Malgudi Days Page 5

  ‘All right,’ said the accountant with a smile. It created a sensation in the office and disturbed the routine of office working for nearly half an hour. On the next pension day he carried another model (children at play) and handed it over the counter.

  ‘Did the Sahib like the last one?’

  ‘Yes, he liked it.’

  ‘Please give this one to him—’ and he passed it over the counter. He made it a convention to carry on every pension day an offering for his master, and each time his greatest reward was the accountant’s stock reply to his question: ‘What did the Sahib say?’

  ‘He said it was very good.’

  At last he made his masterpiece. A model of his office frontage with himself at his post, a car at the entrance and the chief getting down: this composite model was so realistic that while he sat looking at it, he seemed to be carried back to his office days. He passed it over the counter on his pension day and it created a very great sensation in the office. ‘Fellow, you have not left yourself out, either!’ people cried, and looked admiringly at Singh. A sudden fear seized Singh and he asked, ‘The master won’t be angry, I hope?’

  ‘No, no, why should he be?’ said the accountant, and Singh received his pension and went home.

  A week later when he was sitting on the pyol kneading clay, the postman came and said, ‘A registered letter for you . . .’

  ‘For me!’ Any letter would have upset Singh; he had received less than three letters in his lifetime, and each time it was a torture for him till the contents were read out. Now a registered letter! This was his first registered letter. ‘Only lawyers send registered letters, isn’t it so?’

  ‘Usually,’ said the postman.

  ‘Please take it back. I don’t want it,’ said Singh.

  ‘Shall I say “Refused”?’ asked the postman. ‘No, no,’ said Singh. ‘Just take it back and say you have not found me . . .’

  ‘That I can’t do . . .’ said the postman, looking serious.

  Singh seemed to have no option but to scrawl his signature and receive the packet. He sat gloomily—gazing at the floor. His wife who had gone out and just returned saw him in this condition and asked, ‘What is it?’ His voice choked as he replied, ‘It has come.’ He flung at her the registered letter. ‘What is it?’ she asked. He said, ‘How should I know. Perhaps our ruin . . .’ He broke down. His wife watched him for a moment, went in to attend to some domestic duty and returned, still found him in the same condition and asked, ‘Why not open it and see, ask someone to read it?’ He threw up his arms in horror. ‘Woman, you don’t know what you are saying. It cannot be opened. They have perhaps written that my pension is stopped, and God knows what else the Sahib has said . . .’

  ‘Why not go to the office and find out from them?’

  ‘Not I! I will never show my face there again,’ replied Singh. ‘I have lived without a single remark being made against me, all my life. Now!’ He shuddered at the thought of it. ‘I knew I was getting into trouble when I made that office model . . .’ After deeper reflection he said, ‘Every time I took something there, people crowded round, stopped all work for nearly an hour . . . That must also have reached the Sahib’s ears.’

  He wandered about saying the same thing, with the letter in his pocket. He lost his taste for food, wandered about unkempt, with his hair standing up like a halo—an unaccustomed sight, his years in military service having given him a habitual tidiness. His wife lost all peace of mind and became miserable about him. He stood at crossroads, clutching the letter in his hand. He kept asking everyone he came across, ‘Tell me, what is there in this?’ but he would not brook the suggestion to open it and see its contents.

  So forthwith Singh found his way to the City X-ray Institute at Race Course Road. As he entered the gate he observed dozens of cars parked along the drive, and a Gurkha watchman at the gate. Some people were sitting on sofas reading books and journals. They turned and threw a brief look at him and resumed their studies. As Singh stood uncertainly at the doorway, an assistant came up and asked, ‘What do you want?’ Singh gave a salute, held up the letter uncertainly and muttered, ‘Can I know what is inside this?’ The assistant made the obvious suggestion. But Singh replied, ‘They said you could tell me what’s inside without opening it—’ The assistant asked, ‘Where do you come from?’ Singh explained his life, work and outlook, and concluded, ‘I’ve lived without remark all my life. I knew trouble was coming—’ There were tears on his cheeks. The assistant looked at him curiously as scores of others had done before, smiled and said, ‘Go home and rest. You are not all right . . . Go, go home.’

  ‘Can’t you say what is in this?’ Singh asked pathetically. The assistant took it in his hand, examined it and said, ‘Shall I open it?’ ‘No, no, no,’ Singh cried, and snatched it back. There was a look of terror in his eyes. The assembly looked up from their pages and watched him with mild amusement in their eyes. The assistant kindly put his arms on his shoulder and led him out. ‘You get well first, and then come back. I tell you—you are not all right.’

  Walking back home, he pondered over it. ‘Why are they all behaving like this, as if I were a madman?’ When this word came to his mind, he stopped abruptly in the middle of the road and cried, ‘Oh! That’s it, is that it?—Mad! Mad!’ He shook his head gleefully as if the full truth had just dawned upon him. He now understood the looks that people threw at him. ‘Oh! oh!’ he cried aloud. He laughed. He felt a curious relief at this realization. ‘I have been mad and didn’t know it . . .’ He cast his mind back. Every little action of his for the last so many days seemed mad; particularly the doll-making. ‘What sane man would make clay dolls after twenty-five years of respectable service in an office?’ He felt a tremendous freedom of limbs, and didn’t feel it possible to walk at an ordinary pace. He wanted to fly. He swung his arms up and down and ran on with a whoop. He ran through the Market Road. When people stood about and watched he cried, ‘Hey, don’t laugh at a madman, for who knows, you will also be mad when you come to make clay dolls,’ and charged into their midst with a war cry. When he saw children coming out of a school, he felt it would be nice to amuse their young hearts by behaving like a tiger. So he fell on his hands and knees and crawled up to them with a growl.

  He went home in a terrifying condition. His wife, who was grinding chilli in the back yard, looked up and asked, ‘What is this?’ His hair was covered with street dust; his body was splashed with mud. He could not answer because he choked with mirth as he said, ‘Fancy what has happened!’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I’m mad, mad.’ He looked at his work-basket in a corner, scooped out the clay and made a helmet of it and put it on his head. Ranged on the floor was his latest handiwork. After his last visit to the office he had been engaged in making a model village. It was a resplendent group: a dun road, red tiles, green coconut trees swaying, and the colour of the saris of the village women carrying water pots. He derived the inspiration for it from a memory of his own village days. It was the most enjoyable piece of work that he had so far undertaken. He lived in a kind of ecstasy while doing it. ‘I am going to keep this for myself. A memento of my father’s village,’ he declared. ‘I will show it at an exhibition, where they will give me a medal.’ He guarded it like a treasure: when it was wet he never allowed his wife to walk within ten yards of it. ‘Keep off, we don’t want your foot dust for this village . . .’

  Now, in his madness, he looked down on it. He raised his foot and stamped everything down into a multicoloured jam. They were still half-wet. He saw a donkey grazing in the street. He gathered up the jam and flung it at the donkey with the remark: ‘Eat this if you like. It is a nice village . . .’ And he went out on a second round. This was a quieter outing. He strode on at an even pace, breathing deeply, with the clay helmet on, out of which peeped his grey hair, his arms locked behind, his fingers clutching the fateful letter, his face tilted towards the sky. He walked down the Market Road, with a feeling tha
t he was the sole occupant of this globe: his madness had given him a sense of limitless freedom, strength and buoyancy. The remarks and jeers of the crowds gaping at him did not in the least touch him.

  While he walked thus, his eye fell on the bulb of a tall street lamp. ‘Bulb of the size of a papaya fruit!’ he muttered and chuckled. It had been a long cherished desire in him to fling a stone at it; now he felt, in his joyous and free condition, that he was free from the trammels of convention and need not push back any inclination. He picked up a pebble and threw it with good aim. The shattering noise of glass was as music to his ears. A policeman put his hand on his shoulder. ‘Why did you do it?’ Singh looked indignant. ‘I like to crack glass papaya fruit, that is all,’ was the reply. The constable said, ‘Come to the station.’

  ‘Oh, yes, when I was in Mesopotamia they put me on half-ration once,’ he said, and walked on to the station. He paused, tilted his head to the side and remarked, ‘This road is not straight . . .’ A few carriages and cycles were coming up to him. He found that everything was wrong about them. They seemed to need some advice in the matter. He stopped in the middle of the road, stretched out his arms and shouted, ‘Halt!’ The carriages stopped, the cyclists jumped off and Singh began a lecture: ‘When I was in Mesopotamia—I will tell you fellows who don’t know anything about anything.’ The policeman dragged him away to the side and waved to the traffic to resume. One of the cyclists who resumed jumped off the saddle again and came towards him with, ‘Why! It is Singh, Singh, what fancy dress is this? What is the matter?’ Even through the haze of his insane vision Singh could recognize the voice and the person—the accountant at the office. Singh clicked his heels and gave a salute. ‘Excuse me, sir, didn’t intend to stop you. You may pass . . .’ He pointed the way generously, and the accountant saw the letter in his hand. He recognized it although it was mud-stained and crumpled.

  ‘Singh, you got our letter?’

  ‘Yes, sir—Pass. Do not speak of it . . .’

  ‘What is the matter?’ He snatched it from his hand. ‘Why haven’t you opened it!’ He tore open the envelope and took out of it a letter and read aloud: ‘The General Manager greatly appreciates the very artistic models you have sent, and he is pleased to sanction a reward of one hundred rupees and hopes it will be an encouragement for you to keep up this interesting hobby.’

  It was translated to him word for word, and the enclosure, a cheque for one hundred rupees, was handed to him. A big crowd gathered to watch this scene. Singh pressed the letter to his eyes. He beat his brow and wailed, ‘Tell me, sir, am I mad or not?’

  ‘You look quite well, you aren’t mad,’ said the accountant. Singh fell at his feet and said with tears choking his voice, ‘You are a god, sir, to say that I am not mad. I am so happy to hear it.’

  On the next pension day he turned up spruce as ever at the office counter. As they handed him the envelope they asked, ‘What toys are you making now?’

  ‘Nothing, sir. Never again. It is no occupation for a sane man . . .’ he said, received his pension and walked stiffly out of the office.

  THE BLIND DOG

  It was not a very impressive or high-class dog; it was one of those commonplace dogs one sees everywhere—colour of white and dust, tail mutilated at a young age by God knows whom, born in the street, and bred on the leavings and garbage of the marketplace. He had spotty eyes and undistinguished carriage and needless pugnacity. Before he was two years old he had earned the scars of a hundred fights on his body. When he needed rest on hot afternoons he lay curled up under the culvert at the eastern gate of the market. In the evenings he set out on his daily rounds, loafed in the surrounding streets and lanes, engaged himself in skirmishes, picked up edibles on the roadside and was back at the Market Gate by nightfall.

  This life went on for three years. And then a change in his life occurred. A beggar, blind in both eyes, appeared at the Market Gate. An old woman led him up there early in the morning, seated him at the gate, and came up again at midday with some food, gathered his coins and took him home at night.

  The dog was sleeping nearby. He was stirred by the smell of food. He got up, came out of his shelter and stood before the blind man, wagging his tail and gazing expectantly at the bowl, as he was eating his sparse meal. The blind man swept his arms about and asked, ‘Who is there?’ at which the dog went up and licked his hand. The blind man stroked its coat gently tail to ear and said, ‘What a beauty you are. Come with me—’ He threw a handful of food, which the dog ate gratefully. It was perhaps an auspicious moment for starting a friendship. They met every day there, and the dog cut off much of its rambling to sit up beside the blind man and watch him receive alms morning to evening. In course of time, observing him, the dog understood that the passers-by must give a coin, and whoever went away without dropping a coin was chased by the dog; he tugged the edge of their clothes by his teeth and pulled them back to the old man at the gate and let go only after something was dropped in his bowl. Among those who frequented this place was a village urchin, who had the mischief of a devil in him. He liked to tease the blind man by calling him names and by trying to pick up the coins in his bowl. The blind man helplessly shouted and cried and whirled his staff. On Thursdays this boy appeared at the gate, carrying on his head a basket loaded with cucumber or plantain. Every Thursday afternoon it was a crisis in the blind man’s life. A seller of bright-coloured but doubtful perfumes with his wares mounted on a wheeled platform, a man who spread out cheap storybooks on a gunnysack, another man who carried coloured ribbons on an elaborate frame—these were the people who usually gathered under the same arch. On a Thursday when the young man appeared at the eastern gate one of them remarked, ‘Blind fellow! Here comes your scourge—’

  ‘Oh, God, is this Thursday?’ he wailed. He swept his arms about and called, ‘Dog, dog, come here, where are you?’ He made the peculiar noise which brought the dog to his side. He stroked his head and muttered, ‘Don’t let that little rascal—’ At this very moment the boy came up with a leer on his face.

  ‘Blind man! Still pretending you have no eyes. If you are really blind, you should not know this either—’ He stopped, his hand moving towards the bowl. The dog sprang on him and snapped his jaws on the boy’s wrist. The boy extricated his hand and ran for his life. The dog bounded up behind him and chased him out of the market.

  ‘See the mongrel’s affection for this old fellow,’ marvelled the perfume-vendor.

  One evening at the usual time the old woman failed to turn up, and the blind man waited at the gate, worrying as the evening grew into night. As he sat fretting there, a neighbour came up and said, ‘Sami, don’t wait for the old woman. She will not come again. She died this afternoon—’

  The blind man lost the only home he had, and the only person who cared for him in this world. The ribbon-vendor suggested, ‘Here, take this white tape’—he held a length of the white cord which he had been selling—‘I will give this to you free of cost. Tie it to the dog and let him lead you about if he is really so fond of you—’

  Life for the dog took a new turn now. He came to take the place of the old woman. He lost his freedom completely. His world came to be circumscribed by the limits of the white cord which the ribbon-vendor had spared. He had to forget wholesale all his old life—all his old haunts. He simply had to stay on for ever at the end of that string. When he saw other dogs, friends or foes, instinctively he sprang up, tugging the string, and this invariably earned him a kick from his master. ‘Rascal, want to tumble me down—have sense—’ In a few days the dog learnt to discipline his instinct and impulse. He ceased to take notice of other dogs, even if they came up and growled at his side. He lost his own orbit of movement and contact with his fellow-creatures.

  To the extent of this loss his master gained. He moved about as he had never moved in his life. All day he was on his legs, led by the dog. With the staff in one hand and the dog-lead in the other, he moved out of his home—a corner in a choultr
y veranda a few yards off the market: he had moved in there after the old woman’s death. He started out early in the day. He found that he could treble his income by moving about instead of staying in one place. He moved down the choultry street, and wherever he heard people’s voices he stopped and held out his hands for alms. Shops, schools, hospitals, hotels—he left nothing out. He gave a tug when he wanted the dog to stop, and shouted like a bullock-driver when he wanted him to move on. The dog protected his feet from going into pits, or stumping against steps or stones, and took him up inch by inch on safe ground and steps. For this sight people gave coins and helped him. Children gathered round him and gave him things to eat. A dog is essentially an active creature who punctuates his hectic rounds with well-defined periods of rest. But now this dog (henceforth to be known as Tiger) had lost all rest. He had rest only when the old man sat down somewhere. At night the old man slept with the cord turned around his finger. ‘I can’t take chances with you—’ he said. A great desire to earn more money than ever before seized his master, so that he felt any resting a waste of opportunity, and the dog had to be continuously on his feet. Sometimes his legs refused to move. But if he slowed down even slightly his master goaded him on fiercely with his staff. The dog whined and groaned under this thrust. ‘Don’t whine, you rascal. Don’t I give you your food? You want to loaf, do you?’ swore the blind man. The dog lumbered up and down and round and round the marketplace with slow steps, tied down to the blind tyrant. Long after the traffic at the market ceased, you could hear the night stabbed by the far-off wail of the tired dog. It lost its original appearance. As months rolled on, bones stuck up at his haunches and ribs were reliefed through his fading coat.

  The ribbon-seller, the novel-vendor and the perfumer observed it one evening when business was slack, and held a conference among themselves. ‘It rends my heart to see that poor dog slaving. Can’t we do something?’ The ribbon-seller remarked, ‘That rascal has started lending money for interest—I heard it from the fruit-seller—He is earning more than he needs. He has become a very devil for money—’ At this point the perfumer’s eyes caught the scissors dangling from the ribbon-rack. ‘Give it here,’ he said and moved on with the scissors in hand.