A House for Mr. Biswas - V.S. Naipaul [43]
After a brief ceremony at the registrar’s, as make-believe as a child’s game, with paper flowers in dissimilar vases on a straw-coloured, official-looking desk, Mr Biswas and Shama were given part of a long room on the top floor of the wooden house.
And now he became cautious. Now he thought of escape. To leave the way clear for that he thought it important to avoid the final commitment. He didn’t embrace or touch her. He wouldn’t have known, besides, how to begin, with someone who had not spoken a word to him, and whom he still saw with the mocking smile she had given that morning in the store. Not wishing to be tempted, he didn’t look at her, and was relieved when she left the room. He spent the rest of that day imprisoned where he was, listening to the noises of the house.
Neither on that day nor on the following days did anyone speak to him of dowry, house or job; and he realized that there had been no discussions because Mrs Tulsi and Seth didn’t see that there were any problems to discuss. The organization of the Tulsi house was simple. Mrs Tulsi had only one servant, a Negro woman who was called Blackie by Seth and Mrs Tulsi, and Miss Blackie by everyone else. Miss Blackie’s duties were vague. The daughters and their children swept and washed and cooked and served in the store. The husbands, under Seth’s supervision, worked on the Tulsi land, looked after the Tulsi animals, and served in the store. In return they were given food, shelter and a little money; their children were looked after; and they were treated with respect by people outside because they were connected with the Tulsi family. Their names were forgotten; they became Tulsis. There were daughters who had, in the Tulsi marriage lottery, drawn husbands with money and position; these daughters followed the Hindu custom of living with their husband’s families, and formed no part of the Tulsi organization.
Up to this time Mr Biswas thought he had been especially favoured by the Tulsis. But when he came to see how the family disposed of its daughters, he wondered that Seth and Mrs Tulsi had gone to such trouble on two consecutive days to make marriage attractive to him. They had married Shama to him simply because he was of the proper caste, just as they had married the daughter called C to an illiterate coconut-seller.
Mr Biswas had no money or position. He was expected to become a Tulsi.
At once he rebelled.
Pretending not to know what was expected of him, he finished the signs for the Tulsi Store and decided that the time had come to escape, with Shama or without her. It looked as though it would have to be without her. They still had not spoken; and, following his policy of caution, he had not attempted to establish any relations with her in the long room. He was convinced that she was a thorough Tulsi. And he was glad of his caution when she took to crying openly in the hall, surrounded by sisters, brothers-in-law, nephews and nieces, saying that Mr Biswas had been married less than a fortnight but was already doing his best to break her heart and create trouble in the family.
In a tremendous temper Mr Biswas began packing his brushes and clothes.
‘Yes, take up your clothes and go,’ Shama said. ‘You came to this house with nothing but a pair of cheap khaki trousers and a dirty old shirt.’
He left Hanuman House and went back to Pagotes.
He felt unchanged, unmarried. He had simply had a good fright, but had managed things well and escaped.
In Pagotes, however, he found that his marriage was not a secret. Bipti welcomed him with tears of joy. She said she had always known that he wouldn’t let her down. She had