The Satanic Verses

career he had been transformed, by witchcraft, into (not an owl, but) an ass. ‘Yes, yes,’ Sufyan continued, stepping out into the passage and blowing a white mist of winter breath into his cupped hands, ‘Poor misfortunate, but no point wallowing. Constructive attitude must be adopted. I will wake my wife.’
    Chamcha was beard-fuzz and grime. He wore a blanket like a toga below which there protruded the comic deformity of goats’ hoofs, while above it could be seen the sad comedy of a sheepskin jacket borrowed from Jumpy, its collar turned up, so that sheepish curls nestled only inches from pointy billy-goat horns. He seemed incapable of speech, sluggish of body, dull of eye; even though Jumpy attempted to encourage him – ‘There, you see, we’ll have this well sorted in a flash’ – he, Saladin, remained the most limp and passive of – what? – let us say: satyrs. Sufyan, meanwhile, offered further Apuleian sympathy. ‘In the case of the ass, reverse metamorphosis required personal intervention of goddess Isis,’ he beamed. ‘But old times are for old fogies. In your instance, young mister, first step would possibly be a bowl of good hot soup.’
    At this point his kindly tones were quite drowned by the intervention of a second voice, raised high in operatic terror; moments after which, his small form was being jostled and shoved by the mountainous, fleshy figure of a woman, who seemed unable to decide whether to push him out of her way or keep him before her as a protective shield. Crouching behind Sufyan, this new being extended a trembling arm at whose end was a quivering, pudgy, scarlet-nailed index finger. ‘That over there,’ she howled. ‘What thing is come upon us?’
    ‘It is a friend of Joshi’s,’ Sufyan said mildly, and continued, turning to Chamcha, ‘Please forgive, – the unexpectedness et cet, isn’t it? – Anyhow, may I present my Mrs; – my Begum Sahiba, – Hind.’
    ‘What friend? How friend?’ the croucher said. ‘Ya Allah, eyes aren’t next to your nose?’
    The passageway, – bare-board floor, torn floral paper on the walls, – was starting to fill up with sleepy residents. Prominent among whom were two teenage girls, one spike-haired, the other pony-tailed, and both relishing the opportunity to demonstrate their skills (learned from Jumpy) in the martial arts of karate and Wing Chun: Sufyan’s daughters, Mishal (seventeen) and fifteen-year-old Anahita, leapt from their bedroom in fighting gear, Bruce Lee pajamas worn loosely over T-shirts bearing the image of the new Madonna; – caught sight of unhappy Saladin; – and shook their heads in wide-eyed delight.
    ‘Radical,’ said Mishal, approvingly. And her sister nodded assent: ‘Crucial. Fucking
A
.’ Her mother did not, however, reproach her for her language; Hind’s mind was elsewhere, and she wailed louder than ever: ‘Look at this husband of mine. What sort of haji is this? Here is Shaitan himself walking in through our door, and I am made to offer him hot chicken yakhni, cooked by my own right hand.’
    Useless, now, for Jumpy Joshi to plead with Hind for tolerance, to attempt explanations and demand solidarity. ‘If he’s not the devil on earth,’ the heaving-chested lady pointed out unanswerably, ‘from where that plague-breath comes that he’s breathing? From, maybe, the Perfumed Garden?’
    ‘Not Gulistan, but Bostan,’ said Chamcha, suddenly. ‘A I Flight 420.’ On hearing his voice, however, Hind squealed frightfully, and plunged past him, heading for the kitchen.
    ‘Mister,’ Mishal said to Saladin as her mother fled downstairs, ‘anyone who scares her that way has got to be seriously
bad
.’
    ‘Wicked,’ Anahita agreed. ‘Welcome aboard.’

    This Hind, now so firmly entrenched in exclamatory mode, had once been – strangebuttrue! – the most blushing of brides, the soul of gentleness, the very incarnation of tolerant good humour. As the wife of the erudite schoolteacher of Dhaka, she had entered into her duties with a will, the perfect helpmeet, bringing her husband cardamom-scented tea when he stayed up late markingexamination papers, ingratiating herself with the school principal at the termly Staff Families Outing, struggling with the novels of Bibhutibhushan Banerji and the metaphysics of Tagore in an attempt to be more worthy of a spouse who could quote effortlessly from Rig-Veda as well as Quran-Sharif, from the military accounts of Julius Caesar as well as the