The White Tiger

modern ideas!” the Stork said. He put his hands on me. “I have to steal the driver, Roshan—I’m sorry, you’ll have him back in an hour, okay?”
    The Stork had a special use for driver number two. He had bad legs, with blue veins in them, and had been told by a doctor to sit in the courtyard in the evening with his feet in warm water and have them massaged by a servant.
    I had to heat water on the stove, carry it into the courtyard, and then lift the old man’s feet up one after the other and immerse them in the hot water and then massage them both gently; as I did this, he would close his eyes and moan.
    After half an hour, he would say, “The water’s gone cold,” and then I had to lift his feet out, one at a time, from the bucket, and carry the bucket in to the toilet. The water in it was dark—dead hair and bits of skin floated on it. I had to fill the bucket with fresh hot water, and bring it back.
    As I was massaging, the two sons pulled up chairs and sat down by their father to talk. Ram Persad would bring out a bottle full of a golden liquid, and pour it into three glasses, and drop ice cubes in their glasses, and hand one glass to each of them. The sons would wait for the father to take the first sip and say, “Ah…whiskey. How would we survive this country without it,” and then the talking would start. The more they talked, the faster I massaged. They talked about politics, coal, and about your country—China. Somehow these things—politics, coal, China—were linked to the family fortunes of the Stork; and dimly I understood that my own fate, since I was part of this family now, was linked into these three things as well. The chatter of coal and China got mixed up with the aroma of whiskey from the glasses, the stench of sweat rising up from the Stork’s feet dipped in the warm water, the flakiness of his skin, and the light jabs of the sandaled feet of Mr. Ashok or the Mongoose when they bumped into my back in the process of moving about. I absorbed everything—that’s the amazing thing about entrepreneurs. We are like sponges—we absorb and grow.
    A sharp blow landed on my head.
    I looked up and saw the Stork, with his palm still raised over my skull, glaring at me.
    “Know what that was for?”
    “Yes, sir,” I said—with a big smile on my face.
    “Good.”
    A minute later he hit me on the head again.
    “Tell him what it was for, Father. I don’t think he knows. Fellow, you’re pressing too hard. You’re too excited. Father is getting annoyed. Slow down.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “Do you have to hit the servants, Father?”
    “This is not America, son. Don’t ask questions like that.”
    “Why can’t I ask questions?”
    “They expect it from us, Ashok. Remember that—they respect us for it.”
    Now, Pinky Madam never joined in these conversations. Except to play badminton with Ram Persad, which she did wearing dark glasses, she never left her room. I wondered what was going on with her—was she having a fight with her husband? Was he not sticking it to her well in bed?
    When the Stork said, “The water’s gone cold,” for the second time, and took his feet out of the bucket, my work was done.
    I splashed the cold water down the sink.
    I washed my hands for ten minutes, and dried them, and washed them again, but it made no difference. No matter how much you wash your hands after you have massaged a man’s foot, the smell of his old, flaky skin will stay on your skin for an entire day.
     
    There was only one activity that servant number one and servant number two had to do together. At least once a week, around six o’clock, Ram Persad and I left the house and went down the main road, until we got to a store with a sign that said:
“JACKPOT” ENGLISH LIQUOR SHOP
INDIAN-MADE FOREIGN LIQUOR SOLD HERE
    I should explain to you, Mr. Jiabao, that in this country we have two kinds of men: “Indian” liquor men and “English” liquor men. “Indian” liquor was for village boys like me—toddy, arrack, country hooch. “English” liquor, naturally, is for the rich. Rum, whiskey, beer, gin—anything the English left behind. (Is there a “Chinese” liquor, Mr. Premier? I’d love to take a sip.)
    One of the most important duties of driver number one was to come to Jackpot once a week and buy a bottle of the most expensive whiskey for the Stork and his sons. It was part of servant protocol, though don’t ask me why, that the junior driver accompany him on this