‘Yes, only a small delay. It won’t matter in the end,’ said Ghosh. ‘The Company will win. The Supreme Court may have taken up the petition, but that doesn’t mean anything. The judges will probably throw it out anyway. I don’t see why not. And in a way I am glad these people went directly to the Supreme Court. It saves a lot of time. And once the court throws it out, what will they do? They will just return home with their tail between their legs and pack their bags. And their friends, those useless people in Bhubaneshwar and Delhi, they will go find something else to do. It doesn’t matter.’

‘So the Company will not ask the court to ignore the petition?’

‘Patnaik, nobody can ask the Supreme Court to do that, not in so many words. But the government will have to reply to the petition, and tell the court why this so-called voting can’t be done. And the Company doesn’t want any delays, so the government will reply quickly, and the case will be finished soon.’

‘So the Company has not told the government to delay it?’

‘Not at all. The Company has, in fact, told the government to not make any excuses and try to finish it as soon as possible. That is what I told them to do, after all.’

Patnaik decided he had to start calling Ghosh ‘sir’ very soon. This little fellow, sitting here in Balangir, was controlling how quickly a case could be finished in the Supreme Court in far-off Delhi!

‘Just a few more weeks, Patnaik. Courts can move very fast when they choose to. A few more weeks, and you can celebrate as much as you like. We will be finished here.’

Ghosh wanted to leave as soon as he could. This little matter had delayed his plans for the rest of the year. He was supposed to be in Australia by December. Now it looked like he would have to postpone it. In Australia at least he could have the kind of food he preferred, not the horrible hotel food in Balangir—and there would be no smelly water in the sink in his room. In Australia, Ghosh was supposed to go help a big company, an Indian company actually, deal with a coal mine. The locals there didn’t want the mine. Why couldn’t people just roll over and be meek?

But if they did, Ghosh thought, he wouldn’t get paid. So he was glad they fought. As long as they didn’t fight very hard, or for very long.

And while Jadob and his friends went over the case and discussed every part of it in Delhi, and the mahji went back to dreaming of potatoes, and Ghosh lurked around Balangir dreaming of Australia, and Korok lurked among his flowers keeping an eye on the weeds, Anchita went to school in November.