Gregory Roberts - The Mountain Shadow

When the elevator doors closed, she took out a flask, drank a sip, closed it and turned to me, all queens.

‘Do you think I had something to do with her death?’

‘ What? ’

‘The cops did. Worked me over pretty good. Only left bruises where I won’t show.’

I felt my stomach drop. Anger filled the empty inside.

‘Lightning Dilip?’

‘He sends his regards,’ she said.

The doors opened on a small crowd in the lobby. She stopped me in the doorway, blocking the people. Our faces were inches apart.

‘I didn’t have anything to do with it,’ she said. ‘I would never hurt Lisa. Or let anyone else hurt her.’

‘Of course not,’ I replied, but she was already gone.

I made my way to the desk, hurled the visitor tag across the counter, and bounced through people until I found Karla, unruffled, a little way from the front entrance.

We rode to the Bandra sea-face. She clung to my back, her face pressed into me, a ready-to-die passenger.

I could’ve gone to a dozen places closer, but I needed to ride. When we stopped, near the sea, I was as calm as the waves on the bay.

We walked that little smile of the coast in the midday heat, but we were comfortable: two foreigners who’d learned to love a sun-blessed city.

‘We had a date,’ she said, as we walked.

‘We had a date?’

‘No.’

I thought about it.

‘You and Lisa had a date?’

‘Yeah.’

We walked on for a while, and then I got it.

‘You mean, you and Lisa had a date -date?’

‘Kind of.’

‘Kind of?’

‘Kind of.’

‘There’s no kind-of date -date.’

‘There was always this… thing between us, you know -’

‘A thing, huh?’

‘On her side, sure.’

‘And this thing took you there that night?’

‘She said she wanted to have a little booze, and a lotta fun, or a lotta booze, and a little fun.’

‘I’m not understanding this.’

‘It was her plan.’

‘What plan?’

‘I said I’d go three or four drinks with her, and see what happened after that. She said you were cool with it.’

‘Really?’

‘Yeah,’ she frowned.

We walked on a few more steps in silence, our shadows clinging to us, hiding from the heat.

‘And with you, and the date -date? Was that serious?’

‘Not for me,’ she smiled, and then frowned her gaze at our feet. ‘Lisa was a flirt. She couldn’t help herself. I played along, because she liked it when I did.’

‘I’m sorry, Karla. I’m sorry I wasn’t here to stop this, and to stop you being the one to find her. If I could take that from you, I would.’

‘The only beauty the past has is that it can’t be changed. There was nothing you could’ve done, and there’s nothing you can do now.’

‘It… must’ve been… so hard, finding her.’

‘The door was open,’ she said, staring at her feet. ‘She was on the bed. I thought she was asleep. Then I saw how still she was, and the bag of pills. I shook her, but she was gone. Cold. I got the watchman to call the ambulance and the cops, but she was gone, Lin. She was long gone, poor baby.’

I put my arm around her, and she settled into me, as softly as married.

‘Who was with her?’ I asked. ‘Who gave her the stuff?’

‘I don’t know, yet. I’ve been trying to find out, but I haven’t mixed in those circles for a while.’

‘When the cops… worked you over, did they let anything slip?’

‘Only that they want your ass pretty bad,’ she said. ‘That came in clear as a boot on the spine. And I could see their point. Let’s face it, you vanish from the city, and your girlfriend dies. Or was it the other way around?’

‘Wait a minute,’ I asked, pulling my arm away from her to look into her eyes. ‘You can’t think I’d hurt Lisa? You can’t think that.’

She laughed. It was the first time she’d laughed since I’d seen her in Ranjit’s office, sitting behind the plants.

‘It’s good to see you laugh, Karla.’

‘It’s the first time since I found her. I’ve been uncomfortably numb for a while, and hazing purple most of the time. Of course you wouldn’t hurt her. I wouldn’t love you, if you could.’

She turned to the sea, the wind clearing her face for the sun. The breeze made lines of sea-foam music and frothy notes on parallel waves in the mouth of the bay.

‘Karla, what the hell happened? What do you think happened?’

‘I told you, I don’t know yet. Where the fuck were you , anyway?’

Where was I?

Click-clack . Severed head. Blue Hijab.

‘I had a job. Have you heard anything from Abdullah?’

‘No, but he has my number, and he always calls me when he gets back to town.’

‘Abdullah has your number?’

‘Of course.’

‘I don’t have your number.’

‘You don’t use phones, Shantaram.’

‘That’s not the point.’

‘And the point is?’

‘Well -’

‘I’m not going back to Ranjit,’ she said quickly, not smiling.

‘What? I mean, good, but what?’

‘I’m already checked in at the Taj.’

‘The Taj?’

‘My things will arrive by evening.’

‘You’re not going home, to Ranjit?’

‘Let me tell you, if you’re gonna make a move, Shantaram, this is your time.’

The worst part of being in love with a woman who’s smarter than you are, is that you can’t stop coming back for more, which, as it happens, is also the best part.

‘What?’

‘What did you tell me, once,’ she asked, not wanting an answer, ‘about before , and after ?’

‘I… ah… ’

‘ After just started, Lin. After started today. You can’t go home. I won’t go home. The only question is, are you in it with me, or in it without me?’

I felt stupid not understanding what she was telling me, and looking back now, I guess I was. But I didn’t know what decisions she’d made, or why she was telling me then.

Seconds fell, pollen in the wind. It was everything. It was nothing.

‘We just lost Lisa,’ I said. ‘We just lost Lisa.’

‘Lisa would -’

She cut herself off, laughed again, and gave me about eight unhappy queens.

‘ Jesus! ’ she said. ‘Am I… actually… trying to talk you … into coming with me ?’

‘Well, I -’

‘Fuck you,’ she said.

‘Fuck… me?’

She stood quickly, and hailed a taxi.

‘Wait a minute, Karla.’

She got in the cab, and drove away.

I sprinted to the bike, and rode too fast and too loose until I found her cab. I followed her all the way back to the Taj hotel, riding around her cab and trying to catch her eye. She never turned to look.

I parked the bike, and watched her climb the wide steps and walk into the hotel. I went to the reservations desk, and left a note for her.

I rode away from the proud galleon of the Taj hotel through rivers of traffic, and questioned every man or woman I could still trust about Concannon. I checked gambling dens, opium parlours, country liquor bars, hash hangouts and numbers-racket corners. I didn’t learn much, but street voices confirmed that Concannon was running a heroin franchise for the Scorpion Company.

Everyone called them the Scorpion Company, rather than the Scorpion Gang: everyone recognised their status as a full mafia Company.

I had to report to Sanjay. I had a standing appointment for two in the afternoon on the day after my return from Sri Lanka, whatever the date.

No doubt, Sanjay had expected me to report sooner. He wouldn’t be in a good mood. But that was okay. Since the death of his friend Salman, Sanjay didn’t have a good mood.