Misadventures of a Victorian in Victorian London

f you insist on seeing him, you have to sign this declaration clearing me of all responsibility. You realise the patient you want to see is not your close relative. Please don't get me wrong, this is standard procedure.

Sathasivam [pseudonym of a postwar Victorian] didn't hesitate to sign the form put before him.

- It is my duty to warn you that Mr.Vasudevan's reactions to our treatment so far have been particularly violent.

Sathasivam nodded but didn't appear convinced, despite the gravity of the situation.

The director of the asylum rang for the senior male nurse in charge of the wards.

- Mr. Sloane, please show this gentleman the way to ward 9 - he said, adding: He's here to see Mr.Vasudevan. - Then he turned to Sathasivam. - I'll talk to you once you've seen your friend.

The director appeared worried and on the defensive, his compact body in white overalls, resting crushed in the well of his round-backed chair. Throughout the short interview he was overly attentive, more than he needn't have been. Sathasivam's good friend, Frank - met at the Inns of Court - had arranged the rendez-vous. The director fiddled the pens sticking out of his overall front pocket. He rose when Sathasivam got up to follow the male nurse, not out of a need to show respect, but because he had other places in the vast establishment to visit, or at least that's how it appeared to Sathasivam who had never really known doctors. Doctors were scarce where he came from. One healed oneself as best one could, or one never healed at all!

It was one of those places built, it appeared, in the nineteenth century, still stolidly withstanding wear and tear, but never quite giving the impression of cleanliness: great big heavy doors, painted a dull white like the rest of the walls, with multiple locks and bolts, dirt gathering in the interstices of bluish Talavera tiles in corridors, stained encrusted designs and flowery flourishes on floors in the main entrance common parts in jig-saw circular patterns that reminded Sathasivam of pictures of Greek and Roman ruin floors, relieved by less than fresh palm fronds bearing down over huge clay pots, all added to the gloom of the place. The doors opened into vast high-ceilinged rooms with sparse low furniture. A black and white TV set looked down at mostly old and unkempt patients in dressing gowns from a high niche in the wall. The musty air reeked of medicinal odours mixed with personal stench. Three doors of wards were opened and locked behind them with circumspection on the part of the asylum staff. Finally, after going through some hundred or so yards of corridors and lounge-like wards without beds, the hospital assistant stopped in front of a barricaded massive wooden double-door with a small window grating which permitted communication from outside. The male nurse explained who Sathasivam was, and the door was opened from the inside. Sathasivam noticed that there were no knobs on the door. It opened into a tennis-court size vacant room where several distraught baggily dressed men stood or sat on the floor, adopting peculiar postures, or they were simply gazing distractedly through the wide heavily draped bay-windows over the undulating mounds of the grounds of the mental home. Here and there sycamore, cypress and oak trees stood gnarled by age. Some twenty or so oldish white men and women in dark heavy overcoats ambled about the grounds, watched by a couple of men in white overalls a little distance away.

A man in crumpled trousers and a gray-green near-threadbare coat, his pink transparent shirt partially unbuttoned, whom Sathasivam took for a patient, approached him. Suddenly, several patients lifted their heads, and the sight of Sathasivam sent a tremor through the hall. Some dragged their feet towards him; others swayed and mumbled, and it took the rather raised angry voice of the badly dressed man for the commotion to die down, though almost all the inmates followed the goings-on with their hazily half-opened eyes.

- A visitor for Mr.Vasudevan - said the male nurse.

- He's not in a condition to see anyone.

- Dr. Applewood sent him to see the patient.

- Oh, well, he should know better. He's in that cell. - The male nurse made a move towards one of the five cells that lay behind the wall opposite the bay-windows. - No, not that one, the next. Anyway, you need this to let him in. - He produced a bunch of keys linked to a chain at his hip.

The male nurse beckoned to Sathasivam, and they looked through the sliding-judas window in the great big door. It was a massive all-in-one-piece door with bolts on the outside, and without knobs. The room was as narrow as the door, but long and high-ceilinged as the rest of the building on the ground floor. There was a tiny window up near the ceiling with rusting iron bars worked deeply into the heavy limestone slabs that formed the outer walls. Barring a built-in bed and bedding, and a bed-pan, there was absolutely no furniture whatsoever in view. On the bed, fully-dressed - thick brown flannel trousers, burgundy-coloured woolen coat, checkered woolen shirt, broad red and blue striped tie, heavy brown leather shoes under woolen socks - sat Vasudevan, hands propping his chin. The noise of the sliding-judas hole made him raise his head in the direction of the door, but it was obvious he could see nothing but the creamy white paint of the interior.

When the doctor on duty decided that Vasudevan could be disturbed without undue trouble being caused, he gave the necessary instructions to his ward male nurse to open the cell-door. The male nurse who accompanied Sathasivam moved to a side to watch the proceedings more closely. The thought occurred to Sathasivam that he was perhaps as interested in the upshot of a confrontation with the locked-in patient as he might have been in the discovery of a French cuisine recipé. While the door was being opened, the doctor watched Vasudevan closely. He didn't move, except to turn his head again. The doctor signaled to Sathasivam to enter. Sathasivam entered. The door was quickly bolted once he was in. The doctor surveyed the two friends through the judas window.

No sooner Sathasivam entered and stood in front of the door, Vasudevan stretched himself to his full height. His eyes narrowed; then his lips parted. A smile stretched across his face. Dandruff showed profusely on his well-groomed straight brownish-black hair.

- What the hell...- he said and advanced in two strides to within inches of Sathasivam. - Eh, how...how did they let you in?

- He took his friend's hand in his and shook it vigorously. He seemed all flustered and yet well under control. He was beaming all over and seemed to come awake all of a sudden, happy in the knowledge that there was somebody at least he knew and knew well in the same cell, in a place where he knew nobody. Then, something seemed to give in him, which was not very characteristic of this usually self-contained and silent man.

- You don't know how happy I am to see you, Siva; this place is driving me nuts. Ever since they brought me here by force some three or four days ago, they have been giving me pills to take. They say the pills are vitamins, but I know what they are; they are sleeping pills. They look red like vitamin pills, but they are sleeping pills. I sleep and I sleep; that's all I'm doing here, and what's worse, I'm losing my memory. Every day I remember less and less of what took place even a week ago. This is a mad-house. They put me here to say I'm mad. Siva, get me out of here now. I must leave now before it's too late. Can you take me out, Siva? Please, Siva? Vasudevan was out of breath with the sudden outburst. He looked at his friend pleadingly, and tears sprung in his sore-looking eyes; the whites of his eyes were lustreless. - I can't stand this place. Look at this - there's not even a window to look out of. This is a prison, and ...and those bastards...those...those rogues put me in here.

- Who? Who put you in here?

- You know, when you left for Manchester, your landlady told me you'd be away for a week; so I went to Malaya Hall.

- Why did you go to that horrible place?

- I had finished revising my Contract and Tort. With three weeks left for the exam, I thought a nice curry-rice for half a crown wouldn't be a bad idea after all.

- From what I hear from the boys, though each version varies, is that you refused to return to your place and that you insisted on talking and talking...

- No, Siva, that's not true. At first, I was only having fun. I was ready for the exam. I saw you know who, the usual official gang on government scholarships sitting around in the lounge, reading that rag of a paper, and playing their interminable slow-move chess. I didn't talk to any one, just wished them, politely. Then Bala, Nathan, Joe, Chan and Nasir came round me and started to chat me up. They wanted to know why I was away for so long, as if they didn't know. They wanted to know if I was prepared for my exam. I said yes. They didn't believe me. So they pretended to ask me questions, both on contract and tort. Then, they said, we should all go downstairs to the hall and there check it all out with the textbooks in hand. I didn't want to, but they, I thought, were trying to find a way to revise or learn the subject. In fact, most of the boys, I was told, had been spending quite a few hours every day in the reading-room for the past few weeks. So I accepted.

- Don't you see, that was a great mistake.

- I see it now, but then I thought...

- You know only too well they are never up to any good. If they can ridicule and belittle any one, they would do it gladly, because that would give them the elusive feeling of thinking they're superior.

- Now I know but then...then...where were you? I was looking for you. I hoped you'd be back from Manchester. You can't imagine how I needed you around then.

- Good thing, I wasn't around. If I was, I would now be in jail or something...

Tears sprung in Vasudevan's eyes and wet his cheeks and shirt. Sathasivam held his silence until Vasudevan had wrung his heart out. He turned and gained his bed and dried his face with a small handtowel. Then he looked at Sathasivam and the old smile crept back into his face.

- Sorry, Siva. Sorry also because I have nothing to offer you. No chair, no coffee, no fruit, nothing. This is worse than a jail. I must get out. Take me out with you, Siva. I can't stay here even a minute longer. They take me for a madman, and the more I react the more they think I am mad. What else can I do? Am I supposed to also think I am mad?

- Take a hold of yourself, Vasu. I'm seeing the director of this place when I get out of here. I'll speak to him, and I'm sure something can be worked out.

- You promise to take me out of this looney bin?

- I'll do my best. The only trouble is I'm only a friend, not a relative. That sort of restricts my role, you know.

They looked each other in the eyes for a full minute or so in silence. Vasudevan seemed to have recovered his spirits. He was hopeful.

- Just tell me one thing though. Why did you allow them to put up notices with your signature on them, you know, as Colonel Vasu and then even as General.

- Oh, that! I was only joking. He cocked his head as though he was recollecting. - I thought they were joking as well. After the first day, they asked me to come back for more revision the next day. Well, I thought to myself, why not? It would give me a chance to revise as well. Only I didn't know, I couldn't guess what they were up to. Little by little, everything I said they turned around. All that I had learned correctly they began to say, with notes and books on their laps, was wrong. After the third or fourth day more and more law students and many more non-law students began to attend the sessions. I really became confused. I needed to have my notes with me. There was no way I could check on the truth of what I had learned. In the end, nearly a week had gone by and I had lost far too much sleep. Actually I couldn't sleep any more for fear of getting confused with what I had mugged. - He paused and took a long forced breath. - I was absolutely ready for the exam before I went like a damn fool for a rice and curry to that damned hall. A week later, because of what the rascals kept saying, I doubted everything I knew on the subject. You know, they would put a question to me quite seriously. They'd ask: what is a conditional contract? I'd reply fully. They'd listen. Then, they'd say, what about backing up every point with a case or two. I did. In fact, I gave them several cases and even quoted the judgement in many cases. You know what they did. They didn't know the cases themselves. They didn't even realise there were so many cases to illustrate the points. So, they cooked up all sorts of cases and gave all sorts of judgements to confuse me. I argued with them, but the more I argued the more I got heated up and the more I became confused, for I was all alone trying to defend my point, whereas they were something like fifteen to twenty at the end, all shouting at the same time to make things worse. They put up the notices on the main notice board. Permission was given by the director of the hall, you know that old major Ogglesby. Says he served with the Imperial Army in India. He even counter-signed the notices to give the whole business an air of official something or other. These guys got his secretary to type out the notice. It said something like this: General Vasudevan will hold his third meeting on the laws of England in an attempt to put to rights the state of the nation. The meeting will take place as usual in the main conference hall from 8 p.m. onwards. Signed: General of the Armed Forces: Vasudevan.

- Couldn't you see the mistake in signing such a notice?

- I tell you, at first, I was only having a laugh myself. I thought they were all trying to have some good clean fun, too, and I willingly let them have that fun because I thought they were seriously interested in preparing for their bar exams.

- That was the great mistake. They have these notices. The M. S. D. got hold of them. Legally they can't be accused for having authorised or called the ambulance to take you away the Sunday. Why did you stay up all night with them? - Vasu's facial muscles contracted, and let go as the stray lines on his forehead etched themselves out in errant streaks.

- I know.. I know.. he said with a look of pain. - I regret that. Just that I had lost so much sleep, I couldn't sleep any more. By that time, I was only interested in winning the arguments over case law just so that I might have confidence in myself. I was afraid if I let them win, I'd get more confused, and I wouldn't know what was right about what I had learned. They hurled all sorts of lies at me and then as the evening drew on, they began to abuse me, and every one who came in just giggled and giggled. There were even some girls brought in by the group. I just couldn't stand all that any more. I shouted back. And for the first time, I became angry. I even got up and flung my chair against the wall. It must have been about about four in the morning, I think. Others followed suit. They too threw their chairs about. The noise carried in the night, and someone called Ogglesby, and he called the police and the ambulance. The rest you must know.

- Damn that bugger. He could have used his authority to close the place down and send you back home. No, he must have his game of feeling superior. - Sathasivam's righteous anger suddenly got hold of him and overcame his usual composure. He bit his lips. - As for our boys, well, what can anyone expect. They are what they are and what they will always be - mere boys, mere "gentlemen" louts!

- The boys kept the place open by saying they were revising for the exams.

- Wasn't he present?

- Who?

- Ogglesby.

- Yes, of course. He would come in from time to time, talk to the boys, laugh with them and...

- Forget all that. Now we must concentrate on getting out of here. I have an introduction from a friend of the director. You know my Jewish friend Frank, he did the Bar Finals with me?

- Ah! Him! He's a pretty old fella, lah.

- Yes, he is. A nice chap. I talked to him. He has already passed. Passed last Michaelmas Term. Good man. We'll have to see how things will shape up from here. I saw the director of the M.S.D. He is on our side. He is quite categoric. When I described what I already heard about the incident, he was quite furious. He called Ogglesby and shelled him right in front of me. The only trouble is that politician fella, you know, Thevan s friend. He's standing up for Ogglesby and has already alerted the Minister back home. They could sack good old Swathmore and put the bugger in his place. So, that's the danger. Heaven only knows what lies he must have been telling.

Sathasivam had said all he wanted to and had got all he wanted to obtain from his unfortunate friend. He made as if to take leave.

- Don't go yet. Stay a while. I haven't seen anyone I know in three to four days now.

Just then the door was opened. They were obviously being watched, but they had no idea if they could have been overheard as well.

- Time for your pills. It's meal time as well. So, I'm afraid you can't have visitors staying for dinner - said the ward male nurse.

Sathasivam noticed that Vasudevan recoiled from the male nurse quite visibly. But, at the same time, the presence of Sathasivam emboldened him.

- I'm not taking any more of those pills. You call them vitamin pills. They are sleeping pills.

- You have no choice. You have to take what the doctor prescribes. I merely have to see to it that you do take them.

Vasudevan took the pills in his hands, spilt them on the floor and stepped on them; he twisted his shoe heels on them while affixing a look of rebellious relish.

- Now you can tell the doctor I have taken them.

- So we are getting tough again, eh? You know what that entails.

- You just wait, you bunch of morons. I'll be out of here sooner than you think.

- That's not my problem. My task is to obey orders from my superiors. You must take those pills or else...

- Or else, what?

They looked at each other. The blood had risen to Vasudevan's face. He was his former fighting self again. The male nurse turned and left, bolting the door behind him. Sathasivam was somewhat troubled by what he saw. Vasudevan was jumping the gun. If they could get something on him while he reacted in that way... He thought he was damaging his own case.

- Vasu try and take it easy for a while. Don't react with violence. That's all they need as an excuse. If you think the pills are doing you no good, you have to find a way of disposing of them without their getting to know about it.

- You're telling me. You know what they did ? this fella and two of his mates. They had me pinned face down on the floor with a knee pressed into my back the first day when I refused to enter this cell. You can't imagine what they did when I resisted. They put me in a strait jacket in the ambulance when I refused to stay down. They injected something in my thigh and that was that. I only woke up in this ward. Since then it has always been that show of brute force. Three of those rascals against me by myself. Don't worry, I cuffed the buggers in the struggle.

Just then the noise of the door being opened drowned their words. The doctor entered and quite peremptorily asked Sathasivam to accompany him to the director's office. The two friends bade goodbye. A worried look affixed itself on Vasudevan's face.

- I'll see you soon, Vasu - said his friend.

- Visiting days are Thursdays and Sundays in the afternoons - said the doctor.

He had to wait for nearly an hour and a half before he had his talk with the director. He didn't quite mind since he felt he was in safe hands. After all, he had a personal introduction from a close friend, or at least "a friend" of the director. If not, how was it possible that he obtained an appointment with him within a day and now was to be received for a discussion over Vasudevan's plight, or at least that was what he thought they were about to undertake. It was obvious the director was a highly qualified psychiatrist; otherwise how was he to head a huge asylum such as this? It was in this sense of confidence that Sathasivam sat in the waiting room which must have been specially equipped for the staff, not the visitors. Around a round table piled with medical journals, a jaded cushioned sofa and two arm-chairs in thick rattan. On the walls framed pictures of Freud, Adler, Jung, and other framed individual and collective pictures of probably former heads of the establishment with their administrative and medical staff, with the number of years of service hand-printed in white over the bottom of the pictures. There were even a couple of daguerreotypes but they were hung higher up, bigger, grander pictures of bearded and moustachio-ed men of vision in three-piece suits who might have either founded the asylum or been largely responsible for its development and renown. Men and women who went in and out of the director's polished leather and varnished teak office cast curious glances in his direction. Some wished him. When Sathasivam was shown into the office again, there was a man in a tight three-piece tartan suit seated in a low high-backed upholstered chair a little away from and facing the director s table. He took a quick look at Sathasivam and nodded.. Dr. Applewood was on the phone. As soon as he hung up, he said the gentleman was a doctor who had also seen Vasudevan.

- How did it go? How is your friend feeling today?

- Fine. Really fine. May I take him with me?

- I'm afraid it's not as simple as that. If you were his father or member of his family, you might under certain circumstances, but as a friend... I'm afraid that involves much paper work and even then, I'm not sure at all you would be doing the right thing, that is, in the best interests of your friend.

The gentleman seated to a side cleared his throat and lit his pipe. The strong tobacco aroma overtook his senses in an instant. As if this was a signal, the director, too, reached for his Meerschaum in a beer mug filled with old pipes and set about stuffing its bowl from a tobacco pouch he kept in a drawer.

- Are his best interests being served here against his wishes, Dr. Applewood?

The director was a bit taken aback by the question. He bit on the pipe, his lips stretching and closing several times round the mouthpiece. Then he struck a Swan match which leapt high in a yellow-blue flame causing his eyes to close while he sucked at the pipe rather more than eagerly. He must have been a man in his late fifties, thinning hair neatly combed back over a fullsome oval face, the thin aquiline nose pointing wholly outwards from the rest of his features. His hands were small and stubby, his eyes gentle and ruminative, not given to staring directly at his interlocutor. Instead, his eyes roamed about and seemed to take in all the gestures and positions of those around him. Short and tubby though he seemed under his overalls, he was quite nimble on his feet. Perhaps a squash player, thought Sathasivam.

- You are his friend, at least, that's what I hear from my dear friend, Frank. You may not see things the way we do as far as your friend is concerned.

- He says he's being drugged.

- Who says he's being drugged? I can assure you that if we have to administer any medicine to any legally admitted patient, we do so under the constrictions of our usual medical practice.

- That's the trouble. Who's to know if a patient is receiving the right treatment?

- Mr.Satha...Satha... (The director bent his head to look at some papers spread out on his table.)

- Sivam.

- Mr. Sivam, I must tell you that this here asylum is one of the most renowned establishments of its kind in the world. Every one of my medical staff is a highly qualified psychiatrist, and you should trust in their knowledge and experience to treat your friend in his best interests.

- Dr. Applewood, I've just seen my friend, who, to all intents and purposes, is being held against his wishes in this renowned asylum.

- Did he tell you that?

- Yes, in so many words.

Dr. Applewood lit his pipe again and sucked at it, screwing up his eyes. There was absolute silence from the gentleman seated at the back.

- How did you find him? Was he lucid? Coherent?

- Absolutely. Never clearer in what he wanted in his life. He's got to take an exam in less than a fortnight. If he doesn't, he's bound to feel worse. He has been preparing for the exam for nearly six months now. If he misses this opportunity, he'd have to mug up again all he may have forgotten for the next term's exam. Law studies require nothing much more than memory. Besides, it'll cost him, or rather his father who has to deprive his family of much in the way of pleasure, quite a heavy sum to stay yet another six months to finish his Bar exams in this country.

- I've been called to the Bar myself, I know what that entails, but let me assure you, the law doesn't just require memorising. It's highly intelligent work that's required.

- If that's so, why do you think Jonathan Swift wrote what he wrote about the law and its practice as early as the beginning of the eighteenth century?

- What did he have to say, he...he who writes for children?

- You are right, Gulliver's Travels is for children, for it's evident children are more in need of help than adults.

- Mr.Sivam...

- Sathasivam.

- Mr.Sathasivam, I don't much like your remarks and the innuendo. You are entitled to your views, but I'm the one who runs this establishment. I have studied Mr.Vasudevan's case very carefully, and I can assure you there's nothing amiss with the way my staff has been treating him. He may have some lucid moments when he may appear to be sound, but I must concur with the opinion of the doctor in charge of his case: he is a danger to himself and to others. He is besides extremely violent. That's why he's being kept in solitary confinement. We can't disrupt all our services on account of one patient who refuses to accept what's good for him.

- That's precisely the point: why keep him locked up? Let him go.

- That, I'm afraid, we can't do. We have a signed statement from the requisite authorities authorising his ejection from the students' hostel where he has been up to all sorts of disruptive activities. He arrived here in an extremely disoriented state. We've examined him, and we are of the opinion that he needs care and rest for an extended period of time.

- You mean, he needs to swallow all those so-called vitamin pills in order to get rest as you call it.

Dr. Applewood shifted in his seat and looked in the direction of the man seated slightly to a side and behind Sathasivam.

- Let me tell you something. I'm not a politician and I don't want to be one either. Whatever the problems you or your friend may have with your government or my government is not my concern. All I can tell you is that Mr.Vasudevan has been certified insane on his arrival and has been legally admitted to this mental home.

- He is no more or less insane than you, I or the gentleman seated there. Mr.Vasudevan is an extremely intelligent young man, with many endowments, such as a very pleasant gift of the gab. If he qualifies as a barrister and returns to Malaya to practice, you can well imagine the influence he will enjoy in a very short time. Here, unfortunately, in rather very special circumstances, the same people over whom he would have been able to exert considerable influence back home - with the aid of those in charge - reduced him to an object of ridicule within a week. It all, of course, started off innocently, but he was subject to such treacherous crass-headedness, both from his so-called friends and the staff at the hall, that he succumbed to nothing more than sleeplessness, which in turn induced a state of agitation, simply because he wanted to defend himself, though at first he was enjoying it all, more certainly than his taunters, for it gave him a chance to demonstrate his debating skills. He is besides one of the most humourous persons I have known and one never gets bored in his company, which is something you can't say for the rest of the population back home.

- Insomnia alone cannot be a sufficient cause for his condition.

- If that's so, would you like to submit yourself to the same treatment he received from a bunch of knitwits for a week and go without sleep for a week? We'll see how you feel after that and whether your own staff wouldn't admit you - legally - into this establishment for treatment.

There was some movement from the gentleman seated, as he crossed and recrossed his legs. Dr. Applewood sat back in his chair and chewed on his pipe while fixing his eyes on Sathasivam.

The gentleman got up and went behind the table. He put his head rather close to that of Dr. Applewood and whispered something in his face. The director did the same. Nothing of what they said to each other was audible. When they had said what they had to say to each other, the director rose.

- Mr.Sathasivam, I'm afraid I have other duties to fulfill. I have given you much time for one day. I have to put an end to this discussion.

He stretched out his hand. Sathasivam took it warmly.

- I'll be back every visiting day - he said.

The director looked away.

Every day the pampered boys and girls of wealthy parents back in their self-governing countries, under the intent tutelage of their Victorian "mother" in London, had nothing so compelling to talk about during dinner time at their students' hall as the events leading up to the final "eviction" of Vasudevan. The week he held his meetings - or rather the meetings which were held for him in order to make him express himself - was quickly referred to as "Vasu-Week". The only trouble was that there was then nothing they could exercise their talents on, apart from merely recounting the situations in which each one of them tried to or got the better of the arguments with Vasudevan, at least in their own eyes. As a gesture of the importance - and at the same time, at least in their eyes, of their innocence and blamelessness - of the situation, Mr.Ogglesby thought it wise to affix a couple of the notices of the meetings, in which Vasudevan was designated as "Colonel" and "General", in the glass-cased notice-board under lock and key. The appearance of Sathasivam in their midst during dinner of course troubled them in no small way, but they were certain there was nothing he could do to call into question their behaviour during Vasu-Week. Nevertheless, they looked upon him with circumspection, all the more because he seemed to guard a frightening silence and was all ears. Mr. Ogglesby of course was far more worried. He knew of Sathasivam's visit to Mr. Swathmore and of the latter's commiseration for Vasudevan.

The following Thursday when Sathasivam took the 3.20 from Waterloo station, it was drizzling and the skies were overladen throughout the morning, though it was getting clearer as the train pulled and chugged southwards. The rows and rows of tired-looking red-brick houses and their back gardens filled with used tires, cans, barrels, boxes and washing on lines some had forgotten to take in filed past his unseeing glassy eyes. The air was still heavily spiked with coal dust. Not until the grounds on either side of the rail gave place to farmlands and rolling meadows with their dark clusters of heavily weighted trees and stray horses and cattle did he breathe more easily. He couldn't help feeling that the uphill grind had begun for him. He was bound to be obstructed at every move. He had to worry about that later on when the time comes, he said to himself. If the going gets rough, he must even think of making it to the Continent. There his persecutors might have a tough time convincing people who might not much care about the rise and fall of the British Empire! His main concern then was to get Vasudevan out of that solitary confinement cell and into the open where he belonged.

Mr. Swathmore had sent a wire to Vasudevan's father wanting to know if his son could not be sent back and authorising Sathasivam to act in his place. He was on firmer ground now for a confrontation with Dr. Applewood; that is what he thought.

Dr. Applewood wasn't in, or at least, that was what his secretary said. He would have to write in to ask for an appointment. In any case, if there was anything at all about which the director wanted to see him, he would himself get in touch with him in writing.

- Could I see my friend?

- It's visiting day today. You may as far as I know. Anyway, let me see - she said and disappeared behind doors. She emerged to say that he may, provided the doctor-in-charge of the ward thought it desirable and that if the patient was not in an agitated state.

Sathasivam followed the male nurse, another older gentleman on this occasion. All the doors except the ward in which Vasudevan was confined were open. The doctor-in-charge, an older man, probably in his sixties, shook his head and stared at Sathasivam.

- It's yet too early to see the patient in room number 7. He's been agitated all night. Kept the ward awake. I don't really think it's a good idea. Can't you come back another day when he is less violent?

- That's what they said the last time I was here. I saw him in perfect control of himself then. Could it be any different today?

- When was that?

- Last Sunday.

- Oh, that was before I saw him. O, alright, if you must, only don't stay too long. - He opened the door to the cell and closed it behind him.

Vasudevan was standing with his back to the door, fully clothed, facing the wall with the wrought-iron grating covering the aperture on high. The noise of the door being opened and closed did not distract his attention. Sathasivam hailed his friend after a few seconds. Vasudevan didn't react. Sathasivam went up to him and placed a hand on his shoulder. He noticed that his clothes were sprinkled with dandruff, and he reeked of urine or some such smelling medicament. Vasudevan turned slightly to the touch. His face was wan, unshaven, the white of his eyes livid, the pupils lifeless, his hair unkempt and surging with dandruff, his tie floppy and his shirt - the same he wore the last time they met - loose on his open trouser fly.

- Hey, Vasu, it's me - Sathasivam urged him to react with his hand on his forearm. - What's up, man?

There was no sign of recognition in his eyes. Sathasivam took hold of him by the lapels of his coat and shook him. There still was no response. He grabbed him by the forearms and shook him more vigorously. Vasudevan moaned. Some phlegm burst from his nostrils, and he breathed laboriously. It suddenly dawned on Sathasivam that his friend was quite certainly under heavy doses of some kind of medicine which should have knocked him out cold on the bed. Instead, he was standing, a last ditch attempt to withstand the treatment that he didn't want imposed on him at all. He tried to draw him towards the bare bed. Vasudevan wouldn't budge, the moans straining and lengthening. All his violence was limited to restraining activity. Somewhere in his unconscious he was standing up to it all, in his own way, without wanting to be put to sleep. Sathasivam stood for a while watching his friend and tears of anger boiled in his eyes. The sight of a truely good man reduced to this plight was more than he could take.

On the way out, he looked burningly at the doctor and cried:

- Is this how you won your colonies?

The doctor looked stumped.

- I warned you he was in no shape to receive visitors.

Sathasivam turned in anger and left the premises as fast as his feet would carry him out. All along the long return trip, not to mention the long wait on the open platform under the drizzle, he could think of nothing but avenging his friend, but he also knew that there was not much he could do all by himself. If only he could get him out and have his friend sent home as his father had wished? Under the present circumstances, the doctors would certainly oppose his displacement. He needed advice, needed some legal advice. He tried Frank on the phone.

- But Satha, you know I'm only doing my devilry now. I wasn't well for some time after my finals. Besides, you know I can only talk to clients in the presence of a solicitor, even if you're not a client, in actual fact. All I can advise you to do is to try Dr. Applewood again. You told me he received you well.

- I only said that out of sheer courtesy. I didn't want you to complain to him on my behalf.

- What can I do? You know if there's something I can do, I would, but I'm myself quite helpless. My wife leaving me after twenty-eight years of marriage has plunged me in sheer misery and I don't feel up to anything at all these days. Even in the chambers I'm in, I'm not particularly welcome it would seem. They'd rather put a trained barrister in my chair. I'm taking up too much space, it would seem.

- That's alright, Frank. I know you mean well. We'll see each other at the inns one of these days.

- Of course, it'd be a pleasure to have a cup of coffee together again, but Satha, let me tell you something at the risk of seeming to interfere in your efforts to help your unfortunate friend. I don't think you can do much to ease his roblems and yours by trying to get him out now.

- Thanks for the advice. If you know of a solicitor I can see in all confidence, let me know.

There was a moment's silence.

- I know of a few but they'll select their own barristers or the barristers they think suitable for your case, and according to the fees you are willing to pay. That's the way things are; so keep in touch. Goodbye for the moment, Satha.

Sathasivam had paid a couple of visits more to Vasudevan. He was now a "full-time" patient at the asylum. He had made a number of "friends" among the inmates, in particular, a thin extremely nervous woman of some five years his senior. He was not considered a dangerous patient any more. He had "willingly" agreed to take all the regular medicines he was given for his "own" good. From time to time though, the thought of his father hit him like a blow to his temples, and he seemed to revive the past.

- When's the next bar exam? - he would ask in a frenzy. - Haven't got much time to revise - he would mumble to himself. Then he would go off at a tangent. - Rubinstein & Co. versus MacDonald, Reeves & Gooch, 1914 or was it 1919? Judgement...judgement...Justice Every...no Justice Compton MacKenzie. No, that's not a contract case. My God, I don't have my notes here. What am I going to do? - He would look at Sathasivam, the muscles of his face taut, his eyes wildly searching every corner of the room. - My father will kill me. He's working his bones down to the marrow for me to finish quickly and look...look what I'm doing. I'm running around with this nut of a girl.

The girl in question, Fiona, had been a nurse in an old people's home, had been through two marriages and three children and had been so harrassed, she simply lost track of her duties: she couldn't cope with the children and the husbands and the old people at work all at the same time. Little by little, she neglected one after another. First her job went, then the husband, and finally the children were taken away from her when she became pregnant and had a miscarriage. She took to ruminating in a waking state and lost track of time. She ceased to wash herself or change her clothes. She even forgot to eat. She didn't respond to treatment from her usual doctors and the psychotherapists she was entrusted with. In time she was fit for treatment at the asylum. Vasudevan too lost all notion of care in clothes and personal hygiene. They seemed a pair with the same problem. Most of all they needed each other.

The next time Sathasivam paid him a visit, he was out in the meadows with a group of patients who were strolling or lazing around under the trees. The asylum personnel showed him the way down the rolling mounds. Vasudevan didn't respond to his calls even from a short distance. He was with Fiona. When finally Sathasivam was within a few yards of him, he turned and stared at his friend for a full three minutes before he seemed to recognize him.

- Come - he said, taking his hand. - must introduce you to my girl-friend. Here's Fiona. - Fiona refused to look at Sathasivam. She turned to a side and tugged at Vasudevan's sleeve. When the latter insisted, she quickly made as if to dust herself and her clothes and straightened her hair and patted them down with her palms after wetting them with spittle. She appeared thoroughly embarrassed and yet affected a smile.

- You want to kiss her, Satha? Go on - he said and gave her a light thump between her shoulder blades. Sathasivam recoiled. Her clothes: a tartan skirt, brown jumper and a long woolen tattered brown overcoat, reeked of the same staleness and mustiness that had invested Vasudevan's. Both of them were plagued with a sort of skin disease. They scratched themselves incessantly in all parts of the anatomy, including their private parts. Their skin appeared caked in areas.

- Can I talk to you for a while, Vasu?

Vasudevan didn't seem to hear. Fiona had her hand in his, and they strolled down the slope towards the rest of the group, their arms flailing rhythmically between them.

Sathasivam stood watching them for a while and did not seem to know what to do. He knew he was being watched by the staff of the ward. He retraced his steps back to the ward and made straight for the director's office. There he asked to see Dr. Applewood. Oddly enough he was received instantly.

- Well, how are you, Mr.Sathasivam? How is our patient today?

- That's exactly what I've come to see you about. - They sat down. Dr. Applewood seemed amused but hid his glee under the smoke fumes of his pipe. - He's no more what he was, he's lost contact with the past.

- And isn't that a good thing, I mean, isn't that promising?

- Promising for what?

- I mean the past which has produced his present condition.

- What you mean is that if he forgets the cause of his troubles, he can continue blithely in his sickness.

- There you are, you admit he is sick.

- He's as sick as you or any one could want him to be.

- Just a minute, you're not a psychiatrist, you can't possibly understand these things.

- How right you are, you have either to be a psychiatrist or a real madman to drive some sane man insane.

- Oh, come on, Mr. Sivam, you're an intelligent man. Just let things take their course. You know the saying: Don't trouble trouble until ! I hear you're planning to get us all to court on account of your friend.

Sathasivam looked at him with fresher eyes. Dr. Applewood was after all frightened. They were all frightened, it was plain by that remark of his. So, they are guilty, he thought.

- You know Mr. Vasudevan has been pumped full of sleeping pills, he's no more his former self. He's changed. He's an inmate now, and you are his jailor.

- Oh, come on, Mr. Sathasivam, this isn't a prison. See, we don't keep you from seeing your friend freely. Has any one put any impediment in your way? Tell me, I'll see that...

- You don't have to see about anything. I want to see my friend out of this establishment and walking the streets of London hale and hearty as he was before he came here.

- Well, there you've got the wrong end of the stick. - He rummaged among some papers and came up with a piece of printed paper. - Here's the certificate the doctor in charge signed on his arrival committing him to the asylum. Look at it and be well-advised.

Sathasivam took the certificate and scanned it. He couldn't quite read the handwriting.

- Hasn't Mr. Vasudevan a right to leave this place if he wanted to?

- No, not really. It all depends on his condition.

- Then this is a jail.

- We don't look at things the way you do. People are here for their own good and for the good of society.

- Oh, yes indeed! You know the old refrain: it's the society in the first place which puts them in here.

- We are preparing him to make his reappearance in society. He'll then be able to reintegrate himself into society without upsetting the status quo.

- How right you are, one must not upset the status quo, especially the way the colonies are being groomed for full independence, if you can call it that, so that when you the British leave Malaya and Singapore, you can leave the place in the safe hands of people who will hanker after your return.

- Well, there, no one can follow what you're saying. I'm not a politician as I told you the last time I saw you. All I can say is that it would be wise for you to refrain from saying such things. They can get you into a lot of hot soup. You are a bright young man and you must think of making your way in life, instead of taking on more than you can chew. Let sleeping dogs you know the saying.

- Like my friend - already a mangy flea-bitten sleeping dog.

A silence ensued. They both sat wondering at the uselessness of words.

- If you want to take your friend out for a day you might. - Sathasivam's eyes brightened. - You have to take full responsibility for anything that might happen to him. Will you?

- I will, of course.

- Then, let's say, next Thursday or would you prefer Sunday.

- Thursday will be fine.

- O.K. then, Thursday it shall be. You'll have to bring him back for dinner by seven. You can come as early as you like, say, nine.

Sathasivam felt cheered as he shook Dr. Applewood's hand. The latter was feeling fine, too.

On the Thursday Sathasivam was to take Vasudevan out for the day, he woke early and an uneasy feeling of the day being unprepared for him gripped him and stayed with him all through the journey to the asylum. The day started off bright and the cloudless sky promised to stay that way. Clothes and sheets fluttered on lines in the heavily barricaded backgardens of the railtrack houses, and farm animals were out in force. Here and there a rickety horse-drawn cart-wagon lay propped up in the meadow and smoke rose from a gypsy fire. Wide-eyed sullen children in rags, some with babies astride their hips, watched the train go by. The horse with its harness still on or dragging behind grazed closeby.

Vasudevan was ready and waiting for Sathasivam when he arrived at the director's office, but he wouldn't leave the premises without his girl-friend.

- I'm afraid you'd have to take her as well if you want to take your friend along - said the doctor-in-charge of the ward.

Vasudevan was at least properly dressed. He had a clean shirt on and his clothes were properly brushed. His hair was thick with some haircream, but on his occiput and back collar there were cakey black-brown drops of haircream sticking to the uncut furry hair on his nuque. It was obvious someone (perhaps his girlfriend) had prepared him for the day though the tired-looking clothes and the shaving-cuts under the temples and the chin gave him a suspicious look of sorts. Fiona had to be brought by a nurse. She was resplendent in a weary old straw hat with a posey of paper flowers and thin fern leaves sewn in at a side into the velvety black band round her hat. A frilly-bordered triangular black and red shawl with lacework flowery design across the back covered her usual pinky bodice. Her bust cups sagged, and she was constantly setting them aright since the straps had come loose at the back. Her high heels under her flowing black silky skirt made progress even to the bus-stop a veritable calvary. The small unseemly party stopped several times over the couple of hundred yards to the bus-stop for her to adjust her clothes and shoes. Sathasivam didn't seem cheery. Besides Fiona insisted on taking the bus, and then again refused to board the bus which hadn't its upper-deck rear seats free. When finally a double-decker arrived, practically empty, at about ten past ten, the party boarded and settled in the last row. The bus headed for the Victoria Station terminal. At first, Fiona and Vasudevan held their silence as they watched the countryside wobble past them. Then, as young couples and children boarded the bus at the village and town centres chatting and yelling out to one another, their tongues too came loose. They completely ignored Sathasivam. They touched each other under their clothes. Fiona would remonstrate from time to time. The attention she attracted from the other passengers embarrassed Sathasivam.

- Look, Darling, that's where I was first married - she shrieked, pointing a finger at a Town Hall.

- Where? Where?

- Oh, you dopey-dope! There. There in that building.

Vasudevan rose and knocked his head against the curved ceiling at the back. He turned all the way round and watched the buildings hurry away from him. He insisted that she show him the building again.

- I'm not going to show you anything any more. That's final. You're such a sot, you don't listen to what I say. - She feigned being hurt, Sathasivam thought. -You just don't leave me alone, either.

- What, me? What have I done now? - A look of innocence on his face made her relent.

- Alright then, turn around and sit like a gentleman with me.

Vasudevan obeyed. He held his silence. Suddenly Fiona scratched herself under the armpit. Then she got up, put her shawl on Vasudevan's lap and scratched herself progressively from under the armpit to the middle of the back.

- Scratch me quick - she said. - Here, here. - She pointed to the area between her shoulder blades. Vasudevan rubbed as best he could his knuckles on her back. - I said: scratch, you bugger, not rub. Hurry, hurry, I'm going to yell, if you don't.

Vasudevan suddenly grew nervous. He dropped her shawl on the floor while he tried to stand up.

- You bloody dope. You dropped my shawl. That's my granny's, my only hierloom. How dare you! I'm not going to talk to you again.

She gave Vasudevan a nudge and sat apart. Most of the passengers had obviously been listening, and they whispered to themselves while casting fleeting glances to the rear of the bus. Sathasivam was feeling rather beat. He seemed resigned to his fate.

As the bus passed Battersea Power Station along the Thames, Fiona took it upon herself to hum a tune of sorts. Her spirits revived when she saw the chugging barges pulling up the river. Words came in broken phrases at first with a hiatus. Then she suddenly burst into whole lines from the musical My Fair Lady. It seemed alright when she hummed, but when she sang, joined by some seconds after on every word by Vasudevan, athasivam sunk low in his seat. At first other boarding and descending passengers were polite. They merely looked in the direction of the rear and took no more notice of the singers, but when the two revellers took to tapping and bashing time as well, they gradually burst out laughing. The more the others laughed the more the pair were encouraged and sang full-throated out-of-tune all that came into their heads. The one to laugh the most, getting into painful stitches, was a great big West Indian woman who occupied a double-seat all by herself, not far from the pair. Tears streamed from her eyes, and she kept wiping and flipping the tears with her palms wide open. Soon enough the conductor came rushing up.

- Eh, what's up, 'aving a party, eh? Tickets, please. - He clicked his hole-puncher rhythmically, as though he too was infected with the singing. - Ladies an' Gents, tickets, please!

The time it took Sathasivam and his charges to produce their tickets and put them back in their places, their enthusiasm died down, and the bus was already pulling into the Victoria Terminal.

- Windsor Castle - cried Vasudevan, pointing a finger out of the open window.

- You dope. That's not Windsor, that's Buckingham Palace. Guess you don't know the difference between a Palace and a Castle.

Vasudevan was wracking his brain, it seemed.

- Well, do you? - he asked, in defence.

- No, I don't know either. Just pulling your leg, you dope!

The smile came back into Vasudevan's eyes and his spirits lifted again.

Once out on the pavement, Vasudevan and Fiona kept tugging at each other, for each wanted to take the other direction. Sathasivam became apprehensive as he saw a couple of constables in uniform watching them from the other side of the road near the entrance to Victoria Station.

- I want you to come with me to Malaya Hall.

- No, you silly bastard, I want to go to Buckingham Palace.

- You can't go there, it's closed.

- Who said so?

- I don't know, ask Siva.

Before Sathasivam could intervene, the constables crossed the road briskly and came towards them.

- Good morning, Ma'am, can I be of any help?

- Oh, Chief Constable, which is the way to Buckingham Palace?

- Go up that street, veer right and at the first zebra crossing cross over and you'll be there.

- Is it open to the public, Constable? - asked Vasudevan.

- Oh, no, Sir. I don't think that would be at all possible. Not for another century at least I should think - he said, casting a once-over look at them both.

- That's what I told you. So, come with me - said Vasudevan and tugged at her wrist. She yielded after curtseying slightly to the constable.

Sathasivam thanked the constable and quickly led the couple up to Hyde Park Gate. His only fear was that Vasudevan might want to make a reappearance at the student hall which was certain to cause a commotion. Vasudevan kept insisting that they could have lunch at the hall. It was around twelve-fifteen then. Lunch was usually served at twelve-thirty and the canteen shut down at one-thirty. Sathasivam had to find every ruse to keep the pair from appearing in the dining-hall, for that would expose them in one go to all the boaders at the place. Vasudevan insisted on taking the Swiss Cottage bus which would leave them a couple of stops past Marble Arch.

- Look, Vasu, it's a fine day and a stroll through the park might work our appetite up - he said, hoping that he'd fall for it. He wouldn't.

- I want to get there in time to kick some bastards in their bottoms. - He seemed in no mood to joke. Then, luckily for Sathasivam, Fiona broke into their conversation.

- Oh, how I'd like to lie on the grass and watch the lave go by me. Maybe we could rent a boat and row down the Serpentine?

Vasudevan relented. Sathasivam then took great pains to usher them gradually round to taking the direction of the Serpentine. He knew that if they first went there, Vasudevan would never be able to make it to the hall in time for lunch.

There were a lot of people about, even mothers with prams. Over the small wooden bridge leading to the lake and in the cluster of trees around it, whole groups of men and boys circled around each other. He didn't think that at that hour "homos" would already be gathering in public. It was lunch time. All the benches around the lake were taken up. There were literally hundreds of strollers in and around the area. In the open space leading to the wooden shack where boats were hired hundreds of ash-coloured pigeons and white-collared doves swarmed to peck at the crumbs being thrown by passersby. Fiona was carried away by the air of levity that presided over the lake. Several boats were already out on the water which shimmered in the cool autumn sunshine. First she began to skip. She didn't disengage herself from Vasudevan's grip. Then she skipped along as the lake came more fully into sight. Vasudevan let go of her, and she literally circled around herself, picking at her skirt with her fingers while she trilled with her tongue "Summertime". People stopped to gaze at her and then continued in their gait.

- I want to go boating. Who's going to be my beau? Who's going to row me over the mere - she crooned and came dancing up to the boys lagging behind her. Sathasivam felt embarrassed, but there was nothing he could do. He knew his friend had been reduced to a state which was not his own. Something ate at him. He couldn't bear the idea of seeing him in that situation, attached to a woman who needed to be cared for as well. He was wondering: what if they capsized in the lake? And before he could sort things out in his mind, Fiona had virtually dragged Vasudevan to the ticket guichet and was remonstrating with the man in charge. Sathasivam paid for the hour's rowing on the lake, thinking he might get into it as well to keep an eye on them. The boat-keeper warned them against it.

- Just the lady and a gent, please - he insisted, surveying the couple with suspicion.

- I've been rowing down rivers and sea back home - Vasudevan joined in to clinch the deal.

Reluctantly, Sathasivam let them go. Vasudevan kept his tie and coat on. It didn't appear to Sathasivam that his friend new anything at all about rowing though he was built like an athlete with muscular limbs. Vasudevan had quite a time getting the oars together, and by the time the boat got a push from the boat-keeper, a full ten minutes had gone by. A good many people, gathered around the feeding pigeons and doves, looked intently at the unseemly-looking threesome. When finally the boat pulled out, the boat-keeper shook his head fearfully.

- I shouldn't 'ave let the boat out. Weird! Weird couple! - he said to himself, shaking his head again from side to side despondently.

Sathasivam followed the boat with his eyes, and he was gradually getting into a frenzy. He was all uptight, but it was too late. There was nothing he could do. Before he realised what was happening, the boat was heading straight for the opposite bank, the Knightsbridge end. He called out, but it was obvious he couldn't be heard over the noise of traffic and children shouting in the vicinity while playing on the well-kept lawns around the lake. He strained his eyes and cupped his hands around his mouth for another shout when the boat knocked into the buttressed bank and wheeled around. Fiona, it seemed, was yelling at Vasudevan. He didn't know what to do with the oars which had come lose. A man in a T-shirt and shorts rowing all by himself pulled up to the distressed couple and fixed the oars back in place, talked to them and watched them pull away. He kept close to them, and this reassured Sathasivam. Suddenly, it seemed, everything was alright. Then, when they were in mid-water, Fiona stood up and waved her straw hat and curtseyed to everybody around, as though she was the one everyone had come to see. The boat wobbled from side to side. She screamed. Vasudevan stopped rowing, and she fell forwards, losing her balance into Vasudevan's lap. Again, the man rowing alone came up to their side and talked to them. Sathasivam who was for a moment thinking of calling the boat-keeper to recall them felt reassured again. It appeared they had calmed down. The boat drifted towards the Kensington Park end. Sathasivam followed them along the bank, over the boat house and onto a bridge at the thin end of the lake where he could survey the couple more closely. It was while he was waiting for them to approach the bridge that it happened.

Some twenty yards from the bridge where the lake narrowed to swivel round, Vasudevan stopped rowing. Fiona was upbraiding him. He wouldn't continue. Then she raised her voice into a shrill. Vasudevan who still had his coat and tie on appeared to freeze in a stoop. Other boaters behind him yelled at him, for they too wanted to pass under the bridge. In the frenzy that seized him, he rowed backwards. Finding that his way backwards was blocked by several rowers, he rowed forward but again he stopped as soon as he saw the bridge. Again, he tried to row backwards, and all his efforts caused the boat to rotate round and round. In the melee he got himself into with the other boats coming in the opposite direction, he raised the oars in his hands. Fiona screamed continuously. Vasudevan became more and more violent with the oars. Two boats with young couples nearly capsized. They managed to gain the nearest bank. People came running from all around. Sathasivam was no great swimmer to get them out of the muddle. He yelled at Vasudevan. Before Sathasivam could think of a solution, several policemen came running. Whistles went off in all directions. Two constables had left their helmets, tunics, trousers and boots on the bank and had dived into the water. They got hold of Vasudevan's boat and swam with it to the nearest bank while narrowly avoiding the flailing oars. Fiona didn't stop screaming until she was carried bodily and placed on a bench under a birch tree. Vasudevan breathed heavily. His eyes were livid white and blown. It took all the powers of persuasion from Sathasivam to convince the constables that they were alright and had to leave immediately for an appointment. The constables were concerned about either taking them down to the station or to the hospital at Hyde Park Corner. Sathasivam showed the constables his student card and the hospital outing sheet and assured them that the couple would be alright, if only he could leave that very moment for the luncheon appointment. They agreed and escorted them to Hyde Park Gate where they safely saw them into a taxi.

Sathasivam had still the problem of Malaya Hall to be resolved. So, he asked the taxi-driver to drop them off at the Lyon's Corner House at Marble Arch. Vasudevan insisted they drive on to the students' hall.

- It's past one-thirty. You know the hall is closed for lunch.

- What a goon I am. Yes, 'course, it's closed. Now I can't kick the bigger goons in their backsides - he said and seemed to content himself with the idea of a Lyon's lunch of sausages, eggs, tomatoes, chips, custard and tea.

Fiona didn't mind either. She ate little. When the girls came round to pick up the trays, they left hers for it looked practically untouched. It took some effort from Sathasivam to get Vasudevan to hang his coat on the chair and loosen his tie. Fiona kept worrying about her straw hat which accidentally got drenched in the water while she was being carried out by the constables. She picked at the straws absent-mindedly. Sathasivam felt that it was better to leave her alone. She had been through some excitement, and now she was recovering from her ordeal. Vasudevan didn t dare to look at her. She blamed everything on him during the taxi-ride. Vasudevan ate voraciously and not until he had had three cups of tea that he appeared to be at ease. Just then as luck would have it, a group of students from the hall made their appearance and queued at the self-service counter. Two of them were among the most active during Vasu-Week. Vasudevan had himself not noticed their arrival. It was still lunch time, and there were a lot of people moving around. Sathasivam got them up in a hurry saying there was something he was going to treat them to and ushered them out. Just as they were getting out, Fiona insisted on going to the lavatory. At that very moment, one of the students at the self-service counter spotted them, and they all looked in their direction, one or two pointing with their fingers as well.

- You can do it in the cinema lav. It's just here. I'm treating you to a great film.

- What film?

- Where? - said Fiona, her eyes looking anxious again.

- Just here, just two doors away. It's Gone with the Wind. If we hurry, we can catch the main film in a minute.

- Oh, yes, I want to. Let's run. I'll be Scarlet, you Rhett Butler. Chase me - she said and skipped joyously towards the cinema entrance facing the Arch.

Sathasivam managed to get his charges into the theatre just as the film was beginning. He was relieved. Fiona insisted that they occupy the front row. The usherette became impatient. There were others still standing at the back waiting to be shown their seats. After some pushing and pulling between the two, Sathasivam managed to get them seated in the middle but some rows back. Fiona complained. She said she couldn't see anything, not over the heads in front of her. Finally, Sathasivam had to relent. They occupied the front row, right in the middle. The two soon started to fuss one with the other.

- Oh, I forgot. Silly me. I must wee - she said and got up and looked all around. Someone some rows back cried out: Sit down! - Oh, how uncouth, you...you... - Sathasivam pointed to the red light arrow.

- It's down there.

- Where? I don't see anything. - Sathasivam then got up, took her hand and directed her towards the door behind huge red curtains. Not wanting to be left behind, Vasudevan too got up and followed them. At the door Sathasivam left them and waited for their return. They were gone some fifteen minutes. Sathasivam became worried. An usherette noticed Sathasivam as she passed him and asked him if he had a seat. He said he was waiting for his friends who had gone to the toilet. She disappeared behind the curtains and after a full five minutes returned with the two in a huff.

- There's something funny going on, I tell you - she whispered in Sathasivam's ear. - I found the two in the gents'. - Sathasivam pressed two half-crowns in her hand and took his charges to their seats. At first they were quiet. Then, as the film developed, Fiona's memory of the story coming back to her, she took it upon herself to give Vasudevan a running commentary, mostly of what was to come. There were people who began to murmur menacingly at the back. One of them got up and went back up the aisle. He returned with the usherette who verbalised the two in no uncertain terms. - Either you keep quiet or you'll have to leave - she warned.

Fiona then took to crying. Vasudevan said that he'd like to go to Malaya Hall. - It's only five minutes from here.

- Wait till the film is over. Then we'll see - said Sathasivam. That seemed to calm him down. Fiona and Vasudevan talked to each other in lowered voices, and then, when the interval lights came on, Sathasivam noticed they were asleep in each other's arms. The lights and the loudly blaring adverts woke them up. At first, they had no idea where they were. They seemed afraid and lost. Then, on seeing Sathasivam, their wits were revived.

- What's happened? - queried Fiona, a look of surprise invading her face. - Why are we here? What are we doing here? - She looked around. She stood up and surveyed the huge hall. There was so much movement in the hall that no one, it seemed, took notice of them. She stood erect, watching with her eyes wide open. - I want to go home. I want to go home. - She seemed determined to leave the place.

- Not yet, darling. First we'll go to Malaya Hall - said Vasudevan.

- Oh, you and your Malaya Hall. I don't care a damn about that hall. I want to go home.

Sathasivam had no choice. When they were out on the street, he was more than relieved. The lights had already come on. It was around four-thirty. Orators' Corner thronged with people. He had to avoid that at all costs, he thought.

- Let's take the bus to Victoria - he said and ushered them forward. Vasudevan broke lose. He stood for a while looking at his friend, and then, he turned and bolted up Edgware Road. Fiona cried. Sathasivam could not give Vasudevan chase. He tried to force Fiona along, but it was useless.

- Wait here. Don't move. Sit inside if you like, but I have to go after Vasu. Better go inside - he urged her and ran before she could reply. She shrieked after him, but he waved her back.

As Sathasivam turned the corner up Edgware Road, he saw Vasudevan knock into a couple who tried to avoid him. He fell and rolled towards the gutter. Someone pulled him up. He looked fearfully down the road and saw Sathasivam giving chase. He pushed aside the people who tried to give him a hand and cut into a side road where Sathasivam knew stood a red brick structure which was practically always, except on special occasions, closed. There was no doubt his friend was heading for the students' hall, and most certainly for trouble. How to head him off was his only concern. He cut into the Bond Street end and raced up to Upper Berkeley Street. He passed several small groups of Malayans and Singaporeans strolling around in their dark suits or blazers and college ties. None of them had seen anyone running in the direction of the hall. He stopped at the entrance to Bryanston Square. Whichever direction Vasudevan took, he was bound to use the entrance to the hall, and he would be visible from afar. Right in front of one of the great big tar-black entrance doors stood Paul and a small group holding their pre-dinner session, with their backs propped up against the tar-black spiked wrought-iron railings running down both sides of the few steps and all along the pavement. Paul spotted Sathasivam, and he and one or two of the boys stepped down to the pavement rather casually to watch Sathasivam looking all around him. Suddenly, one of them pointed to the other end of the square, and sure enough, there was Vasudevan looking menacingly down at the boys. Sathasivam moved automatically towards his friend. On the way, he looked daggers at Paul and the group. They were silent. They liked nothing better. There was a show to watch for free. One of them called out to Ogglesby who looked out of his office window. Within minutes the air around the hall entrance electrified.

Sathasivam was a long time trying to convince his friend of the futility of visiting the hall. He warned him that if they didn't get back to the cinema at that very instant they'd risk not seeing Fiona for a while yet. Even the thought of Fiona standing alone at the theatre didn't seem to occupy Vasudevan's mind or momentarily distract him from the business of settling old scores with some of his detractors at the students' hall.

- I want to look at one or two of the old buggers in the eye. It won't take a minute, I tell you.

- Look, Vasu, either you come with me or...

Vasudevan looked defiantly at his friend. Sathasivam knew damn well there was no question of "or if you don't..." He was responsible for his friend. He had signed a paper to get him out. He tried nevertheless to make him aware of the situation.

- If you don't come with me now, and if we don't find Fiona, and if we don't get back to the hospital on time, it would mean that I would get into hot soup with Dr. Applewood and this would be the last time you'd be let out of the hospital. He looked calmly at his friend. - Get it, chum.

Oddly enough, Vasudevan seemed to get it alright. The gleam came back into his eyes, and so did his usual smile. He gave one last look of defiance and disgust in the direction of the hall and the men standing and watching them. He lifted his fist and shook it at them.

- Let's go, man. We have to run.

- No, hold on. There comes a taxi.

He hailed it. The taxi took the Edgware Road down to Marble Arch. Fiona was walking up and down the cinema entrance, looking most distressed, her straw hat trailing in her right hand, her shawl coming loose over one shoulder. She was oblivious of the looks or solicitations of passersby. The commissionaire in red and gold buttons at the cinema entrance stood by her as though she were royalty, and he was assigned to her care. When finally the taxi pulled up at the curb in front of the theatre, and Vasudevan called out to her, the commissionaire took off his ceremonial cap, tucked it under his arm, approached Fiona most respectfully and bade her respond to the call. It took her a full minute to wake up to the situation, and when she did, she stalked up to the waiting taxi with the commissionaire waving her forward, as though they were performing to a script. He opened the door. She whisked past him, gathering her skirt before her. When she was seated, she nodded at him. The commissionaire bowed and closed the door. Sathasivam got out the other way and slipped a coin into the white glove.

- Victoria bus terminal - said Sathasivam to the taxi-driver and got in as well. They sat silently all down Park Lane. Then, as the taxi neared the bus terminal, Fiona cried out.

- Where the devil have you been? - She looked burningly at Vasudevan.

- I...I...I...

- He went looking for a taxi - said Sathasivam. She looked incredulously at him, but there was an end to the matter.

All the way down to the asylum, they hardly talked. It was getting dark fast. Vasudevan leaned on Fiona and snored. Fiona too closed and opened her eyes for whole stretches of the journey back. Not until they were within a couple of hundred yards from the asylum, did they come alive and start to sing again. They were coming home, and everything was going to be alright. Sathasivam handed them to the doctor-in-charge and left after a quick farewell. Dinner was already served. They skipped the soup.

Back in his room at Kensington Square Gardens, Sathasivam ate what he had cooked some three days earlier by simply heating the dhal curry still in its saucepan, precariously balanced on the wobbly single gas-ring, and lay down on the bed fully clothed. It must have been about four in the morning when he woke in a frenzy, dreaming of Vasudevan running in the streets with a whole lot of people giving him chase. Whatever anyone did, he was still running ahead of everyone. Sathasivam felt he was out of breath himself. He went down three floors to the lavatory. He purged, but he was feeling better, though his stomach burned and perspiration broke out and soaked his shirt under the pullover. He made some light tea and thought things over. There was certainly no more question of taking Vasudevan out for the day, he thought, at least, in so far as he insisted on taking Fiona with him. The thought of his friend depressed him, and the more he turned the previous day's events over in his mind the more he became uptight and felt himself trapped within the confines of his anger at seeing his friend behave in such a bewildering manner. He felt he had to do something for his friend. For one thing, Vasudevan's father had entrusted him with a letter of thanks to look after the interests of his son, a letter he had shown the authorities concerned. In a way, he had a free hand to act on behalf of his friend, but he wasn't sure if he needed a power of attorney or something like that. The more he thought of his friend the more he was convinced that, unless he succeeded in bringing the guilty parties before the court, there was nothing he would be able to do to get his friend out of the asylum. There was one thing he was certain of: whether guilty or not, all those who enjoyed bullying and driving his friend out of his mind - temporarily - were being protected by all sorts of people in power. And all those who dirtied their hands in trying to cover up for the guilty parties, themselves became as guilty as their protégés. They were all quite happy however in all what they did, until Sathasivam began to turn things over to discover why his friend had been interned. They therefore set themselves vigorously against him, though Sathasivam was not as yet then aware of their intentions as far as he was concerned. To get them to court, he needed a lawyer. That meant seeing a solicitor, and he knew none he could call on. To see a solicitor, he needed money. That he didn't have. The little he had, he had almost totally used up the previous day.

Every job he took, he lost within three weeks. The room he was living in, a tiny three yards by three low top-floor room with a gas ring, wash-basin and built-in cupboard which took up nearly one-third the roomspace, had suddenly to be converted to a bathroom, at least, that's what the landlord said. Since he had been living in it for two and half years, paying a weekly rent of three pounds fifteen, he refused to leave. Notice to vacate the place was filed. The case came up before the county court. After listening to him and the landlord's lawyers, the judges quickly concluded that as the room was to be converted into a bathroom Sathasivam had to vacate the place within a month. For months after the judgement, Sathasivam checked with a friend who stayed in the old place and was told that the room in question was let out as it was, except that the rent was hiked to four pounds ten. From then on, Sathasivam never managed to keep a room for more than two to four weeks, depending on the advance he paid. If he paid for a month, he stayed four weeks; if he paid two weeks advance - the minimum required - he stayed two weeks. The only way he could survive in such a situation was to use a friend's address for his mail and take any menial temporary job, lasting either a week or two at a time. By the time the powers that be found out where he was and got him kicked out, he managed to grab at least some of the pay coming to him. He slept anywhere - Hyde Park, Euston Station, in the basements of huge buildings. He had to get into these places before closing time which was around midnight. At five in the mornings he had to be up and about; otherwise he would have been spotted and pulled in for vagrancy. At five-thirty or so he would buy himself a tuppenny ha'penny ticket and voyage round and round the Circle Line to round off his sleep. By about nine when the commuters began to jam the underground, he would get out of the same station with his ticket and find his way to Malaya Hall where he could wash up. He had his rucksack full of his personal things with him all the time. When he found work, he would sleep in a ten shilling a night hostel in East London, though the sheets were often damp for want of heating in the hostel. His only concern was to try to get his friend out of the asylum. There was absolutely no further reason why he should continue to live in a country which was not cut out for him.

So he took to speaking openly about his difficulties that led up to Vasudevan s internment and the consequences. Some told him that there was absolutely nothing he could do about it, others that he should leave the country while the going was good. There were a few who listened most attentively, and then made some remarks about the whole thing being a figment of his imagination. He kept on bringing the subject up wherever he could, except of course at Malaya Hall. Things took a turn for the worse at the hostel. Every time he appeared at the hall, he was cut away from approaching even anyone he knew. As soon as he engaged his acquaintances or passing friends, some four to five others who followed him around quickly got into conversation with the man or woman he spoke to and deftly drew him or her away from Sathasivam. Sometimes a group of students would ask him to accompany them to the Masons' Arms, a small pub located opposite a huge lodge which the Malaysians frequented and stayed in even well after closing time. There they would get into all sorts of arguments with him, and as soon as they could they tried to pick fights with him by sticking their faces in his. He gave a couple of them who wanted to fight a hefty push and stood his ground. They were either too groggy with bitter or too stuffed with rice and curry to retaliate. Besides, one of the burly barmen always showed up in the nick of time to put a stop to their menacing quarrels. As these petty incidents had a strange way of multiplying, Sathasivam decided to shun the hall almost for good, except on occasions when he felt he needed to check on the news from back home.

On one such occasion, a journalist from a local evening tabloid waited for him in the lounge. Someone must have pointed him out to the journalist. He said that he would like to have a word with him. He had stayed on after his national service in Kuala Lumpur for a couple of years as the News Editor of a local paper. They had tea in a small restaurant behind the cinema at Marble Arch. The place was crowded, and he could hardly hear himself speak. Two others seated on either side of him, however, were extremely silent, and from the expression on their faces from time to time it was obvious they were listening to what he was saying. He recounted the events in chronological order from the time Vasudevan was put through Vasu-Week at Malaya Hall. The journalist took copious notes. He interrupted Sathasivam only when he hadn't clearly heard a word or two, especially when either one of those sitting next to him coughed. When Sathasivam finished relating his story, the journalist quickly folded his note-pad and said he had to go and that he would get in touch with him as soon as it was possible. Sathasivam never heard from the journalist again. When he called the tabloid paper to ask for him, the receptionist said that he was only a stringer for them and that he came in only rarely to see the editors. He wanted to know if he could have his number. The receptionist said he could write in and his letter would be re-directed.

In the meantime, he had been seeing Vasudevan. He once took along a newly-arrived friend of Vasudevan's father to visit him. The friend obviously wrote back giving his version of things. Vasudevan's father, too, seemed reluctant to keep in touch with him after that.

One fine day, he had to chuck up his job as cook at the Newman Foundation, a clean well-managed place on Baker Street which gave him a chance to share a room with a friend and provide himself with regular meals and clean clothes. The assistant cook, a former Spanish sailor who served two years in an English prison, suddenly revolted. His grudge was that he should have been made the chef. Late at night while they were washing up and cleaning the place, he wouldn't do his part. Instead, he picked up a long sharp carving knife and a long cooking fork in each hand and started to threaten Sathasivam. The Irish housekeeper and manager was dining with her staff. He managed to extricate himself from the kitchen in the basement and appeared t her table to her utter astonishment and dismay. There he told the housekeeper that it would be impossible for him to continue working in a place where he was threatened by an ex-convict. She appeared disturbed but tried to show understanding. He left her his white overalls. He had his wallet and keys in his trouser pocket. He said he would come in the morning to collect his coat. She thought it would be a good idea.

- He's supposed to be on good behaviour. Now I suppose things will get worse again - she said rather dejectedly.

When he came for his coat the next day, he found it in shreds.

- Better the coat in shreds than my rib-cage - he thought and collected whatever pay was coming to him.

Sathasivam continued to see Vasudevan, but the latter though always willing to see his friend gradually became more and more integrated into the day-to-day life of the mental home, and the doctors found Sathasivam's visits more and more irritating, for he kept insisting that they set his friend free.

He didn't take Vasudevan out any more for the simple reason that he wanted Fiona to accompany him.

Then, one day, just after Sathasivam was forced out of his job, Vasudevan told him that he was going to marry Fiona. In the opinion of the mental home staff, Fiona was already on the mend. She was free to leave and return to the asylum as she wished, so long as she kept the proper hours prescribed by the staff. The doctor-in-charge of the dangerous persons' ward felt that marriage might do some good to Vasudevan's recovery since Fiona was already pregnant. Sathasivam didn't quite catch the logic in this argument, but he could find no valid reason to oppose the idea, except to say that the baby might need looking after as well. But no-one affirmed if Vasudevan was the father. Nor did the would-be father!

Sathasivam wrote to Mahalingam explaining the situation. The latter couldn't understand what was happening, especially Sathasivam's account of his difficulties with the hospital authorities. He wanted his son back. They were all at home crying for him every day, the letter said.

Vasudevan had luck on his side. Some time after, he was allowed to go home to his country. Someone came to take him back. Not long after, he was back, less angry, less non-conformist. He got through his exams, and returned to a quiet, uneventful life and practice.

The world hurried along yet once again. One more life the less didn t much matter.

[ All the names in this story have been changed to protect Vasudevan's real identity. Apart from certain literary embellishments to liven up the narrative, the above account of what took place in London is based on what actually transpired during 1956-57, together with some narrative recall of later events. ]

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