The Sultan's Tigers by Josh Lacey

Author:Josh Lacey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

24

Ram was called away to perform some priestly duties, so we shook hands and each said it had been a pleasure to meet the other. He was probably just being polite, but for me, it really had been a pleasure. I liked him a lot. I even felt a little bad about grilling him for information. I began to wish I could have been here as a normal traveler, a tourist, the person that I was pretending to be, just a kid from Connecticut who had come to India on vacation.

Oh, well. Ram didn’t even know the tiger existed, so he wouldn’t miss it.

Ram didn’t come back, but a second priest arrived a minute later carrying a shiny metal cup, which he handed to me with a smile.

The metal felt cold against my fingers. The cup was filled with a white frothy liquid. Tiny green seeds floated on the surface.

I looked at Suresh. “What is this?”

“One drink,” he replied.

“But what’s in it? I don’t want to drink it if I don’t know what it is.”

“Yes, no problem. You must drink.”

I took a cautious sniff.

It smelled sweet.

They’re priests. Of course they wouldn’t poison me.

Hoping I was right, I took a tentative sip. The white liquid was thick, cool, milky, and delicious. It tasted even better than the mango lassi I’d had in the restaurant.

I offered the cup to Suresh. “You want some?”

“No. Special for you.”

“What’s so special about me?”

“You are visitor. Please to drink.”

I drained the cup in three or four long gulps, handed it back to the priest, and thanked him. He took the cup away with a smile, sat cross-legged on the floor, and chatted to the other worshipers. I suppose he must have been telling them about me, too, relaying what Ram had said, because they were soon turning and smiling and nodding at me, some of them making namastes, and I did the same back again, all the time feeling like a fraud. I wished they weren’t so friendly. They were just making me feel bad about stealing their tiger.

But how was I going to steal it?

I scanned the room one last time, looking at the bowls of fruit, the stubby candles dripping wax, the bare-chested priests, the cross-legged pilgrims, and I looked at the hole, thinking of the tiger that must be down there, regretting that I hadn’t had an opportunity to steal it yet, and an unexpected idea snuck into my mind.

One of the pilgrims must have thought I was smiling at him, because he grinned at me, then brought his hands together and did a namaste.

I did one back. I was getting pretty good at them by now. I could have stayed here all day doing namastes for everyone. But a plan had formed in my mind, and now it was time to make it happen. I turned to Suresh and said, “I’m worried about my uncle.”

“Your uncle?”

“You know. The guy in the restaurant. Remember him?”

“Ah. Yes. I think he is your father.”

“No, he’s my uncle.

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