Train to Delhi Read Free Page A

Delhi’s only hope is William Thornton, our commissioner of police. But what can a single man do?’
    â€˜Thornton? An Englishman?’ asked Father Jones.
    â€˜No, Anglo-Indian. Father English, mother Kashmiri.’
    â€˜I see,’ the bishop murmured. ‘I’m glad you were with me this afternoon.’
    â€˜But do you realize, Father, what you are doing for me?’
    â€˜I don’t know. Let Christ be with you hereafter—let him guide your steps.’ His voice was a murmur; then it rose: ‘Be careful, Mr Mehta, as you go home. There’s madness on the streets.’
    â€˜No harm will come to me since I live in a Hindu locality.’
    â€˜That’s good,’ the bishop said. ‘Then, until Thursday.’
    Turning to Samuel, he now asked him to have the dead body removed for a burial in the backyard of the church.
    As Gautam walked out of the church into the street, he was surprised to see all quiet everywhere. Where had the rioters disappeared? Or had the police warned them to stay away so that the law could stage a sham investigation into the killing?
    Once out on the street, fear suddenly gripped him. What if he was ambushed by some Muslims? He felt as though the dead man’s eyes were following him.
    He kept on walking, engrossed in his thoughts. Down the street, all the vendors had folded up their stalls. The entire place had been taken over by armed policemen who moved about cockily, brandishing their neatly polished batons.
    Near the Red Fort there was no taxi, only a solitary tonga, with a hefty Sikh perched on the front seat. Gautam thought it safe to take this vehicle, with a sturdy Sardar as his escort.
    â€˜Can you take me to Darya Ganj, please—Hindu sector?’ asked Gautam.
    The driver shot a glance at Gautam, his blood-red eyes glistening even in the evening light.
    â€˜Yes, but only via the Jumna route,’ the Sikh grunted. He then spat vigorously, his spittle landing on the far end of the pavement. ‘I think there’s trouble near the southern end of Faiz Bazaar.’
    Gautam understood it was only a ruse to touch him for more money.
    â€˜All right.’
    â€˜Fifteen rupees.’
    â€˜Okay. Let’s go.’
    As the rickety vehicle, pulled by a shaggy horse, jerked into a rattle on the road, the driver started a friendly conversation, as a palliative for the exorbitant fare he’d hooked out of his passenger.
    â€˜Are you a refugee from Pakistan, sir?’
    â€˜Yes—from Lahore.’
    â€˜Lost everything?’
    â€˜Only property—my family came through, intact.’
    â€˜Were you with your family in Lahore, sir?’
    â€˜No, I’d come to Delhi a couple of years earlier.’
    â€˜Lucky,’ he said, his face turning ashen. ‘My family had the worst of it … Two of my sisters were carried away. My old man’s throat was slit before my mother’s eyes. Then he was roasted alive. I was the only one to escape. Oh, those blasted Muslims!’
    â€˜I’m sorry to hear this.’
    â€˜But we got one Muslim this afternoon, near St. John’s. An old bearded fellow. That was a good catch.’
    â€˜Yes, I know.’
    Gautam wondered if the Sardar was himself one of the killers of Abdul Rahim.

2
    D arya Ganj lies sprawling like the stomach of Delhi whose head is the Central Secretariat raised in red sandstone, and whose legs and feet taper off into the Delhi University campus, and the refugee colony known as the Kingsway Camp. Delhi’s vast belly covers about a square mile between the Delhi Gate and the Red Fort, its intestines coiling round a multitude of narrow streets and bylanes running on either side of Faiz Bazaar, which acts as a watershed between the two belligerent communities, Hindu and Muslim, sworn to eternal enmity.
    Along one side of Faiz Bazaar are the prosperous Hindu establishments—banks, clinics, restaurants, bookshops and insurance