reminded him of his village back home in Deri. Beyond the mango and guava groves and between the fields of wheat, mustard seed and sugar cane, the railway track ran the length of the Punjab skyline.
He and his best friend, Nazakhat, had loved trains. On many an afternoon after school, they would take the long way home so that they might get over to the track and walk on the rails. There was no chance of being run down by a train, as you could see as far as the horizon in each direction. Anyway, long before the train was in sight, you could feel the hum of its power beneath your feet. It was often the smoke they saw first, streaming a long trail in the sky, and then they would hear the piercing shriek of its whistle, which carried all the way to the village.
Although there was no need for danger, they often created it.
‘Let’s see who’ll jump off first,’ Jaspal had shrieked to his friend, as the train came nearer. They had waited and waited, giggling and wobbling about with arms outstretched for balance, each on his rail. Jaspal was to leap off on one side, Nazakhat to the other. As the train bore down on them, the engine driver would often be leaning out of his cab swearing and cursing at them, shaking his fist and telling them to get out of the way. But they would just shake their fists back, mouthing unmentionable insults and then, at the last minute, fling themselves aside.
Jaspal smiled at the memory. If only it was only the good times he remembered. But trains pounded through his dreams at night. Indian trains, filled with refugees, escaping from the mayhem which was caused when India was split into two to create Pakistan; when Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs set upon each other with vicious fury, and people were driven hither and thither. The shriek of the train whistle had been a scream of death; a scream of hatred and murder and massacre. He had seen it. The images would never go away, though he tried to forget. He tried to forget the day they fled from their village. He, his sister, his grandmother and mother set off for Bombay. His mother, Jhoti, had been saving small amounts of money each time Govind sent anything from England. She had this dream, this conviction, that they would be able to buy themselves tickets on a ship bound for England. ‘If your father won’t come to us, then we will go to him,’ Jhoti had declared. Such were the desperate times, everyone was rushing around trying to work out strategies for survival. There was no one to tell her whether or not she had enough money, what papers she would need or how she would get there. With thousands of others, she had simply set off for the nearest railway station.
In the pandemonium of overcrowded platforms and trains packed with refugees, Jhoti and her children were separated from each other. The force of the crush swept Jaspal and Marvinder onto a train, which then moved off, carrying them helplessly away. Now he and his sister Marvinder were here in England while their mother and grandmother had been left behind to an unknown fate. The pain of those memories was too much to bear. Mostly, he kept them locked away in the dark recesses of his mind. Better, instead, to remember his games and his friends – especially, Nazakhat.
There was a clicking sound of a signal being raised. A train must be coming. It would be the express bound for Bournemouth and the south coast. Jaspal felt the same old excitement. If only Nazakhat could see this. He pulled a notebook and pencil out of his pocket and heaved himself up onto the parapet, so that he could get a good view of the name and number of the engine. He could hear it now as it pounded nearer. A thrill of anticipation ran through him.
Suddenly a voice yelled over the increasing roar. ‘Oi!’ Jaspal dropped down and turned. ‘Hey! Blackface! Bandage-head!’ Johnnie Cudlip stood on the other side of the road, leering at him. Although he was only a little older than Jaspal, he was a big boy for his age. Taller by a head and shoulders than any of his peers, his body was clumsy and unwieldy, as if he wasn’t sure what to do with it. His hands looked extra large, sticking out from the sleeves of the blazer he had outgrown six months ago.
Johnnie hated school because it made him feel stupid. Because teachers, who were hardly taller than he, crushed him with sarcasm and seemed to forget that, though he was as tall as a man, he was only a child. Out in the playground and the streets, it was a different story. There, he was king. There, he ruled. He was the leader of a terror gang. All the children feared him for his strength and the way he enjoyed a really good fight. What the teachers did with their tongues, he could do with his fists and feet and brute force. Anyone who wasn’t with him was against him – and your life was hardly worth living if you weren’t on his side – that is, until Jaspal came into the neighbourhood and soon formed a gang of his own.
Ever since Jaspal had moved into Whitworth Road, Johnnie had been out to get him; but though Jaspal was shorter than he, and thinner, somehow, Johnnie could never get to grips with him. He would no sooner jump on his back and get his head into a stranglehold, than Jaspal would wriggle like a fish, slither like a snake – somehow just make himself smaller and slip out of his grip. Other times, when the two boys would come face to face with each other, Jaspal’s body seemed to solidify. He would stand upright, calm and still, except that the muscles in his neck were as taut as rope and his limbs all ready to strike like a whiplash. Many a time, Johnnie had set the gang on him, but Jaspal was fast, elusive and cunning. No one could outrun him. It was as if he could make himself invisible.
‘Hanuman, Hanuman,’ whispered their mother when Marvinder told her from inside her head. ‘Hanuman, the son of Vayu, the god of the wind. He has magic powers – and not even the king of the demons can kill him. Hanuman found Sita. One day, he will find me.’
‘You’re like Hanuman,’ Marvinder whispered to her brother, when she watched a gang fight one day on the common. It had been a brutal, bloody fight, but Jaspal couldn’t be beaten. If he got knocked down, he was up on his feet again in a trice. He seemed to have eyes at the back of his head, and when his enemies came up behind him, he would start whirling his arms about and yelling like a mad creature.
Jaspal took up the name. He liked the sound it made. Hanuman . . . Hanuman . . . general of the king of the monkeys’ army, fighter of demons; son of the wind god with powers to make himself invisible, or turn himself into any shape both big and small. He taught the word to his gang. Now, when they went into a fight, they would chant, Hanuman . . . Hanuman . . . Hanuman . . . and before they had even struck a blow, the sound of the chanting brought fear into the hearts of Johnnie Cudlip and his gang.
‘Watching for the chuff-chuff, are we?’ Johnnie sneered. Jaspal was alone. Alone, he looked small, thin and easy to bully. Taking advantage of a break in the traffic, Johnnie dashed over the road and stood menacingly close to Jaspal.
The train was hurtling closer in a great cloud of black steam and smoke. Jaspal would have to lean well over to see the number. It meant turning his back on Johnnie. He hesitated then, gripping the rail of the bridge, he heaved himself up to his armpits and, with his toes, found some rivets with which to steady himself. He leaned over as far as he dared. The engine smoke whirled about him. Suddenly he felt hands grip his legs. Johnnie tipped him so that he was almost see-sawing over the side.
‘Need some help, do you?’ taunted Johnnie, laughing fiercely.
Jaspal felt himself losing control as the train sped beneath him, under the bridge. Instinctively, he clutched the sides with his hands and, in doing so, let slip his precious notebook, which contained pages and pages of numbers and the names of engines, taken down over hours of train-spotting. With a cry of anguish, he watched it fluttering down onto the track, just as the last carriage was sucked from view.
With miserable fury, Jaspal kicked out with all his might and sent Johnnie stumbling backwards, almost into the road. A bus blared out a warning on its horn, and someone shouted, ‘Bloomin’ rascals! Why aren’t they in school?’
Free of Johnnie’s grip, Jaspal ran to the far end of the bridge. All he could think about was retrieving his notebook. He discovered a small space between the edge of the bridge
