Smita helps her to get ready. Her daughter shows no resistance. She looks anxiously at her mother. What has come over her in the middle of the night?

It’s a surprise, Smita whispers.

She hasn’t the courage to tell her they’re leaving and will never come back. It’s a one-way ticket to a better life. Never again the hell of the village in Badlapur, Smita has promised herself that. Lalita won’t understand, she will probably cry, make a fuss. Smita cannot risk ruining her scheme. And so she lies. A little white lie, she reassures herself, to sweeten the bitter reality.

Before leaving, she takes a last look at Nagarajan; her tiger is sleeping peacefully. Beside him, in her place, she has left a piece of paper. Not a letter – she has never learned how to write. Just the address of her cousins in Chennai, laboriously copied out. Perhaps their departure will give Nagarajan the courage he lacks today. Perhaps he will find the strength to join them down there.

Who knows.

With a last look around the hut, at the life she is leaving with no regrets – or so few – Smita takes her daughter’s frozen hand and hurries out into the dark countryside.

Giulia

Palermo, Sicily

Giulia had expected anything but this.

The contents of the drawer were spread out in front of her on Papà’s desk: summonses from the bailiffs, final demands for payment, dozens of letters sent via recorded delivery. The truth struck her like a slap in the face. It could be summed up in a single word: bankruptcy. The workshop was crumbling under the weight of its debts. The House of Lanfredi was ruined.

Her father had said nothing. He had confided in no one. If she thought hard enough, she could remember one time, and one time only when, in the course of a conversation he had mentioned that the Sicilian tradition of cascatura was disappearing. Modern life, he had told her. Hardly any Sicilians kept their cut hair now, he had said. It was a fact. No one took care to keep anything anymore. People threw everything away and bought everything new. Giulia remembered their discussion, around the table at a big family meal: soon, he had told her, their raw material would be in very short supply. In the sixties, the Lanfredi workshop had fifteen competitors in Palermo. They had all closed. He was proud to be the last. Giulia had known the workshop was experiencing difficulties, but she had never imagined bankruptcy was imminent. The possibility had never even occurred to her.

They must all face the truth. According to the accounts, the workshop could carry on for another month, at most. With no hair to treat, the women would be made redundant. The workshop was unable to pay them, the business would have to file for bankruptcy, and close.