Gregory Roberts - The Mountain Shadow

‘Money that was never adequately accounted for,’ Arshan added.

‘And that missing cash,’ I said, ‘bought stuff from the departing British.’

‘Exactly. Fearing that the Indian authorities might think they’d stolen or looted the jewels they had, and who knows, maybe some of them did, many of the British sold off their jewellery in advance, for cash. My great-grandfather bought a very large quantity of those jewels in the last months before independence, and he hid them -’

‘Somewhere in this house,’ I concluded for him.

Arshan sighed, and allowed his gaze to roam along the catwalks and conduits that wound their way around the woven basket of the chamber.

‘But there was no clue where the treasure was hidden?’

‘Not a word,’ Arshan sighed, opening the parchment letter, and holding it between us. ‘The document we found in an old book is very specific about the number and type of gems, and the fact that they were hidden somewhere, even to describing the chest they were hidden in, but there was no hint about exactly where . My great-grandfather owned all three of the houses in this block, and in his time he lived and worked in them all.’

‘So you started looking.’

‘We searched the rooms, and all the furniture. We turned everything over, looking for secret drawers. Then we searched the walls for secret panels, or hidden sliding doors, or suchlike. When we found nothing, we knew we had to start breaking into the walls.’

‘We started here, on the joining walls in our own house,’ Anahita said, as Kareena placed a bone china cup of chai in front of me. ‘But then, when we started on the this-thing - ’

‘The common wall,’ Arshan helped her.

‘Yes, when we started breaking into the this-thing, a lot of stuff started falling down inside the house of our neighbours, the Khans.’

‘My favourite illuminated clock, for one thing,’ Zaheera said ruefully. ‘It had a waterfall, you know, so it looked like water was falling down all the time. Then the whole clock fell down, and it smashed into a million pieces. I haven’t found one as good since.’

‘And when things started falling down in their house, the Khans came here, asking us what we were doing.’

‘Which is where my dad came in,’ Farzad’s young friend, Ali, said.

‘Literally,’ Farzad joked.

‘Our two families have been close for ever,’ Ali said. ‘Arshan Uncle and Anahita Auntie decided to tell my dad exactly what they were doing, and to invite him to join in the hunt for the treasure.’

‘We thought that my great-grandfather might have hidden the box of jewels inside the common wall,’ Arshan added. ‘There were a lot of renovations and changes made to these houses, in his time, and there was no way into the walls without involving the Khans.’

‘My Suleiman came home that night, after visiting here,’ Zaheera Auntie said, ‘and sat the whole family down for a meeting. He told us about the treasure, and the invitation to join in the hunt, even if it meant breaking down the wall between our two houses. We were all talking at once, like crazy people!’

‘It was damn cool,’ Ali added.

‘And arguing also,’ Zaheera said. ‘But after a lot of heart-to-heart, we decided to join in the hunt for the treasure, and we started breaking down the wall the very next day.’

‘But the treasure wasn’t in there,’ the pretty girl, Kareena, said. ‘Not that we’ve found so far. And that brought my dad into the mela .’

‘Arshan and Anahita invited us in for a talk,’ Jaya explained, smiling at the recollection. ‘When we got here, we found all the Daruwallas and all the Khans, and all the breaking-down inside. Then they invited us to join in with them, because they thought maybe the treasure was inside the wall between our two houses, on the other side. And to search through the upper floors, they needed cooperation from us. My husband, Rahul, agreed right there, on the spot. He’s mad for adventure.’

‘He skis,’ Kareena said. ‘In the snow.’

People shook their heads in wonder.

‘And you’re completely sure this treasure is really here?’

‘Count on it,’ Farzad said. ‘When we didn’t find the treasure in that wall, we started working on the ceilings and floors between us and the roof. It’s here, and we’ll find it.’

‘It’s a kind of madhouse, for sane people,’ Kareena finished for him. ‘With three happy families, one Hindu, one Muslim and one Parsi, all living together in it.’

The people around me, members of three extended families from three faiths, shrugged and smiled.

‘There’s no first and last here,’ Arshan said softly. ‘We’re in this together. We all agreed to split the treasure three ways, with equal shares to each family.’

‘If you find it,’ I said.

‘ When we find it,’ a few voices corrected me.

‘And this has been going on for how long?’

‘Nearly five years now,’ Farzad answered. ‘We started right after we found the parchment. The Khans came in a year after that, and the Malhotras came in about six months later. I went to college and Wall Street and back again, in the time we’ve been searching.’

‘But this isn’t our real job, or anything,’ Kareena Malhotra said. ‘My dad’s a doctor. Ali’s pop, Suleiman Uncle, teaches law at Bombay University. Arshan Uncle is an architect, which is how we can do all this renovation, without the whole thing falling down. And we’re all studying, those of us who don’t work full time outside, or with the kids here at home.’

‘The treasure hunt is what we do at night and holidays, mostly,’ Ali added. ‘Or if we get a free day, like this one, where everybody was so worried about Farzad being missing all night. Thanks for the holiday, cuz.’

‘Any time,’ Farzad smiled.

‘And we have two kitchens,’ Anahita declared triumphantly. ‘Veg and non-veg, so there’s no problem.’

‘Indeed,’ Jaya Auntie said. ‘Really, you know, a lot of differences between communities come down to ghobi and gosht, cauliflowers and kebabs. If there are two kitchens, everybody eats the food they like, and everything is hunky and this-thing -’

‘Dory,’ Anahita said, and the two women exchanged smiles.

‘And we’re all in this together, make or break,’ Ali added, ‘so we don’t have a reason to argue.’

‘Except for philosophy,’ Anahita contradicted him.

‘As interesting as this mystery is -’ I said, but Farzad cut me off.

‘I told you it would be interesting, didn’t I?’

‘Ah… yeah. But we still didn’t get to the part where I know why you’re telling me about all this.’

‘We have a problem,’ Arshan said simply, staring his earnest frown directly into my eyes. ‘And we were hoping you would help us with it.’

‘Okay. Tell me.’

‘An inspector from the City Council came here a few weeks ago,’ Ali said, ‘and he got a look inside at some of the work.’

‘He doesn’t know what we’re doing, of course,’ Farzad added. ‘We told him we’re renovating the houses to make apartments.’

‘What brought him here in the first place?’ I asked.

‘We think it was a neighbour down the street,’ Arshan explained. ‘He saw us taking delivery of some heavy steel girders a few months ago. We use them to support the arches, when we take out sections of the walls.’

‘He tried to buy our house a few years back,’ Anahita said. ‘The rascally fellow tried every trick in the book to make us sell. When we refused, he was angrier than a scalded cat.’

‘It’s bad luck to hurt a cat,’ Zaheera said, nodding sagely.

‘You mean, even in similes?’ Anahita asked earnestly.