The cards were made of pearl-white, textured, linen paper, and the words were embossed in liquid black italic. They declared that Gilbert Parker was a consular under-secretary at the embassy of the United States of America.
"Gilbert?" I grunted.
"So what?"
"So, this taxi crashes, and they gouge my body out of the wreckage, wearing these clothes, and they identify me as Gilbert.
I'm not feeling any better about this, Karla, I have to say."
"Well, you'll have to settle for Gilbert at the moment. There really is a Gilbert Parker at the embassy. His tour of duty in Bombay finishes today. That's why we picked him-he goes back to the States tonight. So everything will check out okay. I don't think she'll be checking up on you too much, anyway. Maybe a phone call, but she might not even do that. If she wants to get in touch with you, she'll do it through me. She had some trouble with the British embassy last year. It cost her plenty. And a German diplomat got into a real mess at the Palace a few months ago. She had to call in a lot of dues to cover that up. The embassies are the only people who can really hurt her, so she won't be pushing it. Just be polite and firm when you speak to her. And speak some Hindi. She'll expect it. And it'll smooth over any trouble with your accent.
That's one of the reasons why I asked you to help me with this, you know? You've picked up a lot of Hindi, for someone who's only been here a year."
"Fourteen months," I corrected her, feeling slighted by her shorter estimate. "Two months when I first got to Bombay, six months in Prabaker's village, and now nearly six months in the slum. Fourteen months."
"Yes... okay... fourteen months."
"I thought no-one got to meet this Madame Zhou," I said, hoping to shift the puzzled, uncomfortable frown from her features. "You said she kept herself hidden away, and never talked to anyone."
"That's true, but it's a little more complicated than that,"
Karla replied, softly. A meditation of memories clouded her eyes for a moment, but then she concentrated again with obvious effort. "She lives on the top floor, and has everything she needs up there. She never goes out. She has two servants who bring food and clothes and stuff up to her. She can move around the building without being seen because there's a lot of hidden passageways and staircases. She can look in on most of the rooms through two way mirrors or metal air vents. She likes to watch. Sometimes she talks to people through a screen. You can't see her, but she can see you."
"So how does anyone know what she looks like?"
"Her photographer."
"Her what?"
"She has photographs taken of herself. A new one, every month or so. She gives them out to favoured clients."
"It's pretty weird," I muttered, not really interested in Madame Zhou, but wanting Karla to go on talking. I watched her red-pink lips form each word-lips I'd kissed only days before-and her speaking mouth was a sublime performance of perfect flesh. She could've been reading from a month-old newspaper, and I would've been just as delighted to watch her face, her eyes, and her lips as she talked. "Why does she do it?"
"Do what?" she asked, her eyes narrowing with the question.
"Why does she hide herself away like that?"
"I don't think anyone knows." She took out two beedies, lit them, and gave me one. Her hands appeared to be trembling. "It's like I was saying before-there's so much crazy talk about her. I've heard people say she was horribly disfigured in an accident, and she hides her face because of it. They say the photos are retouched to cover up the scars. I've heard people say she has leprosy or some other disease. One friend of mine says she doesn't exist at all. He says it's just a lie, a kind of conspiracy, to hide who really runs the place and what goes on there."
"What do you think?"
"I... I've spoken to her, through the screen. I think she's so incredibly, psychopathically vain that she, she sort of hates herself for getting older. I think she can't bear to be less than perfect. A lot of people say she was beautiful. Really, you'd be surprised. A lot of people say that. In her photos she hasn't aged past twenty-seven or thirty. There aren't any lines or wrinkles. There's no shadows under the eyes. Every black hair is in its place. I think she's so in love with her own beauty, she'll never let anyone see her as she really is. I think she's ... it's like she's mad with love for herself. I think that even if she lives to be ninety, those monthly photos will still show that same thirty-year-old blank."
"How do you know so much about her?" I asked. "How did you meet her?"
"I'm a facilitator. It was part of my job."
"That doesn't tell me a lot."
"How much do you need to know?"
It was a simple question, and there was a simple answer-I love you, and I want to know everything-but there was a hard edge to her voice and a cold light in her eyes, and I faltered.
