A photocopy of an article from The Hindustan Times was dated August 15, 1947, with the headline “India Independent: British Rule Ends.” In the body of the article, India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, shook the hand of Liaquat Ali Khan, Pakistan’s first prime minister. In another photo, a defeated looking Gandhi stood alone in his dhoti, propped up with a cane.

Beneath it lay a city map of Delhi. As she opened it, its folds released clouds of dust particles. Her father’s notes filled the white margins. Her own shaky penmanship encircled a few monuments. It was the map from their trip together, the one they used the very last time she would see him alive in New Delhi.

Among the grids of roads, the green squares for parks, the noises of those busy streets returned to her now, the revving of auto rickshaws, the chiming of bicycle bells, the blaring honks of long-bodied Ambassador cars. Unlike the sterile gridded coordinates of American urban centers, the streets of India breathed and moved like a living organism. She missed the sounds of India the most, had discovered something beautiful in them, the feeling of never having to be alone, of never having to be left behind.

A light green hexagon identified India Gate. She remembered the military officer stationed in front, unsmiling, stiff straight, in a dark brown uniform. To the southeast, just beyond the national zoo, sat Humayun’s Tomb, the blueprint for the Taj Mahal, her father had said. They guzzled juice boxes of Frooti there under the shade of a nearby palm tree.

She began refolding the map. A small sticky note was stuck to the opposite side. She hadn’t noticed it before. She tugged it off, tried to make out her father’s faded black penmanship.

Lahore Trip—

June 14, 6 nights, Himalayan Hotel. Confirmation # 645.

He had planned to take a trip to Pakistan, one month after his death, only nine months after she last saw him.

Why?

She set it down, searched through his papers again more carefully. She found a familiar index card with a name and address. Gertrude Enzenebner, 84 Foster Street, London. Years earlier, she had asked her mother about the name. Her mother couldn’t recall her father ever mentioning a woman named Gertrude. Shan had hoped she was an old friend of her father’s—not a lover who may have played a role in breaking up her parents’ marriage.

An old pamphlet of the Taj Mahal lined the bottom of the box. Its edges were warped. On the cover was the monument as she’d remembered it—white, glowing. They stood on its terrace, overlooking the Yamuna River, as the red turrets of Agra Fort in the distance kissed the purple peaks of clouds.