by N. H. Senzai
Maya’s eyelids flew open and she saw a stooped man in a dark blue jacket and cap standing at the door.
“Your ticket, please,” he requested.
“Zara, wake up,” Maya said groggily, shaking her sleeping sister, who woke up and handed over their tickets to the collector. He gazed down at them with a frown.
He’s probably wondering why we’re not in the right compartment, thought Maya. Maybe he’ll show us how to get to first class. A bed and a lock in a private room sounded heavenly right now. They probably had another eight hours before they reached Faizabad and they could get a proper nap.
“Where are you going?” he asked, peering at her over his horn-rimmed glasses.
“Faizabad,” replied Zara. “I know we’re in the wrong compartment,” she added.
The man blinked. “No, miss. You are on the wrong train.”
10
Misdirection
ALL TRACES OF SLEEP vanished in a flash as Maya stared at the attendant with wide eyes. Her sister gasped. “What do you mean, wrong train?”
“This is the Rajasthan Express to Jaipur.”
Fear constricted Maya’s insides. “Jaipur?” she squeaked.
“Is that on the way to Faizabad?” interrupted Zara, scrambling to stand up.
“No.” He shook his head. “Faizabad is to the east. We are journeying south.”
“Oh, no,” said Zara, clutching her hands together as Maya rose beside her.
“I told you,” said Maya, as angry indignation rose within her, alongside the fear. “I told you we should check the board again.”
“Okay, okay, calm down,” said Zara, looking panicked herself.
Maya snorted and turned to the conductor. “Sir, we need to go to Faizabad. . . . What do we do?”
“You must be off-loading at the next station,” he said. “From there you will be needing to change tickets.”
“Is the next stop coming up?” asked Zara, running a hand through her usually perfect bob, which was sticking out in places.
“Yes, arriving shortly,” he replied as Maya glanced down at her watch, heart racing. It was 9:05. They’d been going the wrong way for two hours.
The conductor looked around the compartment quizzically, staring at the dozing family, then back at them. “Where are your companions? Mother, father? Aunty?”
“Oh,” muttered Zara. “They’re meeting us at the train station.”
“In Faizabad?” he asked, giving her an odd look.
“Uh, yes,” she said, straightening her back as Maya cringed at the lie.
“Miss,” he said, eyes troubled, “after you are changing tickets, stay in the waiting room until the train arrives.”
Zara nodded, shifting uncomfortably.
“But you need to be paying me for this portion of the travel,” he said, pulling out a receipt booklet. Zara dug through her wallet for the fare and handed it to him. “Remember the waiting room,” he repeated, then shuffled on.
“Come on,” said Zara, giving Maya a reassuring but strained smile. “It’ll be okay. We just got a little off track, that’s all.”
Maya bit her tongue. There was no point in arguing with Zara; it usually got her nowhere. Quickly gathering their things, the girls stepped over a sleeping little girl and exited the compartment, nodding to the grandmother, who gazed after them with curiosity.
“We’ll wait by the doors,” said Zara. “That way we can be the first to get off.”
Maya ignored her and grabbed a spot beside a window overlooking a dark expanse stretching out beside them. There were no electric lights, just the pale illumination from the full moon above, displaying slumbering villages and fields. As she took in a deep, calming gulp of cool air, redolent with diesel and cut grass, she spotted a burst of lightning in the distance, indicating that clouds, bulging with monsoon rain, were not far off.
“Look,” said Zara in a small voice. “I’m sorry, okay? This is totally my fault.”
Maya looked at her sister in surprise. She didn’t recall her ever apologizing, even when she was dead wrong. “It’s okay,” she replied, deciding to be magnanimous. They had a long journey ahead of them and it would be painful if they weren’t talking to each other. “Let’s just figure out how to get back on track to Faizabad.”
Zara nodded, relieved. They stood touching shoulders as the train flew along a curve, approaching a metal bridge straddling a sinuous river. A city dotted with lights glimmered in the distance. As the train thundered across the bridge, something else caught Maya’s eye, rising from the bank—a glowing beacon, its unmistakable dome shining like burnished silver in the moonlight.
“Look,” she whispered, nudging Zara.
“It’s . . . it’s that building . . . the really famous one . . . Taj something,” said Zara, distracted for a moment from the crisis at hand.
The girls stared in wonder as the building faded in the distance and a whistle shrilled above, announcing their arrival. The sisters jumped from the train and made a beeline for the ticket booth. With just six platforms, Agra Cantt was a much more manageable station, but the crowds, even at night, were sizable. Zara gripped Maya’s hand as they pushed past passengers, porters, hawkers, and a small boy in a frayed Mickey Mouse T-shirt sweeping the floor in front of the waiting room.
The kind ticket collector’s words rang in Maya’s ear as they passed: Stay in the waiting room until your train arrives.
Making a mental note to return to the waiting room, she allowed Zara to steer her toward the long line in front of the ticket window.
“Give me my passport,” said Zara as they reached the front of the line. “I’ll need identification to purchase the tickets.”
As Maya extracted her sister’s passport from the inside pocket of the backpack, a few hundred-dollar bills dislodged and fell.
“Be careful,” whispered Zara, scooping them up. She grabbed the passport and turned to the counter, leaving Maya to nervously gaze at the passengers in line behind them.
“Our train leaves in two hours,” said Zara a few minutes later, looking relieved. “I had to use up most of the Indian money, but we have dollars left.”
“That’s great,” said Maya, clutching the backpack.
“Yeah, we’ll be in Faizabad by nine tomorrow,” said Zara.
Maya followed Zara back toward the waiting room, but the smell of frying bread and simmering curry made them slow. Tucked away to the right was a line of food vendors, where a cheery-faced woman had just placed a bowl of boiled eggs on her counter beside a stack of parathas.
“I think the last time we ate was at Karim’s,” said Zara, eyeing a vendor spoon rice into bowls and top it with a peppery chicken stew.
Maya’s mouth watered. “I’m starving.”
“Okay, let’s get something to eat,” said Zara.
“Wait,” said Maya. “Nothing raw or lukewarm.”
They purchased half a dozen sealed packages of cookies, bottles of water, and bananas. A real meal would have to wait for the hotel. As they turned toward the waiting room, the boy in the Mickey Mouse T-shirt appeared beside them, a thoughtful look on his lean, smudged face. With matted curly hair, a dimpled chin, and scarred knees, he couldn’t have been older than nine.
He looks hungry. Probably one of the dozens of homeless kids roaming the station, she thought, looking for a way to earn a few rupees. She handed him a packet of cookies and patted him on the shoulder with a smile. He looked surprised.
“We should go to the bathroom,” said Zara.
“I don’t need to,” said Maya, imagining the restrooms and wrinkling her nose.
“Okay,” said Zara, holding up a finger and waving it as if she were a disobedient puppy. “Stay here and don’t move.”
“Yeah, yeah . . . I know,” muttered Maya, standing with the bag slung over her shoulder
. As she peeled a banana, she felt a sharp tug on her backpack. Surprised, she turned, losing her balance at another insistent yank. Before she could regain her footing, a third, more forceful jerk dropped her to the ground. She looked up to see a boy racing toward the main exit, dragging her backpack behind him.
Stunned, she lay speechless. “Thief,” she finally croaked, leaping up. “Zara!” she yelled, pounding on the door of the bathroom.
“What?” came an irritated reply.
“The backpack . . . a kid stole the backpack!”
“What!” she screamed. “Hold on . . .”
The boy, the one in the Mickey Mouse T-shirt, Maya noticed, was quickly disappearing into the crowd.
We can’t wait, thought Maya. Naniamma’s memory map is in there . . . the key to the house, our passports. . . . She ran, weaving through the crowd, pausing to jump over a sleeping man. Where is he? She scanned the crowd desperately. Without thinking twice, she ran, shouting “Thief!” at the top of her lungs, but no one paid them much attention; it was as if they were invisible. The boy had nearly made it to the main gate and was about to slip through when Maya shouted again, frantically looking for a khaki uniform.
“Police . . . help!”
The boy looked back, eyes fearful as a man in a safari suit paused in midstride. Before the boy could slither past, he grabbed his T-shirt.
Relief filled Maya, weakening her bones. “He took my bag,” she gasped, running toward them.
Just as she reached them, the boy dropped the bag and fell to his knees. As the man tried to hold on, the boy twisted, maneuvering his shirt over his head and arms. In a blink of an eye he slipped out, leaving the man holding his shirt, a look of surprise on his face. Backpack hanging off his bare back, the boy ran toward Maya. As she lunged for him, he pivoted left, running toward the last platform.
Maya scrambled after him but before she could make sense of which direction he was going, he leapt off the platform and onto the tracks. A deafening whistle reverberated through the air, announcing that a train was approaching. Blinded by the desire to get back the bag, Maya jumped onto the tracks, falling to her knees on jagged gravel. With a muffled curse, she got up and ran across the tracks, feeling the ground quake from the approach of metal wheels.
“Maya!” she heard Zara scream from the platform.
Maya glanced back and saw her sister waving frantically, trying to reach her. The bag . . . I need to get the bag. . . . She picked up speed and ran, gaining ground as the boy sprinted toward a line of hedges at the top of a hill bordering the station. With the train thundering behind them, the boy scrambled up the slope, skidding on the loose rocks. Maya reached out an arm and dove forward, fingertips hooking onto the backpack’s straps. The boy fell back and lay in the dust, staring up with wide, frightened eyes.
Tearing the bag away, Maya stood panting, not sure what to do next. It was unlike her to do something so rash. She looked back to where the train hid the platform. Her sister was somewhere behind it.
“I’m sorry,” whispered the boy, scrambling toward the bushes.
“Yeah, right,” growled Maya, anger simmering to the surface. She debated whether to haul him to the police, but as she stared into his frightened eyes, she deflated. He’s just a kid. With a sigh she turned to head back, just as a rustle sounded deep within the bushes.
The boy stiffened. “Go,” he whispered.
“Huh?” muttered Maya.
“Please, go,” said the boy, his voice tight. “They’re coming. . . .”
Maya backed up, apprehensive at the fear on the boy’s face. She was about to turn and run, when three young men emerged from the tangle of bushes and cut off her path. Dressed in jeans and colorful shirts, they struck a menacing pose.
“What do we have here, squirt?” asked the tallest one in a deep, raspy voice, a jagged scar pinching the skin along the right side of his face.
The boy averted his gaze, staring down at his torn slippers.
The chubby one in a yellow tunic, a gold ring glinting in his ear, whacked him on the head. “Answer Babu, you little runt,” he ordered in Hindi.
The little boy whimpered, doubling over. “Please, Ladu, sir . . .”
“Hey, stop that!” Maya cried in English, stepping forward.
Babu jerked his head toward her in surprise. “Are you an American?” he asked, frowning.
Maya bit her tongue as the third boy, thin as a wire and with protruding teeth, stared at her. Don’t say anything else, she told herself, and glanced back toward the station. Where’s Zara? Before she could move, the one in yellow, Ladu, grabbed the little boy’s ear and twisted. “Looks like girlie here isn’t going to talk, so I’m going to ask you one more time: Why were you chasing her?”
“She’s got money in there,” squeaked the boy, tears glistening in his eyes. “Hundreds of dollars—American dollars.”
The trio stared at Maya, eyes calculating. Babu smiled, twisting his scarred face. “Ladu, Pinto, get her.”
11
From the Frying Pan
into the Fire
RUN! SCREAMED A VOICE inside her head as the boys lunged for her. Sharp branches scraped her face as she bolted farther up the hill through the bushes, clutching her backpack. Realizing that they’d catch her if she ran back toward the train station, she surprised them by plunging headlong into the hedge. As she pushed through the dense bushes, she felt the ground slope down again. She glimpsed bright-colored lights and heard the din of activity. Heart pounding, she burst through the bushes onto the edge of the city. A bazaar loomed ahead—shops strung with bright neon signs—bustling with shoppers, peddlers, beggars, and families out for a stroll.
Disoriented, she stood a moment, uncertain which way to go. She couldn’t go back into the bushes toward the station and her sister—the boys were in there somewhere. She’d have to find an alternative route. But which way? Left? Right? The rustle of leaves behind her forced her to make a quick decision. She dashed toward a line of sari shops and then ducked between a jumble of elbows, seeking cover. Glancing back, she spotted the boys emerging from the bushes: Babu, who seemed to be the leader, Ladu in yellow, and the skinny, weasel-faced Pinto. Babu paused on the curb, cupping a cell phone to his ear, apparently having an animated discussion with someone on the other end, while pointing to the boys to split up.
Not wasting a second, Maya slid past a girl haggling over a pair of red sandals and ducked into a side alley packed with traditional leather and silk shoe-vendors. Zigzagging past shopkeepers and customers, she reached an intersection. She stood wild-eyed and sweating, wondering where to go next.
An auto rickshaw sputtered to a stop across the street, unloading a group of young women. As Maya debated what to do, a shrill whistle sounded at the other end of the alley. She glanced back, breath catching in her throat; it was the one in yellow, Ladu, alerting the others. He’s seen me! she thought. Instinctively, she slipped behind a stack of beaded slippers, trying not to panic, weighing her options. I can’t outrun them. I have to find another way.
She glanced over at the girls paying the rickshaw driver, and without thinking twice, dashed across the street. “Go,” she ordered the driver, jumping inside.
“Eh,” said the old man, owl-eyed behind thick, Coke-bottle glasses.
Maya peered back toward the alley and her blood turned to ice. The boys had made it halfway through, shoving aside an elderly man, overturning his stall.
“Just drive,” she said in Urdu, huddling in the backseat. “Please!”
With a shrug, the driver revved the engine and bucked forward, the rickshaw emitting a smelly plume of diesel from its tailpipe. Maya twisted around on the slippery vinyl seat and peered through the flaps covering the back window. The boys had skidded to a stop at the curb. They were staring at her, fists clenched, as the rickshaw careened around the corner and disappeared
from their view.
Maya slumped forward, gripping her backpack. It’s okay . . . it’s okay . . . breathe . . . I’ve lost them, she told herself.
Hunched over his steering bar and muttering to himself, the driver followed a taxi down a wide, open road while behind them rattled a bullock cart, laden with laundry. Her relief soon evaporated as traffic snarled, slowing to a halt. The area ahead had been cordoned off: hundreds of laborers lugged bags of concrete and metal pilings toward a hotel undergoing renovation.
“Where do you want to go?” the driver asked, glancing over his shoulder.
“Train station,” she blurted. “Please take me to the train station.”
“Which one?” he asked, scratching a wart on his chin.
“Agra Cantt Station.”
The driver harrumphed. “You should have told me before,” he said. “We’re going the wrong way.”
“Sorry,” Maya said. “Please, just get me there as fast as you can.”
“There is a lot of construction,” he grumbled. “I’ll have to go around it.”
“That’s okay,” she said.
As she sat in the safety of the rickshaw, the reality of what had happened hit her like a ton of bricks. She slumped, clutching her backpack, tears blurring her vision. How did that happen? We should have been more careful, she thought. This wasn’t San Francisco, where she and her sister knew their way around. This was India, where things were much more unpredictable . . . and, frankly, dangerous. But as the shock eased, an unexpected feeling of pride buzzed through her veins. She’d outwitted the boys! Wait till she told Zara. . . . Remembering her sister, she realized that she must be out of her mind with worry.
“Do you have a phone?” she asked the driver, desperate to tell her she was on her way back to the train station.
“No,” he grunted.
Disappointed, Maya looked down at her watch. There was still time to catch their train. . . . And this time she and Zara would hide in the waiting room, as the conductor had advised. They had a promise to keep.
She leaned forward in her seat, mentally urging the rickshaw to move, but they sat idling at the bottleneck. The poor bull still stood behind them, his long-lashed eyes resigned, swishing his tail, ignoring the honking horns. Maya turned to scour the road behind them, spotting a cycle rickshaw barreling up the asphalt. She squinted . . . and caught a flash of yellow. It was Ladu, legs pumping on the pedals; Babu sat in the back with Pinto, who was grimacing into his phone.
