Chapter 3 - Naggar
She was sleeping. The train journey's endless meandering was proving to be too dull for her energy, and so she chose to do what she could think of - sleep with her head in her mother's lap. Shailesh had been playing with her for an hour or so, and then after sleep, he tried going through the magazines he'd purchased from the Wheeler stall at the station of departure. Caste, terrorism, Ram Mandir - these were all he could see, and frankly, he was sick of all the verbiage the magazines contained. All the rhetoric had gotten them nowhere, he thought, as he kept the magazines in the seat pocket ahead, and chose instead to stare into the monotony of the passing scenery. You could see the weather change in the color of the crop, was his father would often remark. Simple man that he was, his superstitions were too much to handle for him. He remembered that time when his father had asked him not to touch the broom with his foot. "Beta, it's a symbol of Lakshmi. Don't