We play games together

Dream 3 : Cuppa

Murthy almost felt more handsome than Izuh when Jagruthi looked at him that night. She was so very full of pride in his speech at the union meeting. Murthy told her how these folks' businesses were under dire pressure from mall culture, and Jagruthi immediately decreed that their household would buy from that market street as often as it could. So come Saturday afternoon Murthy played dutiful husband, carrying bags as Jagruthi shopped from folks he now knew to be Izuh's people. The radical sympathisers put on such artful masks that, in the company of his wife, in the peace brought upon him by the kids being at their grandparents', in pure Indian wedded bliss, Murthy almost forgot the significance of where he was. Eventually Jagruthi asked for the bags to be taken to the car, and Murthy instinctively mumbled something about wanting to stay behind to talk to the tradesmen. His wife agreed with obvious pride, ensured that he had change for the bus, and drove away in their Alto.

Quietly, Murthy took a few brisk laps of the street. The makeshift stage was back, and the occasion was probably less serious than a meeting. In a while, some devotional music began to play, and old aunties gathered around the stage. Murthy stood watching and listening, blending with the backstage bamboo as Izuh had done the other day. It was refreshing to see something non-ideological on this stage. There were people Murthy had judged as obvious Izuh-ra the other day, who were among this crowd but did not seem to be on duty. For them, too, it was a wholesome community event. Izuh, of course, was not there, as would be expected before the close of business.

As time passed and religion became boring, Murthy took a closer look at the immediate surroundings of the stage. There were many loudspeakers blasting prayers to the crowd, but one cable seemed to run between the shops, down an alley, to one of the houses that lay behind the market. The tradespeople mostly lived around there, but this one house was rare -- it was two-storeyed, and the alley cut through its lower floor, almost as if it were a supporting structure rather than a house.

Murthy moved cautiously towards the alley, and with boyish excitement realised that the occupants of the house must be interested in the ceremonies outside -- they were unable to show their faces, but had set up a loudspeaker right outside their window. Murthy marvelled at how obvious it had been for him to pinpoint where Izuh obviously lived. Was Izuh so smart after all?

Before he finished that thought, a wiry boy of about fourteen emerged coolly from the alley, placed a square piece of paper in Murthy's left pocket, and returned even more coolly than he had come. Murthy began a quiet exit from the market street, and read the note when he reached the bus stop. It carried a succinct question in the grave but rusty hand of Leader Bhaskar H : the Leader planned to read Stolen Labour Stories over tea the next day at five, and would love to have the author over for a dialogue on the book. He was confident that he remembered how the Professor liked his tea, so perhaps he could be entreated to come?

Murthy shook his head. The bastard is a coffee-drinker, he reminded himself, and immediately wondered why on earth he knew that about Izuh.