Shantaram полностью

It was as good a name as any, and no more or less false than the dozen others I’d assumed since the escape. In fact, in recent months I’d found myself reacting with a quirky fatalism to the new names I was forced to adopt, in one place or another, and to the new names that others gave me. Lin. It was a diminutive I never could’ve invented for myself. But it sounded right, which is to say that I heard the voodoo echo of something ordained, fated: a name that instantly belonged to me, as surely as the lost, secret name with which I was born, and under which I’d been sentenced to twenty years in prison.

I peered down into Prabaker’s round face and his large, dark, mischievous eyes, and I nodded, smiled, and accepted the name. I couldn’t know, then, that the little Bombay street guide had given me a name thousands of people, from Colaba to Kandahar, from Kinshasa to Berlin, would come to know me by. Fate needs accomplices, and the stones in destiny’s walls are mortared with small and heedless complicities such as those. I look back, now, and I know that the naming moment, which seemed so insignificant then, which seemed to demand no more than an arbitrary and superstitious yes or no, was in fact a pivotal moment in my life. The role I played under that name, and the character I became-Linbaba-was more real, and true to my nature, than anyone or anything that I ever was before it.

‘Yes, okay, Lin will do.’

‘Very good! I am too happy that you like it, this name. And like my name is meaning Son of Light in Hindi language, your name, Lin, has it also a very fine and so lucky meaning.’

‘Yeah? What does Lin mean in Hindi?’

‘It’s meaning Penis!’ he explained, with a delight that he expected me to share.

‘Oh, great. That’s just… great.’

‘Yes very great, very lucky. It is not exactly meaning this, but it is sounding like ling, or lingam, and that is meaning penis.’

‘Come off it, man,’ I protested, beginning to walk once more. ‘How can I go around calling myself Mr. Penis? Are you kidding me? I can see it now-Oh, hello, pleased to meet you, my name is Penis. No way. Forget it. I think we’ll stick to Lindsay.’

‘No! No! Lin, really I’m telling you, this is a fine name, a very power name, a very lucky, a too lucky name! The people will love this name, when they hear it. Come, I will show you. I want to leave it this bottle of whisky you gave to me, leave it with my friend, Mr. Sanjay. Here, just here in this shop. Just you see how he likes it your name.’

A few more paces along the busy street brought us to a small shop with a hand-painted sign over the open door:

RADIO SICK

Electric Repair Enterprises

Electrical Sales and Repairs, Sanjay Deshpande Proprietor

Sanjay Deshpande was a heavy-set man in his fifties with a halo of grey-white hair, and white, bushy eyebrows. He sat behind a solid wooden counter, surrounded by bomb-blast radios, eviscerated cassette players, and boxes of parts. Prabaker greeted him, chattering in rapid Hindi, and passed the bottle of whisky over the counter. Mr. Deshpande slapped a meaty hand on it, without looking at it, and slid it out of sight on his side of the counter. He took a sheaf of rupee notes from his shirt pocket, peeled off a number, and passed them across with his palm turned downward. Prabaker took the money and slipped it into his pocket with a movement as swift and fluid as the tentacle-grab of a squid. He finished talking, at last, and beckoned me forward.

‘This is my very good friend,’ he informed Mr. Deshpande, patting me on the arm. ‘He is from New Zealand.’

Mr. Deshpande grunted.

‘He is just today coming in Bombay. India Guest House, he is staying.’

Mr. Deshpande grunted again. He studied me with a vaguely hostile curiosity.

‘His name is Lin. Mr. Linbaba,’ Prabaker said.

‘What’s his name?’ Mr. Deshpande asked.

‘Lin,’ Prabaker grinned. ‘His name is Linbaba.’

Mr. Deshpande raised his impressive eyebrows in a surprised smile.

‘Linbaba?’

‘Oh, yes!’ Prabaker enthused. ‘Lin. Lin. Very fine fellow, he is also.’

Mr. Deshpande extended his hand, and I shook it. We greeted one another, and then Prabaker began to tug at my sleeve, pulling me towards the doorway.

‘Linbaba!’ Mr. Deshpande called out, as we were about to step into the street. ‘Welcome in Bombay. You have any Walkman or camera or any ghetto-blasting machine for selling, you come to me, Sanjay Deshpande, at Radio Sick. I am giving best prices.’

I nodded, and we left the shop. Prabaker dragged me a few paces further along the street, and then stopped.

‘You see, Mr. Lin? You see how he likes it your name?’