228
PARTISAN REVIEW
flocks of doves were flying through , the stained fabric disintegrating ,
the bottom half on fire.
I found Ray in the dormitory of the Tourist Bungalow . He was
sleeping when I staggered in , my dead-body 's-weight of a pack on my
back , shoulders knotted and brain burning after a mile-long trek across
one of the littered wounds India opens in the earth ; sun and vultures
overhead, last night's face forming around the sockets of black slime
surrounding the road, the dream began before I fell asleep: the
half-digested profile approaching , two ash-soft hands brushing my
neck as the leper pulls me down for a kiss, blood pouring from
his mouth into mine , flowing thick as honey, filling me with warm
light.
Ray woke me up, using his south-of-the-border bunkhouse accent
(" Rise ' n shine , Rio , time we did some whoopin ' ' n hollerin' in this
burg " ), and we started the long walk to the river. The light of the last
hour of afternoon had mellowed the landscape and pools of amber
were brimming in the sockets, the eyes of a face in ecstasy where the
other had been. Ray was riding the high swing of his style, plunging
into India with his Pacific Ocean surfer stride , wagging his big
mustaches like antennae, blue electricity in his eyes, rolling his head,
swaying his shoulders , eating the air with the passion of a genius of
cunnilingus, fathoming all the slants , ruts , knots and more insidious
perversities of the Indian earth that always had me srumbling in a
constant struggle for balance. Ray knew the art of motion, turns and
steps edged with nuance, the enlightened dancer-arch the back like a
statement of truth, curl the hand and play the fingers on the air-every
move and every moment rich with style.
Ray had also mastered the acrobatics of outrage. There came a
time, in every Indian day, when it was necessary to relieve the pressure
by kicking a hole in the atmosphere to shout through . If the hole was
big enough , you could even dance in it, as Ray did now, in mid-air ,
spinning around, off the kick, a Nijinsky leap, dust flying in the faces
of our enemies- a flock of cycle rickshaw drivers running us down with
their mongrel hackney-bicycles and nagging monotonously for our
trade,
" Sahib, sahib,
city-going,
sahib, eck rupiya, sahib!"
Ray fired
from the hip , kissing off each shot with bits from the Western movies
we acted out all over India ("Eat dust, you scum-suckin' pig! " ) , the
rickshaws backing off in immediate, amazed retreat, all but the one
