One Lahore, 8th November 1968 Faraz stared into the fog, sensing the movement of men, their animals. As the mist shifted and stretched, he glimpsed only fragments: the horns of a bull, the eyes of shawled men on a street corner, the blue flicker of gas cookers. But he heard everything. The whine of the wooden carts, the strike of a match, the snuffling of beasts. He wasn't sure where he and his men were. They had been led by the officers from Anarkali Police Station through winding streets and now they were somewhere near Mochi Gate, one of the twelve doorways to the walled city, but that was all he knew. The sound of the riot was distant, like the static of radio. The street vendors who'd lingered longer than they should have were nervous now; they dropped their wares as they packed up their things, clipped their animals and their apprentices about the ears, berating them for being too slow. He sensed the nerves of his officers, too, as they lined up next to him. He was jittery himself. This wasn't their beat; he and his men were just reinforcements driven in from Ichra, a place known only for its bazaar crammed with cheap goods, far from the elegance of Mall Road, from Lahore's gardens and the walled city's alleys. "Closer," he said to the men on either side of him, and so they pressed in, their shoulders touching his. They could not afford to get separated or lost. He felt the men lined up behind him pushing. They were panting; the air, the city, was panting. Or perhaps it was him, perhaps he was panting. He couldn't see much so he tried to still himself to hear better. The troublemakers couldn't be far; they had gathered just outside Mochi Gate to wait for Bhutto, who was just as impatient for battle with President Ayub as they were, who was, they said, bringing a revolution with him. They didn't know police orders were to stop Bhutto from getting to Lahore, but it didn't matter. Bhutto or no Bhutto, everyone knew there would be trouble. The gardens could only be a few hundred yards away but just now he couldn't hear them, couldn't hear anything anymore. Closer, he thought, and his men pressed in again, though he had not spoken out loud. He was still listening when a minute later, or perhaps just seconds later, a dog trotted out of the fog. It looked around, tongue hanging out in the cool air. It took a few steps one way, then the other, skittish, sensing danger. Thick black letters had been painted on the dog's brown fur: ayub, they spelled. The officer next to Faraz gasped, incredulous at this smear on the president's good name. A rifle somewhere in the line was cocked, an officer poised to shoot, to obliterate this insult, but before that could happen, the air cleared and there they finally were: the rioters. He squinted. They were boys-just boys. They waved their arms, they chanted; he saw their mouths, their white teeth in the dim light. They took a step toward the lines of armed police but then stopped, uncertain. Faraz waited, willed the boys to disappear back into the fog. But a moment later the ground shook. The boys barreled toward him, his men. And because he was surprised, he was late with the order to charge, and later he would wonder if he actually said it at all. Someone said it, or he did, or no one did, but their bodies knew what to do, or did what they had to, and they charged; a roar, and he was inside it. When he brought down the lathi the first time, he hit air, then the ground. The second time he heard a crack. Maybe a shoulder, a skull; bone. The clink of a tear gas can as it rolled on the ground. A hiss. The smoke caught in his throat, his nostrils, his eyes stung with it. He brought down his lathi again and again. His eyes were closed but streaming, the only sound his breath. When he paused, he realized he was exhausted, as if he had been doing this forever. The line of officers was gone. His men were scattered, some tearing after the boys, others scrambling from them. Plumes of white smoke hung in the air. The street emptied, the noise of the riot became a hum somewhere else-everything slowed-and the thought flickered, like an unexpected memory: What is this for again? That was when they slammed into him. He fell forward, bodies on top of his. But these boys were light. Their thin arms circled his waist, his chest; they clambered on him like children in play. He shook them off and they landed on their backs. There were two of them. One scrambled to his feet and ran. The other boy lay there, breath gone. His eyes were closed-he was playing dead-but Faraz pulled him up and the boy opened his eyes. Faraz didn't think about how fragile the bones in a face are, how he might feel them with the pads of his fingertips if he pressed hard. He thought instead about how he didn't want to be here, that he must get back to Ichra, to the safety of its empty streets. He yanked the boy closer and brought his fist down on the boy's face, again and again. There was relief in the way the boy's face opened up to him, its contours, its ridges caving in so easily, as if he wanted nothing more than this, as if he were being freed. The boy gasped, heaved, before slumping from Faraz's arms to the ground. Then, the sound of a cry. Behind him, a girl in a doorway was squatting on the floor, a baby in her arms. She shushed the baby, squeezed him to her chest. Faraz took a step toward her, to tell her to get inside, get back where it was safe, but he couldn't speak. He was all breath. She didn't move. He lifted up the boy and dragged him to the doorway. He sat on the steps and held him. He gestured to the girl to go. She disappeared for a moment but then came back down the stairs with a cloth and handed it to him. He held the rag to the boy's broken face and then leaned down over him, his ear to the boy's mouth, listening for a sound. Two It was after midnight when Faraz returned to the station with his men, the van loaded with a handful of rioters whom his men continued to beat in the holding cell. They didn't need to, because the boys were afraid and compliant, but as Inspector Karim, his old station house officer, used to say: Best to let them get it out of their systems, and, besides, with all the desk work the sisterfuckers need the exercise. At three a.m., when he felt the boys could take no more, he told his men that was enough and most of them left the station, their bodies still thrumming, to find something to bring them down-a smoke, a fuck, anything. But he didn't leave. He walked the courtyard listening to the boys in the cell whimper and call for their mothers. Shh, he thought as he paced, shh. He looked down at his hands; it hurt to make a fist. He lay down on the sagging charpoy in his office, a portrait of President Ayub Khan in his field marshal's dress uniform above him, the line of gleaming medals across his chest almost as dazzling as his smile. Was the president smiling now? Had they done a good enough job of shutting these boys up with their whining about freedom and elections and the price of flour? He thought of unmoving clouds of tear gas, smashed faces, his thuggery-he turned to his side. He'd just fallen asleep when the phone woke him. He should have ignored it, but that was impossible; as always, its ring induced panic; he might be needed; it could be Mussarat, something might be wrong with the baby, or perhaps someone was looking for him-not for an inspector, but for him. Though it was never any of those things. Still groggy, it took him a moment to recognize Wajid's voice, which was gravelly, as if he, too, had just woken up. "Are you all right?" Wajid asked. Faraz, disoriented, nodded instead of speaking. "Faraz?" Wajid said again. "Yes, I'm fine. Are you?" It had been at least six months since they had spoken. Wajid had called to say he'd heard that Faraz was now living in Lahore, that he would come to see the baby. Faraz had not expected to hear from him again and he hadn't until now, but truthfully he had been disappointed; the baby was Wajid's first grandchild, and he had hoped it might mean something to him even though really he knew better. "I was worried you might have been caught up in this mess on the streets last night." Faraz paused; Wajid had never expressed worry about anything before, least of all about him. "We got back a while ago. Things seem under control out there now," he said. He wished for a moment he'd been hurt, that he might perform the kind of stoicism that would impress Wajid, but instead, to his surprise, he said: "I hurt some boy. I don't know who." Wajid was silent and then he cleared his throat, and Faraz knew he'd said too much, made the old man uncomfortable; he was pleased. "I left to get him help. He was gone by the time I came back." "Most likely dusted himself off and went home, lesson learned." "I don't know. He was in bad shape." "Well. Needs must. I'm sure you were just doing your duty. That's all anyone can ask of you," Wajid said. Faraz was shamed, knowing that this was exactly what he wanted to hear, that he wanted absolution of some kind, that too from Wajid. "I mean, really, these boys are asking for it when you think about it." Faraz felt a loathing then for both Wajid and himself. Yesterday in Rawalpindi, police had killed a young man at a student rally. The students had gathered to hear Bhutto speak, and police orders had been to make sure that Bhutto with his roti, kapra, aur makaan nonsense should not speak. No one was supposed to get killed, but when the boy was shot, Faraz's bosses had said the same thing: He asked for it. Faraz stretched his fingers wide; had the boy he'd beaten last night asked for it? Yes, he had. Wajid had said so, and so would everyone else. "The thing is," Wajid said, "I'm actually calling because I need help with something. I hate to ask when I know Bhutto Saab is intent on dragging you all into his circus act." "That's fine," Faraz said. He wanted to sound poised because his father had never asked him for anything before. "The superintendent from City Division is going to call you shortly. He'll tell you you've been posted to Tibbi Station in the walled city." "The walled city?" The old man was silent again. "Yes, I'm afraid so. Shahi Mohalla." A pause. "I don't understand," Faraz said. "Something's happened. And I need some help, I need someone I can trust." Faraz leaned back. Wajid was trusting him with something. "You're the last person I would send there, but I . . . I think you're the only person I can rely on . . . in this situation." Faraz could hardly imagine the kind of crisis in which Wajid would trust him above any of his many other lackeys and connections. "I know you're smart enough not to go wandering into . . . matters from the past. I mean, your people are all gone from there, I think. But we don't want your connection to the Mohalla announced. It'll be all over town if anyone gets hold of it." He waited. "That wouldn't be good for anyone, would it?" A breeze, and the stack of papers on Faraz's desk fluttered, awakened. "What is it you need?" Wajid sighed, as if exasperated by all he had to do. "There was an accident in the Mohalla tonight. All a bit of a mess. And there were some people present, witnesses, who really can't get embroiled in something like this. You understand what I mean?" "What happened? What kind of accident?" "I don't know. Some kind of drunken brawl, that's all I know." Wajid sounded irritated. "Who are these people? These friends of yours?" "That's irrelevant," Wajid said. Irrelevant meant that they were important, and not only to Wajid. "They have nothing to do with this. They were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Terribly unlucky. When you get there, you should find the officers at Tibbi amenable to your instructions. But I need to be sure that they'll clean this up properly. No records, no paperwork. Official channels are not open on this." "So the local officers know, but no one upstairs?" "I believe not. And I'd like to make sure it's kept under wraps, so I need someone in charge whom I trust." Trust. There it was again. "You've seen the mess on the streets. We don't want to add to the drama by giving the newspapers a story that might inflame people." Faraz thought of the boys on the street; what kind of accident and whose involvement would inflame them further? "It's a plum job too, Tibbi, lots of opportunities there," Wajid said, sweetening the request, blurring the lines of who was really doing a favor for whom. "Faraz?" Wajid sounded subdued, almost anxious-the very idea of that impossible-as he waited for a response. "I wouldn't ever send you there if I had a choice . . . and I wouldn't ask, but . . ." A silence that said, But given everything I've done for you, it's the least you could do. "Well? Can you take care of it?" But it wasn't really a request. A cleanup wasn't difficult; Faraz had followed orders like this before, given them when he had to. He looked up, his eyes coming to rest where the corner of the wall met the ceiling, holding it up, pinning it into place. Three The superintendent of police, City Division, didn't sound tired when he called an hour later. He would have been awakened if they'd lost an officer, but no one would have bothered him about the injured protesters. "Good news," the SP said, sounding less than pleased, before announcing that Faraz was being posted to Tibbi Station, in the walled city, as the new station house officer, effective immediately. "They're sending a man for you. Be ready," he said. Excerpted from The Return of Faraz Ali: A Novel by Aamina Ahmad All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
