coffee while he stood by the window.
‘It’s going to be hotter today, if that’s possible,’ he opined. He was looking out at the garden, which was already shimmering in the heat. ‘We’d better get going unless we want to fry in the jeep.’
There were few other vehicles on the road. Several bullock carts passed them, heading out of town, and for a while they were caught behind a small boy who was driving his flock of goats to the fields. Eventually, he peeled away from the main thoroughfare and, with loud yells and brutal whackings of his stick, herded the beasts down the narrow lane leading to their barren grazing.
Grayson picked up speed again and they were halfway to the centre of town when he said suddenly, ‘Would you like to take a look at the old place?’
He meant the old bungalow, she knew, the one she’d shared with Gerald and his malevolent servant, the one that had stored stolen guns for a group of outlawed fighters and nearly cost her her life. She felt beads of perspiration on her forehead.
‘You don’t have to put yourself through it,’ he said quietly. ‘But I thought it might help.’
Would it help? She didn’t think so, yet she knew she had to see the house again. For years, she’d hoped she could break free of its frightening shadow. Grayson seemed certain that she had, that she’d coped with the past far better than she realised. But she knew differently. She hadn’t coped with it. Not really. Not deep down. She’d muffled it in bandages, layer upon layer of them. And though she’d wanted to come back to India, secretly she’d been sceptical that a return could act as any kind of purification. But here she was, and she owed it to herself to take whatever chance offered to lose the millstone she carried.
‘Yes, let’s take a look,’ she said, as casually as she could.
It was a shock when she saw the place. The garden had always been unkempt, Gerald having little interest and even less money to keep it under control. But now the alfalfa grass had grown almost to the roof line and a weed she couldn’t put a name to had started its inexorable colonisation, gripping the whitewashed walls in iron tentacles. Rajiv’s quarters to the right were almost submerged beneath the wilderness. As she looked across at the rooms he’d inhabited, she could conjure no clear picture, no clear vision of him emerging from his door, sullen-faced, suspicious, hostile. That was good. That particular image was rubbed clean.
‘It looks pretty dilapidated,’ Grayson said.
‘It never looked anything else.’
‘Not quite as bad as this though. In the ten years since you left, I don’t think it’s had a lick of paint. And see, several of the shutters are off their hinges. They won’t afford the house any kind of protection—and there’s a hole appearing in the thatch. Come the monsoon, the rain will pour through that roof and drown the interior. I imagine rot has already set in. A few more years and the house will crumble inwards.’
‘A waste of a bungalow,’ she remarked, though privately thinking that crumbling was exactly what was needed. If the house lay in ruins, she would be happy. It had only ever been the garden that she’d loved and that was beyond saving.
‘It is a waste. It would have made someone a good home. I made a few enquiries.’ That was news to her. So this unscripted visit wasn’t quite so unscripted. ‘The army tried to sell it as soon as they knew the regiment was to disband—they must have acquired the property years ago—and they were willing to sell at a knockdown price. But there were no takers. No one would even move in for free. The locals won’t come near the place.’
‘Because of what happened here?’
‘That hasn’t helped, certainly. The gang has become notorious in the district.’
Anish, too, she imagined. He would be just as notorious. ‘But they’re all in prison.’
‘That makes no difference. India is a land of superstition and superstition ensures that the gang will return to haunt the place. It doesn’t help either that the house was built on an ancestral burial ground. That in itself would be reason enough for the locals to avoid it. Far too many ghosts.’
Ghosts, she thought ironically. The ghosts she was supposed foolishly to have seen when she tried to talk to Gerald of her fears. Those particular spirits had turned out to be entirely flesh and blood, and criminal flesh and blood at that. But she’d had other phantoms to face and they were still with her. She turned away and walked back to the jeep. If she’d hoped the visit might prove an exorcism, it had been unsuccessful.
Grayson dropped her at the edge of the bazaar and then disappeared in a swirl of dust, intent on a mission that would take him deep into the network of narrow alleys and hidden courtyards. For most of that morning, he would be only a few hundred yards from her but she was sure she would see nothing more of him. He would keep a low profile and so must she. She’d had second thoughts about asking questions today. It might be better to postpone them until a second visit and in the meantime, learn or relearn her way around the sprawl of shops and traders.
She spent several delightful hours wandering between brilliantly coloured stalls and, despite her best intentions not to buy until she left for home, she came away with a bolt of the most beautiful emerald silk and a stock of coloured glass bangles. They would be small presents for any patients she had in the future, when or if she found another post. Miss Thornberry’s reaction to her resignation had been typically ill natured and she wasn’t expecting a glowing reference.
In the last few minutes, her skin had begun to burn, even as she stood in deep shade. It was time to turn for home and she headed for where she remembered the tonga drivers used to gather. Weaving a complicated path through the jumble of stalls, she edged her way through one narrow space after another, skirting the sweep of craft workers who plied their trade at ground level. Very soon she spied the tall plumes of a horse’s bridle and saw them move with the shake of the animal’s head. She felt pleased with herself that she’d managed to find the place unaided.
The sun was now directly overhead, its rays arrowing through the thick air and hitting the ground with such force that they bounced upwards and slapped her in the face. She felt sandwiched between two opposing armies, both brandishing fire, and it was a relief to climb into the first carriage she came to. She lay back in the shade of the faded cloth canopy and watched its decorative bobbles jump to the rhythm of the wheels, as the tonga swerved out into the traffic and made for Tamarind Drive. She was looking forward to home, to a cold shower and an even colder drink. And then a long rest on the cool counterpane. It was a guilty pleasure, a sheer indulgence, when at this very moment she should by rights be directing the activities of a busy ward.
But when she walked up the veranda steps, her plans received a setback. Mike was sitting at the dining table surrounded by paper, and she felt disconcerted. She had expected him to be at the office. He looked up when she walked in and she thought he seemed irritated. That was probably her imagination, for his face relaxed quickly into a smile and he folded the map he’d been studying and asked her how her first day’s return to Jasirapur had gone.
‘Don’t clear the table for me.’ She gestured to the stack of papers he’d begun to load into his ancient briefcase. ‘I’m ashamed to say the bazaar has tired me out and I think I may take a sneaky nap.’
‘I don’t blame you. This heat is a killer. But I have to go back to the office
