The White Tiger

fire.
    Now, who would want this to happen to his family, sir? Which inhuman wretch of a monster would consign his own granny and brother and aunt and nephews and nieces to death?
    The Stork and his sons could count on my loyalty.
    When I came back, the Nepali guard opened the gate without a word. I was inside the compound now.
    As far as masters go, Mr. Ashok, Mukesh Sir, and the Stork were better than nine in ten. There was always enough food in the house for the servants. On Sundays you even got a special dish, rice mixed with small red chunks of boneless chicken. I had never had a regular chicken dish in my life until then; it made you feel like a king, eating chicken Sunday after Sunday and then licking your fingers. I had a covered room to sleep in. True, I had to share it with the other driver, a grim-looking fellow named Ram Persad, and he had the nice big bed, while I had to sleep on the floor—still a covered room’s a covered room, and much nicer than sleeping on the road, as Kishan and I had been doing all the time we were in Dhanbad. Above all, I got the thing that we who grow up in the Darkness value most of all. A uniform. A khaki uniform!
    The next day I went to the bank—the one that had a wall made all of glass. I saw myself reflected in the glass panes—all in khaki. I walked back and forth in front of that bank a dozen times, just gaping at myself.
    If only they had given me a silver whistle, I would have been in paradise!
    Kishan came once a month to see me. Kusum had decided that I could keep ninety rupees a month for myself: the rest would go straight to Kishan—who would send it straight to her, in the village. I gave him the money every month through the black bars of the rear gate, and we would talk for a few minutes before the Nepali shouted, “That’s enough—the boy has work to do now!”
    The work of a number two driver was simple. If the number one driver, Ram Persad, was busy driving the masters around town in the Honda City, and someone in the house wanted to go to the market, or to a coal mine, or to the train station, I got into the Maruti Suzuki and drove them there. Otherwise I had to stay around the house and make myself useful.
    Now, I say they took me on as their “driver.” I don’t exactly know how you organize your servants in China. But in India—or, at least, in the Darkness—the rich don’t have drivers, cooks, barbers, and tailors. They simply have servants.
    What I mean is that anytime I was not driving the car, I had to sweep the floor of the courtyard, make tea, clean cobwebs with a long broom, or chase a cow out of the compound. There was one thing I was not allowed to do, and this was to touch the Honda City: Ram Persad alone had the right to drive it and clean it. In the evenings I’d watch him wash the sleek exterior of the car with a soft cloth. And I’d burn with envy.
    I could see, even from outside, that this was a beautiful, modern car, with all the necessary comforts: a speaker system, A/C, nice glossy leather seats, and a big stainless-steel spittoon in the back. It must be like paradise to drive such a nice car. All I had was a battered old Maruti Suzuki.
    One evening, as I was watching, Mr. Ashok came and poked his nose around the car. I was discovering that he was a very inquisitive man.
    “What’s that for? That shiny thing in the back.”
    “Spittoon, sir.”
    “What?”
    Ram Persad explained. This spittoon was for the Stork, who liked to chew paan . If he spat the paan out the window the paan might streak the sides of the car, so he spat near his feet, into the spittoon, which the driver washed and cleaned at the end of every ride.
    “Disgusting,” Mr. Ashok said.
    He was asking about something else when Mukesh Sir’s son Roshan came running up to us with a plastic bat and ball in his hand.
    Ram Persad snapped his fingers for me.
    (Playing cricket with any brat in the household who wanted to play—and letting him win, handsomely—was one of the prescribed duties of driver number two.)
    Mr. Ashok joined the game. He stood as the wicket-keeper while I bowled full tosses to the brat.
    “I’m Azharuddin, captain of India!” the boy shouted every time he hit a six or a four.
    “Call yourself Gavaskar. Azharuddin is a Muslim.”
    It was the Stork. He had come into the courtyard to watch.
    Mr. Ashok said, “Father, what a silly thing to say! Hindu or Muslim, what difference does it make?”
    “Oh, you young people and your