Chapter One - Richard Lewis

At the Gerwani house, the late afternoon's caramel light filled the air, and
dragonflies floated over the bushes like golden motes. The door to the family residence
was open, as were the windows. The women's center stood empty, but chairs and benches
were arranged for a meeting. Naniek's bicycle leaned against the empty carport post.
Apart from the two girls playing hopscotch on the road, no one was in sight.
Reed parked and watched them for a moment before grabbing his camera. He
took pictures, capturing the girls in mid-jump of gangly limbs, their disconnected
shadows flying long behind them.
But he wasn't interested in the girls. He wanted to see Naniek. Should he go to the
house and ask to the use the bathroom?
As he turned, he saw her marching out of the house and to the gate, the fabric of
her skirt snapping against her legs. Her hair was damp from a shower, her face fresh as
heaven, and as remote, too. She ignored Reed and said to the girls, "Your mother says to
go take your baths."
"Oh, come on, let them play a little longer," Reed said.
Naniek folded her arms across her chest, held square to him.
"I have your photo by my bed," Reed said. "The one I took at the rally. I fall
asleep looking at it. I wake up looking at it."
She was silent and then nodded at the long-nosed blond monkey on the side of his
jeep. "I had a dream about him."
"Yeah?"
"He stole my hair."
Parwati bustled out of the house and clapped her hands, calling her daughters. She
made sure they scampered into the house and gave Reed a cold look, a mother protective
of her children, and he the gobbling ogre.
"I was taking pictures," Reed said. "I'll give you copies."
Parwarti did not reply and said to Naniek as she turned to follow her daughters,
"We have to get ready for evening class."
Naniek fell in behind her.
"Bye," Reed said to Naniek.
"Good bye," she said, making it sound final.
He sat behind the wheel of the jeep for a minute, his heart beating hollow. He
peeled away, his foot heavy on accelerator, but at the irrigation culvert at the foot of the
hill, he braked to a shuddering stop. The canal was dry, the bed littered with sticks. He
jumped down into the culvert and picked out a dried segment of bougainvillea vine, one
end spiky with stout thorns. Pressing a thorn to his upper right cheek, he jabbed deep and
tore the thorn down the flesh and across the bone. The pain flooded his eyes with tears.
Blood flowed hot over his cheek, dripping onto his shirt, which he took off to press
against his check. It hurt like hell.
Sunlight fading fast, he bolted the jeep around in a three-point turn and sped back
to the house. Several women were arriving for the meeting, and they pulled back with
cries of alarm when they saw his bloodied shirt.
"Excuse me," Reed blurted and hurried to the women's center. In the room, a
pressure lantern hung from the ceiling, shedding a hot white light. Part of the room was
partitioned as a clinic, with a doctor's table and an examining bed, curtains ready to be
pulled. In the rest of the space, chairs chairs and benches faced a blackboard, and on the
99