Vikram Seth - A Suitable Boy

But Rasheed was continuing with great bitterness. ‘Look all around you,’ he said. ‘Or look at history. It’s always been the same. The old men cling to their power and their beliefs, which admit all their worst vices but exclude the least fault and strangle the smallest innovation of the young. Then, thank God, they die, and can do no more harm. But by then we, the young, are old, and strive to do what little mischief they left undone. This village is the worst,’ continued Rasheed, pointing behind the school to the low buildings of Debaria’s twin village of Sagal. ‘Worse even than ours, and also, of course, more pious. I’ll show you one good man in this village — I was on my way to see him when I saw you tempting fate by swimming alone. You’ll see the state to which he has been driven by the others — and, I suppose, by the just or unjust anger of God.’

Maan was astonished to hear Rasheed talk in this vein. Rasheed’s education before Brahmpur University had been a traditionally religious one, and Maan knew how firmly he believed in God and his Prophet and the Book, the transmitted word of God — even to the extent of refusing to abridge Tasneem’s lesson from the Quran when summoned by Saeeda Bai. But Rasheed was not contented with the world that God had made, nor did he understand why it had been arranged in the pathetic way it had. As for the old man, Maan recalled that Rasheed had referred to him briefly during their long walk around the village, but he did not feel particularly eager to be shown assorted samples of village misery.

‘Were you always so serious about the state of things?’ asked Maan.

‘Far from it,’ said Rasheed, with a rather twisted smile at the corner of his mouth. ‘Far from it. When I was younger, well, I was concerned only with myself and my fists. I’ve told you about this before, haven’t I? I would look around and notice certain things. My grandfather was treated by everyone around him with great respect. People would come from far away to ask him to solve disputes. Sometimes he’d do this with great severity, beating the offenders. This I considered proof of the fact that beating people was a cause of his being honoured. I beat people up too.’

Rasheed paused to look up the slope towards the madrasa, then continued:

‘At school I was always hitting the kids. I’d find one by himself, and I’d beat him up. Sometimes I’d come across a boy in the fields or along the road and I’d slap him hard across the face.’

Maan laughed. ‘Yes, I remember you telling me that,’ he said.

‘It’s no laughing matter really,’ said Rasheed. ‘And certainly my parents didn’t think so. My mother would beat me very rarely, if at all; well, she did once or twice. But my father — he would beat me regularly.

‘Baba, however, who was the real authority in the village, treated me with great love, and his presence would often save me. I was his favourite. He was very regular about his prayers. So I too would always say my prayers even though I did very badly at school. But every so often I would thrash a boy, and his father would report it to Baba. Once Baba told me to sit down and stand up one hundred times while holding my ears as a punishment. Some of my friends were standing around, and I refused to do any such thing. Perhaps I would have got away with it. But my father happened to be passing, and he was so shocked by my insolence towards his father that he hit me across the face very hard. I began crying from shame and pain, and I decided to run away. I ran quite far — till the mango trees beyond the threshing-ground to the north — before they sent someone after me and brought me back.’

Maan was as rapt as if he had been listening to a story by the guppi.

‘Was that before the time you ran away to stay with the Bear?’ he prompted.

‘Yes,’ said Rasheed, a bit vexed that Maan appeared to know his story so well.

‘Anyway, later,’ he continued, ‘I began to understand things. I think it happened at the religious training college I went to. It’s in Banaras, I’m sure you must have heard of it, it’s quite famous, and it has a high academic reputation — though it is a terrible place. Anyway, at first they wouldn’t let me in because of my poor school marks from here; but within a year I had come third in my class of sixty boys. I even left off beating people up! And, because of the conditions we had to live in, I became interested in practical politics, and started organizing the boys to protest against the worst abuses at the college! That’s probably where I got a taste for reform, though I wasn’t a socialist yet. My former associates at school were amazed at me — and probably appalled by the righteous turn I had taken. One of them has become a dacoit. And now when I talk about village improvement and so on, they all think I’m mad. God knows these villages need improvement — and can be improved. But I doubt that God will find time to do it no matter how often people do their namaaz. As for legislation—’ Rasheed got up. ‘Come. It’s getting late, and I have to go for this visit. If I’m not back in Debaria by sunset I’ll have to do my namaaz with the elders of this village — hypocrites to a man.’ Rasheed clearly viewed Sagal as a sink of iniquity.

‘All right,’ said Maan, beginning to be curious. ‘I suppose it’s all right for me to tag along.’

When they were not far from the old man’s place, Rasheed told Maan a little about his background:

‘He is about sixty years old and comes from a very wealthy family of many brothers. He himself had many children, but they are all dead now except for the two daughters who take care of him alternately. He’s a good man who never did anything wrong in his life — and while his crooked brothers are flourishing with wealth and children, he is in a pitiable condition.’ Rasheed paused, then speculated: ‘Some say a jinn did this to him. Though they are evil themselves, they often seek the company of good people. Anyway—’ Rasheed stopped suddenly. A tall, venerable-looking man passed by him in the narrow lane, and they exchanged greetings, sullen on Rasheed’s side.

‘That is one of his brothers,’ he said to Maan a few moments later, ‘one of the brothers who has robbed him of his share of the family’s wealth. He is one of the leaders of the community, and when the Imam of the mosque is absent he often leads the congregation in prayer. Even greeting him makes me uncomfortable.’

They now entered a courtyard and came across a strange scene.

Two thin bullocks were tethered to a peg near a feeding trough. A small goat was lying on a charpoy next to a sleeping child, a boy around whose beautiful face a few flies were buzzing. Grass was growing on the wall of the small courtyard; a broom made of twigs was leaning against it in a corner. A pretty eight-year-old girl dressed in red was looking at them. She was holding up the slack wing of a dead crow that stared at them with one opaque grey eye. A bucket, a broken clay drinking pot, a stone board and roller for crushing spices, a few other odds and ends — all these lay scattered around the courtyard as if no one knew what they were for and no one cared.

On the porch of the ramshackle two-room thatched house was a sagging charpoy, and on this lay an old man. Gaunt-featured, with peppery stubble and sunken eyes, he was lying on his side on a dirty, checked-green covering. His body was entirely emaciated and rib-ridden; his hands were like twisted claws, and his spindly legs too were twisted inwards. He looked as if he was ninety years old and near death. But his voice was clear and, when he saw them approach, he said, since he could see their forms only vaguely:

‘Who? Who is that?’

‘Rasheed,’ said Rasheed loudly, knowing that the man was hard of hearing.