I went back to my hut and sat at the small table made from packing crates. Inside the crumpled envelope was a typed note on matching yellow paper. It was typed in English, and I suspected that it had been typed by one of the professional letter-writers on the Street of the Writers. It was from Abdullah.
My Dear Brother, Salaam aleikum. You told me that you are giving the bear hugs to the people. I think this is a custom in your country and even if I think it is very strange and even if I do not understand, I think you must be lonely for it here because in Bombay we have a shortage of bears. So I send you a bear for some hugging. Please enjoy. I hope he is like the hugging bears in your country. I am busy with business and I am healthy, thanks be to God. After my business I will return to Bombay soon, Inshallah. God bless you and your brother.
Abdullah Taheri Prabaker was standing at my left shoulder, reading the note out aloud, slowly.
"Aha, this is the Abdullah, who I am not supposed to be telling you that he is doing all the bad things, but really he is, even at the same time that I am not telling you... that he is."
"It's rude to read other people's mail, Prabu."
"Is rude, yes. Rude means that we like to do it, even when people tell us not to, yes?"
"Who are those bear guys?" I asked him. "Where are they staying?"
"They are making money with the dancing bear. They are original from UP., Uttar Pradesh, in the north of this, our Mother India, but travelling everywhere. Now they are staying at the zhopadpatti in Navy Nagar area. Do you want me to take you there?"
"No," I muttered, reading the note over again. "No, not now.
Maybe later."
Prabaker went to the open door of the hut and paused there, staring at me reflectively with his small, round head cocked to one side. I put the note in my pocket, and looked up at him. I thought he wanted to say something-there was a little struggle of concentration in his brow-but then he seemed to change his mind. He shrugged. He smiled.
"Some sick peoples are coming today?"
"A few. I think. Later."
"Well, I will be seeing you at the lunch party, yes?"
"Sure."
"Do you... do you want me, for to do anything?"
"No. Thanks."
"Do you want my neighbour, his wife, to wash it your shirt?"
"Wash my shirt?"
"Yes. It is smelling like bears. You are smelling like bears, Linbaba."
"It's okay," I laughed. "I kinda like it."
"Well, I'm going now. I'm going to drive my cousin Shantu's taxi."
"Okay then."
"All right. I'm going now."
He walked out, and when I was alone again the sounds of the slum swarmed around me: hawkers selling, children playing, women laughing, and love songs blaring from radios running on maximum distortion. There were also animal sounds, hundreds of them. With only days to go before the big rain, many itinerants and entertainers, like the two bear-handlers, had sought shelter in slums throughout the city. Ours was host to three groups of snake charmers, a team of monkey men, and numerous breeders of parrots and singing birds. The men who usually tethered horses in open ground near the Navy barracks brought their mounts to our makeshift stables. Goats and sheep and pigs, chickens and bullocks and water buffalo, even a camel and an elephant-the acres of the slum had become a kind of sprawling ark, providing sanctuary from the coming floods.
The animals were welcome, and no'-one questioned their right to shelter, but their presence did pose new problems. On the first night of their stay, the monkey men allowed one of their animals to escape while everyone was asleep. The mischievous creature scampered over the tops of several huts and lowered itself into the hut used by one group of snake charmers. The snake men housed their cobras in covered wicker baskets which were secured with a bamboo slip-catch and a stone placed on top of each cover. The monkey removed one of the stones, and opened a basket containing three cobras. From a safe vantage point at the top of the hut, the monkey shrieked the snake men awake, and they sounded the alarm.
"Saap alla! Saap alla! Saap!" Snakes are coming! Snakes!
There was pandemonium, then, as sleepy slum-dwellers rushed about with kerosene lanterns and flaming torches, striking at every shadow, and beating each other on the feet and shins with sticks and poles. A few of the flimsier huts were knocked over in the stampede. Qasim Ali finally restored order, and organised the snake men into two search parties that combed the slum systematically until they found the cobras and returned them to their basket.
