Darshan Read Free Page A

pebble at the wall, this time with less force. It was a one-story building that had once served as a hotel, the façade dirty and smudged, the color of cornhusk. It was beaten and abused, as though not one person had ever loved it. He did not want to go inside. He was somehow aware that once he did, what little remained of his boyhood would be leeched out of him, like moisture evaporating from picked flowers drying in the sun, their vibrant hues fading to the color of mud. Digesting this new reality was like a too-hot chili sitting painfully in his stomach. But truthfully, though it had only been a day since the Toors packed up their belongings and trekked the several miles of dirt road on a horse tonga to this nearby town, Baba Singh was already changing. He was cross and dejected, like the men of other families he had seen, men who had, like his own father, been shoved off their land and made to lead their wives and children away from the village, sometimes much, much farther away than here.
    That is what Ranjit had said. His older brother was seventeen now and had been in the fields for over a year before they were sent to Amarpur. He had overheard the men talking and knew a great deal about everything. Fertile land was more valuable than gold, and moneylenders had come up with a scheme to steal it away. Preying on the difficulties caused by dry seasons, they would offer promises of low interest they never intended to uphold, altering their books, charging double, triple, and often ten times the interest. And the price for nonpayment was high. Ranjit said that was how honest families were cut down and cast out. He told Baba Singh that they might have to go too, maybe move to Africa or Australia. None of them knew exactly where those places were, but they would need to take trains and ships to get there. They would be left with nothing except what the British felt they were worthy enough to have, perhaps merely a train ticket or passage on a ship or some old ruin of a building, dumped in new places to flounder like fish out of water.
    Harpreet—their mother had always been an optimist—had said it was a blessing that they were relocated only a few miles away in Amarpur, with which they were at least somewhat familiar. They had come into town two or three times a year to trade their crops and stock up on spices, fabrics, cooking oils, and kerosene for their lamps. They knew people here, and that was something. But it made no difference to Baba Singh. They may as well have been exiled to Africa. Amarpur would never be home. There were too many bicyclists hurrying along Suraj Road, the town’s main strip, too much plodding horse-tonga traffic, arrogant Brits sometimes pulling into town in puttering motorcars, and the vegetable pushcart vendor was always shouting in his unpleasantly monotonous voice, “ Aloo, pyaj, tommatter, ghobbi! Aloo, pyaj, tommatter, ghobbi! Potatoes, onions, tomatoes, cauliflower!”
    Their rented horse snorted, and Baba Singh turned to regard the sweat-streaked animal. It was tired and pawed softly at the earth with a hoof before adjusting its weight on weary legs. Baba Singh patted its head and glanced at the load it had carried, the tonga laden with all his family’s possessions.
    Lal swore under his breath, unable to free the key, his fingers too large for the knot in the string.
    Harpreet gently pushed her husband’s fingers aside. “Let me help.”
    “It was almost undone,” Lal said, watching her pull at the strings. “I could have gotten it.”
    A flicker of flame shot through her eyes as she loosened the key. “I know you could have,” she replied.
    He looked away as she pressed it into his hand. She was not angry, just tired. She never really got angry.
    “Thank you,” he murmured.
    “I don’t want to live here,” Kiran said, watching Lal unlock the door. She pointed at Avani. “She doesn’t either. We want to go back to our goats.”
    Khushwant jabbed a twig into the dirt. He