Vidiadhar Naipaul - A House for Mr. Biswas

Market day was over and the street was littered with broken boxes, torn paper, straw, rotting vegetables, animal droppings and, though it hadn’t rained, a number of puddles. By the light of flambeaux stalls were being stripped and carts loaded by vendors, their wives and tired children.

Mr. Biswas tied the suitcase to the carrier of his bicycle, and he and Savi walked in silence to the end of the High Street.

When the red and ochre police station was out of sight, he put Savi on the crossbar of the cycle, took a short run and, with difficulty and some nervousness, hopped on to the saddle. The cycle wobbled; Savi held on to his left arm and made balance more uncertain. Presently, however, they had left Arwacas and there was nothing but silent sugarcane on either side of the road. It was pitch black. The bicycle had no lights and they couldn’t see for more than a few yards ahead. Savi was trembling.

“Don’t frighten.”

A light flashed in front of them. A gritty male voice said harshly, “Where you think you going?”

It was a Negro policeman. Mr. Biswas pulled at his handbrakes. The bicycle leaned to the left and Savi slipped to the ground.

The policeman examined the bicycle. “No licence, eh? No licence. No lights. And you was towing. You have a nice little case coming up.” He paused, waiting to be bribed. “All right, then. Name and address.” He wrote in his book. “Good. You go be getting a summons.”

So they walked the rest of the way to Green Vale, through the darkness, and then below the dead trees to the barracks.

They spent a miserable week. Mr. Biswas left the barracks early in the morning and returned in the middle of the afternoon. All that time Savi was alone. An old woman, who was spending time with her son, his wife and five children in a barrackroom, took pity on Savi and gave her food at midday. This food Savi never ate; hunger could not overcome her distrust of food cooked by strangers. She took the plate to the room, emptied it on to a sheet of newspaper, washed the plate, took it back to the old woman, thanked her, and waited for Mr. Biswas. When he came she waited for the night; when the night came she waited for the morning.

To amuse her, he read from his novels, expounded Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus, made her learn the quotations hanging on the walls, and made her sit still while he unsuccessfully tried to sketch her. She was dispirited and submissive. She was also afraid. Sometimes, especially during walks under the trees, he suddenly seemed to forget her, and she heard him muttering to himself, holding bitter, repetitive arguments with unseen persons. He was “trapped” in a “hole”. “Trap,” she heard him say over and over. “That’s what you and your family do to me. Trap me in this hole.” She saw his mouth twist with anger; she heard him curse and threaten. When they got back to the barracks he asked her to mix him doses of Macleans’ Brand Stomach Powder.

They were both looking forward to Saturday afternoon, when Seth would come and take her back to Hanuman House. There was a good reason why she couldn’t stay any longer: her school was opening on Monday.

On Saturday Seth came. He was not alone. Shama, Anand and Myna came with him. Savi ran to the road to meet them. Mr. Biswas pretended he didn’t see, and Seth smiled, as at the antics of children. Quarrels between Seth and his wife were unknown, and it was his policy never to interfere in quarrels between sisters and their husbands. But Mr. Biswas knew that despite the smile Seth had come as Shama’s protector.

He immediately took out the green table to the yard, setting it some distance away from the room, and the labourers queued up, screening him from Shama. While he sat beside Seth, calling out tasks and wages and making entries in the ledger, he listened to Savi talking excitedly to Shama and Anand. He heard Shama’s cooing replies. Soon she was so sure of the children’s affection that she was even scolding them. What a difference there was, though, in the voice she used now and the voice she used at Hanuman House!

And even while he noted Shama’s duplicity, he felt that Savi had betrayed him.

The labourers were paid. Seth said he wanted to have a look at the fields; it was not necessary for Mr. Biswas to come with him.

Shama was sitting in the kitchen area. She held Myna in her arms and was playing with her, talking baby-talk. Savi and Anand looked on. When Mr. Biswas passed, Shama glanced at him but did not stop talking to Myna.

Savi and Anand looked up apprehensively.

Mr. Biswas went into the room and sat in the rocking-chair.

Shama said loudly, “Anand, go and ask your father if he would like a cup of tea.”

Anand came, shy and worried, and mumbled the message.

Mr. Biswas did not reply. He studied Anand’s big head and thin arms. The skin at the elbow was baggy, and scarred purple with eczema. Had he too been fed on sulphur and condensed milk?

Anand waited, then went outside.

Mr. Biswas rocked. The floor-planks were wide and rough. One had cambered and cracked; whenever the rockers came down on it, it squeaked and snapped.

Savi, not looking at Mr. Biswas, brought Myna into the room and laid her carefully on the bed.

Shama was fanning the coal-pot.

Savi, her pyromaniacal instincts aroused, hurried out of the room, saying, “Ma, you getting coal all over your clothes. Let me.”

So. They had all forgotten the doll’s house. He drew up his feet on to the chair, leaned his head back, closed his eyes and rocked. The board replied.

“Anand, take this to your father.”

He heard Anand approaching but didn’t open his eyes. He wondered whether he shouldn’t take the tea and fling it over Shama’s fussy embroidered dress and smiling, uncertain face.

He opened his eyes, took the cup from Anand, and sipped.

When Seth came back he smiled at everyone benevolently and sat down on the steps. Shama gave him a large cup of tea and he drank it in three gurgling draughts, snorting and sighing in between. He took off his hat and smoothed his damp hair. Suddenly he began to laugh. “Mohun, I hear you have a case.”

“Case? Oh, case ! Small one. Tiny tiny. Baby case, really.”

“You are a funny sort of paddler. Get your summons yet?”

“Waiting for it.”

“And Savi. You get your summons yet?”

Savi smiled, as though there had been no terror in the dark road and the flash of the policeman’s torch.

“Well, don’t worry.” Seth got up. “These people just want to see whether your dollar-notes look any different from theirs. I settle it up. Wouldn’t do anybody any good for your case to come up.”

And he was gone.

Mr. Biswas closed his eyes, rocked on the noisy board, and the children became anxious again.

He remained in the chair until it was dark and time to eat. Oil lamps were lighted in many barrackrooms. Far down a drunk man was swearing.

Savi and Anand ate sitting on the steps. As he ate at the green table Mr. Biswas became less torpid, and Shama correspondingly gloomier. Towards the end of the meal he even began to clown. He squatted on the chair, with his left hand squashed between calf and thigh, and asked banteringly, “Why you didn’t stay at the monkey house, eh?”

She didn’t reply.

After he had washed his hands and gargled out of the side window, Shama sat down on the steps to eat. He watched her.

“Crying, eh?”

Slowly the tears flowed out of her wide eyes.

“So you vex up then?”

One tear raced down her cheek and hung trembling over her top lip.

“It tickling?”

Her mouth was half full but she stopped chewing.

“Don’t tell me the food so bad.”

She said, as though to herself, “If it wasn’t for the children-”