Summary
Hari has had his bodhi hair shaved and become a Muslim. His new name is Himat Ali. He has changed the Hindu dhoti for Muslim-style loose shalwar pants. He has also had his penis circumcised. Lenny gets this news from Cousin, who takes out his uncircumcised penis and shows it to her to demonstrate. Seeing Cousin’s flesh, she remembers the night everyone tore off Hari’s clothes. Lenny thinks that Cousin’s genitals have grown since she saw them three years ago. Cousin tells her to feel his penis and she does, finding it “warm and cuddly.” However, when the flesh “strengthens and grows in [her] hand,” she is alarmed. He tells her to lick his penis because it has become a honeycomb that gives honey. Lenny tells Cousin to suck it himself. Lenny likes Cousin, but she is uncomfortable with this new side of him. He then begins masturbating in front of her and she worries he will bleed. They both begin crying. Since then, Lenny has been more aware of men’s crotches as she walks around.
Lenny spends the night after her birthday at Godmother’s. With five people staying there including Dr. Manek Mody, it resembles a military dormitory. Dr. Mody tells Lenny to go to sleep because he wants to eat up her Godmother. He continues making jokes about wanting to eat Godmother while Lenny gets increasingly upset. Eventually, she threatens to shoot him with the double-barreled gun. Unfazed, he keeps making cannibalism jokes. He also jokes about Lenny wetting the bed. Lenny thinks about how she does not want to be treated like a baby anymore. At one point, Slavesister and Godmother begin fighting. Slavesister is no longer able to get away with rebelling against Godmother the way she was a few days ago when Pakistan and India were split.
The next morning, Lenny notices how fresh and young Godmother looks when she has just had her bath. Godmother and Slavesister prepare breakfast, fighting all the while. Mr. Mody keeps making sexual jokes and also picking on Slavesister for her bathroom habits.
Godmother invited four students from the King Edward Medical College for tea. She likes for them to spend time with Dr. Mody. Only two of them come, a Muslim and an Indian Christian. The Hindu and the Sikh have left. Dr. Mody talks about what he loves in women, namely big eyes. At this point, “zombie-like” Oldhusband tells off Dr. Mody, saying “What’s all this business about eyes!… You can’t poke the damn thing into their eyes!” Mody also makes a big show of shooing away a fly from the desert. He again picks on Lenny, this time calling her cross-eyed.
Analysis
After several chapters describing the traumas of Partition and the population exchange, Lenny’s life reaches something of a new normal. Religious conversions, like Hari’s, have become commonplace. Also, no one is surprised to hear that the Hindu and Sikh medical students have left for India. This chapter also returns to the theme of Lenny’s awareness of sexuality. She enjoys touching Cousin’s penis, but she is well aware that he is trying to get her to pleasure him and she finds this uncomfortable. She likes Cousin, but she does not like this side of him. While at Godmother’s house, Lenny also witnesses the flirtation between her and Dr. Manek Modi. The doctor wants to go to Godmother’s bed at night to “eat” her. He describes this desire openly and in many different humorous ways. This makes Lenny uncomfortable and she tries to threaten the doctor away. In both the case of the doctor and Cousin, Lenny is aware of sexuality but she is still very much a child. She wants to keep this male attention away from both from her and from the maternal figures she loves.
