A House for Mr. Biswas - V.S. Naipaul [48]
‘You know who provide all the food you been eating?’
Mr Biswas didn’t answer.
Seth laughed, took the cigarette holder out of his mouth and coughed, from a deep chest. ‘This is a helluva man. When a man is married he shouldn’t expect other people to feed him. In fact, he should be feeding his wife. When I got married you think I did want Mai mother to feed me?’
Mrs Tulsi rubbed her braceleted arms on the pitchpine table and shook her head.
The gods were grave.
‘And yet I hear that you not happy here.’
‘I didn’t tell anybody anything about not being happy here.’
‘I is the Big Boss, eh? And Mai is the old queen and the old hen. And these boys is the two gods, eh?’
The gods became stern.
Looking away from Seth, and causing a dozen or more faces instantly to turn away, Mr Biswas saw Govind among eaters at the far end of the table, going at his food in his smiling savage way, apparently indifferent to the inquisition, while C, bowed and veiled, stood dutifully over him.
‘Eh?’ For the first time there was impatience in Seth’s voice, and, to show his displeasure, he began talking Hindi. ‘This is gratitude. You come here, penniless, a stranger. We take you in, we give you one of our daughters, we feed you, we give you a place to sleep in. You refuse to help in the store, you refuse to help on the estate. All right. But then to turn around and insult us!’
Mr Biswas had never thought of it like that. He said, ‘I sorry.’
Mrs Tulsi said, ‘How can anyone be sorry for something he thinks?’
Seth pointed to the eaters at the end of the table. ‘What names have you given to those, eh?’ The eaters, not looking up, ate with greater concentration.
Mr Biswas said nothing.
‘Oh, you haven’t given them names. It’s only to me and Mai and the two boys that you have given names?’
‘I sorry.’
Mrs Tulsi said, ‘How can anyone be sorry–’
Seth interrupted her. ‘So we want someone to work on the estate. Is nice to keep these things in the family. And what you say? You want to paddle your own canoe. Look at him!’ Seth said to the hall. ‘Biswas the paddler.’
The children smiled; the sisters pulled their veils over their foreheads; their husbands ate and frowned; the gods in the hammock, rocking very slowly with their feet on the floor, glowered at the staircase landing.
‘It runs in the family,’ Seth said. ‘They tell me your father was a great diver. But where has all your paddling got you so far?’
Mr Biswas said, ‘Is just that I don’t know anything about estate work.’
‘Oho! Is because you can read and write that you don’t want to get dirt on your hands, eh? Look at my hands.’ He showed nails that were corrugated, warped and surprisingly short. The hairy backs of his hands were scratched and discoloured; the palms were hardened, worn smooth in some places, torn in others. ‘You think I can’t read and write? I can read and write better than the whole lot of them.’ He waved one hand to indicate the sisters, their husbands, their children; he held the other palm open towards the gods in the hammock, to indicate that they were excepted. There was amusement in his eyes now, and he opened his mouth on either side of the cigarette holder to laugh. ‘What about these boys here, Mohun? The gods.’
The younger god furrowed his brow, opened his eyes wider and wider until they were expressionless, and attempted to set his small, plump-lipped mouth.
‘You think they can’t read and write too?’
‘See them in the store,’ Mrs Tulsi said. ‘Reading and selling. Reading and eating and selling. Reading and eating and counting money. They are not afraid of getting their hands dirty.’
Not with money, Mr Biswas told her mentally.
The younger god got up from the hammock and said, ‘If he don’t want to take the job on the estate, that is his business. It serve you right, Ma. You choose your son-in-laws and they treat you exactly how you deserve.’
‘Sit down, Owad,’ Mrs Tulsi said. She turned to Seth. ‘This boy has a terrible temper.’
‘I don’t blame him,’ Seth said. ‘These paddlers go away, paddling their own canoe – that is how it is,