The Satanic Verses

faltering, ‘Mean to say, well, we just think it’s great.’ – ‘You, she means,’ Mishal corrected. ‘We think you’re, you know.’ – ‘Brilliant,’ Anahita said and dazzled the bewildered Chamcha with a smile. ‘Magic. You know.
Extreme
.’
    ‘We didn’t sleep all night,’ Mishal said. ‘We’ve got ideas.’
    ‘What we reckoned,’ Anahita trembled with the thrill of it, ‘as you’ve turned into, – what you are, – then maybe, well, probably, actually, even if you haven’t tried it out, it could be, you could …’ And the older girl finished the thought: ‘You could’ve developed – you know –
powers
.’
    ‘We thought, anyway,’ Anahita added, weakly, seeing the clouds gathering on Chamcha’s brow. And, backing towards the door, added: ‘But we’re probably wrong. – Yeh. We’re wrong all right. Enjoy your meal.’ – Mishal, before she fled, took a smallbottle full of green fluid out of a pocket of her red-and-black-check donkey jacket, put it on the floor by the door, and delivered the following parting shot. ‘O, excuse me, but Mum says, can you use this, it’s mouthwash, for your breath.’

    That Mishal and Anahita should adore the disfiguration which he loathed with all his heart convinced him that ‘his people’ were as crazily wrong-headed as he’d long suspected. That the two of them should respond to his bitterness – when, on his second attic morning, they brought him a masala dosa instead of packet cereal complete with toy silver spacemen, and he cried out, ungratefully: ‘Now I’m supposed to eat this filthy foreign food?’ – with expressions of sympathy, made matters even worse. ‘Sawful muck,’ Mishal agreed with him. ‘No bangers in here, worse luck.’ Conscious of having insulted their hospitality, he tried to explain that he thought of himself, nowadays, as, well, British … ‘What about us?’ Anahita wanted to know. ‘What do you think we are?’ – And Mishal confided: ‘Bangladesh in’t nothing to me. Just some place Dad and Mum keep banging on about.’ – And Anahita, conclusively: ‘Bungleditch.’ – With a satisfied nod. – ‘What I call it, anyhow.’
    But they weren’t British, he wanted to tell them: not
really
, not in any way he could recognize. And yet his old certainties were slipping away by the moment, along with his old life … ‘Where’s the telephone?’ he demanded. ‘I’ve got to make some calls.’
    It was in the hall; Anahita, raiding her savings, lent him the coins. His head wrapped in a borrowed turban, his body concealed in borrowed trousers (Jumpy’s) and Mishal’s shoes, Chamcha dialled the past.
    ‘Chamcha,’ said the voice of Mimi Mamoulian. ‘You’re dead.’
    This happened while he was away: Mimi blacked out and lost her teeth. ‘A whiteout is what it was,’ she told him, speaking more harshly than usual because of difficulty with her jaw. ‘A reason why? Don’t ask. Who can ask for reason in these times? What’s your number?’ she added as the pips went. ‘I’ll call youright back.’ But it was a full five minutes before she did. ‘I took a leak. You have a reason why you’re alive? Why the waters parted for you and the other guy but closed over the rest? Don’t tell me you were worthier. People don’t buy that nowadays, not even you, Chamcha. I was walking down Oxford Street looking for crocodile shoes when it happened: out cold in mid-stride and I fell forward like a tree, landed on the point of my chin and all the teeth fell out on the sidewalk in front of the man doing find-the-lady. People can be thoughtful, Chamcha. When I came to I found my teeth in a little pile next to my face. I opened my eyes and saw the little bastards staring at me, wasn’t that nice? First thing I thought, thank God, I’ve got the money. I had them stitched back in, privately of course, great job, better than before. So I’ve been taking a break for a while. The voiceover business is in bad shape, let me tell you, what with you dying and my teeth, we just have no sense of responsibility. Standards have been lowered, Chamcha. Turn on the TV, listen to radio, you should hear how corny the pizza commercials, the beer ads with the Cherman accents from Central Casting, the Martians eating potato powder and sounding like they came from the Moon. They fired us from
The Aliens Show
. Get well soon. Incidentally, you might say the same for me.’
    So he had lost work as well as wife, home, a