The tea stall is just around the corner from the mosquito hut. It is small, a shelter for some poor animal during heavy rain. Three broken benches are scattered outside as though someone left them there in a hurry. A blackboard nailed to the entrance provides proper guidance to all customers. In handwriting that slants to the right are the following instructions in white chalk:
No Combing
No Singing
No Reading
No Standing
No Spitting
No Abusing
No Killing
I must bring myself onto the same side as Baba. Things that make perfect sense are false and should not be trusted. You must be illogical to understand the world. If I say a fish is out of water, you will say it is dead. I say, why pinpoint the obvious? If the sky is blue, you will say the day is clear; I say a beautiful angel has worn a blue gown and we are all looking up her legs from under it.
This tea stall is run by a tea girl. I thought all tea stalls were run by tea boys, all affectionately called Munna no matter how old they became. But this is a tea girl. Behind the small partition in the interior of the tea stall I see her head. Its sideways movement suggests she is washing something. I am glad we are here. I suddenly yearn for morning tea.
“Here we are,” says Daru.
“Now buy the tea,” Andha tells me.
“You order it,” I say out of respect. “We are in your area.”
“Sit on the bench. The tea will come,” remarks Daru.
The bench rocks under our weight. When the three of us stop shifting, it settles down. There are benches but no tables.
The tea girl walks out with two steaming glasses of tea. She is no tea girl, but a full-fledged tea woman. She hands the glasses to Andha and Daru. She sweats a lot; must be the steam from her large pot of tea.
“What tea, Munni!” says Daru. “Class. Too good.”
So all tea girls are called Munni. She has gone back in.
“What tea, Munni!” echoes Andha as he slurps the tea. He is quite loud.
“Etiquette,” says Daru.
“Manners,” says Andha. But his next sip is just as noisy.
I wait for my glass to arrive, but then trains are always late.
“Munni!” shouts Andha. “This pendulum is waiting for his tea. Hurry up!”
I hear a loud noise. I think I know what it is, but I am afraid to ask. Andha and Daru continue to drink, so I assume it is only a firecracker. They notice my concern.
“It’s only a gunshot,” says Andha.
“A gunshot?” I ask. “A real gun?”
“Yes, it must be Goonda,” he says.
“Goonda?”
“Contract killer.” Andha has almost finished his tea.
These impoverished men are casual. They are orange leaves falling on your cheek.
“Goonda is only coming for his tea. Why are you worried? You’ve done nothing wrong,” says Andha with a wry smile.
“Have you?” Daru roars with laughter.
They know about Malaika. I am going to be punished for it, killed in a cheap tea stall. If that is the way I am meant to go, so be it. But I refuse to be afraid. I will have tea with the contract killer. It should be like having tea with anyone else. After all, he is not going to pour the tea in his gun and drink it.
A thin, sunken man sways our way. His silky white clothes and shiny black gun are too loud for the ruins that surround us.
“Killed cockroach, bad cockroach,” he says to himself.
I want to tell him that the cockroaches, black and brown, are already dead. They have stopped coming to me. But before I can say this, he points his gun at us. I duck for cover and scramble underneath the bench.
“Get up, fool,” says Daru. “That’s his way of greeting you. Don’t swing like a pendulum before he even talks.”
Goonda stands very close to Andha and looks down at him. “You are blind, I am not,” he says. “Munni, is tea in the pot?” he shouts.
He then greets Daru. “You drink liquor, I drink not. Munni, is tea in the pot?”
He lowers his gun and looks at me. “You are delicate, I am not,” he says.
I cannot think of a single thing to say.
“You are delicate, I am not,” he repeats.
Daru glares at me; this makes me even more uncomfortable. Goonda simply puts his gun to my head.
Click.
With the click of Goonda’s gun, something clicks within me. I look at his arm and realize that his limb and digit, the opposite clutch, is the one that I must turn to the good. I must save Goonda’s arm, because I was unable to save mine.
“You are delicate, I am not,” he says.
“Munni, is tea in the pot?” I talk back.
He lowers the gun. “Pleased to meet you, I am not. Name is Goonda, contract killer, what?”
“I am armless, you are not. But I must save your hand, understand what?”
“Where did you find this specimen?” Goonda asks Daru. “From our area?”
“Yes. He’s staying with us.”
I can feel that Daru and Andha are proud of me. Their tuition has worked.
“Munni! Too long for tea,” shouts Goonda.
Yes, Munni. You take too long. Even I have not had tea. As Goonda walks to the interior of the tea stall, I look at Daru for approval. I am sure this was a test.
“There’s no bigger sinner than Goonda,” says Andha.
I look behind to see if Goonda is out of earshot. He has disappeared behind the partition with Munni. They must be lovers.
“All sinners deserve to be punished,” says Daru.
“We must go. We have a business meeting,” says Andha.
“No, your place is here. Goodbye, friend,” says Daru.
“You will soon be complete,” Andha says.
There is a gunshot. I find it hard to breathe. My stomach muscles clamp and I clutch at a wound. The bullet must have gone in so deep that there is no blood. I fall to the floor. The bench is the last earthly object I touch.
“You idiot,” I hear Daru tell me. “Just when we thought you had improved.”
“Did Pendulum think he is shot?” Andha asks Daru.
Goonda casually sways out of the tea stall. There is blood all over his silky whites.
“Too long for tea,” Goonda says. “So I sent Munni on a long holiday.”
“Sinners must be punished. They must be prevented from doing more harm,” whispers Daru. He and Andha walk away from the tea stall and toward their mosquito hut.
And then I finally understand. The solution is for Baba Rakhu to take away Goonda’s arm so he cannot hold a gun. Even Goonda will become a eunuch-dog. We are on the same side now, Baba and I.
Goonda goes to the blackboard. With his silk sleeve, he erases the No Killing sign. I have found the lost arm. It is Goonda’s arm, more lost than anyone else’s. It is that of a trigger-happy boy, skipping through the marketplace, killing everyone simply because the morning sun is out.
I know it is time to return to Baba Rakhu for a final visit.