The Sultan's Tigers (12 page)

I stood beside my uncle, staring at the sunbaked view. The landscape seemed to stretch forever: hills and shrubs and trees and a single road zigzagging along the valley.

“Ready for one more?” said Uncle Harvey.

“Sure.”

After six hills, neither of us had the energy for running. We trudged slowly back down to the bottom and found Suresh sitting under the shade of a tree. He held up a metal flask. “You want one drink?”

“Yes, please.” I reached for the flask.

To my surprise, Uncle Harvey stopped me. “You'd better not. You can't drink the water in India unless you know exactly where it's come from.”

“I'm about to die of thirst!”

“I'll buy you a bottle.”

“Oh, yeah?” I gestured at the empty plains surrounding us. “Where?”

Uncle Harvey turned to Suresh. “Is there a shop round here? Or a restaurant?”

“You want tiffin stop?”

“Indeed we do,” said Uncle Harvey. “Do you know anywhere nice?”

“I know very good place.”

“Is it owned by one of your relatives? Do you get a commission for taking us there?”

“No, sir! Just good food. Please to come aboard and we will go.”

Tiffin was an Indian word for a meal. That's what my uncle told me. He'd been to India many times before and knew all the lingo.

We got back in the rickshaw and headed north.

We'd stop for a quick lunch, Uncle Harvey said, then carry on searching for the rest of the afternoon, returning to Srirangapatna in time to find a hotel before nightfall. Tomorrow we would continue our search.

“What if we haven't found the tiger by the end of the week?” I asked. “Will we stay another week?”

“You've got to go back to the States.”

“I don't care.”

“I do.”

“What about you? Will you stay here on your own?”

“I can't go home without the money to pay my debts,” said Uncle Harvey. “I had been planning to spend this week trying to gather together a hundred grand, but I'm here instead. If I don't get my hands on some cash, I might have to stay here for the rest of my life. Which wouldn't be too bad, actually. I love India. I could join an ashram and spend my days meditating.”

“What's an ashram?”

As we drove on, Uncle Harvey told me about Hinduism and Buddhism and all the different gods and religions that you find in India. He told me about sadhus, the holy men who have no money and no possessions, just their clothes, their sandals, and a walking stick. We would see one soon, he said. I would recognize them by their shaved heads. He might become one of them himself, he suggested, if he couldn't find the money to pay off his debts: he would shave his head, swap his clothes for a yellow robe, and spend the rest of his life walking around India, begging for food and coins. To my surprise, he seemed quite keen on the idea.

When we'd been driving for fifteen or twenty minutes, Suresh turned off the main road and rattled us up a dusty lane that soon led to what looked like a small town. Shacks lined the roadside and some kind of big building stood on the top of the nearest hill, looking down on us. It could have been a castle or just more houses, sheltering behind a high wall, protecting the inhabitants from attack. Chickens clucked and squabbled out of our way. A naked toddler giggled at us as if we were clowns putting on a show just for him.

We pulled up at a small restaurant. Wooden tables and plastic chairs were laid out under a wide awning, providing shade from the hot sun. The place wasn't exactly buzzing. An Indian family was sitting at one of the tables, the parents and three kids sharing a big spread, and a female backpacker was at another, a hippie in a pink T-shirt and baggy blue trousers. She glanced at us for a moment, then went back to her book. I smelled spices from the kitchen and realized how hungry I was.

We sat by the door. Suresh went to sit alone at a different table. I felt bad. Why didn't he join us? Shouldn't we ask him over? Actually, maybe better not. He might ask too many awkward questions. He'd obviously been interested in what we were doing, but he'd kept his curiosity to himself, and it would be best if that didn't change. Marko might be right behind us, and we didn't want him to be able to discover what we were doing.

“What do you want to eat?” asked Uncle Harvey.

I didn't have to think about it. I had the same whenever we went out for Indian or if Dad got takeout on a night when Mom was too tired to cook. “Lamb rogan josh, pilau rice, and naan bread, please. And some mango chutney.”

“You won't get that here.”

“Why not? We're in India, aren't we?”

“All those dishes are from the north. We're in the south. It's all masala dosas and idli sambas.”

“It's what?”

“You've never had a masala dosa?”

“No.”

“You're going to enjoy this.” He looked around for a waiter. Then he said, “Maybe we should ask her to join us.”

I thought I must have misheard “her” for “him,” but when Uncle Harvey sprang to his feet and loped across the restaurant, I realized he had forgotten our driver. All his attention had been taken up by that backpacker with baggy pants and a silver ring through her nose. A few moments later, he was beckoning me over. He'd managed to convince the woman that we should join her table.

Did he think she'd be useful to us? Did he hope she could help us find the tiger?

No. He just liked her.

My uncle could sometimes be a real idiot.

The hippie stood up and shook my hand. Her name was Tanya, she said, and she was from Israel. My uncle told her our names, explained where we were from, and waved the waiter over to order a round of mango lassies. “You're going to love this,” he said to me. Then he turned back to the hippie. “Tom's never been to India before. This is his first time.”

“Do you like it?” she asked in her heavy accent.

“So far.”

“Where have you been?”

“Only Bengaluru and here.”

“Why do you come here? To see the temple?”

“We're here because, um . . .” I looked at my uncle for help.

“My nephew is doing a school project on Tipu Sultan and the Duke of Wellington. We've come on a research trip. We're visiting all the places associated with Tipu and the battlefield where Wellington finally defeated him.”

“Really? You've brought him all the way to India for school? That's so wonderful. You must be his favorite uncle!”

“I am. But I'm also his only uncle, so there's not much competition.” Uncle Harvey grinned and the girl laughed. Soon they were chatting away like old friends. She lived in Tel Aviv, she told us, but she loved traveling around the world, seeing how different people lived. She and my uncle discussed the different places that they'd been in India, comparing their experiences. I listened but didn't say much, having decided that my only possible role was stopping my uncle from saying anything too stupid, anything that might give away clues to our real reason for being here. I didn't think Tanya was a spy or a friend of Marko's. Even he wouldn't be able to get someone here so quickly. But I still thought it would be best if she didn't know too much about us.

A mango lassi, I can tell you now, is a sweet, yogurty drink. As for a masala dosa, that turned out to be a large crispy pancake, rolled up and curled around a lump of vegetable curry studded with peas, potatoes, and tiny peppercorns. The only cutlery was a teaspoon in the spicy brown sauce that came with it. Uncle Harvey showed me how to tear off a chunk of the pancake with my fingers, wrap it around the vegetables, and dip it in the sauce.

“Only use your right hand,” he said, winking at Tanya. “Indians keep their left hand for wiping their bum. If they see you eating with your left hand, they won't come anywhere near you.”

Tanya said, “What do you think of the food, Tom? Do you like it?”

“It's great,” I said. And it was: although it tasted nothing like any curry that I'd ever tasted before, the pancake was crispy and delicious, and the sauce had a great spicy taste that was milder and more interesting than curries at home.

“Most of the Indian restaurants in the U.S. serve north Indian food,” said my uncle. “Their food is nice enough, but I prefer south Indian. You should sample as much as you can when you're here. You just have to be prepared for the occasional dose of amoebic dysentery.”

“Oh, I was so sick last week!” said Tanya.

“What happened?”

“It was my own stupid fault. I ate an ice cream. Everyone tells you, never eat ice cream. Whatever you do, never eat ice cream in India, you will be sick immediately. That's what they say, right? But I was in a nice place, and it was clean, and I thought,
Why not?
So I spent the next twenty-four hours sitting on the john.”

“Sitting?” My uncle shook his head. “You've got nothing to complain about!”

“What do you mean?”

“At least it wasn't coming out from both ends at the same time.”

“Oh, that's terrible.” Tanya winced.

“Would you mind?” I said. “I'm trying to eat.”

Neither of them took any notice. I'm not sure Uncle Harvey even heard me. All his attention was focused on the girl. He leaned across the table and said in a low tone, “Have you ever been on a bus with dysentery?”

“That's the worst,” she replied. “I took this bus once from Srinagar to Delhi, and I had to spend the whole journey locked in the tiny toilet at the back . . .”

And so it went on, Uncle Harvey and his new best friend trying to outdo each other with their tales of disgusting illnesses. I'm not squeamish, but all their talk about diarrhea didn't do my food any favors. Eventually I couldn't take it anymore. I picked up my plate and walked away. Rather than returning to our original table, I joined Suresh. He looked up, smiling. “You are ready for leaving?”

“I wish I could say yes, but we might have to wait for Uncle Harvey to pick up that girl first.”

“We must wait to get what?”

“Nothing. I'm just joking. I should think we'll go soon, yes. We want to climb a few more hills before it gets dark.”

“If you don't mind me asking, why are you doing this?”

“I can't explain. I'm sorry.”

“No problem.” Suresh shrugged his shoulders. “I am only driver, there is no need to tell me.”

I said, “Can I sit down here?”

“Please, no problem.”

I sat opposite him. We sat there awkwardly for a moment, then he broke the silence. “You are from which country?”

“The U.S.,” I said.

“Ah, United States! You love football?”

“Not really. I prefer baseball.”

“Yankees?”

“No, Red Sox.”

“Oh, yes. Win World Series.”

“Hey, tell me something. Is this your village? Do you live here?”

“No, no. This is not my village.”

“But you've been here before?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“This is the home of one temple. You see? Here, come, look.”

He pointed at the hill behind us. The awning that stretched above our heads had obscured my view of what I had thought was a castle.

In his halting English, Suresh explained that he had been to the temple several times with his mother, because she was very sick.

“What's wrong with her?” I asked.

He said the word for her illness in his own language. Seeing it meant nothing to me, he described the symptoms. I couldn't be sure, but it sounded to me like cancer. He explained that his family came here to seek help for her illness, bringing offerings for the god of this temple.

“Is she getting any better?”

“Not yet,” said Suresh. “But she will soon.”

“How do you know?”

“Because the temple god, he will help us. Excuse me, sir. There is one thing I must ask. It is possible for me to go there?”

“To the temple?”

“Yes. I wish to make one offering.”

“How long will it take?”

“Only ten or maybe twenty minutes.”

“I don't see why not.”

I looked across the restaurant. Tanya had rolled back her sleeve to expose a tattoo on her forearm, and my uncle was leaning across the table to get a better look. I turned back to Suresh. “Actually, can I come with you?”

At the bottom of the steps,
two men were standing beside a chair lashed to two long wooden poles. They smiled and beckoned, pointing at their strange contraption, and I realized they were offering to lug me to the top.

I said, “How far is it?”

“Three hundred steps,” replied Suresh. “You are happy for walking?”

“No problem.”

I'd just walked up six hills. I didn't mind three hundred stone steps.

We continued past the guys with the chair-lift and plodded up the steps side by side, talking all the way. Suresh told me more about his life. He had three sisters and a brother, all younger than him. Their dad had died in a car accident the year before last. That was why he had to drive his taxi. The family needed money for food, rent, and his mother's medicines, and no one else was old enough to work.

“How old are you?”

“I am twelve years.”

“Don't you have to go to school?”

“I have not time. If I earn good money, my brother will go to the school, but not me.”

That's cool, I almost said, but managed to stop myself before the words left my mouth. Skipping school would be cool, and so would driving a rickshaw, but I was sure Suresh couldn't see many advantages to having a dead dad and a sick mother.

I told him about myself and my own life: my school, the golf cart, and getting grounded, which made me miss out on an overnight sailing trip with my friend Finn, which had annoyed me more than anything else till Grandpa's lunch.