'Yes, Santosh. Yem-bletns' And he sighed and slapped the red seat hard.
A man came out from the kitchen with a tray. At first he looked like a fellow countryman, but in a second I could tell he was a stranger.
'You are right,' Priya said, when the stranger went back to the kitchen. 'He is not of Bharat. He is a Mexican. But what can I do? You get fellow countrymen, you fix up their papers and everything. And then? Then they run away. Run-run-runaway. Crooks this side, crooks that side, I can't tell you. Listen, Santosh. I was in cloth business before. Buy for fifty rupees that side, sell for fifty dollars this side. Easy. But then. Caftan, everybody wants caftan. Caftanaftan, I say, I will settle your caftan. I buy one thousand, Santosh. Delays India-side,9 of course. They come one year later. Nobody wants caftan then. We're not organized, Santosh. We don't do enough consumer research. That's what the fellows at the embassy tell me. But if I do consumer research, when will I do my business? The trouble, you know, Santosh, is that this shopkeeping is not in my blood. The damn thing goes against my blood. When I was in cloth business I used to hide sometimes for shame when a customer came in. Sometimes I used to pretend I was a shopper myself. Consumer research! These people make us dance, Santosh. You and I, we will renounce. We will go together and walk beside Potomac and meditate.'
I loved his talk. I hadn't heard anything so sweet and philosophical since
the Bombay days. I said, 'Priya, I will cook for you, if you want a cook.'
'I feel I've known you a long time, Santosh. I feel you are like a member of my own family. I will give you a place to sleep, a little food to eat and a little pocket money, as much as I can afford.'
I said, 'Show me the place to sleep.'
He led me out of the pretty room and up a carpeted staircase. I was expecting
8. Emblems. 9. In India. 'Caftan': long loose tunic or shirt (Turkish).
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the carpet and the new paint to stop somewhere, but it was nice and new all the way. We entered a room that was like a smaller version of my employer's apartment.
'Built-in cupboards and everything, you see, Santosh.'
I went to the cupboard. It had a folding door that opened outward. I said, 'Priya, it is too small. There is room on the shelf for my belongings. But I don't see how I can spread my bedding inside here. It is far too narrow.'
He giggled nervously. 'Santosh, you are a joker. I feel that we are of the same family already.'
Then it came to me that I was being offered the whole room. I was stunned.
Priya looked stunned too. He sat down on the edge of the soft bed. The dark hollows under his eyes were almost black and he looked very small in his double-breasted jacket. 'This is how they make us dance over here, Santosh. You say staff quarters and they say staff quarters. This is what they mean.'
For some seconds we sat silently, I fearful, he gloomy, meditating on the ways of this new world.
Someone called from downstairs, 'Priya!'
His gloom gone, smiling in advance, winking at me, Priya called back in an accent of the country, 'Hi, Bab!' I followed him down. 'Priya,' the American said, 'I've brought over the menus.' He was a tall man in a leather jacket, with jeans that rode up above thick
white socks and big rubber-soled shoes. He looked like someone about to run in a race. The menus were enormous; on the cover there was a drawing of a fat man with a moustache and a plumed turban, something like the man in the airline advertisements.
'They look great, Bab.'
'I like them myself. But what's that, Priya? What's that shelf doing there?'
Moving like the front part of a horse, Bab walked to the shelf with the rice and the brass plate and the little clay lamp. It was only then that I saw that the shelf was very roughly made. Priya looked penitent and it was clear he had put the shelf up himself. It was also clear he didn't intend to take it down. 'Well, it's yours,' Bab said. 'I suppose we had to have a touch of the East somewhere. Now, Priya?'
'Money-money-money, is it?' Priya said, racing the words together as though he was making a joke to amuse a child. 'But, Bab, how can you ask me for money? Anybody hearing you would believe that this restaurant is mine. But this restaurant isn't mine, Bab. This restaurant is yours.'
It was only one of our courtesies, but it puzzled Bab and he allowed himself to be led to other matters.
I saw that, for all his talk of renunciation and business failure, and for all his jumpiness, Priya was able to cope with Washington. I admired this strength in him as much as I admired the richness of his talk. I didn't know how much to believe of his stories, but I liked having to guess about him. I liked having to play with his words in my mind. I liked the mystery of the man. The mystery came from his solidity. I knew where I was with him. After the apartment and the green suit and the hubshi woman and the city burning for four days, to be with Priya was to feel safe. For the first time since I had come to Washington I felt safe.
I can't say that I moved in. I simply stayed. I didn't want to go back to the apartment even to collect my belongings. I was afraid that something might
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happen to keep me a prisoner there. My employer might turn up and demand his five thousand rupees. The hubshi woman might claim me for her own; I might be condemned to a life among the hubshi. And it wasn't as if I was leaving behind anything of value in the apartment. The green suit I was even happy to forget. But.
Priya paid me forty dollars a week. After what I was getting, three dollars and seventy-five cents, it seemed a lot; and it was more than enough for my needs. I didn't have much temptation to spend, to tell the truth. I knew that my old employer and the hubshi woman would be wondering about me in their respective ways and I thought I should keep off the streets for a while. That was no hardship; it was what I was used to in Washington. Besides,
