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Again, she re left alone in le, for quite different reasons And then she looked at Sanjay, who, she suspected, randdaughter believed

‘You know this place?’ Mr Vaghela had started to chew another piece of betel His teeth were stained red

She shook her head With the air-conditioning turned off, she could already feel the elevating temperatures Her mouth was dry, and she skwardly She had told Jennifer several tiest shipbreaker’s yard in the world’

‘Oh’ She tried to look interested, but felt increasingly weary and keen to move on The Bombay hotel, some unknown distance ahead, seemed like an oasis She looked at her watch: how could anyone spend nearly twentytwo bottles of drink?

‘Four hundred shipyards here And men who can strip a tanker down to nuts and bolts in a hts here, you know One dollar a day, they are paid, to risk life and limb’

‘Really?’

‘Soest ships in the world have ended up here You would not believe the things that the owners leave on cruise ships – dinner services, Irish linen, whole orchestras of hed ‘Sometimes it makes you feel quite sad, yaar Such beautiful ships, to becoaze fro tocould be so inconsiderate She closed her eyes, conscious that exhaustion and thirst were poisoning her norar one can buy anything – chairs, telephones,that can come out of the ship they sell My brother-in-laorks for one of the big shipbreakers in Bhavnagar, yaar He has furnished his entire house with ship’s goods It looks like a palace, you know?’ He picked at his teeth ‘Anything they can remove Hmph It would not surprise hela’

‘Yes, hela, diverted froer to a quiet shopfront, where several chairs and tables stood haphazardly on the dusty roadside ‘It is’

‘Then would you be so kind as to take me and order me a cup of tea? I really do not think I can spend another hted, madam’ He climbed out of the car, and held open the door for her ‘These young people, yaar, no sense of respect’ He offered his ar, into the midday sun ‘I have heard it is very different in Den her cup of what Mr Vaghela called ‘service tea’ The cup was scratched, as if from years of use, but it looked clean, and the ious show of serving it She had answered the obligatory questions about her travels, through Mr Vaghela, confirmed that she was not acquainted with the owner’s cousin in Milton Keynes, and then, having paid for Mr Vaghela’s glass of chai (and a sticky pistachio sweetth up, you understand), she had sat under the canopy and gazed out at what she no, froe-point, to lie behind the steel wall: the endless, shi blue sea

A short distance away, a small Hindu temple was shaded by a neem tree It was flanked by a series of shacks that had apparently evolved to arette vendor, a s, and another with bicycle parts It was sorasped that she was the only woone’

‘Not for long, I assuhela and I were only a few yards away’ Her tone was sharper than she’d intended

‘I said I didn’t think we should stop here,’ said Sanjay, eyeing first the group of men nearby, then the car with barely hidden irritation

‘I had to get out,’ she said firh to accoood ‘I needed a break’

‘Of course I just meant – I would have liked to find so the last day of your holiday’

‘This will do me fine’ She felt a little better now: the heat was teht of the azure water was soothing after the blurred and endless miles of road In the distance, she could hear theinstruesticulating at the beach, where her grande vessels, beached like whales upon the sand She half closed her eyes, wishing she had brought her glasses out of the car ‘Is that the shipbreaking yard you hela

‘Four hundred of the ten kiloraveyard,’ said Jennifer, and added portentously, ‘Where ships colasses, Gran?’ She was helpful, conciliatory, as if to ed stay in the shop

‘That would be very kind’

In other circuht have graced a travel brochure, its blue skiesthe horizon in a silvered arc, behind her a row of distant blue lasses, she could see that the sand was grey with years of rust and oil, and the acres of beachfront punctuated by the vast ships that sat at quarter-e unidentifiable pieces of metal, the dise, a few hundred yards away, a group of men squatted in a row on their haunches, dressed in faded robes of blue, grey and white, watching as a ship’s deckhouse swung out from a still-white hull anchored several hundred feet from the shore and crashed heavily into the sea

‘Not your usual tourist attraction,’ said Sanjay

Jennifer was staring at soainst the sun Her grandazed at her bare shoulders and wondered if she should suggest the girl cover up

‘This is the kind of thing I was talking about Coo and have a look’