The Mountain Shadow (67 page)

‘You’re going to meet Karla?’ Didier asked me, as we watched him leave.

‘At eight.’

‘I have some things to do, my friend, so I will leave now. But I will be available for you later, and I will wait in the Taj for some time, if I discover any news.’

‘Thanks, Didier.’

‘It is nothing.’

‘No, I mean it. The owner of this building is your friend, and this is one of your areas, because the local don is your friend, and that’s why I’m safe here. Thanks, for everything.’

‘I love you, Lin. Please, do not suffer that I say it. We French have no chains on the heart. I love you. We will solve the mystery of sad, sweet Lisa, and then we will march on.’

He left, and I stood in each of the strange, new rooms I’d just rented for a year, on instinct. It was my first home, after the home I’d made with Lisa. I was trying to live again: trying to plant a new tree, in a new place.

I walked back to the balcony, folded my arms on the rail and watched the wheel of lights, red-yellow-white, making slow fireworks where five avenues met and dispersed.

A crow landed on my balcony for a moment, inspected me, ruffled its feathers and flew away. A group of teenagers crossed with the signal, laughing and happy, on their way to the budget shops on Fashion Street.

A distant temple bell sounded, followed by chanting. Then the Azaan rang out from somewhere nearby, clear and beautifully sung.

Is this the place?
I asked myself. I wanted a place. Any place. I wanted a home.

Is this where I find it?
I wanted connection. I wanted to give everything I had to one love, and be loved in return.

Is it here?
I stared at the crossroad, hoping for an answer, as white, red and yellow lights made dragons from weaving lines of cars.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

I
WAS EARLY, AND SO WERE THE STARS
arriving at the Taj in limousines for a gala to promote a new movie. I parked the bike beneath a palm tree, across from the hotel, waiting for snail minutes to make the long creep to eight and my appointment with Karla.

Through the wide doors of the lobby I saw the sponsor wall, with special guests posing for photographs in front of brand names that had paid them by the second. Flash, flash, turn this way, turn that way: the mug shots of the privileged, caught in the act.

The limousines stopped, the photographers hurried to other headlines, and the sponsor wall was dismantled. The spacious, gracious lobby, where great thinkers had discussed great ideas on rainy Bombay afternoons, for rainy decades, was barren and businesslike again.

To hell with early. I walked around the hotel to a back door, guarded by a man I knew, and climbed the promenade stairs to Karla’s door. I knocked, and she opened it.

Her feet were bare. She wore a black silk lounging suit. It was trousers and top all in one, sleeveless, with zip pockets, and a zip front.

Her hair was tied up in a knot behind her head. There was a thin, silver letter opener, in the shape of a Damascan sword keeping the knot together. Karla.

‘You’re early,’ she said, smiling but not inviting me in.

‘I’m always early, or late.’

‘That’s a talent, for a man in your line of not-working. You wanna come in?’

‘Sure.’

‘Rish!’ she called, over her shoulder. ‘Our interview is over.’

She pushed the door wide, and I saw Rish, one of Lisa’s partners at the gallery. He rushed forward.

‘I’m so sorry, Lin,’ he said, holding my hand in both of his. ‘It’s a terrible shock. Dear Lisa. A terrible loss. I’m . . . I’m just beside myself with grief.’

He squeezed past Karla, sidestepped me and scuttled away down the corridor. It was a long corridor.

‘A man who’s beside himself,’ Karla said, as Rish scuttled, ‘usually has a fool for company. Come in, Shantaram. It’s been a long day.’

She walked back into the suite and sat on the window-seat couch.

‘Make me a drink, please,’ she said, when I’d closed and locked the door. ‘I love it when I don’t make the drink.’

‘What’ll it be?’

‘I’ll have a Happy Mary.’

‘A
Happy
Mary?’

‘It’s a Bloody Mary, without the red corpuscles. And rocks. Lots of rocks.’

I made the drinks and brought them to sit with her.

‘Shall we toast?’ she asked.

‘To running away angry?’ I suggested.

She laughed.

‘How about to old times, Shantaram?’

‘To fallen friends,’ I countered.

‘To fallen friends,’ she agreed, clashing glasses with me.

‘You’ve gotta snap out of it,’ she said, taking a long sip of her drink, before putting it down.

‘I’m okay.’

‘Bullshit. I just gave you four leads – fool, happy, blood, and rock – and you didn’t go for any of them. That’s not you. That’s not you and me.’

‘You and me?’

She saw my mind working, and smiled.

‘Why are you so determined to find out who gave Lisa the dope?’

‘Aren’t you?’

She picked up her glass again, studied it for a while, drank off a coalminer’s finger, and turned all the queens on me.

‘If I find out who did it, or if you do, I’ll probably want to kill whoever it is. It’s the kind of true that makes people kill people. You really wanna go there?’

‘I just want to find out what happened to Lisa, that’s all. I owe her that, Karla.’

She put her palms on her thighs, let out a gasp of air, and quickly stood up.

She crossed the room to the escritoire, opened her handbag, and took out a brass cigarette case exactly like Didier’s.

With her back to me she lit a joint, and smoked it doggedly.

‘I didn’t think I’d need this, tonight,’ she muttered, between deep breaths.

My eyes moved down her body, bowing to her. Her silhouette, wrapped in black: love was shouting inside me.

‘It was either this,’ Karla said, her back still turned to me, ‘or breaking a bottle over your head.’

‘Right . . . what was that?’

She stubbed out the joint, took two more joints from the case, snapped it shut, dropped it into her handbag and returned to the couch.

‘Here,’ she said, shoving the two joints at me. ‘Catch up.’

‘I’m kinda high already.’

‘Fuck you, Shantaram. Smoke the fucking joints.’

‘O . . . kay.’

I smoked. Every time I made to say something, she pushed the joint at me again gently.

‘You know,’ I said, when she let me, ‘that’s twice you’ve said
Fuck you
to me, in the same day.’

‘If it’ll make you feel any better,’ she drawled, ‘say
Fuck you
to
me
, right now.’

‘No, I –’

‘Come on, get it off your chest. You’ll feel better. Say
Fuck you, Karla
. Say
Stop fucking with me, Karla
. Go on. Try it.
Fuck
 . . .
you
 . . . Karla.’

I looked at her.

‘I can’t,’ I said.

‘I bet you can, if you try.’

‘Can I say
Fuck you
to a sunset? Can I say
Fuck you
to a galaxy?’

She smiled at me again, but her eyes were fierce. I had no idea what she was thinking.

‘Look,’ I said, ‘let’s get something straight. I just want to know what happened to Lisa. I want some kind of resolution, for Lisa, and for us. Don’t you see that?’

‘It’s a steep slide from resolution to retribution,’ she said. ‘And a lotta people rush off that cliff.’

‘I’m not the cliff-rusher type.’

She laughed. ‘I know everything about you, Lin.’

‘Everything?’

‘Pretty much.’

‘You do, huh?’

‘Test me,’ she purred.

I laughed, and then realised that she wasn’t kidding.

‘Really?’

‘Smoke the fucking joint,’ she said.

I smoked.

‘Favourite colour,’ she began, ‘blue, with green: leaves against the sky.’

‘Damn. Okay, favourite season?’

‘Monsoon.’

‘Favourite –’

‘Hollywood movie,
Casablanca
, favourite Bollywood movie,
Prem Qaidi
, favourite food, gelato, favourite Hindi song, “Yeh Duniya Yeh Mehfil”, favourite motorcycle . . . your current motorcycle, blessings be upon her, your favourite perfume –’

‘Yours,’ I said, holding up my hands in surrender. ‘My favourite perfume is yours. You’re damn good.’

‘Of course I am. I’m born for you, and you’re born for me. We both know that.’

A breeze from the sea ruffled through the room, announcing itself with a flourish of sheer, silk curtains. It suddenly occurred to me that I’d been in the neighbouring suite, years before, visiting Lisa.

Am I mad? Or was it just stupid not to say the words, not to tell Karla the truth: that I didn’t understand her relationship with Ranjit, that I hadn’t found the way to open the fist my life had closed over memories of Lisa living, and thoughts of her dead? I didn’t want to be with Karla wreathed in grief. I wanted to be free, to be hers alone. And that wasn’t going to be soon.

‘Lisa was –’ I began.

‘Shut up,’ she said.

I shut up. She lit the second joint, and passed it to me. She padded over to the small bar, grabbed a chunk of cubes from the bucket, and three-quarters filled a new glass.

‘You’re supposed to put the ice in first,’ she said, pouring vodka slowly over the cubes, ‘and add the Happy Mary with attention.’

She took a sip.

‘Ah,’ she sighed. ‘That’s better.’

She thought about things for a while.

‘It’s been a damn long day,’ she said to the ceiling.

‘What happened with Ranjit, Karla?’

She flashed a look from the angry part of the feminine divine. My heart got colder in my chest. She was magnificent.

‘What did I say?’

She grit her teeth, as if putting them on display.

‘You
finally
peer through your shawl of sorrows to ask about
me
, and what
I’m
going through
?
It’s moments like these, Lin, that give
Fuck you
such long legs.’

‘Wait a minute. I didn’t ask you about Ranjit before, and about why you left him, because I thought it was obvious. He’s a prick. I just wanted to know if there was anything specific. Did he threaten you?’

She laughed, pretty hard, and put the glass down. She came to stand in front of me.

‘Stand up, Shantaram,’ she said.

I stood up. She put her fingers into the front of my jeans, and curled them around my belt. She pulled me toward her.

‘Sometimes,’ she said, not smiling, ‘I just don’t know what to do with you.’

I had a few suggestions, but I didn’t get to make them. She shoved me back on the window seat, and sat down beside me.

‘It’s a
week
, for us, since Lisa died,’ she said, ‘but it’s only yesterday, for you. I get that. We all get that. And it’s freaking you out that we don’t seem to be getting how important this is to you.’

‘Exactly.’

‘Shut up. Kiss me.’

‘What?’

‘Kiss me.’

She put her hand behind my neck and drew our lips into a soft, brief kiss, then pushed me away again.

‘Look, this isn’t about Ranjit, and it isn’t about Lisa. I know your heart can’t let go of this, because I know you, and I love you. That’s –’

‘You love me?’

‘Didn’t I just say it, before? I’m born for you, and you’re born for me. I knew it the first second I saw you again, on the mountain.’

‘I . . . ’

‘But I also know all your weaknesses. We’ve got a couple of them in common, which is always a good start to any relationship. But I –’

‘Relationship?’

‘What are we talking about here, Shantaram, if it isn’t us?’

‘I –’

‘Back to your weaknesses. We’ve gotta –’

‘You’re my only weakness, Karla.’

‘I’m your strength. More than half of it at the moment, it seems to me. Your weaknesses are that you whip yourself with guilt and smear yourself with shame. I’ve been waiting for you to evolve, grow up, and grow out of it.’