Salman Rushdie Midnight's children Salman Rushdie Midnight's ...

d Mother filled Amina with a kind of rage, and even produced slight signs o
f improvement in her defeated husband. So that finally the day came when Am
ina, who had been watching me play incompetently with toy horses of sandal
wood in the bath, inhaling the sweet odours of sandalwood which the bathwat
er released, suddenly rediscovered within herself the adventurous streak wh
ich was her inheritance from her fading father, the streak which had brough
t Aadam Aziz down from bis mountain valley; Amina turned to Mary Pereira an
d said, 'I'm fed up. If nobody in this house is going to put things right,
then it's just going to be up to me!'
Toy horses galloped behind Amina's eyes as she left Mary to dry me and mar
ched into her bedroom. Remembered glimpses of Mahalaxmi Racecourse cantere
d in her head as she pushed aside saris and petticoats. The fever of a rec
kless scheme flushed her cheeks as she opened the lid of an old tin trunk…
filling her purse with the coins and rupee notes of grateful patients and
wedding guests, my mother went to the races.
With the Brass Monkey growing inside her, my mother stalked the paddocks o
f the racecourse named after the goddess of wealth; braving early morning
sickness and varicose veins, she stood in line at the Tote window, putting
money on three horse accumulators and long odds outsiders. Ignorant of th
e first thing about horses, she backed mares known not to be stayers to wi
n long races; she put her money on jockeys because she liked their smiles.
Clutching a purse full of the dowry which had lain untouched in its trunk
since her own mother had packed it away, she took wild flutters on stalli
ons who looked fit for the Schaapsteker Institute… and won, and won, and won.
'Good news,' Ismail Ibrahim is saying, 'I always thought you should fight th
e bastards. I'll begin proceedings at once… but it will take cash, Amina. Ha
ve you got cash?'
'The money will be there.'
'Not for myself,' Ismail explains, 'My services are, as I said, free, gratis
absolutely. But, forgive me, you must know how things are, one must give litt
le presents to people to smooth one's way…'
'Here,' Amina hands him an envelope, 'Will this do for now?'
'My God,' Ismail Ibrahim drops the packet in surprise and rupee notes in la
rge denominations scatter all over his sitting room floor, 'Where did you l
ay your hands on…' And Amina, 'Better you don't ask and I won't ask how you
spend it.'
Schaapsteker money paid for our food bills; but horses fought our war. The s
treak of luck of my mother at the race track was so long, a seam so rich, th
at if it hadn't happened it wouldn't have been credible… for month after mon
th, she put her money on a jockey's nice tidy hair style or a horse's pretty
piebald colouring; and she never left the track without a large envelope st
uffed with notes.