WHEN NEXT she opened her eyes Urmila was lying in the shade of the pillared portico of the Haldar mansion. Her sight was blurred and her head was spinning. A large indistinct shape was hovering above her, and beyond it were about a dozen hazy faces, looking anxiously down at her. A voice was shouting in her ear; she couldn't tell what it was saying; the accent was odd. Someone was fanning her with a newspaper; someone else was offering her a glass of water. The chowkidar was somewhere in the middle distance, gesticulating and arguing with someone she couldn't see.
Gradually, as her vision cleared, she saw that the large blur in front of her was a face, the face of a man, a man with a short, trimmed beard. He looked somehow familiar. 'Miss Calcutta:' he was shaking her shoulder. 'Come on, wake up. Where'd you get these? I've got to know.'
'Get what?' she said. He was waving something at her, but she couldn't see what it was.
'These,' he said impatiently. 'This stuff you brought with you; these papers.'
Brushing his hand away, she sat up. 'Who are you?' she said. 'Why are you shouting at me like this?'
He looked at her nonplussed. 'Don't you remember me?' he said. 'We met that day, at that auditorium.'
'What do you mean, we met?' she said. 'I don't know your name, or who you are, or what you do or anything.'
'I'm L. Murugan,' he said. 'I work for LifeWatch.' Murugan took out his wallet and handed her a card. 'I know who you are,' he said. 'I don't recall the name exactly, but I know you work for Calcutta magazine.'
'That's all you need to know,' she said. 'Now kindly explain what you are doing here.'
'Me?' said Murugan. 'I wanted to ask Mr Haldar's permission to visit his Robinson Street property, so I thought I'd come and introduce myself.'
'And why were you shouting at me?'
'I've got to know where you found these.' He produced the crumpled bits of Xerox paper she had found in the packet of fish. 'Can you tell me?'
'How dare you?' she cried. She lunged at his hand and snatched the papers away. 'These are mine. They belong to me.'
'They're not yours,' he said, grabbing at them. 'They have nothing to do with you.'
'They're mine and I'm going to keep them,' said Urmila.
She screwed the papers into a tight little ball and tucked them into the front of her blouse.
Murugan gritted his teeth. 'Look,' he said. 'You've found something that just might be the key to one of the mysteries of the century, and all you want to do is start a custody battle?'
Urmila rose slowly to her feet. 'Why do you want them so much?' she said. 'They're just bits of waste paper.'
'OK,' said Murugan. 'I'll tell you what: I'll save you the trouble of flushing them down the toilet. Give them back to me.'
'There is no need to get agitated,' she said coldly. She rose to her feet, and directed a look of enquiry at the faces around her. 'Where's my fish?' she demanded, of no one in particular. Someone handed the soggy packet back to her. Taking a firm grip on it she set off down the path, towards the gate.
Murugan ran after her. 'Wait up,' he said, trying to collect himself. 'Look, what is it that you want? Do you want money or something?'
She threw him a contemptuous glance and walked on. 'Then what?' said Murugan.
'I want to know what's in those papers.'
He caught hold of her elbow. 'Look,' he said, in as placatory a voice as he could muster. 'You haven't even told me your name. All I know about you is that you work for Calcutta.'
'My name is none of your business,' she answered, shaking his hand off. 'And kindly do not touch me.'
'Oh, so is that going to be your attitude?' said Murugan, his voice rising. 'So what shall I call you, then, since I'm not going to be granted the honour of an introduction? Miss Calcutta? Or perhaps even just Calcutta, or would that be too intimate? Too affectionate, you think? Your husband might begin to suspect some hanky-panky, some panking hankies, some untoward hanking and panking… '
'I'm not married,' Urmila said coldly.
'Oh, better and better: you just made my day, Calcutta, I'm going to count the seconds till the hanking ends and the panking begins, but before we start heaving our hanks let me tell you something, Calcutta, let me feed a little factoid into your database: let me tell you how this works: let me set your priorities a little more in line with the real world. You don't get to ask me the questions: you see what I'm saying? It's Dr Morgan who gets to decide what you deserve to know and when.'
She narrowed her eyes. 'Is that so?' she said.
'You want an explanation,' he said. 'You're going to get it. But I'm going to choose the weapons and the venue.'
He ran to the road and stopped a taxi.
'Po G. Hospital,' he said, to the Sikh driver. 'Quick; let's go.'
Chapter 28
ANTAR SHIVERED: he felt distinctly ill now. He would have to find a way of letting Tara know that he wasn't up to having dinner with her.
Fortunately she'd been wearing a beeper the last few weeks. Switching screens, he keyed in a few words: Regret must cancel dinner; explain later. He called up her number and dialled the message through.
The beeper had come with a new job Tara had found, a few weeks ago. The woman she was working for now was a stockbroker who often worked late: she liked to stay in constant touch with her four-year-old and had insisted that Tara carry a beeper.
The job was a good one, Tara said, much better than the one she'd lost: the pay was fair and better still, the boy was good-natured and his mother relatively undemanding. Tara never lost an opportunity to thank Antar for helping her to find the job.
But the truth was that if Antar had helped at all, it was only in a rather roundabout way. One morning, about a month ago, he had noticed her hanging about her apartment at a time when she was usually out at work. Pushing up the kitchen window, he called out: 'What's the matter? Not going to work today?'
She stuck her head into the air-shaft, and gave him a rueful smile. Her wispy hair was tied in an untidy knot and she looked as though she hadn't bothered to change after getting out of bed.
'I would if I could,' she said. 'But the job's not mine any more.'
'What happened?'
'Well,' she said. 'The gloss that was put on the matter was that I had rather reluctantly been allowed to depart. But the fact was they needed someone with the right papers so they could get a tax write-off.' She shrugged and made a face.
'Oh,' said Antar. 'Well, that's too bad.' It took him a moment to digest this bit of news.
'Haven't you found anything else yet?' he said. 'I thought babysitters were snapped up the minute they hit the market.'
Tara shook her head resignedly. 'The best jobs are posted on the Net,' she said. 'And I can't afford a susbscription. Come to think of it, I can't afford a computer and wouldn't know what to do with it if I could.'
'On the Net?' Antar was astounded. 'Babysitting jobs? You're joking. Surely?'
'I wish I were,' she said. 'But it's true. I've looked in the Irish Echo and IndiaAbroad: not a thing in either.'