The way she kept repeating that phrase filled Anil with a sense of helplessness. “It doesn’t make sense. You’re not making sense. Leena, do you hear yourself? They killed another woman. They wanted to kill you, tried to kill you. What do you think they’ll do to you when they find Ritu here? We have to call the police.”
“No!” Leena cried.
He threw his hands in the air. “What are you going to do, Leena? You can’t keep her here forever.”
“Why not?” Leena glared at him.
Anil stopped pacing and looked at her.
Her expression was stern, her eyes unflinching. “I can keep her. She can live with me. It’s only me and my mother here. We don’t have much, but we have space for one more.” Her eyes opened wider. “Oh God. Dev!” she said. “He’s still there. God knows what they’ll do to him without his sister to protect him.”
“Leena!” Anil grabbed her arm. “This is not your problem anymore. They are not your family.” He stopped and took a deep breath. “How can you take such a risk with these people who almost killed you?” He pictured the envelope of cash, fifty thousand rupees, back in his room, ready to return but insufficient to repair the damage it had caused. When Leena didn’t respond, he rubbed his forehead furiously with his hand and sank down to the ground. “You don’t have to do this, Leena.” His felt his life, his dream, slipping away.
“Perhaps that is true.” Leena’s voice was steel, her eyes unyielding. “But those children were the only ones who treated me kindly in that home, the only ray of hope I had for more than a year.” A tear slipped down her cheek. “Ritu kept me alive when I thought I would rather be dead.” She pointed toward the house. “And I will not turn my back on her now.”
“They’re his children, his flesh and blood,” Anil said. “You’ll never escape that.”
“At least some good might come of the bad,” Leena said. “It won’t have been for nothing.”
31
ANIL’S BEDROOM DOOR SWUNG OPEN AND BANGED AGAINST THE wall. He jolted awake and reached for his specs on the nightstand. When he put them on, the figure of his younger sister came into focus—hands on her hips, jaw set. “What is it?” Anil sat up. “What’s wrong?”
“She’s gone.”
“Who?”
“Who do you think?” Piya said. “Ritu! She’s gone.”
Anil swung his legs out of bed and went to the window, as if he might be able to see her out there. The fields were still and empty, the morning light filtering into the broad sky. From downstairs, he could hear the sounds of mealtime and chatter. “What do you mean she’s gone? Did the police come for her?”
Piya’s eyes bore into him. “She overheard you and Leena fighting last night. She told Leena she didn’t want to put her in any danger. Leena assured her everything would be fine, but this morning, Ritu was gone.” She walked over to the window. “She’s gone, Anil.” Piya crossed her arms across her chest. “You’ve been away too long, bhai. You don’t even see how you’ve changed. Maybe that’s the way you deal with things in America, just call the police and wash your hands. But not here, bhai. It’s not right.”
In that moment—from the sick feeling that rose in his stomach at the thought of Ritu walking alone in her battered condition—Anil knew he’d been wrong. Under different circumstances, this was a child he would’ve admitted to the hospital. Instead, he’d seen her as a sort of threat to their safety, their independence, their life. He’d already been thinking of himself and Leena as they, an entity together, one that had become imperiled. He’d allowed his judgment to be compromised by the loss of his dream. Anil cursed himself as he hastily pulled on his clothes.
“Where are you going?” Piya called after him as he left the room. “Don’t go over there, Anil.” Her voice rose after him. “She doesn’t want to see you.”
Anil ran down the stairs and into the gathering room. Everyone was sitting around the table, eating breakfast. “Oh, look who managed to get up before noon.” Chandu smiled. “Good morning, Anil bhai. Everything okay?”
Anil shook his head. “Nikhil, can you part with Kiran and Chandu for the day? I need their help, for just one day, I promise.”
“Of course, bhai,” Nikhil said. “You need my help too? We’re just puddling the rice paddies today. The field hands can do it without me.”
Anil considered the offer and what it meant coming from his brother, but he shook his head. “No, you need to take care of things here, keep everyone settled.” Nikhil nodded and Anil gestured for his other two brothers to follow him outside. He led them to the far end of the porch, where they huddled over a small table and formulated a plan.
WITHIN THE hour, they were ready to go. They met up in one of the distant crop fields, out of sight from the Big House. Chandu had borrowed a truck and some provisions from his delinquent bhang-growing friend. Kiran had persuaded two of his larger cricket teammates to come along. Anil wasn’t sure what his brothers had traded for these favors, but he was grateful to them. When Piya became aware of their plan, she wanted to come as well, but Anil convinced her she was more valuable at home, keeping Ma occupied and unaware.
Kiran drove the truck, with one of his teammates next to him, providing rough directions to Dharmala. Anil and the others rode in the rear of the truck. Once they had cleared the outer limits of Panchanagar, Chandu unzipped a bag he’d brought and pulled out a pistol. Anil felt a gripping in his chest. “You think we need that?”
Chandu took a ragged square of cloth from his pocket, rolled it up, and tied it around his forehead. “With people like this, you have to show strength.” He tucked the pistol into the back of his waistband.
Anil’s palms began to sweat. He had never held a gun, much less fired one. Perhaps it would have been wise to go duck hunting with Amber’s brothers after all.
Over the next hour, as Anil anticipated the confrontation ahead and the violence that might ensue, bile rose in his throat. Strangely, it calmed his nerves to watch Chandu, who made such a convincing bandit that Anil wondered if he should worry. But today, his youngest brother made him feel secure, as did Kiran’s friends, each of whom held a cricket bat across his lap.
When they drew close to their destination, Anil recognized the small white house Piya had described, with marigolds out front, and after another kilometer or so, the dilapidated croplands. Chandu shook his head as they drove by the fields of wilted wheat stalks and rotted cotton bushes. Stray goats with visible ribcages wandered through the pastures nosing at the plants, looking for sustenance. Kiran parked in front of a house with a decrepit grand facade and revved the engine to announce their arrival. His two buddies hopped out of the truck, cricket bats swinging at their side, and Anil climbed out after Chandu.
The house was large, nearly as large as the Big House, with a similar porch wrapped around the front. Anil spotted Ritu, camouflaged in the earth surrounding the water well as she crouched down on the ground, her torn clothes caked with dirt, her hair wild, and her eyes frightened. She scrambled backwards, away from them, then stopped abruptly. Anil saw a chain joining her wrists to the well. She was tied up like an animal, an image reinforced by the frantic scanning of her eyes and her whimpering sounds.
Anil told the others to stand back and took a few slow steps toward her. Ritu crawled away again, shielding her head with her chained hands. With a rush of shame, Anil realized she considered him an enemy. He squatted down and held out one hand as slowly as he could. “Ritu, we’re not here to hurt you. We’re going to take you away from here.”
Ritu’s eyes darted from Anil to Chandu, to Kiran’s buddies with their bats. She began to cry and shake her head.
“We’re not going to hurt you,” Anil repeated in his most calming voice. “We’re here to protect you. You remember, I’m a friend of Leena? Your Leena didi? We’re going to take you back to her.”
The front door burst open. “What’s the meaning of this?” a potbellied man in an undershirt and dhoti shouted. “You hoodlum
s get off my property before I kill you myself.”
Anil froze, still crouched on the ground. Was this the man, Leena’s husband? The one who’d hurt her, desecrated her? His stomach tightened. Kiran’s buddies swiveled toward the front door.
A second man came through the front door, younger and more handsome than the first. “What do you want? Who are you?”
Anil realized that must be him. He stood up and walked toward the house. “Anil Patel, son of Jayant Patel.”
The younger man’s face shifted with recognition. “I know your father.” His face grew a sly smile. “He gave me a bad deal. Why has he sent you here? I won’t take that wretched woman back, no matter how much you pay me. I’m done with that garbage.”
Anil clenched his fist at his side and took a deep breath. “I’m here for the girl.” He nodded toward Ritu. “We’re taking her away from here, from you . . . animals.”
“Oh-ho?” The potbellied man laughed. “Who’s the animal? She’s the one who came crawling back here in the night, hiding in the back of a truck until they found her and dumped her on the road.”
Anil fought the urge to lunge at the man. “Let the girl go. Leave her and Leena alone,” he said. “They are dead to you, understand?”
Potbelly leaned forward and spat a stream of betel-nut juice onto the porch, adding to the smattering of old stains. Papa would have whipped anyone who soiled the Big House porch like that. “Dead is what they should be.” He snorted. “Less trouble that way.”
Chandu was standing at Anil’s right shoulder, Kiran at his left. Anil stepped forward onto the bottom porch step, and his brothers followed, flanking him. Anil could see the face of a small boy inside the house peering through a window. He lowered his voice. “Listen to me. If you ever come anywhere near them again, I will go to the police and have you both thrown in jail.”
Girish smirked. “The police already investigated that bitch’s lies and found no wrongdoing.” He raised an eyebrow. “Unreliable witness.”
“Yes, but that was a long time ago,” Anil said. “People forget. Memories fade. Wallets empty.”
“That’s right,” Chandu added. “Once wallets empty, memories fade very quickly, it’s true.”
“Maybe the police will want to investigate again,” Kiran said. “Murder is a very serious crime.”
“What murder?” Leena’s husband said. “That bitch Leena isn’t dead, is she?” He laughed and looked over at his potbellied brother. “Too bad.”
“But your first wife is.” Anil watched recognition dawn on the men’s faces. He climbed two more steps toward the porch. “Did you know, even when you burn a body, even when there’s nothing left but ash, you can still find traces of that person left behind in the soil? It’s called DNA. Deoxyribonucleic acid. You can find it years later, decades even. One hundred percent guaranteed.”
“What nonsense are you talking?” Potbelly said, but Anil noticed the stricken look on Girish’s face.
“It’s true,” Kiran said, throwing an arm around Anil’s shoulders. “My brother here is a very educated man, a doctor from America. He knows all kinds of advanced scientific techniques. You should see the special tools he has back home.”
“What, you think a person can just vanish into thin air?” Chandu clucked his tongue. “Poor, stupid village idiots.”
“Nonsense,” Potbelly said, elbowing his younger brother. “Don’t listen to him. He’s trying to pull our chain.”
“No, it’s true,” Anil said. “And the interesting thing about DNA is it’s like a fingerprint, absolutely unique to each person. Except it’s also passed down to your children.” He nodded toward Girish. “So we can tell exactly who this girl’s true mother is. Her father too. With one simple test.”
“Fine, take the girl,” Potbelly spat. “We don’t want her anyway. She’s useless, another mouth to feed.”
Kiran walked over to the well and unknotted the chains that tethered Ritu’s wrists. When she was free, she stood and slowly walked toward Kiran’s extended hand. Anil watched incredulously as the girl allowed Kiran to lift her in his arms. His brother carried her back to the truck, her face bobbing above his shoulder. When they passed in front of the porch where the two men stood, Ritu raised her head and spat at the ground.
“The boy too.” Anil nodded toward the window. As he spoke, the front door creaked open and the little boy who’d been watching from inside darted out past Potbelly and Girish, calling out Ritu’s name as he ran toward her. One of Kiran’s friends caught him in mid-run and picked him up.
Potbelly spat on the porch again. “Good riddance,” he muttered. But Anil caught a look of regret in Girish’s eyes as he watched Dev being carried toward the truck.
Chandu leaned toward Anil and touched his arm. “Come on, bhai, let’s go,” he whispered. “You got what you came for.”
Anil shook his head. “Not yet. They still have to return what they’ve stolen.”
“Heh? Now you’re calling us thieves?” Girish said. “I haven’t stolen a thing from anybody. If anyone’s a thief, it’s your father. He took those gold coins from me and promised me a good wife in return. Instead, I got nothing but trouble with that woman.”
Anil’s palms were sweating again, but he refrained from wiping them on his pants. “I want the things you took from Leena’s family—the jewelry and saris, everything.”
“Those were gifts,” Girish said. “Part of the girl’s dowry.”
“They were not given willingly.”
“Well, people change their minds. That’s not my problem.” Girish snorted.
A man who paid off others to absolve his own moral failings could surely be bought himself. The envelope filled with fifty thousand rupees sat in Anil’s back pocket. His stomach curdled as he thought of its origins: money paid once already by Papa to this man who’d abused Leena, repaid to his father by Leena’s parents, who had sacrificed everything to do so.
Anil turned toward the truck. Ritu’s face was framed by the open window on the passenger’s side, where Kiran had settled her and Dev with a blanket and bottles of Limca. Anil could detect the faintest tug of a smile at the corner of her mouth as she watched them from her safe perch. Kiran looked like a palace guard, standing outside the truck, his arm resting on the window frame.
“If I let you keep the jewelry, you leave them alone,” Anil said. “Forever, understand? Otherwise my brothers and I will be back, and we won’t be so understanding next time.” Chandu took the pistol out of his waistband and let it dangle from his hand until both men wobbled their heads in agreement. Potbelly spat another red stream of betel-nut juice onto the ground and retreated into the house, Girish following behind.
32
AS SOON AS THEY WERE A SAFE DISTANCE AWAY, KIRAN STOPPED the truck and Anil opened the passenger door to take a better look at Ritu. This time, she allowed him to gently examine her wounds: there were lacerations all over her body, bruising on her ankles and wrists where she’d been bound, and capillaries had erupted in one of her eyes, making it seem as if she were crying tears of her own blood.
“We have to get her to the hospital,” Anil told his brothers. “She has so many injuries, there might be internal bleeding or broken bones.” They drove directly to Ahmadabad, to the hospital where Anil had completed his clinical rotations in medical college. Kiran carried Ritu into the hospital and stayed with her and Dev while Anil went to find the senior doctor in charge. It was decided Chandu would drive the others back to Panchanagar and return the next morning.
“Chandu.” Anil grabbed his brother’s arm. “Do you know anyone with the police?”
“I’ll check into it,” Chandu said before leaving.
THREE HOURS later, Anil and Kiran sat by Ritu’s bedside as she slept deeply, Dev curled up at the foot of her bed. Her X-rays had revealed broken bones in both wrists, which had been set in casts. Her lacerations had been cleaned and stitched, and she’d been given several units of saline for dehydration, and antibiotics
for infection. The ER physician who examined Ritu told Anil that, despite the extensive physical trauma, there were no signs of sexual abuse.
The physical healing would be the least of the challenges Ritu faced in the days ahead, and Anil knew Leena was the right person to guide her down that long road. But his own wounds were fresh, his heart ruined over losing Leena from the life he’d envisioned. He tried to console himself with thoughts of the fellowship and everything he had to return to in Dallas, but it all felt hollow.
Unable to sleep, Anil decided to wander around the hospital. Some of it looked familiar: the simple front lobby without a single plant, the elevator with its overhead fan. But much had changed in the past several years, including the addition of a full-scale radiology lab on the basement level and a neonatal intensive care unit. Two more wings were blocked off for construction. How different this was from the rudimentary medicine he’d practiced in Panchanagar years ago, on a warm summer night when the midwife called. He could conceive of coming back here now and having a real medical career, one without compromise.
Anil found his way to the cafeteria, where the smell of food pricked his appetite. He realized he hadn’t eaten anything all day. Glancing at the menu board, he smiled when he saw the third item listed under Vegetarian, after chana masala and saag paneer, was cheese pizza.