There was no doubt in anyone’s mind what the train contained. They were sure that the soldiers would come for oil and wood. They had no more oil to spare and the wood they had left was too damp to burn. But the soldiers did not come. Instead, a bulldozer arrived from somewhere. It began dragging its lower jaw into the ground just outside the station on the Mano Majra side. It went along, eating up the earth, chewing it, casting it aside. It did this for several hours, until there was a rectangular trench almost fifty yards long with mounds of earth of either side. Then it paused for a break. The soldiers and policemen who had been idly watching the bulldozer at work were called to order and marched back to the platform. They came back in twos carrying canvas stretchers. They tipped the stretchers into the pit and went back to the train for more. This went on all day till sunset. Then the bulldozer woke up again. It opened its jaws and ate up the earth it had thrown out before and vomited it into the trench till it was level with the ground. The place looked like the scar of a healed-up wound. Two soldiers were left to guard the grave from the depredations of jackals and badgers.

That evening, the entire village turned up for the evening prayers at the gurudwara. This had never happened before, except on Gurus’ birthdays or on the New Year’s Day in April. The only regular visitors to the temple were old men and women. Others came to have their children named, for baptisms, weddings and funerals. Attendance at prayers had been steadily going up since the murder of the moneylender; people did not want to be alone. Since the Muslims had gone, their deserted houses with doors swinging wide open had acquired an eerie, haunted look. Villagers walked past them quickly without turning their heads. The one place of refuge to which people could go without much explanation was the gurudwara. Men came pretending that they would be needed; women just to be with them, and they brought the children. The main hall where the scripture was kept and the two rooms on the side were jammed with refugees and villagers. Their shoes were neatly arranged in rows on the other side of the threshold.