Something swam out of the air this evening between the Vijay Chowk traffic signal and the barrier police convoy before Raisina Hill and knocked me down onto the lukewarm tar. I lost what it was in the diffused plushness of terrible bright halogens on North Block, but, as I said, it was dark.

For three minutes, I stood to see if I would see again whatever it was that swam out at me, but I didn't. So after helping myself to some decidedly baked chatter on a group of men or women who had detonated plastic explosives in a Benares temple before heading for the river, I repaired to my vehicle which I had carefully installed between motorcycles in invisibly dark depths of the Vijay Chowk general car park. A mango tree rustled at me, so I blew smoke at its pale green mangolets.

As I bent to enter my automobile, I caught reflected in the swinging door window a quick dash of whatever it was that swam out at me in the space between the Vijay Chowk traffic signal and Raisina Hill a few minutes before. I can tell you without a faint pulse now, and it is no more a source of mirth now than it was then, that what I saw was no apparition. I very much doubt it was my mind playing tricks on me, which I notice it has stopped doing during the later hours. What I saw was also not a mirage, for the evening I remember now was quite cool. I think what i saw was death.