Free The Accidental Apprentice by Vikas Swarup Page A

state, but tolerated it because he was quite simply an outstanding maths teacher, perhaps the best in the country. He could do calculations faster than a computer, solve any equation, prove any theorem.
    What he didn’t know was how to deal with the stresses and anxieties of a fifteen-year-old teenager. I thought he would have a heart-to-heart chat with Alka, instil some sense into her through the sheer moral force of his personality. Instead, their confrontation quickly degenerated into a street brawl, full of belligerent theatrics, yelling and screaming.
    â€˜I can have you sent to jail for possessing drugs,’ Papa said, trying to frighten Alka.
    â€˜Then send me,’ Alka gave him right back. ‘I will be happier there than in this prison called home.’
    Many things were said in the heat of the moment that shouldn’t have been said. Father accused Alka of being a spoilt brat who was a blot on the family’s name. Alka labelled him a bully: ‘Your expectations are unrealistic, your tests impossible.’ The unkindest cut came when she denounced him as a coward. ‘The entire school laughs at you behind your back. You are nothing but a perverse, pathetic loser, undeserving of any respect,’ she shrieked.
    It was as if a volcano had erupted. ‘How dare you!’ Papa thundered, blood rushing to his face as he suddenly sprang to his feet. ‘How dare you!’ he repeated, and slapped her across the cheek, knocking her to the floor.
    Ma, Neha and I stared in stunned horror. This was the first time Papa had raised his hand on any of his daughters.
    Alka picked herself up from the floor. There was a great red welt on her cheek and a scratch on her arm. Her dark eyes glittered with an incandescent fury that would have melted rock. She looked at all of us, before settling on me. I felt a laser beam of pure, unrestrained loathing boring into my soul. ‘I hate you, I hate all of you,’ she hissed through clenched teeth. Then she ran to her bedroom and bolted the door from the inside. I pleaded with her to listen to me, tried desperately to get her to open the door, but she stubbornly refused.
    I deserved her hate. I deserved everything she threw at me that night.
    â€˜Let her rot in her room,’ Papa said disdainfully. ‘Our overindulgence has brought matters to this pass.’
    None of us had dinner that night.
    *   *   *
    The next day was 26 January. India’s Republic Day. The school wore a transformed look with bunting in saffron, green and white strung all around the campus. The tricolour fluttered proudly from the tall poles in the sports field. I could hear the students rehearsing patriotic songs from early in the morning, their hearty voices adding to the festive fervour. Alka, however, had still not emerged from her room and I was getting just a little worried. I knocked on her door several times but there was no response. So I crept in from the back garden. The first thing I noticed was that the window of her bedroom was open. My instant reaction was that Alka had run away. In the background I could hear the hum of ‘Hum Honge Kamyab’ being sung by the boys in the open assembly area: ‘We shall overcome … We shall overcome … We shall overcome some day…’
    I parted the heavy window curtain a crack and a shaft of sunlight spanned the dim penumbra of the room. In its piercing beam I saw a sight that chilled me to the bone. Alka was dangling from the ceiling fan, with her head hanging to one side. There was a yellow dupatta knotted around her neck. The small wooden chair in her room lay upturned on the floor.
    I felt a wave of dizziness assail me. ‘Papa!’ I screamed and stumbled back away from the window.
    We’ll walk hand in hand, we’ll walk hand in hand,
    We’ll walk hand in hand someday;
    Oh, deep in my heart, I do believe,
    We’ll walk hand in hand someday.
    I remember