KUTUMBA RAO
221
for money. He buys it.
If
what he pays is not acceptable to you, then you
refuse and go your own way."
"I wouldn't go on my way, sir. However much they pay me, I would
make sure that was enough money for me.
If
we had to, we would eat
two meals of snack food daily. How could 1 get around it? Even King
Hari Chandradu couldn't avoid it," 1 said.
Mr. Trivikrama Rao grimaced as if he were in a lot of pain and, like
a guard at the railway station waving a green flag, shook his hand very
fast. But 1 reacted as if it were a red flag and stopped talking.
"If
you ask for a salary that seems too high, they won't give you the
job."
"Even if 1 say I don't want any salary, these people won't give me a
job," I said. While his hand was still waving 1 stopped talking and acted
as if I wouldn't speak again.
"That's why I say it's inappropriate to have these expressions of grat–
itude in the application."
"Let's say you're right. But when only one person can provide a job,
and ten thousand people need a job, can both parties really be free
agents?" 1 asked.
He seemed
to
grow angry.
"If that's the way you see it, do what you like," he said. If his living
room were an office, and he had a call bell next to him, he would ring
the bell, call the servant, point to me and say, "Send this man out."
1 felt as if that was exactly what happened, so I stood up and asked
for permission
to
leave. I crossed the road, went home, and posted the
application that day.
One month passed. A response didn't come. But I didn't really expect
one, anyway.
EARLY IN TI-IE MORNING,
when a taxi stopped in front of the house, 1
was confused. No one comes to our house. And they never come in a
taxi. I thought it was somebody who was searching for another address.
When my tall cousin, Parvatheesam, got out of the taxi, I was even more
surprised. Parvatheesam is my mother's older sister's son. It's been ten
years since
r
saw him; I don't even know where he lives or what he does.
He must be making enough money to travel in a taxi. But enough-that
must be very nice.
"Well, friend," I said, coming out to the street. "When did you
arrive?"
"Three days ago," he said. Parvatheesam said something to the taxi
driver, then he came inside.
