The God of Small Things - Get a Free Blog

millstones to take with them before they set off on their voyage.
Estha put his head in his lap.
His puff was spoiled.
A distant train rumble seeped upwards from the frog-stained
road. The yam leaves on either side of the railway track began to
nod in mass consent. Yesyesyes,yesyes.
The bald pilgrims in Beena Mol began to sing another
bhajan.
“I tell you, these Hindus,” Baby Kochamma said piously.
“They have no sense of privacy.”
“They have horns and scaly skins,” Chacko said
sarcastically. “And I‟ve heard that their babies hatch from eggs.”
Rahel had two bumps on her forehead that Estha said would
grow into horns. At least one of them would because she was half
Hindu. She hadn‟t been quick enough to ask him about his horns.
Because whatever She was, He was too.
The train slammed past under a column of dense black
smoke. There were thirty-two bogies, and the doorways were full
of young men with helmetty haircuts who were on their way to the
Edge of the World to see what happened to the people who fell off.
Those of them who craned too far fell off the edge themselves. Into
the flailing darkness, their haircuts turned inside out
The train was gone so quickly that it was hard to imagine
that everybody had waited so long for so little. The yam leaves
continued to nod long after the train had gone, as though they
agreed with it entirely and had no doubts at all.
A gossamer blanket of coaldust floated down like a dirty
blessing and gently smothered the traffic.
Chacko started the Plymouth. Baby Kochamma tried to be
jolly. She started a song.
There‟s a sad sort of c‟anging
From the clock in the ball
And the bells in the steeple too.
And up in the nurs