Jail Break in India?
Chapter 6
Of course I had no idea if Sethi would really do anything or whether he would just pocket all the money for himself and put me off with excuses for a few months. Clive reckoned the risk was worth taking though and wired me $3000 for this greedy little advocate.
The clerk in the Western Union office gave it all to me in 50 rupee notes instead of 500’s and couldn’’t understand my irritation that all the 50’s were stapled together – standard practice in India, resulting that the notes begin life with a huge tear in the middle and pass out of circulation within months.
That evening I took a taxi to Sethi’s office, trying all three office blocks with the same name and handed over the cash. In return he hand-wrote me a receipt on a greasy scrap of paper that could have been a serviette in a former incarnation.
The next possibility was escape. Natasha told me at the jail that she was going to Safrajang Hospital on the Friday to take an AIDS test. I was there two hours early, circling the grounds in a rickshaw to check out getaway routes. The traffic was chaotic but there were a hundred possibilities to weave through the city and avoid any police road blocks.
No one paid any attention to me as I wandered into the hospital and I just walked on as though I knew where I was going. The notice board led me to the 7thn floor where blood tests were taken and there were no cameras or security guards around. On the front entrance two old men had sat around with ancient rifles but I doubted they were even loaded. Up here no one would hear any commotion and Natasha’ s guards could easily be ambushed here; they could be chloroformed or knocked unconscious and then locked in a room. The trouble was we couldn’t forsee how many people would be around on the day and we couldn’t guarantee that the guards would be taken by surprise.
I went back to the car park and waited. I stationed myself by a chai stand and bought an omelette on toast, cursing as I forgot to remove the lethal fragments of green chilli. To my left I saw a bundle of cloth tremble slightly and I realised it was a female beggar. She was covered in the burkah common to extreme Muslim communities and she shook with tears beneath her cloak of shame. A few feet away flies were feeding on the shit she’d left behind and a trail of it led up to her dress. It was the single-most miserable sight I’d witnessed this time around in India. I left her 20 rupees in her begging bowl – enough for her to eat for a day or two. Nothing at all, really.
I looked up and saw that the police van was already entering the hospital grounds. I stood up and took cover behindthe chai stand to watch how the operation would run. First a cop with his pistol drawn stepped out and gave a nonchalant look up and down before giving the all-clear. Natasha the stepped out, her left hand firmly held by a female cop who kept close to her side. They walked along the terrace in front of the hospital and the cop with the gun followed about ten metres behind. I could see Natasha straining her head to see me but I had no intention of drawing attention to myself. A moment later they disappeared through the front entrance.
It seemed too easy. Clive would only need to drive up behind them on a motorbike and club the guard over the head. Either that or we could just turn up with a bag full of hundreds of dollars and suggest that they run away to hide the loot while we ran away with Natasha.
From there it would just be a case of changing vehicles a few times, new clothes and maybe a hair cut for Natasha and then heading to a safe house in Delhi. The heat would die down after a week or so and then they could slip over the border to Nepal.
I flew up to Kathmandu to meet Clive. He was too nervous to come to Delhi in case he was a wanted man. He had gone cold turkey and was only now getting a grip on himself. Before his flight had taken off he’d been desperate for a cigarette and despite the stewardess’s warnings he’d lit up anyway. To appease her he proposed that they open the door and he stepped up to pull at the handle. Three stewards wrestled him to the ground in a moment.
“I didn’t realise that we were 8000 metres in the air at the time, Tom. When we refuelled in Oman a special security van came to pick me up. I was led into an interrogation room with 8 big Arabs glaring at me. I just looked at the chief and said ‘Sir, I am very, very, very sorry’. He smiled and so I asked him if I could smoke now?”
The air was crisp and we walked through the streets of Kathmandu at a brisk pace to stay warm, the intricate wooden architecture a backdrop to our racing thoughts. I brought Clive up to date with the lawyer and the escape possibilities while we sat on the top steps of the looming temples in the shade of their overhanging roves. We shared a hotel room and while I slept Clive stayed up all night dreaming up genius escape plans. I’d wake up in the morning and he wouldn’;t wait for me to rub the sleep out of the corners of my eyes before starting:
“Hey, Tom, do you think jeeps or motorbikes would be better? I mnea, bikes are best for weaving through the traffic but they could skid over or the engine could stall…”
“Coffee.”
“Jeeps are more reliable but then they’re easier to trace and do you think we can find drivers?”
“Toast.”
“And how should we take out the guards? I mean if we hit them over the head then we might end up killing someone and then there’d be a city-wide search for us. On the other hand I don’t need someone taking pot shots at us as we’re driving away.”
I’d stumble up and into the shower where I couldn’t hear any more.
We spent the next couple of days strolling around Kathmandu in the narrow streets that bit cold with a January wind. The light in Nepal was always harder, bleaker than India. The sky was wider and paler here, the home of mountain deities dressed up as buddhas. Hindu gods couldn’t thrive in these temperatures and whatever chaos could be generated in the busy junctions of donkeys, carts and mopeds, it all evaporated with the heat as the evening fell.
Every now and then we’d wander into the tourist complex of Thamel where Westerners on two week trekking holidays munched Sinkers bars and bought discounted hiking gear. Here souvenir shops, bakeries and supermarkets lined both sides and desperate Nepalase guys tried to vend shamanic masks in the street to Canadian kids on their gap year. It was consumer travel at its most soulless and desperate.
To protect ourselves from the icy valley winds we bought blankets from street traders who sold their wares laid out on the sidewalk. Clive was the better bargainer. When the price was too high he walked away so fast that even I thought he didn’t want to buy. The traders always called him back with a better offer.
We brainstormed ideas in cafes and restaurants, going over all the possibilities. Neither of us had much faith in lawyers but to bust Natasha free was risky. It was easy enough for me to talk about the latter as I wouldn’t personally have to run the gauntlet. My role would be limited to organising the vehicles, finding drivers and safe houses and coordinating everything by phone or walkie-talkie.
It was Clive who was looking down the barrel of a gun. If he hurt or killed a police officer and got caught then he could expect some pretty rough treatment and a good few years within the walls of Tihar prison himself.
“And I know that if I go down there’ll be no one who could do for me what I’m doing for Natasha.” He insisted. A direct assault on the guards at then hospital was an all or nothing gamble. If he failed then it would be game over, please insert more credits.
Yet it seemed so easy. That very morning I’d picked up a newspaper and seen the headline: KASHMIRI BANDIT ESCAPES FROM CSTODY. On his way back from court 4 Kashmiri accomplices simply ran up to the guards and threw pepper in their faces. While they were coughing the prisoner ran off to freedom.
The morning before I was due to catch a flight back to Delhi I woke up to see Clive grinning from ear to ear. I wondered for how many hours he’d kept that smile going.
“Alright,” I groaned, “Tell me what genius idea you’ve got this time.” He ignored the irony and triumphantly launched into the details of his scheme.
“After we bust her free the cops will be crawling the streets and, as we know, Delhi traffic is a bitch so I thought of a way to avoid all the roadblocks.” He looked up at me with eureka written all over his face. “Motor-lite paragliders. I’ll head up to the mountains and get trained up first and then we’ll have a paraglider ready and running in a nearby park. I drive there with Natasha and then we fly over the whole fucking lot of them to a field outside Delhi. There out jeep will be waiting to drive us to Nepal!”
“It’s inspired.” I told him, shaking my head in wonder. “You’re brilliant, Clive, without a doubt. There is one small problem though.”
“What?”
“Any u.f.o seen over Delhi will automatically be assumed to be an aerial attack from Pakistan or Kashmiri rebels. You’ll be shot down within minutes.”
Not a bit deflated, Clive dragged me down to breakfast where we went over our plans one more time. We were on our fifth cup of coffee when an elderly Indian gentleman walked up and introduced himself in that happy way Indians have of interrupting your conversation.
“I am delighted to meet you, sirs! Please, what is your good country?”
“We’re from England.”
“Ah, splendid! Splendid!” He turned to Clive as the elder of the two of us and asked. “And what is your occupation, sir?”
This was always problematic for Clive. Few people reacted well to the answer ‘international drug smuggler’. He used to tell people he was a teacher but then he kept on meeting too many teachers who quizzed him about his qualifications and didactic techniques.
“I’m a painter and decorator.” He replied. But at the disappointed look on the Indian’s face the Mancunian in him couldn’t help adding: “actually I specialise in marble work. I import and then design bathrooms for big houses, you know.”
The eyes of our acquaintance lit up.
“Really?” He gasped. “I am the number one marble exporter in Calcutta! Tell me what grade of marble do you use? And at what price do you buy – I’m sure I can do better!”
Clive’s eyes met mine in a desperate plea for mercy from the inscrutable Murphy’s Law. I’m certain that if he’d claimed to be a physicist then we would have bumped into a grandson of Einstein.
