A House for Mr. Biswas - V.S. Naipaul [54]
‘We could say that,’ Mr Biswas said.
‘Now, how are we going to put our ideas across to the masses?’ Misir said, and Mr Biswas noted that Misir’s manner was growing more and more like Pankaj Rai’s. ‘I suggest persuasion.’
‘Peaceful persuasion,’ Shivlochan said.
‘Peaceful persuasion. Start like Mohammed. Start small. Start with your own family. Start with your own wife. Then move on. I want everybody here to go home this evening determined to pass the word on to his neighbours. And I promise you, my friends, that in no time Arwacas will become a stronghold of Aryanism.’
‘Just a moment,’ Mr Biswas said. ‘Not so fast. Start with your own family? You don’t know my family. I think we better leave them out.’
‘This is a helluva man,’ Misir said. ‘You want to convert three hundred million Hindus and you let one backward little family of country bookies frighten you?’
‘I telling you, man. You don’t know my family.’
‘All right,’ Misir said, a little of his bounce gone. ‘Now, supposing peaceful persuasion doesn’t work. Just supposing. What do you suggest, my friends? By what means can we bring about the conversion we so earnestly desire?’ The last two sentences had occurred in one of Pankaj Rai’s speeches.
‘By the sword,’ Mr Biswas said. ‘The only thing. Conversion by the sword.’
‘That’s how I feel too,’ Misir said.
‘Just a minute, gentlemen,’ Shivlochan, BA (Professor), said, rising. ‘You are rejecting the doctrine of non-violence. Do you realize that?’
‘Rejecting it just for a short time,’ Misir said impatiently. ‘Short short time.’
Shivlochan sat down.
‘I think, then, that we could pass a resolution to the effect that peaceful persuasion should be followed by militant conversion. All right?’
‘I think so,’ Mr Biswas said.
‘I think this would make a good little story,’ Misir said. ‘Going to telephone it in to the Sentinel straight away.’
On the country page of the Sentinel the next day there was an item, two inches high, about the proceedings of the Arwacas Aryan Association, the AAA, Mr Biswas’s name was mentioned, as was his address.
He left an open and marked copy of the paper on the long table in the hall. And when that evening Shama came up as he was reading Reform the Only Way and said that Seth wanted to see him, Mr Biswas didn’t argue. Whistling in his soundless way, he put on his trousers and ran down to face the family tribunal.
‘I see you have got your name in the papers,’ Seth said.
Mr Biswas shrugged.
The gods swung slowly in the hammock, frowning.
‘What are you trying to do? Disgrace the family? Here you have these boys trying to get on in the Catholic college. Do you believe this sort of thing is going to help them in any way?’
The gods looked injured.
‘Jealous,’ Mr Biswas said. ‘Everybody just jealous.’
‘What have you got for them to be jealous of?’ Mrs Tulsi asked.
The elder god got up, in tears. ‘I not going to remain sitting down in this hammock and have any-and-everybody in this house insulting me. Is your fault, Ma. Is your son-in-law. You just bring them in here to eat all the food my father money buy and then to insult your sons.’
It was a grave charge, and Mrs Tulsi held the boy to her and embraced him and wiped away his tears with her veil.
‘It’s all right, son,’ Seth said. ‘I am still here to look after you.’ He turned to Mr Biswas. ‘All right,’ he said in English. ‘You see what you cause. You want to get the family in trouble. You want to see them go to jail. They feeding you, but you want to see me and Mai go to jail. You want to see the two boys, who ain’t got no father, go through life without a education. All that is all right. This house is like a republic already.’
Sisters and brothers-in-law froze into attitudes of sullen penitence. Seth’s gratuitous remark about the republic was a rebuke to them all; it meant that Mr Biswas’s behaviour was bringing discredit upon the other brothers-in-law.
‘So,’ Seth went on. ‘You want to see girl children educated and choosing their own husband, eh? The same sort of thing that your sister