Aravind Adiga - The White Tiger

Except here what happens is that your brain starts to hum.

Forty-seven hundred rupees. In that brown envelope under my bed.

Odd sum of money-wasn't it? There was a mystery to be solved here. Let's see. Maybe she started off giving me five thousand, and then, being cheap, like all rich people are-remember how the Mongoose made me get down on my knees for that one-rupee coin?-deducted three hundred.

That's not how the rich think, you moron. Haven't you learned yet?

She must have taken out ten thousand at first. Then cut it in half, and kept half for herself. Then taken out another hundred rupees, another hundred, and another hundred. That's how cheap they are.

So that means they really owe you ten thousand. But if she thought she owed you ten thousand, then what she truly owed you was, what-ten times more?

"No, a hundred times more."

The small man, putting down the newspaper he was reading, turned me to from inside his mandala of books. "What did you say?" he shouted.

"Nothing."

He shouted again. "Hey, what do you do?"

I grabbed an imaginary wheel and turned it one hundred and eighty degrees.

"Ah, I should have known. Drivers are smart men-they hear a lot of interesting things. Right?"

"Other drivers might. I go deaf inside the car."

"Sure, sure. Tell me, you must know English-some of what they talk must stick to you."

"I told you, I don't listen. How can it stick?"

"What does this word in the newspaper mean? Pri-va-see."

I told him, and he smiled gratefully. "We had just started the English alphabet when I got taken out of school by my family."

So he was another of the half-baked. My caste.

"Hey," he shouted again. "Want to read some of this?" He held up a magazine with an American woman on the cover-the kind that rich boys like to buy. "It's good stuff."

I flicked through the magazine. He was right, it was good stuff.

"How much does this magazine sell for?"

"Sixty rupees. Would you believe that? Sixty rupees for a used magazine. And there's a fellow in Khan Market who sells magazines from England that cost five hundred and eight rupees each! Would you believe that?"

I raised my head to the sky and whistled. "Amazing how much money they have," I said, aloud, yet as if talking to myself. "And yet they treat us like animals."

It was as if I had said something to disturb him, because he lowered and raised his paper a couple of times; then he came to the very edge of the mandala and, partially hiding his face with the paper, whispered something.

I cupped a hand around my ear. "Say that again?"

He looked around and said, a bit louder this time, "It won't last forever, though. The current situation. "

"Why not?" I moved toward the mandala.

"Have you heard about the Naxals?" he whispered over the books. "They've got guns. They've got a whole army. They're getting stronger by the day."

"Really?"

"Just read the papers. The Chinese want a civil war in India, see? Chinese bombs are coming to Burma, and into Bangladesh, and then into Calcutta. They go down south into Andhra Pradesh, and up into the Darkness. When the time is right, all of India will…"

He opened his palms.

We talked like this for a while-but then our friendship ended as all servant-servant friendships must: with our masters bellowing for us. A gang of rich kids wanted to be shown a smutty American magazine-and Mr. Ashok came walking out of a bar, staggering, stinking of liquor; the Nepali girl was with him.

On the way back, the two of them were talking at the top of their voices; and then the petting and kissing began. My God, and he a man who was still lawfully married to another woman! I was so furious that I drove right through four red lights, and almost smashed into an oxcart that was going down the road with a load of kerosene cans, but they never noticed.

"Good night, Balram," Mr. Ashok shouted as he got out, hand in hand with her.

"Good night, Balram!" she shouted.

They ran into the apartment and took turns jabbing the call button for the elevator.

When I got to my room, I searched under the bed. It was still there, the maharaja tunic that he had given me-the turban and dark glasses too.

I drove the car out of the apartment block, dressed like a maharaja, with the dark glasses on. No idea where I was going-I just drove around the malls. Each time I saw a pretty girl I hooted the horn at her and her friends.

I played his music. I ran his A/C at full blast.

I drove back to the building, took the car down into the garage, folded the dark glasses into my pocket, and took off the tunic.

I spat over the seats of the Honda City, and wiped them clean.

The next morning, he didn't come down or call me up to his room. I took the elevator, and stood near the door. I was feeling guilty about what I'd done the previous night. I wondered if I should make a full confession. I reached for the bell a few times, and then sighed and gave up.

After a while, there were soft noises from inside. I put my ear to the wood and listened.

"But I have changed."

"Don't keep apologizing."

"I had more fun last evening than in four years of marriage."

"When you left for New York, I thought I'd never see you again. And now I have. That's the main thing for me."

I turned away from the door and slapped my fist into my forehead. My guilt was growing by the minute. She was his old lover, you fool-not some pickup!

Of course-he would never go for a slut. I had always known that he was a good man: a cut above me.

I pinched my left palm as punishment.

And put my ear to the door again.

The phone began to ring from inside. Silence for a while, and then he said, "That's Puddles. And that's Cuddles. You remember them, don't you? They always bark for me. Here, take the phone, listen…"

"Bad news?" Her voice, after a few minutes. "You look upset."

"I have to go see a cabinet minister. I hate doing that. They're all so slimy . The business I'm in…it's a bad one. I wish I were doing something else. Something clean. Like outsourcing. Every day I wish it."

"Why don't you do something else, then? It was the same when they told you not to marry me. You couldn't say no then either."

"It's not that simple, Uma. They're my father and brother."

"I wonder if you have changed, Ashok. The first call from Dhanbad, and you're back to your old self."

"Look, let's not fight again. I'll send you back in the car now."

"Oh, no. I'm not going back with your driver. I know his kind, the village kind. They think that any unmarried woman they see is a whore. And he probably thinks I'm a Nepali, because of my eyes. You know what that means for him. I'll go back on my own."

"This fellow is all right. He's part of the family."

"You shouldn't be so trusting, Ashok. Delhi drivers are all rotten. They sell drugs, and prostitutes, and God knows what else."

"Not this one. He's stupid as hell, but he is honest. He'll drive you back."

"No, Ashok. I'll get a taxi. I'll call you in the evening?"

I realized that she was edging toward the door, and I turned and tiptoed away.

There was no word from him until evening, and then he came down for the car. He made me go from one bank to another bank. Sitting in the driver's seat, I watched through the corner of my eye; he was collecting money from the automatic cash machines-four different ones. Then he said, "Balram, go to the city. You know the big house that's on the Ashoka Road, where we went to with Mukesh Sir once?"

"Yes, sir. I remember. They've got two big Alsatian guard dogs, sir."

"Exactly. Your memory's good, Balram."