My Brother’s Keeper

- 12 -

My first instinct was to run. But where could I go?

Dixie controlled the stairs, Pudd’n was a formidable presence behind us. In any case, I would not leave Ameera to face those two alone.

While we stood there, Dixie advanced warily and came to within about nine feet of us: too far away for any attempt at manual combat, even if I had possessed the talent and taste for it.

I took Ameera’s hand firmly in mine and led her towards the music room. Pudd’n retreated warily before us. Whatever our harmless appearance, neither man was taking any chances. Dixie kept a safe three paces behind us.

“Lee-yo-nel!” Ameera’s voice was frightened.

I squeezed her hand with an assurance I did not feel. “It’s all right. Stay next to me, and don’t move quickly.”

Dixie circled us until we were facing each other. The gun had been transferred to his right hand, and he was training it alternately on me, then on Ameera.

“Back up, and sit down.” He lifted the gun until the open barrel pointed a dark circle straight into my right eye. “On the settee. No funny moves, or you get it.”

As soon we were sitting side by side on the settee, Dixie came around behind us and put the gun against the back of my head. My scalp shivered at the cold touch. We sat perfectly still while Pudd’n came forward and frisked us.

“Sit tight, Missie, I’m not trying to get fresh,” he said apologetically to Ameera as he ran his hands gently along her breasts, armpits, and thighs. “They’re both clean, Dix. Not even a penknife.”

Dixie gave a high-pitched laugh of relief. “Pity, really. Two bloody weeks we’ve waited here for you. That deserves something from both of us.” He moved the gun away from my head, while I shivered at the venom and triumph in his voice. “An’ I owe you a good one. That stuff you poisoned me with had me puking for two days. You’ll pay for that before I’m done with yer.”

Pudd’n went back to sit on the piano stool, while Dixie again circled to stand in front of us.

“How did you know where to look for me?” I said.

As I spoke I looked around the room and wondered about our driver. How long would he wait before he decided that something was wrong? Hours, at the least — we had been that long with Srinivasa.

“Use your loaf, man.” Pudd’n turned back to face the keyboard. “You left a trail a mile wide gettin’ to India . Scouse couldn’t believe it when he found you’d bought a ticket as Lionel Salkind — he was sure you’d have some other fake passport. An’ once he knew you were goin’ to Calcutta , it was obvious you’d be coming back here.”

“I’ve never been here before in my life.”

“Yer, pull the other one,” said Dixie nastily. “We know you were here for sure. Belur told us that months ago, before he croaked.”

He wiped his sleeve across his nose and stared curiously at Ameera. “Anyway, what’s wrong with her? Why’s she starin’ at me like that?”

“She’s not staring. Ameera is nearly blind. She isn’t seeing you at all.”

“You kidding me?” Dixie stepped a little closer and peered hard at Ameera, looking into her eyes. “Hey, kid. How old are you anyway?”

“I am fourteen years old.” Her voice was husky, and she was trembling a little. Her head turned slowly from side to side, like a hypnotized animal. “Lee-yo-nel, who are these?”

“Fourteen!” Dixie turned his head to give Pudd’n a brief glare of triumph. “See, I was right about the Nymphs as well. He’s like all you bloody musicians, screws anything that lets yer.”

“You’re an old poof, Dix — you’re just jealous of my good looks,” said Pudd’n. His voice was good-natured, and the relief in both men’s expressions was obvious. Waiting for our arrival must have been boring and nerve-racking. “Relax a bit, can’t you? We’ve got ’im now, an’ that’s what counts. Who cares if he’s got her on Nymphs or not? That’s their business.”

Instead of more talk, Pudd’n expressed their jubilation differently. He started to play. His choice was “Les Fastes,” one of Couperin’s masterpieces, and Pudd’n picked the riotous passage that the composer described as “the jugglers, acrobats, and tumblers, with bears and monkeys.” Dixie had to keep his gun trained on us, but I noticed that his feet automatically went into a little back-and-forth shuffle with the music, like dancing in place — no doubt which Couperin group he belonged in.

“Like that?” said Pudd’n to me as he finished.

“Pretty good. You’ve been practicing hard since I last saw you. But it’s supposed to be in C Minor, you know. You put it up a tone.”

“Don’t make much odds on this bleedin’ thing.” Pudd’n crashed his left hand flat on the keyboard. “It’s all way out of tune, flat as hell. But you’re right about the practice. There was bugger all else to do around this place until you got here.”

He ran a fast chromatic scale up three octaves.

“Never mind all that,” said Dixie . If it wasn’t music you could dance to, he wasn’t interested. “Let’s get ’em through into the back.”

He nodded his head towards the door. “Come on, you two, on yer feet.” He leered. “I didn’t know there’d be two of you, but I’ve got a nice little love nest for you back there. Real cozy.”

The gun couldn’t be argued with. Pudd’n led us along the corridor, then down another staircase that took us below ground level. Dixie , bringing up the rear, must have noticed my glance towards the front of the house before we started downwards.

“Don’t waste your time wonderin’ about old Gunga Din,” he said. “I dumped a handful of rupees on him, an’ he’ll be back at the station by now looking for his next fare.”

That ended any hopes I might have had about our driver.

We came to the bottom of the stairs, where a solid door led through into a small, windowless room. The heavy padlock and metal frame suggested that the place had been created originally as a store for valuables, probably tea and spices as well as family papers. Broad shelves ran along three walls, and the only furniture was a chair, table, and narrow bed. Seated upon the latter, and rising casually to her feet as we entered, was Zan. It only needed Scouse to make the London cast complete.

“You’re a cool one,” said Dixie . “Didn’t you hear the noise? He could have been shootin’ me an’ Pudd’n full of holes for all the help you were.”

“No such luck.” Even before she spoke, the animosity between Zan and Dixie was obvious. It seemed to crackle between them, a field of hate and contempt. Two boring weeks, cooped up in each other’s company, had changed smoldering dislike to active rage.

It was the first hopeful sign since we had entered the house. I remembered how Scouse had sent Zan out of the room when they started to torture me. If she was no more than Scouse’s mistress, dragged into this thing against her will, she might be ready to make the break from them.

Her first act was promising. Ignoring Dixie ’s curses, she stepped forward to Ameera and took her hand.

“This is an added factor.” Her husky voice was thoughtful. “Where did she come from?”

Dixie shrugged. “Ask Casanova there. She’s his bit of stuff.”

Zan flashed him a look of loathing. If she was Scouse’s mistress, he had chosen fire over comfort. “You simple-minded fool. Can’t you see what a complication this introduces? We know his background, where he came from and who might look for him. What about her? Where is her family?”

Dixie had flushed at her tone. “How the fuck am I supposed to know where her family is? She come in the door with him, right, an’ we’ve never seen her before, right? I don’t know who she is, but you don’t need to be a mind reader to know who’s screwing who — just look at ’em. If her family don’t mind that, they’re not likely to be worryin’ when she’s not home by teatime. Why don’t you use your bloody loaf, instead of tellin’ me I’m stupid.”

“Steady on now.” Pudd’n used a carefully neutral tone. “The main thing is, we’ve got him. That’s what Scouse told us to do, an’ we’ve done it. Zan, why don’t you get him on the phone, sharpish, an’ tell him? You an’ Dixie can’t afford to be fightin’ — we’ve all got work to do.”

Zan looked at him thoughtfully. Her eyes were shielded by heavy lids, and it was hard to know how she reacted to his comments.

“Did you search them?” she said at last.

“Yeah,” said Dixie .

“No,” said Pudd’n. “I mean, all I did was look for weapons. You mean papers an’ other stuff, don’t you, Zan?”

“Naturally.” Again her look at Dixie held only contempt. “If we come seven thousand miles to seek the Belur Package, we ought at least to look for it. I would be surprised if he is carrying it on him, but we cannot rule that out.”

“But we know he doesn’t have it,” objected Dixie , “or he wouldn’t ever have come back here.”

“Logical, but not necessarily true.” Zan stepped forward to Ameera. ” Dixie , you keep them both covered.” She began to search Ameera carefully and unhurriedly, exploring each item of clothing down to skin level, while Pudd’n did the same thing to me.

“Here’s something,” he said after a few minutes. “Look, it’s got the old Belur phone number on it.”

He was holding the paper that Leo had left for me, with its cryptic message. If they could read any more out of it than we could, good luck to them. First Pudd’n puzzled over it, then the other two each had their turn.

“Arabic, is it?” said Dixie . “Can’t Scouse read that for us when he gets here?”

Zan shook her elegant head. Something about her gave me shivers, but I couldn’t be sure whether the feeling was pleasant or unpleasant. All I could say for certain was that when she brushed against me as she was searching Ameera, a tingling wave had run like cold water up my spine.

“Scouse speaks Arabic, but he never learned to read it or write it,” she said.

“We don’t need Scouse.” Dixie nodded his head at me. “Not with ’im here to do the work for us. Give me an hour with him, alone, and I’ll get you a translation.”

“No.” Zan moved to stand in front of him and they stood, eye to eye.

Dixie was the first to flinch. “All right, let’s see what Scouse has to say about that,” he grumbled, and moved away. “When are you going to call him, anyway?”

“Now. He should be able to take an overnight flight and be here by noon tomorrow.” Zan set off purposively towards the door, pausing only to give first me and then Ameera a strange and speculative look. Again I felt the vibration up my spine.

“What about these two?” said Pudd’n.

“They can stay here.” She turned in the doorway and slapped her hand against the jamb. “You checked this place out properly, didn’t you? No way they could break out of it?”

“The door’s metal lined, and the walls are concrete block,” said Pudd’n. “They’re safe enough, but there’s no lavatory. And no food. We didn’t expect two of them — what do we do with her?”

“We’ll worry about that after I’ve called Scouse.” Zan and Dixie left. Their relationship had not improved during the last interchange, and they carefully avoided looking at each other. After an apologetic glance at the narrow bed, and a shrug of his heavy shoulders, Pudd’n followed them out.

The door boomed shut with a clang of finality, and a second later the light went out. The switch must be outside the room.

This time, Scouse’s mob was taking no chances.

The darkness was harder on me than on Ameera. To her, a light haze had simply become darker haze. We groped our way forward for a few seconds until we located the bed, then while I sat uselessly on it Ameera explored the room using her hands, feet, tongue and nose.

She had slipped off her shoes. I heard her padding around quietly, sniffing curiously in one place, rubbing her hand or foot against the floor or wall in another. At last she came back to where I lay and snuggled beside me on the bed.

“No good?” I said. Somehow it seemed right to whisper, even though there was no one to overhear us.

“It is no good.” Ameera moved closer to me. “It is solid, the way that the man said. Lee-yo-nel, what will they do with us?”

“They will let you go — maybe tomorrow.” I tried to sound confident. “But they want to keep me here and ask me questions about Belur.”

“But you do not know about Mr. Belur.”

“They don’t believe that.”

“What will they do to you?”

Burn me with cigarette ends. Beat me to death and then stick me in the river, the way they had handled Valnora Warren. Torture me to learn my secrets, and then fry me to a crisp on a high-voltage wire, the way they had treated Rustum Belur.

“Lee-yo-nel?” Ameera interrupted my gloomy introspection. “Why did the man with the scratchy voice say that you were using the Nymphs with me? That is not true. I am a full-grown-up woman, not a child.”

“Eh? How do you know about Nymphs?”

“Everyone here — every girl in India — knows about them. Lee-yo said that most of the nymph-et-a-mine tablets for the whole world are made near Calcutta . But why do the men here say that you use Nymphs?”

“Ameera, you shouldn’t be thinking about that sort of thing.” I lifted myself higher on the bed. “People who use this drug are sick — sick in their minds. Let’s talk about something else.”

“Lee-yo-nel!” Her body jerked against me. “How can you say that the Nymphs are bad? What is wrong with them?”

“Everything. They make little girls want sex.” I didn’t want to talk about it, but Ameera would not change the subject.

“How can it be right,” I went on, “when men drug children and force them to have sex? It’s wrong, and it must be stopped.”

Ameera was silent against me for a long time, then she sighed. “Lee-yo-nel, you do not understand anything. You think I am blind, but you see less. My sister will marry next year. I will give her a wedding gift of Nymphs.”

“You will do what?” I wondered if the Madrill treatment was making my brains into mush. “Ameera, you are insane even to think of that. What will her husband say?”

“He will never know.” Ameera’s voice was angry now. “You do not understand our ways — Lee-yo was the same. My sister is ten years old. The new laws say she is a child, and she is too young, but my father says she is not too young. He wants a rich husband for her, and she will find one only if she marries soon. So she will marry. Without the Nymphs, she will have soreness, and bad hurt, and bleeding, and bad fear. Her wedding night will be all pain, as it was pain to me. I was married at ten, and widow at twelve. All the nights then were fear and pain.”

She was weeping against my chest. I suspected that the tears were not for herself, they were for all the young girls of India . I stroked her hair gently, and waited. She had never made such a long speech to me before.

“We will not need Nymphs when the men are changed,” she said at last. “Lee-yo-nel, you are not like this, I know it. But four years ago, I would have starved to get those Nymphs you tell me are so bad.”

She was silent for many minutes. At last her regular breathing told me that she had fallen asleep. I lay awake beside her, wondering what tomorrow might bring. No matter what I had told Ameera, I was sure that they would not let her go either. To leave this house alive, we would have to escape from it.

How?

My head was aching again, but I dared not lose time in sleep. The room we lay in was silent as a grave. As the night wore on I reviewed again and again what we had seen of the house, what I knew of Pudd’n, Dixie , Zan and Ameera, and how I might put that knowledge together to free us. It was slim pickings, but after a couple of hours I could see only one hope.

Reluctantly, I woke Ameera. We whispered for many minutes, huddled close in the unrelenting darkness.