And right at the end everything seemed to grow bright. Savi returned and Mr. Biswas welcomed her as though she were herself and Anand combined. Savi got a job, at a bigger salary than Mr. Biswas could ever have got; and events organized themselves so neatly that Savi began to work as soon as Mr. Biswas ceased to be paid. Mr. Biswas wrote to Anand: “How can you not believe in God after this?” It was a letter full of delights. He was enjoying Savi’s company; she had learned to drive and they went on little excursions; it was wonderful how intelligent she had grown. He had got a Butterfly orchid. The shade was flowering again; wasn’t it strange that a tree which grew so quickly could produce flowers with such a sweet scent?

One of the first stories Mr. Biswas had written for the Sentinel had been about a dead explorer. The Sentinel was then a boisterous paper and he had written a grotesque story, which he had often later regretted. He had tried to lessen his guilt by thinking that the explorer’s relations were unlikely to read the Sentinel. He had also said that when his own death was reported he would like the headline to be ROVING REPORTER PASSES ON. But the Sentinel had changed, and the headline he got was JOURNALIST DIES SUDDENLY. No other paper carried the news. An announcement came over twice on re-diffusion sets all over the island. But that was paid for.

Her sisters did not fail Shama. They all came. For them it was an occasion of reunion, no longer so frequent, for they had all moved to their own houses, some in the town, some in the country.

Downstairs the doors of the house were open. The door that couldn’t open had been made to, and its hinges dislocated. The furniture was pushed to the walls. All that day and evening well-dressed mourners, men, women and children, passed through the house. The polished floor became scratched and dusty; the staircase shivered continually; the top floor resounded with the steady shuffle. And the house did not fall.

The cremation, one of the few permitted by the Health Department, was conducted on the banks of a muddy stream and attracted spectators of various races. Afterwards the sisters returned to their respective homes and Shama and the children went back in the Prefect to the empty house.