Indra Sinha - Animal's People

“Nisha?”

“Oh, it’s you.” She seems disappointed, like she’d been hoping it would be someone else.

“What’s going on? What was all that about? Nisha, don’t cry.”

“It’s the onion.”

It rips my heart to see her in tears. “Some good will come of this.”

“Like what?” Her mouth’s filled with the dust of their hopes.

Faced with the bleakness of her despair, I suddenly understand what Zafar meant, back there in the music room. “Nisha, is revenge a reason to ruin your life? What about Ratnagiri, children, that little house by the sea?”

She’s turned round to me. “Animal, do you think I like being a Khaufpuri? Well, I don’t. I’m not heroic enough to fight other people’s causes. I’m not like Elli, came here from her own free choice. I’m caught in it because I was born here. This struggle, it’s going to go on and on and on. It will outlast all of us. If our children grow up here, it will blight their lives too.”

“Then let’s leave Khaufpur. All of us. Why must we stay, just because we were born here? Let’s go to Ratnagiri. Let’s go and forget this horrible place.”

“Now it’s you who’s dreaming.”

“Why? The Kampani has everything on its side, even our own politicians. We Khaufpuris have fuck all. Why give our whole lives to a lost cause?”

Again Nisha’s weeping, this time’s no onion to blame.

“I’m lost,” I say. “Please tell me why you are so unhappy.”

She lifts her shirt hem to dab her eyes. “For me there’ll be no Ratnagiri, nor children either.”

“Stop it. Why are you saying such things?”

“Animal, if I tell you, you must not tell anyone, nobody outside this house knows yet, do you promise?”

“I swear.”

“Zafar is going on hunger strike. A fast unto death.”

“Hunger strike?” Hearing this I’ve started laughing. “Hunger strike! Darling, dry your tears. He’s bluffing, it’s a sham, every corrupt rotten politician fasts unto death at least once during his career, it’s compulsory, somehow the noble bastard is always persuaded to stop in time. Don’t worry, Nisha. Zafar is not mad. He’ll stop after a few days, when he has made his point.”

“You know Zafar is not like that,” she says. “He has given his word. He is pledged not to stop, not until we win.”

Now I understand her terror. Zafar doesn’t lie and when did we, le peuple de l’abîme, ever win anything? Worm meat he’ll be, if this is really his plan.

“You can stop him,” I tell her. “You’re probably the only one who can.”

“He says I mustn’t try, yet how can I not? He is not even well. All those stomach pains he’s been having. Such bad cramps, and nightmares. He gets no better and the politicians will not give in. The Kampani will offer too much money for them to resist. Animal, I’m afraid I am going to lose him.”

My darling covers her face with her hands, she really believes the bugger is crazy enough to do it, and as for the stomach pains, I’ve cloaked myself in guilty silence. What can I say? Never before have I realised how many secrets I have from her. She wipes her eyes. “Thank god Elli will be with him.”

“Yes, thank god.” In my head a vicious voice whispers, speak out now and you will deprive Zafar of his doctor. Zafar himself would want you to speak, says another voice, if he wants to kill himself why should you worry? Says a third, if you don’t tell, you are doing Zafar a good turn, plus it may benefit your back. Shut it, I tell myself, for I can’t in truth blame these thoughts on my voices, as soon as I’ve figured out what’s best for me I’ll do what I will do.

“I am so sorry,” I say aloud. “I am such a bad bastard.”

“What are you sorry about, Animal dear?” asks Nisha, smiling at me through her tears, “you have done nothing wrong.”

The fast begins in a small gaggle of jarnaliss and photographass on the pavement opposite the Khaufpur court where in a few days’ time the hearing’s to happen. Zafar makes a speech for the cameras. Blah justice blah. He’ll be joined on this fast unto death by two women from the slums near the factory. One of them I know, Devika, used to give me sweets when I was younger. The other’s from a place called Blue Moon Colony, her kid is sick from drinking the poison water. To my amazement a fourth hunger striker steps forward. It’s Farouq. For once my archenemy is looking serious, even respectable. He’s all in white kurta pyjamas, around his head is a strip of black cloth like the one he wore for the fire walk. Zafar’s dressed the same except his turban cloth is red.

The courthouse is in the old city behind the Chowk, near the lake. It’s a big building of yellow stone, on its black iron railings they’ve hung a banner which says fast unto death for justice. Opposite’s a small dusty square. Under the shifting shade of four tamarind trees a tent has been pitched, it’s where Zafar and his crew will do their starving. Camped around the tent in a mass of bright saris and black burqas are hundreds of women, always it’s women who support, from places like the Nutcracker and Jyotinagar, same women were at the CM demo. NO DEAL, their placards say.

When the jarnaliss get bored and fuck off, the four hunger strikers dodge across the road through the don’t-give-a-shit trucks and crazy speeding autos, and take their seats like four sages inside the tent. Elli the Betrayess is waiting there with Nisha, whose face is a cupboard full of woes.

“I urge you not to do this,” Elli is telling the four, who listen politely but without expression. “If you insist on going ahead then you must drink plenty of water, at least two litres each day, plus electrolytes. You’re going to need it in this heat.”

“Electro-whats?” asks Devika.

“Uh, just a fancy name for a little sugar and a pinch of salt. Plus a squeeze of lime juice won’t hurt. I’ll be coming here regularly and every few hours I will take urine samples and check your blood pressure.”

Nisha chips in, “If the doctress sahiba finds danger signs she will tell you to stop and you have to listen to her.” Normally she’d say Elli, now it’s doctress sahiba. Who is Nisha trying to convince, so desperate must she be?

“Okay, let me explain what will happen to you,” says Elli betrayess. “In the first few days your body will raid your muscles and liver for their stores of easy energy. It’s called glycogen. You’ll lose weight fast. With the glycogen gone the body starts feeding on muscle. That includes heart muscle. When the muscles are exhausted, the body burns ketones produced by cracking fats. This also makes a lot of toxins. When the fat is used up the body goes into meltdown. It has nothing left to feed on but vital organs, but serious damage begins well before that. In this heat I reckon you can do at most twenty days before things start getting really dangerous.”

“We have five days until the hearing.” This is Zafar, he’s saying this because our enemies will have to sign their deal before the hearing, which falls on the morning of the sixth day.

“Five days you’ll manage,” says Elli, everyone can hear the relief in her voice. “It will be uncomfortable, but drink plenty of water and you’ll be fine.”

The four of them look at each other, then Zafar beckons to me. I shuffle over and he whispers to me, “Animal, take Nisha away somewhere.”

“Where?” I whisper back, bemused by the secrecy.

“Anywhere,” he says. “Just get her out of here for a few moments.”

So I four-foot over to where Nisha is watching us, suspicion settling like a swarm of flies on her face.

“Nish, come with me for a moment.”