Saatch aur himmat," they replied.

Without another word, the men claimed their guns, climbed into the two cars, and drove the few short minutes to Chuha's home on fashionable Sardar Patel Road. Before I could order my thoughts and even consider, clearly, what I was doing, I found myself creeping along a narrow lane with Abdullah in a darkness deep enough for me to feel the widening of my straining eyes. Then we climbed over a sheer wooden fence and dropped down into the backyard of the enemy's house.

We stood together in the dark for a few moments, checking the luminous dials on our watches, and listening hard as we let our eyes adjust. Abdullah whispered beside me, and I almost jumped at the sound.

"Nothing," he breathed, his voice like the rustle of a woollen blanket. "There's no-one here, no-one near."

"Looks okay," I answered, aware that my whispering voice was raspy with hard-breathing fear. There were no lights at the windows or behind the blue door at the rear of the house.

"Well, I kept my promise," Abdullah whispered mysteriously. "What?"

"You made me promise to take you with me, when I kill Chuha.

Remember?"

"Yeah," I answered, my heart beating faster than a healthy heart should. "You gotta be careful, I guess."

"I will be careful, Lin brother."

"No-I mean, you gotta be careful what you wish for in life, na?"

"I will try to open that door," Abdullah breathed, close to my ear. "If it will open, I will go inside."

"What?"

"You wait here, and stay near the door."

"What?"

"You wait here, and-"

"We're both supposed to stay here!" I hissed.

"I know," he replied, creeping with leopard stealth toward the door.

In my clumsier way, looking more like a cat waking stiffly from a long sleep, I crept after him. As I reached the two wide steps leading down to the blue door, I saw him open it and slip inside the house like a shadow thrown by a swooping bird. He pushed the door shut soundlessly behind him.

Alone, in the dark, I took my knife from the sheath in the small of my back, and enclosed the hilt in my right fist, dagger-point down. Staring out into the darkness, I put all of my focus on the beating of my heart, trying by force of will to slow its too rapid pace. It worked, after a time. I felt the count reducing, calming me further in turn as the meditative loop closed around a single, still thought. That thought was of Khaderbhai, and the formula he'd made me repeat so often: The wrong thing, for the right reasons. And I knew, as I repeated the words in the fearing dark, that the fight with Chuha, the war, the struggle for power, was always the same, everywhere, and it was always wrong.

Salman and the others, no less than Chuha and the Sapna killers and all the rest of them, were pretending that their little kingdoms made them kings; that their power struggles made them powerful. And they didn't. They couldn't. I saw that then so clearly that it was like understanding a mathematical theorem for the first time. The only kingdom that makes any man a king is the kingdom of his own soul. The only power that has any real meaning is the power to better the world. And only men like Qasim Ali Hussein and Johnny Cigar were such kings and had such power.

Unnerved and afraid, I pressed my ear to the door and strained to hear anything of Abdullah or the others within. The fear that twisted in me wasn't the fear of death. I wasn't afraid to die. I was afraid of being so injured or wounded that I couldn't walk, or couldn't see or, for some other reason, couldn't run from capture. Above all things I was afraid of that-of being captured and caged again. As I pressed my ear to the door, I prayed that no wound would weaken me. Let it happen here, I prayed. Let me get through this, or let me die here...

I don't know where they came from. I felt the hands on me before I heard a single sound. Two men slammed me round and hard up against the door. Instinctively, I struck out with my right hand.

"Chaku! Chaku!" one of the men shouted. Knife! Knife!

I couldn't swing the knife up quickly enough to stop them. One man pinned me to the door by the throat. He was a big man, and very strong. The other man used two hands, trying to force me to drop the knife. He wasn't quite so strong, and he couldn't make me drop the weapon. Then a third man hopped down the steps from the darkness, and with those extra hands they twisted my grip and forced me to drop the knife.

"Gora kaun hai?" the new man asked. Who's the white guy?

"Bahinchudh! Malum nahi," the strong man replied. The sisterfucker! I don't know.

He stared at me, obviously bewildered to have stumbled on a foreigner who was listening at the door and armed with a knife.

"Kaun hai tum?" he asked in an almost friendly tone. Who are you?

I didn't reply. All I could think was that I had to warn Abdullah somehow. I couldn't understand how they'd reached that spot without making a sound. The back gate must've swung silently on its hinges. Their shoes or chappals must've been soled with soft rubber. Whatever. I'd let them sneak up on me, and I had to warn Abdullah.

I suddenly struggled as if I was trying to break free. The feint had its effect. The men all shouted at me, and three pairs of hands slammed me against the blue door. One of the smaller men scrambled to my left side, pinning my left arm to the door. The other short man held my right arm. In the wrestle, I managed to kick my boots hard against the door three times. Abdullah must've heard it, I thought. It's okay... I've warned him... He must know something's wrong...

"Kaun hai tum?" the big man asked again. He took one hand from my throat, and bunched it into a fist poised menacingly close to my head, just below the line of sight of my eyes. Who are you?

Again I refused to answer, staring at him. Their hands, as hard as shackles, held me to the door.

He slammed his fist into my face. I managed to move my head, just slightly, but I felt the blow on my jaw and cheek. He had rings on his fingers, or he was using a knuckleduster. I couldn't see it, but I could feel the hard metal chipping bone.

"What you are doing here?" he asked in English. "Who you are?"

I kept silent, and he struck me again, the fist ramming into my face three times. _I know this... I thought. _I know this... I was back in prison, in Australia, in the punishment unit-the fists and boots and batons... I know this...

He paused, waiting for me to speak. The two smaller men grinned at him, then at me. Aur, one of them said. More. Hit him again.

The big man drew back and punched at my body. They were slow, deliberate, professional punches. I felt the wind empty from my body, and it was as if my life itself was draining from me. He moved up the body to my chest and throat and face. I felt myself wading into that black water where beaten boxers stagger and fall. I was done. I was finished.