The God of Small Things
Page 32
They chose him because they knew that they had to put their faith in fragility. Stick to Smallness. Each time they parted, they extracted only one small promise from each other:
Tomorrow?
Tomorrow.
They knew that things could change in a day. They were right about that.
They were wrong about Chappu Thamburan, though. He outlived Velutha. He fathered future generations.
He died of natural causes.
That first night, on the day that Sophie Mol came, Velutha watched his lover dress. When she was ready she squatted facing him. She touched him lightly with her fingers and left a trail of goosebumps on his skin. Like flat chalk on a blackboard. Like breeze in a paddyfield. Like jet-streaks in a blue church sky. He took her face in his hands and drew it towards his. He closed his eyes and smelled her skin. Ammu laughed.
Yes, Margaret, she thought. We do it to each other too.
She kissed his closed eyes and stood up. Velutha with his back against the mangosteen tree watched her walk away.
She had a dry rose in her hair.
She turned to say it once again: “Naaley.”
Tomorrow.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ARUNDHATI ROY was trained as an architect. She has worked as a production designer and has written the screenplays for two films. She lives in New Delhi. This is her first book.
This is a work of fiction. The characters in it are all fictional.
Liberties have been taken with the locations of rivers, level crossings, churches, and crematoriums.
Copyright © 1997 Arundhati Roy
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in Canada by Vintage Canada, a division of Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
First published in Canada in hardcover in 1997 by Random House of Canada.
www.randomhouse.ca
Grateful acknowledgment is made to the following for permission to reprint previously published material:
ABKCO Music, Inc.: Excerpt from “Ruby Tuesday” by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Copyright © 1967 by ABKCO Music, Inc. Copyright renewed 1995 by ABKCO Music, Inc. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by permission.
Williamson Music: Lyric excerpts form “The Sound of Music,” “Maria,” and
“My Favorite Things” by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. Copyright © 1959 (Renewed) by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. Lyrics excerpts from “So Long Farewell” by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. Copyright © 1959, 1960 (Renewed) by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. Williamson Music is the owner of publication and allied rights throughout the world. International copyright secured. All rights reserved. Used by permission of Williamson Music.
Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data
Roy, Arundhati
The god of small things
eISBN: 978-0-307-37467-7
1. Title
PR9499.3.R59G62 1998 823 C98-930648-8
v3.0