Chapter One - Richard Lewis

picked out the dirtiest glass and a saucer that had a dried gecko dropping on it. Mantera
pretended not to notice, although he didn't touch the glass.
He showed little Wayan his gift for her. A new shiny sheet of carbon paper, which
he placed between the pages of a blank notebook.
"Look what you can do!" he told the girl. "Let me write your father's name –
Madé Catra and look, there it is, on the page below! Like magic! And your name, let me
add your name to the list. Little Wayan. See? Your name appears like magic!"
He glanced up at Arini. How cold his face, his eyes! How remote hers! As if she'd
retreated from her own skin.
She took the notebook from her daughter and carefully ripped off the pages with
the two names before handing the notebook back.
"You stay and play with that," she said.
She didn't resist as Mantera reached for her wrist. She didn't resist as he marched
with her to the back of the property, didn't resist as he herded up the steps to the granary,
didn't resist as he shoved her through the small door.
On the recording, there is a long silence filled with the rasp of wind and the fizz
of waves. Then Dharma speaks again, in a hard and level voice.
"Mantera was the one who betrayed my brother," Dharma says. "He was the one
who told the Red Berets about that letter. He'd never forgiven Catra for stealing Arini
from him."
"He raped her," Tina says, her voice uneven and agitated. "To this day, he toys
with her."
"That is not all," Dharma says. "Whose son is Nol? Who fathered him?"
A long silence. Then Tina, softly, a sigh barely heard: "Oh dear Lord."
"I raised Nol like he was my own son. He is an innocent. None of it was his fault.
Now he is a grown man. It is time for him to know these things. You have the story in my
words. You can play it for him."
There is a click as the recording stops.
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