In a Free State by V.S. Naipaul Read Free Book Online Page B

myself. Consumer research! These people make us dance, Santosh. You and I, we will renounce. We will go together and walk beside Potomac and meditate.’
    I loved his talk. I hadn’t heard anything so sweet and philosophical since the Bombay days. I said, ‘Priya, I will cook for you, if you want a cook.’
    ‘I feel I’ve known you a long time, Santosh. I feel you are like a member of my own family. I will give you a place to sleep, a little food to eat and a little pocket money, as much as I can afford.’
    I said, ‘Show me the place to sleep.’
    He led me out of the pretty room and up a carpeted staircase. I was expecting the carpet and the new paint to stop somewhere,but it was nice and new all the way. We entered a room that was like a smaller version of my employer’s apartment.
    ‘Built-in cupboards and everything, you see, Santosh.’
    I went to the cupboard. It had a folding door that opened outward. I said, ‘Priya, it is too small. There is room on the shelf for my belongings. But I don’t see how I can spread my bedding inside here. It is far too narrow.’
    He giggled nervously. ‘Santosh, you are a joker. I feel that we are of the same family already.’
    Then it came to me that I was being offered the whole room. I was stunned.
    Priya looked stunned too. He sat down on the edge of the soft bed. The dark hollows under his eyes were almost black and he looked very small in his double-breasted jacket. ‘This is how they make us dance over here, Santosh. You say staff quarters and they say staff quarters. This is what they mean.’
    For some seconds we sat silently, I fearful, he gloomy, meditating on the ways of this new world.
    Someone called from downstairs, ‘Priya!’
    His gloom gone, smiling in advance, winking at me, Priya called back in an accent of the country, ‘Hi, Bab!’
    I followed him down.
    ‘Priya,’ the American said, ‘I’ve brought over the menus.’
    He was a tall man in a leather jacket, with jeans that rode up above thick white socks and big rubber-soled shoes. He looked like someone about to run in a race. The menus were enormous; on the cover there was a drawing of a fat man with a moustache and a plumed turban, something like the man in the airline advertisements.
    ‘They look great, Bab.’
    ‘I like them myself. But what’s that, Priya? What’s that shelf doing there?’
    Moving like the front part of a horse, Bab walked to the shelfwith the rice and the brass plate and the little clay lamp. It was only then that I saw that the shelf was very roughly made.
    Priya looked penitent and it was clear he had put the shelf up himself. It was also clear he didn’t intend to take it down.
    ‘Well, it’s yours,’ Bab said. ‘I suppose we had to have a touch of the East somewhere. Now, Priya –’
    ‘Money-money-money, is it?’ Priya said, racing the words together as though he was making a joke to amuse a child. ‘But, Bab, how can
you
ask
me
for money? Anybody hearing you would believe that this restaurant is mine. But this restaurant isn’t mine, Bab. This restaurant is yours.’
    It was only one of our courtesies, but it puzzled Bab and he allowed himself to be led to other matters.
    I saw that, for all his talk of renunciation and business failure, and for all his jumpiness, Priya was able to cope with Washington. I admired this strength in him as much as I admired the richness of his talk. I didn’t know how much to believe of his stories, but I liked having to guess about him. I liked having to play with his words in my mind. I liked the mystery of the man. The mystery came from his solidity. I knew where I was with him. After the apartment and the green suit and the
hubshi
woman and the city burning for four days, to be with Priya was to feel safe. For the first time since I had come to Washington I felt safe.
    I can’t say that I moved in. I simply stayed. I didn’t want to go back to the apartment even to collect my belongings. I was afraid that