Moth Smoke (14 page)

I grab her by her wrists, just below her gloves, and pull her to me. She looks up, still smiling, and I can feel my mouth throbbing from her punch.

I’m intensely aware of every contact between my body and hers.

‘I could knee you,’ she says. Her leg moves up slightly, between mine, and I realize how vulnerable I am. That would hurt.

I let her go.

‘I wasn’t actually going to knee you,’ she says.

‘I didn’t think you were going to punch me either.’ My lips feel a little puffy as I speak.

‘I didn’t think I’d be able to hit you.’

I smile at her, feeling my lips stretch. ‘Very funny.’

I help her out of the gloves, and she takes off the hand wraps, rolls them up, and gives them to me. Then we head back inside and finish off a pitcher of water. Mumtaz stays for lunch. The sweat has dried on her face and covered it with dirty streaks. I imagine licking one and almost taste the salt, but I try to get the thought out of my mind before she sees what I’m thinking. I don’t eat very much, a little ashamed that there’s no meat or even chicken. I just watch her serve herself and clean all the food off her plate, wishing there was some reason for me to reach out and touch her skin.

I look at my hands. Who would have thought that I would ever teach a woman to box and come out of it with a bloody mouth and torn knuckles?

‘Let me see them,’ she says.

I reach across the table. She runs her fingers over my red knuckles, lightly, but doesn’t say anything. Then she turns them over and strokes my palms with her thumbs.

‘I went to see a palm reader the other day,’ she tells me.

Palm readers must be the new fad among the idle rich. ‘I would have thought you were too educated for that sort of thing.’

‘I’ve told you I’m superstitious.’ She lets go of my hands and lights a cigarette.

‘And is this palm reader a well-connected young socialite?’

‘Her name’s Allima Mooltani. She’s about sixty and she lives in Model Town.’

‘A well-connected old socialite, then,’ I say, taking one of her cigarettes. ‘How much did she charge?’

‘Five hundred. But she spent an entire hour with me.’

‘I can’t believe you paid that much.’ I do some quick arithmetic. Let’s say she sees three people a day and works five days a week. That comes to seventy-five hundred a week, thirty thousand a month. That’s more than what I made as a banker, before taxes. And she probably doesn’t even pay taxes. Why am I sitting here, deeper and deeper in debt, when palm readers are making that much?

‘What are you thinking?’ Mumtaz asks me.

‘Nothing,’ I say, noticing that the ash has grown on my cigarette. I flick it. ‘What makes you think this woman isn’t a complete fake?’

‘That’s hard to explain. She doesn’t try to tell you that your eighth kid’s name will be Qudpuddin or anything. She just shows you yourself.’

‘For five hundred an hour I’d want to know my eighth kid’s name, birthday, and favorite dessert.’

‘You have to go.’

‘No thanks. I can’t afford it.’

‘My treat.’

‘I couldn’t.’

‘You have to. I’ll take you.’

‘When?’

‘Tomorrow.’

Manucci comes in with her ring and shades, which we forgot on the bench outside, and she takes them casually, not at all upset that she was so absentminded.

‘Do you know what happens when you detonate a nuclear bomb under the desert?’ she asks.

‘No.’

‘The sand turns to glass.’

‘From the heat?’

She nods.

When she leaves, I present my cheek for her to kiss, but she kisses my lips instead, softly. I smile in surprise, and then I remember pulling her to me earlier, which makes my smile wider even though my mouth hurts. And she smiles back at me like she knows what I’m smiling about. Then she’s gone, and I sit back down to lunch and finish off the food. Manucci clears the plates, giggling to himself, and although he’s just being silly, he makes me laugh as well.

The celebrations begin not long after Mumtaz has left. How everyone knows I don’t understand. The excited
trrring
ing of bicycle bells brings me to the gate, witness to the victory parade of a half-dozen gardeners, long shears tied to the backs of their Sohrabs, pedaling triumphantly, wobbling,
clapping as often as balance and courage will allow.

Manucci brings the news with him at a run, doubled over with the effort, from the neighbor’s servant quarters.

‘What the hell is going on?’ I ask him.

‘We’ve done it,’ he pants.

‘What?’

‘We’ve exploded our bomb.’

I feel something straighten my back, a strange excitement, the posture-correcting force of pride. Manucci looks up at me, his face sweaty, dirty, and grins. We shake hands like old comrades, two warriors home at last, and I’m about to say something, to launch into a little self-congratulatory speech, when a sound interrupts the flow of my elation.

From somewhere down the road we hear the first burst of celebratory gunfire, a hard-edged firecracker set to automatic, emptying its magazine into the sky. And I find myself thinking of my mother, beautiful, wasp-faced, with high cheekbones and hollow cheeks, her strict expression softened by sad eyes and a small, round smile. Never any jewelry, holes in her ears shriveled shut, still-black hair pulled into a bun. How young she always seemed, young enough to be mistaken for my sister the year she died. But not the day she was buried: bloodless, all color drained from her face, wrinkles visible in her pale skin like creases on a ball of paper.

Manucci puts his fingers in the air and launches into a
spontaneous bhangra. The Kalashnikov spits again. I head inside.

That evening Raider comes to see me. He’s wearing his power suspenders, the ones with a red polka dot on either side, which he calls the Rising Sun.

‘Five each, baby,’ he says, giving me a hug.

‘Five each.’

We sit on the bonnet of his car and share a cigar. ‘It’s a Havana,’ he tells me.

‘I hate cigars. You can’t inhale them.’

He shakes his head and rolls up his shirtsleeves. Work is miles away, but Raider’s still wearing his tie. His jacket hangs in the car, broad shoulders, no vents, very European, copied from
GQ
by a tailor on Beadon Road.

‘Good parties tonight.’

‘Really?’

‘Of course. People are feeling good. It’s been a nervous couple of weeks.’

‘Armageddon parties?’ I ask, trying to sound superior, mainly because I haven’t been invited to any.

‘Initiation parties. Welcome to the nuclear club, partner.’

‘Are you going?’

‘I’m going to your buddy Ozi’s.’

‘Maybe I’ll see you there,’ I say, hiding my surprise. I didn’t know Ozi was having a party.

Raider spits out a piece of tobacco and takes a few quick puffs. ‘I have to ask you a favor. I need some pot.’

My stash is running low. ‘I can give you enough for a joint or two.’

‘I need more. I promised a couple of friends and all my sources are out.’

‘I can get you some in a few days.’

‘Before the weekend?’

‘I think so.’ I should be able to track Murad Badshah down before then.

‘Thanks, partner. I owe you, big-time.’

Raider likes that phrase, big-time. He wants to make it, big-time. He owes you, big-time. He’s going to party, big-time.

‘No problem, yaar,’ I tell him, thinking I have nothing better to do. ‘How much do you want?’

He takes out a note and hands it to me. ‘Five hundred worth?’

‘That’s a lot of hash.’

‘I know. Do you think you can get it?’

I’ve never placed an order with Murad Badshah that he couldn’t fill. ‘I think so.’

‘Great,’ Raider says.

I feel strange buying that much pot, especially since it isn’t for me. It isn’t even for Raider. It’s for his friends. But Raider’s an openhearted guy and there’s no way I can turn
him down. Besides, I might be able to keep a little for myself, a heartening thought given the sorry state of my supplies.

Once the cigar is finished, I invite him in to share a joint, but he tells me he has to run and drives off. Raider’s always rushing. He’s busy, big-time.

Mumtaz picks me up after lunch the next day for our date with Allima Mooltani, the palm reader. I know I shouldn’t be doing this. But I am doing it, slouching a little in my seat as though it’ll make me less visible if Ozi or someone we know happens to see us. Mumtaz seems completely unconcerned. I don’t know what she’s used to in Karachi, but here in Lahore going for a drive with a friend’s wife when the friend doesn’t know about it definitely qualifies as self-destructive behavior.

‘I like your servant, Munnoo-ji,’ she says as we power down Main Gulberg Boulevard, cutting through traffic. We’ve decided to get a couple of paans since my appointment isn’t for another half hour.

‘He’s called Manucci, not Munnoo-ji.’

‘Manucci? That’s a strange name.’

‘I think it’s Italian.’

‘But he’s not Italian.’

‘No.’

‘Then why is he called Manucci?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Where does he come from?’

‘He tried to rob my mother.’

‘While he was working for you?’ She takes the Liberty roundabout at high speed.

‘Before. He’s had a colorful past. Kind of like Kim.’

‘Kipling’s Kim?’

I nod. ‘But not as romantic. Manucci’s missing a kidney.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘The kidney-theft racket. But he’s lucky: they only took one of his, and they were nice enough to sew him back up.’

We reach Main Market and pull into a space in front of Barkat’s paan shop. A dozen runners surround the car, knocking on the windows, each claiming he saw us first. I realize that it was stupid of us to come here: Main Market’s paan runners are Gulberg society’s elite reconnaissance team. I point to my guy, Salim, and wave the rest of them away.

Once Salim’s taken our order, the beggars move in. Most are genuinely crippled, or hooked on heroin, or insane, or too old to work, or dying from some debilitating disease, and I’d give them a rupee or two if it weren’t for the few strong ones, perfectly healthy, waiting to take their cut when night falls. But Mumtaz is more softhearted than I am, and when our runner comes back with the paan, I have to tell him to clear them away. Give money to a few and the whole market wants some. I tip Salim very well, with a look that means keep your mouth shut, because he knows
who I am and who Ozi is, and a leak from him could spark some vicious gossip.

Which reminds me of something I’ve been meaning to ask Mumtaz since I spoke to Raider. ‘How was your party?’

She looks embarrassed. ‘I’m so sorry he didn’t invite you. But what a stupid reason to celebrate.’

‘Is he angry with me?’ What I’m really asking is: Has he found out we’ve been spending time with each other?

‘No, of course not. Why would he be?’

‘You tell me.’

‘He isn’t. I think he’s just trying to meet new people. He’s been away from Lahore for so long that he feels a little cut off.’

Mumtaz honks until the driver of the car that pulled in behind us, blocking our exit, comes running out of a shop.

Then we’re off to Model Town for our appointment. The palm reader lives in an old house with a crumbling boundary wall. I expect to be led inside, into a dark room with a crystal ball, perhaps, but Mumtaz takes me onto the lawn.

Allima Mooltani is sitting in the shade, on a cushion at the base of an enormous tree, smoking through a long ivory holder. An extension cord snakes through the grass, providing electricity to a pair of pedestal fans. In front of each fan rests a slab of ice covered with motia flowers. Allima’s long hair, mostly white but streaked with gray, moves like a tattered curtain in the wind.

‘This looks like an abandoned ad for menthol cigarettes,’
I tell Mumtaz, but she elbows me. We say our salaams and sit down.

I have to admit that it’s surprisingly pleasant out here, with the ice and fans and shade.

‘I’ve been waiting for you, Darashikoh,’ she says.

‘My God, you know my name!’ I exclaim.

‘Be serious, Daru,’ Mumtaz says.

‘Give me your hands,’ Allima tells me.

I do, and she strokes them with her forearm, front and back. I break out in goosebumps. Her fingernails are long and unpolished.

‘Shut your eyes.’

I do it. She gives me an exquisite hand massage, following the bones of my fingers into my palms, tracing the scabs on my knuckles lightly with her nails.

‘I have bad news for you,’ she says.

‘What?’

But before she can answer a woman calls out from the house. ‘Telephone, Amma. It’s Bilal.’

‘I’m so sorry,’ Allima says, jumping up. ‘My son. In Singapore.’

And with that she’s off at a trot. The door slams shut behind her like the distant retort of a howitzer, and I’m left looking at Mumtaz.

‘The suspense is too much,’ she says.

‘If she knows the future she should schedule these palm-reading
sessions so they’re not interrupted by phone calls.’

Mumtaz shakes her head. ‘You have no faith.’

I light a smoke, cupping my hands against the best efforts of the pedestal fans.

We hear the unmistakable
phirrr
of a kite at low altitude and look up. Sure enough, there it is: a red-and-black patang, slim-waisted, wasplike, wing tips curved back like the horns of the devil. On the rooftop, directly above the door that swallowed Allima Mooltani, the patang’s young pilot acknowledges us with a jaunty salute.

Mumtaz waves to him.

And in the driveway, struggling to get aloft, we have the challenger: a battered machhar, its tail a white pom-pom, green-and-purple patches telling tales of battles past. And string in hand, jerking rapidly to capture altitude, is the machhar’s commander, a barefoot servant boy a little taller than the bonnet of the car beside him.

We’re in for a kite fight.

The patang, temporarily denied any more string, catches the wind and soars straight up.

The machhar flips about at tree level, displaying a tendency to circle in a counterclockwise direction. But its minuscule commander manages to use this imbalance to his advantage, timing his tugs to the moment the machhar’s nose points in the direction he wants, finding maneuverability in capriciousness.