Chapter 16 — After the Sundarbans

Haripada was not found.This was not unusual. He had given no address, no surname, no contact. He had been paid in cash by Madan Das. He had walked off the boat at the Gosaba landing and into the town and had not been seen again.Madan Das, when asked about him, said: "He comes when he needs to come. He goes back when he's done.""Back where?"Madan Das looked at the river."He was taken once," he said. "Long ago. He never really came all the way back. He stays near the edge." He paused. "Men like that — the ones who are partly inside the temple still — they become guides sometimes. They can move between. They can help people come out." He looked at his hands. "They can't go in too far. But they can reach.""Did he help Rohan come out?"Madan Das was quiet for a long time."He helped him come out as far as Rohan was willing to go," he said at last. "The willing was the problem. The willing was what the temple took first."* * *Rohan Nair has not been found.The Forest Department search covered the relevant channel networks for five days before weather conditions ended it. No physical evidence was recovered.Rohan's family received the camera footage. They watched it together. The footage from inside the temple — the interior, the teeth, the floor — they watched once. They have not watched it again.His mother, in the account she gave to the documentary reconstruction team, said: "The last footage. The one they found on the river. The night footage.""CLIP_0047?" the interviewer said."Yes," she said. "The shape in the roots. My son—" She stopped. "I have watched it twelve times. The way it moves. The way it turns toward the camera." She was quiet. "He is in there. I know my son. He is still in there."She was asked: "In the footage? Or in—""In the forest," she said. "He is in the forest. Not dead. Changed." She looked at her hands. "Changed and alive. That's what I think." She looked at the interviewer. "Is that worse? Knowing he is alive in there and not being able to reach him?"The interviewer did not answer.Some questions have no answer that helps.