TUESDAY, JULY 15, 1975, 4:36 P.M.
Willy and Sushmita were having their tea when I returned to the bungalow.
“You’ve been gone a long time,” she said. I saw the concern on her face, even as she tried to disguise it.
“Exploring,” I said.
She cocked her head. “Exploring? Where?”
“Around. I visited the ashram.”
“Oh, Danny, darling,” she said. “You didn’t do something mad, did you? Buy robes and sign up for their meditation classes?”
“No. Excuse me. I’ve got a headache. Maybe I ate something bad. I’m going to lie down.”
“Stick your fingers down your throat, Danny Boy,” called Willy as I took my leave. “You’ll feel relieved, trust me.”
In my room, I tried to put the pieces of my meeting with Harlan, Ranjit, and Birgit into some kind of order I might understand. First, I’d been a complete dupe. Granted, I was new to India, but this went beyond mere naïveté. I’d exposed myself to ridicule and perhaps worse, by carrying on the least secretive affair in the history of lovers. Second, Ranjit, who was the lead investigator on the case, and Harlan, who was working closely with him in an advisory role, wanted my help in bringing down Willy. I hadn’t even had a moment to consider their request, and I was too confused now to give it serious thought.
Finally, third, I was crazy for a woman who’d welcomed into her life—and two of her expensive homes—a man who would falsify, corrupt, and steal to make a dishonest buck. For, make no mistake, I blamed Sushmita as well. It was one thing to fall in love with an urbane, rich man from the Continent. But it was quite another to prop up his felonious, immoral business dealings in her heritage homes. She had to know what he was up to. Hadn’t she told me herself the day before that we could never survive on my salary? Was that all that mattered to her? Money? She owned beautiful properties in Bombay, Lonavala, and Poona. Surely, she could sell one of them, or get a job. She’d studied at Cambridge, hadn’t she?
These were the thoughts torturing me as I lay down on the bed, shades drawn and ceiling fan buzzing, to close my eyes and decide a course of action. Harlan had asked me to help. And Ranjit and Birgit had made compelling cases against my friend Willy. The friend I realized I didn’t know.
And, of course, I’d been fooled by Birgit, too. In the coffee shop of the Blue Diamond Hotel, she told me she’d been born in West Berlin to a German mother and an American father—an OSS officer—a year or so after the war ended. That she’d moved to Virginia at the age of seven when her mother was finally granted a visa, and she’d grown up on the outskirts of D.C., perfectly bilingual and determined to be a good American.
She was a DEA special agent, working mostly on drug cases involving Europe, for obvious reasons. Recruited straight out of Duke for her linguistic skills and superior test scores, Birgit was one of twenty-six female DEA agents. She went by Brigitte back in the States. Christ, did everyone have to have a different name? I was just Danny Jacobs.
Goddamn Willy, I thought as I lay on the bed. Couldn’t he have been a prick to me? Or vaguely indifferent? I might not have felt the conflict that troubled me now. And, most of all, couldn’t he have had a less attractive lover? One who didn’t light a fire in my heart?
I wanted to disappear. Leave them all behind and start anew back home. Be anonymous. Marry a girl who’d never thrown her lot in with a smuggler, a pimp, a drug dealer.
But then a thought occurred to me. For the first time since I’d realized my manservant was a well-trained cop—and the hayseed bigot I’d hated was, in fact, a disciplined, principled civil servant who’d been playing me for a fool—for the first time, yes, I realized that this was a chance. Here was a way to rid myself of the obstacle to my happiness. Willy. Was there a way to hand him over to the DEA, the CBI, or CID, and have Sushmita all to myself? It was the darkest impulse I’d ever experienced. Could I do it? Betray Willy and win the girl? The girl I couldn’t get out of my mind, even as I told myself she was a stranger to me.
TUESDAY, JULY 15, 1975, 8:02 P.M.
A light kiss on my forehead woke me.
“Mazha Danny. Wake up, my darling. It’s time for cocktails. I can’t bear it without you. Come.”
I stared up at her, wanting to tell her to go back to her man. But at the same time, wanting to … Never mind.
“What happened today, Danny?” she asked in a half whisper. “Something’s changed.”
At dinner, I told my hosts that I’d gone to the station that afternoon and bought my ticket back on the Bombay Express.
“You’re leaving us?” asked Sushmita. “When?”
“Tomorrow. I have to get back to work before I lose my job.”
“But what about the bomber?”
“I’ll ask Lokhande for help. I’m sure he can do something to protect me.”
“But we don’t yet know what the inspector’s intentions are,” said Willy. “I’m working on solving this, Danny Boy. Give it a few more days.”
I shook my head. “I’m going back.”
“Stay here, Danny,” said Sushmita. “You’re safe.”
I avoided looking her in the eye and addressed Willy instead, thanking him for his generosity. All I could think of was how much I wanted to get away. From Willy, Chhotu, Harlan, and—yes—even Sushmita. I was a nice boy from Connecticut. What business did I have hobnobbing with drug smugglers and DEA agents?
But I also wondered if I should leave. I hadn’t yet given Harlan my answer. He had no legal leverage over me, but still I felt the pressure to give him the cooperation he’d asked for. What that cooperation might entail, I could only guess. Maybe they’d want me to wear a wire or steal documents. Find out who his associates were.
A new thought occurred to me. I’d be only too happy to hand Chhotu to them on a platter. That might even solve my blackmail problem. But it would also amount to betraying Willy, which I hadn’t yet decided to do.
So, as I thanked Willy and kept my thoughts to myself, I had no idea what my next move would be. I knew I couldn’t tell Sushmita what had prompted my sudden decision to leave, even if she came to my room later that night. And she did.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 16, 1975, 12:06 A.M.
“You’re leaving?” she asked, her eyes pleading with me to change my mind.
“I’ve got to.”
“No, you don’t. What’s happened, Danny?”
“I’m worried about my job. And the sneaking around behind Willy’s back and the blackmail.”
“Don’t worry about Chhotu. I can deal with him.”
“How?”
“Chhotu was willing to keep our secret for a price. I’ll threaten to show Willy the blackmail note.”
“That’s brilliant,” I said. “Except for one problem. We burned it.”
She cocked her lips into a crooked smile. “No, we don’t have it. But Chhotu doesn’t know that. And I can let him believe it’s my insurance forever. A threat of mutual assured destruction.”
“You don’t think he’ll tell Willy about us before you get to him?”
“No, he wants money. And he’s afraid of me. He’ll wait.”
She was smart. And the smarter I found her, the sexier she became. And more dangerous. While I wanted to get away, I also knew it was going to be torture for me to leave her. If her plan worked—and it sounded good to me—then one obstacle would be eliminated. Of course that did nothing to solve my Harlan problem. Should I help him nab Willy? If I didn’t get killed, would it open the door to living happily ever after with Sushmita?
Happily ever after? With a girl who’d willingly signed on with a man wanted in several countries? A girl who lived with him, made love with him? Not in his houses, but in hers? I had to assume he’d duped her into believing he was a good man, otherwise I could have no respect for her. But even if she’d been tricked, why had she stayed with him? Would I, could I, be happy with such a girl?
Perhaps not happy. But obsessed? In too deep? I could be all those things. Of course I let Sushmita into my bed, thinking it would be the last time. I wanted it to be and, at the same time, I never wanted it to end.