I tell to Monju. Even face is melt still you see how it change her. She close good eye and rest for while. Almost is too much. Is like give feast to starving man.

When she open eye she say something I cannot hear. I must put ear against mouth. Before I go I must confess. She say this. Something so wrong I done and I never tell to anyone. This is what she say. I look inside the good eye and see she must speak or have no peace.

What she tell me when Khurshed two years old baby is scream and scream many hour and one time she losing all presence of mind and slap hard on legs. She say only week before was operation to leg region. Maybe is she who make leg damage need more further operating. She say this.

Have you ask doctor? I tell her. Have you ask doctor? I shout for her to hear me. No. She did not tell to anyone.

Then I go away and walk around hospital. I come back I put my face to hers and I shout. The doctor has say No. It is not for you but the acid has damage him.

The trouble go out of her eye. I see a bit like the old Monju. She whisper from very small mouth hole nearly close up now. These secret things will kill us. Do you have any secret? You want to tell to me? I keep it safe for you! I think she try for smiling.

Next day I go for telling her newspaper man come make photograph with Lovely. But that day sister my friend is gone.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

A Bengal Tigers meeting was called for Friday, one week and one day before the march. Chanu said, 'I think we will go to that meeting.'

Nazneen dropped her scissors.

'Yes,' said Chanu, 'I think it will be interesting.'

Nazneen retrieved her scissors and continued unpicking the stitching on a botched jacket lining. 'You go. I have to work.'

'Very well. But I think you'll find it interesting,' said Chanu. He hid himself behind a newspaper.

All night, Nazneen imagined what he could mean. What did her husband intend to do at the meeting? If he knew about Karim (how many times had she willed him to know? He would not yield to her and yet he must know) had he chosen this venue to confront him? But surely he would not do anything in front of all those people? Did he intend to try to humiliate him in some way, challenge him to a public duel of intellects? Did he mean to take her along to humiliate her as well? Perhaps even to stone her, as was his right? What was Chanu going to do? She could think of no plausible answer.

The girls went off to school and Nazneen went with Chanu to the meeting. The preparations compelled her. Chanu donned his suit. It had a little white mark on the jacket collar which he rubbed with a flannel and turned into a bigger mark. The suit, dark blue serge, double-breasted, was old and the fabric had become a touch uncertain around the knees and the elbows. But Chanu had lost weight since the return of his ulcer and the fit was not bad. He could get all of the buttons on the jacket done up, which had never before been possible. He put on a salmon-coloured tie belonging to his council days and slipped a packet of Rennies into his trouser pocket. From a folder marked 'Speech', he took an A4 Premier Collection refill pad and flicked open the cover. Holding the pad in one hand he made a sweeping gesture with the other and rocked on his heels. His lips moved but no words came out. After a while, he made a slight bow and closed the notebook. He cleared his throat. 'I think we're ready.'

She followed a step behind him across the estate and into the concrete valley that cradled the meeting hall. Chanu was eager to get there. To keep up, Nazneen had to trot. By the time they entered the building her heart had overpowered all other internal organs. It beat in her chest, in her stomach, in her ears and in her head.

The Secretary hung around by the doors. A boy in a dark purple tracksuit called to him. 'Hey, get on the train of repentance, brother.'

The Secretary grinned. 'It's already passed your station, brother.'

They slapped each other on the arms.

The hall was about half full. There was none of the family atmosphere of the previous meeting. Most of those gathered were young men. A handful of girls of similar age clustered at the back of the room and several more in burkha gelled together at the front. The boys on the right-hand side of the aisle had broken the ranks of chairs to form a circle. Within the circle, some were sitting on their chairs, others were standing, and a few had perched with their feet on the seats and their bottoms on the chairbacks. At the outer perimeter the boys stood on their chairs. They were listening to someone at the centre. Above the general hubbub, Nazneen discerned a speech already in progress. She tried to interpret the voice, to hear Karim's tones within it, but the voice was unfamiliar and it slid away from her.

On the left-hand side, where Nazneen and Chanu took their places, the boys kept glancing over to the other side of the room and shaking their heads. One lad smashed a fist into his other palm and ground it round. Then he flicked his hand like a wet rag and the fingers made a snapping noise. His friends laughed and a finger-flicking tournament began. The boys wore jeans, or tracksuits with big ticks on them as if their clothing had been marked by a teacher who valued, above all else, conformity. A few were in traditional Bengali garb with a twist. Panjabi-pyjama customized with denim on the leg and sleeve cuffs, or worn with a black leather jacket, or with the trousers tucked into buckled knee-length boots. Only Chanu wore a suit. The elbows were really quite worn. He touched the knot of his tie over and over as if he were afraid it would choke him.

He took his pad out of the folder and turned to the front page. 'I'll give you a taste,' he said to Nazneen. 'This is the title: "Race and Class in UK, A Short Thesis on the White Working Class, Race Hate, and Ways to Tackle the Issue".'

So that was it. He would challenge Karim with words. And prove himself his equal. His better. During these past weeks, in which he had hardly spoken, he had been storing his words, stockpiling them for this battle, honing them for this: the fight to reclaim his wife.

The circle broke up and chairs were scraped back into position. The people on the left looked at the people on the right. Some people got to their feet to get a better look. Then the doors at the back of the hall closed and Karim bounded onto the stage. The Secretary skipped on after him carrying what seemed to be an old mango packing crate. He put the upturned crate on the stage and stood on it. 'Order, order, order. I call the meeting to order.'

Conversation was extinguished at a leisurely pace.

'Brothers and sisters,' said Karim. 'It's good to see so many of us united in our stand against those scummy people who dare to come round here and slander our religion.'

'Kick them out,' yelled someone from the back.

'Send them back where they came from,' shouted another.

Karim folded his arms. 'Leave the cheap insults to the racists.' He paused and looked over the whole audience, taking his time, making everyone feel his power to do this, to make them wait. 'When we march, we'll show them how wrong they are about Islam. They'll see we are strong. And we will show them we are peaceful. That Islam is peace.

'What we need to discuss today is how we are going to spend every hour, minute and second between now and the twenty-seventh getting people to pledge their support.'

A hand shot up in the front row.

'Yes?' said the Secretary. From his elevated position on the crate he no longer bounced on his toes. 'State your question.'

'Can we get a flat-bed truck there? Hire one?'

'For people without legs?' said the Secretary. 'Or the very sick?'

'For a sound system, brother. Or if you like I could set up a keyboard and play live.'

'Live music is un-Islamic,' said the Secretary, raking his beard.

'What?' said the musician. 'What about devotional bands? What about all the Sufis? They're always, like, singing and dancing.'

'Un-Islamic,' said the official quickly. 'Move on.'

Someone else spoke up from the audience. 'That's why the Taliban banned it.'

'What about recorded music?' said the musician.

'That's banned as well.'

'Don't we have a Spiritual Leader here? Let's ask him what the Qur'an has to say.'

The Spiritual Leader was located. The Secretary stepped down to confer with him. The Spiritual Leader had put on a considerable amount of weight in a few months. The little conference on sharia did not interfere with his consumption of a very large, lavishly glazed pastry.

'It's settled,' announced the Secretary on his return to the stage. 'All banned.'

'Man!' said the musician.

'Move on. Move on,' urged the Secretary.

The musician stood up. He still wore his strange fingerless gloves. Maybe he didn't burn himself, thought Nazneen. Maybe he has some kind of skin disease.

'If everyone's going to sit there and tell me I'm un-Islamic, then I ain't staying.'

'Sit down,' said Karim. 'It's all right. We'll talk about music later. Now, I've got a list of the local estates here and I want two organizers for every estate . . .'

From the corner of the stage, a figure materialized.

Karim hesitated.

'Don't let me stop you,' said the Questioner.

'You're not,' said Karim.

'I've just got something to show people, when you're finished.'

The audience emitted a low noise, like a pan of boiling water.

'Show it then,' Karim ordered.

'Well,' said the Questioner. 'If you say so.' He reached into the lining of his jacket and took out a scroll of papers. He unrolled the sheets, rolled them up the other way and did his best to make them hang flat. He held them against his chest so that only a blank page showed. 'Our Chairman is a man of peace. I am also a man of peace. Islam is a peaceful religion. But what do you do if someone comes to fight you? Do you run away?

'A few weeks ago, persons unknown launched an attack on American soil. Innocent people were killed. Civilians. Men, women and children. The world wept and sent money. Now, America is taking her revenge and our brothers are being killed. Their children die with them. They are not any more or less innocent. But the world does not mourn them.'

He turned his sheaf of papers round and held it out, gripping both top and bottom to prevent it from curling. The photograph showed a tiny girl dressed in rags, her leg blown off at the knee. 'Some collateral damage,' said the Questioner.

He showed the next photo.

'This is a just war.' The boy was no more than six or seven.

He rolled the pictures up and put them away. 'Our Chairman says we must show our strength. What he means is we must walk together down the street. We mustn't do more than that.'

'What shall we do, then?' called someone from the audience. The crowd rumbled a bit, as if the last words had been stolen from the tips of their tongues.

The Questioner shrugged. He put his hands in his pockets. 'The most powerful nation on this planet attacks one of the most ravaged countries in the world. We are fit young men. There are no chains tying us to these walls. With a little planning, a little effort, we can cross continents.' He shrugged again. 'What can we do?'

Nazneen looked at Chanu. He had his head bowed. His cheeks hung like empty purses.

The black man, the Multicultural Liaison Officer, got to his feet. 'I been reading up,' he began. He blew hard to signify just how much effort this had cost him. 'I been reading up, and it seems that being a Muslim brings many heavy responsibilities. Not just the praying, and laying off drinks and laying off bacon and women and laying off every other manner of thing. It also has it written in the Qur'an that every Muslim should work towards one, unified Islamic state across the world. It is written, Khilafah is fard.' He thumped a huge hand against the snowy expanse of robe that covered his great chest. 'Now, what are we all doing about that?'

'Good question, brother,' said the Questioner.

Karim stepped in front of him. 'Listen to me. Let's not get distracted-'

A couple of seats to the right of Chanu, a girl jumped up and shouted over him. The sharp lines of her hijab emphasized the fine bones of her cheeks. 'According to United Nations statistics, there was another big tragedy on September eleventh. On that day thirty-five thousand children also died through hunger.' The girl looked straight at Karim as she spoke. Karim folded his arms. He looked straight back at her. The girl was barely out of her teens. She had large, long-lashed eyes, not too close together. The dark headscarf framed her forehead to perfection. 'What do we know about this tragedy?' the girl continued. She looked down at the piece of paper in her hand. 'Victims: thirty-five thousand. Location: the poorest countries in the world. Special news reports: none. Appeals for the victims and their families: none. Messages from Heads of State: none. Candlelight vigils: none. Minutes' silence: none. Calls for the perpetrators to be called to justice . . .' The girl looked up. Her face grew flushed with emotion. 'None.' She sat down quickly.

Karim let his gaze travel over the audience. He saw Nazneen, and Chanu with his head bent, and for a brief moment his eyebrows knitted together.

Nazneen wondered how he would look at her if she jumped up now and began to make a speech.

'How many were Muslims?' called a voice from the front of the hall. It was a woman's voice, emanating from somewhere in the region of the burkhas. 'How many of the thirty-five thousand were Muslims?'

What does it matter? thought Nazneen. Those who were not Muslims, would they be any less dead?

'People, people, let's get around to our business.' Karim paced up and down across the front of the stage. His elbow knocked against the Questioner, but Karim appeared not to notice. 'Out there, right now, are people who are twisted with hatred for us and for Islam. They are planning to march right on our doorsteps, and we are not going to let them get away with it. Let's show the Lion Hearts that Bangla Town is defended. Tigers will take on Lions any day of the week.' He strode over to the Secretary and procured a sheet of paper from the clipboard. 'Right. The list of estates. We need volunteers for organizers. First one: Berners Estate.'

Over on the right-hand side of the aisle, two lads rose to their feet. 'That's ours.'

Immediately, three boys jumped up on the opposite side of the aisle. 'It's ours, and you know it.'

'It doesn't belong to you.'

'Come here and say that.'

'You come here.'

The boys regarded each other with distinct and yet lazy menace, as if they knew there was much more in the way of menacing to be done and they did not wish to exhaust themselves.

'In here,' said Karim, 'and out there, as Bengal Tigers, that's the only group we belong to. Get it? No one owns any estate. Leave everything else out of it. OK?' He looked from one group to the other. 'OK, lads?'

Karim assigned people to the estates. He issued instructions for canvassing, targets to be met, reports to be filed, dates for the organizers to convene, plans for stewarding the march itself. He kept up a constant flow of talk, and all the time he talked he moved about the stage, filling it with his personality. Nobody objected to his allocated role. He eased each one into a slot, with a 'You'll be good at this, Khaled,' or 'This is just made for you, Monzur.' 'The Women's Committee I'm putting in charge of the banners.'

Nazneen kept glancing at her husband to see when he would make his move. Chanu did not look at her. His neck curved closer and closer to his body until it appeared he was examining his chest rather than his writing pad. Nazneen moved her legs slightly so that her knee pressed against his. She elicited no response.

For a while, as she watched Karim, she lost track of his words and witnessed only the tension in his body as he traced and retraced a path across the stage.

It was supposed to be her. She was supposed to be the one who could not think about the world, who had a head so filled with herself, her week, her day, her hour, that the big things would not fit. But she looked at Karim now: how absorbed he was in his manoeuvrings. If the Questioner had talked about the Lion Hearts, Karim would have talked of Afghanistan. If he said black, Karim would say white. And she felt misery rise like steam from Chanu at her side, and knew that he was lost in his own private torment; Race, Class and Short Theses did not touch him there.

But what was the good of aching for the world if she offered no balm to her own husband?

'Let's go,' she said. He did not hear. She pushed her knee against his and his leg swung away from her.

The meeting wound up. Chanu cleared his throat and tucked his speech inside his folder. 'Better save this for another day,' he said and smiled while his eyes danced on hot coals, darting everywhere and flinching from everything.

'Anyone who is interested in what I was saying, come and see me now,' called the Questioner.

A few boys gathered round him. Nazneen saw Sorupa's eldest among them.

'Insh' Allah, we all stand together,' shouted Karim as people began to file out of the hall.

But God is not willing, thought Nazneen. Oh, Karim, why do you see only what you want to see?

There was no escaping Mrs Islam this time. As Nazneen stepped over the threshold of the butcher's shop she practically stood on the great lady's toes.

'Ah, to be young again and walk around in a dream,' said Mrs Islam.

Nazneen enquired as politely as possible after her health.

Mrs Islam ignored her. 'Dreaming of home? But not long to wait now.'

The smell of meat was intense. Entering the shop was like wandering into a giant intestine. A huge stack of plucked chickens filled the window. It was a plain old massacre, nothing like the polite displays of cello-phaned body parts in the English supermarkets. Behind the high counter the men wore white coats, honestly and decently covered in blood. Inside the counter was every cut of mutton and all the cuts were jumbled together. Sides of beef coated in yellow fat hung from ceiling hooks. At the back, a solitary chill cabinet contained only an empty ice-cream tub, placed there to collect drips when the cabinet was unplugged after a brief and never-to-be-repeated term of service. The chill cabinet never caught on. Nobody wanted to buy meat that had been hidden away in there for who knows how long.