The Last Color

by Vikas Khanna

  Noor shook her head and clicked her tongue. “Choti, child! You’re not lowly at all.” She pointed to a concrete bench. “Let’s rest our famished bodies on that bench.”

  They reached the bench and sat down next to each other. Noor took a slow, deep breath and glanced down at Choti, who was still fuming and had started to violently kick her legs back and forth to vent her frustration.

  “Choti,” Noor said. “Do you know what an eclipse is?”

  Choti shook her head.

  “It’s when the much smaller moon blocks out the entire sun and causes the whole world to go dark. One of my fondest memories from when I was young was seeing an eclipse with my grandfather. In that rare miraculous moment, the usually smaller, shyer moon suddenly becomes big and powerful enough to hide the usually more majestic, more powerful sun. And when it does, everyone, I mean everyone, both then and now, is awed by its power,” Noor said.

  “Kind of like me when I’m on my rope, everyone looks up to me when I’m above them, in the sky,” Choti said, grinning.

  Noor beamed. “I wish you see it sometime. It is like a victory of good over evil, like when Lord Rama defeated the evil Ravana, like a re-writing of the edict of the natural order of things, about who is powerful and who is not. When I witnessed it, and sensed the awe and fear it caused in others, I was filled with hope. I thought, so it is possible for the weak to overcome the strong; it is possible to rewrite the rules? Choti, do you understand me, Choti?”

  Choti stopped kicking her feet, absolutely mesmerized. “I think I do.”

  “You remind me of that eclipsing moon, my child. One day, you will have the power to change the order of things.”

  Watching Noor’s face grow animated as she spoke, it seemed to Choti like the moon itself. Radiant, wise, gentle, shining a small light to one eclipsed in the dark.

  “The moon can be just as powerful as the sun, but it’s got a cooler brightness and glows soft, so you can see it without hurting your eyes. There is more truth to the moon for that reason. And it’s so powerful it can even pull water from the rivers and seas and send it across the earth. If Choti is small, then she is small like the moon, which is not small at all.”

  Climbing back into her sky-nest after seeing off Noor, Choti was sure she had been spotted by one of Raja’s goons. This would be very bad. Choti prayed fervently to Ganga Ma. She prayed that she was wrong and no one had seen her sneak in. She lay down on her back and hoped to fall asleep, when a skinny black cat passed by, meowing and then lulling itself into a purr at her shoulder. She shooed it away because it seemed like bad luck, the last kind of luck she needed.

  Choti closed her eyes and covered her ears, but still heard the growl of motors and saw the beam of headlights. Raja’s swarm of motorcycle-riding potbellies had arrived back at the gym. She heard them collect at their usual spot near their sandbox of weights. There was something even more reckless and dangerous about their grunting and laughing that day. She thought of the savage ferocity with which they had ravaged her teddy bear and ripped it to shreds.

  What she heard next, she had heard before in the same circumstances, but this time it froze her.

  It was Anarkali’s voice.

  She was screaming in pain!

  Choti huddled further in fright but couldn’t shut out the thrashing and screams that echoed off the concrete walls of the gym. She heard Anarkali beg the beasts to forgive her for not cooperating with them. When she heard Anarkali shout her name—something about excusing her for her petty crimes—she uncovered her ears, opened her eyes, and looked through the peephole to see what was really going on. Immediately, she wished she hadn’t.

  Bloody Raja appeared out of the shadows and went straight for Anarkali’s throat. Choti wanted to jump down and attack them with everything she had, which, compared to them, wasn’t much. Raja was hitting Anarkali with his stick. The animals were making too many drunken sounds to understand what they were saying. Some of the chamchas were even laughing at what was going on. Choti slipped on her cardboard floor and it made a dull thud. Everyone stopped what they were doing, except Anarkali who had fallen to her knees and looked like she was about to faint. She looked so meek, not at all like the devil-maycare beggar who dared force to a stop any vehicle in the traffic at Sangam Chowk.

  Choti prayed that no one thought the noise came from her. Luckily, the cat slipped out and ran across the gym.

  Raja towered over Anarkali “So, you bloody hijra, you said you will tell my wife about me? About me? You exist only on my leftovers, you understand? You only exist because I allow you to exist,” Raja said, and punched Anarkali in the face. Choti felt like she had been punched in the face too, but she didn’t cry.

  Anarkali fell to the side, groaning and writhing in pain while Raja’s chamchas started tearing off her clothes. Animals! Bastards! Half of her clothes were off, she was almost naked. Her sister! Anarkali tried to crawl away. Choti was ashamed that she was too scared to help.

  Then the shadows, Raja’s obedient drunken horde of cops, moved in and held a naked Anarkali in place until she stopped screaming. Raja then calmly pulled out his gun and pulled the trigger. There was a resounding bang and Anarkali slumped to the ground.

  Am I dead, too? Choti thought, she couldn’t feel anything anymore. It was the numb feeling of weightlessness, the numb feeling of death. A dead person cannot move, so she must have died. Even Raja’s drunk and boisterous chamchas seemed to have died, no longer making any sound. The gun went off again, and this time Choti counted its echoes— one off the gym walls, another off Sangam Chowk, another off Tulsi Ghat, another off the Nameless House with Pink Walls, the final one off Manikarnika, where those lucky enough had already been turned to ash.

  No one moved.

  Choti felt that all the witnesses to that moment of Anarkali’s death were acutely aware of each other’s presence, like they were trapped in some silent theatrical performance.

  “Throw this bastard hijra’s sin-filled body into the Ganga,” Raja’s command broke the sudden stillness of the night.

  Choti felt smaller and more insignificant than she ever had before.

  The next morning a weak morning sun awakened Choti’s deadened body. She must have been crying through the nightmares she had because her eyes were swollen and encrusted. Luckily, she had been smart enough to insert a swatch of saree into her mouth to muffle any sounds of inadvertent screams and stop her teeth from chattering.

  That day Choti was more determined than ever to beg at Sangam Chowk, all by herself, in Anarkali’s memory. In a way, and with her friend’s blessing—or perhaps, her curse—the Chowk had become as much her turf as it had been Anarkali’s. In the past, when one of them hadn’t been there in flesh and blood, they had been there in spirit and grace. And from the previous night and every day onward, all that remained of Anarkali for Choti to rely on was that spirit and grace. She was too young to admit it to herself, but Noor’s words, that’s life, kept drilling at her brain as she started to work the traffic again, now sans her best friend.

  As she looked around with listless eyes Choti noticed that Ram Halwai Sweets was gone and a new owner was ensconced in his place with a sign that read, “Basant Sweets,” already affixed in preparation for the coming of Holi.

  Suddenly, as Choti approached a line of cars, Raja revved-up alongside her on his motorbike, looking beaten and old, as if now death had been chasing and running him ragged. Raja could barely hold Choti’s gaze as he suspiciously probed her eyes. Every twitch of Raja’s tired eyes sent a tremor through Choti.

  Choti did not blink when Inspector Raja suddenly reached out and grabbed her by the hair. “So, your name is Choti,” Raja said. Every motorist, every person walking by, was stunned to see the big hefty cop yanking the hair of a small street girl, but no one intervened.

  “Where does Anarkali live?” Raja said, obsessively looking around and fidgeting with his mustache. Perhaps she had hidden some evidence there that incriminated the cop and
he wanted to destroy.

  The question shocked Choti to the soles of her feet, but she kept her expression as straight as she had once held her balancing stick. “How would I know?” Choti said, shrugging. “I’ve never gone to her house. All I know is that she didn’t show up today.” Choti’s eyes chose the swelling traffic over Raja’s sallow eyes. She would not grant her friend’s murderer even one accidental blink of respect.

  Raja released Choti’s hair. “I don’t want to see you in this area again, you can’t beg here anymore, this is my area,” Raja the murderer said. “I was doing your friend Anarkali a favor allowing her to beg here.”

  Choti refused to meet his eye.

  “Understand, girl? Now get out of here! If I ever see you here again, I will do much worse things to you than pull at your hair,” Raja said, his voice quivering with rage as he looked around threateningly before gunning his bike and speeding off toward his preferred cigarette kiosk.

  A sudden downpour drenched the next few hours with torrential rain. Choti, wet and still numb from her encounter with Raja, walked onto the hidden terrace near Tulsi Ghat, where she had fixed to meet Noor.

  Noor had been waiting a long time for her, and when Choti saw her friend sitting on their bench waiting for her, staring into the parting, sun-releasing clouds, Choti stumbled over to fall into Noor’s lap, shivering and weeping.

  At first, Noor resisted the urge to comfort and hug her friend in public but then she let her arms cover and embrace her distraught young friend. Choti’s little body shook with sobs and her unstopping tears dampened Noor’s saree.

  “Noor, Anarkali’s dead, the bloody animals killed her. I saw it with my own eyes. Raja shot and killed her,” Choti wept, not even bothering to lift her face as she wiped off her nose and mouth with her hand.

  Noor’s face became instantly alert. Her eyes sharpened. “Ram, Ram, Ram. May Satan fall on all of them. This Raja is a Ravana, a real devil.”

  Noor hugged Choti, then kneeled down beside her, deep lines of concern forming on her face. Now Noor trembled, too.

  “You saw them?” asked Noor urgently, “But did anyone see you?”

  Choti’s chest started to heave. “No, as much as I wanted to, I couldn’t utter a word or make any sound. I was so scared, Noor, I couldn’t help my friend. Bloody bastards. I hate Raja. One day, when I become big enough, I will give him the karma he deserves, I swear.”

  Noor rubbed Choti’s back and holding her in her lap rocked Choti back and forth trying to soothe her. An hour or so later, Choti finally lifted her face. Her eyes were swollen, and she had gone as pale as if she herself had died.

  “Poor, poor child,” Noor said. “Let me show you something. Maybe it will lift your mood.” Noor pulled out the frock she had hand-stitched for her. It was covered in huge, brightly colored flowers and, best of all, it had a big front pocket where Choti could keep all of the rupees she would earn in the future.

  Choti had no words, but managed a wan smile as she took the frock in her hands. It was absolutely beautiful. “I don’t know what to say,” Choti said.

  “You’ve lost your best friend, you needn’t say anything,” said Noor.

  “This frock is too beautiful. I don’t deserve it,” Choti said and began to cry again. “I’m not worthy of it, Noor, I just lost a friend and didn’t do anything to help her. I’m worthless, I don’t deserve it.”

  “Quiet your mouth, child, don’t be silly,” Noor said. “I made it just for you. It’s only a frock, a piece of material I threw together, but I hope someday by wearing it you will be happy again.”

  “Thank you,” Choti said, and leaned her weary head on Noor’s thin, white-draped shoulder.

  “You are welcome, Choti. Now run and change into your frock behind the temple, near Lolark Kund. If you stay in these wet clothes, you’ll catch a fever.”

  Choti got up and walked towards the temple, clutching her new flower-covered dress, which made her feel like some lovely garden in motion. It would be the first time in her life she would wear new clothes.

  A few days later, a visibly subdued Choti, in her new frock, was back, sitting quietly next to Noor on their terrace bench, observing the pilgrims and aarti and Holi visitors in the distance amid the ghats. Suddenly a stranger, a tall woman dressed in a starched saree, and bell-shaped gold earrings approached her.

  Choti’s eyes flared in fear as the tall woman came closer and bent her knees to look Choti straight in the face. “Such a lovely dress,” the woman said in a kind voice.

  Choti looked away.

  Then the woman continued: “I’m a reporter from the India Crime newspaper in New Delhi. My name is Rekha, Rekha Saxena. Didn’t you and a person who went by the name ‘Anarkali’ beg together on Sangam Chowk?” the woman asked.

  Choti began to tremble in fear.

  Noor immediately put her arm around her friend. “Why do you want to know?” she demanded.

  “Choti…” Rekha the reporter started to say something.

  Immediately Choti thrust out her chin and stiffened her shoulders, now on guard. “How do you know my name?”

  “I can explain later, but don’t worry, I’m on your side. I care about what happened to Anarkali,” said Rekha. “I heard about her body being found, and I’m investigating her death.”

  “I wish I could help you, but I only worked for Anarkali. I don’t know what happened to her, we weren’t really friends,” Choti lied, too scared to get involved.

  Noor looked at Rekha sternly: “We don’t know anything about Anarkali. Now stop bothering the child.”

  Rekha courteously nodded to the old widow, but then turned back to Choti. “You do know your friend Anarkali was murdered, right?” she said.

  “No, I didn’t. I don’t know anything. She was a good boss and seemed like a nice person,” Choti pretended not to know anything. “I am really sorry to hear that.”

  “Do you have any idea who might have murdered her?” Rekha said. “Like someone she had dealings with, or owed something to, anything like that you can remember?”

  Noor had to intervene, and raised her voice. “Reporter Rekha, this is a child you are asking all these questions. She doesn’t know anything, can’t you see? Why are you trying to drag her into this mess?”

  “I’m sorry. May I know your name?” Rekha said.

  “My name is Noor. Now please leave this poor child alone.”

  “But we want to bring the murderer to justi—”

  “—You can? You promise? Then I know who killed Anarkali,” Choti said suddenly, cutting Rekha off and prompting Noor to exclaim, “Child! Stay out of it, you’ve been through enough in life.”

  Choti turned to Noor. “I know, Noor, but Anarkali was my best friend and someone has to punish these bloody animals. Don’t worry about me,” Choti said, and turned back to Rekha.

  Rekha had already grabbed Choti’s hand and was now leading the girl toward the edge of the terrace and back into the streets.

  Noor shook her head, then closed her eyes in silent prayer.

  Rekha marched into the Nagar Nigam police station holding Choti by the hand with the intention of filing an F.I.R., the First Information Report for the criminal offence of the murder of Anarkali.

  The Nagar Nigam sat high on Ganga’s banks and was the main Varanasi police headquarters from where Raja, the King, lorded over everyone, and, at least in his mind, perhaps lorded over even Ganga herself.

  As they entered, Choti saw all the goons she had witnessed from her sky-nest a week before at the police gym, now glaring at her from their tea-swilling huddle.

  Choti’s first instinct was to flee, but her second instinct was a feeling that if she did flee, it would make her appear guilty of whatever the chamchas wanted to make her appear guilty of. Her third and fourth more terrifying instincts were that someone on that terrible night had not been fooled by the cat, or that someone on the Chowk had told Raja where she slept at night, and therefore must have witnessed any violent act
ions that had occurred at the gym, past or present, including Anarkali’s murder.

  Rekha leaned down to whisper in Choti’s ear while holding her hand: “Choti, I don’t know what you know or don’t know. The point is that we must punish these corrupt bastards for what they have done to Anarkali, and probably to many others like her, and probably to children like you. Even if they hold the keys of power, we have the right to open the doors to what is right.”

  Rekha straightened up and together they walked to the front desk. “Officer,” she demanded. “I want to file an

  F.I.R. over the murder of Anarkali.”

  The officer behind the desk put down his tea and leaned his elbows on its filthy, samosa-crumbs and chai-stained surface, as Rekha went on: “She was killed last week at your very own gymnasium and then her body was dumped in the Ganga and was discovered near Sangam, where the locals identified it. It was sent for a post-mortem. And the doctor’s verdict is homicide. The bullet has been identified. Now we have a witness.”

  “Is this street urchin your key witness?” the officer said, wiping off his mouth with studied casualness as he looked down at Choti. “This girl you’ve brought with you is just trying to make a quick buck by manipulating you out of your money, so you can report some fake news story. We see kids like her all the time. She’s not to be trusted; we know her, she’s already been caught and warned for stealing. I can only imagine what other crimes she’s committed, especially if she was hanging around with that criminal, Anarkali.”

  Choti was struck numb with fear as those who were supposed to protect and serve revealed themselves to possess the most evil faces of society she had ever come across.

  Another, even brawnier police officer, a known tyrant to street children with a particularly nasty reputation among them for extreme cruelty and corruption, approached the desk.

  He checked out Rekha from top to bottom but focused his vitriol on Choti, allowing his eyes to shamelessly bore into hers: “So is this your witness?” he said, cracking his knuckles.