Page 392 - Leadership in the Indian Army

willows.

Mariam's kolba is still here.
When she approaches it, Laila sees that the lone windowpane is empty

and that the door is gone. Mariam had described a chicken coop and a

tandoor, a wooden outhouse too, but Laila sees no sign of them. She

pauses at the entrance to the kolba She can hear flies buzzing inside.

To get in, she has to sidestep a large fluttering spiderweb. It's dim

inside. Laila has to give her eyes a few moments to adjust. When they

do, she sees that the interior is even smaller than she'd imagined. Only
half of a single rotting, splintered board remains of the floorboards. The

rest, she imagines, have been ripped up for burning as firewood. The

floor is carpeted now with dry-edged leaves, broken bottles, discarded
chewing gum wrappers, wild mushrooms, old yellowed cigarette butts.

But mostly with weeds, some stunted, some springing impudently

halfway up the walls.

Fifteen years, Laila thinks. Fifteen years in this place.

Laila sits down, her back to the wall. She listens to the wind filtering
through the willows. There are more spiderwebs stretched across the

ceiling. Someone has spray-painted something on one of the walls, but

much of it has sloughed off, and Laila cannot decipher what it says. Then
she realizes the letters are Russian. There is a deserted bird's nest in one

corner and a bat hanging upside down in another corner, where the wall

meets the low ceiling.
Laila closes her eyes and sits there awhile.

In Pakistan, it was difficult sometimes to remember the details of

Mariam's face. There were times when, like a word on the tip of her

tongue, Mariam's face eluded her. But now, here in this place, it's easy to