The porter’s son sat in the shop all day. I spent a little time each night to check the cash and stock. There was no definite arrangement about what he should be paid for his trouble. I gave him a little money now and then. Only my mother protested. “Why do you want him to work for you, Raju? Either give him a definite commission or do it yourself instead of all this wandering in the country. What good does it do you, anyway?”
“You don’t know, Mother,” I said, eating my late dinner. “This is a far better job I am doing than the other one. I am seeing a lot of places and getting paid for it; I go with them in their car or bus, talk to them, I am treated to their food sometimes, and I get paid for it. Do you know how well known I am? People come asking for me from Bombay, Madras, and other places, hundreds of miles away. They call me Railway Raju and have told me that even in Lucknow there are persons who are familiar with my name. It is something to become so famous, isn’t it, instead of handing out matches and tobacco?”
“Well, wasn’t it good enough for your father?”
“I don’t say anything against it. I will look after the shop also.” This pleased the old lady. Occasionally she threw in a word about her brother’s daughter in the village before blowing out the lamp. She was always hoping that someday I would consent to marry the girl, though she never directly said so. “Do you know Lalitha has got a prize in her school? I had a letter from my brother today about it.”
I had classified all my patrons. They were very varied, I can tell you. Some were passionate photographers; these men could never look at any object except through their view-finders. The moment they got down from the train, even before lifting their baggage, they asked, “Is there a place where they develop films?”
“Of course, Malgudi Photo Bureau. One of the biggest . . .”
“And if I want roll-films—I have, of course, enough stock with me, but if I run out . . . Do you think super-panchro three-color something-or-other is available there?”
“Of course. That’s his special line.”
“Will he develop and show me a print while I wait?”
“Of course, before you count twenty—he is a wizard.”
“That is nice. Now, where are you going to take me first?”
These were routine questions from a routine type. I had all the satisfactory answers ready. I generally took time to answer the latter question as to where I was going to take him first. It depended. I awaited the receipt of certain data before venturing to answer. The data were how much time and money he was going to spend. Malgudi and its surroundings were my special show. I could let a man have a peep at it or a whole panorama. It was adjustable. I could give them a glimpse of a few hours or soak them in mountain and river scenery or archaeology for a whole week. I could not really decide how much to give or withhold until I knew how much cash the man carried or, if he carried a checkbook, how good it was. This was another delicate point. Sometimes a traveler offered to write a check for this man or that, and, of course, our Gaffur or the photo store or the keeper of the forest bungalow on top of the Mempi Hills would not trust a stranger enough to accept his check. I had to put off such an offer with the utmost delicacy by saying, “Oh, the banking system in our town is probably the worst you can think of. Sometimes they take twenty days to realize a check, but these poor fellows, how can they wait?”—rather a startling thing to say, but I didn’t care if the banking reputation of our town suffered.
As soon as a tourist arrived, I observed how he dealt with his baggage, whether he engaged a porter at all or preferred to hook a finger to each piece. I had to note all this within a split second, and then, outside, whether he walked to the hotel or called a taxi or haggled with the one-horse jutka. Of course, I undertook all this on his behalf, but always with detachment. I did all this for him simply for the reason that he asked for Railway Raju the moment he stepped down on the platform and I knew he came with good references, whether he came from north or south or far or near. And at the hotel it was my business to provide him with the best room or the worst room, just as he might prefer. Those who took the cheapest dormitory said, “After all, it’s only for sleeping, I am going to be out the whole day. Why waste money on a room which is anyway going to be locked up all day? Don’t you agree?”
“Surely, yes, yes.” I nodded, still without giving an answer to “Where are you going to take me first?” I might still be said to be keeping the man under probation, under careful scrutiny. I never made any suggestion yet. No use expecting a man to be clear-headed who is fresh from a train journey. He must wash, change his clothes, refresh himself with idli and coffee, and only then can we expect anyone in South India to think clearly on all matters of this world and the next. If he offered me any refreshment, I understood that he was a comparatively liberal sort, but did not accept it until we were a little further gone in friendship. In due course, I asked him point-blank, “How much time do you hope to spend in this town?”
“Three days at the most. Could we manage everything within the time?”
“Certainly, although it all depends upon what you most wish to see.” And then I put him in the confessional, so to speak. I tried to draw out his interests. Malgudi, I said, had many things to offer, historically, scenically, from the point of view of modern developments, and so on and so forth; or if one came as a pilgrim I could take him to a dozen temples all over the district within a radius of fifty miles; I could find holy waters for him to bathe in all along the course of the Sarayu, starting, of course, with its source on Mempi Peaks.
One thing I learned in my career as a tourist guide was that no two persons were interested in the same thing. Tastes, as in food, differ also in sightseeing. Some people want to be seeing a waterfall, some want a ruin (oh, they grow ecstatic when they see cracked plaster, broken idols, and crumbling bricks), some want a god to worship, some look for a hydroelectric plant, and some want just a nice place, such as the bungalow on top of Mempi with all-glass sides, from where you could see a hundred miles and observe wild game prowling around. Of those again there were two types, one the poet who was content to watch and return, and the other who wanted to admire nature and also get drunk there. I don’t know why it is so: a fine poetic spot like the Mempi Peak House excites in certain natures unexpected reactions. I know some who brought women there; a quiet, wooded spot looking over a valley one would think fit for contemplation or poetry, but it only acted as an aphrodisiac. Well, it was not my business to comment. My business stopped with taking them there, and to see that Gaffur went back to pick them up at the right time.
I was sort of scared of the man who acted as my examiner, who had a complete list of all the sights and insisted on his money’s worth. “What is the population of this town?” “What is the area?” “Don’t bluff. I know when exactly that was built—it is not second-century but the twelfth.” Or he told me the correct pronunciation of words. “R-o-u-t is not . . .” I was meek, self-effacing in his presence and accepted his corrections with gratitude, and he always ended up by asking, “What is the use of your calling yourself a guide if you do not know . . . ?” et cetera, et cetera.
You may well ask what I made out of all this? Well, there is no fixed answer to it. It depended upon the circumstances and the types of people I was escorting. I generally specified ten rupees as the minimum for the pleasure of my company, and a little more if I had to escort them far; over all this Gaffur, the photo stores, the hotel manager, and whomever I introduced a customer to expressed their appreciation, according to a certain schedule. I learned while I taught and earned while I learned, and the whole thing was most enjoyable.
There were special occasions, such as the trapping of an elephant herd. During the winter months the men of the Forest Department put through an elaborate scheme for trapping elephants. They watched, encircled, and drove a whole herd into stockades, and people turned up in great numbers to watch the operation. On the day fixed for the drive, people poured in from all over the country and applied
to me for a ringside seat in the spacious bamboo jungles of Mempi. I was supposed to have special influence with the men who were in charge of the drive: it meant several advance trips to the forest camp, and doing little services for the officials by fetching whatever they required from the town, and when the time came to arrange for the viewing of the elephant-drive, only those who came with me were allowed to pass through the gates of the special enclosures. It kept all of us happy and busy and well paid. I escorted visitors in bunches and went hoarse repeating, “You see, the wild herd is watched for months . . .” and so forth. Don’t imagine that I cared for elephants personally; anything that interested my tourists was also my interest. The question of my own preferences was secondary. If someone wanted to see a tiger or shoot one, I knew where to arrange it: I arranged for the lamb to bait the tiger, and had high platforms built so that the brave hunters might pop off the poor beast when it came to eat the lamb, although I never liked to see either the lamb or the tiger die. If someone wanted to see a king cobra spread out its immense hood, I knew the man who could provide the show.
There was a girl who had come all the way from Madras and who asked the moment she set foot in Malgudi, “Can you show me a cobra—a king cobra it must be—which can dance to the music of a flute?”
“Why?” I asked.
“I’d like to see one. That’s all,” she said.
Her husband said, “We have other things to think of, Rosie. This can wait.”
“I’m not asking this gentleman to produce it at once. I am not demanding it. I’m just mentioning it, that’s all.”
“If it interests you, you can make your own arrangements. Don’t expect me to go with you. I can’t stand the sight of a snake—your interests are morbid.”
I disliked this man. He was taunting such a divine creature. My sympathies were all for the girl—she was so lovely and elegant. After she arrived I discarded my khaki bush coat and dhoti and took the trouble to make myself presentable. I wore a silk jibba and lace dhoti and groomed myself so well that my mother remarked when she saw me leave the house, “Ah, like a bridegroom!” and Gaffur winked and said many an insinuating thing when I went to meet them at the hotel.
Her arrival had been a sort of surprise for me. The man was the first to appear. I had put him up at the Anand Bhavan Hotel. After a day of sightseeing he suddenly said one afternoon, “I must meet the Madras train. Another person is coming.”
He didn’t even stop to ask me what time the train would arrive. He seemed to know everything beforehand. He was a very strange man, who did not always care to explain what he was doing. If he had warned me that he was going to meet such an elegant creature at our station I should perhaps have decorated myself appropriately. As it was, I wore my usual khaki bush coat and dhoti, a horrible unprepossessing combination at any time, but the most sensible and convenient for my type of work. The moment she got down from the train I wished I had hidden myself somewhere. She was not very glamorous, if that is what you expect, but she did have a figure, a slight and slender one, beautifully fashioned, eyes that sparkled, a complexion not white, but dusky, which made her only half visible—as if you saw her through a film of tender coconut juice. Forgive me if you find me waxing poetic. I gave some excuse and sent them off to the hotel, and stayed back to run home and tidy up my appearance.
I conducted a brief research with the help of Gaffur. He took me to a man in Ellaman Street, who had a cousin working in the municipal office said to know a charmer with a king cobra. I carried on the investigation while I left the visitor to decipher episodes from Ramayan carved on the stone wall in Iswara Temple in North Extension—there were hundreds of minute carvings all along the wall. They kept the man fully occupied as he stooped and tried to study each bit. I knew all those panels and could repeat their order blindfolded, but he spared me the labor, he knew all about it.
When I returned from my brief investigation, I found the girl standing apart with every sign of boredom in her face. I suggested, “If you can come out for an hour, I can show you a cobra.”
She looked delighted. She tapped the man on the shoulder as he was stooping over the frieze and asked, “How long do you want to be here?”
“At least two hours,” he said without turning.
“I’ll go out for a while,” she said.
“Please yourself,” he said. Then to me, “Go to the hotel direct. I’ll find my way back.”
We picked up our guide at the municipal office. The car rolled along the sand, crossed the stretch at Nallappa’s grove, and climbed the opposite bank, the entire route carved by the wheels of wooden bullock carts. Gaffur looked sourly at the man sitting by his side. “Do you want me to reduce this to a bullock cart, dragging us about these places? Where are we going? I see no other place than the cremation ground there,” he said, pointing at the smoke above a forlorn walled area on the other side of the river. I didn’t like such inauspicious words to be uttered before the angel in the back seat. I tried to cover them up hastily by saying something else aloud.
We arrived at a group of huts on the other side of the river. Many heads peeped out of the huts as soon as our car stopped, and a few bare-bodied children came and stood around the car, gaping at the occupants. Our guide jumped out and went at a trot to the farthest end of the village street and returned with a man who had a red turban around his head, his only other piece of clothing being a pair of drawers.
“This man has a king cobra?” I looked him up and down and said hesitantly, “Let me see it.”
At which the young boys said, “He has a very big one in his house; it is true.” And I asked the lady, “Shall we go and see it?”
We set off. Gaffur said, “I’ll stay here, otherwise these monkeys will make short work of this automobile.”
I let the other two go forward and whispered to Gaffur, “Why are you in such a bad mood today, Gaffur? After all, you have gone over worse roads and never complained!”
“I have new springs and shock-absorbers. You know what they cost?”
“Oh, you will recover their cost soon; be cheerful.”
“What some of our passengers need is a tractor and not a motor car. That fellow!” He was vaguely discontented. I knew his wrath was not against us, but against our guide, because he said, “I think it will be good to make him walk back to the town. Why should anyone want to come so far to see a reptile?” I left him alone; it was no use trying to make him cheerful. Perhaps his wife had nagged him when he started out.
The girl stood under the shade of a tree while the man prodded a snake to make it come out of its basket. It was fairly large, and hissed and spread out its hood, while the boys screamed and ran off and returned. The man shouted at them, “If you excite it, it will chase you all!”
I told the boys to keep quiet, and asked the man, “You are sure you will not let it slip through?”
The girl suggested, “You must play on the flute, make it rear its head and dance.” The man pulled out his gourd flute and played on it shrilly, and the cobra raised itself and darted hither and thither and swayed. The whole thing repelled me, but it seemed to fascinate the girl. She watched it swaying with the raptest attention. She stretched out her arm slightly and swayed it in imitation of the movement; she swayed her whole body to the rhythm—for just a second, but that was sufficient to tell me what she was, the greatest dancer of the century.
It was nearly seven in the evening when we got back to the hotel. As soon as she got down, she paused to murmur a “Thanks” to no one in particular and went up the staircase. Her husband, waiting at the porch, said, “That’s all for the day. You could give me a consolidated account, I suppose, later. I shall want the car at ten o’clock tomorrow.” He turned and went back to his room.
I felt annoyed with him at this stage. What did he take me for? This fellow, telling me that he wanted the car at this hour or at that hour—did he think that I was a tout? It made me very angry, but the fact was that I really was a tout, havin
g no better business than hanging around between Gaffur and a snake-charmer and a tourist and doing all kinds of things. The man did not even care to tell me anything about himself, or where he wanted to go on the following morning; an extraordinary fellow!
A hateful fellow. I had never hated any customer so much before. I told Gaffur as we were driving back, “Tomorrow morning! He asks for the car as if it were his grandfather’s property! Any idea where he wants to go?”
“Why should I bother about it? If he wants the car he can have it if he pays for it. That is all. I don’t care who pays for a thing as long as they engage me. . . .” He rambled on into a personal philosophy which I didn’t care to follow.
My mother waited for me as usual. While serving me food she said, “Where have you been today? What are the things you have done today?”
I told her about the visit to the snake-charmer. She said, “They are probably from Burma, people who worship snakes.” She said, “I had a cousin living in Burma once and he told me about the snake women there.”
“Don’t talk nonsense, Mother. She is a good girl, not a snake-worshiper. She is a dancer, I think.”