Free The Cripple and His Talismans by Anosh Irani Page A

only I have dark friends who fly in hundreds.
    “What black finger?” he asks the lady.
    “A black finger is a word ladies use for cockroach,” I interject.
    “Ah.” He seems satisfied.
    “There’s no cockroach! It’s a real finger,” the lady insists.
    “That stupid handcart fellow!” bellows the taxiwala. “Who told him to go in between? Now at least ten more minutes wait.” He cranes his neck outside the window to get a better view.
    I remove the finger from the bag and present it to the lady as though I am giving her a red rose. “Lady, how much will you give for this magnificent structure?” I ask.
    She fiddles with her handbag again, this time struggling to reach in. She throws fifty rupees onto the driver’s seat and flees the taxi from the other side.
    “Is this taxi empty?” I ask the driver.
    “Where you want to go?”
    “I need to decide. I must look for my next clue,” I tell him.
    I listen for clues in the blaring of horns. But there is no pattern in the way they erupt; I can take hints only from things that are systematic. Maybe nature can direct me. There are small trees, very thin, planted on the sidewalk at regular intervals. The trees are bereft of leaves. That also means nothing. I look at the hot sky. It is so hot that one by one birds will burn and fall to the ground. On a charred wing, I will find words in my name. I will tear the wing off, secretly put it in my pocket and read it in the shade. But there is not a bird in the sky.
    “What are you looking up for?” asks the taxiwala.
    “An answer.”
    “The day the heavens give an answer, I will stop driving like hell.”
    “I don’t think I will take your taxi. I have to wait here.”
    “For a plane?”
    “For directions.”
    “Look ahead. The cars are moving. Get in fast.”
    “But I don’t know where to go.”
    “All line clear,” he says. “Just like Clear Road.”
    “Clear Road?”
    “You don’t know Clear Road?”
    “No.”
    “It’s near St. Bosco School at Byculla.”
    As soon as he mentions St. Bosco School, I open the door of the taxi and get in as if my life depends on its torn seat. “You mean
Clare
Road,” I tell him. My heart is pounding so hard that women plucking tea leaves in Assam can hear it.
    “Clear
Road! It’s given that name because it is one of the few roads in this city that has no traffic. All line Clear.”
    “Okay. Take me to Clear Road, then,” I say.
    My driver slides left on the seat, circles his arm through the open window and turns the meter to bring the fare back to minimum.
    I look up at the sky and tell it that I do not need its birds to tell me where I must go next. “Stop outside St. Bosco School,” I tell the driver.
    “Careful. A lot of gangs are there.”
    “I know. I went to school with them.”
    “Were you beaten?”
    “Lots,” I lie.
    “Then why go back to your school?”
    “To show people my finger.”
    It makes perfect sense. Only a taxi driver can show me the way, tell me what road I must take. I am going back to my roots. I must go back to school, where I will learn something.

    Viren is breathing heavily. The lid of his brown desk is open as he puts all his schoolbooks into his sweet little blue bag. Each of his notebooks is neatly marked: History, Geography, Mathematics, Science, Moral Science. I do not see his English book. Perhaps he has given it to Shakespeare to read.
    The rest of us are getting ready for the first period after the lunch break. The class is Moral Science. Marks from this class are not counted as part of the final grade, but the lectures have been added mainly for our class, since we were asked to leave the church and its beautiful hymns more than a year ago.
    Viren sees me as he puts the last of his books into his bag. He does not take his eyes off me, but continues to wheeze hard. I approach him and start wheezing exactly like him. Now I have the class’s attention. I must hurry before the teacher walks in with messages from