As always, when she leaves the house, she remembers the routine of early days when Anisa lived across the landing. She would leave the house key with her when Siddharth was on shore duty because you never knew when he would return from work. When she suggested he carry his own key, his face would look like she had asked him to climb Mount Everest without oxygen. A man who regularly carried thousands in his wallet found a key too heavy to carry. In Surgaon the doors of his house were kept wide open in the day. He had never outlived the habit. Should she have recognized it as a sign when he had volunteered to carry his key that day? He had winked mischievously at the sight of her astonished face. He had not needed it that day.

Down on the road, Anima can’t see Sanjay anywhere. The five o’clock sun pierces her eyeballs. She shades her eyes. There he is, right across the road, smiling, holding the car door open for her.

‘What's the news on your jhopdi, Sanjay?’ Anima asks as soon as she settles down. Giving her a deep-dimpled smile in the rear-view mirror, he says, ‘I’ve built it.’

She gapes at him in the mirror.

‘I got the money, bought the stuff and built it overnight. Sunday.’

Sanjay had bought a plot of land in the marshland on the east side of the city where once salt pans had existed. The political party in power in the municipal corporation had advised its corporators to encourage a few prospective voters to reclaim the marsh and build their homes on it for free. Once a few shanties went up, others were bound to crowd in like ants around jaggery. These new settlers had to pay the party ten thousand rupees per plot. Including bribes to the police and to the municipality for electricity and water connections, every family that wanted shelter had to raise roughly forty thousand rupees, plus costs for four truckloads of debris to reclaim the plot and building materials. The shanties had to be built overnight. The bribed municipal workers and police would find it difficult to turn a blind eye to the illegal building work if they saw it in bright daylight. Once a shanty was built, it became a fait accompli. Nobody could touch it after that. The task was beyond anybody's capacity to complete single-handedly. It was therefore an unwritten rule in the community that the older residents would turn up in full force to help new settlers. A cousin of Sanjay's had persuaded him to buy a plot and Sanjay had put all his savings into it. He had needed twenty thousand more for bricks and bribes.

‘So where did you find the money in the end?’ Anima asks anxiously.

Sanjay grins widely. ‘Sahib gave it.’