The Death of Vishnu

skeptically at the pail.
    “Oh, all sizes,” the boy says, and lowers the pail, so that Vishnu can peer inside. “See this one?” He points with his spade at the largest crab, only a few inches wide. “That’s the only large one. I’m going to add it to my aquarium.”
    Vishnu shakes his head and mumbles no. The boy stands there, surprised. “You really should take them—they’d make great pets. Besides, I spent all afternoon looking for them.” His voice has an injured tone.
    “Go away,” Vishnu hisses at the boy. “I don’t want your crabs, they’re too small!”
    The boy goes running toward a man and a woman. They are also wearing swimming clothes. “Mummy,” he cries, “the man says my crabs are too small!” Vishnu turns away.
    When he looks back, the boy is emptying the pail into a hole dug out in the sand. Vishnu watches as he straightens up and goes running after the couple, the pail swinging by his side.
    A fresh knot of hunger tightens in Vishnu’s stomach. His vision swims. He suddenly sees Padmini emerge from the water and walk toward him across the wet sand. Drops of water fall from her hair, a platter piled with fish gleams in her hands. The sun blurs and lists peculiarly to one side. He wonders if he should go over to the hole and see if the boy has dumped in the large crab as well.
    There is a screech from above. Wings flap above his head, and he looks up to see a blur of oily brown feathers. The seagull circles once, then lands. It hops to the hole and perches at the edge, gripping the wet rim with its claws.
    Leaning forward, the gull probes deep into the hole, then straightens out. Vishnu can make out legs and claws flailing through the sides of its beak.
    The gull hops back from the hole, then turns toward Vishnu. It stares at him for a second, then spreads its wings wide. Vishnu watches the feet leave the ground, watches the body ascend into the air, watches the head turn lazily toward the sea. He tracks the bird as it completes half a circle, tracks it through the sky, tracks it until it flies toward the sun and is swallowed in its brilliance.

C HAPTER T HREE
    M RS. JAISWAL WAS cheating again, and as usual there was nothing Mrs. Pathak could do about it. Not unless she was prepared to be banished from the kitty party circle, like poor Mrs. Bawa had been. The scene was still fresh in her memory—the last time anyone had ever seen the hapless Mrs. Bawa, who had not even directly accused Mrs. Jaiswal, just said, “You seem to be getting too too too many good cards today.”
    It had been the three “toos” that had done her in—Mrs. Bawa could not have made a bolder statement had she pulled three aces from Mrs. Jaiswal’s breast and flung them in her face.
    “Are you suggesting I am getting these too too too good cards not by my own good luck?”
    The chill had been so palpable that the women in the room had hugged their saris tight around their shoulders. Even Mrs. Mirchandani had felt it in the kitchen and rushed back to catch every word.
    Perhaps if Mrs. Bawa had been keen enough to perceive the danger she was in, and skillful enough to pretend she’d just been joking, she might have escaped. But she interpreted the silence as encouragement to blunder on. “So much luck you have—last week too your three-three queens to my ninetenjack—it must be something you eat, to get this rosy rosy luck every time.” She laughed nervously and looked around the room for support, but no one would meet her eye.
    “Never so-so much luck for one person only, never have I seen that.” Mrs. Bawa laughed again, more nervously this time.
    “You haven’t been playing very long then,” Mrs. Jaiswal said, and everyone in the room, except Mrs. Bawa, knew what the words foreboded for Mrs. Bawa’s cardplaying future. For Mrs. Jaiswal controlled all the top kitty parties in town, and no one who wanted to keep playing dared challenge her.
    Poor Mrs. Bawa, Mrs. Pathak thought, she had been so distraught on the phone. “The exact amount that I put into the kitty!” Mrs. Bawa had wailed. “It came in a letter, today only! And now Mrs. Dosh won’t let me play in her group either, says her sister has moved into town, and she has to give my place to her.”
    Mrs. Pathak had clucked sympathetically. She bit her tongue now, as Mrs. Jaiswal plucked the two-rupee notes, several of which had been lying in front of Mrs. Pathak a few minutes ago, from the sheet spread out on the floor. “I was