Baba Deep Singh whirled his sword against his enemies.
The whole cinema was on its feet, Jaspal too, cheering him on – howling at these Afghan enemies who dared to defile the sacred temple.
Nazakhat sank lower and lower in his seat. He dreaded the moment when the lights would come up and everyone would recognise him as the Muslim enemy. Before the film ended, he whispered to Jaspal, ‘I’m dying for a pee. I’ll meet you outside.’ He wriggled himself out of the row and escaped from the seething darkness of the cinema.
For the next twenty minutes, Nazakhat hung about outside waiting for the film to end. At last the doors were flung open and the thick velvet curtains tossed aside. Usually, when the boys came jostling out, they were still part of the film. They carried on the action, chasing and play-fighting and quoting back all their favourite bits. But today was different. The men, nearly all of them Sikhs, some of them Hindus, but no Muslims, poured from the cinema, their eyes shining with excited fervour. Nazakhat, sheltering behind one of the pillars in the foyer, strained to find Jaspal. Then he saw him. Jaspal looked dazed, walking slowly, while everyone around him swirled past.
‘There you are!’ exclaimed Nazakhat, leaping out and linking arms.
Jaspal turned and looked at him blankly, as if he were a stranger. He withdrew his arm and moved away – almost imperceptibly – but Nazakhat knew.
They came out into the street.
‘Hey!’ cried Nazakhat playfully. ‘What’s up with you?’ and he jumped on his friend’s back and tried to tussle him into a play fight.
‘Get off !’ growled Jaspal.
At first Nazakhat carried on, teasing and goading, trying to provoke him into action. Jaspal threw him off so roughly that he tumbled to the ground.
‘Yeah!’ laughed Nazakhat, thinking it was all in fun. Then he saw Jaspal’s face. It was frozen in anger. His eyes were narrowed and his lips tight. ‘Hey, Jaspal! You OK?’
‘Just leave off will you!’ Jaspal muttered vehemently and walked ahead through the bazaar.
Nazakhat got to his feet, amazed and disturbed. Jaspal could be moody, he knew that, but this was the first time he had felt his hostility; an enmity even.
Instead of heading for the railway station, Jaspal turned towards the old quarter of the city.
‘Eh, bhai! Brother!’ Nazakhat called uneasily. ‘Aren’t you going home? The train goes in ten minutes. We haven’t got too much time.’
‘You go,’ shouted Jaspal over his shoulder. ‘There’s something I want to do,’ and he strode away even faster, disappearing into the throng of the bazaar.
Nazakhat stood, unable to move for a minute or two. First and foremost he longed to catch up with his friend and beg his forgiveness for whatever it was he had done to make him angry. Surely he didn’t blame him for the actions of those Afghan Muslims in the film? But the thought of his cold, unfriendly face restrained him. With an uncomprehending shrug he carried on to the station.
Doubts overwhelmed Nazakhat. Were not he and Jaspal still the best of friends? He looked at the scar on the palm of his hand. They were blood brothers. Their history went back a long way. They both remembered – had nightmares of remembering – when their village was burned and all around them people – their own friends and neighbours and families – were massacred. Yet, how, despite the danger, first Jaspal’s family had sheltered Nazakhat’s family when a band of Sikhs came burning and driving out all Muslims; and then how Nazakhat’s family had protected Jaspal and his mother and sister when Muslims came on a murderous raid, intent on revenge, killing any Sikh they could find and burning down all their property.
Everyone had gone mad with blood lust, but the two families, Nazakhat’s and Jaspal’s, had never betrayed each other, and their friendship stayed true till the end, when Jhoti and her children finally fled.
It was two years before Jaspal returned to his village. The two friends had greeted each other joyfully – hardly able to believe that the other was alive. Bit by bit, Jaspal learned the terrible fate which had befallen Nazakhat’s family.
‘They came again,’ whispered Nazakhat.
Both knew ‘they’ meant the jathas, the Sikh war bands who had ruthlessly tried to defend what they saw as their homeland. It was because of the splitting of the Punjab into two. One part in India would be ruled by Hindus and the other part in Pakistan would be ruled by Muslims. The Sikhs could not accept it, and fought like trapped tigers. Should they not have a homeland too?
‘We should have got out earlier,’ said Nazakhat despairingly. ‘Gone to the Pakistan part – but this has been our home for generations. We all lived like brothers – Sikhs, Muslims and Hindus. We thought we could see it through. But the jathas were like crazed demons,’ he wept. ‘I saw them all killed – my father and brothers – with swords and knives. They showed no mercy; not even for my mother, my sisters or my grandmother.’
‘How did you escape?’ Jaspal had whispered, hardly able to comprehend such a loss.
‘I don’t know. I just don’t know. I was there. I saw my little brother dying. I held him in my arms. I nursed him and rocked him and begged him not to die. A Sikh saw me. He raised his sword and brought it down to strike off my head. I felt its wind as it slashed past my ear, but it just crashed into the ground beside me and he didn’t touch me. After that, it was as though I was invisible. They went on slaughtering – any Muslim they could find – and burning and screaming. I just sat there with my dead brother in the middle of it all – the smoke, the flames and the blood – until they went. Then there was a silence – a terrible silence. More terrible than anything. No one moaned or stirred or called out even to God. No dog howled. No vulture screeched. No wind blew. It was a hell of non-existence. Why didn’t they kill me, Jaspal? Why?’
‘Because,’ Jaspal said as softly as a stalking tiger, ‘because they recognised you as a brother. My brother. Look.’ Jaspal took out his kirpan – his dagger. He held out his left hand and slashed its palm. Red drops of blood immediately spouted. ‘Will you be my blood brother?’ he asked, staring intently at Nazakhat. Without a word, Nazakhat held out his left hand and allowed Jaspal to slash it. As the blood flowed, the two boys clasped hands and rubbed their palms together and then licked the mingled blood.
‘Brothers for ever!’ cried Jaspal.
‘Brothers for ever!’ Nazakhat agreed joyfully.
Nazakhat stared now at the faint scar which crossed the fate line and life line of his palm. He felt a great chasm of despair opening up inside his stomach. ‘Brothers for ever?’
When Jaspal left Nazakhat after the film, he headed for the Golden Temple. That was where the action in the film had taken place. Jaspal had been to the temple many times. Now, all he wanted was to step on that dazzling white marble and imagine Baba Deep Singh whirling his sword in defence of the temple. He wanted to see where the blood had been spilled and hear the clash of swords and spears.
He wound his way through the bazaar, looking neither to the right nor the left; ignoring the teeming shops and hawkers yelling their wares, until at last he was outside the great white façade.
He
