Island - Aldous Huxley [31]
“A statement,” said Mr. Bahu, “which I can unequivocally confirm. Miss Radha is not merely a good nurse; she’s an absolutely first-rate one.”
But what he really meant, Will felt sure as he studied the expression on that face of a much-tempted monk, was that Miss Radha had a first-rate midriff, first-rate navel, and first-rate breasts. But the owner of the navel, midriff and breasts had clearly resented Savonarola’s admiration, or at any rate the way it had been expressed. Hopefully, overhopefully, the rebuffed Ambassador was returning the attack.
The spirit lamp was lighted and, while the needle was being boiled, little Nurse Appu took her patient’s temperature.
“Ninety-nine point two.”
“Does that mean I have to be banished?” Mr. Bahu enquired.
“Not so far as he’s concerned,” the girl answered.
“So please stay,” said Will.
The little nurse gave him his injection of antibiotic, then, from one of the bottles in her bag, stirred a tablespoonful of some greenish liquid into half a glass of water.
“Drink this.”
It tasted like one of those herbal concoctions that health-food enthusiasts substitute for tea.
“What is it?” Will asked, and was told that it was an extract from a mountain plant related to valerian.
“It helps people to stop worrying,” the little nurse explained, “without making them sleepy. We give it to convalescents. It’s useful, too, in mental cases.”
“Which am I? Mental or convalescent?”
“Both,” she answered without hesitation.
Will laughed aloud. “That’s what comes of fishing for compliments.”
“I didn’t mean to be rude,” she assured him. “All I meant was that I’ve never met anybody from the outside who wasn’t a mental case.”
“Including the Ambassador?”
She turned the question back upon the questioner. “What do you think?”
Will passed it on to Mr. Bahu. “You’re the expert in this field,” he said.
“Settle it between yourselves,” said the little nurse. “I’ve got to go and see about my patient’s lunch.”
Mr. Bahu watched her go; then, raising his left eyebrow, he let fall his monocle and started methodically to polish the lens with his handkerchief. “You’re aberrated in one way,” he said to Will. “I’m aberrated in another. A schizoid (isn’t that what you are?) and, from the other side of the world, a paranoid. Both of us victims of the same twentieth-century plague. Not the Black Death, this time; the Gray Life. Were you ever interested in power?” he asked after a moment of silence.
“Never.” Will shook his head emphatically. “One can’t have power without committing oneself.”
“And for you the horror of being committed outweighs the pleasure of pushing other people around?”
“By a factor of several thousand times.”
“So it was never a temptation?”
“Never.” Then after a pause, “Let’s get down to business,” Will added in another tone.
“To business,” Mr. Bahu repeated. “Tell me something about Lord Aldehyde.”
“Well, as the Rani said, he’s remarkably generous.”
“I’m not interested in his virtues, only his intelligence. How bright is he?”
“Bright enough to know that nobody does anything for nothing.”
“Good,” said Mr. Bahu. “Then tell him from me that for effective work by experts in strategic positions he must be prepared to lay out at least ten times what he’s going to pay you.”
“I’ll write him a letter to that effect.”
“And do it today,” Mr. Bahu advised. “The plane leaves Shivapuram tomorrow evening, and there won’t be another outgoing mail for a whole week.”
“Thank you for telling me,” said Will. “And now—Her Highness and the shockable stripling being gone—let’s move on to the next temptation. What about sex?”
With the gesture of a man who tries to rid himself of a cloud of importunate insects, Mr. Bahu waved a brown and bony hand back and forth in front of his face. “Just a distraction, that’s all. Just a nagging, humiliating vexation. But an intelligent man can always cope with it.”
“How difficult it is,” said Will,