have a point,’ Jaspal conceded. ‘But you live there. You see everything. Come on, think. If there is someone, you must know.’
‘Perhaps he got her from a newspaper ad,’ reflected Nazakhat. ‘I’ll find out one of these days.’
‘You re wrong. You must be. He wouldn’t marry.’ Jaspal finally hacked off another piece of cane and started to strip away the outside. ‘He’s not the marrying kind. Here.’ Jaspal handed Nazakhat the white fibrous stalk, dripping with sugar, and proceeded to hack one for himself.
A distant shriek of the train whistle made them sit up.
‘It’s the Amritsar train. ‘Jaspal leaped to his feet, his gloom fully vanished and his eyes now sparkling with enterprise. ‘Let’s catch it – eh, bhai?’
‘Are you going to school after all?’ Jaspal’s school was the intermediate college in Amritsar.
‘Nah! I feel like going to the pictures. Will you come?’
Nazakhat got to his feet. He was nervous about going into town. He loved films too, but, as a Muslim, he was afraid of going out of his neighbourhood. Memories of the past were still fresh. But Jaspal grabbed his arm warmly. ‘Come on, bhai. Say yes.’
‘Your school though, what about school? ‘Nazakhat asked weakly.
‘Oh, to hell with school! Come on!’
This was good old Jaspal. Nazakhat couldn’t resist. ‘Get a move on then,’ he yelled, pushing ahead.
They chucked away the sugar-cane and thrashed their way out of the field. They heard the whistle again. Nearer this time. They were running full pelt. They reached the edge of the long white road, dashed over and plunged down the dyke disappearing into the waves of barley. They re-emerged on the path dividing the saffron crop from the mustard seed.
‘Hey, wait for me Jaspal!’ yelled Nazakhat. He clutched his side as a stitch seared through his guts. Jaspal only slowed down sufficiently to glance over his shoulder and to give an encouraging yell. ‘Get on with it! We’ll miss it!’
A long streak of grey smoke in the sky straggled out like the hair of an old woman who shakes away the tangles of sleep. And again the siren; closer now, its pitch screaming out intervals as the train slowed down. Good old Hari Singh, the engine driver. He has relatives in this village. He does them a favour by slowing down here.
From out of nowhere, figures came leaping up the embankment along the track and others, like the boys, raced along the paths through the fields, as the great black, iron goddess approached with burning fiery belly and smoke belching out of her ears. She was many-headed and many-armed, flailing with limbs from the bodies which hung from her carriages and clung to the roof.
‘Make room, make room!’ shouted voices panting with exertion. They sprinted alongside with arms outstretched. It was each one for himself now. Jaspal noted a space the size of a hand on the vertical steel pole by one of the doors. He focused on it, running faster and faster. It was now or never as gradually the train began to pick up steam once more. He grabbed with one hand. It tugged his feet from beneath him, and only the friendly hands of others saved him from being dragged along, or dashed back on to the sharp chippings of the track.
He managed to find enough toe room on the wooden running board, and with both hands, he gripped the pole. His body arched from the train like a bow, the wind billowing his shirt. And so he stayed, hanging on for dear life, until Amritsar. But he laughed – an open-mouthed laugh, eating the air – and felt a pure, fierce joy.
He looked up and down the length of the train. Did Nazakhat make it?
He couldn’t see him beside the track, so he must have got on somewhere. They would meet up later.
‘Hey Jaspal! Are you going to the pictures?’ someone bellowed.
‘Yeah! It’s a Prithviraj Kapoor film today!’ Jaspal yelled back.
‘See you at the Rialto then.’
Jaspal loved going to the pictures. Often, he went alone, on afternoons when he should have been at school. He didn’t mind seeing the same film over and over again – even if each time it meant sneaking in without paying – especially the historical films about battles between rajahs and invading armies, and brave warriors of the past.
The outskirts of the city undulated into sight: walls and roofs and balconies hanging with washing; narrow alleys and streets teeming with people and animals. Black, long-haired pigs foraged in the rubbish tips, ambling alongside dogs and crows and other scavengers. Monkeys lined the walls, preening each other, slapping their little ones into line as they tumbled and played.
The train slowed down to give the tens of dozens of non-ticket holders a chance to drop from the train before it entered the station precincts. Jaspal lowered himself till his feet were running along the ground, then he loosened his grip and continued running to gain his balance.
Nazakhat caught up with him and the two left the track and headed across rough ground towards the city. Nazakhat always felt a little nervous about coming into the city. Although he had allowed his wispy boy’s moustache to grow, and his hair was thick and black and long to his shoulders, he was conspicuously not a Sikh like Jaspal. The vicious troubles of partition were still too fresh in people’s memories to enable him to feel comfortable. He would never have ventured there without Jaspal at his side.
The new Pakistan had wanted Amritsar too. ‘But what about our Golden Temple? ‘protested the enraged Sikhs. ‘Only over our dead bodies will our Golden Temple go into Pakistan with the Muslims.’ And there were many dead bodies before it was certain that Amritsar would stay part of India.
Nazakhat knew that any trips into the city meant he had to brave the taunts from gangs jeering, ‘What is that blood-drained, meat-eating, son of a pig-dog, hair-cutting Muslim doing, contaminating our holy city?’ But Jaspal had always been Nazakhat’s stout and loyal defender, and had got into many a brawl protecting him from mobs of youths out for trouble.
There were a few hours to kill before joining the queue which would start forming outside the Rialto. The boys headed into the bazaar. They liked to go to the metal area where they sold not only pots and pans, farming tools and kitchen utensils, but knives and daggers and swords of all descriptions. They fingered the sharp blades and counted their money. They knew they didn’t have enough, so after a lot of comparing and exchanging knowledge and expertise about the lethal nature of this weapon or that, and what kind of wound it could inflict, the shopkeeper realised they weren’t going to buy, and shooed them away. So they went to a tea stall and bought tea and samosas, and sat at a bare wooden table and grinned at each other and gripped each other’s hands – elbows on the table – to see who could force the other’s hand down first and prove the stronger.
‘Hey! Speak of the devil! Quick!’ Nazakhat grabbed Jaspal and thrust his head down under the table. ‘It’s Bahadur Singh, I tell you. I just saw him! Boy, would I be in trouble if he caught me here.’
‘Take it easy. What are you so scared of ?’ drawled Jaspal. ‘He never lays a finger on you.’
‘Yeah – but you should feel the hand of his aunt round your ear. She’s worse than any man. She hits so hard, all her bones rattle.’
‘Well, my father hits so hard you can’t hear anything for the blood pounding inside
