Aravind Adiga - The White Tiger

However, displaying their usual genius for town planning, the rich of Delhi had built this part of Gurgaon with no parks, lawns, or playgrounds-it was just buildings, shopping malls, hotels, and more buildings. There was a pavement outside, but that was for the poor to live on. So if you wanted to do some "walking," it had to be done around the concrete compound of your own building.

Now, while they walked around the apartment block, the fatsos made their thin servants-most of them drivers-stand at various spots on that circle with bottles of mineral water and fresh towels in their hands. Each time they completed a circuit around the building, they stopped next to their man, grabbed the bottle-gulp-grabbed the towel-wipe, wipe-then it was off on round two.

Vitiligo-Lips was standing in one corner of the compound, with his bottle and his master's sweaty towel. Every few minutes, he turned to me with a twinkle in his eyes-his boss, the steel man, who was bald until two weeks ago, now sported a head of thick black hair-an expensive toupee job he had gone all the way to England for. This toupee was the main subject of discussion in the monkey-circle these days-the other drivers had offered Vitiligo-Lips ten rupees to resort to the old tricks of braking unexpectedly, or taking the car full speed over a pothole, to knock over his master's toupee at least once.

The secrets of their masters were spilled and dissected every evening by the monkey-circle-though if any of them made the divorce a topic of discussion, he knew he would have to deal with me. On Mr. Ashok's privacy I allowed no one to infringe.

I was standing just a few feet from Vitiligo-Lips, with my master's bottle of mineral water in my hand and his sweat-stained towel on my shoulder.

Mr. Ashok was about to complete his circle-I could smell his sweat coming toward me. This was round number three for him. He took the bottle, drained it, wiped his face with his towel, and draped it back on my shoulder.

"I'm done, Balram. Bring the towel and bottle up, okay?"

"Yes, sir," I said, and watched him go into the apartment block. He took a walk once or twice a week, but it clearly wasn't enough to counter his nights of debauchery-I saw a big, wet paunch pressing against his white T-shirt. How repulsive he was, these days.

I signaled to Vitiligo-Lips before going down to the parking lot.

Ten minutes later, I smelled the steel man's sweat and heard footsteps. Vitiligo-Lips had come down. I called him over to the Honda City-it was the only place in the world I felt fully safe anymore.

"What is it, Country-Mouse? Want another magazine?"

"Not that. Something else."

I got down on my haunches; I squatted by one of the tires of the City. I scraped the grooves of the tire with a fingernail. He squatted too.

I showed him the strand of golden hair-I kept it tied around my wrist, like a locket. He brought my wrist to his nose-he rubbed the strand between his fingers, sniffed it, and let my wrist down.

"No problem." He winked. "I told you your master would get lonely."

"Don't talk about him!" I seized his neck. He shook me off.

"Are you crazy? You tried to choke me!"

I scraped the grooves of the tire again. "How much will it cost?"

"High-class or low-class? Virgin or nonvirgin? All depends."

"I don't care. She just has to have golden hair-like in the shampoo advertisements."

"Cheapest is ten, twelve thousand."

"That's too much. He won't pay more than four thousand seven hundred."

"Six thousand five hundred, Country-Mouse. That's the minimum. White skin has to be respected."

"All right."

"When does he want it, Country-Mouse?"

"I'll tell you. It'll be soon. And another thing-I want to know another thing."

I put my face on the tire and breathed in the smell of the leather. For strength.

"How many ways are there for a driver to cheat his master?"

Mr. Jiabao, I am aware that it is a common feature of those cellophane-wrapped business books to feature small "sidebars." At this stage of the story, to relieve you of tedium, I would like to insert my own "sidebar" into the narrative of the modern entrepreneur's growth and development.

HOW DOES THE ENTERPRISING DRIVER

EARN A LITTLE EXTRA CASH?

1. When his master is not around, he can siphon petrol from the car, with a funnel. Then sell the petrol.

2. When his master orders him to make a repair to the car, he can go to a corrupt mechanic; the mechanic will inflate the price of the repair, and the driver will receive a cut. This is a list of a few entrepreneurial mechanics who help entrepreneurial drivers:

Lucky Mechanics, in Lado Serai, near the Qutub

R.V. Repairs, in Greater Kailash Part Two

Nilofar Mechanics, in DLF Phase One, in Gurgaon.

3. He should study his master's habits, and then ask himself: "Is my master careless? If so, what are the ways in which I can benefit from his carelessness?" For instance, if his master leaves empty English liquor bottles lying around in the car, he can sell the whiskey bottles to the bootleggers. Johnnie Walker Black brings the best resale value.

4. As he gains in experience and confidence and is ready to try something riskier, he can turn his master's car into a freelance taxi. The stretch of the road from Gurgaon to Delhi is excellent for this; lots of Romeos come to see their girlfriends who work in the call centers. Once the entrepreneurial driver is sure that his master is not going to notice the absence of the car-and that none of his master's friends are likely to be on the road at this time-he can spend his free time cruising around, picking up and dropping off paying customers.

At night I lay in my mosquito net, the lightbulb on in my room, and watched the dark roaches crawling on top of the net, their antennae quivering and trembling, like bits of my own nerves: and I lay in bed, too agitated even to reach out and crush them. A cockroach flew down and landed right above my head.

You should have asked them for money when they made you sign that thing. Enough money to sleep with twenty white-skinned girls . It flew away. Another landed on the same spot.

Twenty?

A hundred. Two hundred. Three hundred, a thousand, ten thousand golden-haired whores. And even that would still not have been enough. That would not start to be enough.

Over the next two weeks, I did things I am still ashamed to admit. I cheated my employer. I siphoned his petrol; I took his car to a corrupt mechanic who billed him for work that was not necessary; and three times, while driving back to Buckingham B, I picked up a paying customer.

The strangest thing was that each time I looked at the cash I had made by cheating him, instead of guilt, what did I feel?

Rage.

The more I stole from him, the more I realized how much he had stolen from me.

To go back to the analogy I used when describing Indian politics to you earlier, I was growing a belly at last.

Then one Sunday afternoon, when Mr. Ashok had said he wouldn't need me again that day, I gulped two big glasses of whiskey for courage, then went to the servants' dormitory. Vitiligo-Lips was sitting beneath the poster of a film actress-each time his master "hammered" an actress, he put her poster up on the wall-playing cards with the other drivers.

"Well, you can say what you want, but I know that these jokers aren't going to win reelection."

He looked up and saw me.

"Well, look who's here. It's the yoga guru, paying us a rare visit. Welcome, honored sir."

They showed me their teeth. I showed them my teeth.

"We were discussing the elections, Country-Mouse. You know, it's not like the Darkness here. The elections aren't rigged. Are you going to vote this time?"