Another Heaven. Annu Subramanian

his blunt question. Despite his gentlemanly demeanor, she found him a little carelessly direct. “That’s why I purposely took a day train instead of traveling by night.”

      “I usually take the overnight train, but this time I made an unscheduled visit and the Express was full.”

      “What brings you here from Chennai?” asked Tina, trying to understand the routine of her new mentor.

      “They are setting up a trauma center near the airport and I’m one of the consultants. Are you ready to go to your hotel?”

      “Yes, thanks. But you know, I can probably take a taxi from here. Wouldn’t you like to return to your work?”

      “No. I won’t let you go alone in a taxi after what you went through last night and this morning.”

      Shaker led Tina towards the front door. The rain had subsided significantly, and she still was not used to the desperate downpour and the urgent retreat. The drive was ironically smooth, considering the emotions sloshing in her restless mind. The highway soon picked up various noises as they neared the city, and Tina saw the crowd thickening along the bus stops and in the street corners. Her alien eyes curiously jumped from rattling auto-rickshaws to crowded buses and settled on the unfamiliar faces.

      “I’ll drop you at the entrance,” suggested Shaker. “I’ll park the car and follow you.”

      “Oh, you don’t have to come in. I can take care of it from here,” she smiled, a little tired of following his lead.

      “No, I must come in. I’ve to make sure that your room is still unoccupied. Besides, until your contact meets you, how can I be sure that you’re safe? Remember, Tina, now I’m your mentor?” he smiled genially, when she was still hesitating. “No arguments.”

      She could not return his smile while she was considerably annoyed. The last thing she wanted was her father’s paranoid shadow, but she quietly followed him out of the car.

      An old blue van was waiting in the last row of the parking lot, not far from the main road. A man with a scar on his cheek, sitting on the driver’s seat, exchanged glances with the bald man sitting next to him when he saw Tina and Shaker walking towards the entrance to the hotel.

      - 7 -

      19 Temple Street, Seloor • November 11, 2009

      A tall, gaunt, elderly man—with a startlingly white beard and a white tagiyah covering his head—stared at the paddy fields surrounding 19 Temple Street from his window.

      “Kumar, you’re sure her name is Tina Matthew?” he asked, looking at the bald man standing in front of him.

      “Yes, Usman Sahib,” Kumar replied respectfully. “That’s how she registered at the front desk when she arrived at Palace Hotel, when Manohar and I followed her.”

      “Yes,” confirmed the man with the scar, who was standing by the door. “Dr. Shaker is here on work. I got that checked out. It’s Tina Matthew who is still nagging me.”

      “I’ve been reading about Dr. Shaker and the psychological gibberish he writes. He should return to the United States soon, I think. Nuisance! I can’t afford any wrinkle in my next mission. Call Abdullah, Kumar,” commanded Usman, his worried mind darkening his angular face. “Ask him to come here today for a meeting. We need to transfer Maya to a different location right away. And ask Yusuf to see me when he returns from his errand.”

      “Yes, Sahib.” Kumar hurried out of the room.

      “Manohar, ask our man at The Express to make a report, especially in the city edition which Dr. Shaker and Tina Matthew might read,” said Usman, turning to the other man, and began to dictate exactly what he wanted to see in the paper and exactly what Shaker and Tina would read later in the day.

      d

      A grey Mercedes Benz pulled by the front door of 19 Temple Street in the next hour. A tall, grotesquely obese man got out of the car when the driver opened the door.

      “Sahib, he is waiting upstairs.” Kumar respectfully greeted Abdullah in the foyer.

      As the visitor breathed heavily and dragged his feet laboriously up the stairs, his chest moaned in misery. Usman was sitting on his usual chair behind the usual desk, but he did not have his usual smile when his friend shut the door upon entering the room.

      Kumar lingered for a few seconds, hoping that Usman would invite him to join the discussion, but he walked away disappointedly.

      “Is Abdullah Sahib here already?” asked Manohar, stepping out of the room across the hallway. He tentatively touched his scar and glanced at the closed door.

      “Yes.” Kumar, after another longing look at his master’s closed door, walked towards the other end of the hallway.

      “And we’re not included?”

      “No. This must be a very private meeting. Usman Sahib doesn’t invite us to all the discussions, but one day he would. After all, we’re becoming quite indispensable. Aren’t we, Manohar?”

      “You think so? But he pays well, Kumar,” whispered Manohar. He pulled out a couple of cigarettes from his shirt pocket and offered one to his friend. “Come, let’s go check on Zakir.”

      Kumar and Manohar went up a set of staircase at the end of the corridor and began to walk towards the opposite side of the building where a room in the corner was reserved for interrogation.

      “Does Usman Sahib frighten you sometimes?” asked Manohar.

      Kumar looked puzzled by the direct question. “He can be a little intimidating. I know what you mean. There’s always a space between him and me, no matter how much I do, no matter what I accomplish. After all we’ve gone through, I still feel he doesn’t trust me. I don’t mean trust me like it sounds,” Kumar added hurriedly, “but I’ll never mean to him what Yusuf means to him.”

      “Well, Yusuf is his kind, just as Abdullah Sahib is. Usman Sahib will never consider us in the same vein. My friend, they’re different breed.”

      “Because they are Muslims and you and I are not?”

      Manohar nodded his head. “Well, Usman Sahib favors Yusuf and there’s nothing we can do about it. Yusuf has a cold focus that’s similar to our master’s. Perhaps that’s why he’s special in his eyes.”

      “But we’re loyal to our master. What difference can it make…what breed we are?”

      “We’re here for the money. They’re not, and that makes all the difference.”

      “So the inner circle is out of the question?” asked Kumar, smiling wryly.

      “Yes, and we better remember that.” Manohar stopped outside a room from where suffocated groans were seeping through a small opening under the door.

      “Your project is still alive.” Kumar stepped into a small, dark, grimy room.

      A man was tied to a metal chair, his bare body gleaming in streaks of blood and sweat. A couple of men were standing on each side of the chair with blunt instruments and vicious expressions. As one of the men raised his instrument towards the victim’s head, Manohar raised his hand to stop him.

      “I want to talk to the manager. Wait outside for my orders.” Manohar shut the door as the other two men left the room.

      The victim stopped groaning and began to breathe arduously. His face, almost unrecognizable through raw bruises, contorted in pain as he struggled to breathe.

      “Usman Sahib is furious because you disobeyed orders. Why did you let a visitor stay here last night, Zakir?” Manohar asked softly.

      Zakir did not answer for a few seconds. He tried to move his jaw slowly in an attempt to open his mouth.

      “WHY DID YOU?” shouted Manohar, throwing the cigarette butt on the dirty floor.

      Zakir tried