At Piccadilly Circus we were engulfed by the underground station. I was going towards Green Park. At the bottom of the escalator, he stood, his little valise in hand, his raincoat loosely hanging over him like a cassock, his hat somewhat crushed with hurry and affection, his eyes bright as ever, to see that I went the right way up. Then he smiled that my trip be successful.

9

The Kumkum1 Mark

It had historic certainty—a moment of pauranic2 truth. The city of Prayag and the gods hovering, seemed playing hide-and-seek between themselves that luminous afternoon. Down below, space seemed tight-textured and knit into a steady silence. The year was 1942. There was a pinch of cold in the air, despite the warming sun. A British tommy was walking from corner to corner of the upper chowk,3 pistol at the waist, his nose straight up, as if he were watching a fly on his short, round nostril. Some seven to ten thousand people had gathered, men and women, for whatever the event was going to be. Soldiers stood on the four corners of the chowk, bayonets in hand, aiming at their own people. On the other side of the chowk was another tommy, walking exactly as his colleague did, one-two, one-two, watching his nose, knowing what should happen, yet not knowing what will happen. For, remember all around this vast land of India, rails were being lifted and self-singing telegraph wires cut. ‘Shoot at sight,’ was the British order, for anyone walking by a railway line. In the nearby district of Ballia, on an island, a schoolmaster, having disarmed the police with pure non-violence, had blown up the two bridges on either side, and declared: ‘Don’t you see, brothers and sisters, India is free, we are free.’ Further down and east—and the two tommies knew—a Canadian army of six hundred had shot all the ammunition it had, on a non-violent crowd of ten thousand. In pockets of the country, however, some members of the American army stealthily distributed ammunition to those who wanted it, for the Americans believed in liberty. But the British will rule India whatever happens, for the war has to be won, no matter what happened. Thus spake Winston Churchill.