Shantaram (124 page)
"What?"
"Yes," he whispered. "These fellows, they actually know that Sapna. They speak to him almost of every day."
"That's not possible," I said.
"Oh yes, Linbaba. They are his friends. And we are making the army-the army of poor fellows. We will teach those Muslims who is the real boss here in Maharashtra! That Sapna, he killed the mafia boss, Abdul Ghani, in his own mansion, and put the pieces of his body all around his house! And the Muslims, after that they are learning how to fear us. I must go now. We will see us, before too much time, isn't it? Goodbye, Linbaba!"
He ran off through the lanes. I turned away, to walk unsmiling into a sudden mood that was anxious and angry and forlorn. And then, as it always did, the city, Bombay, my Mumbai, held me up on the broad back of a nourishing constancy. I found myself at the edge of a devoted crowd gathered before the new, large hut belonging to the Blue Sisters. Men and women stood at the rear of the crowd, while others sat or knelt in a semi-circle of soft light at the threshold of the hut. And there in the doorway, framed by haloes of lamplight and wreathed about with streamers of blue incense smoke, were the Blue Sisters themselves. Radiant.
Serene. Beings of such lambent compassion, such sublime equanimity, that in my broken, exiled heart I pledged to love them, as every man and woman who saw them did.
At that moment I felt a tug at my shirtsleeve and I turned my head to see what seemed to be the ghost of a gigantic smile with a very small man attached to it. The ghost shook me, grinning happily, and I reached out to enclose it in a hug and then bent forward quickly to touch its feet, in the traditional greeting to a father or mother. It was Kishan, Prabaker's father. He explained that he was in the city for a holiday with Rukhmabai, Prabaker's mother, and Parvati, his widow.
"Shantaram!" he admonished me when I started speaking to him in Hindi. "Have you forgotten all your lovely Marathi?"
"Sorry, father!" I laughed, switching to Marathi. "I'm just so happy to see you. Where is Rukhmabai?"
"Come!" he answered, taking my hand as if I was a child, and leading me through the slum.
We arrived at the little group of huts, including my own, that clustered around Kumar's chai shop near the crescent of the sea.
Johnny Cigar was there, with Jeetendra, Qasim Ali Hussein, and Joseph's wife, Maria.
"We were just talking about you!" Johnny cried as I shook hands and nodded my greetings. "We were just saying that your hut is empty again-and we were remembering the fire, on that first day.
It was a big one, na?"
"It was," I muttered, thinking of Raju and the others who'd died in that fire.
"So, Shantaram," a voice scolded in Marathi from behind me, "now you are too big a fellow to speak to your simple village mother?"
I swung round to see Rukhmabai standing close to us. I bent to touch her feet, but she restrained me, and joined her hands together in a greeting. She looked sadder and older within the soft endearments of her smile, and grieving had put a swipe of grey in the black pelt of her hair. But the hair was growing back. The long hair I'd seen falling like a shadow dying was growing back, and there was living hope in the thick, upward sweep of it.
Then she directed my gaze to the woman in widow's white standing beside her. It was Parvati, and a child, a son, was standing with her. He was clinging to her sari skirt for support. I greeted Parvati, and when I gave my attention to the boy and looked into his face I was so shocked that my jaw dropped open. I turned to the adults and they all smiled, waggling their heads in the same wonder, for the child was the image of Prabaker. More than merely resembling him, the boy was the exact duplicate of the man we'd all loved more than any other we knew. And when he smiled at me it was his smile, Prabaker's vast, world-encompassing smile, that I saw in that small, perfectly round face.
"Baby dijiye?" I asked. Can I hold him?
Parvati nodded. I held my arms out to him, and he came to me without protest.
"What's his name?" I asked, jigging the boy on my hip and watching him smile.
"Prabu," Parvati answered. "We called him Prabaker."
"Oh Prabu," Rukhmabai commanded, "give Shantaram-uncle a kiss."
The boy kissed me on the cheek, quickly, and then wrapped his tiny arms around my neck with impetuous strength, and squeezed me. I hugged him in return, and held him to my heart.
"You know, Shantu," Kishan suggested, patting at his round belly, and smiling to fill the world, "your house is empty. We are all here. You could stay with us tonight. You could sleep here."
"Think hard, Lin," Johnny Cigar warned, grinning at me. The full moon was in his eyes, and pearling his strong white teeth. "If you stay, word will get out. First, there'll be a party tonight, and then, when you wake up, there'll be a damn long line of patients, yaar, waiting to see you."
I gave the boy back into Parvati's arms, and wiped a hand across my face and into my hair. Looking at the people, listening to the breathing, heaving, laughing, struggling music of the slum, all around me, I remembered one of Khaderbhai's favourite phrases.
Every human heartbeat, he'd said many times, is a universe of possibilities. And it seemed to me that I finally understood exactly what he'd meant. He'd been trying to tell me that every human will has the power to transform its fate. I'd always thought that fate was something unchangeable: fixed for every one of us at birth, and as constant as the circuit of the stars. But I suddenly realised that life is stranger and more beautiful than that. The truth is that, no matter what kind of game you find yourself in, no matter how good or bad the luck, you can change your life completely with a single thought or a single act of love.
"Well, I'm out of practice sleeping on the ground," I said, smiling at Rukhmabai.
"You can have my bed," Kishan offered.
"Oh no you don't!" I protested.
"Oh yes I do!" he insisted, dragging his cot from outside his hut to mine while Johnny, Jeetendra, and the others hugged and mock wrestled me into submission, and our cries and laughter rolled away toward the time-dissolving everness of the sea.
For this is what we do. Put one foot forward and then the other.
Lift our eyes to the snarl and smile of the world once more.
Think. Act. Feel. Add our little consequence to the tides of good and evil that flood and drain the world. Drag our shadowed crosses into the hope of another night. Push our brave hearts into the promise of a new day. With love: the passionate search for a truth other than our own. With longing: the pure, ineffable yearning to be saved. For so long as fate keeps waiting, we live on. God help us. God forgive us. We live on.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I wrote the first lines of Shantaram thirteen years before I wrote the last. Many people have been involved with the project during those years, and have helped me in ways great or small. In making this grateful acknowledgement I am sure that, unintentionally, some names will be omitted. I ask those friends and colleagues to forgive me.
I want to thank my publishers at Scribe and, in particular, Henry Rosenbloom, who saw the love in this book, and who held his nerve when the chips were down-you can't ask more than that in any context; my editor, Margot Rosenbloom, for providing me with a loving edit that was always a brave but regardful combination of head and heart; the agent for the project, Jenny Darling, whose insightful suggestions helped me to make Shantaram a better book than it ever could have been without her; the book's designer, Miriam Rosenbloom, for the imaginative elegance with which she graced the project; the inspiring team at Pan Macmillan, for their enthusiastic and enduring encouragement; Debbie McInnes, the book's full-hearted and tireless local publicist; Aysha Rowe and Jenny Nagle, who championed the book in Aotearoa New Zealand;
Jessika and Nick, for their being and their courage and their joy; Nick, Mary, Paris, and Blaise, for keeping the faith in their absent friend; my mother and my stepfather, whose unflagging moral, spiritual, and financial support-beyond what I have ever deserved or could repay-has sustained me, and uplifted this work; and my partner, Shula, who has been the first positive word and the last loving line of defence.
And, reaching back through those thirteen years, I also want to thank the following colleagues and loved ones: Allan and Maria Almeida, Trish Anderson, Chloris and Chris Bath, Christine Boyle, Kerry Boxall, Buckley Bullock, Grant Carey, William Carey, Sarah Carroll, Tracy Carroll, Alfredo Cerda, Paul Chamberlain, Narayan Chandrashekar, Julia Chennels, Glen and Bindi Choyce, Sue Coley, Celia Conor, Tom Cooper, Graeme Corcoran, Daniella Cripa, Malcolm Crook, Alison Davidson, Mark Davis, Danny Derse, James Dorabjee, Paul Dornbusch, Cameron Drake, Suzannah Espie, Lindsay Forbes, Kate Galloway, Con Gantinas, Richard Gelemanovic, Claudia Glenewinkel, Linnet Good, Nicholas Goodwin, Sherridan Green, Ingrid Grobel, Lutz Grossman, Anna Hampson, Justine Hampson, Jason and Victoria Hartcup, Wendy Hatfield, Robbie Heazlewood, Chris, Lee, and Ian Hunter, Pietro The Colonel Iodice, Bashka Jacobs, Su Jamison, Sandy Jarrett, Jenny and Stuart, Julie Jordanou, Yusuf Mohammed Khan, Daniel Keays, Val Keogh, Ranyana Khotari, Glen King, Andy Kirkland, Dr.
Sue Knight, Clay Lafferty, Dr. John Lattanzio, Marc Lawrence, Kevin Leighton, Lisette, Myriam Leo, Paul Linacre, Gnter Lck, Dr. Mohammed al Mahdi, Amad Malkoun, Big Mick Mantzaris, Pat Martin, Nick and Christine Matheou, Maximillian, Elaine May, John McAuslan, Joan McQueen, Martin and Claudia Meurer, Marjorie Michael, Mark Mitchell, Myriam, Kim Albert Ng, Blaise Oarsman, Donna Palma, Kylie Parish, Lindon Parker, Vikram Patel, Jan Paull, Sally Paxton, Joyce Petrie, Susan Rokich, Max Rosenbloom, Fabian Salamon, Kristina Schelldorfer, Sven Schmidt, David and Michelle Shipworth, Kathy Simota, Dave Stevens, Barry and Steven Stockley, Anand Subramaniam, Sue and Phyl, Gregory and Mary Szczepaniak, Gillian Upton, Chandrakant Vishwanath, Void, Werner and Linda Weber, Cheryle Weinstein, Chris Wilson, John Wooller, and Lee Xiaoshin.
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The End
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