Don

Chapter Ten

Chapter 10

Natara revived her consciousness, fluttering her eyelids jocularly. She had swollen and vermilion eyes. The capillaries in her big eyes were magnified to a much greater extent. Her dress was in a dusty and a crumpled state, with the crème colour now faded to a shade of brown and black. Natara laid on the cold hard ground for a few more minutes until she deciphered that her hands and legs were loose to move freely around.

 “A stupid,”she carefully remarked under her breath. “Who would leave a police officer just enough to escape?”

  She struggled to get up with the help of her bruised knees. What would Colton be doing? Will he be worried? Will he be waiting? Natara’s thoughts further hit her into the cerebellum. She ambled towards the brown door. The surroundings were quite depressing. The room was languid with black draperies and a stroke of sunlight coming through the gap between the windows which were covered with the curtains. There was a bed, with an old torn bed sheet, like one would find in a brothel. The room was similar to that. Natara looked around the room with a sharp, observing glance. Everything seemed of little importance to her except for the fact that she was trapped.

  She stared at the door for a few moments as if the door would automatically open for her, paying a homage to her. Well, she was nothing special. Natara heaved a long breath, hoping that the door would also be unlocked for her to easily escape into the bewildering world once again. She took the big golden knob in her small palm and slowly twisted it. It clicked.

  Natara snorted ignominiously. The door was locked.  No luck had followed her through the consequences. She backed a few steps and started to think about what had happened in the last few days or hours. Days or hours? She thought, Natara was not even aware of the passing time. For her, it just flew by.

 “Who was it that brought me here?” Natara questioned herself but the facts were assiduous for themselves. They were like blank sheets of papers thrown here and there.

 “Another plan of Don?” She asked.

 “Oh, so he is cunning, so much so that he didn’t tie me up?” Natara chortled and lampooned.

 But within deep, a visceral conviction told her that she was scared. Scared to death, she could never have imagined, that it would get this much far. Natara consoled herself by verily explaining that everything would be fine. The ardor that was on her face started to fade away. 

 She heard someone talk in the mere distance, just behind the wall, hushing something. The baritone told the story, they were two men.

 “Oh, you don’t worry. I’ll take good care of her,” one was saying.

“Well, let’s see, you better do your duty well,” the other said dubiously. Then the footsteps walked themselves away in the endless distance. The quietness touched Natara. It was as if it were telling her something, informing about something, which she was certainly unknown to. Everything befuddled her.

 Natara sat down on the floor with a thud. She took her face in her hands and stroked her head hard. No ideas were coming to her mind, she could not think. Each and everything was driving her mad. She did not have the courage to do something. Suddenly, she remembered about Mr. Vito. He wanted her to be successful in the mission. Nobody in the world but him.

 Some ray of hope.

 Natara roamed in the room thinking of how to escape. She walked towards the window, drew the curtains aside with a flick. She could see the hustle-bustle of the market. Kiranahs were there, people were rushing. There were vendors which were selling some copper items calling out something in a language which she did not understand. The market was a very good spot to trap a person, without suspicion. Nobody could imagine. Natara shook her head, sympathetically. She could not understand what did those people wanted from her? for the fact it was still not rested upon her mind that it would be Don.

"Why would Don send me here to perish? He could've killed me straightaway." Natara surmised.

She saw the corroded handle of the rusty window. She held it tight and moved her fingers in a clockwise motion. The window opened, but just a little bit. Only an elf would have passed in between the space.

Natara coerced and the window flung open. She could not believe her eyes, she was left astound. The loud noises accustomed in her head, she could not discern anything for a minute.

"A life so dangerous, yet so easy?" Natara questioned herself. 

The smell of dust filled her nostrils and she breathed heavily. Her eyes were moving in different directions observing every single movement. She shot a hand to her coat pocket and escaped a gasp.

"That bally person! Took my gun," Natara abruptly spoke.

She put a step across on the iron railing of the window. The scene was a somewhat surprising yet enjoyable one for the people in the market. They saw her for a second, then turned away. The darting eyes were roaming, the dark complexions of the people's faces' told their story. The constant movement were quick as lightning. The covered faces of the women and the men, wearing Kurtis, children were wailing in their mother's arms. Mother's wept away the tears of their children as they continued doing their activities. The ambiguous eyes of the populace reminded Natara of Middle East. 

"By Jove am I correct! It's somewhere in the Middle East only!" Natara conceded.

Natara forgot her present situation and leaned a little forward and in no time found herself onto the hard dusty ground rubbing her back.The fall to the ground was a hard one. She lost her balance, and the other leg also followed the same movement, that of her first leg. The nervous system functioned alright. The electrical impulses reached from her spinal chord to the brain and then by the motor nerves back to the target organ.The target organ, being her back. It was aching unbearably.

 She had never imagined all this happening, in her wildest dreams. It was like an impasse for her. 

Natara shot her head towards the left and then the right. She was totally stupefied. Natara contended to get up and finally was on her toes, pulling her dress in the downward direction. She was feeling all dizzy, her head spinning wheezily in all directions. Her hair were totally unkempt. Nobody would've have thought Natara as an Interpol officer but a girl from a rural house. She moved a little forward towards a boy in rugged clothes. He had a sun-burn complexion with dark earnest eyes. He wore khaki pants, with tousled hair.

"Ahlan, ichtara hatha." he was shouting in all directions, showing some decorative items which were embedded with beautiful, intricate, excrescent design.

Natara was automatically pulled towards him. She stopped one foot away with a sudden halt. The boy snapped his head in her direction and smiled.

"Memsahib, you English?" he started to stutter. He did not know good English but was trying hard to make it up to impress Natara. Natara nodded her head in the affirmative. She like the attention she was getting form the orthodox rush in the market.

"Which place is this?" Natara abruptly asked. A sudden silence followed, with some blank faces looking at her, flabbergasted. It was a bizarre question to be asked. The mothers were fanning their weeping children but all rapt attention was set on Natara.

The boy courteously replied, "Thees ees Baghdad."

Natara backed up a little and strode forward in the direction of the hullabaloo. The boy did not call after her but resumed to perform his duty, faithfully.

Natara smiled a little to herself, facing the facts.

Indeed it was Baghdad.