Read Online Shame by Salman Rushdie - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Salman Rushdie
Tags: Unread
Ads: Link
no wall, no police, no barbed wire or
floodlights, no red-and-white striped barriers, nothing but a row
of concrete bollards at hundred-foot intervals, bollards driven into
the hard and barren ground. There is a small customs house, and a
railhead that has turned brown with rust; on the rails stands a
single forgotten goods van, also browned by oblivion. 'The trains
don't come any more,' Farah says, 'the international situation does
not permit it.'
Escapes from the Mother Country ? 47
A customs officer depends, for a decent income, on traffic.
Goods pass through, he not unreasonably impounds them, their
owners see reason, an accommodation is reached, the customs
man's family gets new clothes. Nobody minds this arrangement;
everyone knows how little public officials are paid. Negotiations
are honourably conducted on both sides.
But very little in the way of dutiable items passes through the
small brick building that is Mr Zoroaster's power centre. Under
cover of night, tribals stroll back and forth between the countries
through bollards and rocks. Who knows what they carry forth and
back? This is Zoroaster's tragedy; and, in spite of her scholarship,
he has trouble financing his daughter's fine education. How he
consoles himself: 'Soon, soon the railway line will open . . .' But
the rust is accumulating on this belief as well; he gazes across bol-
lards to the ancestral land of Zarathustra and tries to gain solace
from its proximity, but there is, these days, a strain in his expres-
sion . . . Farah Zoroaster claps her hands and runs in and out
between the interminable bollards. 'Fun, na?' she yells, 'Teep-
taap!' Omar Khayyam, for the sake of maintaining her affable
mood, agrees that the place is quite tip-top. Zoroaster shrugs
without bitterness and retreats into his office with the jeep-driver,
warning the young people not to stay out too long in the sun.
Perhaps they stayed out too long, and that was what gave Omar
Khayyam the courage to declare his love: 'The sight of you
through my telescope,' etc., but there is no need to repeat
his speech, or Farah's coarse reply. Rejected, Omar Khayyam
unleashes piteous questions: 'Why? Why not? Because I'm fat?'
And Farah replies, 'Fat would be all right; but there is something
ugly about you, you know that?' - 'Ugly?' - 'Don't ask me what,
I dunno. Something. Must be in your personality or somewhere.'
Silence between them until late afternoon. Omar meandering
in Farah's wake between bollards. He notices that broken pieces
of mirrors have been tied to many of the posts with pieces of
string; as Farah approaches each fragment she sees shards of herself
reflected in the glass, and smiles her private smile. Omar Khayyam
Shakil understands that his beloved is a being too self-contained to
Shame ? 48
succumb to any conventional assault; she and her mirrors are twins
and need no outsiders to make them feel complete . . . and then,
in the late afternoon, inspired by too-much-sun or fainting fit, he
has his idea. 'Have you ever,' he asks Farah Zoroaster, 'been hyp-
notized?' - And for the first time in history, she looks at him with
interest.
Afterwards, when her womb began to swell; when an outraged
headmaster called her into his office and expelled her for calling
down shame upon the school; when she was thrown out by
her father, who had suddenly found that his empty customs
house was too full to accommodate a daughter whose belly
revealed her adherence to other, unacceptable customs; when
Eduardo Rodrigues had taken her, pulling and fighting against his
inexorable, gripping hand, to the Cantt padre and married her by
force; Eduardo, having thus declared himself the guilty party for
all to see, was dismissed from his job for conduct unbecoming;
when Farah and Eduardo had left for the railway station in a tonga
notable for the almost total absence of luggage (although a bird-
cage, still empty, was present, and malicious tongues
floodlights, no red-and-white striped barriers, nothing but a row
of concrete bollards at hundred-foot intervals, bollards driven into
the hard and barren ground. There is a small customs house, and a
railhead that has turned brown with rust; on the rails stands a
single forgotten goods van, also browned by oblivion. 'The trains
don't come any more,' Farah says, 'the international situation does
not permit it.'
Escapes from the Mother Country ? 47
A customs officer depends, for a decent income, on traffic.
Goods pass through, he not unreasonably impounds them, their
owners see reason, an accommodation is reached, the customs
man's family gets new clothes. Nobody minds this arrangement;
everyone knows how little public officials are paid. Negotiations
are honourably conducted on both sides.
But very little in the way of dutiable items passes through the
small brick building that is Mr Zoroaster's power centre. Under
cover of night, tribals stroll back and forth between the countries
through bollards and rocks. Who knows what they carry forth and
back? This is Zoroaster's tragedy; and, in spite of her scholarship,
he has trouble financing his daughter's fine education. How he
consoles himself: 'Soon, soon the railway line will open . . .' But
the rust is accumulating on this belief as well; he gazes across bol-
lards to the ancestral land of Zarathustra and tries to gain solace
from its proximity, but there is, these days, a strain in his expres-
sion . . . Farah Zoroaster claps her hands and runs in and out
between the interminable bollards. 'Fun, na?' she yells, 'Teep-
taap!' Omar Khayyam, for the sake of maintaining her affable
mood, agrees that the place is quite tip-top. Zoroaster shrugs
without bitterness and retreats into his office with the jeep-driver,
warning the young people not to stay out too long in the sun.
Perhaps they stayed out too long, and that was what gave Omar
Khayyam the courage to declare his love: 'The sight of you
through my telescope,' etc., but there is no need to repeat
his speech, or Farah's coarse reply. Rejected, Omar Khayyam
unleashes piteous questions: 'Why? Why not? Because I'm fat?'
And Farah replies, 'Fat would be all right; but there is something
ugly about you, you know that?' - 'Ugly?' - 'Don't ask me what,
I dunno. Something. Must be in your personality or somewhere.'
Silence between them until late afternoon. Omar meandering
in Farah's wake between bollards. He notices that broken pieces
of mirrors have been tied to many of the posts with pieces of
string; as Farah approaches each fragment she sees shards of herself
reflected in the glass, and smiles her private smile. Omar Khayyam
Shakil understands that his beloved is a being too self-contained to
Shame ? 48
succumb to any conventional assault; she and her mirrors are twins
and need no outsiders to make them feel complete . . . and then,
in the late afternoon, inspired by too-much-sun or fainting fit, he
has his idea. 'Have you ever,' he asks Farah Zoroaster, 'been hyp-
notized?' - And for the first time in history, she looks at him with
interest.
Afterwards, when her womb began to swell; when an outraged
headmaster called her into his office and expelled her for calling
down shame upon the school; when she was thrown out by
her father, who had suddenly found that his empty customs
house was too full to accommodate a daughter whose belly
revealed her adherence to other, unacceptable customs; when
Eduardo Rodrigues had taken her, pulling and fighting against his
inexorable, gripping hand, to the Cantt padre and married her by
force; Eduardo, having thus declared himself the guilty party for
all to see, was dismissed from his job for conduct unbecoming;
when Farah and Eduardo had left for the railway station in a tonga
notable for the almost total absence of luggage (although a bird-
cage, still empty, was present, and malicious tongues
Similar Books
