“Out again so soon?” he said.
Estha was already retching. Ammu moonwalked him to the Princess Circle bathroom. HERS.
He was held up, wedged between the notclean basin and Ammu’s body. Legs dangling. The basin had steel taps, and rust stains. And a brownwebbed mesh of hairline cracks, like the road map of some great, intricate city.
Estha convulsed, but nothing came. Just thoughts. And they floated out and floated back in. Ammu couldn’t see them. They hovered like storm clouds over the Basin City But the basin men and basin women went about their usual basin business. Basin cars, and basin buses still whizzed around. Basin Life went on.
“No?” Ammu said. “No,” Estha said. No? No. “Then wash your face,” Ammu said. “Water always helps. Wash your face and let’s go and have a fizzy lemondrink.”
Estha washed his face and hands and face and hands. His eyelashes were wet and bunched together. —
The Orangedrink Lemondrink Man folded the green sweet wrapper and fixed the fold with his painted thumbnail. He stunned a fly with a rolled magazine. Delicately, he flicked it over the edge of the counter onto the floor. It lay on its back and waved its feeble legs. —
“Sweet boy this,” he said to Ammu. “Sings nicely.”
“He’s my son,” Ammu said. —
“Really?” the Orangedrink Lemondrink Man said, and looked at Ammu with his teeth. “Really? You don’t look old enough—”
“He’s not feeling well,” Ammu said. “I thought a cold drink would make him feel better.”
“Of course,” the Man said. `Of course of course. Orangelemon? Lemonorange?” Dreadful, dreaded question.
“No. Thank you.” Estha looked at Ammu. Greenwavy, seaweedy, bottomless-bottomful.
“What about you?” The Orangedrink Lemondrink Man asked Ammu. “Coca-ColaFanta? Icecream Rosemilk?”
“No. Not for me. Thank you,” Ammu said. Deep dimpled, luminous woman.
“Here,” the Man said, with a fistful of sweets, like a generous Air Hostess. “These are for your little Mon.”
“No thank you,” Estha said, looking at Ammu.
“Take them, Estha,” Ammu said. “Don’t be rude.’
Estha took them.
“Say thank you,” Ammu said.
“Thank you,” Estha said. (For the sweets, for the white egg white.) “No mention,” the Orangedrink Lemondrink Man said in English.
“So!” he said. “Mon says you’re from Ayemenem?”
“Yes,” Ammu said.
“I come there often,” the Orangedrink Lemondrink man said. “My wife’s people are Ayemenem people. I know where your factory is. Paradise Pickles, isn’t it? He told me. Your Mon.”
He knew where to find Estha. That was what he was trying to say. It was a warning.
Ammu saw her son’s bright feverbutton eyes.
“We must go,” she said. “Mustn’t risk a fever. Their cousin is coming tomorrow.” She explained to Uncle. And then, added casually, “From London.”
“From London?” A new respect gleamed in Uncle’s eyes. For a family with London connections.
“Estha, you stay here with Uncle. I’ll get Baby Kochamma and Rahel,” Ammu said.
“Come,” Uncle said. “Come and sit with me on a high stool.”
“No, Ammu! No, Ammu, no! I want to come with you!” Ammu, surprised at the unusually shrill insistence from her usually quiet son, apologized to the Orangedrink Lemondrink Uncle.
“He’s not usually like this. Come on then, Esthappen.”
The back-inside smell. Fan shadows. Backs of heads. Necks. Collars. Hair. Buns. Plaits. Ponytails.
A fountain in a Love-in-Tokyo. A little girl and an ex-nun. Baron von Trapp’s seven peppermint children had had their peppermint baths, and were standing in a peppermint line with their hair slicked down, singing in obedient peppermint voices to the woman the Baron nearly married. The blonde Baroness who shone like a diamond. —
“We have to go,” Ammu said to Baby Kochamma and Rahel. “But Ammu!” Rahel said. “The Main Things haven’t even happened yet. He hasn’t even
“Estha’s sick,” Ammu said. `Come on!”
“The Nazi soldiers haven’t even come!”-
“Come on,” Ammu said. “Get up!”
“They haven’t even done
“Estha has to be well for Sophie Mol, doesn’t he?” Baby Kochamma said.
“He doesn’t,” Rahel said, but mostly to herself.
“What did you say?” Baby Kochamma said, getting the general drift, but not what was actually said.
“Nothing,” Rahel said. —
“I heard you,” Baby Kochamma said.
Outside, Uncle was reorganizing his dim bottles. Wiping with his dirtcolored rag the ring-shaped water stains they had left on his marble Refreshments Counter. Preparing for the Interval. He was a Clean Orangedrink Lemondrink Uncle. He had an air hostess’s heart trapped in a bear’s body.
“Going then?” he said.
“Yes,” Ammu said. `Where can we get a taxi?”
“Out the gate, up the road, on your left,” he said, looking at Rahel. “You never told me you had a little Mol too.” And holding out another sweet “Here, Mol—for you.”
“Take mine!” Estha said quickly, not wanting Rahel to go near the man. —
But Rahel had already started towards him. As she approached him, he smiled at her and something about that portable piano smile, something about the steady gaze in which he held her, made her shrink from him. It was the most hideous thing she had ever seen. She spun around to look at Estha.
She backed away from the hairy man.
Estha pressed his Parry’s sweets into her hand and she felt his fever-hot fingers whose tips were as cold as death.
“Bye, Mol” Uncle said to Estha. “I’ll see you in Ayemenem sometime.”
So, the redsteps once again. This time Rahel lagging. Slow. No I don’t want to go. A ton of bricks on a leash.
“Sweet chap, that Orangedrink Lemondrink fellow,” Ammu said. — “
“He doesn’t look it, but he was surprisingly sweet with Estha,” Ammu said.
“So why don’t you marry him then?” Rahel said petulantly.
Time stopped on the red staircase. Estha stopped. Baby Kochamma stopped.
“Rahel,” Ammu said.
Rahel froze. She was desperately sorry for what she had said. She didn’t know where those words had come from. She didn’t know that she’d had them in her. But they were out now, and wouldn’t go back in. They hung about that red staircase like clerks in a government office. Some stood, some sat and shivered their legs.
