“Ki? Mohit? What is happening?”
“Aii, saheb.” He stood dripping rainwater onto the reed mat and panting. “Why? Why?”
Farid rubbed sleep from his eyes and pushed his hair back. “Bhai?”
“You never gave Hasan the money.” Mohit thought he might cry. “That’s why the thief was still here in Bhatiary — he didn’t gain enough to leave, only enough to get himself killed.”
“What are you saying?”
“Did you arrange that too?” Mohit stepped forward to stand above Farid, staring down at him. “Because he might tell?”
“No, no.” Farid shook his head.
“You told me yourself — only someone with long experience and deep knowledge of the ships could have rigged the explosion. And who here has longer experience than yourself?”
“You don’t know what you’re saying!”
“Just tell me—” Mohit’s voice broke. “I’ve known you my entire life, saheb. You are the hero of Ghorarchar, the only reason the village did not starve years ago. When you selected me to come to Chittagong, I was so proud, I could have floated off the ground. And now...”
A long pause. Farid’s head dipped, and he mumbled something Mohit could not understand.
“What?” Mohit sank to one knee, to look Farid in the eyes.
“My daughter,” Farid whispered. “I told you, the school fees — she would have had to leave.” He hesitated. “She is not strong, like you. I would do anything for her.”
Rain gusted in through the open doorway, spattering the floor and desk. Mohit looked at the pictures on the wall, and felt the tears finally run down his face.
“What now?” said Farid, slowly.
“It is too late.” Mohit stood, stiff and aching. “I’m sorry, saheb. They figured it out, I guess, and they were already arriving. I came just before, but they’ll be along now. They gave me only a few minutes.”
“Who?” But Farid didn’t need or want the answer.
“Badai,” said Mohit, and he backed to the door. “Farewell, saheb.”
As he stepped out, the rain fell even harder, hammering with painful force on his head and shoulders. The world was a blur, and he stumbled, to be caught and held up by a strong hand.
“Careful, mashai.” Chauhan made sure Mohit was upright, then let go. They looked at each other for a moment. Finally Mohit nodded, once. Chauhan stepped past, up to Farid’s door, followed by several of his men. None had any more attention for Mohit.
You are still young, Chauhan had said.
Mohit walked away, not looking back, into the darkening rain and his life, to start over.
Ryan Zimmerman
Blood and Dirt
From Thuglit
Mosquitoes pricked Doyle’s skin. They whined in his ears. They tickled his eyelids. It had rained that afternoon, and Doyle should have known not to go into the woods after sunset, but he had to get out here, be by himself for a while. That’s what he’d told Sheila. She always let him go when he said that.
The path that Doyle followed was hard to see in the day, almost impossible now in the dim moonlight that filtered through the trees. Even so, Doyle didn’t have to pay the path much mind. He’d walked this way so often over the years that sometimes he expected to wake up some night and find that he’d sleepwalked his way to the patch of marijuana that grew at the end of the faint trail.
He walked through the pine flatwoods that radiated from the old family cabin that he and Sheila lived in, over a little clearing that his dad had called the prairie for as long as he could remember, and down into the swamp. He worried some about the cotton-mouths that sometimes curled up around the cypress knees, and stomped his feet on this part of the path to warn them away. He kept to the high ground, avoided the black pools that could hide gators and snapping turtles that could take off a toe as easy as a pair of tin snips.
A rise of ground led to a hammock ringed by a thicket of vine and scrubby oak saplings. Once through the brush, the mature oaks spread out overhead, sheltering the marijuana plants underneath. Here, Doyle sat on a bare patch of ground, listened to the raucous frogsong that surrounded him, thought about what he had come here to do. Way back at the cabin, the dogs were barking, the sound traveling through the woods, over the prairie, and down into the swamp, muffled by distance, softened in the humidity, to where Doyle sat under the oaks. He resolved to take action, and whatever reaction that might come from it.
When he got back to the cabin, Doyle could see his brother Ray’s pickup parked outside. That explained the dogs barking, he thought. He could see Sheila through the window talking to Ray’s wife, Polly. Sheila looked like she was trying to be polite, but Doyle could see in her body language that she was tense. She held herself stiffly, back too straight to be relaxed, hands clutching a bottle of beer as opposed to gesturing freely as she sometimes did. Nevertheless, a smile played across her face. Always the hostess, Doyle thought.
He took the steps up to the front door and went inside. Ray was sitting on the couch, beer in hand, but it didn’t look like it was his first of the night. “How’s it goin’, brother,” he said. His eyes were red and he spoke slowly. Doyle had seen him like this many times over the years, and he knew that the sluggishness could be deceiving. Ray’s temper lay coiled inside him like a moccasin that could strike out quickly and with little warning.
“Ray,” Doyle said. “Looks like you done started without me.”
“Don’t be rude, little bro, say hi to Polly.”
“Hi to Polly.” Doyle nodded in her direction. Polly smiled in response. She was a meek woman, Doyle thought. Probably learned to lay low having to live with Ray over the years. Hell, in private she probably was limited to yessir and nosir. This must be a vacation for the woman. Polly was hard to talk to. Not much of a conversationalist. Doyle sometimes joked with Sheila that Polly was conversationally constipated. He got a big kick out of that, but Sheila never laughed. Instead, she would just frown and tell him to stop picking on poor women.
“Where’s Ray Junior?” Doyle asked.
Polly looked to Ray before responding, gave him the chance to say if he wanted to. When he didn’t, Polly said he was staying at her sister’s.
Now Ray spoke. “Wanted to bring the little booger. Polly don’t seem to think he’s old enough yet. I say what the fuck? How old was we when Daddy took us on our first hog hunt? Six? Seven?”
“I think we was a bit older than that, Ray.” Doyle walked to the fridge, pulled out a beer.
“I still say what the fuck. Don’t want to raise a kid soft. Maybe that’s what’s wrong with you, Doyle.” Ray grinned, more like a dog showing his teeth than anything else, waiting for Doyle to take the bait.
Sheila spoke up. “Come on, boys. I can vouch that Doyle’s not soft. Least not till he’s done.”
“That woman of yours got quite a mouth on her,” Ray said.
“Don’t mind that.” Doyle gave Sheila a knowing look. “It’s just how she’s raised.”
In the night Doyle woke to the sound of barking dogs. “Shit.” He put his feet on the floor and walked out to the living room. It was dark, but he could see that Ray wasn’t on the couch where he had passed out a few hours before. He went to the extra bedroom. The door was cracked open so that he could see inside. Polly lay there on the bed alone, covered in mismatched sheets, facing the opposite wall. Doyle could hear her breathing. Slowly, she rolled toward him. Now he could see that she wore no nightclothes. The shadows of her ribs stood out in the pale light. Doyle saw her open her eyes, look right at him. She didn’t say anything. He shut the door.