Gopal approached Arayi. “Kuppuswami?” he asked, a single word that towed the weight of a heavier question.
“Not here.” Her answer was awkward, hesitating. “He’s been . . . taking this hard.”
Gopal didn’t push. With his younger brother, some things were simply understood.
“Where do we start?”
The women had sliced up the city into pieces like they would a jackfruit. The first groups would begin with the bus station, the train terminal, the park, the market, the hospitals, and then all of the neighborhoods in between. After that, they would fan out into the less populated areas, checking rivers and roads, fields and groves, ponds and canals.
A boy doesn’t simply disappear for no reason.
It would be hot and grueling, but certainly, with so many people coming, someone would turn up something! It was just a matter of finding one person who saw something out of the ordinary.
One person.
“Stay calm,” Gopal assured. “We’ll find him. We’ll find Chellamuthu.”
It was late morning when the door beside the gate clanked open and a boy walked in, escorted by Rajamani.
The youngster, half a head taller than Chellamuthu, had lanky hair and a hefty chin. He seemed child-curious, with inquisitive eyes and a mouth that couldn’t wait to smile.
The boy spied Chellamuthu in the courtyard and rushed right over.
“I’m Vikesh. What’s your name?”
Chellamuthu glanced past him for a cautious second until Rajamani had left the courtyard.
He answered in a half-whisper. “Chellamuthu.”
Vikesh pointed to the open yard. “You want to play?” he asked. At eight, few boys are strangers.
“Play?”
It was a peculiar question for an arriving child at a place like this.
“Yeah, play. Why not?”
“Aren’t you scared?” Chellamuthu wondered.
Vikesh glanced around. There were only small children. “Scared of what?”
Of what? “Of never seeing your family again.”
It was a question that bumped Vikesh back half a step. His face scrunched. His volume rose. “What are you talking about? Rajamani is my father. He brings me here to play.”
The moment hung as Chellamuthu assembled the pieces in his brain. Was he the only one who’d been kidnapped? The word from Vikesh that stuck out, the one Chellamuthu finally grabbed hold of to make sense of the situation, was the last—play.
Chellamuthu’s worry softened. His head tilted forward. “What do you want to play?”
Vikesh shrugged. “We could pretend we’re soldiers protecting the Khyber Pass.”
It was an excellent plan. For the better part of an afternoon, two boys, one free and one captive, single-handedly defended their country’s honor by decimating legion after legion of enemy soldiers trying to enter India through one of the oldest mountain passes in the world.
When Rajamani announced that playtime was over, that it was time for Vikesh to leave, the boys’ pleas melded together. “Can we play a little longer?”
The two were assured that India’s sovereignty would be safe for a few more days until Vikesh could return. Then, as quickly as the boy had appeared, he was gone.
Later that evening, after Chellamuthu had finished eating and carrying pans to Mrs. Sundar, he noticed Eli standing in the yard near the fountain. With valor from the day’s battles still pulsing in his veins, he marched over and tugged at the man’s lungi.
“I was taken. I have a family!” he declared with a strength that surprised them both.
Eli tipped toward the child like a deaf grandfather to make sure he’d understood.
“I’m sorry, Chellamuthu. What did you say?”
Another breath of bravery. “They stole me. I was with my father . . . on the street. I knew one of them. They said they had food, then they threw me in a van. I ended up here.”
Eli turned. Alarm spread across his face like a third-world plague, not only at the child’s words but at his determination.
“Chellamuthu, the children here are orphans. They are brought here because they have no family. Are you telling me that you do?”
The boy nodded.
Eli scratched amply at his chin, let the moment stretch. He stooped near the boy.
“Son, I am going to check into this. I will contact those who brought you here. I will investigate fully. It will take a few days, so be patient. Can you do that?”
Did he have a choice?
“Thank you, Chellamuthu, for being courageous. We’ll resolve this. If you have a family, I will find them. That’s what I do.”
Eli stood. “Now, have you seen Rajamani?” he said, as casually as if he’d just stumbled into Chellamuthu in the courtyard. “I need to speak with him right away.”
Kuppuswami hadn’t returned home since the relatives began to arrive. How could he? He could barely tolerate living with himself under normal circumstances. To drape on the added load of disappointment, especially from family—the burden might crush him.
There was no escape but to the streets, the gutters, the solitude, which he could bear as long as he could stay utterly plastered.
In India, that part was easy.
However, now that he’d quit trying to find work, money to buy palm toddy was harder to come by. Worse, the toddy sellers, for crazy reasons he could only understand when he was sober, insisted he pay up front. The setback left a single solution: he would make his own. It involved two simple steps:
1. Extract sap from a palm tree.
2. Wait.
In real life, it meant that he had to climb to the top of a palm and cut a flower. He could then fasten a bucket beneath the flower stump to collect the milky sap.
An amazing property of palm sap is that it begins to ferment immediately, due to natural yeasts in the pores of the collecting pots. Within as little as two hours, a bucket will hold an aromatic wine that is not only intoxicating but deliciously sweet.
In Kuppuswami’s case, making his own palm toddy was both good and bad. The good part was that it was virtually free. The bad part was that Kuppuswami had to be sober enough at least once a day to make the climb to the top of a palm tree to retrieve his buckets.
One of these days, if he wasn’t careful, he’d fall from the top and snap his neck.
Chapter 8
With each passing day, Chellamuthu worried less about the door beside the gate. Eli would soon discover the truth, and all would be made right. The mix-up would be straightened out, Chellamuthu would be returned to his family in Erode, and he’d be left with the most incredible story to tell his cousins and friends!
It was dusk when Chellamuthu was drawing water from the fountain for Rajamani that the boy again heard the cries of a child. They were coming from the room with the large, white door. He stepped close and flattened his ear tight to the wood. Someone was inside.
Chellamuthu glanced back at the fountain and then to the open room where Rajamani was working but not watching. Chellamuthu set the bucket down on the dirt and reached for the handle.
It twisted. Without thinking, he pushed the door open and slipped inside.
The crying halted.
Beside the door, high in the wall near the ceiling was a lone window that opened into the courtyard. With the sun all but set, it took a moment for Chellamuthu’s eyes to adjust.
Lying on a mat against the wall was the little girl from the Jeep. The light spilling in from the window seemed to take pity and gather around her. Anyone could see she wasn’t well.
“Are you sick?” Chellamuthu asked, as he inched forward, his foolish words spilling off his tongue before he could stop them. He didn’t give her time to answer. “What’s your name?”
She shifted her weight slowly, silently.
“It’s okay. Maybe I can help,” Chellamuthu coaxed.
“Anu,” she mouthed, with large eyes and a voice like fractured glass that might shatter into a million pieces at any moment.
As he took a step closer, he could see where she had thrown up. While the stench made Chellamuthu want to cover his mouth, it also tightened familiar fingers around his ankles that held his feet. He remembered his sister Manju, her sickness . . . his mistakes.
It was odd. With family far away, even the bitter memories were now sweet.
“I saw you in the Jeep,” Chellamuthu said.
She didn’t answer.
“I want to help,” he added. Then, remembering her plea about needing to go home and hoping it would lift her spirits, Chellamuthu shared his good news.
“I told the commissioner, Eli, the one in charge, that I’d been kidnapped. He promised to find my family. I’m sure he can find yours, too.”
Her face was wet, shiny, and fevered. She was too frail to respond. He was about to ask if she would like some water when the door behind them opened.
“Chellamuthu, what are you doing in here?” It was Rajamani, and he didn’t sound happy.
“I heard crying and came to help.”
As Rajamani glanced down at the girl, his own face saddened. When he spoke, his tone leaked regret. “She’s been sick again,” he said, stating the obvious. “I’ll call someone to help clean her up.”
“What’s wrong with her?” Chellamuthu asked, ignoring that she was right there listening.
“Don’t know. She can’t keep anything down.”
“Why is she in here?”
Rajamani touched Chellamuthu on the shoulder. “We weren’t sure if she was contagious. We couldn’t risk putting her in the room with the babies.”
“Will she be all right?”
“We’ve been watching her, doing all we can. You didn’t touch her?”
“No.”
“Well, go wash up anyway and get to bed. We’ll take care of her.”
Chellamuthu turned to leave but paused at the door.
“Mr. Rajamani?”
“Yes?”
“Can I come back tomorrow, just to see how she’s doing?”
Rajamani glanced first at the sickly girl, face down now on the mat and barely breathing, then at Chellamuthu, staring anxiously from the door.
“We’ll see, son,” he answered. “We’ll see.”
Chellamuthu hardly slept. He was thinking about home—and about Anu. His sister was the same, refusing to drink because it would make her vomit. He hadn’t worried at the time, since his mother had taken charge. Today, by the time the sun had come up, he knew what he needed to do.
Eli was sitting beside Anu when Chellamuthu pulled open the door. The boy didn’t wait to explain. “I can help. I saw how my mother helped my sister.”
He set down a rag and bucket he’d taken from the kitchen, dipped the cloth in the water, and bent down beside the girl. She didn’t move.
Chellamuthu continued. “She just squeezed some drops on her lips for almost all day, like this . . .”
The rag was full of water and when too much dripped into the girl’s mouth, she gagged, coughed, and groaned.
Eli reached for the rag, as if he was about to shoo Chellamuthu away, but reconsidered when he took another glance at the girl.
“Chellamuthu,” Eli said, reaching down for the boy’s hand to make certain he was listening. “You should know that the doctor was here early this morning. He wasn’t encouraged. He said that Anu is a very sick little girl.”
He didn’t need to say more. Chellamuthu had already pulled away and was dipping the rag in the bucket.
Vikesh and Chellamuthu wrestled in the dirt, though the dirt seemed to be winning. When the gate beside them clicked open, the boys’ eyes turned—whoever it was had a key!
The man who entered was older, like Eli, but to young boys every adult is old. In place of a traditional lungi, he was dressed in a white buttoned shirt with dark slacks, like the businessmen Chellamuthu had watched coming and going from the International Bank building near where he and his father waited to transfer buses in downtown Erode.
This man was heavy, with open nostrils and a thick nose that adeptly balanced a pair of black glasses wrapping around his cantaloupe-sized face. Also like Eli, his hair was turning gray, but there was little of it, leaving him completely bald on top.
He surveyed Chellamuthu like a man buying a prized goat at the market.
“You’re new,” he said. “What’s your name?”
His voice was smooth and rich, like English tea with cream. The air about the man practically wore a badge: Indian Banker Boring.
Should Chellamuthu answer?
The man glanced at Vikesh, who didn’t hesitate. “His name’s Chellamuthu.”
“Is that right?” The stranger edged forward. “How old are you, Chellamuthu?”
Vikesh would have answered, had he known, but Chellamuthu didn’t give him time.
“I’m eight.” In truth, he wasn’t sure. Birthdays were seldom celebrated by the poor.
“That’s perfect.” The man turned to Vikesh. “Is Eli here?”
“I think he’s in his office.”
As the stranger walked away, Vikesh dropped to a knee and stretched for Chellamuthu’s ankle, hoping for a quick takedown. “Come on!” Vikesh called out. “Let’s wrestle!”
Chellamuthu jerked away. He wasn’t finished watching. His nose pointed toward the man’s back. “Who is he?”
“Him? That’s Maneesh Durai. He owns this place.”
Chellamuthu’s face puckered. “I thought Eli did.”
“Maybe they both do.” Vikesh added, “Eli runs it, but Maneesh helps with the money. He’s a banker or something. They’re friends.”
Maneesh had slipped inside the building, but the upper window was open. The boys could hear the men talking, though it was tough to make out their words.
“Come on,” Vikesh pleaded. “Let’s . . .”
“Shhhh!” Chellamuthu pressed a finger to his lips. “Ah . . . I . . . I’m pretending we’re spies, and we’ve sneaked up to enemy headquarters.”
Vikesh crouched. His eyes adjusted to the notion. Much better! This was a game he could work with.
The two knelt against the building and listened.
The men’s garbled words reminded Chellamuthu of picking through dirty trash looking for an item or two still fresh enough to eat. The first name Chellamuthu heard was Anu. It was followed by something about sickness and travel. Next was talk about numbers, but neither boy understood what they meant.
More jumbled words.
More waiting.
Then a word floated down from the window, a word they both recognized. Perhaps it was clearer than the rest because it was familiar. The boys definitely heard a name . . .
Chellamuthu.
“How are things at the bank?” Eli asked, making obvious conversation. He was already seated.
Maneesh prattled about the office, looking over their kingdom, taking in changes. He plucked an envelope from the desk, flipped it over absently to scan the postmark, then returned it unharmed. “Bank’s the same,” he answered. “The rich are getting richer, and the poor are helping them. I’m caught in between.”
When Eli offered no smile, Maneesh moved in for a closer look. “You seem tense.”
“Do I?” Eli asked. His voice was low, worn, fraying at the edges. “It’s the sick girl, Anu. I was up all night again.”
Maneesh took a chair beside him. “Is she getting better?”
“Not yet, but I’m hopeful.”
“You and your hope. I guess that’s why we work well as partners. You dream. I make sure we stay afloat.”
Spoken like a banker.
“I th
ink we’re doing more than just floating.”
Maneesh offered no hint of apology. “India has millions of starving orphans. America has parents yearning to adopt. We match them up and earn a profit. Nothing wrong with that. The more we earn, the more children we can help. And we’re gaining status in the community. People are noticing. Everybody wins.”
More than a banker, Maneesh was almost a politician.
“But don’t you get tired of . . .” Eli paused. Had the word escaped him, or could he not bring himself to say it?
“Tired of what?”
“ . . . the corruption. Everyone in India wants payment. To keep the engine running, money is passed, favors are granted, eyes look away. I’m starting to choke on the fumes. Doesn’t it all make you . . . I don’t know . . . weary?”
Maneesh’s eyes actually brightened. “It’s the way India works, my friend. Everybody has a price. We can’t change human nature. We can only use it to our advantage.”
“Our problem isn’t human nature,” Eli answered, never looking up. “It’s human behavior.”
Arayi paced by the fire as she waited for the last searchers of the day to return. It was a constant battle to keep dejection from clawing at her bleeding heart, as if she were fighting a determined tiger with nothing but a twig.
Friends and relatives had searched for Chellamuthu for days with few leads.
A man by the river had remembered a boy playing apart from the others and thought it could have been the lost child. But when he was shown a picture, he couldn’t be certain—skinny, naked Indian boys playing in the mud can all look alike.
A merchant selling fish in the market near the hospital swore he’d watched a man tie up a screaming boy and carry him away into the crowd. But no one else in the busy square saw any such thing, and when pressed further, the man confessed he’d made up the story to draw attention and sell more fish.
The most promising lead was from a woman walking with her sister near the government building where Chellamuthu had disappeared. They had watched a van speed away that day with two or three children inside, but the woman admitted that from a distance she couldn’t be certain. It might have simply been a young family in a hurry. The woman’s sister, who was closer, had since returned to her village and hadn’t been found to see if there was anything further she could add.
The Orphan Keeper Page 7
