Garden of Dreams Read Online Free PDF Page B

energy.’
    ‘For what? Where am I?’
    ‘You’re Auntie Lakshmi’s payback,’ the man said, lighting a cigarette in the still darkened room. ‘A present, shall we say, from people who messed Auntie around, didn’t deliver the goods. Now I guess they’re paid up.’
    Eli looked around to see if there was anything – a chair, a small table – that he could fling at the man. Nothing, just the plate of soggy rotis on the floor, and the man’s boot next to them. ‘Where are my things?’
    The man blew a vast cloud of smoke, cinnamon-scented, into his face. ‘Auntie Lakshmi has them. She’s waiting for you in the next room. She’s been waiting all day for you to wake up. Let’s go,
jaldi
!’
    As the man turned his back on him to open the door, Eli thought of tackling him from behind. But he was way too big – and then what? Run screaming down the stairs and into the streets, where he’d probably be mugged, murdered or dragged off into another dump? Instead, feeling sick to his stomach, he followed the creep into the hallway.
    It was a long, dark, narrow passage, leading into blackness, with the faint outlines of benches along the far walls. Eli could see light coming under the doors at the ends, and vaguely hear what sounded like snorting and grunting from that direction. But he followed the pathan suit just one door down, on the right, where the Mozart was coming from, and waited for the man’s knock to summon whoever was in there.
    ‘Don’t be shy, gentlemen,’ said a voice behind the door, screechingslightly, munchkin-like. ‘Auntie Lakshmi is waiting patiently and for too long!’
    A key turned in the inside lock, a bolt was unbolted and the patter of slippered feet rushed away from the door. The goonda pushed it open to a room glowing with candles, drenched with floral scent and draped with pink, orange and purple silks. There was a garish red Persian carpet on the floor, and on the lilac walls, posters of the gods: Hanuman, Shiva, Ganesh and of course Lakshmi, the goddess of beauty and wealth. Smack in the middle of the room, on a gold brocade daybed, reclined a middle-aged woman whose long black hair, loose, snaked over her humongous breasts, down over the folds of her bare belly. Crammed into her crimson sari with fake gold coins she looked like a fancy sausage.
    ‘Eli, my little
chutiya
,’ she said, beckoning him nearer, her fingers covered in rings, ‘Auntie Lakshmi wants a closer look.’
    ‘Meet Auntie-ji,’ the goonda said. ‘Runs the best kotha on G.B. Road. Best girls, fresh, healthy, best prices …’
    ‘Anand – that all can wait,’ said Auntie Lakshmi. ‘Now we must get to know Eli, isn’t it?’
    Anand pointed to one of two Queen Anne chairs facing the daybed, showing Eli where to sit. At Auntie Lakshmi’s insistence Eli pulled it closer, to less than a metre away from this creature with a pale, pancaked face, drawn-in black eyebrows and lips slathered in red. She had eyes black and bottomless, like a shark’s, and an overlong nose with a ruby in the left nostril. Her right hand propping up her head, she breathed heavily, her chest heaving.
    ‘What the fuck am I doing here?’
    Auntie Lakshmi raised a finger to her lips. ‘Shhh … bring me his rucksack, Anand, it’s in the bedroom.’ She waved the goonda into the adjoining room.
    Anand returned with the rucksack, still zippered shut. Eli moved to grab it but Auntie Lakshmi’s solid arm barred him. ‘Wait,
chutiya
. Let us see what kind of little man you are.’
    She nodded to Anand and said something in Hindi, so Anand unzipped the bag and scattered the contents on the floor between them. He then hovered behind Eli’s chair, ready to pounce.
    ‘Oof! Anand, back down! This is not an inquisition. Auntie Lakshmi is merely getting to know the boy – and he may get to know her, just a little bit …’
    Sitting up now, she took the green and black rucksack on to her lap and examined it. ‘What is this “Billabong”?