<i>The dwarfs</i>

Itimoni is hardly three feet something. She dwarfs us.
She was hiding behind the "anchal" of her mother's sari. Her gaze fixed on the Buddha. The Buddha in his lotus position looks beautiful. His bronze face and body have taken on a distinctly ashy look. The golden Buddha looks almost fair in the afternoon light. Itimoni stares on.
Where were you that night? We ask her.
She does not answer. Just burrows her face deeper in the warmth of her mother's "anchal" (the loose end of a sari).
Where were you? Were you at home?
First she nods. Then mutters, almost inaudibly, “No”.
Then where?
“In the field. In the betel nut plantation.” She mutters again. We had to get down on our knees to pick up her voice.
Why?
“Because they came.”
Who came?
“They.”
Who are they?
Silence.
Who? Who are they?
More silence.
Why did they come?
Silence again.
Tell us.
“To kill us.”
To kill you? Why?
Silence. And then: “Because we are Buddhists.”
Because you are Buddhist?
“Yes.”
Itimoni's lips quiver. But she does not cry. She keeps rolling her mother's "anchal" around her fingers. Her hair is now neatly combed. A red hair clip on one side. She looks frail. She looks tired. Naturally.
What else do you expect of an eight-year-old girl who had spent the whole night without any food or water in the plantation?
Who tried to kill you?
“They. The Muslims.”
She looks away.