White Teeth

warhorse big mouths all night.’

‘Go on, Sam,’ said Archie with a wink. ‘Give us the one about Mangal Pande. That’s always good for a laugh.’

A clamour of Nooo’s, mimed slitting of throats and self-asphyxiation went round the assembled company.

‘The story of Mangal Pande,’ Samad protested, ‘is no laughing matter. He is the tickle in the sneeze, he is why we are the way we are, the founder of modern India, the big historical cheese.’

Alsana snorted. ‘Big fat nonsense. Every fool knows Gandhi-gee is the big cheese. Or Nehru. Or maybe Akbar, but he was crook-backed, and huge-nosed, I never liked him.’

‘Dammit! Don’t talk nonsense, woman. What do you know about it? Fact is: it is simply a matter of market economy, publicity, movie rights. The question is: are the pretty men with the big white teeth willing to play you, et cetera. Gandhi had Mr Kingsley – bully for him – but who will do Pande, eh? Pande’s not pretty enough, is he? Too Indian-looking, big nose, big eyebrows. That’s why I am always having to tell you ingrates a thing or two about Mangal Pande. Bottom line: if I don’t, nobody will.’

‘Look,’ said Millat, ‘I’ll do the short version. Great-grandfather-’

‘Your great-great-grandfather, stupid,’ corrected Alsana.

‘Whatever. Decides to fuck the English-’

‘Millat!’

‘To rebel against the English, all on his Jack-Jones, spliffed up to the eyeballs, tries to shoot his captain, misses, tries to shoot himself, misses, gets hung-’

‘Hanged,’ said Clara absent-mindedly.

‘Hanged or hung? I’ll get the dictionary,’ said Archie, laying down his hammer and climbing off the kitchen counter.

‘Whatever. End of story. Bor-ing.’

And now a mammoth tree – the kind endemic to North London, the ones that sprout three smaller trees along the trunk before finally erupting into glorious greenery, city-living for whole diaspora of magpie – a tree of this kind tore itself from the dog shit and the concrete, took one tottering step forward, swooned and collapsed; through the guttering, through the double glazing, through the hardboard, knocked over a gas lamp, and then landed in an absence that was Archie-shaped, for he had just left it.

Archie was the first to leap into action, throwing a towel on the small fire progressing along the cork kitchen tiles, while everyone else trembled and wept and checked each other for injury. Then Archie, visibly shaken by this blow to his DIY supremacy, reclaimed control over the elements, tying some of the branches with kitchen rags and ordering Millat and Irie to go around the house, putting out the gas lamps.

‘We don’t want to burn ourselves to death, now do we? I better find some black plastic and gaffer tape. Do something about this.’

Samad was incredulous. ‘Do something about it, Archibald? I fail to see how some gaffer tape will change the fact there is a half a tree in the kitchen.’

‘Man, I’m terrified,’ stuttered Clara, after a few minutes’ silence, as the storm lulled. ‘The quiet is always a bad sign. My grandmother – God rest her – she always said that. The quiet is just God pausing to take a breath before he shouts all over again. I think we should go into the other room.’

‘That was the only tree on this side. Best stay in here. Worst’s done here. Besides,’ said Archie, touching his wife’s arm aff ectionately, ‘you Bowdens have seen worse than this! Your mother was born in a bloody earthquake, for Christ’s sake. 1907, Kingston’s falling apart and Hortense pops into the world. You wouldn’t see a little storm like this worrying her. Tough as nails, that one.’

‘Not toughness,’ said Clara quietly, standing up to look through the broken window at the chaos outside, ‘luck. Luck and faith.’

‘I suggest we pray,’ said Samad, picking up his novelty Quran. ‘I suggest we acknowledge the might of the Creator as he does his worst this evening.’

Samad began flicking through and, finding what he wanted, brought it patrician-like under his wife’s nose, but she slammed it shut and glared at him. Ungodly Alsana, who was yet a nifty hand with the word of God (good schooling, proper parents, oh yes), lacking nothing but the faith, prepared to do what she did only in emergency: recite: ‘I do not serve what you worship, nor do you serve what I worship. I shall never serve what you worship, nor will you ever serve what I worship. You have your own religion, and I have mine. Sura 109, translation N. J. Dawood.’ Now, will someone,’ said Alsana, looking to Clara, ‘please remind my husband that he is not Mr Manilow and he does not have the songs that make the whole world sing. He will whistle his tune and I will whistle mine.’

Samad turned contemptuously from his wife and placed both hands rigidly on his book. ‘Who will pray with me?’

‘Sorry, Sam,’ came a muffled voice (Archie had his head in the cupboard and was searching for the bin bags). ‘Not really my cup of tea, either. Never been a church man. No offence.’

Five more minutes passed without the wind. Then the quiet burst and God shouted just as Ambrosia Bowden had told her granddaughter he would. Thunder went over the house like a dying man’s bile, lightning followed like his final malediction, and Samad closed his eyes.

‘Irie! Millat!’ called Clara, then Alsana. No answer. Standing bolt upright in the cupboard, smashing his head against the spice shelf, Archie said, ‘It’s been ten minutes. Oh blimey. Where are the kids?’

One kid was in Chittagong, being dared by a friend to take off his lungi and march through a renowned crocodile swamp; the other two had sneaked out of the house to feel the eye of the storm, and were walking against the wind as if thigh-high in water. They waded into Willesden recreation ground, where the following conversation took place.

‘This is incredible!’

‘Yeah, mental!’

‘You’re mental.’

‘What do you mean? I’m fine!’

‘No, you’re not. You’re always looking at me. And what were you writing? You’re such a nerd. You’re always writing.’

‘Nothing. Stuff. You know, diary stuff.’

‘You’ve got the blatant hots for me.’

‘I can’t hear you! Louder!’

‘THE HOTS! BLATANTLY! YOU CAN HEAR ME.’

‘I have not! You’re an egomaniac.’

‘You want my arse.’

‘Don’t be a wanker!’

‘Well, it’s no good, anyway. You’re getting a bit big. I don’t like big. You can’t have me.’

‘I wouldn’t want to, Mr Egomaniac.’

‘Plus: imagine what our kids would look like.’

‘I think they’d look nice.’

‘Browny-black. Blacky-brown. Afro, flat nose, rabbit teeth and freckles. They’d be freaks!’

‘You can talk. I’ve seen that picture of your grandad-’

‘GREAT-GREAT-GRANDAD.’

‘Massive nose, horrible eyebrows-’

‘That’s an artist’s impression, you chief.’

‘And they’d be crazy – he was crazy – your whole family’s crazy. It’s genetic.’

‘Yeah, yeah. Whatever.’

‘And for your information, I don’t fancy you, anyway. You’ve got a bent nose. And you’re