The Green Room

Paper Planes

"Of what?"

"I told you, you won't understand. And I don't want to explain either." Her voice had lost its softness. She was deliberately looking away from him. "Where are the others?"

"Look, I..."

"What time does the practice start?"

"I am sorry." He didn't know if he had actually been rude or whether her indignant behavior was justified. But he knew he had annoyed her. "But don't you think, after all the beatings I took because of you, Ma'am, I deserve an explanation... and of course, these chocolates!"

Chandni passed him a smile. But he knew it was fake. She had been faking it all along. She seemed troubled, her eyes gave her away. Rohan too leaned on the railing beside her and watched paper planes flying over the Field.

"I don't know," she broke the silence at last, still avoiding eye contact, "but..."

"What is going on, Chandni?"

"I am scared." She paused to study him. He remained grave, listening closely to everything she had to say. He, somehow, understood her. "Something terrible happened at this place."

"Yes I know. There is a story that a girl disappeared from the Green Room."

"Kajal."

"What?"

"Her name was Kajal."

"What do you mean?"

"It is not a story."

"What do you mean? It actually happened. She just disappeared? And no one went looking for her?"

"No. She ran away into the forest... and a leopard took her away."

Rohan thought of the screams he had heard in the Green Room. There was a wide, unguarded entrance to the forest below the back door of the Green Room even now. "But how do you know this is true?"

Chandni hesitated for a moment, and then whispered, "Because I saw her!" She studied his reaction again. He still believed her. His eyes were wide, yet comprehensive. "I didn't believe it either. But I saw her again and again. Something happened here. These school people are trying to hide something."

"Hide what?"

"When Kajal died, her body was not found. There was no trace. She just went missing. There was a rumor that a man-eater had been spotted in these forests and some believed that she had been taken away. A forest officer was called from Jim Corbett and he confirmed it. A few weeks later a guard shot down the leopard near his village."

"But how do you know all this?"

"I went through old newspapers and contacted a few people when I went home. But there is more. The then principal, what was his name... Adam Smith Williams, yes, Mr. Williams... resigned after this incident... in 1989. And a few years later, I think in 1993, he died."