“I was happier in my father’s cool bungalow. In those days there was no TV in Sri Lanka, and I would spend the morning reading in a planter’s chair with a tall glass of sugared lime juice at hand. I’d brought my favorite comics with me, and they were supplemented by an old storybook I found in the bungalow, a tale of derring-do called The Captain’s Revenge. I’ve forgotten most of it, but I know that the Captain was slim and plucky and always carried a dagger—sometimes between his teeth. When I grew tired of reading, I would go in search of the cook. He had a really majestic silver mustache, and he told me a ghost story about a water carrier who appeared at dusk and made his way with his cart to a spot near an outbuilding where a well had once stood. There was also a tale about a white dog that brought misfortune to whoever saw it. My parents were rationalists, and my father would certainly have put an end to the cook’s stories if they had come to his notice. But he would no doubt have been pleased to learn that the ruins we had visited together had made quite an impression on me. Although we’d spent no more than an hour among them, they had begun to invade my dreams. Night after night brought stupendous domes, flights of steps, tall stone figures, ancient trees whose massive branches formed archways through which I had to pass. That sounds alarming. In fact, I would wake from those dreams, in which I wandered among the ruins on grassy paths, filled with a tremendous sense of well-being.
“One morning, lolling about in my chair, I became aware of a commotion in the street. I went outside and down to the gate and looked down the street. People and vehicles were rushing through the junction with the main road. There was an odd smell—then I saw smoke rising from the direction of the shops. The cook appeared on the veranda and called me inside. He said there was ‘trouble with Tamil people.’ The phone started to ring, and I ran past the cook to answer it, sure that it would be my mother, who put a trunk call through to us every day. It was my father. He told me that there had been ‘an incident at the station.’ An ‘incident’: I was struck by the word, at once portentous and vague. My father said there was nothing to be concerned about, and that I was to stay indoors and do as the cook said. Then he asked to speak to the cook.
“My father didn’t come home for lunch that day. I pestered the cook for information, and at last he told me that when the Jaffna train pulled into the station that morning, a mob had boarded it and assaulted the Tamil passengers. The violence spread and escalated, and soon Tamil shops were being looted and Tamils attacked in their homes. Casualties were still streaming into the hospital, and my father expected to be there all day. The cook related these facts dispassionately and assured me that, being Sinhalese, we had nothing to fear.
“‘Why do people want to kill Tamils?’ I asked. ‘What have they done?’
“The cook considered this, smoothing his mustache. Even-tually, ‘They are not like us,’ he said, and went away.
“I felt intense excitement as I ate my rice and curries in solitary splendor in the dining room. The events unfolding outside had the unreality and glamour of the books I read. They would bring the test of courage I had always longed for—the Captain and Batman collaborated in the scenarios my imagination supplied. At the head of a daredevil band, I issued brutal orders: ‘Spare no one!’ ‘Holy smoke—stand back, you dogs!’
“In fact, time dragged, heavy and slow. I must have taken the siesta that had become routine when I was ill. The smell of smoke intensified as the day wore on. My sense of eager anticipation had vanished, and I felt aggrieved by my father’s prolonged absence. Self-pity, which lies close under the surface in children, took over. My mother’s failure to call exacerbated my sense of neglect. When I complained to the cook, he lifted the receiver and held it out to me: there was only silence, and I understood that the line was down. This often happened in Sri Lanka, so it seemed unimportant and increased my sense of injustice: my mother should have found a way around the problem. It was an endless day, characterized by grievances and tedium.
“That night, I was woken by a bustle. There were voices: a woman’s, a strange man’s. My father came into my room. When he saw that I was awake, he sat on my bed. ‘One of my colleagues and her husband have come to stay for a few days,’ he said.
“‘Why?’ I asked.
“‘Their house was set on fire.’ He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. They were red with exhaustion. He said, ‘A lot of the medical staff, Sinhalese and Tamil, left in a rush. But Dr. Rajanathan is very brave. She insisted on staying and helping me. We’ve kept a skeleton service going.’
“I laughed. I saw bony figures bending over patients, tending their injuries. My father smiled. He told me that early the next day, I was to take the train to Colombo in the care of one of his Sinhalese clerical assistants. He touched my hand briefly and said, ‘Go to sleep now, son.’
“It was a time in my life when I was fascinated by the idea of character. I would scrutinize people I had heard described as ‘thoughtless’ or ‘stubborn’ or ‘generous,’ trying to discover those traits in their faces. I woke early the next day, eager to study brave Dr. Rajanathan, but she had already returned to the hospital. Her husband must have joined us for breakfast—I can’t remember him at all.
“On the way to the station, our taxi passed a truck full of soldiers traveling slowly toward the center of town: the army had been called out. I saw roofless buildings and others that were only charred remains. Broken glass twinkled beside the road. Very few people were about. Even the boy with the twisted legs had deserted his post at the hospital gate. I pointed this out to my father, who looked half-asleep. He was unshaven and smelled stale. At the station, where we were met by the same profound quiet that hung over the town, there was no difficulty buying tickets. When our train pulled in it was almost empty; no Tamils were traveling that day. My father stepped forward to hand me up into the carriage, and I noticed then that his gait was lopsided. I remarked on his limp, and he shrugged, saying, ‘Someone threw half a brick at me.’ He shook my hand and wished me a pleasant trip.
“The clerk and I had a first-class compartment to ourselves. He was a pudgy young man with an unctuous manner and a jiggling knee. I had disliked him as soon as he came forward to greet us at the station. When our train set off, he asked me an inoffensive question or two. I answered briefly and coldly, buried myself in my book, and ignored him. Later, lulled by the movement of the train, I dozed off. When I woke, he was gone. He returned after a long interval and I said, peevishly: ‘Where were you? You’re supposed to look after me.’ He said that he had been talking to a friend who was traveling third class—he had exchanged his own ticket for one paid for by my father—and assured me that I was perfectly safe. ‘You can’t be sure of that,’ I said. ‘There’s been a riot. At any minute, I could find myself beset by grave danger.’ It was the language of my storybooks, but as I spoke, I found myself swept up in its drama. My mind’s eye showed me a solitary hero making a last, gallant stand against an advancing horde. My self-pity brimmed over, and I said, ‘I’ll tell my father that you left me alone.’
“The fellow’s ingratiating mask vanished at once. Years later, when I encountered the term ‘class hatred,’ I saw that naked face. It wasn’t looking at me but at a child with a Batman T-shirt, a leather traveling case, and French sandals. The clerk leaned forward and hissed, ‘Nothing will happen to you. Nothing happens to people like you.’ The change in him frightened me, and he saw it. He settled back into his seat and, jiggling his knee furiously, told me that a group of about fifty Tamil workers—technicians and clerks, but also gardeners and cleaners—had asked permission to stay overnight in the hospital. Their homes were far away and they were too terrified to venture into the street.