A House for Mr. Biswas - V.S. Naipaul [228]
How many letters of resignation he had mentally addressed to the Sentinel! Yet when, letters having passed between the Secretariat and himself, the moment came and he sat up in the Slumberking to write to the Sentinel, he used none of the phrases and sentences he had polished over the years. Instead, to his surprise, he found himself grateful to the paper for employing him for so long, for giving him a start in the city, equipping him for the Service.
He felt a fool when he received the editor’s reply. In five lines he was thanked for his letter, his services were acknowledged, regret was expressed, and he was wished luck in his new job. The letter was typed by a secretary, whose smart lowercase initials were in the bottom left corner.
Working out his notice, he let the Destees slide, and prepared zestfully for his new job. He borrowed books from the Central Library and from the department’s small collection. He began with books on sociology and immediately came to grief: he could not understand their charts or their language. He moved on to simpler paperbacked books about village reconstruction in India. These were more amusing: they gave pictures of village drains before and after, showed how chimneys could be built at no cost, how wells could be dug. They stimulated Mr Biswas to such a degree that for a few days he wondered whether he oughtn’t to practise on the little community in his own house. A number of books laid a puzzling stress on the need for folk dances and folk singing during the carrying out of cooperative undertakings; some gave examples of songs. Mr Biswas saw himself leading a singing village as they cooperatively mended roads, cooperatively put up superhuts, cooperatively dug wells; singing, they harvested one another’s fields. The picture didn’t convince: he knew Indian villagers too well. Govind, for instance, sang, and W. C. Tuttle liked music; but Mr Biswas couldn’t see himself leading them and the singing readers and learners to re-concrete the floor under the house, to plaster the half-walls, to build another bathroom or lavatory. He doubted whether he could even get them to sing. He read of cottage industries: romantic words, suggesting neatly clad peasants with grave classical features sitting at spinning wheels in cooperatively built superhuts and turning out yards and yards of cloth before going on to the folk singing and dancing under the village tree in the evening, by the light of flambeaux. But he knew what the villages were by night, when the rumshop emptied. He saw himself instead in a large timbered hall, walking up and down between lines of disciplined peasants making baskets. From cottage industries he was diverted by juvenile delinquency, which he found more appealing than adult delinquency. He particularly liked the photographs of the hardened delinquents: stunted, smoking, supercilious, and very attractive. He saw himself winning their confidence and then their eternal devotion. He read books on psychology and learned some technical words for the behaviour of Chinta when she flogged Vidiadhar.
Miss Logie, who had at first encouraged his enthusiasm, now attempted to control it. He saw her often during the month, and their relationship grew even better. Whenever she introduced him to anyone she spoke of him as her colleague, a graciousness he had never before experienced; and from being relaxed with her he became debonair.
Then he had a fright.
Miss Logie said she would like to meet his family.
Readers! Learners! Govind! Chinta! The Slumberking bed and the destitute’s diningtable! And perhaps some widow might want to try again, and there would be