Sylvie, busy pouring more wine, had ceased discussing the subject. Maya hadn’t pushed her. She’d respected Sylvie’s need for privacy in this matter. Instead, changing the subject, she’d asked, ‘Where did you get that haircut done?’
‘Salon Martin, unisex, on the Broadway. Check it out.’
Maya had intended but never managed to visit that salon.
Less than an hour later, Maya again sat at a table at Spices & Sweets. A large brown package resting near her elbow contained two boxes of raj bhogs and a pricy jar of premium cardamom. While she waited for Jeet, who was finishing a phone call, Maya fixed her gaze on the sizeable, black-bordered flyer on the opposite wall.
Written in a gigantic font were three words: War on Malaria.
A photographic image below the words depicted a long black mosquito. Its mouth resembling a straw, it hovered over the smooth, bare arm of a woman, ready to suck her blood. The image made such a vivid impression that Maya rubbed her arm.
‘So you’re interested in malaria?’ Maya asked Jeet, who had pulled up a chair.
‘Not me, really. Anna brought that poster.’
Jeet got up again because a gust of wind coming through the open door had knocked the napkins off their stand on a table. Maya wondered if her action was to avoid the subject or cover her emotion. A sudden chill enveloped Maya as she sat alone.
When Jeet returned and joined her, Maya asked about Anna’s hobbies.
‘Oh, she liked to volunteer for causes.’
‘Such as?’
Jeet expelled a sigh. ‘There’s no malaria in Seattle or Tibet that I know of, but Anna volunteered to be a participant in a malaria challenge trial project. Such a selfless person.’
Malaria participant – the thought gave Maya a pause, a shove and a warning. ‘I can’t imagine why anyone would get involved in a high-risk trial.’
Jeet remained silent.
‘She trusted you. Didn’t she confide in you?’
‘Well, yes, Anna did explain her reasoning to me,’ Jeet said. ‘It was eerie.’
‘Could you perhaps share it with me?’
‘What does it have to do with anything? She gave her life for Tibet. Isn’t that enough for you? I, for one, would like to hold on to only the sweetest memories of her.’ She paused. ‘And why have you been stalking me, if I may ask?’
‘In my line of work, I have to stalk people sometimes … Sorry if I made you uncomfortable. Getting back to Anna’s death … I was present and I have many questions. Please share any recollections you have of Anna.’
‘You’re so persistent, young lady.’
‘This is a serious situation. I have to be. Please—’
‘OK. Quite by chance, Anna had come across an ad in the paper asking for voluntary participation in a disease trial program. She visited their website and was satisfied enough to contact the volunteer coordinator. He talked her into being an early malaria vaccine candidate and enrolled her. Can you imagine sitting in a cubbyhole and offering up your arm to be bitten by mosquitoes? Hundreds of them? How gross.’
‘You see, my mother had malaria and she has horror stories to tell,’ said Maya. ‘I’d worry about the trial being unsuccessful and me winding up with one or more different strains of malaria.’
‘That was precisely my concern. I … I told Anna if she ever contracted the darn disease she wouldn’t be able to get rid of it. She might even lose her permit as a food service worker. She smiled and said that the risk was low and that this was a small sacrifice to pay when you consider how many children it could save worldwide. “I won’t even feel it,” she said. According to her, clinical trial programs were generally safe and she didn’t mind signing a waiver.’ Jeet shifted her position. ‘Still, the whole idea of her healthy body being infected with a parasite made me feel creepy, so creepy that I did something I’m not proud of, something I don’t usually do.’
‘What was that?’
Jeet glanced out the window, stayed quiet.
‘If I knew my friend was involved and risking her life for a volunteer project,’ Maya said, ‘I might not be proud of the things I did to protect her, either.’
‘You keep trying, but I can’t bear to …’
‘You were one of the few people who knew Anna. What you reveal can only help bring justice to the case.’
‘This is how it went. When Anna told me about her plan to be a vaccine candidate, I wasn’t feeling so generous but didn’t show it. We were standing right here, as a matter of fact. After she went back to the kitchen, I got my cellphone out and called the volunteer coordinator. I raised hell for putting my employee’s health in danger. We had a shouting match for which, I’m sure, he would hate me for the rest of his life. He called me malaria naive. Said I was acting like a controlling mother, which I had no right to do, Anna being an adult.’ Jeet paused. ‘I gave Anna the time off. Amazingly enough, a few weeks later, she returned to work, rosy-cheeked and robust. It came as a relief when she told me proudly and confidentially she’d passed the trial. No chills, shakes or flu-like fever – she had no symptoms of the disease. Even though the doctors had detected no malaria parasites in her red blood cells, they kept monitoring her for a while.’
‘Did she look different over time?’
‘She did, but the symptoms were of a different sort than I’d expected and had a different cause.’ Jeet hesitated. ‘Anna swore me to secrecy.’
‘Anna is dead. And the circumstances of her death are murky. The police could make the assumption that Anna committed suicide due to job stress and hold you responsible. What will you do?’
‘Not true, not true – it was something else altogether.’
‘I might be able to help you, but only if you tell me the real story.’
Jeet kept her gaze low. She obviously needed time to settle.
‘If you’d rather wait for another time …’
Jeet raised her head. ‘It was weird, it was scary, like Anna was under the influence of something or somebody. Distracted, smiling big and forgetting things, losing interest in her job, dressing better than usual, even putting make-up on.’
‘Maybe she’d met someone?’ Saying so, Maya went back to the time when she’d first met Justin: those days of romantic madness, when she was wildly happy, hearing music when none existed and glued to her cellphone.
‘Is that any of my business?’ Jeet said.
‘Yes. You cared about her, didn’t you?’
‘She couldn’t wait to get out the door when her shift ended. Eventually, she confided in me that she was hanging out with a foreign man, one with a temporary visa and soulful eyes. She could look into those eyes forever, she said. Other than that, she kept her relationship a secret. Why? I don’t have the foggiest. Then, over time, she began to seem grumpy, not quite herself, and the quality of her work started to slip. That charming guy might have been taking advantage of her.’
‘What? Was he providing her with any “designer” drugs?’
‘He could have, although I have no idea what kind.’
‘And did he eventually …?’
‘Yes, I think he did drop her. Toward the end, she seemed hungover a lot, started swearing, stopped talking and looked nervous as hell. She lost weight. Back home in Madurai, if this was happening with my sister I’d have thrown cold water on her face and said, “Wake up, girl. Seriously! Wake up!”’
Anna’s death wasn’t natural, Maya reflected, only made to appear so. What would make a confection-maker the target of a violent crime? ‘I, for one, find it hard to believe that two young American women my age—’
‘I share your feelings. You’re Indian. You must know the word prana.’
‘Certainly, prana is the life energy.’
‘Yes, good. Prana is life force and I believe it’s strong in everyone. No matter how difficult life is, if a woman tries to take her own life, her prana will put a stop to it, unless …’ Jeet’s voice trailed off and she looked blankly at the wall.
&n
bsp; ‘What else did you notice in Anna?’
Jeet gave Maya a ‘get out of my face’ look. Maya sat patiently, even drew the chair closer to Jeet’s in an attempt to establish more trust.
‘On her last day,’ Jeet said, ‘Anna dropped a spice jar and spilled my most expensive cardamom powder. She stood there like a zombie, didn’t try to clean up the mess, didn’t even apologize. I suspected she’d broken up with that guy and was taking it hard. I was so angry. I told her that I couldn’t afford such expensive mistakes. “One more time and …”’
‘You were getting ready to fire her, weren’t you?’
Jeet put her face in her hands. When she raised her head, tears spilled from her eyes. ‘Yes. I feel terrible for having been so harsh to her. I regret not having asked her more about what was going on. She didn’t kill herself because of that. Still, it tears me apart that I didn’t help her. You see, we don’t poke our noses into the personal lives of our employees.’
Maya read guilt and regret in Jeet’s face and allowed her a few moments to recover. ‘I don’t suppose Anna had any close relatives nearby?’
‘None that I know of. Didn’t have many friends, either. A loner, she was.’
‘No friends?’
‘Wait. She often mentioned that malaria-nut, that volunteer coordinator, who’s also a Tibetan-American, who put her life at risk, who wanted to “help eradicate malaria from the planet.” Such pretenses. They’d have coffee together. That weirdo is, in my view, formidable. Pink hair, you know? Why would a man my age go pink?’
Maya reached into her purse for a pen and piece of paper. ‘How do I get in touch with him?’
‘You should’ve been a lawyer. Would’ve made more money. Promise not to mention where you got it from?’
‘Promise.’
‘Cal Chodron, bless his prana, works part time at Rent Me, an apartment rental agency on Aurora Avenue. You can probably walk into his office and speak with him. But be careful. He’ll charm you, make you listen to his rubbish pitch and try to get you to sign up as a malaria volunteer. And if he offers tea, refuse it. Who knows what he’ll put in it? I do sound like a mother, don’t I? Poor Anna. That vaccine trial might have nothing to do with her death but, after our talk, I’m beginning to wonder.’
‘Has Cal Chodron threatened you in any way?’
‘Well …’ Jeet struggled to get the words out. ‘I don’t know. It probably wasn’t him – he doesn’t visit this shop – but a few weeks ago someone left a handwritten note on the counter. It said, Mind your own stupid business, you old crow.’
‘Do you still have the note?’
‘No.’
‘Are you sure?’
Jeet’s attention was drawn to the front door. A woman, who had glided in, now searched the room. Jeet waved at her. ‘There she is, an applicant for the kitchen worker position. I have to interview her – we’re pitifully short-handed. A couple more days and my display case will be empty. End of supply, the death of my retail operation.’
Maya glanced at Anna’s potential replacement: skin-and-bones, frizzy-haired, a tattooed arm and a slutty look. She got out of her chair.
‘One more question, Jeet. Where did Anna get her hair cut?’
‘I’m not her mother.’
‘Could it have been a fancy salon?’
‘I suppose. It was her only extravagance, her “snip tour.”’
Maya rose. ‘May we talk another time?’
Jeet shook her head, teary-eyed. ‘Make raj bhog runs as often as you like, but I can’t help you out any more. You’re one hungry girl. I’ve already given you more than enough ammo. I have to get my business going. A competitor will eat me up if I don’t.’
Maya thanked Jeet, adding, ‘We’ll keep Anna in our hearts, won’t we?’
Outside, she shook out her shoulders, dug out her cellphone and left a message for Detective Justin, aching to speak with him.
TEN
Her hands smeared with fresh cheese, fragrant sweet syrup simmering over the stove, the buzz of the retail shop drifting through the door, Anna Kamala bent over a bowl on the kitchen counter, intent on preparing the next batch of raj bhogs.
That image swirling in her head, the same afternoon at around 5 p.m., Maya cruised down Aurora Avenue, a seedy stretch of state highway notorious for drugs, crime, failed businesses and streetwalkers. Through feeble sunlight, she parked on a side street and walked two blocks down the avenue, past shoulder-to-shoulder buildings housing small retail operations. The wind howled over the dusty tops of trees. She squinted at the numbers and checked the storefronts, glancing back every now and then to see if she was being followed. Sandwiched between a dilapidated motel and an X-rated video rental shop, her destination stood across the street from a gun dealership.
The signboard above the door declared: Rent Me. Apartment and Storage Rental Services.
Inside, a short, stocky man of East-Asian origin was perched behind a rectangular steel desk. Aged about forty, he tapped intently on a computer keyboard. The wood-grained desk nameplate read Cal Chodron. Maya would have known who he was even if the nameplate wasn’t there. His spiky, fuchsia-pink hair gave his identity away.
Natural light flooded the small, square, tall-windowed room. A map of the city, highlighting the neighborhoods served by the agency, lined the back wall. The desk held several personal effects, including two wood-framed photographs sitting side by side. The first displayed Cal with a Caucasian woman and three beaming young boys, one with similarly pink hair. The second was that of a grave, elderly man who resembled Cal: same eyes, cheekbones and nose. To the left of the photos stood a glass of water. To the right squatted a small clay figurine of a sitting Buddha; it held the inscription: What would Buddha do?
Cal looked up at Maya, swiveled his chair to face her and offered a smile. ‘Pardon me, I didn’t hear you come in. Looking for a rental?’ He gestured toward a chair.
Maya shook her head, plucked a business card from her wallet and slid it across his desk. ‘Maya Mallick. Sylvie’s sister is my best friend.’ At Cal’s nod, she added, ‘I’ve heard about Anna from a mutual acquaintance. I came here to talk.’
A tremor passed over Cal’s body. His smile grew grim. ‘According to my family’s belief about dying, which goes back to ancient Tibetan traditions, we don’t observe grief by talking about it.’ Cal’s voice was choked with emotion. ‘Only by fully experiencing grief can we let it go.’
Maya nodded. ‘I certainly respect your tradition. I happened to have been there when Sylvie and Anna died … it was beyond belief … I can’t forget what I saw.’
Cal stared at the family photo on his desk and sighed. ‘I tell my children what my Tibetan grandmother impressed on me. “Let events run their own course. Don’t constantly try to channel them to rivulets of your liking.”’
Maya sighed. How well had she been able to accept reality? Justin flared to her mind and along with that came a twinge of torment. He used to call her the ‘Mistress of Trying Too Hard.’ It dawned on her now that Justin hadn’t returned her last phone call.
Cal scrutinized her business card. Maya noticed the neatness all around him. It befit a traditional, duty-bound man, hardwired to do the right thing.
Cal raised his eyes, a tightness about him. ‘You’re a private detective?’ Then, at Maya’s nod, ‘Why did you come to see me?’
Maya got her pen and notebook out of her purse. ‘I understand you were the malaria volunteer coordinator who recently worked with Anna.’
‘The question most people ask me is how I got so pink. But you’re asking me about the malaria trial. Who told you about it?’
‘A friend of Anna.’
Suspicion stirred on Cal’s face; he lowered his eyes to the desk. ‘I’m not at liberty to talk about my activities at the malaria clinic.’
‘You were friends with Anna. No doubt you’re mourning her loss. The circumstances surrounding her death – let’s say they’re murky. I bet you have an interest in fi
guring out—’
Cal sighed, then glanced through the window. ‘OK, Ms Mallick. At this late hour, I don’t expect anyone to show up for a rental. How can I help you?’
‘Please, call me Maya. And please tell me how a malaria trial is conducted.’
Cal’s gaze was skeptical. ‘What makes you ask about it?’
‘My conversations with Sylvie Burton about her malaria research.’
‘Why should I talk to a perfect stranger about the trial?’
‘The trial is a common element between the two women. I wonder if it has anything to do with their untimely deaths.’
‘Do you have any idea how many untimely deaths there are because of malaria fever?’
Maya had heard the grim statistics from Sylvie, the mosquito expert, but to keep Cal talking she shook her head.
Cal turned to his desktop, clicked his mouse and positioned the machine so Maya would have a full view of a world map. Cal traced the malaria-endemic areas of the African continent and the Indian subcontinent successively, his fingers moving in a knowledgeable fashion. ‘These continents are ravaged by that godawful disease. Something like five hundred million are infected every year. The pity of it is mostly kids die from it, especially kids in Africa. India and Bangladesh haven’t been spared, either.’
Maya noted the deep sorrow in his voice. ‘Anyone in your family?’
Cal glanced at the photograph of the elderly man on his desk. ‘Yes, my father, brave soul, who escaped from Tibet – what a story he had to tell about that. Settled in Northern India but contracted malaria within six months. He didn’t make it.’
‘I’m sorry.’
Cal’s voice shook as he went on: ‘I was only six then but I’ll never forget his suffering. Shortly thereafter, my mother had a chance to immigrate to this country. I was raised on the East Coast.’
This gave Maya a chance to offer a brief recap of her mother contracting malaria in India. How Uma was able to manage the disease, but only after much suffering and prolonged treatment. As she spoke, Maya looked steadily at Cal.
Cal got up, crossed over to a small refrigerator in the back of the room, pulled out two bottles of water and handed one to Maya. ‘My association with malaria didn’t end with my father’s death. After graduating from college, I moved to Seattle to look for a job. Guess what I found? The city had a malaria center, one of the largest in the world. I got hired as a clerk in that center and worked there for a few years. When I married and needed a better income to support my family, I quit and got into the real estate business but still spent my spare hours at the center. I worked first as a volunteer and eventually took over as the coordinator, a part-time position for which I now get paid a stipend. I recruit participants for the malaria challenge trial. Anna’s boss, that sweet-shop lady, accused me of brainwashing her but that’s hogwash. There’s no pressure, none. It’s entirely up to an individual whether to join or not.’
Season of Sacrifice Page 8
