Travelers Read Free

though he did not look comfortable. His joints were not as flexible as Gopi’s, and his knees stuck up into the air.
    â€œYou didn’t bring any with you?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œFurniture from England.”
    Raymond explained how he had brought nothing because he wanted to be quite free and also he didn’t know how long he was going to stay, though he hoped it would be for some time. Gopi was a little disappointed that Raymond didn’t belong to an embassy or some international organization, but he was intrigued by Raymond’s reasons for coming at all. He didn’t quite believe him and felt there was something more which Raymond was hiding.
    Raymond was already used to this reaction but with Gopi he took more trouble than usual to explain himself. He said, “My family has always had connections with India. One of them was in Delhi in 1835, the year when William Fraser was murdered here. He was a friend of Fraser’s and wrote long letters home about the case. We still have them. And there’s a great-uncle buried somewhere near Meerut, he was killed while he was out pig-sticking. . . .”
    Raymond saw that Gopi’s attention was beginning to wander and guessed at once that he would be more interested in practical matters; so he told him how he had taken a year’s leave fromhis job—which was in a publishing firm owned by his uncle—and that he intended to spend that time living in India.
    â€œAnd money?” Gopi asked, with a shrewd, inquiring gesture of rubbing two fingers together.
    â€œWell . . . there was this little legacy my aunt left me—”
    â€œHow much?”
    Raymond was taken aback for a moment and then said, rather cautiously, “Not all that much. . . . But enough for me to take some time off and experiment.”
    â€œWith what?”
    â€œMyself.”
    Raymond smiled in embarrassment. He heard himself sounding pompous. But in any case Gopi’s eyes had again begun to wander around the room. Raymond watched him and after a while he said, “There’s something on your lip.” He took out his handkerchief and said, “No, here,” and wiped it skillfully away.
    After a pause Gopi said, “You don’t look like other English people. No, you don’t,” he insisted. “Your face is not red.”
    Raymond was as a matter of fact unnaturally pale. His hair had a reddish tint in it and he blushed very easily.
    Now Gopi was tired of sitting on the floor and making conversation. He bounded up again and began to walk around the room, picking things up here and there. He also went into the bedroom. He didn’t much like the bedcover, he said. It was not very bright. He said he liked very very bright things. “Are there any more rooms? Only these two?” He added, “There is only one bed.” He asked, “You’re not married?”
    When Raymond laughed, he said, not without reproach, “In India you would have been married long ago. . . . Will you have friends to stay with you?”
    â€œI hope so.”
    â€œDo you like friends to stay with you?”
    â€œSome friends, yes,” Raymond said. He added, “Very much.”
    But Gopi had already moved over to the wardrobe and opened it and was critically studying Raymond’s clothes. Althoughthey were not very bright, Gopi liked some of them. He fingered the material, with approval and desire.
    Lee Among Hindus and Christians
    Lee had no fixed itinerary. She got on a train and got off when she felt like it. Usually she met people on the train who urged her to come and stay with them, or gave her the address of relatives who would put her up. She had begun to take such hospitality for granted. She was also beginning to find her way around the small towns where she so often landed up. They were always the same. There was a bazaar down the center and, branching off it, a network of lanes which got narrower and narrower