I let out a deep breath. 'I think it is stupendous. Something never seen before in Indian cinema. It will be another Jay Chatterjee masterpiece.'

'So are you in? Will you be my Chandni?'

'Absolutely! When do we start shooting? I'll commit dates to you straightaway.'

'We begin shooting as soon as I cast K.'

'What do you mean?'

Chatterjee paused and fingered his straggly beard. 'I mean that I want to create a new paradigm for the angry young man. For K. I have been thinking, how long can we continue to give audiences the same bicepped hunks masquerading as action heroes or chocolate-faced nerds pretending to be kings of romance? People want change, they crave something new. I want K to be the harbinger of that change. He will be the ultimate quasi-hero. Someone whose persona combines the qualities of both a hero and a villain. Hard, yet soft. Brutal, yet tender. Someone who has the looks to melt your heart and the anger to chill your blood.' The Actress 35

'Don't you think Salim Ilyasi would be perfect for this part?' I asked.

'My sentiment exactly,' Chatterjee said morosely. 'Trouble is, Salim refuses to work with me.'

'But why?'

'I made the mistake of bad-mouthing his mentor, Ram Mohammad Thomas, in some interview.'

'Then what are you going to do?'

'Try to find another Salim Ilyasi. Till then, the film will just have to wait.'

Have you ever heard anything more ridiculous? A film held up, not for want of a script or a director or finance, but a hero who doesn't even exist. But then, that's Jay Chatterjee. And when he says wait, you wait. So I'll wait.

2 August

The following letter arrived today, marked 'Private':

Respected Shabnam Didi,

Hoping you are fine with God's grace. Myself Ram Dulari respectfully touching your feet. I am being Maithil Brahmin, nineteen years of age, living in Gaurai village of Sonebarsa block of district Sitamarhi and being only girl in village who is Class Six pass.

Myself now in great difficulty. Big floods coming to our village and drowning everything. Our house and cattle being washed away, respected father and mother dying very unfortunately. I am being saved by army boat. First I am staying in very bad camp made of torn tents in Sitamarhi but now myself living in best friend Neelam's house in Patna.

Myself not knowing anything about you because in village there being no big sinema hall like in Patna. But Neelam seeing lots of your fillims and calling me your younger sister. She is taking photu from her camera and asking me to be sending you.

I am being very good cook knowing very many types of recipes including gulab jamun and sooji ka halwa. Nice sewing also doing and knitting one sweater in only two days. Since myself being Maithil Brahmin, I am cooking food strictly as per rituals, full vegetarian, and all fasts and festivals being observed properly.

Kindly contacting me at above address and helping me out by taking me to Mumbai and giving me shelter and job. God showering you with full blessings.

With feet touching to all elders in family and love to children,

Your younger sister

Ram Dulari.

There was nothing remarkable about the contents of the letter. I receive dozens of such offers from young boys and girls, willing to work as bonded labour in my house, simply for the privilege of sharing space with me. But I was intrigued by Ram Dulari's reference to herself as my younger sister. I immediately thought of my real sister, Sapna, who would also be nineteen. She was probably still in Azamgarh with my parents, though I couldn't be sure as I had had no contact with her, or them, for the past three years. They had erased me from their lives, but I had been unable to erase them from my mind.

So I extracted the pictures from the envelope. They were standard 6 _ 4 glossies. I looked at the first one, and almost fell off my chair. Because staring back at me was my own face in close-up. The same large dark eyes, small nose, full lips and rounded chin.

I quickly glanced at the second photo. This one showed Ram Dulari in a cheap green sari, leaning against a tree. Not only her face, even her build was similar to mine. The only visible difference was the hair. She had long, lustrous black tresses, whereas my current hairstyle was a chin-length bob with the latest asymmetrical fringe. But this was an insignificant detail. I knew I was looking at my spitting image. Ram Dulari was my Doppelg?ger.

What struck me about the photos, beside the uncanny resemblance to me, was the fact that Ram Dulari seemed so unselfconscious. There was no artifice, no pretence, no effort to appear like me. She was just made that way. This was a girl unaware of her own beauty and I immediately felt a sense of kinship with her. Here was I, living in a luxurious five-bedroom penthouse apartment in the best city in India, and there was she, a luckless orphan, barely managing to survive in the heartland of Bihar where marauding gangs roamed free and unchecked. I resolved in that moment to help her, to send Bhola the very next morning to Patna to bring Ram Dulari to Mumbai, and to me.

I don't know what I will do with her. I have enough servants already, even good Brahmin ones. All I know is that I cannot leave the poor girl to her fate. I cannot be a silent spectator to her suffering. So I will intervene in her destiny, alter her fate.

But in so doing, will I be altering my own?

4 The Tribal

THE CRYING emanated from the middle of the clearing, a long wail punctuated by two short ones, like a funeral dirge. The arc of grief rose to a peak, tapered off, then rose again, mirroring the rhythm of the ocean waves crashing against the jetty a short distance away.

It was the beginning of October. The fury of Kwalakangne, the south-west monsoon, had abated, and the days had started to become hot once again. Stepping out in the scorching sun at noon required constitution and resolution.

Melame and Pemba approached the clearing, where six wooden shacks with corrugated asbestos roofing stood on stilts. A couple of young boys wearing shorts were noisily playing football in front of the huts, oblivious to the wailing in the background. A thin, mangy dog lay flopped on the ground, its tongue hanging out. The smell of chicken shit hung in the air.

Melame paused before the third shack and waited for Pemba to push open the door. The room inside was small and sparsely furnished. It contained a high wooden cot with a mosquito net supported by four bamboo sticks. A clay pot rested on a wooden stool. The walls were adorned with cautionary posters provided by the Welfare Department dispensary, warning against polio, tuberculosis and AIDS. An ancient ceiling fan whirred overhead, bringing some respite from the heat. In the right-hand corner, on the wooden floor, lay the naked body of a man approximately sixty years old. His eyes were closed, but his mouth was incongruously open, gaping in amazement at his own death. There were two people, one on either side of the body, crying in unison. One was a wrinkled old woman, wearing nothing but tassels made of sea shells around her waist, her withered breasts hanging like udders on a cow. The other was a young man wearing a loincloth and sporting a plain clay wash on his face and body, the sign of mourning. He got up as soon as he saw Melame and Pemba.

'Melame is very sad to know that his friend Talai has gone to the great beyond,' Melame said gravely as he embraced the young man. For a couple of minutes they communed in silence, eyes closed, cheek against cheek.

'When is the funeral, Koira?' Pemba asked the young man.

'This evening,' Koira replied.

'I didn't know Talai was sick,' said Melame.

'He wasn't,' said Koira. 'My father just had mild fever yesterday. Mother applied some moro leaves to bring the fever down, but by this morning he was gone. Just like the wind.'