Read Online Sir Vidia's Shadow by Paul Theroux - Free Book Online

them?”
    â€œSometimes.”
    â€œYou should cut them.”
    â€œYou mean not speak to them?”
    â€œI mean not see them. You walk past them. You cut them. They don’t exist. Nothing at all.”
    Not even the G. Ramsay Muir treatment—you just walked on.
    The point about the rocking, squeaking hobbyhorse of a bed was that when I heard it, its first murmurs and jerks and hiccups, hesitating, just foreplay, nothing rhythmic yet, I prepared myself, and soon it was swaying and calling like a corncrake, and the woman was urging this late-night plowing. Then, almost against my will, I became aroused and woke Yomo and we made love.
    One of those nights Yomo turned me away, hugged herself, and said she was really ill.
    â€œYou might be pregnant,” I said. “You have to see the doctor.”
    â€œI don’t want the doctor. I don’t need him.”
    â€œHe’s good. He’ll need to examine you.”
    â€œIndian doctor,” she said. “Bloody shit.”
    Dr. Barot was a Gujarati, Uganda born, trained in the Indian city of Broach, who in the past had treated me for gonorrhea and for malaria. I asked him if he would see Yomo. He said of course, that he was also an obstetrician, and that it was important that he see Yomo soon.
    Sleepy-eyed, reluctant, slightly sulky, Yomo finally agreed. She always took pains to dress up before leaving the house, but this was a greater occasion than most. She put on her brocade sash, her expensive cloak, her best turban. I loved seeing her dress up, and she became haughty and offhand when she wore her elegant clothes.
    The February heat was oppressive. In the car Yomo said, “You don’t know. Black people get hotter than white people. It’s our skin.” I wondered whether this was true.
    Dr. Barot greeted her and took her into his examining room. I heard the scraping sound of her disrobing, stiff colorful clothes sliding away, of her folding them. If she was going to have a baby, I would be happy. It was not what I had planned, but really I had no plans. There was something wrong with the very idea of a plan, and anyway I half believed that my life was prefigured—perhaps, as people said, like the lines on my palm. My random life was pleasant enough, and everything good that had happened to me had come accidentally. I just launched myself and trusted to luck.
Mektoub
—it is written.
    I sat waiting, thinking of nothing in particular. When the examining room door opened I smiled, having just been reminded of why I was there.
    â€œWhat’s the verdict?”
    â€œFour months pregnant,” Dr. Barot said.
    Yomo looked shyly at me and slipped next to me as we watched Dr. Barot write his bill on a pad. While he wrote, he said that Yomo was healthy and that she should see him regularly from now on so he could monitor her blood pressure.
    In the car, sitting on the hot upholstery, I said, “How can you be four months pregnant? You’ve only been here three months.”
    I felt innumerate and confused and was not blaming her but rather trying to explain my bewilderment.
    Yomo said, “I had a friend in Nigeria before I came here to see you.”
    Now it became harder for me to drive. The road was full of obstacles, and it was much hotter in the car.
    â€œWhat are we going to do?” I said.
    She was silent, but I could see she was sad, and her sadness seemed worse because she was dressed so beautifully.
    â€œDo you think you should see your friend?” I asked.
    She said nothing. She did not cry until that night, when her clothes were neatly folded on the chair, all that stiff cloth in a deep stack. She was in bed, hiding her face, sobbing.
    I did not know what to say. I did not have the words. I loved her, but I had just discovered that I did not know her. Who was this friend, and what was this deception? It must have been obvious to her that she was at least one month pregnant soon after she arrived