Or was it some native code of honour, of loyalty to friends, which she doesn’t comprehend at all, some time-honoured custom sanctioned by centuries of practice by people of this unreadable nation? So preoccupied is she with these unwholesome thoughts that she misses the track looping back to the village. She stops for a while to reorient herself and instead of turning back, presses forward and then turns right at a field; she is sure if she continues down that road it will take her downriver to the village.
She is not wrong. A few minutes later she notices a few men and has a mild sensation of relief that she is nearing Nawabgunj. She reaches the rail tracks, crosses it and continues south: she must be somewhere in between Nawabgunj and its north-neighbouring village, the name of which she cannot remember. The place looks slightly more inhabited than the open country through which she had been riding earlier. She gets off her horse and decides to walk to the nearest gathering of people and ask for directions.
Suddenly her back is hit by something hard and heavy. She turns around, letting go of Pakshiraj’s reins. There are four men a few yards behind her. Two of them have lathis in their hand and one of them is bending down to pick up another stone. Miss Gilby is so sure that a stone has been hurled at her in mistake or by accident that she advances towards them to complain and ask them to be more careful. Before she has taken half a dozen steps, the young man who had been picking up a broken brick flings it at her, his arm moving back and then forward in a sweeping arc. It misses Miss Gilby narrowly but she is no longer left in doubt that she is their target; she is also certain they have been following her for some time. Pakshiraj takes fright at the flung brick and runs away across the field, neighing. Miss Gilby cannot mount him and gallop away to safety or to the nearest police station — she is left to face them alone.
As the distance between her and the assailants decreases, she recognizes two of the young men. She used to see them often in the market square; they smiled and wished this exotic foreigner in their village ‘Good morning, memsa’ab’, ‘Good evening, memsa’ab’ every time they saw her. This is some terrible mistake, she thinks; if only she can talk to the two familiar men, everything will be all right. They will understand and go away to summon help. The men exchange a couple of words, another stone is thrown. This hits her forehead and she sinks down on to the muddy field on her knees, clutching her head in pain and shock. A warm trickle gets into her left eye, blinding it momentarily. She didn’t know that her own blood could blind and sting her eyes.
The men gain in on her and before she has had a chance to look up, or hold out her hand in fragile defence, in protest, the lathi blows fall on her thickly, with a dull thwacking sound against her layers of clothing. She cowers and covers her head, cringing and squirming in the mud. She cannot see anything except moving feet, dark, dirty, shod in rubber sandals. She cries out in pain, in the vain hope that someone can hear her. And just as suddenly they had arrived, they disappear, running off across the field, shouting bande mataram, bande mataram. We hail thee, mother goddess. After that, Miss Gilby doesn’t remember anything.
TWELVE
Zafar says, ‘I’ll be back in half an hour. Just a quick drink at the bar. Let’s see what he wants. You stay here, OK? I’ll be back soon.’
Ritwik nods and watches him leave. An unexpected telephone call from one of his clients, he said; surprising that he should have come to the hotel within half an hour of the call, requesting to see Zafar, rather than let it wait until tomorrow. Must be something urgent, Zafar had said, although he added that he had no idea what it could be.
Ritwik counts one hundred, careful to space the numbers out equally, not rushing them, especially towards the end, and then leaps out of the sofa and goes to the table on which Zafar’s briefcase, papers, laptop, filofax all lie in crowded confusion. There is no point in looking at the computer; he doesn’t have a clue what to do with it, where to look. Besides, he might do something, in his ignorance, which will make it obvious that he has been snooping.
The filofax gives nothing away. There are a lot more entries in Arabic than he expected but then he forgets most of the time that Zafar is Arab. The English entries do not yield up their secrets either. Some names are followed by what appears to be clearly a name for a company or an institution: John Grimble, Fender Care Naval Solutions; Jonathan Pacitto, AgustaWestland; Al Lilley, Accuracy International; Randeep Modi, William Cook Defence; Simon Newton, LM UKIS Ltd. Ordinary names, ordinary addresses, ordinary phone numbers, all unrevealing and silent. He puts back the filofax exactly where he picked it up from and looks through the papers, first gingerly, turning up corners and edges, then more boldly, lifting them up, leafing through them. Latest newsletter from British Aerospace Ltd. A thick tome: SBAC Chain Directory. Society of British Aerospace Companies. A folded printout, like a giant compressed Japanese fan, of the SBAC ‘Members’ Capability Matrix’. It is a beautiful thing, with randomly positioned red and blue dots and, here and there, ticks, an Arab character or two, a ‘yes’, a few crosses, dispersed across the unfolding concertina. Donna Tartt, The Secret History. His attention is held by the spanking-new hardback: the blurb intrigues him and he makes a mental note to buy it, now that he can afford such luxuries. Zafar has dog-eared the page to mark the point where he has stopped reading. There is an official-looking letter from the Defence Manufacturers’ Association talking of strategic consultancies, cost-related improved efficiency, a forthcoming calendar of events, invitation to members’ meetings. Ritwik has to read each sentence a few times over to understand the purpose and meaning behind the unfamiliar jargon. By the time he reaches the invitation to the Defence Systems and Equipment International Exhibition, he is so bored — and a tiny bit guilty about intruding shamelessly like this — that he is ready to take a catnap. Something in the invitation letter catches his eye and he reads it carefully to pin it down. In a minute he has it — both the date and the word ‘Gloucestershire’. 13–15 May, Lydney, Gloucestershire. Today is the 12th.
A solid find at last, the secret of Zafar’s disappearance to Gloucestershire, but it comes as an anticlimax and the boredom floods back in again. The ringing phone makes him start: he cannot make up his mind whether to pick it up, whether he should, and by the time he has decided not to, it stops. A minute later, it rings again; he picks it up. It is Zafar.
‘Look, I have to go somewhere. Something’s come up. You can stay here but I shall be back very late. Or I can get them to call a taxi for you to take you home.’